Scotus Academicus, Tomus tertius: De adorando divinae Trinitatis mysterio

Once the origin and existence of the divine Persons have been set forth as far as was permitted, the order of doctrine requires that their quiddity, or constitutive principles, be examined deeply, and explained more precisely. For besides the divine nature common to those adorable Persons; besides the difference of one proceeding from another, it is certain that certain properties inhere in them, by which they are constituted in the formal notion of Person, and are mutually distinguished. — But if the most sharp-sighted philosopher is unable to detect the nature of any, even the paltry and most worthless little worm; who among the theologians will dare to rise to the very bosom of the Godhead, and to scrutinize it with curious inquiry, by what characters the divine Persons are constituted, and appear mutually distinct? Indeed, who would not pronounce with St. Hilary, lib. 2. De Trinitate:

Immense is what is required, incomprehensible is what is dared, that speech about God should pass beyond God's prescribed limit. He has set for nature the names Father, Son, and Holy Spirit: whatever is sought beyond is outside the meaning of speech, outside the sense of intention, outside the conception of understanding; it is not enunciated, it is not attained, it is not held?

But he himself adds: Going from the harborless places into the deep, we are on a troubled sea; neither to go back nor to go forward is permitted without danger; yet there is more difficulty in the places to be traversed than in those already traversed. — Yet, that we may somewhat soften the immense difficulties which occur in this Disputation, we shall enclose them all in due order in three Articles, of which the First will open how the divine Persons are constituted, and distinguished: the Second sets out the relations of the divine Persons constitutive and distinctive in personal being: the Third finally will comprise the characters, or notions, by which those adorable Persons, mutually distinct, become known to us.

St. Hilary wisely and prudently warns, in lib. 2. De Trinit., that heretics receive the simplicity of the heavenly words according to the sense of their own will, and not according to the full declaration of the truth itself, interpreting otherwise than the force of the sayings demands; for heresy is of the understanding, not of Scripture, and the sense, not the word, becomes the crime. He adds: Thus they destroy the unlearned while they affirm the reason of this preaching; and they deceive the hearers while they take nature away from the names. He concludes: Therefore... since malice, stirred up by the instinct of diabolical fraud, shuts up the truth of things within the names of natures; let us set forth the nature of the names. But above all, the genuine signification of the names hypostasis, person, and subsistence must be laid open; since it is well known that their varying interpretation has been to many a stone of offense and a rock of scandal. Wherefore, for an easier and safer understanding of the things to be determined in this Article, I have thought it worthwhile to touch upon some things concerning the aforesaid names, and first indeed

On the name of Hypostasis.

Nicephorus rightly relates, in lib. 10. Histor. cap. 15., that the business of Hypostasis and Subsistence once troubled the whole Church; for long was it fought among the holy Fathers concerning the signification of that very name, namely whether it signified the same as substance or the same as supposit. The same Nicephorus writes that the first occasion of this controversy was given by Hosius, Bishop of Corduba, who, sent to Alexandria by the Emperor Constantine to quiet the disturbance stirred up by Arius, first made mention of substance and subsistence, that is, of οὐσίᾳ and ὑποστάσει, and called into question whether they signified altogether the same thing. This question, indeed, the Nicene Synod at first judged unworthy of being treated in a Council, as Nicephorus relates in the same place; but when shortly after, in the Council of Alexandria (as Rufinus witnesses in lib. 1. Histor. cap. 29.), the controversy had again arisen among the Fathers concerning the signification of both the aforesaid names, some asserting that it was the same, others that it was different, it came about, the same Nicephorus says, that in that same Council of Alexandria it was decreed that no one should commonly use the word hypostasis, since it is not contained in the sacred Letters, and St. Paul, compelled only by the necessity of teaching, had as it were misused the name of subsistence in Hebrews 1. to signify essence. Moreover, the great Athanasius seems to have settled that dispute in the Council of Alexandria in the year 362, since Nicephorus affirms in the same place, c. 16., that he was present at the Council of Alexandria; and Nazianzen, speaking of him in Orat. 21., which is on the praises of Athanasius, says: Both parties having been gently and humanely summoned, and the sense of the words diligently and accurately weighed, after he found them concordant, and in no way disagreeing among themselves as far as doctrine is concerned, he so settled the business that, granting them the use of the names, he bound them to the things themselves: Nazianzen himself accomplished the very same thing at Constantinople, as he testifies in Orat. 32., which is addressed to the 150 Bishops; for when they had been convoked at Constantinople by Theodosius, and a similar controversy had arisen among them, Nazianzen proved that there was no disagreement among them concerning the things, between those who say three hypostases and those who profess one; for the former understood persons by hypostasis, the latter essence. Hence it seemed lawful even up to those times to use the name hypostasis indifferently, to signify the nature and essence, which is called οὐσία, or the person, which is called πρόσωπον.

But the controversy about hypostasis was not settled there, nor entirely exhausted; for shortly after the Bishops of the Antiochene Church renewed it, some admitting with the Westerns a single hypostasis, others with the Easterns three hypostases, as is clear from Epistle 10. of St. Athanasius, in which he argues that the Westerns establish heresy per se.

Again, we gather from their writings that this dispute also flourished in the time of Saints Jerome and Augustine. For when St. Jerome was pressed and importuned by the Bishop of Antioch, the patron of the Arian heresy, to confess and admit three hypostases in the divine; consulting on this matter the Roman Church, as the mother of the rest, and she to whom the greater questions of faith are referred, he asks of the holy Damasus, the Supreme Pontiff, what he ought to believe, in Epist. 57., where among other things he writes: The whole school of secular Letters, he says, knows hypostasis as nothing other than usia: whence after a few things he infers: Whoever says that there are three, that is, that there are three hypostases, that is, usias, under the name of piety attempts to assert three natures: and a little further down: Let the three hypostases be kept silent, if it pleases, and let one be held. And again: Poison lies hidden under honey; the Angel of Satan has transfigured himself into an Angel of light. — The same difficulty agitated and detained St. Augustine; for in lib. 5. De Trinitate, cap. 8. he speaks thus:

Essence, I say, which is called usia in Greek, which we more customarily call substance: they indeed (namely, the Greeks) also call it hypostasis, so that most of ours who treat these things in the Greek tongue are wont to say μίαν οὐσίαν, τρεῖς ὑποστάσεις, which is altogether the same as one essence, three substances.

And immediately after, in cap. 9., he adds: But because our custom of speaking has already prevailed, so that when we say Essence what is understood is what is understood when we say Substance, we do not dare to say one essence, three substances. And lib. 7. cap. 1.

In the beginning, he says, it was said by our Greeks: one essence, three substances; by the Latins: one essence, or substance, three persons, as we have already said; in our speech, that is, the Latin, essence is not wont to be understood otherwise than substance.

From which it is evident that Augustine held the aforesaid word hypostasis in suspicion among the Latins in the same way as Jerome did; except that at length, in lib. 7. De Trinitate cap. 6., he concedes that three substances can be said in Latin of God, just as three hypostases are said in Greek, where there would be no scandal and the Catholic sense would be certain. Hence it came about in the course of time that the word hypostasis, by ecclesiastical usage, signified not substance or essence, but person or supposit. Indeed, whatever certain heretical little grammarians may cry out, if we consult antiquity itself, it will be evident that hypostasis was used by the more learned for subsistence: for it is well known, first of all, that Aristotle, or another author of the book De mundo addressed to Alexander, said, about the middle of it: Of the things which are observed around us, to touch upon these briefly, some appear, others subsist, or in Greek, others are according to hypostasis, that is, they truly exist. Likewise Dionysius, in cap. 1. of De Divinis Nominibus, calls God Ἑνάδα Τρισυπόστατον, that is, a unity thrice subsisting, and in c. 3. he uses the name hypostasis three times to designate the subsistence of the persons. Justin Martyr used the same name, and in the same signification, in the exposition of the true Confession of the Trinity, etc. From which it is clear that Nicephorus, in lib. 10. Historiae cap. 15., and Socrates, in lib. 3. c. 7., wrongly said that the word hypostasis, which the ecclesiastical writers use, is barbarous, and was used by none of the Ancients to signify a person.

On the name of Subsistence.

The word subsistence had various significations in antiquity; for, as Rusticus says in the disputation against the Acephali, subsistence sometimes signifies a person, sometimes a substance; for in the holy Ephesine Synod both are shown. Indeed Athanasius, in Quaestionibus quaest. 1., seems to extend the name of subsistence to signify any individual whatsoever, even of an accident; for he says: Three subsistences of the solar orb: the ray and the light; moreover, three subsistences of the subject of fire: the burning and the shining. More frequently, however, it was used in the Councils to signify hypostasis or person; thus the First Nicene Council, in lib. 2., says: One divinity of the holy Trinity is considered in three perfect, equal subsistences. And toward the end of the same book, after it has distinguished the divine persons and hypostases, it adds: Whatever subsists per se, insofar as it subsists per se, is properly said to have the person, or face, or figure of a nature. Likewise the First Constantinopolitan Council, in the Epistola ad Damasum, says that God is in three most perfect subsistences, or in three perfect ones, so that the languor of Sabellius may have no place, whether by the confusion of the subsistences with the persons or by the abolition of the properties. Finally, the Second Constantinopolitan Council, in anathematism 2., says: If anyone does not confess one Deity to be adored in three subsistences, or persons, let him be anathema. The Lateran Council under Martin the First repeats the same, in Consultation 5., Can. 1., saying: If anyone does not confess, according to the holy Fathers, properly and truly the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, the Trinity in unity and the unity in Trinity, that is, one God in three consubstantial subsistences, let him be anathema. — All the holy Fathers, whom Ruiz sets forth at length in disp. 31. sect. 3., confirm this very thing. Wherefore Theodoret, in the breviary of Liberatus, in the last chapter of the additions, says: Subsistence and person differ in none of their significata except in name: for subsistence is a person; but nature indeed and substance signify something general, while subsistence and person signify something proper.

On the name of Person.

The name person, as Boethius affirms in the book De duabus naturis, seems to be derived from those things by which, in comedies and tragedies, they represented the men whose interest it was; or, as Anitius adds, Since, masks having been put on, the actors, whose interest it was, represented in tragedy or comedy, therefore the rest of men, whose recognition would be certain by their form, the Latins called persons, and the Greeks prosopa. Hence, according to its primary institution, it was used to designate the face and figure of each one; in which way the Fathers of the Nicene Council, in lib. 2., used person: When we hear person, they say, let us not suspect that the divine has a human likeness; for it is free from composition, as being without figure; and when he had proved from the Gospel, especially from that of Matth. 16., You know how to discern the face of the sky, where instead of face the Greek reads πρόσωπον; he concludes: for whatever subsists per se, insofar as it subsists per se, is properly said to have the person, or face, or figure of a nature. — Nevertheless the usage prevailed that the name person signified the same as supposit, or the ultimate complement of the individual nature; in which sense it is also used everywhere in the Scriptures, where we read that God is not an acceptor of persons, especially Acts 10., Romans 2., etc. Wherefore, to comply with the Greek usage, we will use essence for οὐσίᾳ, substance for ὑπάρξει, supposit for ὑποστάσει, person for προσώπῳ.

These things having been premised, three things are to be resolved in the present Article. First, whether and how the name and notion of person befits God. Second, by what things the divine Persons are constituted, namely whether by absolute or by relative properties. Third and last, whether, besides the three relative subsistences which constitute the persons, one absolute subsistence is to be admitted, by which the divine Essence subsists.

Note 1. The definition of person is varied, but especially twofold. The first is handed down by Boethius, praised above, saying: A person is an individual substance of a rational nature. Although the Doctor does not disapprove of this definition, in 1. dist. 23. n. 4. he nonetheless judges that it is to be expounded by the definition handed down by Richard in lib. 4. De Trinit. cap. 22., saying that a person is the incommunicable existence of an intellectual nature. For according to the definition of Boethius it would follow that the rational soul, and even the Deity itself, insofar as it prescinds from the divine supposits, would be a person, because both the Divinity and the rational soul are an individual substance of a rational nature; yet no one will call the Deity so considered a person; otherwise there would be four divine Persons; likewise no one should assert that the rational soul is a person, since it is not ultimately complete, nor incommunicable, for it always has an order to the body, either that which it informs, or that which it can inform. It does not escape me, however, that many oppose this opinion as regards the rational soul; but concerning these things let the Physicists and Metaphysicians see.

Note 2. From the same author, in the same place, nature is distinguished from person in this, that nature is communicable, whereas person is incommunicable, both ut quo and ut quod. To be communicated ut quod is to be communicated as a universal to its inferiors, with which it is the same; thus human nature is communicable ut quod to Peter and Paul, each of whom is truly a man; to be communicated ut quo is to be communicated either as a singular nature to its supposit, or as a form to the subject which is denominated from it. Thus, v. gr., human nature in Christ, although it is singular, is nevertheless communicable ut quo, because it is unible to the supposit of the Word; so likewise whiteness, which is in a wall, is communicable ut quo, because it is united to it as to a subject which it informs; the notion of person and of supposit excludes both of these communicabilities, since a personated nature is not communicable to another after the manner of a superior and common nature, because it is singular and individual: nor even ut quo, because it cannot be communicated to another, neither as to a supposit, nor as to a subject. For it does not have the notion of a part, but of a whole in every way complete and terminated.

Note 3. That although the divine nature, considered precisely in itself, and insofar as it prescinds from the persons of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, is perfect in the being of a divine and infinite nature; because as such it consists of all the essential predicates, intrinsic modes, and attributes constituting it on every side in the being of an infinite nature; nevertheless, as such, it is not complete in hypostatic being, nor is it ultimately terminated according to existence. For it is communicated to the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, subsisting in themselves, and ultimately terminating the divine nature. Hence it comes about that, although the divine nature so considered has existence and subsistence, as will be established in the following Question three; yet as such it does not have the notion of supposit, nor of person; but it is constituted in the notion of person by the relative properties, which determine the divine nature to the supposit of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit.

These things being noted, three points are to be resolved in the present Question. First, that the notion of person properly belongs to God. Second, that this notion is not something positive, but negative. Third, that it belongs univocally to the three persons.

First conclusion. — The name and notion of person truly and properly belongs to God.

This is the common opinion, and of faith, as is evident from all those oracles both of Sacred Scripture and of the Councils, by which three divine Persons, distinct from one another, are affirmed in God.

It is also proved by reason. Person, from what has been said, is the incommunicable existence of a rational nature: but it is most evident that these three things placed in the definition of person, namely a rational nature, existence, and an incommunicable mode of existing, perfectly belong to God; a rational nature indeed, since God holds the primary and most excellent grade among spiritual natures, and is endowed with infinite power and wisdom, not indeed of reasoning, but of understanding; likewise existence, for to Him first and most of all does it belong to be a necessarily existing being; finally, that incommunicable existence belongs to Him, natural reason itself demonstrates, because to the first and greatest being there necessarily belongs a mode of existing independently of another, and consequently a mode of subsisting per se, which is the same as existing incommunicably: therefore, etc.

Secondly: if He existed in another as a form in a subject, or as a nature in a supposit, He would not exist per se precisely, but only by reason of another, by whom He would be sustained: but this is unbecoming to God, the first being wholly independent: therefore, etc.

Finally: the notion of person will be truer and more perfect in God the more perfectly subsisting per se and existing wholly incommunicably belongs to Him: but the mode of subsisting per se belongs most perfectly to God, since He depends on nothing either in being or in being conserved: the notion of existing most perfectly independently of another likewise belongs to Him, as from a subject and an extraneous supposit, one that is not divine and really the same as the Deity: therefore the notion of person likewise belongs to Him most perfectly.

You will say 1. The name of person is not attributed to God in the sacred Letters. Moreover, it was unusual and unknown to the first Christians, as Coccius relates in lib. 1. De Trinit. articulo 4. Finally, properly speaking there is nothing in God which that name signifies, and the Theologians use the name of person, not to express something, but lest they seem to be silent, as St. Augustine says in 5. De Trinit. cap. 9.: When it is asked, he says, what three? human speech labors under a truly great poverty. Yet three persons has been said, not that that might be said, but lest it be passed over in silence. Therefore it must be admitted that the name of person does not truly belong to God, or at least that the Theologians have nothing certain on this matter. — I deny the consequence, and to the first I say: although the name of person is nowhere found in the sacred Letters said of God, nor do we anywhere read of the person of God; nevertheless, what the name of person signifies is found affirmed of God in many ways in sacred Scripture, namely, that He is a Spirit endowed with infinite wisdom, and hence that He is of a rational nature: likewise, that He has an incommunicable existence, both ut quo and ut quod, since on account of His singularity He cannot be communicated as a common nature, and on account of His independence He cannot be communicated either as a form to a subject, or as an individual nature to a supposit: therefore, since the notion of person belongs most perfectly to God, the name of person is also fittingly attributed to Him. — To the second I say, that indeed the name of person was not first taken up by the faithful and attributed to God; but nevertheless it came about, says Richard in lib. 1. De Trinit. cap. 5., that those who first transferred this name of person to divine things did this very thing out of necessity, that they might have something to answer those asking what those three in the Trinity were, since they could not answer that they were three Gods. He adds: Let us no longer ask from what necessity it was afterwards transferred to divine things, but in what truth, through the Spirit of truth, it was inspired to those who transferred it, and universally used by the Latin Church. It is certain, therefore, from the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, and the common usage of the Church, that the name of person properly belongs to God. — To the third I say, that indeed the name of person does not perfectly declare the quiddity and the peculiar properties by which the three supposits of the Divinity are distinguished from one another; nevertheless, that name was wisely taken up by Catholics, that in one word they could answer the Sabellians asking what those three were. Nor did St. Augustine intend anything else in the cited place: to which that which he adds in lib. 7. cap. 4. corresponds: When therefore it is asked, what three, or what three things, we betake ourselves to finding some special or general name by which we may comprehend these three; nor does it occur to the mind, because the superemi- nence of the Divinity exceeds the faculty of ordinary speech: for God is more truly thought than said, and is more truly than He is thought

You will say 2. The notion of person renders the nature, the same in number, incommunicable to another supposit; for human nature, v. gr., which is personated in Peter, cannot be communicated to another: but the divine nature, which is communicated to the Father, is also communicated to the Son and the Holy Spirit: therefore in the Father it is not incommunicable, and hence not personated. — I answer 1, distinguishing the major: the personated nature is incommunicable precisely insofar as it is a singular nature, I deny: for the human nature of Christ is truly and properly singular and individual, and yet it is communicated and united to the Word: it is incommunicable reduplicatively, as personated, that is, insofar as it signifies precisely the nature determined by personality, or the person in concreto, I concede. And with the minor likewise distinguished, I deny the consequence: thus the divine nature is indeed in the Father communicable to another, insofar as it is divine nature: not, however, insofar as it is the personality of the Father; for as such it signifies nothing other than the supposit consisting of divine nature and Paternity; and hence it signifies nothing other than the Father. It is certain, however, that the divine Father is not communicable to the Son, so as to be one and the same with Him; indeed He is really distinguished from Him. — I answer 2. that this is peculiar to the divine nature, that one and the same wholly indivisible nature can be communicated to three supposits, because neither does its infinity suffer several numerically distinct divine natures, nor does its supreme unity and simplicity sustain any multiplication and division; but it is otherwise with created natures, which, since they are finite and multipliable, hence it comes about that the same numerically one nature cannot be in several supposits.

You will say 3. The divine nature, insofar as it prescinds from the divine Persons, is in every way complete and incommunicable to another nature; since it is individual and singular: therefore it has no need of any supervening notion of person and of supposit, by which it might be completed and rendered incommunicable. — I distinguish the antecedent. It is in every way complete in the notion of divine nature, namely, because it consists of the essential predicates, intrinsic modes, and attributes perfecting and constituting it in the notion of an infinitely perfect being, I concede: it is complete in hypostatic being, and in ultimate incommunicability, I deny. For the divine nature taken precisely, whole and entire, is in the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. Whence of itself it does not have the notion of supposit nor of person; since it is not ultimately terminated according to existence; but it is constituted in the being of person by those relative properties, which are the ultimate term of the existence of the divine nature, and together with it constitute the three subsistents, further incommunicable to others, as terminating.

Second conclusion. — It is probable that the divine personalities are some positive mode terminating the divine nature, and as it were completing it in incommunicable being.

This seems to be the genuine opinion of the Doctor in 3. dist. 1. quaestione 1. n. 10., where, after he had said that a created nature can be said to be communicable in three ways, namely, either actually, as the soul is communicated to the body which it actually informs; or aptitudinally, as the separated soul, which has an inclination to inform the body; or obedientially; such as is the obediential potency in the rational soul to inform its body, he adds:

The divine Person has not only the negation of actual and aptitudinal communication, but also has a repugnance to communication ut quod and ut quo. But such repugnance cannot exist except through a positive entity, and therefore it follows that this person is never without such an entity; but the created person too, because it is not repugnant to it to be communicated, since it is in obediential potency, is not thus incommunicable, and therefore it is not necessary to attribute such a positive personal entity to it, but the double negation of actual and aptitudinal communication suffices for it.

It is moreover proved. The divine personality obtains a twofold office; for it completes the divine nature and ultimately terminates it, and constitutes and distinguishes the divine persons: but the divine nature cannot be completed through a simple negation, nor can the divine Persons be constituted and really distinguished from one another through something purely negative: therefore the notion of person in divine realities must be something positive. — Then, from St. Augustine, lib. De Doctrina Christiana: The things to be enjoyed are the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. Moreover, from the same author, 7. De Trinit. cap. 5.: It is not one thing to be God and another to be a person: but the thing and the Deity are something positive: therefore divine personality, for its formal element, is likewise something positive. — Finally, the divine Person is a real positive being: therefore its formal constituent must also be real and positive.

You will say. Created personality formally consists in a twofold incommunicability, ut quo and ut quod, and imports nothing positive beyond the notion of individual; therefore the same must be said of divine personality. — I deny the consequence. And the reason for the disparity is, first, because, as the Doctor said above, divine personality implies a repugnance to communication in every way, such as created person does not imply; but a negation founded in repugnance, since it is in every way inseparable from the subject, therefore requires something in the subject by reason of which it cannot be separated from it: whence it comes about that every repugnance is the repugnance of something, that is, of something not having a potency to something: but the simple negation, which created personality implies, is not thus inseparable from the subject, because in fact it is separated in the human nature assumed by the divine Word. Add, that even with created personality set aside, the notion of individual still remains, which sufficiently distinguishes the singular nature from another; but with divine personality set aside, nothing would remain by which the divine persons would be constituted and distinguished from one another.

Third conclusion. — Some common concept can be abstracted for the divine persons, which is univocal to them in the notion of person. Thus the Doctor in 1. dist. 25. n. 1., and

Proof. because each of the three divine persons is called a person; and truly the three agree in the notion of person, as such, not however as Peter and Paul agree in this man, for this man is said only equivocally of Peter and Paul: for this pronoun signifies what it demonstrates: whence when this man is said of Peter, that singular thing is demonstrated which is Peter, and which is wholly different from another singular thing which is Paul: whence it comes about that this man is not said of them univocally: but divine Person is truly said of the three according to its own proper notion; since each of them truly is the incommunicable existence of the divine nature; therefore it belongs to them univocally. — It is confirmed: if the name of person did not belong to them univocally, they would not be called three persons; for nothing is numbered except what is univocal: whence the heavenly and the earthly dog are not rightly called two dogs, because the name Dog is not univocal to the heavenly and the earthly: but truly three divine persons are said: therefore the name and notion of person belongs to them univocally.

You will say. Three created individuals and singulars are said as truly and properly as three divine Persons: but according to the Doctor created singulars do not agree in a common univocal notion; for this man does not agree univocally with Peter and Paul: therefore although three divine Persons are said, it is not rightly inferred that the name and notion of person belong to them univocally. — I answer to the major, that three individuals are said to be three only insofar as it is true that the created nature is numbered in them, which belongs to them univocally; whence, since the divine nature cannot be numbered in this way in the divine persons, because it is the same in number in the three; therefore something else univocal to them must be numbered in them; but this other cannot be anything but that which person formally says: therefore the notion of person must be univocal to them.

You will insist. Not only three created individuals, but also three individual differences and singularities are properly said: but three individual differences do not agree in a common univocal notion: therefore although three divine persons are said, it does not follow from this that they agree univocally. — I answer. Indeed three singularities are rightly said to be three, not on account of the commonness of a univocal concept of nature, but on account of the proportion of office, because they equally distinguish ultimately, and render the nature incommunicable to several inferiors. But the divine persons agree thus not only on account of the proportion of office, but also on account of the definition and notion of the divine Person, which belongs to them; for each of them truly is the incommunicable existence of the divine nature, ut quo and ut quod. Whence there is no parity.

Note 1. The opinion of the theologians concerning the resolution of the present Question is varied, but chiefly threefold: of which the First, says the Doctor in 1. dist. 2. n. 1., was that of Praepositivus, who affirmed that the divine Persons are constituted and distinguished by their whole selves, an opinion long since banished from the Schools, which Gregory of Rimini in 1. dist. 26. and 27. called back anew. The Second is that of Lincolniensis, and of John of Ripa, saying in the same place that there are indeed in the divine some constitutive and distinctive properties of the persons, but that they are absolute, not relative; which opinion, because the praised Doctor proves it with various arguments and solves all those things which are wont to be objected against it, some Recent authors wrongly attribute to him. The Third finally, the common and universal opinion of the theologians, now prevails: that the divine persons are constituted through relative properties. How, however, this is done, all do not explain in the same way; for the arguments of Scotus, says Vazquez, disp. 189. cap. 1., exercised the wits of the Thomists to such a degree that they divided them into various opinions: for some assert that the persons are not constituted by relations insofar as they are relations, but insofar as they are hypostatic forms; for they say that a divine relation claims two things for itself, namely, to be in itself, or per se; and to be toward another; and that according to being in itself it constitutes the person, but according to being toward another it does not constitute, but refers the person to another correlative to itself. Some, with St. Bonaventure in 1. dist. 26. q. 3., teach that the three persons are constituted by the relations as they are origins, e.g. that the divine Father is constituted in the notion of person by Paternity, not as Paternity is, but as active generation. The rest finally, with the Subtle Doctor, judge that the divine relations are constitutive of the divine Persons insofar as they are formally relations.

Note 2. Here the question is not raised about real constitution, which is made through constitutive things really distinct from one another, but about formal, which namely is made through constitutive things formally distinct; for although any divine person is a being really simple and indivisible on account of the real indistinction of the personal properties from the essence, nevertheless a twofold entity is conceived in it, one of which is absolute and simpliciter, the other relative and modal, or a mode of so being: through the first God is one, and is constituted formally in the notion of God; through the second indeed He is three, and is constituted in the notion of Father, and of Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Absolute being is prior, with the priority of reason and of sign, to the relative; for it is primary, which through the relative, as through a secondary being, is contracted and determined to the person; whence the relations are rightly conceived, as it were, to come to the divine nature and to constitute it in personal being, which, considered in itself, namely insofar as it is divinity, it does not have.

Note 3. That although the relative properties are conceived to come to the divine nature, already essentially constituted, they are nevertheless not accidental, but substantial; just as forms, although they are not essential to matter, but, as the Logicians say, come to it accidentally, are nevertheless substantial in themselves, and together with matter constitute a composite, not from accident and subject, but from diverse substances. Moreover, not only are those properties substantial and constitute substances, or things existing per se, but they are also hypostatic forms and the notions of supposits and persons, which together with the divine essence constitute the divine Person in the being of an intellectual nature complete and ultimately terminated according to existence. With these things premised, three things must be determined: first, that the divine Persons are constituted by properties. Second, that those properties are relative. Third, that they formally constitute the divine Persons precisely insofar as they are relations.

First conclusion. — The divine Persons are not constituted, nor distinguished, by their whole selves, but by certain personal properties.

This is the common opinion among the theologians, and is gathered and confirmed, first, from the various Councils, especially from the Lateran, cap.

Firmiter. where it is said that the Most Holy Trinity is undivided according to the common essence, but distinct according to the personal properties: likewise in the Council of Florence, sess. 1., it is asserted that the divine Persons differ by their properties: finally the Church sings in the preface of the Mass of the Feast of the Most Holy Trinity: And in the persons let property, in the essence unity, and in majesty equality be adored.

Proof 2. by the authority of the holy Fathers. First indeed of St. Dionysius, lib. De Divinis Nominibus cap. 2., saying: Those things which are of divine fecundity are not reciprocated among themselves, but only the Father is the font of the heavenly Divinity, so that the Father is not the Son, nor the Son the Father, but the holy praises preserve for each divine Person its own properties. Likewise Saint Basil, lib. 2. Contra Eunomium: The properties, he says, αἱ δὲ ἡμέτεραι, like certain characters and forms beheld in the substance, distinguish indeed what is common by the appropriated characters, but do not cut off the communication of the substance. Saint Athanasius, Dialog. 1.: A hypostasis, he says, has a property by no means common to the hypostases which underlie the essence, nor does it admit the multiplication of number, since it is one and singular; but whatever admits the multiplication of number wholly has a property, and what has a property admits number. Saint Ambrose, in Symbolum Apostolorum cap. 11.: We, he says, distinguishing the persons of the Deity in their properties, nevertheless confess the inseparable unity of the Most Holy Trinity. To these St. Augustine assents, serm. 38. De Tempore: Each of the persons in the Trinity, he says, has something proper, by which, in inseparable equality, they show in themselves some property: whence the Council of Toledo 11. in the Confession of Faith rightly concludes, There is, he says, abiding in each person his own property: for the Father has eternity without nativity, the Son eternity with nativity, the Holy Spirit procession without nativity.

Proof 3. The Doctor proves by theological reason: whatever things are not first diverse, but have something in which they agree, are not distinguished by their whole selves, but by something of themselves: but the divine Persons are not first diverse, because they are of the same essence: therefore they are not distinguished by their whole selves, but by something of themselves. — Then, several properties are in the same person, as in the Father innascibility, and active generation, which according to St. Augustine 5. De Trinit. cap. 6. are mutually distinguished; for, he says, if the Father were not unbegotten, He could nevertheless be Father, and conversely: therefore even if per impossibile one would not distinguish the Father from someone, another could distinguish, and conversely; and so the Father always has something by which He is distinguished from the Son, and consequently they are not distinguished by their whole selves. — Finally, in the Father there is active generation, and active spiration: but by active spiration He is not distinguished from the Son: indeed that is common to Him with the Son: therefore the Father is not distinguished by his whole self, but by something of himself. — These reasons are confirmed: if the persons are distinguished by their whole selves: therefore they are distinguished also by the essence: but this cannot be, because they agree in the essence, and the same thing cannot be the principle of agreeing and of distinguishing. Moreover, either the divine Person, e.g. the Father, has something beyond the essence which the Son does not have, or He does not: if the first, we have what was intended: if the second, no reason can be given why this person is the Father rather than the other; indeed nor why He is a person distinct from the other: therefore some Recent authors rightly pronounce the opposite opinion of the Conclusion to be rash, and almost heretical; nevertheless its assertors

They object 1. The divine Person is just as simple as the essence: but the divine essence itself is distinguished by itself from anything else: therefore also the person. It is confirmed: Paternity is not more simple than the Father: but Paternity, because it is simple, is constituted by nothing distinct from itself: therefore neither is the Father. — I deny the major. for, as we observed in the 2. Note, the divine Person is constituted in the being of a complete person through the entity of the Deity, and of personality, and so the person expresses two entities, or formalities, constitutive of itself, and thus could be said to be less simple than the essence. Or I distinguish: it is just as simple as the essence, with real simplicity, which excludes real composition from parts really distinct, I concede: with formal simplicity, which excludes the plurality of formalities, I deny: but this formal simplicity does not befit God, but real simplicity does, as we proved when treating of divine Simplicity. The confirmation is to be distinguished in like manner. I add moreover, that Paternity is not therefore not constituted by something distinct from itself because it is simple, but because it is conceived after the manner of a form, which does not consist of other formalities: whence since the Father is signified after the manner of a whole and of a concrete, and consists of nature, and of Paternity, which are formally distinguished, He must also be constituted by something distinct from the divine nature, and so the account is not the same of Paternity as of the Father.

They object 2. The constituted depends on, and is caused by, the constituent: but the divine Persons are wholly independent, and uncaused: therefore they are not constituted by something distinct. — I distinguish the major. the real constituted, which is made through the union of constituents really distinct, such as is the constitution of a physical composite, which is made through the union of matter with form, depends on the constituent and on the uniting of the constitutive things, I concede: the formal constituted, which is made through formalities really indistinct, and which by themselves, and independently of anything extrinsic, are united and constitute the whole, depends thus, I deny.

They object 3. From the Lateran Council, chapter Firmiter, it is said that the Father gave the whole substance to the Son: but those properties, if there are any, whether relative or absolute, are substances: therefore He gave them to the Son; and so He is not distinguished from the Son by them: therefore neither is the divine Father constituted in the being of a person by them. — I answer. The Council understands by the name of substance the essence, and the divine nature, insofar as it prescinds from the personal properties; in which way also the holy Fathers are wont in this matter to oppose substance to relation: whence Boetius toward the end of lib. De Trinit.: Substance contains unity, relation multiplies the Trinity; by which he opposes unity to multitude, substance to relation.

Second conclusion. — The divine Persons are constituted and distinguished by properties not absolute, but relative.

This is the more common, and truer opinion of the theologians, and it is proved first. by all those texts of Sacred Scripture by which the divine Persons are called by the relative names of Father, and of Son, and of the Spirit of truth proceeding from the Father, most of all from that text of the last of Matthew, where Christ, sending the Apostles for the conversion of the Gentiles, commands that they baptize them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit; from which places I argue thus: Sacred Scripture, and Christ the Lord designate the divine Persons by names most proper and signifying the personal properties: but these names from their primary imposition signify a relation, not indeed something absolute: therefore those personal properties are relative. The major is clear; for Christ the Lord imposed on the persons those names which best fit them, as they can be conceived and distinguished by us in this life.

Proof 2. From the Councils, especially the 11th of Toledo, in the Confession of Faith, chapter 1.: In the relative names of the persons, he says, the Father is referred to the Son, and the Son to the Father, and the Holy Spirit to both; and although the three persons are thus said relatively, one nature is nevertheless believed through the substance: and below: In the relation of the persons the number is discerned. The same is gathered from the Council of Florence, where John the Theologian, pleading the cause of the Latin Church, with the Council silently approving, said: Relation alone, among all the Greek and Latin Doctors, multiplies the persons by the divine procession; to which also those two, the a quo and the ad quod, of which mention was made above, agree. Since therefore relations in this way multiply the persons, so that the Father differs from the Son, one person from another, by no other reason than by the force of the relation. It judges therefore that the divine Persons are constituted and distinguished by relations; which is confirmed moreover from the oration which Bessarion the Patriarch gave for the union of both Churches, namely the Greek and the Latin, where cap. 6. he says: Therefore the divine Persons are distinguished in both ways indeed; but first and principally, according to the manner of understanding, through the relations, through which also the divine Persons are constituted: and after a few words inserted: the divine Persons are distinguished indeed in both ways, but more principally relatively, or by properties.

Proof 3. By the authority of the holy Fathers; for Nazianzenus, Orat. 37.: The mutual difference of their relation, he says, produced also different names for them; namely of Father, and of Son. Similarly Chrysostom, homil. 5. De incomprehensibili Dei natura, thus distinguishes: The proper names of God, so that the property of the persons may be denoted; for Father, and Son is the proper name of a person, but God, and Lord is common: St. Cyril of Alexandria, lib. 12. Thesauri cap. 15.

There is, he says, no difference between the Father and the Son, except only the personal, because the Father is, and the other is the Son; how will the Son be created, since the Father is uncreated? especially since the relative names are said of the one in regard to the other, and by one word spoken the other is immediately understood? for, he who says Father immediately understood the Son, and he who named the Son at once referred to the Father.

Damascenus also agrees, De Fide cap. 11.: We acknowledge one God, he says, but in the properties alone, namely of Paternity, of Filiation, and of Procession, and as regards the cause, and those things which proceed from the cause, and the perfection of the person, that is, the mode of existing, we notice the difference. Finally St. Anselm, book De Processione Spiritus sancti, chapter 1., writes thus: This therefore is the sole cause of plurality in God, that Father, and Son, and Holy Spirit cannot be said of one another, but are others in regard to one another, etc. From all of which it is clear that the opinion of the holy Fathers is manifest: that the divine Persons are constituted by properties not absolute, but relative.

This truth cannot be proved by an efficacious reason: for all the reasons which can be devised, the Doctor sets forth and subtly solves in 1. dist. 23. n. 31.; therefore only this one can be formed: in the mysteries of the Faith, especially in the mystery of the Trinity, nothing should be affirmed except what appears more conformable to Sacred Scripture, and to the sayings of the holy Fathers: but both Sacred Scripture and the holy Fathers signify that the divine Persons are constituted not by absolute, but by relative properties: therefore it must be so held. — Then, the holy Fathers for the most part teach that all absolute things are common to the three divine persons: but the personal properties are not common to the three: therefore they are not something absolute. — Finally, by that thing the divine Persons are formally constituted by which they are formally distinguished and multiplied: but this is done through the relations alone, as is clear from what has been said; for relation alone multiplies the Trinity: whence that common saying: In the divine, all things are one, where the opposition of relation does not stand in the way: therefore, etc.

You will object 1. That text of Proverbiorum 30.¹ where Solomon, speaking of God, asks among other things: What is his name, that is, of the Father, and what is the name of his Son, if you know? From which it is argued thus: every question supposes something, and inquires after another: but here the Father, and the divine Son are supposed to be; and moreover their proper names are asked: therefore Solomon supposes that the proper name of the first and second person is not Father, and Son, otherwise there would be no place for the question, for thus he would know and not know the same thing, or he would suppose to know and investigate, than which nothing is more inept. — I answer. That Solomon there indeed rightly asks something else, which adequately and exactly explains the nature and property, both of the divine Father and of the divine Son; because although these names Father, and Son signify that the divine persons are constituted and distinguished through relations, they do not however sufficiently explain who, and of what sort, those constitutive divine relations are, and in what way those divine Persons are constituted: they signify indeed the constitution of the persons through relation; they do not explain the dignity of the persons.

You will object 2. One divine Person is referred to another through a relation: therefore they are not constituted through it in the being of person. The antecedent is clear; for that which is referred is neither the essence, because the relatum must be really distinguished from the term; but the divine essence, which is in the Father, is not really distinguished from itself in the Son; indeed it is really the same; nor again is the relation referred, because it is itself the cause of referring; and therefore what is referred is the person. The consequence is proved 1. by the authority of St. Augustine saying in book 7. De Trinit. cap. 2.: Every relative is something, except the relation. And cap. 3.: If the Father, he says, is not something in regard to himself, there is nothing that is referred. — Then, that which is referred through a relation is prior to the relation, because it is the foundation and subject of the relation; but the foundation is presupposed to that which is founded in it. — Finally, that which is denominated a relatum is neither the essence nor the relation: therefore it is the supposit, and person: therefore just as a wall, which is denominated white, is presupposed to whiteness, so the person must be presupposed to the relation, through which it is referred, and so is not constituted through it in the notion of person. — The Doctor denies the consequence, n. 41. For that which is referred is the whole supposit consisting of essence, and of relation, which supposit indeed thus constituted is called relative, or relatum. — To the first proof. he responds, n. 42., that St. Augustine does not will that that relatum, as that which is referred, is something absolute, but only that it includes some absolute, as the foundation of the relation. To the second proof. he says that the antecedent is true of created relations, which do not constitute the supposit in the being of supposit, but not of the divine ones, which are constitutive of the supposits; for the constituted is posterior to all its constitutive things, or at least simultaneous in nature with them; and so the person constituted through the relation is simultaneous in nature with the relation itself, through which it is constituted in the being of divine Person. Add that created relations must therefore suppose that which they refer, because they are accidents, which come to the foundations, as to subjects: but it is otherwise with the divine relations, which, since they are substantial, do not pre-require a subject which they refer, but only presuppose the essence, from which they arise, and with which they constitute the person. In the same way the third proof is solved; for whiteness supposes the white thing for this reason, because it is an accident coming to it extrinsically, and really distinct from it; but the divine essence is neither really distinguished from the relation, just as neither is the related person, and therefore it should not be presupposed to it.

You will object 3. A real relation presupposes extremes constituted as really distinct: but the divine relations are real: therefore they presuppose the persons related to one another, really constituted and distinct, and so they do not constitute them. The major is proved: both because that which is referred is constituted before it is referred: and because Aristotle proves that identity is for this reason not a real relation, because it does not presuppose really distinct extremes: and finally, because the producing person, constituted in personal being, is prior in origin and in reason to the person proceeding from it: but a relation can be prior in neither way, because relatives are simultaneous in nature and in knowledge: therefore the producing person is not constituted in its personal being through a relation. — The Doctor denies the major ibid. n. 42. For in the first place that is false of transcendental relations, which do not presuppose extremes already constituted and distinct, but are one of the extremes, which by itself formally and from its own nature is referred to another, and is of itself formally a relation to another; thus, for example, knowledge is referred to its object, potency to the possible, etc.; but the relations of the divine Persons are transcendent. To the first proof I say, that what is referred through another must be constituted before it is referred, I concede; what is referred through itself, I deny: but the divine Persons are referred to one another through themselves: whence it comes about that a divine Person is not constituted in being before it is referred. To the second proof the Doctor says, that Aristotle gathers that identity is not a real relation not only from this, that it does not presuppose really distinct extremes; but also because he supposes that the identity of one thing with itself does not make really distinct extremes either. To the third proof, I distinguish the major; the producing Person is prior in origin to the produced, by a priority in quo, that is, of duration, I deny: by a priority a quo, that is, of origin, I concede. To the minor I say, that relatives are simultaneous in nature and in knowledge, because from the production of the one the existence of its correlative is gathered, either in the being of existence or in objective being. Hence it follows that in the first sign of origin in which the Father is conceived, the Son is also known, not indeed in the being of existence for that prior sign, but only in objective being, as was said when treating of the objects of the divine processions. Add that, as the Doctor says n. 41., although relations are simultaneous in nature, yet among some correlatives one can be prior to the other with a priority of origin; thus action is prior to the passion correlative to it.

You will insist. The supposit is in some way pre-understood before action, because each thing is understood first to exist of itself, and then to act of itself; therefore in the prior sign of origin the supposit of the Father is understood either as something absolute or as something relative; if the first, the intended conclusion is had; if the second, then in that prior sign of origin the Son is also presupposed before he is generated, and so he will not be the term of generation. It is confirmed, because with whatever priority one correlative is pre-understood before something, with the same priority its correlative is also pre-understood. Add that, if Paternity is constitutive of the Father, it will thus be prior to the Father; therefore Filiation, which is simultaneous with Paternity, will also be prior to the Father, and so the Son will not be produced by the Father. — The Doctor distinguishes the major. When the supposit is not constituted through a productive action, he concedes; when it is so constituted, he denies. But the divine Father is constituted in the being of Father, and of the first Person, through active generation; and so he ought not to be presupposed to it. He also denies the second part of the consequent, together with its confirmation, because, as was just said, the simultaneity of nature which correlatives have does not remove the priority of origin, and consequently does not prevent Paternity from belonging to the Father prior in origin to Filiation, or from being understood to belong to the Son.

You will object 4. Every real relation is terminated at something absolute: but this would be false if the person at which Paternity is terminated were constituted through a relation, for then it would not be something absolute, but something relative: therefore, etc. — The Doctor denies the major n. 48. For although it is true of relations that do not constitute their extremes that they must be terminated at something absolute; it is nevertheless false of those which constitute really distinct extremes: for just as their foundation is something relative, so likewise is their term, which can be something relative, because it is constituted in the being of a term through relations.

Third conclusion. — The divine Persons are constituted in personal being through relation, under the formal notion of relation.

This seems to be the Doctor's genuine opinion, as is gathered from various places, especially q. 1. of the Quodlibet n. 1., and q. 19. n. 5., and in 1. dist. 2. q. 7., dist. 5. q. 2. and dist. 11. q. 4.; finally at greatest length throughout dist. 26., and Proof, first. by the authority of the Eleventh Council of Toledo c. 1., where it is said that the divine Persons intimate number by this alone, that they are toward one another, and they lack number in that which they are in themselves: therefore from the Council's definition the relations do not constitute nor distinguish the persons according to their being in, as the Thomists will, but according to their being toward, that is, under the formal notion of relation. It is gathered likewise from the discourse of John the Theologian in the Council of Florence, sess. 18., saying: It is said that relations of this sort multiply the persons, so that it is on no other ground than by force of relation that the Father differs from the Son, nor one person from another. But what is it to differ by force of relation, if not under the formal notion of relation? but the proper being of relation, as the Philosopher says, is being toward, not being in: therefore they truly constitute the divine persons under the formal notion of relation.

Proof by reason. A relation cannot constitute or distinguish the divine persons except according to the formal notion which it has: but it has no formal notion other than the relative one: therefore it constitutes the persons precisely insofar as it is relative, that is, insofar as it regards its term. — It is confirmed: a relation cannot be conceived unless it is understood according to its essence and the formal notion by which it differs from the other beings: but the proper essence of a relation is to regard its term, for by this it differs from the other beings, for the other beings have being in themselves; but this one is wholly toward another: therefore, etc. — Secondly, that by which a relation formally constitutes a person is either something formally in itself, or toward another. If the first, that is something absolute; and so persons are not constituted through a relation: if the second, then it truly formally constitutes the divine Persons insofar as it is relative. — Thirdly, it is impossible to conceive that some form inhere in something without giving it its formal effect: but the formal effect of a relation is actually to refer one thing to another: therefore by the very fact that the divine Paternity is understood, e.g., it is also understood as actually referring the Father to the Son, and consequently it implies a contradiction that Paternity be understood to constitute the Father in the notion of person, without being understood as actually referring the Father and the Son. Moreover, that being in which relation expresses either signifies the essence with which it constitutes the person, or the constituted person: not the first, because the relation of Paternity is not said to be in the essence, but in the Father: not the second either, for then the relation of Paternity would not constitute the first supposit, but would presuppose it already constituted, just as a form presupposes the subject in which it is.

They object 1. St. Augustine in lib. 7. De Trinit. cap. 2. saying: Substance is the Father Himself, not by that by which He is Father, but by that by which He is; thus the Person of the Father is so called, for the person is said indeed in reference to Himself, not to the Son or the Holy Spirit: therefore according to the mind of St. Augustine the divine person is not formally toward another; and so it is not constituted in the being of person through relation reduplicatively, as relation is. — I answer. St. Augustine by that being toward oneself does not deny that the person is relative to another, for he asserts that same thing ibid., but only that each person has in itself its own constitutive principle, really distinct from the other person: Or I say that he wishes there that the divine personal relations are substantial and per se, not however accidental and in another as in a subject of inherence, as the relations of creatures are.

You will object 2. The notion of person and the notion of relation are opposed; for a person is something subsisting in itself; but a relative is essentially toward another; personality is substance itself in itself, but relation is the very referring to another: therefore a person is not constituted in the notion of person through relation reduplicatively, as it is relative. — I distinguish the antecedent. The notions of person and of relation are opposed in creatures, I concede; in the divine, I deny: for the disparity is that a created relation is an accident presupposing a subject already in every way substantially complete, and so having the notion of subsistent and person; but it is otherwise in the divine, where the relation itself constitutes and distinguishes the persons.

You will object 3. If the divine relations, insofar as they are relations reduplicatively, constituted and distinguished the divine Persons, this would be at most either insofar as they are relations, or insofar as they are divine relations. Not the first, because then any relation, even a created one, would be constitutive and distinctive of a person: not the second either, otherwise it would belong to every divine relation to constitute a person, and so active spiration, which is a divine relation, would constitute a divine person, which is false: therefore, etc.

I answer. That constitutive notion of person belongs to the divine relations not precisely insofar as they are divine, but insofar as they have mutual opposition by reason of procession, and the origin of one person from another: or rather insofar as they imply and signify the real distinction of one from another: but active spiration does not imply such a distinction, because it is made through one and the same formal principle by which, namely through the will.

Corollary I. — From what has been said it is inferred 1. against the Thomists that the divine relations are not constitutive of the persons insofar as they are a hypostatic form, as the Doctor rightly proves in 1. dist. 28. q. 3. n. 2. Both because a relation considered as a hypostatic form is conceived as an entity either absolute or relative: for although the concept of being in common is neither relative nor absolute, because being as such prescinds from relative and absolute being and embraces both under itself: nevertheless a singular entity, such as the entity constitutive of a person in incommunicable being, must be either absolute or relative, since between a singular absolute being and a singular relative being no middle is given: but the entity constitutive of a person cannot be absolute, otherwise it would follow that the divine persons are constituted through absolutes, which has been disproved: therefore it must be conceived as relative. Both because that notion of hypostatic form either signifies something distinct from the formal notion of Paternity, e.g., as relation is formally, or not; if the first, therefore the Father is not constituted through the relation, but through a formality distinct from the formality of the relation, which nevertheless all the Thomists disapprove. If the second: therefore the persons are formally constituted through the relations, as relations are, since they are constituted through an entity which is formally a relation.

It is confirmed from a similar case. Although whiteness, e.g., can be conceived as dispersive of sight, without its being conceived as it is a quality; nevertheless just as no one can say that it is not whitening, nor dispersive of sight, as it is such a quality; so by parity, although we can form some concept of the divine Paternity in which the concept of relation is not explicitly involved, nevertheless it ought not on that account to be inferred that it does not constitute the persons, as relation is.

Corollary II. — It is inferred 2. from the same ibid. n. 3. that although the divine origins are not formally distinct from the relations, both because otherwise they would be something absolute, and so would be common to the three Persons, which implies a contradiction: and because nothing is so much toward another as generation and active or passive spiration; and so active generation is formally nothing other than Paternity, just as passive generation is formally the same as Filiation: nevertheless they constitute the divine Persons not precisely as origins are reduplicatively, but only as relations. First because, as the Doctor says, origin, as origin formally, is only a way between the producing and the produced person: therefore it is not their constitutive form; indeed it seems to presuppose in the producing person a proper constitutive form; for a thing is first conceived to have its own being before it is conceived to operate: therefore the Father is first conceived as constituted in the notion of person, at least inadequately, before he is conceived adequately to produce the Son: the same must be said of the produced person. For origin is the way by which the produced person receives its being, and consequently by which it receives its constitutive form in the being of person. — Secondly, the constitutive of a thing having fixed and permanent being must be expressed after the manner of the fixed and permanent, not however as a way to being, that is, not as in fieri, but as in facto esse: but the divine persons have fixed and permanent being: origin, however, signifies something flowing, and precisely signifies only the being which is made and produced: therefore the divine persons in facto esse are not adequately constituted through origins, but through relations. — Thirdly, finally, origin, as origin formally, is something absolute or something relative; not the first, as has been said, and moreover it would follow that the persons would be constituted through something absolute, if in their personal being they were constituted through absolute origins: if the second; therefore they constitute the persons not precisely as origins, but as relations. — And so the divine origins properly signify persons really distinct, but do not formally constitute them. In this sense are to be understood those holy Fathers who seem to assert that the divine persons are constituted and distinguished through origins.

Thus St. Cyril lib. 2. Thesauri cap. 3.: In order, he says, that the divine Scripture might distinguish by its reasonings the hypostasis which generates and that which is generated, it made use of the names of Father and Son. Thus St. Anselm in the book De processione Spiritus sancti cap. 2.: This, he says, is the sole cause of plurality in God, that the Father and the Holy Spirit cannot be said of one another, but are other from one another, because in the two ways aforesaid God is of God, all of which can be said relatively. Thus finally St. John of Damascus lib. 1. De Fide cap. 2. says: The Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit are altogether one, except for the property of the unbegotten, of generation, and of procession: not that the Fathers truly wish the divine Persons to be constituted through origins, but that, constituted and really distinct, they become better known through the relations insofar as they are origins, than as they are conceived under the formal concept of relations.

This same doctrine borrowed from the Subtle Doctor Cardinal Bessarion lucidly expounds in the Council of Florence, Oratione pro unione utriusque Ecclesiae Graecae, et Latinae c. 6., saying:

Relation and origin, although they differ according to the mode of understanding (since origin is signified after the manner of an act, as generation; relation however after the manner of a form, as paternity) nevertheless do not differ in reality; therefore in both ways indeed the divine Persons are distinguished; yet first and principally according to the mode of understanding through relations, through which also the divine Persons are constituted; consequently through the diverse mode, that is, through origin. For to generate and to be generated, which belongs to origin, does not principally constitute the person, but Paternity and Filiation, that is, to be Father and Son, which belongs to relation; but because relation and origin are the same in reality, and relation follows upon origin (according to concept) therefore in both ways indeed the divine Persons are distinguished, but more principally by relation.

Corollary III. — It is inferred 3. that the divine Father is not constituted through the notion of the unbegotten, but through the relation of Paternity, because, as the Doctor says in 1. dist. 28. q. 2. num. 11., the unbegotten formally expresses a negation: but a divine person cannot be formally constituted through a negation: therefore, etc. The major is evident, for the unbegotten is the negation of the begotten. The Doctor proves the minor: no negation can be of itself incommunicable; but it must be incommunicable by reason of another: therefore it cannot of itself make an incommunicable person, but only by reason of another incommunicable thing in which it inheres: but there is nothing in the divine essence which is incommunicable: therefore no negation together with the divine essence can constitute a person. — It is confirmed, and the preceding argument is further illustrated: in the first divine Person there must be a negation of communicability inseparable from its foundation, and rendering that foundation altogether incommunicable both actually and aptitudinally and obedientially, because the divine person has a repugnance to its own communication: but that foundation is not the divine essence; nor any absolute common to the three Persons: therefore that positive absolute which is constitutive and distinctive of the first person must be something. Therefore the first Person is not formally constituted through a negation, and so neither through the notion of the unbegotten, which is formally a negation.

Some reply: That the notion of the unbegotten is not a pure and simple negation, but imports something positive, namely the notion of first principle and of fontal Divinity.

On the contrary. The Doctor presses in Quodlibet 4: that notion of first principle signifies that the Father is a se, and that either effectively, because He is the cause of Himself, or only negatively, because namely He has no principle of Himself: not the first, because it is repugnant that something be the author and cause of its own being; otherwise it would be before it was, as has already been said many times: if the second, then to be the first principle is only a negation of another prior principle, and so is not something positive. Secondly, if the unbegotten expresses something positive, it is at most either something absolute or something relative: if absolute, then the first person is constituted through something absolute, which the holy Fathers and Councils deny: if relative, either that relation is formally the same as Paternity, and the intended conclusion is had; or it is formally distinct from it, and so there will be more than four distinctive relations of the divine Persons, which no theologian admits. Thirdly, finally, that fontal notion of Divinity which is in the Father is either essence or relation. If essence, it cannot be constitutive and distinctive of the person: if relation, either it is Paternity, or it is distinct from Paternity: and thus the prior objection recurs. It must therefore be conceded that the first person is formally constituted through Paternity, which in its formal concept of constitutive relation of the first supposit imports the notion of the unbegotten and of first principle, etc.

Note 1. The name subsistence is here used to signify the mode of existing per se. It is, however, taken in two ways: first, as it is opposed to existing in another through inhesion, in which manner every substance is called a being subsisting per se, whether it be complete or incomplete: thus any part of a physical body, whether integral or essential, although existing in the whole, is called a being subsisting per se, no less than the physical body itself. Second, it is taken for existing per se, insofar as it signifies a most perfect existence, independent of another as of something perfective or sustaining, in which manner any nature wholly complete, and standing firm in its essential predicates, as well as in its attributes and properties, prior in nature to being in its own supposit or another's, is called a being subsisting per se: thus humanity, prior in nature to being assumed by the Person of the Word, is said to exist per se, or to subsist; for by the name of subsistence is signified not only a person or hypostasis, but also any thing whatsoever existing per se and in itself, as Rusticus clearly teaches in his book De Incarnatione contra Acephalos: Therefore, he says, the name of subsistence very clearly signifies sometimes a person, but sometimes a nature.

Note 2. The mode of existing per se completely is again twofold, namely communicable and incommunicable. The former belongs to any common substantial nature, which, insofar as it prescinds from those things to which it is communicated, just as it is called a truly complete and real nature, so likewise is to be called existing per se, or subsisting; the latter, however, belongs to a singular nature, not only complete in the notion of a singular nature, but also in the notion of a person, or supposit. Hence a twofold difficulty arises concerning the present Question: first, whether the divine nature, insofar as it prescinds from the divine persons and the relations constitutive of the persons, can be said to subsist per se, and to have an absolute existence and a subsistence distinct from the relative subsistences: second, whether on the hypothesis that this absolute subsistence is given, three others are to be admitted as relative, really distinct from one another, and formally from the absolute existence.

Note 3. Concerning the two aforesaid difficulties there is a twofold opposed opinion of the Authors: for first Vazquez, Disp. 125., affirms that the divine nature subsists in the divine persons only through their own relative subsistences; and hence denies that there is given in the divine any absolute subsistence common to the three persons and proper to the divine nature. Durandus, however, in 1. dist. 13. quaest. 2., judges that the three divine Persons draw the whole notion of subsisting from the absolute subsistence of the divine essence included in them; but that they have incommunicability from their constitutive relations; and hence that three relative subsistences are altogether superfluous for constituting the divine persons. Between these extreme opinions the disciples of the Subtle Doctor walk by a middle and safer way, and the weightier Thomists follow them, affirming that one absolute subsistence and three relative ones are to be admitted.

First conclusion. — Truly there are three relative subsistences in the divine persons. This Conclusion sufficiently stands firm from the Holy Fathers praised at the beginning of the present Article in the explanation of the name of subsistence, and is moreover proved: there are several subsistences in the divine: but there are not several absolute subsistences: therefore there are several relative ones. The major is evident, both from what has been said, and especially from the Sixth General

Synod, action 11., where it is said that the Most Holy Trinity was made numerable by personal subsistences. Likewise from the holy Fathers, especially Cyril of Alexandria in the Dialogo De Trinit., lib. 3., where he says: Every discourse of our faith tends to this, that we see one nature of the Deity, which properly subsists in three subsistences. So likewise Athanasius, in the Sermone De Deipara, says: We proclaim one God in three subsistences, in which there is one substance. Finally, St. Ambrose in the Symbolum Apostolorum, cap. 2., says: It is Catholic, that we confess both one God according to the unity of substance, and that we acknowledge the Father and the Son in each one's own subsistence.

Some reply: That while the Councils and holy Fathers proclaim several subsistences in God, they take subsistence for personality.

On the contrary. That acceptance is either a proper or an improper locution: if the first, the proposition is had, namely that subsistence in some proper acceptance of itself is manifold in God: if the second, surely it is unbecoming, without any urgent necessity, to twist the words of the Councils and Fathers to an imperfect sense.

Add. That if the Fathers and Councils have used subsistence for personality, the proposition is truly concluded; for just as there are several relative personalities in the divine, so also there will be several relative subsistences.

Others reply: That the Councils and holy Fathers take subsistence, not for personality in the abstract, but for the persons and the subsisting thing in the concrete; and so when they affirm that several subsistences are to be admitted in God, it is the same as if they said that there are several persons and subsisting things by the same essential subsistence.

On the contrary. The holy Fathers and Councils speak of subsistences as of forms by which the divine Persons are constituted, distinguished, and numbered: but this is to use subsistence in the abstract, and not in the concrete: therefore, etc. Then, even if they use subsistence in the concrete, it is always lawful to infer that the relative subsistences are distinct: for to the multiplication of a concrete substantive it is necessary that the forms be multiplied: whence the three Persons cannot be called three Gods, because the name God is a substantive; and there is only one form signified by that name, namely the Deity: therefore if only one absolute subsistence is given, it will not be able to be multiplied in the persons, just as the Deity itself is not multiplied. And consequently, since the Councils and holy Fathers affirm that subsistences are multiplied, it is necessary that they distinguish the relative subsistences from the absolute one.

The Conclusion is moreover proved by theological reason. Whatever belongs to the divine Persons by reason of the relations by which they are constituted in personal being is multiplied in them: but subsistences belong to them in this way: therefore they are multiplied. The major stands firm, for with the formal notion multiplied it is necessary that that also which is formally the same with it be multiplied; but subsistences are formally the same with the constitutive relations of the divine Persons: for subsistence, as it expresses a mode of subsisting incommunicably, is the very constitutive notion of the person in personal being: for the divine Persons, insofar as they are Persons, subsist per se independently and incommunicably, therefore they truly have incommunicable subsistences. — Then; where there are diverse productive principles quod, there must be diverse subsistences: for just as to operate follows being, so the productive principle quod presupposes complete being, and hence subsisting per se: but in God there are diverse productive principles quod of the Son and of the Holy Spirit; for the Father is the principle quod of the Son, and the Father and the Son are the principle quod of the production of the Holy Spirit: therefore the Father and the Son must have distinct subsistences. — Finally, the humanity of Christ was assumed and terminated only by the subsistence of the Word, not by the subsistence of the Father or of the Holy Spirit. Therefore the subsistence of the Word is distinguished from the subsistence of the Father and of the Holy Spirit, and hence they do not subsist by a single absolute subsistence.

You will say 1. To subsist is a perfection simpliciter simplex: but a relation in the divine expresses no perfection, as will be established in the following Article: therefore likewise no relation is a subsistence.

I distinguish the major. To subsist per se communicably and absolutely expresses perfection, I concede: to subsist per se incommunicably and relatively expresses perfection, I deny.

You will object 2. The notion of subsistence is something absolute: therefore no relative subsistence is given in the divine. The consequence is evident. The antecedent is proved from St. Augustine, 7. De Trinit., cap. 1., saying: Every thing subsists to itself; how much more God? But that which is to itself, and not to another, is absolute. Therefore the notion of subsisting is something absolute.

I deny the antecedent, and to its proof I say that St. Augustine there speaks of subsistence as it expresses a per-se-ity independent of another sustaining it, such as is the absolute subsistence belonging to the divine Persons by reason of the essence communicated to them, not by reason of the relations. Or I say that he wills only this, that subsistence, or the subsistent, be not to another, so as to be the subsistence or the subsistent of another thing, as the Father, e.g., is the Father of the Son: this, however, does not prevent subsistence from being relative, just as a person, which although it cannot be called the person of another person, is nonetheless no less relative.

You will say 3. The divine nature, as we will soon prove, subsists by an absolute subsistence; therefore it does not subsist by relative subsistences. The consequence is evident; for subsistence is the ultimate term in the line of subsisting. Therefore it cannot be terminated by another, and consequently besides the absolute one a relative one ought not to be admitted.

I distinguish the antecedent. It subsists by a communicable subsistence, I concede; by an incommunicable one, I deny. Likewise I distinguish the consequence: other communicable and absolute subsistences ought not to be admitted, I concede: incommunicable and relative ones, I deny.

I likewise distinguish the proof. A personal and incommunicable subsistence is the ultimate term in the notion of subsisting, I concede: a non-personal and communicable one, I deny. For an absolute and essential subsistence, just as it is not incommunicable, so neither does it have the notion of an ultimate term, but only of a term constituting the nature wholly complete in the notion of the divine nature, and rendering it capable of being communicated to the three divine Persons.

Second conclusion. — Subsistence taken for the mode of existing per se, and excluding dependence on another extrinsic thing in existing, belongs to the divine nature, insofar as it prescinds from the personalities. This is the teaching of the Doctor in 2. dist. 7. quaest. 1. and in 3. dist. 1. quaest. 1. n. 6., where, speaking of the divine nature insofar as it prescinds from the personal relations, he affirms that it could have been the term of the hypostatic union, because, he says, it has no being from a person, but is naturally prior to being in a person, and gives being to the person; for it is a nature of itself this, and subsisting per se, although not incommunicably.

The Conclusion is proved. First indeed by the authority of the holy Fathers: for first of all Pope Agatho in the decretal Epistle, which is found in the sixth Synod, art. 4., says: We confess God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit, not three Gods, but one God: not the subsistence of three names, but one subsistence of three subsistences. Likewise St. Augustine, 7. De Trinit., cap. 1.: Every thing, he says, subsists to itself; how much more God? And cap. 5., near the end: For God to be is the same as to subsist: and therefore if the Trinity is one essence, it is also one subsistence. St. Jerome agrees with him, Epistola 57. ad Damasum: One, he says, is the nature of God, and alone, which truly is; for that which subsists does not have it from elsewhere, but it is its own. St. Hilary urges the same thing in his book De Trinit.: It is not, he says, the condition of corporeal natures, that they be in one another: that they have perfect unity of nature in subsistences; with a few words interposed: but to be in, not one thing in another, as a body in a body, but so to be and subsist, as to be in a subsistent; and to be in in such a way, that these things subsist, belongs to God alone. St. Anselm also subscribes in the Monologion, cap. 13., where he says: The Father, by begetting, gave to the Son, that he might subsist, be wise, and live, not through an extraneous, but through his own essence, wisdom, and life, etc. Finally Boethius concludes in his book de duabus naturis, about the middle: God, he says, is a hypostasis, that is, a subsistence; for he subsists needing nothing; whence we say that there is one usia, or usiosis, that is, one essence, or subsistence, of the Deity.

The Conclusion is proved by reason. To the divine essence, insofar as it prescinds from the divine Persons, belongs every perfection simpliciter simplex: but to subsist per se is a perfection simpliciter: therefore it is to be attributed to it. The major is evident: for the divine essence, the relations being cut off, is infinitely perfect in the genus of being, and is true God, and hence a complete being in the notion of the Deity. Therefore all compossible perfections are to be attributed to it. The minor also stands firm: since it far surpasses to subsist per se than to exist either in another, or dependently on another. Therefore it is a perfection simpliciter simplex to be attributed to the divine essence; not indeed through the personal relations, which express no perfection. Therefore it subsists per se and immediately. — Second, the divine essence, insofar as it prescinds from the persons, exists per se completely, and independently of any extrinsic thing, as well as of the persons. Therefore it truly subsists. The consequence is evident: since by absolute subsistence we understand nothing other than a complete substance existing per se, and incommunicable to any extrinsic complement really distinct from itself. The antecedent, however, is proved; the divine essence receives no perfection from the Persons, but bestows on them very many perfections, indeed all, since all the perfections of the divine Persons flow from the essence. Therefore it subsists independently of them: much more independently of every extrinsic thing really distinct, and hence it subsists per se. — Third, that which is a sufficiently active principle per se is also subsisting per se: but God, as He is pre-understood to the persons, is a sufficiently active and productive principle: therefore He is subsisting per se. The major stands firm: for since subsistence is the complement of nature, and since nature ought first to be complete in being before operating, because being is prior to operating; therefore it ought first to subsist before it acts. The minor also stands firm: both because the works of the Trinity ad extra are undivided, namely by reason of the undivided Deity, for whatever belongs to all the persons entirely, that belongs to them by reason of the essence common to them; but to create, e.g., belongs to them undividedly: therefore by reason of the common essence, or the Deity. Therefore producing belongs to God prior to the persons; and producing cannot belong to the essence unless it is subsisting, since actions belong to subsistents; and consequently God, insofar as He prescinds from the persons, is subsisting.

It is confirmed. By the authority of the holy Fathers, who affirm that creatures are produced by God subsisting. Thus St. Dionysius, cap. 1. De Divinis nominibus, says: The subsistence of Goodness, through its own being, is the cause of all subsisting things; and Gregory of Nyssa in the book De Vita Moysis: Nothing, he says, besides the supreme essence, which is the cause of all things, and on which all things depend, truly subsists.

You will say 1. If the divine Essence subsisted insofar as it prescinds from the persons, it would be a person: but this is absurd; otherwise there would be given in God a quaternity of persons, which was condemned in the Lateran Council: therefore God, insofar as He prescinds from the persons, does not subsist. The sequel of the major is proved: a person expresses nothing other than the subsistence of an intellectual nature: but the divine Essence, insofar as it prescinds from the persons, is an intellectual nature; therefore if it subsists per se, it will truly be a person. It is confirmed, for according to the holy Fathers praised at the beginning of this Article, Subsistence signifies the same as Hypostasis: but hypostasis in God is the same as person: therefore if the divine Essence subsists, it will truly be a person.

I distinguish the major. If it subsists by a personal subsistence, incommunicable to another as to a supposit, it will be a person, I concede: if it subsists by an absolute subsistence, incommunicable indeed to another extrinsic thing really distinct from the subsisting essence itself, but communicable to the divine supposits really indistinct from the essence itself, it will be a person, I deny: for it is of the notion of a person that the subsistent be an intellectual nature incommunicable to another, whether extrinsic or a supposit. To the confirmation I distinguish the major: subsistence in Latin signifies the same as hypostasis in Greek, according to some acceptance of it, and that the more frequent, I concede: according to every acceptance of it, I deny. For, as we have observed, the name of subsistence is taken in two ways by the Fathers: first indeed for a per-se-ity excluding dependence on a sustainer: second, for a per-se-ity excluding communicability to a supposit. In the former way it does not signify the same as hypostasis; but only in the latter; according to the former acceptance, we say that there is a single absolute subsistence in God; according to the latter, truly there are three relative subsistences.

You will say 2. Subsistence is the ultimate term of the nature which it affects: but the divine Essence antecedently to the personalities has nothing which is its ultimate term. Therefore it does not have subsistence. The minor is proved: the ultimate term excludes a posterior term; but the divine essence does not exclude a posterior term; since it is still terminated by the relative subsistences: therefore, etc.

I distinguish the major. A personal subsistence, incommunicable to another supposit, is the ultimate term of the nature, which acknowledges no posterior one, I concede; an absolute and natural subsistence, by which it makes the nature existing per se, and nonetheless communicable to another as to a supposit, ought to be its ultimate term, I deny: for thus the divine nature, since it is infinitely fruitful, by its own notion demands to be communicated to the divine Persons, and to be finally terminated by them, and further to be made incommunicable.

You will say 3. To subsist is to exist per se, not only independently of another, but also with a repugnance to being in another; just as to inhere is to be in another with a repugnance to existing per se: but the divine nature, insofar as it prescinds from the Persons, does not enjoy this mode of existing per se; rather it demands to exist in the Persons: therefore as such it does not truly subsist.

I distinguish the major. It is to exist per se, and not in another, as in a sustainer, I concede; as in an ultimate terminator, I deny. And with the minor likewise distinguished, I deny the consequence. For the divine nature, although it demands to be in the Persons, as in the terms of its fruitfulness; is not, however, in them as in a sustainer completing it; for the divine Essence receives no perfection from the Persons, indeed every perfection of the Persons flows from it; nor is it completed by them in the notion of the divine nature, but only in them is its infinite fruitfulness derived, and by them terminated.

Theologians distinguish a twofold genus of relations in God especially, some of which they call ad extra, others ad intra. The relations ad extra are those by which God is referred to creatures, whether from eternity, as are the relations of omnipotence and of simple knowledge to possible things, and also those of the predestining and reprobating God, etc., to future rational creatures; or in time, as are the relations of Creator, Governor, Redeemer, etc. The relations ad intra are those by which the divine Persons are mutually referred to one another. These, again, are of a twofold genus: for some are proper to each of the divine Persons; others are common to the three. The proper ones are called by another name relations of origin, by which the divine Persons are especially constituted; and these are paternity, filiation, active spiration, and passive spiration, all of which, if you except active spiration, are in the several Persons of one and another notion, and are really distinguished from one another. The common ones are those which are found in the several Persons, and are founded upon the unity, and the metaphorical quantity, and the divine quality, and are called equality, identity, and likeness. — The relations ad extra are not to be debated in the present place, but the relations ad intra; concerning which especially three things come to be resolved. 1. Whether all the relations ad intra, both common and proper, are real. 2. Which of the proper ones are truly constitutive of the divine Persons. 3. Whether the constitutive relations of the Persons import and connote some perfection.

Note 1. By the name of relation we understand that form, as it were, by which one thing regards another and is compared with it. Hence it comes about that in any relation a twofold being is distinguished, namely being in, and being toward. For since a relation is a habitude of one thing to another, it is necessarily in a subject, which relates, and toward a term, which it regards. But whether a relation is real according to that twofold being, the Authors do not agree; for some, with William of Paris, praised by the Carthusian in 1. dist. 26. q. 2., affirm that both in God and in all creatures relations are not real entities, but only beings of reason; or at least only extrinsic denominations, as Ockham taught in 1. dist. 30. q. 4. Some contend that relations are not real insofar as they are toward something, but only insofar as they are in something; so most Thomists with St. Thomas in De potentia, quaest. 4. art. 5. and in dist. 26. quaest. art. 2. ad 3. Finally, the rest agree with the Subtle Doctor that the divine relations ad intra are real according to that twofold being, namely in something, and toward something.

Note 2. From the Doctor, Quodlibet. 6. n. 33., three things are especially required for the reality of a relation: First, a real foundation, which is in the thing, and from the nature of the thing. Second, real extremes, really distinct. Third, that it itself inhere in the extremes from the nature of the thing, namely without any consideration of the intellect, or without the operation of an extrinsic power. It must moreover be noted that of real relations, especially of those which are called mutual, there are three properties, of which the First is that they are simultaneous by nature: the Second, that they are simultaneous in knowledge, or definition: the Third, that they are said convertibly; all of which, from Aristotle, St. Cyril thus weighs in lib. 2. Thesauri c. 3.: Things which are relative, he says, are simultaneous both by nature and by reason, and one is inferred from the other. It is consequent, therefore, that those relations are to be called real to which the three aforesaid conditions and the three designated properties belong: but whether all these fit the divine relations ad intra, will have to be determined here.

Note 3. The divine relations differ from created ones especially in three things; for first, a created relation is of almost no entity and existence, of no activity and efficacy, and finally of no solidity and permanence; indeed, by the defect of its own fragility and thinness, it vanishes at almost the same moment in which it is born: but the divine relation is of such and so sublime an entity that it institutes the most august Trinity and constitutes the divine Persons in personal being. Second, the relations of creatures are accidental, and therefore need a subject both to exist and to be conserved: but the divine relations are substantial, and subsisting per se, and although they flow from the divine Essence, as from a sea of all entity and perfection, and determine it to the constitution of the Persons, nevertheless they are not in the divine essence itself as in a subject, but are really identified with it. Third, the relations coming intrinsically in creatures suppose their extremes, that is, the foundation and the term, really existing and distinct, because they arise only from the position of the foundation and of the term: but the divine relations do not suppose, but constitute the divine Persons, and make them really distinct.

These things having been premised, three remain to be established: First, whether the divine personal and proper relations are truly real: second, whether they are real both according to being toward something and according to being in something: Third, whether the common relations of identity, equality, and likeness are also truly real.

First conclusion. — The relations proper to the divine Persons are simpliciter real. This sufficiently appears from those things which we said in proving that the divine Persons are constituted through the relations, reduplicatively as they are relations.

It is proved moreover. By the authority of the Councils, especially of the Council of Toledo 11, cap. 1., saying: In the relative names of the persons the Father is referred to the Son, and the Son to the Father, and the Holy Spirit to both. Which, since the three persons are said relatively, nevertheless one nature is believed through substance. The same is evident from the Council of Florence, session 18, where John the Theologian, from the common opinion of the Greek and Latin Fathers, says: Only relation, among all the Greek and Latin Doctors, multiplies the persons by divine procession, so that one person differs from another on no other account than by force of relation. From which I argue thus: the divine Persons are really constituted and distinguished: therefore through something real, constitutive and distinctive: but that, from the Councils, is nothing other than relation: therefore that is truly real.

Proof 2. Those relations are truly to be called real to which the three properties required for a real relation belong; but they belong to the notional relations: therefore these are real. The major is evident: for property follows entity; and so if that is real, this likewise will be real. The minor is proved: the three conditions are that the mutual relations are simultaneous by nature, simultaneous in knowledge, and in reciprocal inference, as was said in the second Note: but they fit indeed the relations constitutive of the divine Persons; the Father and the divine Son, for example, are simultaneous by nature, and from the existence of one the existence of the other is inferred, as St. Cyril expressly proves in Dialogo De Trinit. lib. 1.: If the Son existing as begotten were not, he says, neither would the Father be according to the reason of nature; for the Father is because he begot: therefore it is true both that they subsist together and that both are taken away together. They are also simultaneous in knowledge; for Basil says, lib. 2. Contra Eunomium: From the fact that the Father is, the Son also is; and immediately, when one takes up the thought of the Father, that of the Son also occurs to him; for the Father is evidently the Father of the Son. With this agrees Cyril of Jerusalem in Catechesi 7.: The name of the Father, he says, together with the appellation of that very name, presents the Son also to be understood; just as likewise one naming the Son also understands the Father; for, as Gregory of Nyssa subjoins in Epist. Contra Apollinarem: When one has named the Father, it is certain that he has brought in the signification of some Son; for how will he be called Father unless the Son is also understood? St. Hilary favors this in book 7. De Trinitate: The name of the Father, he says, has in itself the name of the Son; for he is the Father only through the Son; and the signification of the Son is the demonstration of the Father, because the Son is only from the Father. Therefore if the property of a real relation belongs to the personal relations, those will truly have to be called real.

Proof 3. Those relations are truly to be called real to which the three conditions required for a real relation belong, namely that its foundation is real, that it is between real extremes, and that it inheres in the foundation from the nature of the thing, and apart from consideration of the intellect: but these three conditions belong to the personal relations: the first indeed, because the active and passive origin in which the relations of the producer and the produced are founded is truly a real foundation: second, those relations are between really distinct extremes, for the producer and the produced are really distinguished from each other: finally, those relations and the habitudes of one Person to another belong to them apart from any operation of the intellect; for even if no created intellect had ever existed, the divine Father would no less really be the Father of the Son, and the Son the Son of the Father: therefore they would have had relation to each other no less really.

You will say 1. A real relation requires really distinct extremes: but the divine relations do not have really distinct extremes. Proof: for those relations are between the Essence, which is communicated by one Person to another: but the divine Essence in the Person communicating it is not distinguished from itself insofar as it is in the Person to whom it is communicated; indeed it is altogether the same: therefore, etc.

I deny the minor, and to its proof I say that the divine essence itself is not the extreme, or the proximate foundation, of the relation which intervenes between the divine Persons; but the divine Persons themselves are the very extremes of the relations; for it is not the Essence, but the divine Persons themselves that are really referred to each other; and so, since the Persons are really distinct, their relations too are between really distinct extremes.

You will insist. Not only does a relation require, but it also prerequires the reality and distinction of the extremes: but the divine relations do not suppose real and really distinct extremes: therefore they are not real.

I distinguish the major. A created relation prerequires the reality and real distinction of the extremes, because it does not arise except from the foundation and term being posited, I concede: an uncreated and divine relation so requires really distinct extremes, I deny. For since this relation is constitutive and distinctive of the divine Person, because it is terminative of the communication of the divine Essence, therefore it does not suppose, but effects the distinction of the extremes.

You will say 2. Real relations are affirmed to be in God for this reason, because the divine Persons are denominated by relative names: but from that it is not lawful to gather that there are in them some real relations: therefore, etc. The major is evident from the proofs of the Conclusion; the minor is proved: for God is no less truly really called Lord, Creator, etc. than the first person is called Father: but from the fact that God is called by the relative name of Lord, it does not follow that there is in him a real relation, such as intervenes between lord and servant among creatures: therefore from the fact that the first person is called Father, it is not lawful to conclude that it is the same relation which is between Father and Son among creatures.

I deny the minor, and to its proof I distinguish the major: God is said to be Lord as really as the first person is said to be Father, with the reality of termination, because namely the relation of Lordship is terminated at creatures really existing, just as, proportion being kept, the relation of Paternity is terminated at the Son really existing, I concede: as really intrinsically, or through an intrinsic relative form, I deny. For the relation of Lord arises only from the extrinsic, and belongs to God already constituted on every side in his being both essential and personal: therefore it is said to be a relation coming to him from the extrinsic, namely from the production of the creature; but the relation of Paternity belongs to him from the intrinsic, not only because it flows from the essence with which it is really the same, and from which it is distinguished only formally, but also because together with the divine Essence it concurs to the intrinsic constitution of the divine person in his personal being.

You will say 3. Boethius, book 1. De Trinit., about the middle, having enumerated all the categories, says: These, when anyone turns the predication to the divine, all things that can be predicated are changed: but being toward something cannot be predicated at all. Therefore from that it follows that relation, which is the category toward another, does not really belong to God, as substance does, and those things which beyond substance are signified by way of quantity, or quality, or action, etc.

I answer. Boethius means that relations are not predicated of the Divinity in the same way as the other categories are enunciated, but in an altogether different way: for when in the next following book he had inquired whether the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit are substantially predicated of the Divinity: after the middle of the book he concludes thus:

From these things therefore we understand that the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit are not said substantially of the Divinity itself, but in a certain other way: For if it were substantially predicated of each one, it would also be said singularly of all: But now it is manifest that it is said toward something; for the Father too is the Father of someone.

Boethius therefore confesses that relations are predicated and said of God as toward something; which is a certain other mode of predication distinct from the predication of substance, and of the other categories, which are verified of the individual persons. For the individual persons are said to exist per se, to be equal, similar, etc., but the individual persons are not said to be Father, etc.

Second conclusion. — The relations of origin constitutive of the divine Persons are truly real according to being toward something. It is proved from all those things by which it has already been intimated that the divine relations are constitutive of the persons, insofar as they are relations; for the relations of origin are constitutive of the divine persons insofar as they are real, and according to the proper notion by which they are relations: but they are proper relations according to being toward another: therefore they are also relations, and constitutive, according to their being toward something. The major is evident from what has been said. The minor is proved: with being toward something set aside from a relation, nothing further remains through which one thing is understood to be referred to another: but with the notion of referring one thing to another removed from a relation, the relation no longer remains: therefore, with being toward something set aside, there will no longer be a true relation.

It is confirmed. The divine relations constitute the persons in the same way in which they distinguish them: but they distinguish them only according to being toward. Proof: they do not distinguish except insofar as they are opposed to each other only according to being toward; not indeed according to being in, which is common to them with the absolute forms: therefore, etc.

Second: Paternity according to the most formal notion of Paternity is a relation to the Son: therefore relation according to the most formal notion of relation, or according to being toward another, is a real entity. The major is clear: for if Paternity according to its most formal notion were not a real entity, God would not be truly and properly Father, but only through a certain comparison of the human intellect; and therefore he would be less properly Father and Son than a man generating and begotten, who really are Father and Son. The minor is evident from what has been said, by which we proved with very many authorities of the holy Fathers that the proper notion of Paternity is wholly toward the Son, just as the whole notion of the Son is toward the Father. And it is proved moreover from the Council of Worms in the profession of faith, where, repeating the words of the Council of Toledo 11 saying: In the relative names of the persons the Father is referred to the Son, and the Son to the Father, and the Holy Spirit to both, etc.; it subjoins: That which the Father is, he is not to himself but to the Son; and that which the Son is, he is not to himself but to the Father. With this agrees St. Bernard in Epist. 192. ad Innocentium, where he says: Not that which he is to himself, but that which he is to the Son, is designated by the name of Father. Therefore the true notion of relation is toward another.

Third, finally: if relation according to being toward another were not of itself properly real, but only from the fact that the substance of God is real, or his love and intellection; it would follow that the eternal divine relations are not real in a more perfect and truer way than the relations are real which belong to God from time, by which he is really denominated Lord and Creator; for these are likewise founded in the operations of the divine intellect and will; for God in time is really and properly called Lord from the real subjection of creatures, the foundation of the volition and command being supposed, by which God from eternity pre-defined to produce and govern creatures: but this consequent is absurd; otherwise the relations of origin would be only extrinsic denominations; and so they would not be real and intrinsic constitutive principles of the divine Persons: therefore, etc.

You will object. Being toward something formally regards only the term: but formally regarding the term is not some real notion: therefore being toward something is not real. The major is clear. The minor is proved: that is not per se real which is common to real being and being of reason: but regarding the term is something common to a real relation and a relation of reason: for each refers the foundation to the term: therefore, etc.

I deny the minor, and to its proof I deny the minor: for a relation of reason truly does not regard the term, but is conceived after the manner of those relations which regard the term, just as any being of reason is not a being, but is conceived after the manner of a being. Then, just as being in something is said of a real relation and of a relation of reason, so too is being toward another; for relations of reason are conceived as much after the manner of accidents inhering in subjects as they are conceived to be toward another: therefore if from the fact that being toward a term is said of a real relation and of a relation of reason it would follow that the relation is not real insofar as it is toward something, it would also not have to be called real insofar as it is in something, and so the relation would be real according to no notion of itself; which is absurd.

You will say 2. The whole reality of any being is in it itself: therefore it can really be real only according to being in, not indeed according to another being opposed to this, such as is being toward.

I distinguish the major. That the whole reality of an absolute being is to be in itself, and toward itself, I concede: of a relative being, I deny. Indeed, from the definition of relatives their whole being is toward another; for Aristotle says in defining relation: Things are relative to something for which this very being is to be related to something, that is, to have a habitude toward another. The rest that could be objected is drawn from Philosophy, and we have already solved it in our Academical Philosophy by proving that relations are real beings; therefore let it be

Third conclusion. — Truly in God there are relations of identity, equality, and likeness: and they are real. This conclusion has two parts. Of these the first is proved: In God there are relations of identity, equality, and likeness, in which there is perfect identity, equality, and likeness: but that most perfectly obtains among the divine Persons. — For first, among them there is the highest essential Identity: both because the same essence is numerically one in the three persons: and because the divine Essence, by reason of its infinity, identifies with itself the constitutive relations of the divine Persons, whence it comes about that although there are three persons, nevertheless there is one only God; therefore among them there is the highest and perfect identity. Second, there is also an all-around Equality among the divine Persons, as is gathered from that passage ad Philippens. 2, where Paul says of the divine Word: He did not think it robbery to be equal to God, that is, he did not tyrannically, nor by robbery, usurp the equality of God, but it was connatural to him. This divine equality, moreover, is attended to chiefly in three things, namely, in the infinite magnitude of the perfections, in the eternal immutability of existence, and in the inexhaustible fecundity of power, as St. Fulgentius sets out in the book De Fide ad Petrum, chap. 1, saying:

That none of these, namely of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit, is outside any one of them, because no one of them either precedes in eternity, or exceeds in magnitude, or surpasses in power: because neither to the Son, nor to the Holy Spirit is the Father anterior or greater, nor can the Son's eternity and immensity, as it were anterior or greater, naturally precede or exceed the immensity and eternity of the Holy Spirit.

The Council of Toledo 6 likewise agrees, in the profession of faith before the middle: In this Trinity, he says, there is such unity of substance that it lacks plurality, and holds equality, nor does it remain less in each one than in all: nor greater in all than in each person. It is likewise confirmed from the Creed of St. Athanasius saying: In this Trinity nothing is earlier or later, nothing greater or less, but all three persons are coeternal with one another, and coequal. — Third, finally, this same thing is evident regarding Likeness: for among the divine Persons there is a perfect assimilation, by reason of the attributes and divine perfections, in which those divine Persons are said to be altogether alike: whence Athanasius in the Creed: As the Father is, such is the Son, such is the Holy Spirit: hence in the first oration Contra Arianos he says: The Son inasmuch as He is the Word, and Wisdom of the Father, has all things that are the Father's, eternity, immutability, and in all things and in all respects the same likeness. The Holy Spirit also has this same likeness, not indeed by the most formal force of His procession as the Son does, but by reason of the divine nature communicated to Himself; wherefore some Fathers went so far as to call the Holy Spirit the form, and image, and Word of the Son, as will appear in the following Disputation. — St. Hilary proves this divine likeness in book 3 De Trinit. from that passage of Genesis let us make man, etc. He who says, he remarks, let us make man to our image, and likeness, shows that they are mutually like themselves in this, that he speaks of our likeness.

Richard of St. Victor proves it, however, in book 3 De Trinitate chap. 7, from the perfect charity that is among the divine Persons:

The fullness of Charity requires, he says, that each be supremely loved by the other, and consequently, according to the aforesaid norm of discernment, each be supremely lovable. But where each is equally to be loved, it is necessary that each be equally perfect: it is necessary, therefore, that each be equally powerful, equally wise, equally good, equally blessed, etc.

Whatever could be objected against this truth has already been resolved from what has been said about the consubstantiality and equality of the divine Persons.

Thus the second part is proved. Namely, that those relations of identity, equality, and likeness are truly real, as the Doctor affirms in 1. dist. 31. and elsewhere.

Proof 1. A real relation is one that belongs to its extremes, setting aside the work of the intellect: but such are the aforesaid relations: therefore they are real. The major is evident. The minor is proved from the holy Fathers and Councils, especially Nicaea, Toledo 1., Constantinople 1., in which the divine Son is said to be of the same essence with the Father, and equal to Him in all things, and perfectly like Him.

It is confirmed. On the side of the thing the divine Son has all things required on the part of the foundation for the relations of identity, equality, and likeness with the Father: therefore truly also on the side of the thing He has those notions. The consequence is evident; for in these intrinsically adventitious relations, once a sufficient foundation and term are posited, the relation necessarily results. The antecedent is proved, for from Aristotle book 5 Metaphysicorum chap. 5: Those things are the same whose substance is one; like, however, those whose quality is one; equal, moreover, those whose quantity is one; but on the side of the thing in the Father and the Son there is one substance, namely the divine nature; likewise one quality, namely the attributal and modal perfections; finally one quantity, not of bulk, but of worth, namely the Divinity, Majesty, and Sublimity: therefore likewise in them there are on the side of the thing the relations of identity, equality, and likeness.

Second, equality and likeness are real relations in creatures: therefore much more so in God. The antecedent is evident: the consequence is proved: Equality and likeness are much more perfectly in divine things than in creatures: therefore it will stand much more strongly that they are real in God. The antecedent is of St. Augustine himself lib. 3. De Trinitate, cap. 4. and 5., where he proves the supreme equality of the persons from their supreme simplicity, and in chapter 10, speaking of the Son insofar as He is the image, he says: To whom there is already such congruence, and first equality, and first likeness, disagreeing in nothing, and in no way unequal, and in no part dissimilar, but corresponding identically to him whose image He is.

Third, the cited Doctor proves in number 2.: Those relations are real to which all the conditions desired for a real relation belong, namely: first, that the extremes be real: second, that they be really distinguished: third, that the relation result from the nature of the thing, or of the extremes, and so without any comparison of the intellect: but those three conditions truly fit the aforesaid relations. For first, the essence and divine perfections, which are the foundations of the identity, equality, and likeness of the Persons, are truly real: second, the Persons themselves, between whom those relations obtain, are really existing, really distinct from one another: third, finally, no comparison of the intellect is needed for those divine Persons to be the same, equal, and like: therefore truly those three conditions necessary for a real relation belong to the aforesaid relations.

The Thomists reply: Besides the three assigned conditions, a fourth is required, namely that there be a foundation by which it is really distinguished in each extreme: this, however, does not occur in divine things; for the essence is the same, and the perfections are the same in number in the three adorable Persons; and so on account of the lack of this condition the aforesaid relations cannot be real in God.

On the contrary 1. Paternity and Filiation in creatures are real relations: but the foundation of Paternity is not really distinguished from the foundation of Filiation; for the foundation of Paternity is active generation, and the foundation of Filiation is passive generation: but action and passion are not really distinguished according to the Philosopher, 3. Physic., as the Thomists themselves freely admit: therefore the foundation of created Paternity is not really distinguished from the foundation of Filiation; and so, for relations to be real, a real distinction of the foundations is not necessary. Second, if the same numerically one quantity or quality were constituted in diverse subjects, there would obtain between those subjects the relation of equality and likeness: but in such a case the foundation would not be really distinct in those extremes; therefore the unity and identity of the essence and divine perfections in the divine Persons does not hinder there being in them real identity, equality, and likeness.

They reply 2. That in that case equality and likeness would not arise between those subjects, because, they say, a form placed in two subjects does not render those two such; for to have a duality the forms must be multiplied. — But the reply is shown to be false by two instances: for first, in the eternal Father and in the Son there is one only active spiration, and yet the Father and the Son are two spirators: likewise in the three Persons of the same most holy Trinity there is one only eternity, and yet St. Athanasius teaches in the Creed that those three are coeternal: therefore whiteness, e.g., placed in two subjects will truly make two white things, and so two like things, although the form is one in number; and consequently for the reality of the relation a real distinction of the foundation in the extremes is not necessary, but it is enough that the extremes themselves be really distinct.

They reply 3. If the foundation were not multiplied, it would follow that the same thing would be related to itself: for the foundation is that which is related.

I deny the consequence. For the foundation is indeed the reason of relating, but not that which is related; for the extremes are the things which are related, and these are the divine persons really distinct from one another.

The aforesaid reasons are confirmed: the aforesaid relations are founded in unity: therefore the greater the unity of essence, perfection, and magnitude, the more excellent will be the identity, equality, and likeness, and consequently if the relation of identity arises between two substances distinct in number or in species, much more will it arise between extremes in which there will be one substance in number. Moreover

You will say 1. If equality and the other relations were real in divine things, it would follow that there are given in God more real relations than four: but the consequence seems false, and against the common opinion of the theologians: therefore also the antecedent. The consequence of the major is evident, for the relations of identity, equality, and likeness are formally distinguished from the relations of origin: therefore truly there would be in God more relations than four. Indeed the Doctor himself constitutes two relations of likeness, two of equality, and two of identity in each divine Person, of which one is referred to one, and the other to the other Person; from which result 18. real relations, to which if you add the four relations of origin, there will be in God twenty-two real relations. Again, since all divine perfections are distinguished from the nature of the thing, and are all infinite intensively, the consequence will be that there are as many relations of equality and likeness as there are attributes, which certainly would produce an immense number of relations in divine things. — The Doctor denies the minor ibid. n. 7. It can be conceded, he says, that as many perfections as there are in God simpliciter, so many habitudes there are also, and so many equalities: yet just as all those are simpliciter one thing, so too the equalities according to being are simpliciter one thing. Therefore it does not imply a contradiction that in God there be many relative formalities, just as there are many absolute ones.

You will say 2. Formalities and entities in divine things are not to be multiplied without any urgent necessity: but there seems to be no necessity of multiplying so many relative entities; for the divine Persons can be said by themselves to be mutually equal, the same, and like; for by this nothing else can be said to be signified than that they have the same essence and perfection, or that one does not have another essence, nor a greater or lesser perfection than the other: therefore for this those positive entities are superfluous.

I deny the minor, and to its proof I say that since divine equality, identity, and likeness are positive, those denominations also must be made through something positive; and so through some positive formality: but to have the same essence and perfection, or not to have another essence and perfection, is not formally something positive, but purely negative; and therefore this does not suffice for that denomination of identity, equality, and likeness; but for this there is required some entity, or relative formality, distinguished from the essence and attributes, and from the relations of origin themselves, formally or at least modally.

You will say 3. Equality is a relation simpliciter simplex: but a relation in divine things is not such: therefore equality is not a relation.

He distinguishes the major. The Doctor in 1. dist. 19. qu. 1. n. 8.: Equality taken fundamentally is a perfection simpliciter simplex, because it presupposes the perfect and in every way infinite nature in the Persons, I concede: equality taken formally, insofar as namely it is a relative formality by which the divine Persons are referred to one another, is a perfection simpliciter, I deny; or, as the Doctor speaks ibid.:

I say that a perfection simpliciter, that is, which formally could be infinite, elicits nothing but something that can be essential in divine things, and toward itself, and such is in some way pre-understood to the relations of origin, such as wisdom, goodness, etc.; equality, however, is not pre-understood to the relations of origin, nor can it be toward itself: for the Father is not equal to Himself, but to the Son, and therefore equality in this way does not say a perfection simpliciter; it says, however, a perfection which in every nature, compared to something of the same nature, is better than its opposite, because its opposite of necessity says imperfection, for there is no inequality in the same nature unless one individual has that nature imperfectly. Nor does it hinder that in dist. 26. he affirms that equality formally says perfection, for he does not say this from his own opinion, but according to the mind of others, who from the fact that the persons were said to be constituted by something absolute inferred that it followed that there was some perfection in one person which was not in another; which inference the Doctor shows to be null, saying that they would conclude better that the relation did not constitute the person. For it seems more probable, he says, that a relation can be a perfection, than that it is a hypostatic property, etc., supply, in the opinion of the one arguing.

Note 1. It is the common opinion of the theologians that four personal relations of origin are to be admitted, namely paternity, filiation, passive spiration, and active spiration. For these alone are the relations which are founded on the divine processions considered in the manner of action and passion: for there are only two real processions, as we proved above, namely the generation of the Word and the procession of the Holy Spirit. These can be considered in two ways, namely actively or passively; generation taken actively is called paternity, but taken passively it is named filiation. Similarly, the procession of the Holy Spirit can be viewed actively or passively: in the former way it is called active spiration, which is in the Father and the Son, and through which they are distinguished from the Holy Spirit; in the latter way, however, it is called passive spiration.

Note 2. Almost all theologians also agree that paternity is truly constitutive of the first divine person, filiation of the second, and passive spiration of the third; but there is no slight difficulty concerning active spiration, namely whether it also constitutes some distinct divine person: for if it is not constitutive of any person, why does it hold a place among the constitutive personal relations? But if it is, then there will be not only three, but truly four divine Persons; and so the mystery of the divine Trinity utterly collapses. To avoid these reefs of error, some theologians judge with Gregory in 1. dist. 26. that active spiration is to be banished from the relations of origin; to whom our Baro partly subscribes in Apologia 3, action 3. The Thomists indeed do not reject it, but contend that it is only virtually distinct from paternity and filiation. Durandus, however, contends that it is really distinguished from paternity and filiation. But the Subtle Doctor, in Quodlibet 5, affirms that spiration is indeed real, yet is diverse from paternity and filiation not really, but only formally and in act.

Note 3. It is most certain that the Father and the Son are really distinguished from the Holy Spirit, and that the Holy Spirit is likewise distinguished from them: but by what power this distinction is made, not all agree. For some will that this distinction is to be traced back to paternity and filiation, so that for this purpose active spiration is superfluous. On the contrary, others affirm that this real distinction is to be gathered from nothing other than active spiration. Hence two things especially come to be established in the present Question: first, that active spiration is a real relation necessary for the distinction of the persons: second, that it is distinguished from paternity and filiation not really nor only virtually, but formally.

First conclusion. — Active spiration is a real relation, and one necessary for gathering the complete distinction of the divine persons.

Proof of the conclusion: Between a principle and a term really proceeding from the principle, a real relation intervenes, especially when the proceeding term is of the same nature as its principle: but the Father and the Son are one principle, from which the Holy Spirit really proceeds, who is of the same nature as the Father and the Son: therefore the Father and the Son regard the Holy Spirit with a real and mutual relation. I subsume: but they do not so regard him through paternity and filiation: therefore they must regard him through another relation; and so through active spiration.

The major of the syllogism is evident; for there is no stronger reason why a mutual real relation of principle and proceeding term, namely paternity and filiation, should intervene between the first and the second Person, than between the Holy Spirit and the Father and the Son, from whom he proceeds as a term from a principle.

The inference, moreover, is proved from St. Augustine, Serm. 38. De Tempore, where he says:

The very relation of the Holy Spirit cannot be converted by a reciprocal term in the way that Father and Son can, for the Father is called Father of the Son, and the Son is called Son of the Father, but the Holy Spirit is called uniformly with respect to the Father and the Son, because he is the Spirit of the Father and the Son; for we say that the Holy Spirit is the Spirit of the Father... But we do not conversely say that the Father is of the Holy Spirit, lest the Holy Spirit be understood as his Son; likewise we say that the Holy Spirit is the Spirit of the Son, but we do not say that the Son is of the Holy Spirit, lest the Holy Spirit be understood as his Father:

therefore that mutual relation is not by reason of paternity and filiation, and so another relation is to be admitted.

— It is confirmed from the same book 5. De Trinitate, cap. 11., where he proves that between the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit there is a mutual relation, not under the notion of Spirit, but under the notion of Gift: for he says:

That relation itself does not appear from this name, namely Holy Spirit, but it appears when it is said gift of God; for it is the Gift of the Father and of the Son, because it proceeds both from the Father, and the Apostle says: he who does not have the Spirit of Christ, this one is not his... Therefore when we say gift of the giver and giver of the gift, we say both relatively to each other:

therefore he judges that between the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit there is a mutual relation: but the Father and the Son are not mutually referred to the Holy Spirit through the relation of paternity and filiation, but under the notion of gift, as he himself teaches in cap. 12., where he proves that the relation of the Holy Spirit has as its correlative neither the relation of the Father nor the relation of the Son.

When we say, he says, gift of the Father and of the Son, we cannot indeed say Father of the gift, or Son of the gift; but so that these may answer one another, we say gift of the giver and giver of the gift, because here a customary word could be found, there it could not; we say therefore relatively Father, and the same is said relatively principle, and if perhaps anything else: but the Father is said so with respect to the Son, the principle of things with respect to all things which are from him;

therefore St. Augustine judges that the Father and the Son are truly referred to the Holy Spirit, not through the relation of paternity and filiation, but through the relation of principle: but this relation is called active spiration: therefore this is truly real.

This very point Bessarion lucidly proved from the holy Fathers in the Council of Florence, Oratione pro unione, cap. 6., where, after he had urged that between the Son and the Holy Spirit there is a mutual relation, as of cause to caused and of caused to cause, employing after the Greek manner the name of cause for principle, he proves from this that that relation is not made through filiation: whence he concludes that since the Son as Son is not referred to the Spirit, for he is not called Son of the Spirit, it remains that he be referred to the Spirit as spirating, since the Spirit is also referred to the Son as Spirit; for the Spirit corresponds to the Spirator, and passive spiration corresponds to active spiration; moreover, the Spirit is called both the Spirit of the Son in many places of Sacred Scripture, and his spiration; for this Spirit (as the holy Athanasius says) is the spiration of the Son; since therefore the Spirit is referred to the Son both as spiration and as Spirit, the Son also is referred to the Spirit as spirating. In which he concludes two things: first, that between the Son and the Spirit there is a mutual relation. Second, that this relation on the part of the Son is not filiation, but active spiration, and consequently, that since the Son is really referred to the Holy Spirit, active spiration must necessarily be real.

You will say 1. Nothing is to be asserted in the mystery of the Trinity unless it is supported either by Sacred Scripture or by the oracles of the Councils or of the holy Fathers: but there is no mention of active spiration among the holy Fathers; indeed Albinus Flavius, lib. 1. De Trinit., c. 5., says that the relation of the Holy Spirit to the Father and the Son is not reciprocal, that is, mutual: therefore this active spiration is not to be asserted.

I deny the minor: for although the holy Fathers did not call the relation between the Father and the Son active spiration, they nevertheless sufficiently designated it by establishing a mutual relation among all the Persons, as we asserted above not only from St. Augustine, but also as is evident from the 11th Council of Toledo, saying: They suggest number by this alone, that they are mutually related; and Nazianz. Orat. 37.: The manifestation, he says, so to speak, and the mutual difference of their relation also produced for them diverse names. There is therefore among those divine Persons a mutual real relation: but this, on the part of the Father and the Son, is not paternity and filiation with respect to the Holy Spirit: therefore the holy Fathers sufficiently affirm that another is to be admitted, namely active spiration, which the Council of Florence tacitly approved, as we said above; indeed the Council of Lyons under Gregory X had also indicated it, in its single chapter De summa Trinitate, saying not only that the Father and the Son produce the Holy Spirit by one spiration, but also that they are One principle of the Holy Spirit; and so by the same reason they have a relation to the Holy Spirit by which they are his principle: but according to the Council they are his principle through active spiration, and consequently in the mind of the Council they are referred to him through active spiration.

To Albinus Flavius, I answer that he indeed wills that the Father and the Son are not referred to the Holy Spirit by a mutual relation under the notion of Father and of Son, but only under the notion of principle, as we said above from St. Augustine.

You will say 2. The holy Fathers assign only three personal relations. Moreover, the Lateran Council in the chapter Damnamus excludes a real quaternity in the divine: but if active spiration were real, there would truly be a quaternity of real relations in the divine: therefore etc. Finally, St. John Damascene, lib. 1. De Fide, cap. 10. and 11., discourses copiously on the divine relations: but he makes no mention at all of active spiration: therefore he judges that it is not to be admitted.

I answer 1. The holy Fathers assigned only three personal properties really distinct for this reason, because they were treating only of the relations constitutive of the persons and really distinct; whence, since active spiration constitutes no Person nor is really distinguished from paternity and filiation, therefore there was no discussion of it among them.

To the Lateran Council I say that it excludes a quaternity in the divine only insofar as a quaternity of Persons would be inferred from it: but that is not inferred from the admitted active spiration, for this is not constitutive of a divine Person: therefore the Council does not exclude it. Add that the Council excludes a quaternity of things really distinct, as thing from thing: but active spiration is not so distinguished from paternity and filiation, as we shall immediately prove: therefore it does not fight against us.

To St. Damascene I answer that from a negative authority nothing is certainly gathered, especially when the contrary may be inferred: but S. Damascene supplies in the same cap. 11. a sufficient foundation for asserting the real relation of active spiration, when about the middle he says: God is understood in the properties alone of Paternity, Filiation, and Procession according to cause and the causal: by which he denotes that the reciprocation of the producing principle and the produced term between the Holy Spirit and the Father and the Son is mutual: but this cannot be paternity and filiation: therefore it is active spiration.

You will say 3. The relation of principle in God is not always real, for truly God is the principle of creatures, and yet he does not have a real relation to them: therefore although the Father and the Son are the principle of the Holy Spirit, it does not follow from this that they have a real relation of active spiration.

I distinguish the antecedent: when the producing principle and the produced term are of a diverse order and a diverse nature, I concede: when they are of the same, I deny. But the relation of the Creator to created things is to things of another order and nature, and comes to God only in time: whereas active spiration is toward a term of the same order and nature, and it befits God from eternity, and therefore it is real.

You will say 4. Active spiration presupposes the Father and the Son as constituted: therefore if it is real, it will come to them only by resultance and in the manner of an accident: but this is unbecoming to God: therefore etc.

I deny the minor: for this resultance is not made according to reality, but according to formality, nor does it come from any extrinsic action, as created relations do, but from the intrinsic, and from the fecundity of the divine will: as therefore it is not repugnant that the attributes should result from the essence, distinct from it not really but only formally, so also it is not repugnant that that active spiration should result from the Father and the Son.

Second conclusion. — Active spiration is distinguished from paternity and filiation not really, but formally and in act.

This is the opinion of almost all theologians as to the first part, and Proof 1. From the Lateran Council, cap. Damnamus, where the opinion of Abbot Joachim is proscribed, who said that a quaternity is to be admitted in God, because the essence was really distinct from the Persons really also distinct from one another; and the Council established that it is only a Trinity and not a quaternity for this reason alone, because each of the three Persons is that thing, namely the substance, essence, or nature; from which one may argue thus: the Council established that there is no quaternity of things in the divine: but if active spiration were really distinguished from paternity and filiation, there would be a quaternity of things in the divine; therefore in the mind of the Council it is not so distinguished. It is confirmed, for the Council in the same place especially proscribes a quaternity of Persons: but if spiration were really distinguished, there would be a quaternity of Persons, for that relation would be per se subsistent, and so would be a supposit, and consequently would be a Person, because every supposit of intellectual nature is a person.

Secondly, from the holy Fathers and the very many Councils already often praised by us, but especially from St. Anselm, book De Spiritu sancto: in the divine all things are one, except where the opposition of relation stands in the way, whether it be relative opposition, as the Thomists will, or disparate, as will appear below, in treating of the distinction of the Holy Spirit from the Son: but between paternity and active spiration there is no relative opposition, because the one is not produced by the other; nor is it between producing principle and produced term; nor is it even disparate, because for this it is required that it be constitutive of a Person, but active spiration does not constitute a Person: therefore it says no opposition with paternity and filiation, and so is not really distinguished from them.

Thirdly and finally, in the divine that which does not proceed from another is not really distinguished from it: but active spiration does not proceed from paternity and filiation: therefore it is not really distinguished from them. The minor is evident, for there are only two divine processions. The major is also evident; for there are only three indications of real distinction, namely those of which one is the producer and the other the produced, those of which one can exist while the other does not exist, and those which can in-exist in subjects really distinct; but the two latter cannot be in the divine: therefore only the first indication of distinction is admitted there: whence rightly John the theologian in the Council of Florence, sess. 18.: Only the relation, he says, which we above named the principal habitude, among all Doctors, both Greek and Latin, multiplies persons by divine procession.

The second part is sufficiently gathered from what has been said, for active spiration is a real relation: but it is not the same formally with paternity and filiation, nor is it really distinguished from them: therefore it is at least formally distinguished. The major is clear from the first Conclusion: the minor also is clear, as to the second part, from what was just said.

Therefore its first part is proved: those relations are distinguished at least formally which have per se distinct terms and are the notions from which the distinction and diversity of the persons is gathered; but such is active spiration with respect to paternity and filiation, since paternity per se regards the Son, and filiation the Father, but active spiration regards the Holy Spirit, and is the reason why the Father and the Son are distinguished from the Holy Spirit. Moreover, it itself effects the mutual relation between the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, which paternity does not effect, nor filiation, as was proved in the preceding Conclusion: therefore active spiration is at least formally distinguished from paternity and filiation. Moreover, a disparate relation is not the same formally with a directly opposed relation: but paternity and filiation are disparate relations only with respect to passive spiration, whereas active spiration is directly opposed to it: therefore this is at least formally distinguished from paternity and filiation. Finally, if active spiration were formally the same as paternity, it would be as true to say that the Father produces the Son by spirating as by generating; and so the Word could as well be called Spirit as Son: but the consequent is absurd: therefore etc. The sequel is evident; for where there is no distinction in the thing, there cannot be a diversity of the real predicates of the thing itself; and so if paternity and active spiration are in no way distinguished a parte rei, whatever is affirmed of the one can also be affirmed of the other.

You will say 1. Just as there is a disparate opposition between filiation and passive spiration, so likewise there is between filiation and active spiration: but the former opposition suffices to distinguish filiation really from passive spiration: therefore the latter will also suffice to distinguish it from active spiration, and so they will be distinguished not only formally, but also really.

I answer to the major that the Son is not for this reason alone really distinguished from the Holy Spirit under the formal notion of Son, because filiation is a relation opposed disparately to passive spiration, but chiefly because passive spiration is altogether incompossible with filiation in the same supposit; for if filiation and passive spiration were in the same supposit of the Son, it would follow that he would be produced, namely by generation from the intellect and by spiration from the will: but that very thing does not follow from active spiration and filiation; for although the Son spirates and produces the Holy Spirit, he does not on that account cease to be the Son.

You will say 2. As being generated and being spirated stand, so stand generating and spirating: but being generated and being spirated are really distinguished and produce really distinct relations: therefore generating and spirating are also really distinguished, and produce really distinct relations.

I deny the major, for being generated and being spirated are opposed at least through the mediation of active spiration, and constitute diverse Persons; but generating and spirating are not properly opposed; therefore being generated and being spirated are really distinguished, but not so generating and spirating.

You will insist. As generating stands to being generated, so spirating stands to being spirated: therefore by permuted proportion, as generating stands to spirating, so being generated stands to being spirated: but being generated and being spirated are really distinguished: therefore generating and spirating will also be really distinguished. The consequence is clear; because there is no greater reason for distinction in the one pair of extremes than in the other.

I deny the consequence: for although permuted proportion has force of inference in quantity, in other things it nevertheless proves nothing; indeed it appears false by many examples. For instance: as fire stands to heat, so water stands to cold: therefore by permuted proportion, as heat stands to cold, so fire stands to water: but heat and cold can be together in the same subject in remiss degrees; therefore water and fire will also be able to be together in the same matter according to some of their degrees; which consequence is altogether false. The reason, therefore, of the disparity is that the passive being-spirated, that is, the Holy Spirit, really proceeds from the active being-generated, which is the produced Son himself; and therefore it is necessarily distinguished from it, as from a producing principle: but the spirative does not proceed from active generation as from a producing principle, and so they do not keep the same permuted proportion.

Note 1. From the Doctor, q. 5 of the Quodlibet, the relations of origin can be considered in two ways, namely either really and identically, insofar as they are really the same as the divine essence, and also with the Persons whom they constitute together with that essence: or formally, and according to their own proper relative entity, that is, insofar as they are formally distinguished from the divine essence, and are like hypostatic forms determining it to the constitution of the divine Persons. In the former way it is certain that they are really infinitely perfect, for thus they are one and the same thing with the Divinity itself, whose infinite perfection they imbibe in themselves: but the difficulty is whether these same relations, considered in the latter way, import some perfection and infinity; so that just as the Attributes add to the divine essence some absolute perfection formally distinct from the perfection of the essence itself, so likewise the relations of origin, besides the absolute perfection of the essence which they really include, add to it some relative perfection also formally distinct from its essential perfection.

Note 2. From the same, ibid., num. 27., real being, as such, is first divided into quantified being and non-quantified being. Then quantified being into finite and infinite being: afterwards finite being into the ten Categories. By quantified being he understands a perfect being, that is, one measured by the quantity of perfection: by non-quantified being, on the other hand, he understands a being not having this perfection. Moreover, it must be noted that a threefold perfection can be distinguished: the first is moral, which in God is absolute and unique, namely divine Holiness, of which there is no question here. The second is transcendental, or entitative, which is the integrity of a thing consisting of all the things that are required for its constitution in the notion of such a being; and this belongs to absolutely every being. The third is the perfection of virtue, or qualifying, which is the gradual perfection of each nature, according to which a nature is said to be more, or less, or equally perfect. All agree that the divine relations are perfect with that transcendental perfection, since they have whatever can be desired for the completion of the divine hypostatic relation: but they do not so agree that they are perfect with a qualifying perfection, by which they could be said to perfect the divine essence relatively, just as the attributes perfect it absolutely.

Note 3. From the same, ibid., the infinite is twofold, namely intensive and extensive. The extensive infinite is that which extends to more things in number to infinity, such as is the infinite number of possible creatures. The intensive infinite is described by the same in two ways: first indeed absolutely, so that the infinite is that to which nothing of entity and perfection is lacking, in the way in which it is possible for it to have these in some one thing, namely either formally, or really and identically, or eminently, in which way infinity can be described: The most simple and most eminent complex of all entity and of every perfection that can be thought of: comparatively, however, the infinite can be described: That which exceeds any finite being beyond every determinate or determinable proportion of being: thus, says the Doctor, the infinite is distinguished from any finite being however perfect; for there is no finite being that is not exceeded by another; for whiteness, v. g., is exceeded by knowledge threefold, knowledge by the intellective soul tenfold, this by the Angels a hundredfold; but God, who is infinite, exceeds every finite thing beyond every assignable proportion of entity and perfection. By the former description infinity requires that any lack of entity and perfection whatsoever be removed from the infinite being; since a being thus infinite must lack no perfection at all: by the latter there is removed from the infinite whatever higher thing by which it could be exceeded. These things having been thus premised, it must be resolved whether the divine relations, constitutive and distinctive of the Persons, are formally infinite perfections.

The single conclusion. — The relations of origin formally import no perfection, and they are neither finite nor infinite.

Thus the Subtle Doctor says in many places, but especially in 1. dist. 8. q. 3. n. 16., Whatever is said commonly of God and of the creature is indifferent to the finite and the infinite, speaking of essential things; or at least to the finite and the not-finite, speaking of anything whatsoever; because the divine relation is neither finite nor infinite. He has the same in q. 4. n. 23., where he says that if Paternity and Deity are conceived in the abstract, this predication: Deity is Paternity, cannot be true, Because, he says, one of them is not formally infinite, but only Deity is formally infinite. But he expressly embraces and proves this conclusion in q. 5 of the Quodlibet:

"Concerning the second Article," he says, "I hold this conclusion: Paternity is not formally infinite, and there are three reasons for this: the first reason is taken from the unity of infinite being: the second from its communicability: the third from its simplicity and incompossibility, since intensive infinite being is unique, incapable of being multiplied, and not restricted, but communicable, and incompossible with anything whatsoever."

He forms the first reason thus: There cannot be several really distinct things formally intensively infinite: but there are several relations of origin really distinct: therefore they are not formally intensively infinite. The minor is evident from what has been said: the major he proves by three means, namely from the comparison of those infinite things among themselves: secondly from the comparison between the finite and the infinite: thirdly from the comparison of those several infinite things to the intellect and the will. First indeed the intensive infinite really claims for itself every perfection simpliciter; but it does not really claim for itself that perfection which another being has, from which it is really distinguished: therefore there cannot be two infinities simpliciter really distinct from one another. From the second means he proves the major thus: among essentially subordinated beings one finally arrives at some being which sufficiently terminates the dependence of all finite beings, and which must necessarily be infinite and unique; infinite indeed, because it must have every perfection from itself, otherwise it would again depend on another, nor would the series of subordinated beings rest in it. Unique indeed, because there cannot be several total causes of the same order for the same effect. Finally, from the third means he proves the same major thus: infinite being is the adequate object of an infinite intellect and an infinite will: but there cannot be several adequate objects of the same intellect and will: therefore there cannot be several infinite beings really distinct.

He forms the second reason thus: Every perfection simpliciter is communicable: but everything intensively infinite is a perfection simpliciter: therefore every intensive infinite is communicable. He subsumes: but no Personal property is communicable, because it is the formal reason of existing incommunicably: therefore no Personal property is a perfection simpliciter; and so the relation of origin, which is a Personal property in the divine, is not a perfection simpliciter. The major of the first syllogism he proves from the description of perfection simpliciter, Which, according to St. Anselm, is in anything better itself than not-itself, that is, as the Doctor explains, which in anything, insofar as it is the supposit of being, is better itself than another incompossible with it in the same: but what is formally incommunicable is formally incompossible with another in the same supposit of being: therefore what is formally incommunicable is not a perfection simpliciter: but every perfection simpliciter in the divine is communicable: therefore the relations of origin, since they are incommunicable, are not perfections simpliciter.

From which I gather with the Doctor ibid. that no simpliciter simplex perfection is incompossible with another simpliciter simplex perfection; for if, v. g., A were incompossible with B, and they are simpliciter simplex perfections: therefore A is better than B, which is not-itself; and B, since it is also a perfection, will be better than A, which is not-itself, and consequently A would be more perfect and less perfect with respect to B, which is impossible.

Finally, the third reason of the Doctor is thus formed: A perfection simpliciter and infinite must be so really identified with every perfection compossible with it in the same supposit that one of them can be predicated of the other in the abstract: but the relation of origin is not so really identified with everything compossible with it in the same supposit: therefore the relation of origin is not a perfection simpliciter and infinite. The minor is evident: for although active spiration, v. g., is really identified with generation, as was proved above, nevertheless this proposition is not true, active generation is active spiration; otherwise it would be true that the divine Father would produce the Son equally by spirating as by generating; and thus the Son would proceed as much through the will as through the intellect, which is plainly false. The major he proves as to its first part, namely that a perfection simpliciter and infinite must be really identified with everything compossible with it in the same subject: both because nothing is essential in the divine that is not really the same as the divine Essence and as every essential thing, which comes from no other source than that every essential thing is a simpliciter simplex perfection: and because the infinite cannot be composed with another, otherwise it would be a part of it and would be exceeded by the whole; but excess is repugnant to the infinite; but if something compossible with it in the same supposit were not entirely really the same as it, they could not constitute one thing except through some composition: therefore every perfection simpliciter and infinite must be really the same as everything compossible with it in the same supposit. From these the second part is inferred, for those things which are really the same are truly predicated and affirmed of one another by reason of the identity of the predicate with the subject; for however much abstraction is made from the subject, since the identity of the predicate with the subject always remains, the affirmation of one of the other is also always true.

The Conclusion is confirmed from the absurdities which follow from the opposite opinion. First indeed, if the divine relations import some perfection, it follows that one person will contain some perfection which another does not contain; because each contains the personal relation proper to itself, not belonging to the other; for Filiation does not belong to the Father, nor Paternity to the Son, nor Paternity and Filiation to the Holy Spirit; and consequently the divine Persons will not be infinite, because each lacks some perfection: but to the infinitely perfect one no simpliciter simplex perfection should be lacking. Moreover, since in the Father and the Son there are two relations, namely in the Father Paternity and active Spiration, and likewise in the Son Filiation together with the same active Spiration; but in the Holy Spirit there is only one, namely passive Spiration; the consequence is that if the relations are simpliciter simplex perfections, the Father and the Son will be more perfect than the Holy Spirit, since they have one simpliciter simplex perfection to which the Holy Spirit has no corresponding one: but this is most absurd: therefore also that from which it follows.

The Doctor ibid. objects four difficulties against his doctrine set forth above. First, that which is not comprehensible by a created and finite intellect is infinite: but the relation of divine origin is not comprehensible by a finite intellect, according to that saying of Isaiac 18. Who shall declare his generation? Therefore it is formally infinite; for everything finite is comprehensible. Second, every action adequate to an infinite principle and term is formally infinite: but divine generation is an action adequate to an infinite formal principle, namely the infinite fecund memory, and to an infinite term which, namely the Son, and to a term by which, namely the communicated essence, both of which terms are infinite: therefore divine generation is formally infinite. Third, the reason of subsisting per se is the most perfect mode of being: but the relations of origin are reasons of subsisting per se: therefore they are most perfect. Fourth, that which is the same as the infinite essence cannot not be infinite; but the relations of origin are identified with the divine Essence: therefore they cannot not be infinite.

The Doctor answers the first by denying the major, for to the notion of the incomprehensibility of anything, its identification with the infinite suffices; for something cannot be comprehended unless its being is perfectly known; nor can this be so known unless all its modes and all its perfections are apprehended; but infinite perfections cannot be comprehended by a finite intellect; and so, for something to be incomprehensible, it suffices that it be identified with the infinite: but the relations of origin are identified with the infinite essence: therefore, although of themselves they are not formally infinite, they are not on that account comprehensible by a created and finite intellect.

To the second he answers that there is a twofold adequation, namely proportional and quantitative: and the proportional again twofold, namely intensive and extensive. Whence in form he distinguishes the minor: that divine generation is adequate to its principle and term with an extensive proportional adequation, which only requires that the origin, or action, be so from such a principle and to such a term that it cannot be from another and to another; nor can such a principle extend itself to eliciting another action, nor can such a term be produced by another action, he concedes: that it is adequate with a quantitative or intensive proportional adequation, namely one requiring the same perfection in the origin and the term as there is in the principle, he denies; for not even a created origin is thus adequate to its principle, which is always more perfect than its action and the produced term, because it depends less. From extensive proportional adequation, however, it does not follow that if the one is formally infinite, the other must likewise be infinite, because formal intensive infinity regards the quantity and the intensity of grades, not extension.

To the third he answers that to subsist per se is equivocal, and is taken in two ways: first indeed for a mode of existing per se and independently of anything else; and thus it is something absolute in the divine; and so it is a simpliciter simplex perfection, and is the absolute existence spoken of above. Second, for a mode of existing incommunicably to another, as to a supposit, and thus it is neither a simpliciter simplex perfection, nor secundum quid; but it is only in this latter way that the divine relations are called reasons of subsisting per se, and so they are neither perfect nor imperfect.

To the fourth he distinguishes the major: whatever is identified with the infinite is infinite, if it is capable of infinity, he concedes; otherwise he denies: but the relations of origin are not capable of infinity by reason of their incommunicability, and because of the reasons already assigned, and so the consequence is to be denied.

You will object 2. The divine relations are called perfections both by the Councils and by the Fathers: therefore they truly are such. The antecedent is proved from the Council of Constantinople, the Epistle to Damasus, We believe, it says, equal honor and dignity, and coeternal empire in three most perfect subsistences, or three perfect persons: likewise Justin, in the exposition of the faith on the Trinity, We preferred, he says, to set forth the knowledge of one Deity in three perfect subsistences. Likewise Cyril of Alexandria, in book 1 of the Thesaurus, c. 6.: He is perfect, he says, not only because He is God, but also because He is Father. Damascene subscribes, 1. Fidei c. 11., saying: In the properties of Paternity, Filiation, and Procession, we understand the difference according to cause and caused (or causal) and Personal perfection, that is, the mode of existing: the same, in lib. De Decretis primae institutionis: The hypostases, he says, and persons are the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, for each of them is a perfect hypostasis and a perfect person. Therefore truly the personal relations are perfections, and perfect.

I deny the antecedent, and to its proof I say that the holy Fathers and the Councils, in the cited texts and other similar ones, take the divine hypostasis and person, not in the abstract for the formal subsistence and personality, insofar as it is formally distinguished from the divine essence and concurs with it to constitute the divine person; but in the concrete for the divine Person itself, insofar as it simultaneously imports the essence and the personality, in which way truly the divine Persons are most perfect. That the sayings of the holy Fathers are not otherwise to be taken is sufficiently gathered from their cited words. To St. Damascene especially I answer that he does not will the personal properties to be formally perfections: for he teaches the contrary in c. 9., saying: All things which the Father has are the Son's, with this one exception, that He is not unbegotten; which word indeed indicates neither a difference of nature, nor dignity and authority, but a mode of existence. Therefore he names those properties perfections only as taken in the concrete, and for the persons.

You will object 3. The mystery of the Trinity, insofar as it is the Trinity, is supremely adorable, and therefore infinitely perfect: but the Trinity, insofar as it is the Trinity, connotes and imports the divine relations: therefore it is true that the relations import supreme and infinite perfection.

I distinguish the major: the mystery of the Trinity imports a supreme perfection holding from the part of the divine nature, which is communicated to the three Persons together with its attributes and perfections, I concede: a supreme perfection proceeding from the divine relations, which are the terms of the divine communication and fecundity, I deny: for the whole perfection which shines forth in adoring the mystery of the Trinity is to be traced back to the part of the divine nature, which supremely and infinitely constitutes and perfects the divine Persons; not however to the part of the relations, which are pure terms of divine fecundity and nature, adding no perfection to it, but only giving it a mode of subsisting incommunicably.

You will object 4. The subsistence of the divine Word, insofar as it is formally distinct from the essence, terminates the assumed human nature, and confers on it and also on its actions supreme perfection and dignity: therefore it itself has that perfection formally. The consequence is evident: for what the personality of the divine Word bestows on the human nature, it confers not in the notion of an efficient cause, but of a formal one; and so by itself as a form it signifies the actions and perfects the nature of the assumed man, and consequently it itself either is a perfection, or formally contains the supreme perfection. The antecedent is proved: for the assumed man, by reason of the personality communicated to him, is adorable, and that with the adoration of latria: therefore he contains a good, not of any kind, but infinite and supreme, because he merits supreme worship.

I deny the antecedent as to the second part, namely that the subsistence of the Word, insofar as it is formally distinguished from the divine Essence, confers supreme perfection on the humanity of Christ; and its proof I distinguish: the assumed man is adorable and supremely perfect by reason of the personality of the Word alone, I deny: by reason of the Deity hypostatically united to him, I concede: for Christ is therefore said to be supremely perfect and worthy of supreme worship, not precisely only because He subsists by the subsistence of the Word, but because by reason of this subsistence He is hypostatically united to the Deity, and is the Man-God.

By the name of notion the theologians intend nothing other than the proper manner of knowing one person. This manner is taken either for the formal concept, by which we specially know that divine Person, and discern him from another, concerning which St. Augustine lib. 5. De Trinit. c. 6. One notion is that by which the begetter is understood, another that by which the unbegotten is understood; or for the objective concept, that is, some special mark, and as it were a character holding from the side of the same person, by reason of which we know him as distinct from another, concerning which St. Basil lib. 2. Contra Eunomium: The properties, he says, αἱ δὲ ἡμέτεραι, as certain characters, as it were, and forms inspected in the substance, distinguish. Concerning the notions according to this latter acceptation, two things come to be resolved. 1. Whether some characters are to be admitted in the divine Persons, by which they appear distinct from one another. 2. That those characters are customarily numbered as five. Since, however, the principal difficulties which regard this matter have been resolved above from those things which we said concerning the properties and the personal relations; therefore it will involve and resolve the three aforesaid investigations

Note 1. Although one and the same real formality is at once a property, a relation, and a notion, nevertheless these differ from one another according to their various respects; for paternity, e.g., is called a Relation insofar as it regards its term and refers the generating Person to the one generated; it is called a Property insofar as it belongs only to the first divine supposit and affects the first Person; it is named a Notion in comparison with the intellect, since it is for it the reason for knowing the first Person as distinct from the others. Although all these things signify one and the same formality, they nevertheless keep this order, that that formality is first called a relation, then a property, and finally a notion; for nothing can be the reason for manifesting something else unless it is proper to it, nor can it be proper unless it is distinguished from the others. Moreover, the distinction of the divine Persons is sought from their constitutive principle, which is the personal relation itself.

Note 2. Three conditions above all are required for a notion. The first, that it be a property of one person, or of some persons, yet not common to all three, for which reason neither the divine essence nor anything essential has the character of a notion. The second, that it be signified and expressed in the abstract; for notions are, as it were, forms by which the divine Persons are known; hence it comes about that the names Father, Son, and Holy Spirit neither are nor can be called notions, because they directly signify the persons themselves in the concrete, and do not per se denote those forms by which the persons can become known, such as Paternity, etc. The third, that it signify that form not as in fieri, but as in facto esse, for want of which to generate and to be generated, likewise to spirate and to be spirated, cannot be called notions, because they are signified as in fieri. Some Scotists also add a fourth, namely that the notion signifies and imports the dignity of the Person: but this is repugnant to the Doctor and to the truth: since, as we said above, the personal relations connote no formal perfection.

Note 3. The notion is described by the theologians in this way: A notion is the proper reason or mark for knowing a divine person as distinct from another. This is abundantly clear from what has just been said; for it is called a reason or mark because it is like a character or seal by which one person is designated and marked as distinct from another; whence Justin, in the exposition of the faith on the Trinity: When we hear the word "begotten," he says, as it were a certain mark, we immediately think of the Son, just as also by the mark of the one proceeding we call the Spirit a proper person. Secondly, it is added, the proper reason for knowing the person; for, says St. Basil, book 2 Contra Eunomium, since there is one Deity, it is impossible to grasp the proper notion of the Father or of the Son, unless our thought is strengthened by the reception of the properties.

Finally it is added, as distinct from another:

For neither, says St. Basil in his single book De Spiritu sancto, cap. 5, explaining that text of the Apostle to the Ephesians 4, "One God, and Father, etc.," are the notions employed for this, that they might introduce a diversity of natures, but that he might approve the unmixed notion of the Father and of the Son: thus the Apostle employed them.

First conclusion. — Notions are to be admitted, as certain characters by which the divine Persons become known to us more easily.

This is common among the theologians, and not only among them but also among the Holy Fathers. This truth is evident from the 3rd Note, and it is moreover proved especially from St. Gregory of Nyssa, Ep. 43.

It is necessary, he says, that through certain proper notions an unconfused comparison be had in the Trinity: and further on, of the Holy Spirit: It has the essence engrafted from the cause of the Father; whence it also proceeds, and it has this notion and knowable sign of the property which is according to hypostasis, by which together with the Son it also makes itself known: and after a few words he says of the Son: It has absolutely no communication of notions according to its own property, neither with the Father nor with the Holy Spirit, but from the signs already mentioned it alone is recognized. Finally he adds of the Father: But the Father, who is God above all things, alone has the peculiar notion of his hypostasis, that he is the Father, and that he subsists from absolutely no cause, and by this indication again he himself is known properly and separately.

In which words he openly confesses that the divine Persons are recognized as distinct from one another by their marks and characters, where although he uses the word notion in the concrete, which indeed most of the Fathers also do, it is nevertheless clear that it is more correctly taken in the abstract: since to those asking how the three divine Persons agree and differ among themselves, it would be answered more easily and more correctly by saying that the Father is distinguished from the Son by Paternity, than if, using the concrete name of the Father, one said that the Father therefore differs from the Son because he generates him; for this is a circumlocution, not a formal reason.

It is confirmed from other Holy Fathers, who use the notions in the abstract; first indeed from St. Basil, book 2 Contra Eunomium, saying: Properties and marks, as certain characters and forms beheld in the substance, distinguish what is common by the appropriated characters. Tertullian agrees, book De Fide, cap. 2, where he teaches that the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit are three, not in substance but in form, nor in power but in kind: and he gives the reason for this, because there is one God from whom also those grades and forms and species are assigned to the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. As if he would say that the three divine Persons are recognized as distinct from one another, not by their concrete names, but by the relations and, as it were, their constitutive and distinctive forms; which for this reason St. John of Damascus, book 3 De Fide, cap. 6, calls characteristic and signal properties: whence in cap. 7 he says: The characteristic and discretive property of the filiation of the Word of God, according to which it is distinguished from the Father and the Holy Spirit.

The same Conclusion is proved by reason: that is to be admitted in the divine matters which most conduces to the easier perceiving and explaining of the distinction of the divine Persons: but the divine notions contribute wonderfully to this: therefore they are to be admitted. The major is evident, since the theologians must employ those very words which contribute most to the explanation and disclosure of so abstruse and so ineffable a Mystery. The minor is proved: the property and distinction of the divine Persons can become known and be expressed in two ways, namely through concrete and abstract names: but the abstract words are more fitting for signifying not only the simplicity but also the distinction of the Persons than the concrete ones, because abstracts are conceived as most simple forms, and on that account are more apt for conceiving and signifying divine simplicity: whence Nazianzen, Oration 39: The Holy Spirit, he says, proceeding from the Father, not however in the manner of Filiation, as neither of generation, but of procession: For let it be permitted, for the sake of perspicuity, to coin names. He judges therefore that abstract names confer perspicuity and clarity upon the distinction of the persons: therefore, etc.

It is confirmed: three notions belong to the Father, two to the Son, and one alone to the Holy Spirit: for Innascibility, Paternity, and active Spiration belong to the Father; Filiation and active Spiration belong to the Son; but to the Holy Spirit only Procession, or passive Spiration, befits: therefore through the proper concrete name of each Person it is not understood to be sufficiently distinguished from another; and so it was fitting that the notions be signified in the abstract through the peculiar properties of each Person, by which all the modes by which one Person is distinguished from another would become known more easily. The consequence is evident, for easily through these abstract names we explain that the Father and the Son are distinguished from the Holy Spirit, not by Paternity and Filiation, but by active Spiration; by which however they agree with each other mutually, but differ by Paternity and Filiation: therefore, etc.

You will object 1. Things which are simple are known and distinguished by themselves, nor do they need forms or marks by which they appear distinct: but the divine Persons are most simple: therefore they do not need notions in order to be known as distinct.

I distinguish the major: things which are simple both formally and really do not need marks and characters, I concede: things which are simple only really, but not formally, I deny. I distinguish the minor in like manner: the divine Persons are most simple really, that is, they are not constituted out of really distinct parts, I concede; they are most simple formally, I deny; for they comprise several entities formally distinct from one another; for they consist of the divine essence and also of the relations by which they are constituted in the character of person; whence just as real simples are better known through some form signified in the abstract than through the concrete name itself, so also the divine Persons become known more easily through the divine notions than through the concrete names Father, Son, etc.

You will insist. Nothing is signified by the name Father which is not likewise signified by the name Paternity, for Paternity denotes generation just as much as the name Father: therefore either neither suffices, or one of the two is superfluous.

I distinguish the antecedent: the same thing is signified really, and in a different mode, I concede; formally, and in the same mode, I deny. For the word Father not only imports the form of Paternity, but moreover connotes the Deity, either in recto or at least in obliquo; but Paternity neither in recto nor in obliquo formally signifies the Deity, but in recto says the property, and in obliquo connotes the person of the Father, whose property it is; although the Divinity is indeed included and contained really in Paternity, this inclusion nevertheless proceeds only from the thing signified, not from the mode of signifying of the word.

Second conclusion. — The theologians rightly number, as is customary, five notions by which the divine Persons become known to us, namely Innascibility, Paternity, Filiation, active and passive Spiration.

Proof: as many notions are to be admitted as there are modes by which the divine Persons can be known as distinct from one another: but that mode is fivefold: therefore, etc. The major is evident; for notions are admitted only for the easier detecting and perceiving of the distinction of the Persons. St. Bonaventure proves the minor in 1, distinct. 26, art. unico, q. 4.

The reason for distinguishing, he says, is taken from the side of origin: either therefore positively, or privatively: if privatively, it either deprives origin in the manner of a producer, and this does not express nobility, namely, not to produce, therefore it is not a notion. Or it deprives origin in the manner of a product, and this either specially or generally: if specially, it does not express nobility: if generally, thus it expresses nobility, and therefore the privative notion is one alone, namely Innascibility. But if it be taken from the side of origin positively, since origin is twofold, and to each there necessarily corresponds a twofold relation, of necessity there will be four, active and passive generation, and active and passive Spiration, and in all five.

In almost the same way St. Thomas proves it in the first part, q. 32, art. 3: Since the notion pertains to the order of origin, as many notions must be admitted as there are orders of origins: but these are five: therefore the divine notions are just as many. The minor is proved: in the divine reality there are only two processions, each of which imports a twofold positive order of origin, namely that from which another is, and that which is from another: for first, the procession through the intellect imports the order of him from whom another is, which order is called Paternity and is the notion of the Father: likewise it imports the order of him who is from another, and it is called Filiation, which is the notion of the Son. Likewise the procession through the will also imports this twofold order, namely that of him from whom another is, which order is active Spiration, by which the Holy Spirit is produced, and this notion distinguishes the Father and the Son from the Holy Spirit; and that of him who is from another, and this order is called passive Spiration, which is the notion of the Holy Spirit. Besides those positive orders of origin, there is still another that regards origin negatively, namely the order of him from whom another is, and who is not from another, and thus is Innascibility, which is another notion of the Father. Besides these five, however, no other mode of origin appears. Therefore there are only five notions.

You will say. There must be as many notions, and no more, as there are properties constituting and distinguishing the divine persons: for notions are established in order to the knowledge of the Persons, as they are constituted and distinguished in themselves: but those properties are only four, namely Paternity, Filiation, and Spiration, both active and passive: therefore the notions are just as many; and so since Innascibility does not constitute a person, it also cannot have the character of a notion.

I distinguish the major: there must be as many positive notions as there are properties, I concede: there must be as many both positive and negative, I deny. For those four properties can found more than four positive or negative concepts: for the divine persons can be known by us either positively, according to the relation and relative opposition which they have to themselves, or negatively, according to the exclusion of an external or internal principle: hence it comes about that although the Person of the Father becomes sufficiently known as positively distinct from the other persons through Paternity and active Spiration, nevertheless since a place for doubting would remain, whether the Father is produced by another or not, in order that he be understood as a person entirely unproduced, it is necessary that Innascibility be attributed to him, which is the negation of generation and of production from another.

You will say 2. Active Spiration is common to the Father and the Son: therefore it is not the proper notion of any divine Person. The antecedent is evident from what has been said, and will appear more fully from what is to be said: the consequence also becomes certain from the conditions required for notions which we have assigned.

I answer, that the properties are of two kinds: for some are singular and belong to one Person alone, as Paternity, Filiation, and passive Spiration: but the other is not singular, nor yet common to all, but proper to only two persons, namely active Spiration, which belongs to the Father and the Son, but not to the Holy Spirit. Whence it comes about that under that respect in which it does not belong to the Holy Spirit, it sufficiently distinguishes him from the Father and the Son, and since it is proper to the Father and the Son, it must also be called the notion of the Father and of the Son.

You will say 3. Innascibility in the Father is taken either for the material element or for the formal: if the first, it is not something distinct from Paternity, for thus taken it formally signifies Paternity: if the second, it cannot be called a notion, since it is a pure negation of a productive principle, and consequently does not express the dignity which seems to be required for the character of a notion.

St. Thomas answers that Innascibility taken formally says a negation, and nevertheless entails dignity: for a negation, he says, imports dignity when the affirmation opposed to it expresses imperfection; for in a King, e.g., it is a dignity that he is not an artisan or a merchant: but innascibility negates procession from another, which although in the Son and the Holy Spirit it does not express imperfection but perfection, nevertheless in the Father it would import imperfection, for it would signify that he is not the first principle, the font, and the origin of the whole Trinity.

The Doctor answers in 1. d. 28. q. 2. n. 7. That the unbegotten under its proper notion, as it signifies not having a begetter, is a property of the Father, and sufficiently imports dignity, that is, non-indignity; for this suffices for a personal property, that it be not an indignity, just as the personal properties in the divine reality are not said to be imperfections: yet not perfections simpliciter, that is, universally such that in anyone it is better to have it than not to have it. Then, to the mind of St. Thomas, he replies that the unbegotten, insofar as it denies having a begetter, expresses the personal dignity of the first person in the divine reality, because just as it is a dignity in the second person to have an originating principle, so it is a dignity in the first person not to have one, and yet it is not necessary that this dignity be formally the dignity of some positive proper thing connoted by this, that he is unbegotten. Whence a negation can be said to be of dignity in someone, insofar as it would be of indignity if the opposed affirmation were placed in him, just as it is a dignity in a King not to be slothful and shameless.

You will say 4. By the same reason that Innascibility is established as a notion proper to the Father, by the same Inspirability will have to be attributed to the Son, as well as Ingenerativity, or the negation of the generative power of another Son: likewise to the Holy Spirit there will have to be attributed Ingenerability, as well as Inspirativity, or the negation of the power of spirating and generating; for the Son too can be understood to generate another Son, for if he is at once Son and Spirator, why will he not be at once begotten and begetting? The Spirated one also can be understood as generative, for in created things love can apply the intellect to conceiving a word, and so it can be the principle of the word, if not elicitive, at least imperative. Therefore in order that it appear that these do not belong to the Son and to the Holy Spirit, it is necessary that the aforesaid notions be attributed to them, and so far more than five notions can exist.

The Doctor answers in 1. dist. 28. q. 1. n. 9. That it is not unbecoming that more notions than five be admitted; for just as in the time of St. Ambrose the notion of Innascibility and of the Unbegotten was unknown, rejected by St. Ambrose himself and by the other Fathers, but afterwards was accepted by St. Augustine and the other Fathers, or, as the Doctor himself adds,

If from the beginning there were known only three notional properties, namely Paternity, Filiation, and Spiration, this from the word of the Savior in the Gospel, and of John in his Canonical Epistle, cap. 1., nevertheless afterwards by investigation other notions and properties became known, which were in themselves before, although not known before; and so just as the later Fathers granted more notions than the earlier ones, yet the earlier ones did not deny them, although they did not express them: so it does not seem unbecoming for the later ones, with respect to those Doctors, to posit such notions, provided they can conclude them from the words of the earlier ones.

The Doctor therefore judges that in truth more notions than five can be admitted: nevertheless, that we may comply with the more common opinion of the theologians, I answer, secondly, that the aforesaid notions are either reduced to the earlier ones or excluded by the others: for since active Spiration is attributed to the Son, through it it is sufficiently understood that he himself cannot be produced through Spiration, otherwise he would produce himself. Add that active and passive spiration are relatively opposed, and so require really distinct terms, and thus cannot be in the same Person, and consequently by the position of active Spiration in the Son it is sufficiently understood that the character of passive Spiration is excluded from him, and so he does not need another reason, namely Inspirability, to signify that exclusion. Likewise, since, as was proved above, there cannot be several processions, nor several Persons of the same kind in God, nor can one Person proceeding through the intellect proceed through the will, and vice versa; consequently, since there is one Son in the divine reality proceeding through the intellect, and one Holy Spirit proceeding through the will, it is sufficiently known that another Son or another Holy Spirit cannot be produced: and so to signify this there is no need of the notions of Inspirativity in the Holy Spirit, or of Ingenerativity in

the Son and the Holy Spirit: this negation of the generative or spirative power is sufficiently known from elsewhere to be excluded.

You will say 5. The character of Word and of image is proper to the Son, just as the character of love and of gift is proper to the Holy Spirit: but each character signifies those divine Persons as distinct: therefore each has the force of a notion; and so there are more notions than five.

I answer, that these names signify not so much properties as appropriations; for they signify the mode of procession of the Son through the intellect and of the Holy Spirit through the will, which modes of proceeding appear sufficiently and more than sufficiently diverse through the origins and constitutive relations of the divine Persons, and so to express this there is no need of a multiplication of the divine notions beyond the number five. Add that even if an open reason did not support this truth, it would nevertheless not be fitting on that account to depart from the common opinion of the theologians; for one must think and speak as the many do, especially concerning this abstruse mystery of the Trinity.