Scotus Academicus, Tomus quartus: De Angelis

Note 1. With the Seraphic Doctor, in the first dist. 2., question 2., that place has a threefold relation to the thing placed. For it is compared first, under the aspect of containing; second, under the aspect of measuring; third, under the aspect of conserving. For it contains as a vessel; it measures as a quantity; it conserves as a nature.

For indeed according to this threefold habitude, finite, corporeal, and corruptible substances are in place: for because they are finite and limited, they are in place as in a container: but because they are corporeal, they are in place as in a measurer: finally, insofar as they are corruptible, they are in place as in a conserver. According to the first two relations, which are to contain and to measure, substances which are finite and corporeal are in place, but incorruptible, namely the lower heavens: but according to the first, which is to contain, finite substances that are spiritual and incorruptible are in place, such as angels. And I say this of bodily place: for an angel has a spiritual conserving place, namely the power of God; a measuring or circumscribing place of its own substance, namely a limitation or enclosure of power: but it has a containing place, not only spiritual, but also bodily.

Note 2. The bodily place in which an angel is said to exist can be distinguished generically into two kinds: one connatural to it, the other violent, or beyond the inclination of its nature. The place connatural to an angel is called that one in which it presents itself as present according to the wish of its free will; the violent, however, is that in which it does not freely situate itself, but is shut up and detained therein by external force, such as, for example, the eternal fire and hell with respect to demons. We inquire here about both kinds of place: what is the proximate account by which angels are said formally to occupy place. For the resolution of this difficulty, a threefold opinion of authors is distinguished: The first is that of the Angelic Doctor and his disciples, who assert that the formal account immediately founding the location of an angel in a connatural place is an operation virtually passing outward: but in a violent place, it is a passion by which it is detained against its will in some place. The second assigns as the foundation of such location and presence some mode of union produced through the free will of the angel, by which before every passing operation it is united to a bodily place; thus Vasquez, disp. 188. Finally, the third opinion teaches that the formal account by which an angel is immediately in a place is the very substance of the angel, by which it becomes really and substantially present in the place it occupies. Thus the Subtle Doctor in the second dist. 2., question 6.

Note 3. From the Doctor just cited above, number 6., six conditions are required in creatures for the true determination of place and of the thing placed: First, he says, to be in place; Second, to be in actual place: Third, to be in determinate and equal place: Fourth, to be in place commensuratively: Fifth, to be in place determinately, here rather than there: Sixth, to be in place naturally or violently. The four first conditions, he says, belong to body insofar as body is body; the fifth belongs to it from an agent; the sixth belongs to it insofar as it is a natural body.

Moreover, from these six conditions only three seem to be required per se and intrinsically for constituting the account of place and of the thing placed formally, which conditions can belong not only to bodily things but also to spiritual substances: The first condition is that there be real and actual presence of the thing placed to the place, without which neither bodily things nor spiritual things can truly be said to exist somewhere. The second condition is that the thing placed, as regards its substance and entity, be terminated and bounded by the space and extent of the place itself. Finally, the third is that this determination to place come about through the formal account of being located. But the formal account, as the same Doctor observes in dist. 4., question 10. q. 3., ad 2., is taken two ways: First, properly for the proximate formal account by which a thing is called such formally; thus whiteness is the formal account by which a wall is called white. Second, it is taken fundamentally for the remote account by which a thing is denominated in such a way; thus the whiteness of one wall is the fundamental formal account of the likeness which one white wall has to another. These two formal accounts are also found in being-located: for the formal account of existing in place, properly so called and proximate, is the respect of the thing placed toward the place; but the fundamental and remote one is that in which such respect is founded: thus in bodies, the formal account of existing circumscriptively in place is quantity; but in angels or souls, it is substance, as we shall prove below.

First conclusion. — Angels are neither nowhere nor everywhere: but in some certain and definite space. This is common as regards all three parts among all theologians. The first part is openly gathered from sacred Scripture, which makes mention in many places of the place of angels, as will appear in the proof of the second part. Hence among the articles condemned by Stephen of Paris, this third is written in chapter 1., That an angel or separate soul is nowhere. It is proved also by reason: If angels were nowhere, especially on account of their spirituality, by which they would be said to be altogether separable from, and independent of, true or imaginary space: yet this reason does not prevent them from truly being said to be in place; since God himself, although supremely spiritual, is truly everywhere, not only by presence, knowing all things; and by power, operating all things in all; but also by essence, inasmuch as he fills all things with his substance and entity necessarily diffused everywhere unto immensity. Then, from the instant of their creation, angels either remained immobile, or had local motion: if the first, therefore they are by substance where they were created, namely in some lower empyrean heaven: if the second, therefore, changing place, they obtained other space and a place true or imaginary, and accordingly they are always supposed to be in place. Finally, angels cannot fail to be intimately present to God, upon the hypothesis that they exist: but if they were not in some part of true or imaginary space, they would not be intimately present to God. Lastly, it is no less improbable that something truly exists and exists nowhere, than that something truly exists and yet never exists: therefore just as whatever is at some time is, so too it must also be somewhere. Hence St. Gregory of Nyssa, book 1. Contra Eunomium: "It cannot be," he says, "that things brought forth by creation, or coming to be, should not have existence wholly in place or in time. Only that nature which needs nothing, is eternal, and embraces all things, is neither in place nor in time."

The second part is proved. Namely, that angels are not everywhere: First indeed from Scripture, which teaches that angels are in one place so as not to be in another. Thus Apocalypse 12.: Their place was no longer found in Heaven: where the words concern wicked angels driven out of Heaven because of sin. Scripture teaches likewise that angels are moved locally, and thus are present to one part of the Universe so that if they wish to be present to another, they must needs abandon this place and come to that one by local motion: thus Zechariah 2.: Behold the angel who spoke with me went forth to meet him, and said to him: Run, speak to this young man: thus Job 1., Satan says: I have gone round about the earth, and walked through it: Tobit 5., the angel Raphael said: I have often walked through all his ways, etc. All these are to be taken in their proper and literal sense; especially since no reason urges recourse to tropes; and moreover the holy Fathers themselves explain them literally.

For St. Basil, book De Spiritu Sancto, chapter 16., openly says:

Moreover, the several Powers are believed to be circumscribed within a definite place: for that angel who stood by Cornelius was not at the same time with Philip: nor did he who spoke to Zachary from the altar at the same time discharge his proper station in heaven. Yet the same spirit is believed to have worked both once in Habakkuk and in Daniel at Babylon.

Theodoret subscribes, question 3. on Genesis, where he pronounces God alone to be uncircumscribed: "But those things which began at some time to be are circumscribed; wherefore although we confess that the nature of angels is without bodies, we nevertheless assert that their substance is circumscribed."

St. Damascene agrees, book 2. De Fide, chapter 3., where concerning angels he says: "They are circumscribed, because when they are in heaven they are not on earth; and when they are sent to earth by God, they do not remain in heaven."

St. Gregory the Great openly teaches the same, book 2. Moralia: "In this," he says, "the angelic nature is now distinguished from the condition of our nature, in that we are both circumscribed by place and confined by the ignorance of blindness; but the spirits of angels are indeed circumscribed by place: yet their substances are far extended above us beyond comparison."

The third part follows from what has gone before, and the Seraphic Doctor confirms it in the place cited by a twofold reason: he repeats the first from the reason of a created and limited spirit. For since, he says, the uncreated Spirit, who is God, has in himself simplicity, by which he is within all things, and immensity, by which he contains all things and is outside all things, he communicates those conditions to a creature insofar as it is apt to receive them:

But because spirit could not receive the power of containment, since its simplicity is finite, therefore it is in place; and because it has not part and part, therefore it is whole in itself simultaneously here and now: whence it cannot have a capacity for containing: but since body is composite and has many parts, it could not participate divine simplicity, but on account of the extension of parts it could participate and receive a capacity for containing: therefore God made one most noble body which could embrace all things, outside which absolutely nothing existed, namely the empyrean, in which he placed the angel.

He draws the other reason from the fact that the distinction according to here and there belongs to body alone;

for since, he says, the other creatures hold order in the world, having distinction and position according to degrees of perfection: and thus one is here, another there, one above, another below: and because in body alone there is potential distinction according to here and there, therefore among creatures the universal power of locating, with respect to visible and invisible things, ought to be given to body alone, so that the Universe might be one, ordered in all its parts. And thus is clear the twofold reason why the power of locating spirit was given to body, and why spirit is contained by body. For this the order of the Universe required, both on account of the limitation of created spirit, and because distinction according to here and there is found in body alone.

You will object 1. Many of the holy Fathers deny that angels are defined by place; for besides Gregory of Nyssa praised in the prelude of the present Section, Didymus teaches the same in book 1. De Spiritu Sancto, where he denies that spiritual creatures are circumscribed by place and bounds, and in book 2. he says: "We separate places and changes of places from incorporal things:" St. Basil teaches the same, homily 30. De Paradiso, where he says: "Place belongs chiefly to body; the soul, however, is in place consequently, and as it were by accession, on account of its relation to body, since by the property of its own nature it is not at all circumscribed by place:" therefore much less ought angels to be circumscribed by place, since they profess no order to body. For that which is of magnitude of bulk and parts, namely body (says Nemesius, book De natura hominis, chapter 3., where he teaches that the soul is not at all circumscribed, because it is spirit), cannot be circumscribed by any part of place: for place exists by means of bulk, since place is the term of the ambient body, embracing the thing contained. Whence Boethius de Hebdomadibus says: "A common conception of mind, which appears to all, is that an incorporal thing is not in a place." Therefore since an angel is altogether incorporeal, it is by no means to be said to be in place.

— The Doctor answers, in the number 17. cited above: that the aforementioned opinions of the holy Fathers, and others like them, are to be understood as wishing that spiritual substances be not in place circumscriptively and commensuratively, in the manner of bodies, each of whose parts corresponds to a part of place, as St. Damascene explains in the place cited above: "And since angels are intelligences," he says, "they are in places also in an intelligible manner, not circumscribed after the manner of bodies. For they are not figured as bodies are by their nature, nor do they consist of three dimensions, but they are in place by this very thing, that they are present intelligibly etc." Therefore those holy Fathers deny that angels are circumscribed by place because they lack the parts which place measures, and which embraces the situated thing so that part may answer to part. Which Augustine declares in Epistle 28. to Jerome thus:

Further, if a body is only that which through the extent of place is set or moved with some length and breadth, so that with its greater part it occupies a greater place, and with its lesser a lesser, and is less in a part than in the whole, then the soul is not a body: for throughout the whole body which it animates it is extended not by local diffusion, but by a kind of vital intentness. For through all its particles it is whole and simultaneously present: nor lesser in lesser things, and greater in greater; but in some places more intense, in others more remiss; and whole in all, and whole in each.

You will object 2. Place, according to the Philosopher, is the ultimate surface of the first immobile containing body: but no body contains an angel, because the container ought to be more actual than the content: but body is not more actual than an angel: therefore an angel is not in body as in a place.

— The Doctor answers there, denying the minor, and distinguishes its proof: that the container, after the mode of cause, ought to be more actual than the content, he concedes: that the container, after the mode of place, such that the thing placed be found totally within the place, he denies. If, however, it be asked how an indivisible angel can be contained within some surface of a body: it is answered, not in any other sense except insofar as it is present to that surface; not that it is the ultimate surface of it, because an angel cannot be in place with extension of parts, but in such a way that it penetratively be within a part of that body to which it is present. — From these things the Doctor rightly infers that an angel is not necessarily in place: for if even body does not exist necessarily in place — seeing that it could be produced outside the world and set in a vacuum — much less will an angel depend on bodily place: for it can be produced independently of the production of any creaturely body whatsoever, and then there would be nothing in which it would be said to be located, and accordingly it does not have from its own nature the necessity of inhering in some place. It has, however, a power to be in place at least definitively, whether meanwhile that power is founded in it insofar as it is substance, or insofar as it is actually a limited nature, or by reason of something extrinsic; and therefore, says the Doctor, one need not seek some intrinsic account of being in place, because there is none there, but there is in it only passive potency, by which it can be in place, because it does not repugn to itself.

Second conclusion. — The fundamental formal account by which an angel is constituted in place is not to be sought from its operation, but from its substance.

This is the Doctor's teaching in dist. 2. qu. 6. n. 1. *where, having proposed the opinion of St. Thomas, who says in dist. 37. question 3. art. 1., and part 1. question 52. art. 1., that an angel is formally constituted in place by operation and application of power producing some effect in a place, he says: This seems to be condemned as* a certain article condemned by the Bishop of Paris (namely Stephen), and excommunicated. And if it be said that excommunication does not cross the sea, or a diocese: still, if it was an article condemned as heretical, it is everywhere condemned as heretical; not by the authority of a diocesan alone, but also by the authority of the Pope, Extra. de Haeres. c. Ad abolendam; or at least the opinion is suspect, when it is solemnly condemned in some University. — *Now the first of those articles which Stephen, Bishop of Paris, condemned, was that separate substances are somewhere by their operation alone, and that they cannot be moved from one extrinsic place to another. And since this is a proposition copulated from two, it leaves doubt whether the condemnation falls upon the copulate of both, or upon each taken singly and separately. And therefore perhaps Scotus used the word "seems," because the censure could be carried over both joined together, and not over one or the other torn away. — That this article was condemned is testified also by Richard of Mediavilla in dist. 2. art. 2. question 1.; and Gabriel in dist. 2. question 2. art. 2.; and Henry, who was one of those condemning, reports that censure. Whence it appears that some Thomists wrongly rebuke the Subtle Doctor, as if he had gratuitously invented that condemnation, or hurled it against adversaries like a glassy shield, using it as if the strongest argument of all for establishing and confirming his own opinion: how ridiculously contrived that reproach is, must be shown by the arguments of the Doctor proving the Conclusion.

First, indeed, the conclusion is to be supported *by all those texts of sacred Scripture in which angels are said to have approached places before they did anything there; thus Luke 2.: The angel Gabriel was sent to Mary, and entering in he said etc. Therefore he enters and becomes present before he speaks. Matthew 4.: Angels came and ministered to him, namely Christ the Lord after the assaulting demon had been overcome: therefore they were present to Christ before they did anything toward him; and hence their presence is precisely not to be gathered from operation.

The Thomists reply. That angels are indeed present before they operate, but with inadequate and inchoative presence, which an angel has when it begins to order itself toward some place, that it may operate there: which presence Cajetan calls the presence of order, teaching that three conditions are required for it, namely practical judgment about the operation to be done now, or at such time, by the angel; second, election of such operation, and dispatch of the executive power; these suppositions granted, he teaches that the angel becomes present to the place inchoatively and incompletely before it operates there; completely, however, and adequately through operation.

— On the contrary. For the true and adequate account of the angelic presence it is only required that the angel be truly whole here and not elsewhere; for what else does the presence of a thing mean? But by that very fact whereby an angel is somewhere, it is true to say that he is truly there, not elsewhere, even though he should work nothing there: therefore his presence there is adequate. Next, in that instant in which the angel orders himself to his operation, he can be removed from it, either by divine command, whereby he will be summoned elsewhere, or he will be forbidden to exercise the operation, just as those angels were forbidden to whom it was said in the Apocalypse: Hurt not the earth, nor the sea, etc. Or through the denial of divine concurrence; but in that case the angels would truly have been present in the place, and yet not operating there: therefore etc. Finally, if an angel were adequately in a place only through operation, it would follow that he could never be said to operate in a place; for to operate in a place presupposes a place, and a thing constituted in the place: but the angel, as operating, does not presuppose himself as constituted in a place, since by his very operation he would have to be constituted in a place: therefore he would never be said to operate in a place: which consequence no one admits, and therefore neither ought that whence it is inferred be admitted.

The Doctor proves the conclusion 1. To be is prior to operating: therefore to be in a place is prior to operating in a place: but what is later is not the cause of what is prior: therefore operating in a place is not the cause why the angel is in a place. It is confirmed: as being simply stands to operating simply, so being here stands to operating here. Therefore just as operating simply presupposes being simply, so operating here necessarily presupposes being here: and hence the angel must first be here before he operates here.

But the Thomists deny the antecedent: since, they say, nothing prevents something from being prior simply which is not prior according to something, as the subject is prior to surface simply, but not qua colored: for there are, says Cajetan, three things in the located thing. In a body, e.g., there is the substance which is located, the quantity which is the reason of location, and the relation of presence, which follows upon those two as upon its proper foundation. In an angel likewise there is the substance which is present as that which, the contact of power, which is present as that whereby, and the relation of itself arising from those two. These three can be diversely considered, and according to diverse considerations can have the character of prior and posterior: for if they are considered as certain entities existing in the nature of things, thus in the angel substance is prior to operation, and operation to relation; just as also in a body substance is prior to quantity and relation: but if they are considered not absolutely, as they are entities, but as reasons of being in a place, thus just as in bodily things substance is prior to quantity, and then the relation follows, so in spiritual things the very operation is prior to the substance of the angel, upon which, as upon subject and founding reasons, the relation of presence results.

— Contra 1. The example about the subject is not to the purpose; for it is evident that the reason of the extended colored thing constitutes that subject under the character of surface, since surface is the extension of a body according to length and breadth: but it is not likewise evident that operation is the constitutive reason of the angel in a place; nay rather the contrary is shown; for, as we have already said, the agent must first be located before acting, which is most evident in corporeal agents, for they are located before they act. Second, they falsely suppose that quantity is the reason of locating bodies, for the quantity of bread and wine in the Sacrament of the Eucharist remains the same after consecration, and yet it is not the reason why the bread is said to exist in a place; since it no longer exists: therefore quantity precisely is not the reason why a body is in a place, since it can subsist after that body is destroyed. Moreover, the adorable Body of Christ the Lord in the Eucharist has no quantity whereby its parts would be extended toward the place and circumscribed by it, and yet it is none the less truly in a definitive place; therefore quantity per se is not the reason why bodies are in a place, but only insofar as it affects bodies and inheres in them. Thirdly finally, they do not rightly reply that the application or contact of power to a place is the reason why the angel is in a place; for that application is either the first act of the angel, or the second. If the first, since the first act of the angel is his very substance, or a substantial faculty; the consequence is that the angel is present to the place by reason of his substance. If the second, either that act is transitive or immanent. Not immanent, as even the Adversaries confess, since an immanent act has no reference ad extra, and consequently cannot be the reason why angels are said to be present in a place. Not even transitive; for if transitive operation were the formal constitutive reason of the angel in a place, what sort of thing is that transitive operation? Therefore, since that extrinsic operation of the angel is in a place circumscriptively and measuratively (since it is commensurated with the body about which it acts, and in which it is received; while the body is circumscribed by the place) that operation must likewise be circumscribed by the place: for this is why the operation of a man, e.g., inasmuch as it imports the thing operated, is circumscribed by the place, because it is received in a subject which is circumscribed by the place: but the presence of the angel is not circumscriptively in a place, as will appear in the following Question: therefore, etc. Add that if the substantial power itself of the angel is not for him the reason of existing in a place, neither is the application of that same power; for if the quantity of a body were not the reason of existing circumscriptively in a place, neither would its application effect such a presence. Moreover, just as the application of a heating power to wood so as to heat it is not the reason of heating, but only a condition sine qua non; so similarly the application of angelic power to a place is not the reason of existing in a place, but a condition sine qua non whereby we would know the angel to be present to this place rather than to another; for angelic presence becomes known to us only through operation, although it is presupposed in the place before he operates there.

The Doctor proves it 2.: if the angel were precisely in a place through operation, it would follow that he would often be nowhere; *since it often happens that they operate nothing in places where they can be thought to exist. First indeed they perform no work in the empyrean heaven: but among the other celestial orbs only some Intelligences are occupied in governing and moving them, while the rest do not exercise their power in them. In the sphere of fire they attempt nothing at all, for fire in its center has need neither of fuel, nor of tinder, nor of an inciting air. In the air indeed demons sometimes excite and hurl hailstorms, thunderings, and lightnings as lictors and ministers of God the avenger; but good angels are exempt from these and rest. Nor do these expend any labor on the surge and motion of the sea, nor are good angels reckoned the authors of tempests, although demons sometimes stir them up. On earth finally no work can be thought of in trees, flowers, or living things worthy to be ascribed to the power of the angels; for without their operations rivers run headlong with their own clearness and nature, meadows sprout, trees are adorned with flowers and fruits, animals live and direct their movements according to instinct and impulse, and universal nature tends toward its ends according to the laws prescribed by its divine Maker without any special governance of the angels. Indeed demons are occupied in hell in tormenting and cruciating the reprobate; but they are demons, and not the most holy angels of whom principally we speak. Therefore for these no other ministry seems to be assigned with regard to creatures than the guardianship of men and the liberation and solace of souls groaning in Purgatory. But few out of so immense a multitude of them are detained in those ministries. From all these things, therefore, it may be gathered that if the existence of angels in a place were to be gathered from their operation around the place, few of them would be reckoned to abide in a place.

* Gonet answers, from Cajetan. First, indeed, that the angels have some operation regarding the empyrean heaven, although such an operation does not become known to us. — But this solution is offered quite gratuitously and is by no means to be admitted; both because if such an angelic operation does not become known to us, it is asserted without foundation and fictitiously imagined: and because in this way it would be easy to dissolve any arguments whatever: for who could not evade any difficulty whatsoever by answering that the matter is indeed as asserted, but that its reason and cause lie hidden from us?

He answers 2.: that the angels produce some light whereby the innate splendor of the empyrean heaven is more perfected: for although, he says, an angel cannot immediately produce alterative qualities, e.g., heat and cold, but only by applying active things to passive ones; yet he can well produce light, for light is supreme among all corporeal qualities; and the lower nature is touched in its supreme degree by the higher nature, because, as S. Dionysius says, De divinis nominibus: divine wisdom joins the ends of the first to the beginnings of the second. By this light moreover that celestial body is chiefly beautified and adorned. For thus it is said of the Blessed, Apoc. 21: They shall bring their glory and honor into it, namely into the heavenly City; much more will the angels, with their special light, make that city most glorious. — Against this: it is gratuitously and without any reason feigned that the angels adorn the empyrean heaven with new light; for that light would either emanate from the angels themselves, as it shall emanate from the glorified bodies, as is asserted by the cited text of the Apocalypse, or it would be produced by them: but neither can be said. Not the first indeed, since angels are purely spiritual substances, they cannot pour forth from themselves the corporeal light wherewith the heaven would be illuminated. Not even the second: for they would produce that light either through creation, or through generation. Not through creation, since creation is proper to God alone, as we proved with the Subtle Doctor in the Physics. Add that if the angels could produce light through creation, on the ground that what is supreme of the lowest order can be produced by something of a higher order; if, I say, on this account an angel could create light, much more could he create a rational soul; for although this is more interior to them, yet it is most akin to them: but no one admits the consequence; therefore neither ought the antecedent be admitted. Nor can the angels produce light through generation; for generation comes about through the corruption of a form previously existing in matter, whereas in the empyrean heaven there is nothing that can be corrupted, and therefore nothing whence generation could take place. Finally, a most perfect substance, such as the empyrean heaven is, ought to proceed from its Creator at the beginning of its formation with the whole perfection due to it, and consequently it obtained the light fitting to it by force of its creation. Nor does it avail to reply that a most perfect substance subordinated to another can be completed by that other, just as the lower angels, although perfect, nevertheless stand in need of illumination from the Superior ones. This reply, I say, is not to the purpose; for there is a far different distinction between the empyrean heaven and the angels; since the angels are operative intellectually, they can receive daily new perfection and illumination, which certainly can in no way be said of the empyrean heaven, wholly immobile and unalterable; since it can exercise no action, neither can it acquire any perfection, and therefore it must have had every perfection due to it by force of its perfection.

The Doctor proves it 3.: If the angel had necessarily to operate where he is, it would follow that the angel moving the heavens would be immediately in the whole heaven; for the whole heaven is proportioned to the power of the angel; but the consequence is false; for the angel would have his presence supremely diffused and extended through the whole heaven, which the Adversaries do not admit. — Nor say that the angel is only in that part of heaven in which he operates immediately, and which he moves, and mediately in the others. For, the Doctor says, the angel of himself has no greater power to move one part immediately than the others except insofar as he is more applied to one part than to the rest; but if he be first applied to one part, which he moves immediately, the consequence is that he is first in a place with that part before he operates in that part, and thus he will not have precisely from operation that he is in a place. He has other similar proofs, all of which, like the preceding ones, I touch upon briefly for this reason:

It is proved 4.: An angel can be in a corporeal place without any operation, or application of his power, whether properly or improperly called an operation, and without undergoing anything in the place, or adorning it; therefore he does not have from operation, as from the fundamental reason, that he is in a place. The antecedent is proved: a body can be in a place without any application of power, or operation proper or improper: therefore much more an angel. The Adversaries admit the antecedent; the consequence is proved: a body can be placed in a place without any operation either because it can have in itself an intrinsic ubi whereby it is formally said to be in a place, namely the relation of the located thing to the place; or because through the action of an extrinsic cause, motive of the place, it would be put in a place; but the angel is equally capable of an ubi, and of an intrinsic form whereby he would be placed formally in a place without any operation, and he is equally capable of being placed in a place through the action of a cause motive of the place as a body is: therefore just as a body can be placed in a place without any proper or improper operation, so too the angel. The minor is proved: first, no reason can be brought forward, or assigned why the substance of the angel by its quantity of power should not be capable of a definitive place without operations, any less than the material substance of a body by benefit of its quantity of bulk is capable of a circumscriptive place: therefore, etc. Second, God depends no more upon anyone to constitute some angel in a place independently of operation, than to transport and establish some body therein: but he can do this: therefore also that. Third, when an angel is located somewhere and operates, God can suspend his operation, either by forbidding him to do anything further in that place, or by denying him his concurrence: but by that suspension of action the angel no less remains present in that place, and another angel there would see him equally as he saw him while he was operating: therefore independently of operation he is truly as capable of occupying a place as a body.

The Thomists object 1.: A corporeal substance cannot, by its formal reason, proximately and immediately grant to bodies to be in a place: therefore neither can a spiritual substance be the formal reason proximately founding ubication in corporeal and immaterial things. The consequence is evident: for if a corporeal substance cannot of itself, and prescinding from quantity, be the formal reason proximately founding ubication for bodies, but holds this only by reason of quantity, much less will a spiritual substance hold of itself that it is for the angel himself the formal reason of being in a place. But the antecedent is proved: only that is in a body the formal reason immediately granting it to be in a place which is for it the proximate and immediate formal reason of touching the place: yet a corporeal substance cannot of itself be the proximate and immediate formal reason of touching the place; for a corporeal substance touches the place not immediately by reason of itself, but only by reason of the quantity mediating between it and the place: therefore, etc. The major is proved from a likeness, for one clothed, although he has a garment, is in no way said to be clothed unless he touches the garment: therefore neither could a substance be in a place unless it touched the place, either by physical contact through quantity, as corporeal substances; or metaphorically through power, as all spirits.

— I answer 1. by denying the consequence: for although real and physical contact would be necessary for bodies to be said to be formally in a place, it does not thence follow that the contact of power ought equally to be required, that a spiritual substance be said to be formally present to a place: for physical contact is said to be required in bodies because they are in a place divisively and through commensuration; so that their parts correspond to and are commensurated with the parts of the place, unto which, as appears, contact and application of the parts of the body to the parts of the place is necessarily required: otherwise it is with a spiritual substance, which since it is in a place definitively and in a manner wholly invisible, it is not necessary that it have any contact, or at least none other than the real presence of its substance: for as a body is said to touch the place through quantity, and by this reason becomes present to it; so the angel through his substance becomes really present to the place, which suffices for him to be said to touch it.

I answer 2.: the antecedent can be denied, as well as the major of its proof: Both because, as we have already said, the adorable Body of Christ the Lord in the Eucharist, stripped of its quantity at least external, and whereby it could really touch a place, is truly present on the altar, and under the eucharistic species, with definitive presence: therefore that quantity, whereby the place is touched, is not the formal reason why bodies are precisely in a place. And because the eucharistic species of bread and wine remain the same after and before consecration: but once consecration is accomplished, their quantity is not the formal reason why the substance of bread and wine is said to be in a place, since that substance has ceased to be, and subsists no longer: therefore quantity is not the formal reason founding the ubication of bodies in a place, since bodies, at least divinely, can be formally in a place without quantity, and quantity itself can remain in the same place without thereby constituting bodies formally in the place.

They object 2.: What is the proximate reason of founding angelic ubication imports determination, or limitation with respect to the place, since by it one is so here as not to be elsewhere: but the substance of the angel per se, and operation removed, does not import such a determination; for the order to place is not essential but accidental to the angel: therefore, all operation removed, the substance of the angel is not the formal reason immediately founding the ubication of the angel.

— I deny the minor. for that determination, or limitation with respect to the place is either understood causally, and denotes an extrinsic or intrinsic cause whereby the angel is determined to occupy this place rather than another; or fundamentally, or formally, insofar namely as existing here it has the reason of founding a relation to this place rather than to another: but it can hold this independently of any extrinsic operation; since it can be determined, either by the divine, or by its own will, to undergo this or that place: to which ubi when it is present, its substance is the sufficient reason of founding the relation of presence and ubication to the place; for nothing else is required for this than that the angel can be said to be truly present here, and not elsewhere, and hence to have a relation of presence to this, and not to another place, all of which can come about with any operation excluded: therefore whichever way the Thomists use that determination, it comes about independently of operation.

They insist: the substance of the angel per se is indifferent to every single place in particular: therefore that it be in a certain, or determinate place, it necessarily requires something whereby it be determined to undergo this place rather than another: but that cannot be anything other than its transitive operation: therefore by this it is substituted formally in a place.

— I deny the minor. for, as was said, that determination is understood either causally or fundamentally. If the first, the angel has it not from his operation transiting to the place, but either from his own motive power, whereby he freely transferred himself to that place, or from an extrinsic power, namely from God, whereby he was produced in that place, or detained therein, or translated to it. But if that determination be taken fundamentally, he has it from his substance, which although of itself it is indifferent to existing here or elsewhere, yet when it is stationed present here, whether by its own, or by another's will, it is no longer indifferent to founding a respect to this or another place, but necessarily founds a relation of presence to that place in which it is substantially present.

They urge again: with operation excluded, the angels have nothing whereby they could found a real relation of presence to a place; therefore this is necessarily required, that they be said to have a determinate place. The antecedent is proved: if there be anything besides operation in the angel whereby he could found this relation immediately, it is above all his substance: but the substance of the angel cannot be the immediate foundation of such a relation: Both because a substance per se and precisely founds no other relation than that of identity. And because if it founded a relation, it would be above all either qua it is substance, and insofar as it has the common concept of substance, or qua it is angelic substance: but neither can be affirmed: not the first indeed, otherwise every substance would found a like relation: not even the second, because the formal reason of angelic substance formally denotes nothing else than a total and adequate spiritual substance, denoting no order to a body: therefore the substance of the angel per se precisely cannot found a relation to space, or place.

— I deny the antecedent; and to the minor of its proof I say, that angelic substance founds a respect to the place, not precisely qua it is substance, nor qua angelic substance, but qua it is substance here, and not elsewhere; just as, e.g., a wall founds a relation of similarity to another, not precisely qua it is a corporeal substance, nor qua it is extended, but qua it is white, or black. But to what is said, namely that a substance founds no other relation than that of identity; I answer that this is true while it is compared with another substance, but not while compared with something else; for as substance qua created, when compared to God, bears to God a relation of dependence; so when compared to a place, it can bear to it a relation of presence entirely distinct from that respect of identity which it has to another substance. Thence it appears that the Thomists seem not to philosophize sufficiently congruously, while, as if indubitable, they put forward as the foundation of their opinion that substance per se can found no relation, since it has to God a relation of dependence, and to another substance a relation of identity.

They object 3.: If the substance of the angel per se, and anterior to the virtually transiting operation, were the proximate reason of founding ubication, or immediately granting to the angel that he be in a place, the angel would always claim for himself a certain place, and could not exist in a greater or lesser one at his pleasure: but this cannot be said: therefore neither that. The minor will appear below. The major is proved: for the substance of the angel within its own line is something invariable, for it always holds the same substantial perfection, and never varies in its substantial being: therefore if that per se, and anterior to operation, be the proximate reason of founding angelic ubication, or immediately granting to the angel that he be in a place, he will always claim a certain place for himself, nor can he at his pleasure exist in a greater or lesser place within the sphere of his activity.

— It is confirmed, from this, that since the quantity of bulk is in us the formal reason of being in a place, a body, e.g., cannot occupy or fill now a greater, now a lesser place unless some intrinsic change be made in its quantity, namely through condensation or complication, or rarefaction: therefore similarly, if the substance of the angel according to what it holds within its own line be the proximate formal reason of being in a place, the angel will not be able sometimes to exist in a greater, sometimes in a lesser place, unless his very substance be intrinsically varied, and within its own line, which however is impossible.

— I deny the minor, and to its proof I say, that although the substance of the angel is of itself invariable according to its entity, it can nevertheless be varied by respect to the place to which it is applied, insofar namely as it is subject to the determination of the divine or its own will, whereby it is applied to such or such a place. For although the substance of the angel per se is determinate to the place adequate to it, in this sense, that it cannot be in a greater, still it is not determined to exist in the whole of that place, nor in any certain part of it, but indifferently it can be either in the place, or within its breadth in a greater or lesser place: and consequently it is necessary that in this respect it be determined in some way, so that the very substance be a determined thing. Yet this determination is not to be understood as made in such wise that the very substance of the angel, before (at least in the order of nature) it be united to the place, lose the termination it has from its nature, and acquire another, as it were through a certain constitution or dilatation, by reason of which it demands so much or so much place within the breadth of that place, which according to its natural termination it demanded; just as bodies by reason of their own quantity demand a place of a certain extension, and that they be in a lesser one it is necessary that their quantity be first, at least in the order of nature, constrained, or in some other way acquire a new termination: but it must be said that the aforesaid termination is made in the angel by this alone, that his substance is applied to so much or so much place, according to the measure of his own will.

To the confirmation, I deny parity; for there is disparity between corporeal and angelic substance, in that the former while it is divisively in a place, is in it through commensuration of every kind of the whole quantity with the whole place, and of the parts of that same quantity with the parts of the place: but the latter is whole in the whole, and whole in any part, as the rational soul in the body, and the Body of Christ in the Eucharist; whence just as the rational soul, without intrinsic variation of itself, can inform now a greater, now a lesser matter, and the Body of Christ can sometimes exist under greater, sometimes under lesser dimensions or species, according to the will of the consecrator; so too the angel, without intrinsic variation of his substance, will be able sometimes to exist in a greater, sometimes in a lesser place, according to the good pleasure of his will, by reason of which angelic substance can be united either to the whole place adequate to it, or only to some one of the parts of the place.

Gonet urges: even if some substance be whole in the whole of some place, and whole in any part of that place, it does not thence follow that it can constitute itself now in a greater, now in truth in a lesser place, as it pleases it; for God is whole in the whole corporeal place, and whole in any part of it, and yet he cannot fail to fill every created place. Likewise the rational soul is whole in the whole body, and whole in any part of it, and yet it cannot at its pleasure inform sometimes the whole body, sometimes only one part of it. Whence that it can inform now a lesser matter, namely while it first actualizes the body of a child, now a greater, when indeed the same child grows, does not arise from this, that it is whole in the whole body, and whole in any part of it, but because from its nature it is determined to this, that it first actualize a lesser matter, then a greater converted into the proper substance of man. Similarly, that the Body of Christ can sometimes exist under lesser, sometimes under greater dimensions of the bread, according to the good pleasure of the consecrator signing the matter to be converted into it, arises from the nature or institution of the Sacrament of the Eucharist determining it to this. But the substance of the angel is not per se, and intrinsically, or from its nature determined to this, that for diverse times it be now in a lesser place, afterwards in a greater; nay rather, since it is wholly invariable from within, it must consequently be determined to exist always in an equal place, if it be the proximate formal reason of existing in a place.

— I deny the minor: for since angelic substance, as regards motion and its union to such or such a place, hangs altogether upon its free will, although per se it be invariable; yet it is not determined from within to exist always in an equal place; whence much more easily than the rational soul can it occupy a greater or lesser place; for the soul is so bound that a greater or lesser diffusion of it to the body hangs upon the greater or lesser constitution of the body itself; but the angel does not thus depend upon the place; but according to the inclination of his will he can pour forth the presence of his substance to a wider or stricter place.

— But the reason why peculiarly the substance of the angel, for the occupation of a place, hangs upon his free will, whereas the corporeal quantity of man is not so subjected to the empire of his liberty as to occupy a greater or lesser place according to his inclination, and neither is the substance of the rational soul free to inform the whole body, or only some parts of it, nor can God, by reason of his immensity and eternity, effect that his substance be only in some part of a place, and not everywhere; nor that his duration coexist with only some part of time: the reason, I say, of this distinction is, says our Rada, that the quantity of perfection in the angel, with regard to that union, holds two things by reason of which it befits it to be so subjected to the liberty of the angel himself: The first is, that from its own entity, and from the mode wherein it is united, it does not repugn to it indifferently to be united to the whole place, and to a part of it: The second is, that that union be the term of the free operation of the angel himself, namely local motion: for by means of local motion the angel applies and unites himself efficiently to some place. But to corporeal quantity the first is lacking by reason of its extension, as was expounded; and to the rational soul the second is lacking, for its union with the body which it informs is not the term of any free action of the soul itself, but is wrought by an extrinsic agent; and similarly the power of God toward every place, and coexistence with the whole time, if considered on the part of God, do not terminate any free action of God himself: but supposing that there be place and time, God necessarily coexists with them, otherwise God would be mutable as regards place and time.