Scotus Academicus, Tomus quartus: De Angelis

All Authors agree that the angels are endowed with intellectual cognition; they differ, however, about the principle of that intellection: for some will have it that angels understand by their very substance and essence, as the Commentator seems to have taught in 12. Metaph. text. 52., where he affirms that in separate substances essence and operation are not something distinct, and consequently that the understanding of an angel is his very substance.

Durandus, however, in 2. distinct. 3. quaest. 5. asserts that although that intellection by which an angel understands things really distinct from himself is distinct from his substance, yet that by which he knows himself is entirely indistinct from it.

The Thomists contend that angelic understanding is really distinct from his substance, since it is a pure accident.

But the Disciples of the Subtle Doctor with him will have the angelic intellect, like the human, to be a power only formally distinct from the substance of the angel or soul, yet elicitive of an intellection really distinct from it.

Wherefore three points above all must be resolved in the present Question: First, that the angel does not understand by his very substance, but by an intellectual power formally distinct from his substance and essence. Second, that that intellectual power has the character of an agent and possible intellect. Third, that the angelic intellect is made understanding formally by the word of the mind produced by itself.

Note 1. That this is the distinction between the intellect and intellection: that the former is the first act of understanding, that is, the power and activity of a spiritual substance for perceiving and knowing an intelligible object; while the latter is the second act, that is, the very operation of the spiritual substance whereby it in fact perceives the intelligible object. The former is called first act because it is evidently the first reason why a spiritual substance is capable of perceiving an intelligible object; the latter is called second act because it evidently emanates from that very power and capacity of understanding, as an effect from its cause. Hence the prior is called not only act but also power, because it is ordered to a further act which emanates from it and ultimately perfects it; the latter, however, is called act simply, because it is, as it were, the form of the intellectual power itself, ultimately perfecting it in the character of understanding.

Note 2. That the agent intellect can be spoken of in two ways. First, broadly, as a faculty in any way active, whether productive of its own acts, or of species or intellectual habits; and in this sense no Theologian denies that there is an agent intellect in the angels. Second, strictly, as a faculty only and immediately productive of intelligible species in a possible intellect lacking them, whether by abstracting those species from the phantasm, or by acting otherwise. Therefore the agent intellect is an internal faculty of the soul by way of an intellective principle in first act; hence Aristotle calls it active and factive in book 3. De anima, texts 17 and 18, where he writes, the agent intellect makes all things, and the possible intellect becomes all things, as the Subtle Doctor observes, Quodlibet. 5. art. 1. Now this agent intellect has especially two functions, namely to illuminate and to prepare the intelligible species.

This illumination, however, is not precisely only with respect to the phantasm drawn from the senses and presented to the intellect, but also with respect to the intelligible species, from whatever source it comes, and to the possible intellect, insofar as the species is bound to it for understanding, which indeed the Doctor indicates in the first dist. 3. quaest. 6. where he writes that the agent intellect causes nothing in reality in the phantasm through its illumination, but only in the possible intellect by imprinting the intelligible species.

Therefore, even if no phantasm were present to be illuminated by the intellect, nevertheless this function of it would still subsist with respect to the intelligible species.

Which indeed Aristotle confirms in the place cited, text 28., when he writes: the agent intellect is related to intelligibles as light to colors, which it makes visible in act when before they were only visible in potency.

Therefore just as light illuminates colors, and the visual power itself, so also the agent intellect, even with the phantasm set aside, illuminates the intelligible species by rousing them and presenting them ready in first act for the possible intellect to understand, which is said to be illuminated by it because it receives the principle of its intellection from it.

Whence appears the second function of that agent intellect. But whether the agent intellect itself produces intellection also in second act is no slight controversy among certain Scotists, as may be seen in Mastrius disput. 6. De anima, quaest. 5. art. 3. But since we shall treat of these matters in our Physics, we pass over a fuller inquiry into this question here. From what has been said, moreover, appears one function of the agent intellect itself, namely to prepare the intelligible species, by illuminating them and making them fit to be received in the patient intellect.

— Similarly the possible or patient intellect is taken in two ways: First, broadly, for a faculty in any way passive and receptive, or existing in potency to suffering and receiving. And thus the intellect of the angels is passive insofar as it is in potency to its proper acts, and the species and intellectual habits which are educed from it and received in it. And in this sense St. Bonaventure in the second book, distinct. 3. calls the intellect of the angels possible. Second, strictly, as it is taken by Aristotle in book De anima c. 4., for the faculty which is first bare potency in the genus of intelligibles, and afterwards becomes all intelligibles through the reception of species or of the word of the mind.

Note 3. That intellection consists inchoatively in that action of the intellect by which it produces that quality which is called the word of the mind; but consummatively in the reception of that same quality: for intellection formally consists in this, that it assimilates the intellect to the thing understood and makes it formally understanding; but this is accomplished inchoatively through that productive action of the word of the mind, and completely through the reception of that same word; for that quality, since it is an expressed likeness of the thing understood, will without doubt assimilate the intellect to the known object by informing it and adhering to it, and consequently will make it completely understanding. Now the word of the mind is an act of the intellect produced by the fruitful memory, having being only dependently upon actual cognition; so says the Doctor in the first dist. 27. q. 3. It is called first an act of the intellect, because it constitutes the soul formally understanding, as heat constitutes the hot. Second, produced by the fruitful memory, that is, by the intellect informed and, as it were, pregnant with the intelligible species of the object. Third having being only dependently upon actual thought, because it is the very complete intellection.

First conclusion. — An angel does not understand by his very substance, but by a power at least formally distinct from that substance, which we call the intellect.

This conclusion embraces two parts, of which the first is proved, first indeed by the authority of the Holy Fathers, for St. Dionysius in book De coelesti Hierarchia cap. 11. distinguishes in the supreme Spirits substance, virtue, and operation: Into three, he says, all the divine Minds are divided by their celestial reason, into Essence, into Virtue, and into Action. And St. Anselm in the book De conceptione originali cap. 4. similarly distinguishes these three. And in the book De casu Diaboli cap. 8. he affirms that the will of an angel is not a substance, although it is some essence. And St. Augustine lib. 6. De Trinitate, cap. 6. says that the human soul falls short of divine simplicity on account of the multitude of its operations and virtues.

The first part is also proved by reason. if the substance of an angel were its own understanding, it would also be pure act, because it would identify itself with the ultimate actuality of the intellectual order, and consequently would have nothing of potentiality mixed in: but no created substance can be pure act: therefore the substance of an angel cannot be its own understanding. Second, if the substance of an angel were for it the reason for knowing all things, it would follow that the angel would always and necessarily understand all things: but it is certain, as will appear below, that an angel does not understand all things either necessarily or always, and that some things can escape its knowledge: therefore an angel does not understand all things distinct from itself by its substance. Finally, third, if an angel through its substance were the intellection of itself, it would also through its substance be the love of itself; for between intellection and love there is a natural proportion: but an angel cannot be essentially and substantially the love of itself: therefore neither the intellection of itself. The minor is proved: for if an angel were the love of itself by its substance, such a love would be essentially and invariably right in the angel: but this cannot be said: therefore neither that. The sequela of the major is evident; for the whole substance of an angel is created by God alone; but those things which are from God alone are necessarily and essentially ordered. The minor, however, is urged; for evil angels do not possess a right and ordered love of themselves, since a right and ordered self-love cannot subsist together with sin and hatred of God; whence in Psalm 10. it is said: he who loves iniquity hates his own soul: therefore in the angels the love of self is not essentially and invariably right.

The second part is proved by the Doctor in the second distinct. 15. where he demonstrates that the faculties of the soul are not really distinct from it, by all those philosophical arguments which we have already weighed in our Philosophy, quaest. 3. conclusione 2. de Anima. It suffices therefore now to establish that truth by the oracles of the Holy Fathers. In the first place, then, St. Augustine lib. 1. De Trinitate, cap. 11. has this: These three therefore, memory, understanding, and will, since they are not three lives but one life, nor three minds but one mind; consequently certainly not three substances but one substance: therefore those faculties are not accidents or qualities really diverse from the soul, as the Thomists will have it. Moreover St. Bernard in sermon 11. Super Cantica says: Certain things I contemplate in the soul, memory, understanding, and will, and these three are the soul itself: but what is really distinct from the soul is not the soul itself.

Finally Hugh of St. Victor in the book De Spiritu, et anima, has this:

The soul is called by various names according to its operations; for it is called anima while it gives life, sensus while it senses, animus while it is wise, mens while it understands, etc.: yet these do not differ in substance any more than in names, since all are one essence, though the properties are diverse.

By these things it is established that the human intellect is truly distinct from the essence of the soul; not indeed really, nor merely in name; and therefore it is only formally diverse from the substance of the soul. But the same reasoning holds for the angelic intellect, as is evident, and therefore it is established that it is not really but formally distinct from the essence.

You will say 1. Angels are pure act, and essentially intellective: therefore they can receive nothing distinct from their substance which together with their intellect would effect cognition of things distinct from them: but only their own substance will supply such a medium.

I distinguish. Angels are pure act, by a purity excluding matter alone, with which some spiritual form rightly received in them can consist, which together with their intellect would effect in them the cognition of all things distinct from them; likewise they are essentially cognitive and intellective in first and radical act, I concede: they are pure acts by a purity excluding the potentiality of a faculty; likewise they are in proximate act and in actual cognition which would be of their intrinsic concept, I deny; for this cannot be from the precise character of a creature, which the angels intrinsically include, and which necessarily admits composition of act and potency.

You will say 2. For this reason our soul does not understand by its substance nor is it its own intellection, because it is understanding only in potency, since it is joined to the body and depends upon it in operating in such a way that only through it does it acquire the species of things, and through them is constituted understanding: therefore since an angel is not understanding only in potency but in act, the consequence follows that it is its own intellection, or that it understands by itself.

I answer. granting the antecedent and denying the consequence; for an intellectual nature can stand related to its own intellection in three ways: first, so that it is understanding only in potency; second, so that it understands in act, but by an act distinct from itself; third, by an act which is the same nature as the understanding subject. The first and second suit both our soul and the angels: but the third is proper to God, who is pure act. Whence the consequence must be denied along with its antecedent.

Second conclusion. — There must be admitted in the angel an agent and a patient intellect properly so called. This is the Doctor's teaching in the second book, third distinction, quaest. 11. n. 4. And he proves it thus. 1. Every active power which is granted to a lower nature without imperfection must not be denied to a higher one: but the agent intellect in men, who are inferior to the angels, is of this kind: therefore it must not be denied to the angels. The major and the consequence hold of themselves. The minor is proved: it is the greatest perfection in any nature that it should have within itself the power and principle by which it can acquire for itself a perfection suited to it, if it does not have it from elsewhere: but the agent intellect is the principle by which man can attain true knowledge and science, which is the highest perfection of his intellect: therefore it belongs to perfection in man to have an agent intellect.

It is confirmed. the noblest nature ought to embrace within itself those powers by which it can attain its perfection, if it has it not from elsewhere: therefore the angelic nature, which holds first place among all created things, ought to have within itself the principle by which it can procure for itself the cognition of universal things, if from the beginning of its formation it did not already know them through their species infused into it by God, and likewise can acquire the cognition of many singular things whose knowledge it has not congenitally. The antecedent is evident, and likewise the consequence; for the knowledge of things is the perfection of an angel, which it can procure for itself only through the benefit of the agent intellect.

The Thomists reply. that the major of the argument is indeed true of perfection simply speaking, which includes no imperfection in its concept and presupposes none; false, however, of that perfection which is only compared to supplying an imperfection: now the agent intellect (they say) is not a perfection simply speaking, but is granted in man only to supply an imperfection in him, namely the lack of knowledge of things, from which he is bound to beg from the things themselves dependently upon phantasms; and since the angels are free from that imperfection, that agent intellect must not be admitted in them either, just as generation is not admitted in them, which nevertheless imports a perfection in men, namely the propagation of the species.

On the contrary. by the same reason that the agent intellect is admitted in men, it ought to be conceded in the angels; for although they have species of the most excellent things concreated with them, yet they do not obtain connate knowledge of all things, especially singular ones; and therefore either they can acquire it for themselves, and so they need an agent intellect; or if they cannot, they are without doubt of a worse condition than men: for that nature must be judged more perfect which, though it does not have its perfection intrinsically, nevertheless has faculties and natural powers by which it can acquire it. Further, although the angels had from the beginning of their formation species of all things, even material and singular ones, concreated with them, they should no less have an agent and possible intellect: for (says the Doctor) although Christ the Lord had knowledge of all things from the instant of his conception, and saw all things in the Word, he nevertheless had an agent and possible intellect, otherwise he would not have been a perfect man, since he would not have had both that intellect which the Adversaries concede in all men. Finally, the action by which an agent of a higher order anticipates the operation of an agent of a lower order does not take away from the latter its active power with respect to its own operation; for if God were now to create water and infuse heat into it and continually preserve that heat, he would not on that account be said to have stripped the water of its refrigerative virtue: for indeed if God decreed to preserve that heat, immediately the water would acquire from itself the cold naturally due to it with no less facility than it repeats its cold when removed from the fire which had induced heat into it. Therefore similarly, although God has infused into the angels the species of things immediately from their creation, he must not on that account be said to have taken from them the agent intellect by which they could compare those species to themselves if he should cease to conserve those species in them. Nor does the example about generation help at all; since the imperfection which generation is granted to remove or supply, namely corruptibility, is not found in the angels, and therefore neither should its reparative generation be found in them. But it is otherwise with the agent intellect; since the imperfection which it removes and supplies, namely the lack of knowledge of many things, especially singular and immaterial ones, is found equally in the angels as in man: therefore it must be admitted in both.

The Thomists reply 2. That the aforementioned argument of the Doctor Subtilis concludes indeed in things which do not have perfections coeval with themselves, but not in those which by their nature and from their origin claim perfections for themselves, such as the angels are: which they prove by the example of the heavens, which, since they have natural perfections congenital with them, would be set in vain if powers and instruments by which they might attain them were posited in them.

— Truly this reply neither weakens nor breaks the argument of the Doctor Subtilis; for something can be said to have its perfection coeval with itself in one or other of these three ways: first, namely because such a perfection emanates from its nature and intrinsic principles, just as risibility arises from the nature of man, and the faculties burst forth from the substance of the soul: second, because since such a perfection cannot be produced by any natural power, it necessarily requires to be caused by the Author of nature together with the thing itself which is produced; as, for example, the qualities of the heavens, which cannot be produced by natural causes, must have been formed by their Administrator and Author together with the heavens themselves: third and finally, something can be said to have a perfection coeval with itself by the good pleasure of the Creator wishing to grant that perfection to it from the very beginning of its formation, which nevertheless the thing itself could by its own powers and the passage of time acquire for itself: just as the soul of Christ had knowledge of all things coeval with itself from the beginning of its conception through species infused divinely, which in the course of time it could have acquired for itself. These points premised, I say that a nature which has its perfection coeval with itself in the first or second manner indeed does not need means or instruments by which it may attain it, since those perfections either arise from its own substance or were granted to it by the Author of nature: but I deny that a nature which obtains this perfection only in the third manner, namely by the good pleasure and decision of the Author of nature granting it at his pleasure, which nevertheless the thing could claim from elsewhere, should not have faculties and intrinsic powers by which it could claim that perfection for itself if they had not first been granted by the Author of nature. Since therefore the angel has knowledge of universal things coeval with itself only in this third manner, it seems that the faculties by which they could attain it should not be denied to them if God had not implanted this knowledge in them.

Proof 2. The Doctor proves the Conclusion by the very reason by which St. Thomas had contended for the opposite of the established Conclusion, which the Doctor however draws out to the opposite. The adequate object of the angelic intellect is either something singular, or something universal by predication, such that it comprehends under itself absolutely all intelligibles: not the first; for a created singular thing, however perfect, cannot contain formally or eminently all intelligibles for the angel: but the first and adequate object of any faculty must contain formally or eminently all things that can be perceived by it, and therefore the object of the angelic intellect must necessarily be something universal and common by predication and attribution: such that it contains under itself all things intelligible by the angel, whether immaterial or material: but sensible objects are not proximately and actually intelligible: therefore in order that the angel perceive them, he necessarily needs an agent intellect, by whose power and operation he can receive species from the material things themselves, and make them proximately and actually intelligible.

The Thomists reply. that the adequate object of the angelic intellect is not something abstracted from sensibles, but only a universal species naturally implanted in the angelic intellect, by which it can perceive singular things, whether material or immaterial.

Against this first. It is false that there are given such universal species expressive of singular things of this kind, as we shall demonstrate below. Second, the adequate object of the angelic intellect, which is common by predication to all those things that can be known by the angel; either is thus common, that it belongs to all intelligible things, whether material or immaterial; or fits only immaterial things. Not the second, because it would follow that material and corporeal things, e.g. the heavens and the elements, could not be known by the angels, for no faculty is engaged about what is not comprehended under its adequate object. But if you admit the first, since sensibles and material things are not per se proximately and actually intelligible, because they are not objects proportioned to a purely intellectual faculty, it will be necessary, in order to perceive them, that the angel have an agent intellect, through whose mediation he may receive species from the material things themselves, and by their aid be able to know those material things themselves, if he did not have their knowledge implanted in him from elsewhere.

Proof 3. The Doctor: there must be admitted in the angel a possible intellect: therefore also an agent intellect. The consequence is evident; for an intellect is not called possible except with respect to an agent: therefore, once the one is admitted, the other must necessarily be admitted. The antecedent is proved: the intellect of the angel receives species which God implanted from the beginning of its formation: therefore it has in itself a power and faculty receptive of those species. The Thomists admit the antecedent; they must therefore also admit the consequence, since every recipient of some form needs to have a receptive power of that same form; nor does it matter that the recipient does not precede in duration, but only in nature, the reception of the form; for if God had concreated our soul with the species of all intelligibles, nevertheless there would be in it a receptive power, which we call the possible intellect, and therefore it is not necessary that the recipient precede in time the form received in it in order to be said to have a receptive faculty of it.

The Thomists reply. that although that receptive faculty of species is admitted in the angels, it nevertheless cannot be called the possible intellect, because it is always under act, and never in the state of a power ordered to that act.

On the contrary. The angel really can receive species of many things, for instance singular ones, which he did not have from the beginning of his formation: therefore at least with respect to those he will have a power, which is called the possible intellect. The consequence is evident from the terms: the antecedent will be proved below, and is urged now from this, that God could concede fewer species to the lowest angel than he bestowed on a superior one; and therefore that inferior angel will be able to receive those species, not coeval with himself, anew, either from God himself, or from superior angels illuminating him, and consequently with respect to them he will have a receptive power, because he will truly be in potency to the knowledge of those things whose species he newly receives: and thus he will truly have a possible intellect. Further, it is not required in order that a power be properly called receptive that it sometimes not be under act, or that it not actually have the form to which it is ordered; but it suffices that it can naturally be deprived of that form. For indeed the matter of the heavens and the elements is coeval with its forms, and nowhere existed without them; yet no one would say that it does not have in itself a receptive power of those forms: therefore similarly, although the angel had species of all things coeval with himself from the beginning of his creation, he would no less on that account have to be said to have a receptive power of them, and therefore also a possible intellect, and consequently an agent intellect.

You will say 1. Our soul depends in operating on the body because it depends on it in being: but an angel does not depend in being on a body: therefore neither in operating: but to receive species from corporeal things themselves is an operation dependent on the body: therefore the angel cannot elicit it, nor consequently have an agent intellect, whose primary office is to forge species, refine them of their corporeity, and make them spiritual.

I distinguish the major. that it depends on the body in operating only because it depends in being on it, I deny the major: that it depends on the body in operating through the mediation of the senses and phantasms, I concede the major; and the minor conceded, I likewise distinguish the consequent: that the angel does not depend on a body in operating as though he ought necessarily to operate through bodily senses and phantasms, I concede; that he does not depend in operating on corporeal things, so as to receive from them the species by whose aid he may understand those corporeal things, I deny. And so the angel depends on the body not as on a principle and co-cause of his knowledge, but as on the object from which he must receive the knowledge of a material thing.

You will say 2. The agent and possible intellect are so named and distinguished only by comparison to phantasms: but in the angel there are no phantasms: therefore those intellects ought not to be admitted either.

I deny the major. for the proper office of the agent intellect is to forge spiritual species of the things which it understands; whence when the intelligible objects are corporeal and can emit only corporeal species, the angel must necessarily fashion spiritual species from the presence of those material species, by whose benefit he may perceive those material things themselves; nor is any phantasm needed for this, as happens in us who, since we can perceive nothing except dependently on the senses, hence it is that our intellect needs phantasms in order that, at their sight, it may fashion spiritual images of intelligible things.

You will say 3. The agent and possible intellect disfigure the dignity of the angelic nature: therefore neither of them is to be attributed to it. The antecedent is evident, for the agent intellect is servile; its function and office consist chiefly in this, that it make or receive species and carry them like a porter's burden and minister them to the possible intellect. Now this possible intellect is so called because it suffers and receives those species, whereby it betrays its imperfection, namely a negation of actuality; for its passivity or possibility in being denies actuality and efficacy, and straightway betrays its weakness and inertness.

I deny the antecedent. for the office of supplying and conferring species is not servile work; otherwise God would have to be said to act and operate servilely while he confers and supplies the intelligible species of things to created intellect. Whence the argument can thus be retorted: the highest dignity is to carry out the same thing that God works and strives at from infinite goodness and power: but the agent intellect, by conferring species, carries out what God bestows: therefore etc.

It is confirmed. this reply follows from the fact that it is not unseemly for faculties and powers to assist and support one another; rather it is most honorable; for no one will impute disgrace to the intellect because it serves the will, illuminating it and proposing to it the good to be chosen and the evil to be shunned. Nor does it turn to reproach for the superior angels that they spend their ministry on the inferior ones, illuminating and governing them. And so with respect to the first part, the falsity of the antecedent is evident. It is evident also with respect to the second; for it is no disgrace to the possible intellect that its operation be a kind of undergoing, since since it is a power for understanding which is not pure act as God is, it is necessary that it receive from elsewhere the principles of understanding, from wherever they come, whether they are concreated by God, or supplied by the agent intellect, or flow from the objects. Therefore it is in no way unseemly that the agent and possible intellect be admitted in the angels.

The remaining things which could be objected will be dissolved in the following Question.

Third conclusion. — The angelic intellect can discourse, and from things known conclude others unknown by legitimate discursive reasoning. This is the Doctor's teaching in q. 4. and 5. of the Prologue: and in dist. 1. q. 1. n. 3. and dist. 7. n. 7., where he asserts that it does not seem probable that all discourse should be denied to the angels: against St. Thomas, who in 1. p. q. 58. art. 3. and elsewhere teaches that the intellect of the angel is not discursive, such that it proceeds from principles to conclusions by understanding them separately.

He proves the conclusion. The Doctor: the angel would not be discursive either because he would not have the power of drawing conclusions from premises, on the hypothesis that conclusions were not known to him; or because all conclusions had been known to him from the beginning of his creation; or finally because at least habitually he had known them from the very beginning of his formation: but none of these can rightly be affirmed. Not indeed the first, for there would be an imperfection in the angel if he did not have the power of collecting what is deducible from the known. Not even the second; for it is false that the angel understood all conclusions at once in act, otherwise he would have known almost infinite things by natural power; for the conclusions deducible from created things are nearly infinite: but for the angel to know infinite things implies a contradiction. Not finally the third, for although he had known all things habitually from the beginning, namely inasmuch as he had the habit and species divinely implanted, by whose mediation he could understand whatever cognition at his pleasure; nevertheless it would not follow from that that he was not discursive of himself; just as equally men would be no less discursive even if they knew all conclusions through species implanted in them, as is evident in the soul of Christ, which although it had the knowledge of all things implanted in it divinely, was no less truly discursive, or had the power of discoursing, otherwise it would not have been made like us in all things in what is natural.

Proof 2. The Doctor: if the angel could not discourse, then especially because in that discursive power no difference would follow between it and the rational soul: but this reason is null: therefore the discursive power must be conceded to the angels. The major is the principal and fundamental reason of St. Thomas: the minor is proved: although the angels and rational souls agreed with each other in discursive power, they could no less be specifically distinguished from elsewhere: therefore from the fact that the power of discoursing were attributed to both, it does not follow that there would be no difference between the two. The antecedent is proved: although the angels, in the opinion of the Adversaries, do not discourse, they are no less distinguished specifically from one another in the order of intellectual power: therefore similarly although the angels and the soul did not differ from one another by the discursive power, they could no less have a specific difference from elsewhere: for there is not a greater reason why various distinct species can be admitted within the grade of intellectual power without discourse than that they are admitted within the grade of intellectual power with discourse.

You will object 1. The Holy Fathers expressly denying discourse in the angels, and attributing to them simple knowledge. Thus St. Dionysius ch. 7. De Divinis nominibus says: The simple and blessed Intelligences do not gather divine science by indivisibles or divisibles, whether senses, words, or reasonings: and further on: They penetrate purely, spiritually, and beyond matter with one single indivisible act: therefore he denies that there is in them a multiplicity of acts which are required in discourse. Whence afterwards, concerning our soul, he adds: By divine wisdom also the reasoning power of the soul has its course, applying itself through long habit to the truth of things, and is inferior to those singular Spirits. By which words he seems quite clearly to establish the difference between the soul and the angel, that the soul obtains knowledge by discoursing, but the angel in a simpler manner. St. Bernard subscribes, serm. 5. on the Canticles, where he teaches that the angels do not know spiritual things from corporal ones as we know them, but says by their own power alone and capacity of nature they penetrate the highest and the lowest.

I answer. from those sentences of the Holy Fathers only this is inferred, that the angels do not understand divine things from corporeal ones in a corporeal manner, namely through phantasms, nor do they labor with that difficulty with which we mostly sweat in gathering truth, either of effects from causes, or of causes from effects, because the necessary connection of both does not clearly shine forth for us. But it is otherwise with the angels, for, as St. Bernard adds in the cited place, That inhabitant of the heavens, by his innate subtlety and sublimity, reaches everything with all speed and ease.

You will object 2. In this especially the angelic and human intellects seem to be distinguished, that the latter apprehends the truth of things by discoursing, the former by simple intelligence or intuition: whence our spirits are wont to be called rational; but the angels sublime intelligences: therefore really the angel is not discursive.

I deny the antecedent. in which certainly the principle is begged; for the angels are distinguished specifically among themselves, although in the opinion of the Adversaries they are not discursive; why then would they not also be specifically distinguished from the soul, even though they had the same power of discoursing with it?

You will object 3. The angelic Spirits are compared to human ones just as celestial bodies to sublunary ones: therefore just as the celestial bodies differ from earthly ones in that the latter obtain their perfection without motion, while the former attain it through motion, so men need discourse, which is as it were a spiritual motion, in order to arrive at the knowledge of truth; but the celestial Spirits behold it without discourse.

I distinguish the antecedent. they are compared with respect to all things, I deny: with respect to some things, let it pass, for they can be compared with one another either in incorruptibility or in some other property. The remaining reasons of D. Thomas either beg the principle, or can easily be dissolved by the solution of the preceding ones.