Scotus Academicus, Tomus primus: De Deo in se subsistente

Five things especially present themselves for examination in this Section: first, whether God can be seen by the powers of nature by a created eye, both spiritual and corporeal. Second, whether this vision can be granted at least by God, and with supernatural aid. Third, whether the possibility of this divine Vision can be demonstrated. Fourth, whether it was ever granted to any mortal man. Fifth and finally, whether the souls of the Saints enjoy the divine vision itself before the final judgment: which difficulties will be developed in just as many Questions in what follows.

It is a commonplace among the Philosophers that there is a twofold seeing power: one corporeal, the other spiritual; of which the former is simply called the eye; the latter is called the intellect, and the eye of the mind. Each has a twofold order to the visible object, and regards it either as a cause or as the term of vision: for the visible object concurs efficiently with the seeing power, whether per se immediately or through a visible species emitted from itself, to form the act of vision; of which it is likewise the term, since every vision is terminated at the visible object.

— It is likewise certain that the visibility of an object is a peculiar perfection of the object itself, insofar as it is the cause of vision: for the power of causing is a special attribute of the cause itself, and distinct from its essence; especially when it is ordered to a transient and merely accidental effect, as happens in the present case; by which the causative power is distinguished from the communicative, or diffusive, power of intrinsic properties; for the latter is the very nature and essence of the thing, from which those properties arise and naturally flow. Although invisibility seems to be a mere privation of visibility, and a lack of the object's relation in the order of cause to forming vision, nevertheless it is something positive and intrinsic, because such a lack of power to cause vision is founded upon a special perfection of the being which is called invisible; for such an absence of power arises from the fact that the being has, whether in its essence or in its attributes, a certain limitation or illimitation, by reason of which there is no proportion between the visible object itself and the seeing power; but the limitation or illimitation of a being consists in its intrinsic mode, as was said in treating of infinity. That the power of terminating vision, especially intellective vision, is also something intrinsic in the intelligible object, is established from the Metaphysica, in which it has been proved that the cognoscibility, or truth, of a being is a special perfection of it.

These things being premised, three points are proposed in the present Question to be resolved: first, whether God is naturally visible to the corporeal eye. Second, whether by the forces of nature alone He can be attained clearly and intuitively by the intellect. Third, whether at least through divine omnipotence some creature could be produced so perfect that by its natural activity alone it could behold God intuitively, so that the intuitive and beatific vision of God be said to be connatural to it; so that these may be resolved more evidently

Note 1. With the Doctor, in 1. d. 3. q. 1. n. 2., 'natural' can be taken in three ways, namely as opposed to the voluntary, the supernatural, and the violent. In the first way, every power that is not free, or that acts from natural necessity, whatever effects it produces, is called natural. In the second way, every power, even a free one, acting according to the forces implanted in it by nature, is called natural. In the third way, every power acting even beyond its forces to produce some effect perfective of it can be called natural. To these I add a fourth: namely, that can be called natural which is opposed to the acquired: thus the power of seeing is natural, but that of playing the cithara is not so.

Note 2. The visible object, according to the relation which it has to the seeing power, is wont to be distinguished as twofold by the Philosophers, namely either as proportioned and connatural, toward which the power can be connaturally borne and without any divinely implanted activity and elevation; or as extensive and praeternatural, which indeed the power cannot attain by the forces alone implanted in it by nature; it can, however, if aided from above and elevated through divinely implanted activity. We speak of the former in the present Question; of the latter, however, speech will be made in the following one.

Note 3. The errors of heretics concerning the present truth have been various: for St. Augustine, lib. 2. De Trinit., cap. 8., and Gregory Nazianzenus, lib. De Fide, testify that certain Arians held that the Son of God is visible to corporeal eyes. But since they did not affirm Him to be truly God, indeed they contended that He is a certain most excellent creature, and the first of all, whom they asserted had appeared to the Fathers of the Old Testament in the form of His own body, as is clear from the disputation of Athanasius in the Council of Nicaea; therefore this error, as Smisingus rightly observes, does not pertain to the present place. — There were nevertheless other heretics older than Arius who affirmed that God is visible to corporeal eyes, as St. Irenaeus reports, lib. 4. cap. 37.; into which error Novatianus also fell, lib. De Trinit., which is reckoned among the works of Tertullian. — Other heretics likewise judged that God is naturally visible to the eye of the mind, which Aetius afterward, Eunomius, and the disciples of both, the Anomoeans, taught. Concerning Aetius, certainly, Epiphanius writes thus:

For he with his followers fell into that madness of vanity, that he boasted himself above all mortals to know God not by faith alone, but by nature according to knowledge: just as I mentioned somewhere above, they say that God is not known to them simply by some knowledge of faith; but just as anyone knows whatever is discerned by the eyes or handled with the hands. As if someone should take into his hands a stone, or wood, or an instrument of another material. Thus that most audacious man said: then I know God as much as myself: nay, I do not know myself so much as God.

That the error of all of these may be refuted, and the Catholic truth may appear, let it be

First conclusion. — God cannot be seen naturally by the corporeal eye. This seems to be of Faith; since it is plainly inferred from all those places of Sacred Scripture cited above, in which God is affirmed to be invisible, which must at least be understood of invisibility through the natural power of the corporeal eye. Likewise St. Paul says in Rom. 1.: The invisible things of God are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made; by which he denotes that the invisible nature of God is known through this sensible and visible world; which discourse would certainly be futile, if the very nature of God were visible per se, and exhibited itself to be looked upon by corporeal eyes. Add that the Apostle himself, in 1. ad Corinth. 2., expressly affirms that eternal Beatitude, which is the very possession, vision, and love of God, is so excellent a good, and so far exceeds the forces of any natural cognitive faculty, that he justly said that the eye has not seen, nor the ear heard, nor has it ascended into the heart of man, what things God has prepared for those who love Him.

This same truth is strengthened by a theological argument to be deduced from the Spirituality and Immateriality of God: A corporeal faculty cannot by the forces of nature perceive a spiritual substance: but God is a most spiritual substance: therefore He cannot be conceived by the forces of nature by the corporeal eye. Titus Bostrensis proves the major, lib. 1. contra Manichaeos: For a body, he says, sees a body; the like directs its gaze into the like; nor can the eyes of an inferior nature see what is more excellent and more eminent in nature; much less what is of a contrary nature. But if what is of a more excellent nature, since it is not contrary except insofar as it is incorporeal, cannot at all be seen by an inferior as being corporeal; certainly the contrary cannot be seen by the contrary, if it exists at all. By these words he demonstrates the error of the Manichaeans, and argues against them because they affirm that primary matter saw God. — This same argument is confirmed by the holy Fulgentius in his response to the third question of Ferrandus, where he proves that God cannot be seen by corporeal eyes on account of His spirituality, and His absence of distance from all places.

For the eyes of the body, he says, have this property, that they not only see corporeal things, but cannot even see, unless there are intermediate intervals of some space between them and the things which they see. Hence it is that although they see very many other things, they cannot see themselves, nor do they see in themselves when they see outside themselves; for even the very keenness of vision is blunted, if something to be seen is joined to the eyes themselves. Whoever, therefore, thinks that God can be discerned by corporeal eyes, must first say that He is separated from those eyes by a corporeal space. Whoever, however, wishes to know with what eyes God is seen, let him think of God Himself, because He is wisdom, He is truth, He is charity: wherefore, with whatever eyes wisdom, truth, and charity are seen, with those same eyes is seen that wise and true Divinity. God, therefore, promises His vision not to the eyes of the body, but to the eyes of the soul, which He constituted capable of wisdom, truth, and charity.

The authorities and arguments which are wont to be objected against this Conclusion will be proposed and solved in the following Question, where we shall prove that God is invisible to the eyes of the body even supernaturally.

Second conclusion. — God is also invisible naturally to the created intellect. This is of Faith, determined in the Council of Vienne against the Beguines and Beguards, who are condemned by Clement V, because they asserted, as is related in the Clementine Ad nostrum, etc., that man can attain final Beatitude in the present according to every grade of perfection just as he will obtain it in the blessed life: and that every intellectual nature is naturally blessed in itself: and that the soul does not need the light of glory elevating it to see God and to enjoy Him beatifically: whence the Subtle Doctor concludes in 4. dist. 19. q. 11. num. 2. that this heresy is worse than the heresy of Pelagius, who held that man could be justified without grace.

The truth of this conclusion is gathered from Sacred Scripture, which constantly affirms that Beatitude, which it is certain consists in the possession of God through the love and vision of God, can be obtained only through grace and supernatural help. Thus Rom. 6.: The grace of God is life everlasting. And Ps. 83.: The Lord will give grace and glory: and as often as eternal life is promised, it is affirmed to be a special gift of God, and to be able to be had only through supernatural virtues. Thus Romanorum 6.: You have your fruit unto sanctification, but the end, life everlasting. — Add that for the Angels themselves the attainment of Beatitude is supernatural, nor did they obtain it except through supernatural works and infused habits, as the Theologians affirm with St. Augustine, lib. 12. De Civitate Dei, cap. 9., saying: it must be confessed with due praise of the Creator, that it pertains not only to holy men, but can also be said of the holy Angels, that the Charity of God has been poured forth in them by the Holy Spirit, who has been given to them: therefore much less will men be able to exercise that divine vision by the forces proper to their own nature. This very thing is insinuated in that wonderful vision of the Prophet Isaias, cap. 6., where he says among other things: I saw the Lord sitting upon a lofty throne, as it were transcending the forces of any created intellect, and he adds: The Seraphim, who stood around it, with two wings covered their faces, to signify the greatest disproportion which is between the Angelic intellect and the immense splendor of divine light. Hence St. Dionysius, cap. 5. De Divinis Nom., affirms that the blessed minds are divinely elevated to the beatific vision, and says that they are constantly and immovably raised up to the ray shining upon them, and by a fitting love of the illuminations granted to them are lifted aloft as it were on wings.

The modern Thomists strive to demonstrate this truth by a threefold natural argument taken from the Angelic Doctor, 3. contra Gentes cap. 52, but in vain; for those arguments do not conclude rightly, nor do they press anything.

They form the first thus: that which is proper to some superior nature cannot belong to an inferior nature, except through the action of the superior to which it is proper: just as heating does not befit water, except from the action of fire, to which it is connatural to be hot and to heat water: but to see God as He is in Himself is proper to the divine nature, because to operate according to one's proper form is proper to every operator: therefore, they say, no creature can attain to the vision of God as He is in Himself, except by the action of God elevating it to this sublime operation.

On the contrary: This argument begs the question, and supposes what is in controversy; for it had to be proved that the vision of the divine Essence is so proper and connatural to God alone, that it cannot naturally belong to any other intellectual creature; for this the Eunomians and Aetians denied, as also the Beguards, as was said above. Nor does it matter that God knows Himself through His proper form, or intellection: for this does not hinder that He can be naturally perceived by another intellect: for although an Angel perceives himself through his own intellection, he is no less able to be understood and known by another.

They prove secondly: If some created intellect naturally saw God, it would have the divine Essence connaturally united to itself by way of form and intelligible species: but this is repugnant: therefore, etc. The major is certain, because, they say, for the vision of God any other species distinct from the divine Essence is impossible, or at least useless. They prove the minor: First, because a form connatural and proper to some nature cannot be communicated to another naturally, but only supernaturally; as is clear by the example of uncreated subsistence, which, since it is connatural to God, cannot be communicated to any creature naturally, but only supernaturally: but the divine Essence, they say, as it has the notion of intelligible species, is the proper form of the divine intellect, just as subsistence is the proper term of the divine Essence: therefore it cannot be communicated to any creature naturally. Second, if a created nature could naturally be united to the divine Essence as to an intelligible species, it would have a natural power for that union, and consequently would have some efficacy upon the divine Essence; for he who can unite extremes must have dominion and efficacy over them: the consequence is absurd: therefore, so is the antecedent.

On the contrary: First, it is false that it is impossible for the divine Essence to inform a created intellect through its own species and image: for below we shall prove that this species, representative of the divine Essence and informative and perfective of the divine intellect, is not only possible, but can also be useful. Second, it is likewise false that the object of vision must necessarily inform the intellect of the one seeing; for it suffices that it terminate the vision, and objectively concur to its production through its own motion and excitation. Add that although in other visions this information might be desired, it would not be necessary in the vision of God; for such information could not be made through the inherence of the divine essence, but only through the assistance and intimate presence of it, namely by reason of its immensity, whereby God is present to everything, not only to the intellect but also to all beings. But this presence serves nothing for intuitive knowledge; otherwise God would be seen by every intellect. Nor do the proofs of the minor press: not indeed the first, because it is false that a form connatural to a nature cannot be communicated to another: for heat is connatural to fire, and yet it is communicated to water and the other subjects which are heated by fire. Not the second either; for although a created intellect saw God naturally, it would not on that account have any efficacy upon the divine Nature; since the divine Nature concurs to this vision in no other way than by way of the object moving and determining it, which concurrence does not disgrace God.

They prove thirdly, from the disproportion which is between the divine essence and the created intellect: To every intellectual nature, they say, it is proper to be understood according to the mode of its own substance: but the essence of God cannot be known quidditatively in the mode of some created substance: therefore it cannot be naturally seen by any created intellectual substance. The minor is certain, they say, because the essence of God, since it is pure act, and infinite, and subsisting per se, infinitely exceeds any created intellectual substance whatsoever. The major is proved: First indeed a priori: knowledge, they say, is made according as the known is in the knower: but the known is in the knower according to the mode of the knower, for whatever is received is received according to the mode of the receiver: therefore the knowledge of every knower is according to the mode of its own nature. Second they prove a posteriori, by induction: there are, they say, four genera of knowing things, and as many of knowable objects: the first order is of the sensitive faculties, which extend themselves to sensible objects: the second is of the rational soul, which, since it is at once intellective and the form of the body, therefore knows objects proportioned to its mode of being, namely spiritual and corporeal things dependently on phantasms: the third order is of the substance immune from body, namely the Angelic; for Angels have their own substance as connatural object, to the mode of which they know all things. Finally, the last order God constitutes, who, since He is most pure act and His own being, has no other species by which He understands, nor any other motive and terminative object than His own essence: therefore, since He is not in the same grade of immateriality with any created intellect, He cannot be connaturally seen by any.

But this argument presses no more than the preceding ones; for they will that the known object be understood in the mode of the knowing substance; either because it must be of the same nature at least by representation, or because it must be perceived in a finite mode, if the power is finite: but the first is false, otherwise it would follow that even the Blessed could not see God as God is, but only as He would be assimilated to the Blessed themselves, and accordingly would hold Himself in the manner of a creature: but the second does not hinder natural knowledge; for that God be known by a finite act detracts nothing from His vision, otherwise the Blessed could not see Him perfectly, since they can exercise only a finite vision. Nor do the proofs of the major establish anything either. Not indeed the first, for the known need not be in the knower otherwise than through its own expressed or impressed species; and accordingly, although the object be of a diverse and more perfect nature, it can no less be in a knower which is of a less perfect nature. Not the second either, because if God cannot be attained naturally by a created intellect, for the reason that He exceeds it in a more perfect mode of being, because God is pure act and infinitely immaterial, such as a created substance is not, and accordingly there is no proportion between the intellect and God; it follows that not even the Blessed can see God, because however much they are elevated through the light of glory, they never become pure acts and infinitely immaterial, and accordingly the greatest disproportion in the order of being always remains between them and God; and accordingly if on account of this disproportion a created intellect cannot by the forces of nature see God, neither, even elevated by the benefit of supernatural light, will it be able to perceive Him.

But if you reply that this disproportion is to be derived from the fact that God is of the supernatural order, but the creature of the natural order, and therefore the creature cannot by the forces of nature perceive God, because a power of an inferior order cannot naturally see that which is of a superior order, unless it be elevated to that superior order, as is wont to happen in the Blessed by the benefit of the light of glory.

On the contrary: when it is said that God is of the supernatural order, either it is understood that He is of such a nature that He cannot be seen naturally, and thus the principle is begged, and what had to be proved is supposed: or that He is infinite, uncreated, pure act, and supremely immaterial, and thus He could never be seen by a creature, however much elevated, since there is no creature which can be elevated to this order of infinite, uncreated, and pure act being. And so, setting aside those arguments.

The conclusion is proved by the argument which the Subtle Doctor supplies in 4. d. 49. q. 11. n. 9. and in the Quodlibetis q. 14. n. 10. art. 2: A created intellect cannot naturally see any object, unless it naturally has everything necessary for eliciting this vision: but a created intellect does not naturally have whatever is necessary for the intuitive vision of God: therefore neither can it see God naturally. The major is certain: for no power can exercise its act, unless it has everything required for the production of this act. The minor is also proved: The intuitive knowledge of an object requires the object present, and moving the power through its presence to elicit the vision: but God is not naturally present to the intellect under His own proper notion of the knowable, nor does He naturally move it to His own proper and immediate knowledge: therefore a created intellect does not naturally have whatever is required for the intuitive vision of God. The minor is clear: for since God is a voluntary object, He moves the power to His vision only insofar as He wills to be freely seen by it; for He is not seen necessarily, like any other objects which present themselves to our senses or intellect, but only most freely does He exhibit Himself to creatures to be looked upon, as He wills and to whom He wills. For although He is intimately present to all intellectual creatures, even to the damned and the demons, He is not however seen by them, namely because He does not will to manifest Himself to them. The Doctor confirms this with these words of the holy Ambrose on these words of St. Luke: And the Angel of the Lord appeared to him: Sensible things, he says, are not seen in like manner; and it is placed in His will to be seen, for it is of His nature not to be seen; if He does not will, He is not seen: if He wills, He is seen. — It is confirmed: if God naturally moved a created intellect to His vision through something other than His free manifestation, that other mover would either formally contain the divine nature, or eminently, or intentionally, that is, as an intelligible species perfectly representing God: but He cannot move through another thing which contains the divine nature formally or eminently, because there is nothing which participates eminently or formally in the divine being; otherwise there would be given something which would be either more perfect or equally perfect as God, which is contradictory. Nor yet through another thing which contains the divine being intentionally, and by way of an intentional species representing the divine nature, because although this species is possible, it cannot however be produced by any creature, but only by God alone; for since a species is expressed and the proper likeness of the object, it cannot be formed by any other than the object itself, unless perhaps it be made by omnipotent God through creation: therefore much more must the representative species of the divine Essence be formed by God Himself: but God produces nothing ad extra naturally, but freely: for He operates all things according to the counsel of His will: therefore whether He manifests Himself per se or through a species, He exhibits Himself to be seen not naturally, but most freely, and accordingly there is no created intellect which can behold Him by natural power.

Some reply that from this discourse of the Subtle Doctor it is proved that the vision of God is supernatural not in entity but only in mode, namely insofar as it can be produced by no natural cause, in the way in which the rational soul can be called supernatural.

On the contrary: for a form to be supernatural in substance, it is not only required that it be producible by God alone, but further it is required that it be produced in a substantial nature already fully constituted in its being of substance, and so be an accident, since no substance can be supernatural in entity, as we shall prove below. Hence the supernaturalness of that vision is not only in mode, but in entity, since this vision is produced through a free manifestation of God, and cannot be formed by the powers of nature.

You will say 1. Any potency can naturally tend toward everything that is contained under its adequate object: but God is contained under the adequate object of the created intellect: therefore the created intellect can naturally know God. The major is evident: for since the sensible is the adequate object of sense, sense can therefore be exercised about any particular sensible. The minor is also evident: for being, as such, which is common to God and creatures univocally, is the adequate object of the intellect itself, which is borne toward anything intelligible.

I distinguish the minor with the Doctor in the aforementioned quodlibetal question: that God is contained within the adequate object that naturally moves the intellect, and is attainable by it through the powers of nature by intuitive knowledge, I deny: that He is contained within the adequate object moving to abstractive and confused knowledge, I concede the minor; and I deny the consequence: for from this it only follows that God, insofar as He is the noblest species of being, can be known naturally, indeed by abstractive and confused knowledge, but not by intuitive and evident knowledge.

You will say 2. According to the Subtle Doctor, q. 1. Prolog. n. 20.: God clearly seen is the natural end of man and of the created intellect. But a natural end can be attained by the principles and means of nature: for how would it be a natural end, if natural means failed for attaining it? Therefore God can be seen naturally by the created intellect.

I answer that the Doctor indeed holds that God clearly seen is the natural end of man passively, so that human nature by itself, and without any elevation, can receive the beatific vision, I concede: actively, so that it can produce that vision by the powers of nature, I deny: for this was not the mind of the Doctor, as will appear more fully below, where we shall show how man can have a natural inclination to see God clearly, although he does not have natural means by which he can form this vision from himself.

Third conclusion. — No substance is creatable to which the beatific vision is connatural. This is common among theologians, against Durandus, Molina, and some other recent authors, whose opinion Vasquez calls inept; Nazarius, reckless; Bannes, notable ignorance.

Proof first. The intuitive vision of God cannot be connatural to any created intellect, unless there is given some object which formally, or eminently, or intentionally contains the divine nature, so that it can move such an intellect to its vision: but no such object is possible which contains the divine essence in either of these ways, as was proved in the confirmation of the preceding conclusion: therefore neither is any intellect possible to which such a vision is connatural. The major is proved: because the intellect cannot be moved to this vision naturally, except either by the divine essence, or by some object containing it in either of the assigned ways: but it cannot be moved by the divine Essence itself, because, as we said, it does not move ad extra by itself immediately, nor does it work anything naturally, but merely freely: therefore if any intellect is moved to its vision, this motion must come from some other object which contains the divine Essence; and since this cannot be given, it must also be acknowledged that such connaturalness of the vision cannot exist.

Proof second. If some creatable intellect could be given to which the beatific vision would be connatural, this would be chiefly because some supernatural substance could be given, to which the light of glory would be natural and from which it would flow as a property: but such a substance is not possible: therefore neither is the connaturalness of that vision. The major is admitted by the adversaries. The minor is proved: a substance would be called supernatural for this reason, either because it would connaturally require from itself some accident supernatural in its entity, e.g., the light of glory: or because it would exceed in perfection all other finite substances: or because it would transcend the physical and intentional powers of any created substance, so that it could be produced by no other, nor known naturally and intuitively: or finally because it would not have in itself the principles of a natural substance; for this supernaturalness does not seem able to be derived from any other source: but under none of these heads can that substance be called supernatural: therefore such a substance is not creatable.

The minor is evident as to the first part, for by the very fact that some substance would require some supernatural accident from its native principles, an evident and manifest contradiction would arise, namely, that that supernatural accident would be, and would not be, such at the same time: it would indeed be supernatural, as is supposed: but it would not be, because it would be required connaturally by that created substance; but what is required in this way is not above its nature, nor consequently is it considered to be supernatural. For the rational soul, although producible by God alone, is not considered natural on any other account than because it is required by the body, as its connatural form.

The same minor is also evident as to the second part; both because, by the more common opinion, no finite substance of such perfection can be given that a more perfect one could not still be produced, to infinity: therefore no substance can be given which is called supernatural because it exceeds others in perfection. Then, even if such a substance were given, it would not from its own nature require any supernatural form, and so would not on that account be considered supernatural, namely in the sense in which a supernatural substance is treated of here.

It is also evident as to the third part: for although some substance could not be produced and known naturally by any other created thing, it would not follow from this that it is supernatural: both because supernatural accidents, for instance the light of glory and the beatific vision, would not naturally belong to it, otherwise they would no longer be supernatural: and because, although the rational soul can be produced by no created substance, but by God alone, it is not on that account called supernatural: and finally, because no substance can be conceived which could not be reached and known, either by the Angels already created, at least by abstractive knowledge, or by other substances to be created of the same perfection as itself; hence no substance can be given which entirely exceeds the intentional powers of created substance.

Finally, it is evident as to the fourth part: for created substances, which in fact are natural, are called such for this reason, either because they have in themselves the nature and principle of motion and rest: or because they cannot be conceived so perfect that still more perfect ones to be produced could not be conceived: but every creatable substance would have in itself the principle of motion and rest, for it could be moved to intellection and love, and cease from both operations: nor would it be of such perfection that God could not produce a more perfect one still, and the human intellect conceive it: therefore, etc.

Proof third. If some intellectual substance were possible to which the beatific vision would be connatural, and from which the light of glory would flow as a property, it would follow that that beatific vision would not be simply and absolutely supernatural, but only secundum quid: but this cannot be said: therefore, etc. The consequence of the major is proved: for that is called supernatural simply and absolutely which transcends the powers and existence of the whole created and creatable nature, and can be produced by God alone, and is not required connaturally by any natural being as its form; for no other concept of supernaturalness is given; and if another is imagined, it will no longer be the same controversy: but if some creature were possible to which the beatific vision would be connatural, it would not exceed the powers of the whole creatable nature: therefore it would not be supernatural simply, but only secundum quid, namely with respect to creatures already existing. I pass over the other arguments customarily brought forward by authors, since they seem less effective.

You will say 1. If it were repugnant that some supernatural substance be given, this would be chiefly either because it is a created being, or because it is a substance: but under neither head is it repugnant. Not under the first: for the light of glory, the beatific vision, and the infused virtues are created beings, and yet supernatural. Nor under the second: for if an accident, which is of lesser perfection than a substance, can be elevated to the grade of supernaturalness, why should not a far more excellent substance also be able to become supernatural? Add that the divine Essence is a substance supernatural in entity; and hence it is not repugnant that some substance become supernatural.

I answer that it is repugnant that some created substance become supernatural precisely because it is a created substance: for by reason of both it is not immediately and per se unifiable with the supernatural end, that is, without the motion and help of an extrinsic agent of another order, otherwise it would be pure act, which is repugnant to a creature. But this reason does not apply to an accident, nor to the divine nature. Not indeed to an accident, which, since it is the very attainment of the supernatural object, does not from its immediate union with it follow that it is pure act: rather it is the act of the substantial potency elevating it and uniting it with the supernatural end. Hence there is no parallel reason regarding an accident and a created supernatural substance. But neither does it apply to the divine nature, which, since it is pure act, attains itself immediately, and without the benefit of an agent of another order.

You will insist. To every act there corresponds a potency of its own order: therefore since there are supernatural acts, namely the theological habits, the light of glory, the beatific vision: some supernatural potency which corresponds to them must also be given; but this can be none other than a substance: therefore a supernatural substance must be given.

I distinguish the major; that to every act there must correspond an active potency of the same order, I deny: since in natural things, which are produced by creation alone, such as the Angels, rational souls, and prime matter, there is no creative potency of the natural order. That a subjective potency must correspond to the informing act, I concede: and so to the beatific vision, the light of glory, and the other supernatural gifts there correspond a passive and subjective potency, namely, the intellectual substance. Add that from the supernaturalness of the form the supernaturalness of the subject cannot be proved, because, as we shall say in the following question, the supernaturalness of an act is derived from the producing principle, not from the receiving subject.

You will press: A supernatural substantial mode can be given: therefore the supernatural substance itself can also be given. The consequence is evident; for no difference, and no reason for disparity, seems able to be brought forward. The antecedent is proved: for the union of the divine Word with the humanity is a supernatural substantial mode. It is confirmed by the same example; for by reason of that union and substantial mode, human nature has a connatural immediate union with the supernatural end; for Christ, even as man, is not an adopted Son of God, but a natural one, and the beatific vision is owed to Him connaturally: therefore some supernatural substance can be understood as possible which has an immediate union with the supernatural end. I deny the consequence: for the reason of disparity is that the hypostatic union of the divine supposit with human nature is only that by which the created nature is formally united to the supernatural nature, and this formal unitive element, or means, by which the union is made, can be supernatural not only in the genus of substance, but also in the genus of accident: but a supernatural substance would not be that by which, but that which would be immediately united to the supernatural end; otherwise it would be pure act, and its own beatitude, which is repugnant. This repugnance is not found in a mode or in a supernatural accident, since it is not that which is united, but that by which the union is made, and is an incomplete being, ordered to something else, and hence cannot be pure act, nor its own being, nor its own beatitude: and since these are proper to God alone, they cannot be communicated to any creature, and hence no complete substantial creature can be supernatural. To the confirmation I say that it is false that Christ, as man, has an intrinsic connatural union with the supernatural end, and is the natural Son of God; for He does not have this from the intrinsic notion of human nature itself, but from the hypostatic union, and by reason of the supposit of the Word. Hence there is no parity.

You will say 2. God can create an intellect of such power and perfection that it equals the activity of the beatific intellect furnished with the light of glory: therefore also one that sees God naturally. The consequence is evident; otherwise it would not equal the activity of the beatific intellect. The antecedent is proved: the beatific intellect, even informed by the light of glory, is created and of finite power and perfection: but given any finite intellect, God can produce a more perfect one: therefore He will also be able to produce an intellect which by its natural power equals, indeed even exceeds, the beatific intellect, even one furnished with the light of glory.

I deny the antecedent: for although the beatific intellect furnished with the light of glory is of finite activity and perfection, it does not however follow from this that God can create some intellect which by its natural power equals its perfection and activity, because they are of different orders; that one indeed of a higher and supernatural order: but this one of a natural and lower order; but God cannot bring it about that a thing of a lower order, however great a perfection it is endowed with, can equal a thing of a higher order: for however much a material and corporeal creature is perfected, it will never be able to attain the perfection of the rational soul, nor of an Angel.

You will subsume. That intellect to be produced would not be of a lower order with respect to the intellect furnished with the light of glory: therefore there is no solution. The antecedent is proved: such an intellect can be conceived to be of a lower order in two ways, namely, either because it would be of a more imperfect species, just as man is said to be more imperfect than an Angel, or because it would be disproportionate to the vision of God, so that God to be seen would be considered entirely outside the object of that intellect, just as a brute animal is wholly disproportionate to intellection, and an object which is only intelligible, and in no way sensible, is outside the notion of the object of the cognitive potency of brute animals: but both are false: therefore so is that from which it follows. The antecedent is proved: First indeed, an intellect can be produced so perfect that by its nature it has a greater faculty of understanding than is the power of the intellect which is in fact furnished with the light of glory. For given any finite intellectual nature, or substance, God can create another, and another more perfect, to infinity, since there is no contradiction in this, and God is omnipotent, and infinitely participable substantially more and more by intellectual natures, just as by other substances multipliable to infinity: therefore, given any finite intellect, a substantially more perfect one can be given; for the more perfect an intellectual nature is, the more perfect is the intellect, which indeed is either the very substance and essence of such a nature, or a property flowing from it naturally and commensurate with it, and hence more perfect in a more perfect nature. But if a more perfect intellect can be given, and more perfect to infinity, it can reach, indeed even surpass, the distance which is between itself and another intellect furnished with the light of glory, because that distance is finite, and hence will gradually be diminished, and at length exhausted, indeed even surpassed, by an intellect more perfect to infinity.

The same minor is evident as to the second part: for the intellective potency is of itself universal, extending itself to all intelligible things, according to the activity and power proper to it, in which it differs from the sensitive potency, which is limited to the sensible object, and hence however much the sensitive potency of brute animals grows, it cannot attain an intelligible object, which is outside the sphere of the object of the sensitive potency: but God, to be seen clearly, is not entirely outside the sphere of the intellect already created, since in fact He is seen by the Blessed: therefore if the inchoate power which the created intellect in fact has for seeing God grows to infinity, it will be able to be increased to such a point that it equals the power of the intellect furnished with the light of glory.

I deny the antecedent, and likewise the minor of its proof; both because it is false that an intellect can be produced more perfect to infinity, otherwise there would be given a creature which from its nature and in its entity would be of infinite perfection, and hence would be God: which implies a contradiction, as we have said more fully when treating of divine infinity: and because, however much the natural power of the intellect would grow to infinity, it would always be more imperfect and of a lower order with respect to the intellect furnished with the light of glory, and hence would never equal its perfection in the power of understanding, because that increase would always be natural, and so would always be inferior to any finite supernatural light; wherefore, although a more perfect created intellect would naturally avail for understanding natural objects more perfectly, it would not however avail for seeing supernatural objects, nor would it ever attain the perfection of the intellect elevated and constituted in a higher order through the light of glory. Just as brute animals, although they were created one more perfect than another to infinity, would never attain the perfection of human nature, which is of a higher and more perfect order.

Concerning the twofold resolution of this Question, there were not only various errors of the heretics, but also diverse opinions and judgments of the holy Doctors: and indeed concerning the first, some thought that the Blessed do not see the very essence of God, but only a certain most excellent light and brightness emanating from God, in which He offers Himself to be seen, just as the Sun through rays received in water or air, as St. Gregory reports, 18. Moralium cap. 18. in these words:

It should be known, he says, that there were some who said that even in that region of Blessedness God is seen indeed in His brightness, but is by no means seen in His nature; whom, of course, the falsity of excessive inquiry deceived, for in that simple and immutable essence brightness is not one thing and nature another; but His very nature is His brightness, His very brightness is His nature; for He Himself promises, saying: He who loves me will be loved by my Father, and I will love him, and I will manifest myself to him.

— The Armenians likewise taught this same opinion, as Armacanus testifies, lib. 14. De quaestionibus Armenorum, and Amalricus, condemned in the Lateran Council under Innocent III. This error is likewise attributed to Abailard and to his disciple Arnold, whose followers were called Arnoldists, as our Alphonsus a Castro reports, under the heading Beatitudo. Yet St. Bernard, Epist. 188. and 189., where he reports the errors of Abailard and Arnold, makes no mention of this error, just as also in Epistola 190., which Alphonsus himself cites. Some holy Fathers, whom Vasquez brings forward in the first part disp. 37. cap. 2. and the following, seem to have gone over to the same opinion. But that they were far from this error will clearly be established from what is to be said.

— Concerning the latter resolution of the question, however, there was the error of the Anthropomorphites, that God is corporeal, and therefore visible to bodily eyes by the powers of nature. But whether God is to be beheld by bodily eyes after the resurrection by supernatural power, or whether some body of so great activity could be created that it could exercise the divine vision, St. Augustine not only wavered in this opinion, but certain modern Doctors also vigorously defend it. But in order that it may appear what ought more truly to be said

Note 1. A threefold active and passive potency is distinguished by the Philosophers; for the first is either natural, which can do something according to the powers implanted by nature, such as is the power of speaking and of laughing in man; or supernatural, by which a faculty is elevated to eliciting an action that transcends natural powers, yet is perfective of the potency which elicits it, such as is the beatific vision elicited by the intellect endowed with the light of glory; or obediential, by which it can act in a manner neither proportioned to it nor perfective of its nature, but only insofar as it lies subject to the supreme dominion of its Creator, such as was the power of speaking in Balaam's ass. — Passive potency likewise, in ordination to the form which it can receive, is also threefold: namely, either natural, when it has a natural inclination to receive the form, as a stone to receive downward motion; or violent, when it receives a form against its natural inclination, as a stone thrown upward; or indifferent, when from itself it is not determined to either form, as an Angel to receive motion upward or downward. It must likewise be recalled, from those things which we said in art. 3. q. 2. De Theologia in communi, that a supernatural form is so called only in ordination to the agent that first produces it, not, however, in ordination to the subject that receives it.

Note 2. Obediential potency is the capacity of a creature by which, with the extraordinary concourse of God, it can produce some effect or receive some form, beyond its natural powers and the prescribed natural sphere of activity. It must likewise be observed that this potency, both subjectively and actively, does not extend to any act whatsoever to be elicited or form to be received. For an Angel, says the Doctor, in 1. dist. 12. quaest. 2. num. 8., cannot be white, because he is in no way receptive of this form; nor can a stone see, because it has neither an eye nor any faculty for eliciting vision.

Note 3. God can be understood or imagined to be visible supernaturally to the bodily eye in three ways: First indeed objectively, so that the vision is formally corporeal not only in itself, but also objectively, as tending toward God as a corporeal object, by expressing His light and image, in the way in which it expresses the colors and lineaments of visible objects, with this difference, however, that God is held to be an object exceeding the natural sphere of the visual power, and therefore it itself needs supernatural concourse in order to be able to attain it. Second, God can be understood to be visible by a vision indeed corporeal formally in itself, but expressing a spiritual object, as it is spiritual in itself, in the way (as far as concerns the object) in which it is expressed by spiritual and intellectual vision. This manner of seeing, although it is naturally impossible to the bodily eye, nevertheless does not seem to exceed its obediential potency, by which it can be elevated to seeing, with a corporeal and in itself divisible vision, something indivisible, for example a point of light, or a body placed in an indivisible, as the Body of Christ in the Sacrament of the Eucharist; from which one can suspect that the eye can also be elevated to seeing a spiritual substance. Third, finally, it can be imagined that the bodily eye can elicit a vision which is spiritual, because it is not repugnant that a material potency be elevated to producing something spiritual, and to acting upon a spirit, just as the Thomists judge that the Sacraments concur physically in producing grace, and that the fire of hell and of purgatory physically torments souls. These things presupposed, let it be

First conclusion. — God is not visible to the bodily eye even supernaturally.

This Conclusion is common among Theologians, most of whom affirm that it is of faith. And the holy Fathers confirm it with their judgments. For Cyril of Jerusalem, Catechesi 9., it is impossible, he says, to contemplate God with the eyes of the flesh, for that which is devoid of body cannot fall into the eyes of the flesh. And St. Jerome, c. 21. in Isaiam, God, he says, is by no means set forth in words, nor is He contemplable by the eye, but He is seen by those of whom it is written: Blessed are the clean of heart, for they shall see God. Whence Rabbi Moses, tract. De fundamentis Legis, cap. 4., says that he marvels greatly how any Christian should think that God is to be contemplated in any beautiful, in any sublime body; a body nonetheless.

Proof. This truth is proved by reason: It is repugnant that a vital potency be carried beyond the latitude of its adequate and specifying object, otherwise it could be carried beyond its own species and quiddity, which implies a contradiction; but God, since He is a spiritual and immaterial substance, is beyond the latitude of the adequate and specifying object of the bodily eye, and likewise of any other sensitive potency, whose adequate object is material and corporeal being; therefore God cannot be attained by the bodily eye. — It is confirmed: God, in the notion of a visible and spiritual object, is more distant from all sensible objects than one sensible object is from another sensible object, v. gr. than sound is from color: but it implies a contradiction that sound or odor be seen per se by the bodily eye, because sound and odor are outside the sphere of the operation of the eye, which is concerned only with visible things: therefore much more does it imply a contradiction that God be perceived by the bodily eye, or by another sense. — Then, if the bodily eye of man could supernaturally see God, the eye of a brute could also be elevated to the intuitive vision of God: for some brutes, such as the lynx and the eagle, have a more perfect eye: but this is absurd, for if brutes could supernaturally see God, they could also supernaturally love Him and enjoy Him: for love and enjoyment follow the vision of God; which things are most absurd. — Finally, if the eye could be elevated to seeing God, hearing could also be elevated to hearing Him. For just as God presents Himself as visible to the Angels and to the Blessed minds, so too He shows Himself as audible, while He speaks to them spiritually: but no one would say that God can be perceived by hearing: therefore neither by bodily sight.

It is proved secondly. If God is visible to the bodily eye, it is above all in one or the other of the three ways assigned in the 3rd Note: but He can be visible in none of these ways: therefore He can in no way be seen by the bodily eye, even supernaturally. Not indeed in the first way: for whatever is seen in such a way as it is, is corporeal, because it is luminous, colored, extended, and divisible: but since God is altogether spiritual, He is neither luminous, nor colored, nor divisible: therefore neither is He corporally visible. Nor in the second, because although absolutely a body placed in a single indivisible could be seen by the bodily eye, it is otherwise, however, with a spirit, which, since it is outside the sphere of the activity of the bodily eye itself, is much more outside the latitude of the object of sight than sound or odor; whence it comes about that it no less implies a contradiction for the bodily eye to see God as He is, than for it to see an odor or a sound. — Then, material and corporeal vision is a certain image and expression of the object: but it is impossible for God to be expressed quidditatively by any image: therefore also for Him to be seen by corporeal vision. The minor is evident: for just as it is impossible for God to be depicted and represented as He is in Himself, to be figured by some external image and by colors and lineaments, so likewise it is impossible for Him to be represented through an expressed material species and an internal image formed by the bodily eye. Not, finally, in the third: for no corporeal potency can physically act upon a spirit, as the Doctor expressly proves in 1. Whence he rightly concludes that neither are demons tormented by corporeal fire through the physical action of the fire itself, nor do the Sacraments concur physically, but only morally, in the production of grace. For if it is once admitted that some corporeal cause can act upon a spirit, no contradiction will appear why the bodily eye could not also be divinely elevated to seeing God. — Nor do I see why the Thomists, who admit the physical action of fire upon spirits and the physical causality of the Sacraments in the production of grace, could deny that the bodily eye can be elevated to perceiving a spiritual object.

Some indeed reply, that this is the difference, that vital potencies, such as the eye, cannot be carried beyond the latitude of their object, insofar as they are vital, although they can be taken up, insofar as they are creatures, to producing instrumentally any effect whatsoever which does not require being produced by a vital potency. — But this satisfies in no way, nor does it establish a sufficient disparity. First, because a vital potency is as much subject to the divine command, as vital, with respect to producing a vital effect as with respect to a non-vital effect; nor does it appear why it could be elevated more to a non-vital effect than to producing a vital one, for the object of the one is not more unlimited in its order than the object of the other. — Then, for that reason a vital potency could not be elevated to producing any vital effect whatsoever, chiefly either because that production of an effect must presuppose in the elevated potency itself some inchoate power, which must be completed through the elevation and supernatural concourse; or it prerequires nothing of the sort, but this whole activity depends on the will of God alone, that He would elevate it to whatever effect He willed. If the first, a vital potency has a greater inchoate power with respect to producing some vital effect than a non-vital one has with respect to a non-vital effect, and consequently the former could be elevated more to a vital effect than the latter to a non-vital one. If the second: therefore God will be able as much to elevate a vital potency to producing any vital act whatsoever, as a non-vital potency to forming any non-vital effect whatsoever, and so He will be able as much to elevate the bodily eye, which is a vital potency, to the vital act of the beatific vision, as the infernal fire to physically tormenting demons and the damned, and the Sacraments to physically producing grace.

You will object 1. Various passages of Sacred Scripture are brought forward, in which God is affirmed to have been seen at times by the bodily eye: first indeed, Genesis 32. Jacob says: I have seen the Lord face to face, and my soul has been saved. Second, Iob 14.: I know that my Redeemer lives, and in the last day I shall rise from the earth, and in my flesh I shall see God. Third, likewise St. Job says cap. 12.: With the hearing of the ear I have heard you, but now my eye sees you. Fourth, Isaias 6. says: I have seen the Lord sitting upon a throne. The other Prophets for the most part affirm the same thing: therefore God is truly visible naturally, or at least supernaturally, to the bodily eye.

I deny the consequence. and to the aforesaid passages of Scripture I answer, to the first, that the aforesaid words mean the same as: I have met with, and wrestled with God, namely by a Hebrew phrase, similar to that by which French combatants, provoking one another to single combat, are wont to say: We shall see each other face to face. Or it must be said absolutely that he saw the Lord, that is, the Angel, who in an assumed body discharged the part of God, as the Prophet Osee indicates c. 12., where, speaking of Jacob, he says: in his strength he was directed with the Angel, and he prevailed against the Angel, and he was strengthened; he wept, and besought him.

To the second. I say that St. Job speaks of the vision of Christ the Lord according to His humanity, in which, being about to judge all, He will show Himself visible to all after the resurrection; whence, after the aforesaid words, he adds: My Savior, which words, although they are not found in the Hebrew and in the Vulgate of Sixtus V., nevertheless agree most excellently with the preceding: I believe that my Redeemer lives.

To the third. I say that St. Job himself is to be understood in this way, as if he said: previously I had heard many things about Your providence, but now I discern its manifest indications in myself. Or it is understood that God is seen with the eye of the mind, of which St. Paul to the Ephesians 1.: May He give you the Spirit of wisdom in the knowledge of Him, enlightening the eyes of your heart, with which eyes of the mind it is also certain that Isaias, as well as the other Prophets, saw God, that is, knew Him more evidently. And so from these passages nothing is proven against the Conclusion.

You will object 2. St. Augustine, the most clear-sighted investigator of Christian truth, judges it more probable that God can be seen by the bodily eye; for although in Epist. 6. he had expressly affirmed that God is perceptible by no sense, above all by the eyes, and had proved this with these words of St. John: We know that when He shall appear we shall be like Him, because we shall see Him as He is; therefore we shall see Him in so far as we shall be like Him, because even now we do not see in so far as we are unlike Him: hence, therefore, we shall see from that by which we shall be like, he concludes: but who, being most mad, would say that we are, or shall be, like God in body? He likewise adds in confirmation of this truth:

Why do they contend that this gift has been attributed to the eyes of Christ's body alone, and not also to the other senses? Therefore God will be a sound, so that He can be perceived even by the ears: and He will be a breath, so that He can be sensed by smell: and He will be some liquid, so that He can even be drunk; and He will be a mass, so that He can even be touched? No (they say), what then? Can God do that, and cannot do this? If they shall say that He cannot, why do they detract from the omnipotence of God? If they shall answer that He can, and wills not, why do they favor only the eyes, but mock the other senses of Christ's body?

Nevertheless, treating the same matter in Epist. 111. to Fortunatianus, Bishop of Sicca, and in Epist. 112. to Paulina, he seems to establish nothing certain on this matter, but, wholly doubtful and hesitating, at the end of the latter Epistle he promises that he will have a fuller treatment of this matter: But concerning the spiritual body, he says, if the Lord shall command, we shall test in another work what we may be able to dispute. In lib. 2. however of Retract. cap. 11. he says that he has sufficiently explained this truly most difficult Question in lib. 20. and 21. of De Civit. Dei.

Yet in this book, cap. 29., he seems more inclined to think that God will be seen by the Blessed with bodily eyes:

How now we discern the life of others, not indeed separated from the body, namely through the body, with those same eyes. Then, he says, each one knows his own life, which will then be in the body, and which quickens these earthly members and makes them living, by an interior sense, not through bodily eyes; but the lives of others, since they are invisible, he sees through the body. For whence do we discern living from non-living bodies, unless we see the bodies and the lives at the same time, which we cannot see except through the body? But we do not see lives without bodies with the eyes of the body.

But soon he decides the matter thus:

Wherefore it can happen, and it is very credible, that we shall then so see the mundane corporeal things of the new heaven and the new earth, that we shall see God, present everywhere and governing even all corporeal things, through the bodies which we shall bear and which we behold, wherever we shall have turned our eyes, with the clearest perspicuity, etc., just as men, among whom we live as living beings exercising vital movements, as soon as we look upon them we do not believe that they live, but we see it, since we cannot see their life without bodies, which nevertheless we discern in them through their bodies, with all ambiguity removed. Thus, wherever we shall carry those spiritual lights of our bodies, we shall behold the incorporeal God ruling all things, even through bodies.

— Some answer that in the aforesaid words Augustinus does not assert that the glorified eyes will see God immediately, as He is in Himself, but only that they will see certain wonderful corporeal effects, attesting and manifesting the presence and providence of God no less than the vital movements, which we discern in those whom we see, make known that they live, whose substance, however, and essential life in itself we do not behold with bodily eyes, but apprehend through the mind. Or, as he speaks

St. Thomas, explaining St. Augustine:

just as now our eyes see the life of someone, and life is not seen by the bodily eye as per se visible, namely as a sensible per accidens, which indeed is not known by sight, but immediately with the sense by some other knowing power, namely by the intellect. That, moreover, the divine presence is known from them through the intellect immediately upon the sight of bodies, comes about from two things: namely, from the perspicacity of the intellect, and from the refulgence of the divine brightness in the renewed bodies. Likewise from their wonderful and ineffable beauty, which will breathe forth and declare the divine majesty.

— But this response does not sufficiently cohere with the mind of St. Augustine, who says in express words that it can come about, and that it is very credible, that God be seen by the bodily eye in bodies seen; for if by this vision he understood that He Himself is to be perceived by the mind, certainly he would not say that it is credible that God be perceived by the mind in bodies seen, but rather most certain, and altogether to be believed. Add that he himself sufficiently explains his doubtful opinion on this matter:

through those eyes, if this is only to be attributed to them, even the incorporeal nature is discerned, which it is either difficult or impossible to show by any examples or testimonies of the divine Scriptures; or, which is easier to understand, God will be so known and conspicuous to us, that He is seen by the spirit by each of us in each of us, seen by one in another, seen in Himself.

By which it appears, according to the former opinion, that he probably thinks God can be seen by the bodily eye. — Therefore I answer. 1. St. Augustine proposes this opinion there not absolutely, but only with doubt and a wavering mind; 2. that wherein St. Augustine hesitated in doubt has been constantly affirmed by the other holy Fathers, namely by Athanasius, Chrysostom, Gregory Nazianzen, and Jerome, whose opinion, in confirmation of this truth, Augustine himself relates in the aforesaid Epistle 111., where he concludes thus:

Such am I in the writings of others, such do I wish the readers of mine to be. Finally, in all those things which I have recounted about the little works of the Saints and Doctors, of Ambrose, Jerome, Athanasius, Gregory, and whatever other such things of others I could read, which I thought it long to recount, that God is not a body, nor has the members of a human form, nor is He divisible through the spaces of places, and is by nature immutably invisible, and is seen not through the same nature and substance, but through an assumed visible form, as He willed to have appeared to those to whom He appeared, when He is narrated to have been seen through the eyes of the body in the holy Scriptures, with the help of the Lord I believe unshakenly.

By which he confesses that his mind is not alien to the other Fathers of the Church; and so, since those holy Fathers judge that God is not visible to the bodily eye, it must be confessed that Augustine likewise so judged. Whence he rightly says in Epistle 6.:

Truly that light is God Himself, since God is light, and in Him there are no darknesses: but it is the light of purified minds, not of these bodily eyes. Therefore the mind will then be fit, which may see that light, which now it is not yet; but the eye of the body can see this neither now, nor will it be able to then.

And in Epist. 112. c. 23., when he had confirmed this same opinion with many arguments, he finally concludes: Not only what blessed Ambrose, but also what St. Jerome, I will say not only the divinity of the Father, but neither indeed of the Son, nor of the Holy Spirit, because in the Trinity there is one nature, can they behold with the eyes of the flesh, but with the eyes of the mind, of which the Narrator Himself says: Blessed are the pure of heart, for they shall see God. For, just as the same Jerome elsewhere briefly and truly defined: an incorporeal thing is not seen by bodily eyes. From these things, therefore, it is clear that although St. Augustine somewhere seemed doubtful in this matter, yet elsewhere he asserted the opinion which we defend.

Second conclusion. — God can be clearly seen by a created intellect strengthened by the light of glory. This is of faith, and

Proof first. by very many texts of Sacred Scripture. Isaiae 33.: His eyes will see the King in his beauty; they will behold the land from afar; that is, as Gregory explains, in the very splendor of the Divinity, or, as the interlinear Gloss says, in the Deity itself. Psalmo 83.: They will go from strength to strength; the God of gods will be seen in Sion. Which St. Augustine, Lyran. and others interpret of the beatific vision. Prima Ioann. 3.: When He appears, we will be like Him, because we will see Him as He is; that is, immediately in Himself, as Pope Evaristus explains, in the Epistle to the Bishops of Africa, and the Council of Frankfurt in the Epistle to the Bishops of Spain. Primae ad Corinthios 13.: We see now through a mirror, and in an enigma, but then face to face. Now I know in part, but then I will know, even as I am known. Where the Apostle, with Irenaeus, lib. 5. cap. 7., and Augustine, lib. 1. De Trinit. cap. 13., as interpreters, calls the knowledge through created species, which we have of God, specular and enigmatical, because it is mediated and obscure; for the mirror signifies creatures, which being known first, God is known as in a darkness; for the invisible things of God are perceived, being understood from the creation of the world. But the knowledge of the other life he says to be face to face, so that by this face he excludes every medium on the part of the knowing one, and by to face he excludes the medium on the part of the known; and so by both these particles the immediate intuition of God is expressed at once, wholly similar to corporeal intuition terminated immediately at a present object. Whence he adds: Now I know in part, that is, inadequately, but then I will know, even as I am known: that is, says Anselm, I will purely know Him Himself, as He has known me. Not that the Apostle builds an equality between the knowledge of the Blessed and the comprehension of God, by which He knows Himself and the Blessed themselves; but to designate the clarity and evidence of both knowledges: whence he does not say how much, but as I am known. With these agree those words Matth. 5.: Blessed are the pure of heart, for they shall see God. And 18.: Their angels in the heavens always see the face of my Father.

This same truth was defined in the Council of Vienne, in the Clementine Ad nostrum, concerning the heretics, and in the Council of Florence, in the letters of Union, where it is said: The souls fully purged see God clearly, Three and One, as He is: and in the Council of Trent, session 2., on the invocation of the Saints, where it is decreed that they think impiously who deny that the Saints enjoying eternal beatitude are not to be invoked. This same truth the holy Fathers affirm, as may be seen in Vasquez, Disp. 37. cap. 5. Whether, however, it can be demonstrated by some natural reason, we will open in the following Question.

You will object 1. Various contexts of Sacred Scripture, by which it appears that the created intellect can neither be elevated, nor is in fact elevated, to the intuitive and clear vision of God. For 1. Ad Timotheum, 6.: God inhabits inaccessible light, whom no man has seen, nor can see. Likewise God is absolutely called invisible, ad Colossenses 1. and ad Hebraeos, 11. Add that sometimes Sacred Scripture pronounces the divine vision proper to the Son of God alone. Thus Ioann. 1.: No one has ever seen God; the Only-begotten, who is in the bosom of the Father, He has declared Him to us. Where Irenaeus, Athanasius, and Pope Evaristus read except the Only-begotten. Which is confirmed from that Ioann. 6.: Not that anyone has seen the Father, except he who is from God; this one has seen the Father. Therefore, since the vision of God is proper to the Son Himself, it seems to be conceded to no creature.

— I answer. that by these, or similar texts of Sacred Scripture, the created intellect is not wholly barred from the vision of God; but Scripture only intends to designate and affirm that God is invisible intuitively to the bodily eyes, as St. Augustine explains, Epist. 111. and 112.: or that He cannot be seen by the powers of nature alone, as St. Ambrose expounds, in 1. caput Lucae: or that this cannot be beheld in the mortal state by a supernatural and beatific vision, as St. Gregory interprets, lib. 18. Moral. cap. 36.: or that He is not comprehended and naturally known by a creature, but by Himself and His Son, as St. Gregory himself indicates there, in the last chapter. Which of all these expositions fits and suits the text of Sacred Scripture will have to be judged from the end and scope of Scripture itself, and is to be gathered from the antecedent or subsequent words of that place.

You will object 2. Between the object and the potency there must be proportion: but between God and the created intellect there is none; for God is infinite, and the created intellect is finite: therefore, etc. — I distinguish the major. There must be proportion in the notion of being and perfection, I deny; in the notion of object and habitude, I concede. For the ear, for example, although in the notion of perfection it has proportion with color, yet because in the notion of a cognoscible object it has none, therefore it cannot perceive it. But God clearly seen, although in the notion of perfection He has no proportion with the created intellect, yet has the proportion of a cognoscible object to the knowing potency, inasmuch as He participates in the common notion of the adequate object of the intellect, which is cognoscible being. Nor does it matter that between God to be known and the knowing intellect there is no proportion in entity and perfection; for this is not required for perfect knowledge; otherwise neither could God, as being infinite, know any finite object, for lack of such entitative proportion, nor could He Himself be known by us, not even by abstractive knowledge, for lack of such proportion.

You will say 3. An altogether supernatural object, as such, is not within the latitude of the adequate object of the intellect of a created potency: but God clearly seen is a supernatural object: therefore it is not within the latitude of the object of the created intellect. The Major is proved: that is not the object of a created potency by which this cannot be specified: but it cannot be specified by a supernatural object; for that which is natural according to itself cannot be specified by a supernatural being: therefore the supernatural object is not within the adequate object of a created potency. — I distinguish the major: inasmuch as the potency is natural reduplicatively and according to itself, I concede; inasmuch as it is in obediential potency, and its inchoate power is divinely elevated, that it cannot be specified by a supernatural being, I deny: for as such it is supernatural, at least connotatively, namely by reason of the elevating principle, namely the light of glory, and of the object to which it is elevated, namely God to be clearly seen. Whence, although the supernatural object is not contained within the latitude of the object of the created intellect, inasmuch as it is a natural potency, yet it is contained within its object, inasmuch as it is in obediential potency.

You will say 4. God cannot be seen in Himself, unless His infinity be seen, because it is essential to Him, and unless He be comprehended, since He is most simple: but infinity cannot be seen by a finite intellect, nor can His divine Nature be comprehended: therefore, etc. — I deny the major. for neither is it necessary that those who see God see all His infinity adequately, nor is it fitting that they know or comprehend Him totally, in such a way that He could not be known in a more perfect way by any other intellect. For just as the eye knows whiteness intuitively, although it does not perceive its dependence on God and on the subject, so can the created intellect see that God is infinite and incomprehensible, although it does not see what and how great His incomprehensibility and infinity are.

You will say 5. The quidditative vision of God cannot but be infinite: but our intellect can elicit an infinite vision by no powers: therefore neither can it know God quidditatively. The major is proved: knowledge grows in proportion to the increase of the perfection of the object: therefore the knowledge of an infinite object must necessarily be infinite. — I answer. denying the major, to whose proof I distinguish the consequence: if such knowledge attains the infinite object in an infinite and adequate way, I concede; if in an inadequate and finite way, I deny: for although our knowledge of the existence of God is terminated at an infinite object, yet it is not infinite, because it is not engaged with it in an infinite way.

You will say 6. God is more distant from the created intellect than an Angel from corporeal sight: but on account of this distance, the corporeal eye cannot be elevated to attain the Angel: therefore a fortiori the created intellect will not be able to be elevated to see God, as He is in Himself. — I answer. He is indeed more distant as to entity, but not as to the proportion of the habitude of the potency to the object; for God is contained within the latitude of the adequate object of the created intellect, which is concerned with intelligible being, and consequently with God, who is the first of all beings. But the Angel is in no way contained within the object of corporeal sight.

You will say 7. The created intellect cannot be elevated to the knowledge of all possible creatures: therefore neither to the clear vision of God. The antecedent is admitted by almost all Theologians. The consequence is proved: it is more difficult to know a being infinite simpliciter, such as God is, than a being infinite only secundum quid and as to number: but God is a being infinite simpliciter and according to substance; but possible creatures are infinite only by reason of numerical quantity: therefore, etc. — I deny the consequence. and also the proof of that Major; for although the divine Essence is in itself more perfect in the notion of being, and in the notion of object, than the collection of possible creatures, yet it is repugnant on a double head that the created intellect, which can see God, could know the collection of all possible creatures: both because, if it knew this collection, it would follow that it comprehends the divine omnipotence; for then some potency is comprehended when all that to which it can extend itself is known; but it is more difficult to comprehend the divine omnipotence than only to see the essence by a finite and limited vision: and because the knowledge of all possible creatures requires infinite intentional species, which a finite intellect can neither use nor be actuated by; but for the vision of the divine Essence it suffices that It itself be communicated to the intellect by way of an intelligible species, exhibiting Itself to be discerned in a finite, limited way, attempered by the light of glory.

You will say 8. St. Chrysostom affirms that God according to Himself is altogether invisible; for in homilia 14. in Ioannem he says that neither the Prophets nor the Archangels have ever seen God, and that to see Him is altogether impossible: That which is God Himself, he says, not only the Prophets, but neither the Angels nor the Archangels have seen; for that which is of a creatable nature, how will it be able to see that which is increatable? Whence in the same homily he asserts that the Angels indeed saw God in the assumed nature, which they did not see before. Hence in homil. 3. De incomprehensibili Dei natura, explaining the text of Isaiae, 6., where the Seraphim beholding the divine Majesty are said to have veiled their face, Because, he says, they did not see the pure light itself, nor the sincere substance itself, but what they saw was a condescension and an indulgence: as if he would say that the Seraphim, out of divine indulgence, saw a certain ineffable light representing God, as he himself explains, both in the aforesaid homily and in the others which he wrote against the Anomoeans.

— I answer. that St. Chrysostom by the aforesaid words and similar ones does not exclude the intuitive knowledge of God, but the comprehensive. For that he simply admits the clear vision of God after this life is clear from Epistola 5. ad Theodorum lapsum, and homil. 3. in Epistolam ad Philippenses, and 69. ad populum Antiochenum, where he asserts that the Blessed behold the King Himself, namely God, not through entry, not through an enigma, not through a mirror, but face to face, not through faith, but through species.

You will insist. By that knowledge he says that God is invisible by which the Eunomians and the Anomoeans pronounced Him visible: but they did not affirm that God is visible by comprehensive knowledge, but only by intuitive: therefore St. Chrysostom excludes not only comprehensive, but also intuitive knowledge. — I deny the minor. for it is clear from Theodoret, lib. 4. Fabularum haereticarum, under the title De Eunomio, that he arrogated to himself comprehensive knowledge of God: Eunomius dared to say, says Theodoretus, that he is ignorant of nothing of divine things, but knows the very substance of God exactly, and has the same knowledge of God which God Himself has of Himself, etc. Socrates testifies the same, lib. 1. Historiarum, cap. 7., where, introducing Eunomius and the Anomoeans speaking, thus, he says, God understands nothing more of His own essence than we; nor is it more known and perspicuous to Him than to us. Likewise Jerome on cap. 11. Matth. at those words: No one knows the Son, except the Father: let Eunomius blush, he says, who boasts that he has as much knowledge of the Father and of the Son as either has of the other. It is clear, therefore, that those heretics arrogated to themselves comprehensive knowledge of God; and consequently that St. Chrysostom affirms only the comprehensive knowledge of God to be impossible, but not the intuitive.

It is certain, and it already sufficiently stands by the light of faith, that the divine intuitive vision is not only possible, but is also in fact obtained by the Blessed, as was proved in the preceding Question by many oracles of Sacred Scripture, decrees of Councils, and authorities of the holy Fathers. It remains to be examined whether the possibility of this divine vision can also be demonstrated by some natural reason so evident and efficacious that no one but a pertinacious man can deny it to be possible: in order that this may be made more evident

Note 1. With the Doctor in 1. dist. 49. q. 10. n. 2., a twofold appetite can be distinguished in man, one innate, the other elicited. The former is the propensity of nature toward that which is perfective of itself and suitable to itself. The latter is an act of the will, or of the animal appetite, by which it desires or is inclined toward some good, true or presumed. These two appetites, however, are distinguished from each other; for, says the Doctor in 1. dist. 19. q. 10. n. 2., someone can by natural appetite shrink from death, because we do not wish to be unclothed according to the Apostle, and by a freely elicited act choose death, as the martyrs did. I said that the former is an inclination toward the good as suitable to oneself, namely as much to the agent as to the patient or recipient; for those extend the appetite too little who affirm that it is a potency of acting or of being acted upon universally, that is, with respect to whatever it can effect and by which it can be acted upon: for from that it would follow that the created intellect could desire error, the Angel his own annihilation, an accident its separation from its subject, and other things of this kind which they can undergo; which, however, is absurd.

Note 2. With the same Doctor ibid. num. 18., the elicited appetite is again twofold: one efficacious and absolute, which indeed imports the application of means to the attainment of the desired good; the other inefficacious, or unconditional, which does not require the aforesaid application of means. The former is a positive act of the will by which it tends absolutely toward the end and wills to obtain it, and is signified by the verb volo. The latter is a simple complacency, or a certain weak volition, by which the will indeed desires to attain the end, but does not will to apply the means to attaining it; for this reason it is rather called a velleity, signified by the verb vellem, than an absolute volition. The former, says the Doctor n. 13., is concerned only with the possible; the latter can also tend toward the impossible.

Note 3. That the intuitive vision of God cannot be proved naturally impossible: both because the false cannot be proved by evident reason, and because the arguments which can be formed against this possibility are soluble; and the more urgent ones which can be brought forward were proposed and solved by us above. Whether, however, its possibility can be proved naturally with no prior light of faith, or whether, revelation being supposed, there are some natural reasons persuading this possibility, is what must be resolved here.

First conclusion. — The possibility of the divine intuitive vision cannot be demonstrated by natural light, nor evidently known, without any revelation.

Proof 1. If that intuitive vision of God could become known naturally by some demonstration, it would be chiefly either a priori or a posteriori; namely, either through an effect contained in the cause, or through a cause connected with the effect: but neither can be said. Not indeed a posteriori, since that blessed vision produces no natural effect from the intuition of which it could itself be detected. Nor a priori; for every a priori demonstration must be made through a cause proximately containing the effect: but beatitude is not an effect that has a necessary connection with some natural cause evidently known and deductive of the knowledge of beatitude itself: therefore it is demonstrable neither a priori nor a posteriori. — Again, what is of the supernatural order has no necessary connection either with the effects or with the causes of the order of nature: but that divine vision is of the supernatural order, as stands by faith: therefore it has no necessary connection with any natural cause or any natural effect through which it could be demonstrated. — Finally, what is demonstrated by natural light becomes known either through innate principles or through sensible effects: but there are no innate principles nor any sensible effects by which the supernatural beatific vision could be evidently known: therefore it cannot be demonstrated. The minor, in which alone the difficulty lies, is evident: for supernatural things, such as intuitive vision is, are called supernatural to the extent that they exceed the whole order of nature; but they would not transcend the whole order of nature if they had a necessary connection with natural effects or principles: therefore etc.

Proof 2. The possibility of an end cannot be demonstrated unless the possibility of the means necessarily conducing to the attainment of the end is known: for since the end cannot be acquired except through the means ordered to it, so too it cannot be known as possible unless the means by which it is attainable are known: but the possibility of the means conducing to intuitive vision, namely grace, faith, hope, charity, cannot be known by natural light alone, since these means, being supernatural, transcend the grasp of natural light, as we have proved at greater length when treating of the necessity of theology. Therefore neither can the possibility of the beatific vision become known naturally.

Finally it is proved. If the possibility of supernatural beatitude were evidently knowable from the principles of nature alone, undoubtedly someone among so many most distinguished ancient philosophers would have known it: but according to St. Augustine, lib. 13. De Trinit. cap. 8. and 9., the philosophers were wholly ignorant of supernatural beatitude, for there, speaking of this beatitude, he says:

If faith be present, there is no question; for those who, attempting to discover these things by human arguments, scarcely a few, endowed with great genius, abounding in leisure and trained in the most subtle doctrines, were able to arrive at the investigation of the immortality of the soul alone. Yet for that soul they did not find a stable, that is, a true, happy life. Therefore it is a sign that it is not knowable by the light of nature alone.

Second conclusion. — The natural reasons by which the Thomists strive to persuade the possibility of the divine intuitive vision are in no way efficacious.**

Proof. Some Thomists, as has been said, strive by a twofold reason to prove the possibility of that divine vision: but neither reason assigned by them establishes this possibility. Not indeed the first, which they form thus: every man has a natural appetite for beatitude, as Augustine frequently teaches among others, lib. 13. De Trinit. cap. 8.: All men, he says, wish to be happy: truth proclaims it, nature compels it, to which the supremely good and immutably happy One has implanted this. And lib. 1. Confess. 1.: You have made us for Yourself, O Lord, and our heart is restless until it rests in You: but our beatitude is the clear vision of God: therefore men naturally desire that clear vision of God. But nature implanted nothing in vain and uselessly, and much less does it enkindle a natural desire with respect to an unattainable end: therefore since all men have an appetite for beatitude, which is the intuitive vision of God, it stands that it is naturally possible. —

I deny this last consequence. And to the argument from which it is drawn we answer with the Doctor in 1. dist. 19. q. 8. n. 2. that it fails in several respects: First indeed it supposes that desire is only with respect to a possible thing, which, however, is false; for it is certain that impossible things can be desired, at least with an inefficacious desire and by way of simple complacency; for many delight in the desire of honors, riches, and the like, which they know they cannot attain: so also Lucifer is said to have desired to make himself like the Most High, which, however, he judged impossible: therefore since both impossibles and possibles can be desired, from the appetite for some thing its possibility is not rightly inferred. Second, although the desire of beatitude is innate in men, it does not follow from that that this desire is borne naturally toward the intuitive vision of God. For since a twofold beatitude of man is to be distinguished, one natural, consisting in the perfect knowledge of God from creatures and in the love consequent upon such knowledge, the other supernatural, consisting in the immediate and intuitive vision of God, the desire connatural to man is borne determinately and distinctly toward natural beatitude alone; but toward the immediate vision of God man is not borne by such a desire, except insofar as it becomes known through the supernatural light of faith. Whence St. Augustine, when he had said in lib. 1. contra Iulianum: We should not, by natural instinct, will to be immortal and happy, unless we could be so; there declares that he is speaking of man elevated to supernatural beatitude, and not indeed of natural beatitude, as appears among other things from these words of his: If therefore, he says, for attaining the true beatitude, which the faith that is true in Christ promises to us as immortal, virtues profit a man nothing; in no way can they be true virtues. By which true beatitude and true virtue are opposed to that beatitude and to the other virtues which are called beatitude and virtues only secundum quid by comparison with the true beatitude, which is the intuitive vision of God, and with the true virtues which conduce to its attainment. — Nor does their latter reason press more strongly, which they form thus: every intellectual substance has naturally and necessarily an appetite for seeing the cause, once the effect is seen, nor can the human intellect rest perfectly in seeing the wonderful effects of God in this universe without desiring to see God their maker: therefore since by the forces of nature alone men see the effects of God and know that he is their cause, as the Apostle teaches Romanorum 1., so they can by the same forces elicit the desire of seeing God the maker of such wonders. — But this reason is easily solved by this distinction: the human appetite cannot rest, once a wonderful effect is seen, until it attains the vision of that cause, if it thinks that it is possible with respect to itself, I concede: if it thinks that it is impossible, or doubts its possibility, I deny; for it rests when it arrives at that which it judges it can arrive at; but it does not stand evident to man by any natural certainty that the intuitive vision of God is possible: therefore he cannot be naturally tormented for want of the vision of God, which he does not naturally know to be possible for himself.

Third conclusion. — Granted that someone has known through divine or human revelation the possibility or the futurition of the divine intuitive vision, he will be able to persuade it by the reasons of the Subtle Doctor in 4. dist. 49. q. 8., the first of which is formed thus: it is evident by natural light that the created intellect can know whatever is contained within its adequate object: but God clearly seen is contained under the adequate object of the created intellect: therefore it stands by natural light that God can be seen by the created intellect as he is in himself. The major is evident; for the intellect is not of a worse condition than sense: therefore just as sight, v. g., because it is concerned with the visible object in common, can also be concerned with any visible object in particular, so likewise the intellect attaining the intelligible object in common will also be able to attain any particular intelligible object comprehended under that common object. The Doctor proves the minor: the intelligible in common is being as such, insofar as it prescinds from material and spiritual being, substantial and accidental, natural and supernatural; for that is called the common and universal intelligible than which nothing broader and more universal can be given; but some more universal intelligible object could be given if it were not being as such prescinding, as is evident. That God clearly seen is contained under this adequate visible object, the Doctor proves: both because God clearly seen is perfectly intelligible: therefore it most of all pertains to the intelligible object in common; and because an intelligible potency is not deemed to understand its object in the most perfect way unless by a more perfect intellection it attains the most excellent intelligible: therefore since God is the most excellent intelligible object, and since the most perfect intellection and knowledge takes place through intuitive vision, it follows that God clearly seen is the most perfect intelligible object comprehended under the adequate object of the created intellect; and so that the created intellect is naturally ordered to seeing God, as to a particular object under its adequate object, and consequently that his intuitive vision is possible.

You will say. That what is asserted does not seem true, namely that the human intellect cannot rest except in the intuitive vision of the most perfectly intelligible object; for, you will say, its desire could be fulfilled and quieted in an abstractive and precisive cognition of it. Again, if the most perfect cognition of the supremely intelligible object were required for the satiety of its desire, it would follow that the created intellect could not be satiated except by the comprehension of the supreme intelligible; for this alone is the most perfect and adequate cognition.

I answer. It is true that the human intellect does not rest in the cognition of the supreme intelligible unless it attains it by the most perfect kind of cognition not implying contradiction, such as is intuitive cognition, not however abstractive: both because it is not agreed among all that this abstractive and precisive cognition exists, and because since this cognition is obscure and lacking in evidence, it is certain that the intellect does not rest in it, but of its own accord tends to the intuitive cognition of the object, which is far more perfect than the former. Although, moreover, the comprehensive cognition of the supreme intelligible is also far more perfect than simple intuitive cognition, yet because it implies a contradiction that a finite intellect could equal and comprehend an infinite object by its finite cognition, therefore the created intellect does not tend to this comprehensive cognition, but rests in the intuitive.

The latter reason of the Doctor is formed thus: It is evident by natural light that a perfection suitable to a lower potency can belong to a higher one, if both those faculties pertain to the same genus of operation: but the intuitive vision of an object belongs to sense, namely to the eye of the body, which is lower than the intellect: therefore in like manner the intuitive vision of the most excellent object, such as God is, ought to belong to the intellect.

It is confirmed. For just as sight is not perfectly quieted except in the attainment of the most beautiful visible object, so neither will the created intellect be able to rest, unless it attains intuitively the most excellent intelligible object, such as God is.

It is objected. Q. 1. disp. 20. cap. 2. n. 4. That the major proposition assumed by the Subtle Doctor, namely that a perfection suitable to a superior also belongs to an inferior, is only true when the object that is known is naturally proportioned to a natural potency; for if it is of the supernatural order, it will suffice that it be apprehended through foreign species and known by abstractive cognition.

I answer. That the reason of the Doctor truly supposes that uncreated being is an object proportioned to a natural potency, at least an inchoate one, inasmuch as it is contained under the most universal intelligible object; and that he therefore rightly concludes, namely from the prior line of reasoning, that the intellect cannot rest in the cognition of the most excellent object comprehended under the common object, unless it sees it intuitively.

Other Thomists reply, denying the major. For many perfections, they say, belong to the lower member of some genus which cannot belong to the higher: for incorruptibility belongs to heaven, which, however, does not belong to man, who is higher than heaven: evidence belongs to natural science: yet it does not belong to faith, which is higher. And the reason, they say, is at hand, for although such a perfection does not belong to the higher, yet another greater perfection can belong to it, by which it exceeds the other lower members of the same genus; and so it happens in the present case; for to be able to attain God abstractively, like all objects of the senses, is far greater, and something more excellent, than to be bound only to attaining sensible objects intuitively: the former, however, belongs to the intellect: the latter to the senses.

I answer. That both of these objections are false, and neither is to the point. The first, indeed: for here we are dealing with the perfections belonging to operative potencies, not with the perfections suited to things that do not operate. Then, it is false that the heavens are simply incorruptible; they are called incorruptible only because less corruptibility belongs to them than to mixed bodies. Finally, mixed bodies, such as the human body, can be said to be less perfect in the notion of body, however much they are ordered to the soul and to life, than the heavens, which, since they are simple bodies, can be said to be far more excellent than any mixed bodies whatsoever. The latter objection is likewise false: both because our natural science is not simply and absolutely clear and evident; for through it the essence and quiddity of any object does not shine forth, nor is it apprehended per se and as it is in itself, but only through effects and begged-for species; whence it always has something of obscurity and of non-evidence: and because faith is not judged to be more perfect in the notion of cognition than the most excellent knowledge; for this, by reason of its clarity and its perfect commensuration with its object, can be said to be more excellent than faith, although it is less true. Nor does it matter that faith is supernatural and producible by God alone: for not every supernatural form is absolutely more excellent than any natural form; for any substantial form is better than supernatural accidents, and the life of a horse, produced by another horse with the general concurrence of God, is more perfect in the notion of being than an accident producible by God alone; and so the aforesaid objection does not dissolve the force of the Doctor's argument.

Suarez replies. In Tract. 1. lib. 2. cap. 7., he holds that this inference of the Subtle Doctor is invalid, because it concludes: the created intellect is capable of intuitive knowledge; therefore it is also capable of the intuitive knowledge of God. This consequence, he says, is invalid: both because the object, since it is the most excellent and most elevated, can exceed the powers of the created intellect: and because corporeal sight, although it can intuit a visible thing, it does not follow that it can see any visible thing whatsoever; for the human eye reaches the light of the Moon, but not that of the Sun, except by squinting, and perhaps so excellent a light can be produced that no eye could naturally intuit it: and because from corporeal vision the consequence does not hold to the vision of the intellect regarding any intelligible whatsoever; otherwise it would have to be inferred that, just as corporeal sight can naturally extend to any visible thing, so the created intellect can naturally see any intelligible object, and consequently could see God by the powers of nature; which consequence is wholly false.

On the contrary. The Subtle Doctor does not intend to prove that the created intellect can see the uncreated object by natural powers, but only that this vision is absolutely possible, in whatever way it comes about, whether by the powers of nature or through divinely infused powers; whence the objections do not hold, because just as the eye can be engaged with any visible object whatsoever, so that no object, even the most excellent, could be given which it could not attain, either by its own powers or insofar as it can be elevated; so by a similar reasoning it is rightly concluded that there is no most excellent intelligible, visible by the intellect, which could not be perceived by that intellect itself, whether naturally or divinely; for the Doctor does not dispute about the mode of seeing God, but about its possibility, in whatever way at length this may come about.

Finally, some Thomists together with the same Suarez reply ibid. that the intellect does not concur by natural power, but by obediential power, to the intuitive vision; but it cannot be proved naturally that these acts are supernatural, and that the created intellect can be elevated to them, since those acts and this elevation exceed the order of nature; and hence they cannot be discovered naturally.

I answer. That although natural reason does not perceive what the intuitive vision of God is, nor know that some acts are supernatural in their entity, nevertheless it can perceive that the vision of a most excellently intelligible object is possible to the created intellect, in whatever way this vision may come about, whether by the powers of nature or through a divinely infused power; which alone the Doctor intends to prove, and hence his arguments sufficiently demonstrate the possibility of the beatific vision to the philosopher who has heard that this divine vision is either possible, or future, or already existing.

You will ask 1. Whether the intuitive vision of God can be naturally desired, both by innate appetite and by elicited appetite.

I answer. Affirmatively, with the Subtle Doctor, in 1. dist. 19. q. 10. n. 11. And first, indeed, that it can be desired by innate appetite, I prove thus: innate appetite is nothing other than the perfectibility of nature, or its inclination toward that which is perfective of itself: but this inclination toward the beatific vision, which is perfective of human nature, is in us. I prove it: all men have a natural propensity toward beatitude, as we said above from the mind of St. Augustine: therefore also toward supernatural beatitude. If anything stood in the way of the inclination toward the beatific vision being called natural, it would be chiefly because that beatitude is supernatural: but this reason does not stand in the way. I prove it first by a comparison from St. Augustine, lib. 1. De praedest. Sanctorum, cap. 1.: To be able, he says, to have faith, just as to be able to have charity, is the nature of men: to have faith, however, just as to have charity, is the grace of the faithful. From which I argue thus: what is the nature of men is natural: but the potency for having faith, which is supernatural, is the nature of men: therefore that potency is natural; and so supernaturality does not prevent some inclination from being called natural toward that which is supernatural; and consequently, although the beatific vision is supernatural, the inclination toward it can nonetheless be called natural. Secondly: this divine vision is the greatest perfection of the intellect; and so the intellect is perfectible through it: but this perfectibility is a natural appetite, no less than the perfectibility of matter with respect to substantial form, and of the corporeal eye with respect to the vision of a colored object: that appetite is likewise innate, because this inclination does not presuppose knowledge, nor is it something distinct from the intellect, nor does one who has such an inclination experience that he has it: therefore the intellect has an innate appetite for the intuitive vision of God. Finally, the Doctor says, quaest. 11. n. 8.: what is ordered to many ordered forms is maximally ordered to the most perfect: but the will is ordered to many volitions, and the intellect to many intellections: therefore maximally to beatitude, since it is the most perfect. Which argument, although it presses most strongly in favor of the elicited appetite, nevertheless also confirms the natural one, since nature is ordered of itself to that which is maximally perfective of itself, such as is the beatific vision. Whence the Doctor rightly concludes

The Doctor, quaest. 10. num. 13., concludes that in the damned there is a natural appetite with respect to beatitude, because the natural appetite does not add any perfection over absolute nature, but only the inclination of nature itself toward its own perfection: and therefore, nature remaining, that appetite remains. He adds: And if you should say that then that appetite will be in vain: you should also say that the damned are in vain men, and Angels, since the natural appetite does not add anything absolute over their nature.

I answer 2. With the same Doctor, ibid. num. 12., I hold that men also have a natural elicited appetite for the beatific vision. For it is evident that anyone can desire that divine beatitude itself without any supernatural help, when it is proposed to him, whether through faith, or through opinion, or through knowledge, that this vision is either possible, or future, or existing; for it is certain that many heretics desire that beatitude, although they have no supernatural principle concurring with their will to form such a desire: add that the beatific vision can be known by a natural abstractive concept: therefore it can also be naturally desired by an act which is natural, although it tends toward a supernatural object.

You will say. What is not, cannot be received: therefore what cannot naturally be, cannot naturally be received: but the intuitive vision of God cannot be naturally, since it is supernatural in substance: therefore it cannot be naturally received, and consequently there is no natural inclination or appetite toward it.

I deny the first consequence. For it implies a contradiction that that which is wholly not should be received; otherwise it would be and not be: it would be because it is received, but it would not be, as is supposed: but it does not imply a contradiction that that which is not natural can be naturally received, namely according to the inclination and capacity of a natural thing, which indeed extends itself to everything that is perfective of itself, in whatever way it can attain it, whether by the powers of nature or with divine aid assisting.

You will insist. A form is therefore called supernatural because it transcends the capacity of nature: but the intuitive vision would not transcend the capacity of the soul, if the soul had a natural capacity for receiving it: therefore either that vision is not supernatural, or the soul does not have that inclination and natural capacity toward it.

I distinguish the major. Insofar as it transcends the active and productive natural capacity, I concede: the receptive and passive, I deny. I confess indeed that some supernatural form wholly transcends the powers of any natural cause, nor can it be produced by any: but it does not transcend the natural receptive and passive capacity, which namely extends itself to every form whatsoever that is perfective of itself. Nor will this form for that reason be the less called supernatural, both because it is not required connaturally by any creature, and because it cannot be produced by any other than God.

You will press. To every passive and receptive potency there must correspond some natural productive potency: for a natural receptive potency would be in vain, which could not be reduced to act naturally; but it could not be reduced to act unless there were given an active potency naturally corresponding to it: but there is no natural potency that is productive of the intuitive vision of God: therefore neither is there a natural capacity and passive potency toward it.

I deny the major with its proof. For no potency is in vain which is reduced to act, in whatever way this reduction is made, whether naturally or supernaturally.

You will say 2. The innate appetite is from God, as the author of nature, and as infusing the natural form; but the appetite for the intuitive vision of God cannot be from the author of nature: therefore neither can an innate appetite toward it be given. The major is clear; the minor is proved: first, the appetite implanted by God as the author of nature tends only toward God, as He is the natural end: but God, as clearly seen, is not the natural end, but the supernatural: therefore the appetite for the intuitive vision of God cannot be from God, as the author of nature. Second, the author of nature does not give an appetite which he could not fulfill: but God, as the author of nature, cannot fulfill the appetite for the beatific vision, because he cannot fulfill that appetite unless by giving the means to the attainment of such a vision: but God, as the author of nature, does not bestow the means necessary for the beatific vision; for since those means are entitatively supernatural, namely grace, faith, hope, charity, and the light of glory, they proceed from God only as the author of grace and glory.

I deny the minor. Likewise both of its proofs; for the author of nature implanted in it a general appetite, both for the complete possession of Himself, and for everything that is perfective of that nature; whether in the meantime that possession of God and perfection of nature is acquired by the powers of nature alone, or by divinely infused aid: which is chiefly confirmed by that well-worn saying of St. Augustine: You have made us, Lord, for Yourself, and our heart is restless until it rests in You.

Add. That here the discourse is only of the inefficacious appetite, not of the efficacious one, namely applying the means to the attainment of the end; and therefore the aforesaid proofs of the minor do not press, which are to be understood only of the efficacious appetite; but we speak of the inefficacious.

I establish 1. It is beyond controversy that God can be seen clearly and intuitively by a mortal man, through His extraordinary power and a supernatural privilege; for all Catholic Doctors acknowledge that it was liberally granted to Christ the Lord by God the Father from the instant of His conception; why, then, could God not likewise, if He so willed, grant the same grace to another? Add that, as the Doctor says in 1. dist. 19. quaest. 12. n. 3., if there were any repugnance why this privilege could be granted to a mortal man, it would be chiefly either on the part of the agent, namely of God granting it, or on the part of the patient, namely of the man receiving it. But it is repugnant from neither part. Not indeed on the part of the agent, since God grants the blessed an intuitive vision of Himself in the other life, why could He not grant it to a man living a mortal life? Nor is it repugnant on the part of the man receiving it; for if it were so repugnant, it would be chiefly either from his nature, or from his state and condition of mortality: but from neither head is it repugnant. Not indeed from man's nature, otherwise man could nowhere receive a beatitude repugnant to his nature: nor from the part of the state; both because mortality does not conflict formally, but only effectively, with the state of beatitude, namely by reason of its effects, and hence both can by divine power be found at the same time in the same man. And because in fact Christ the Lord was at once mortal and blessed, a wayfarer and a comprehender. Therefore the present question is not moved about the possible, but only whether in fact intuitive vision of God was granted to some mortal man.

I suppose 2. Concerning the resolution of the present doubt, there is a celebrated controversy not only among the scholastic Doctors, but also among the holy Fathers, some of whom deny, while others affirm that intuitive vision of God was granted to certain pure men living this mortal life, especially indeed to Moses, St. Paul, Adam, St. Benedict, Augustine, and Francis: and this they gather, in the case of Moses and St. Paul, from various places of Sacred Scripture to be cited below: in the case of Adam, however, they infer it from that passage of Genesis 2: The Lord God sent a deep sleep upon Adam, in which sleep Adam was present at the assembly of the Angels, as St. Augustine affirms on that same passage, and St. Bernard, serm. 2. de Septuagesima, says: That he entered into the sanctuary of God, and had an intuitive sight of the unchangeable truth, and of the abyss of divine wisdom. Concerning the blessed Augustine they gather it from what he writes in lib. 9. Confessionum, cap. 10., that when he had stood at Ostia Tiberina with his mother, he had a divine vision together with her: Which if it were continued, he says, and other visions were withdrawn, so that eternal life might be such as was this moment of understanding for which we sigh, is this not, enter into the joy of your Lord? Concerning the blessed Benedict, they infer it from St. Gregory, lib. 2. Dialogorum, cap. 35., relating the vision by which St. Benedict beheld the whole world gathered as it were under one ray of the sun; and to persuade that this is easily believed, St. Gregory says: For to one seeing the Creator every creature is narrow. As if he would say that every creature is finite, and therefore could easily have been looked upon by one seeing the Creator. Finally, concerning St. Francis our Felix infers it from St. Bonaventure in the Prologue of Itinerarii mentis in Deum, and from St. Bernardine, tom. 1. Serm. 61. art. 2. c. 3.; whether all these things are true and supported by certain testimonies will appear below.

I suppose 3. That if it be established that the privilege of seeing God in this mortal life was granted to some man, this very thing is to be attributed by stronger right to the Most Blessed Virgin. For, as St. Thomas says, 3. p. q. 27. art. 1., it is reasonably believed that she who gave birth to the Only-begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth, received greater privileges of grace than all others; or, as St. Bonaventure says in 3. d. 3. p. 1. a. 3. q. 5., what is read to have been conferred on others is not to be believed to have been denied to the Virgin. Indeed St. Antoninus, p. 4. tit. 15. cap. 17., expressly affirms, That at her very conception or birth there was given to the Virgin, for an hour, to see a mystery of this kind as in the homeland: just as Paul saw God in rapture. And Rupert, on that passage of Canticles: Your eyes are doves, says that the Blessed Virgin was rapt into the third Heaven, and saw the secret mysteries which it is not lawful for man to utter, more perfectly and more excellently than Paul. Hence in the present there will be no disputation about the Blessed Virgin; for although intuitive vision of God was never conferred on any mortal, I nevertheless judge that it is piously to be believed that it was granted to the Blessed Virgin herself, because of her most strict connection and affinity with her Son, God and man. Therefore let the disputation be only about the other men

First conclusion. — No pure man ever saw God intuitively in this mortal life. This is the more common and more certain conclusion.

Proof 1. By all those places of Sacred Scripture in which God is proclaimed invisible to mortals. Thus in John 1: No one has ever seen God. And in chapter 7.: Not that anyone has seen the Father, except him who is from God, he has seen the Father. 1. ad Timotheum 7.: Whom no man has seen, nor can see. From which I argue thus: Sacred Scripture is not to be twisted into any other sense than that which the words themselves bear, unless some contradiction to be resolved occurs, or some other necessity appears: but neither occurs here; for it is not a contradiction that God is not seen by a mortal man, and no reason appears why this should be affirmed against the express sentence of Sacred Scripture: and consequently, since God is proclaimed invisible to mortal man, it does not seem credible that He granted to anyone an intuitive vision of Himself.

Proof 2. From the holy Fathers, very many of whom, especially Irenaeus, lib. 1. cap. 37.; Origen, Homilia 1. in Isaiam; Nazianzen, Oratione 31.; Cyril, lib. 1. in Ioannem, cap. 22.; Tertullian, lib. 1. contra Marcionem, cap. 22; Ambrose, on the first chapter of Luke, and many others, expressly affirm that intuitive vision of God was not granted to Moses. The same is thought about St. Paul by Chrysostom, Homilia 5. De incomprehensibili Dei natura, Nazianzen, Tertullian, and in general all the praised Fathers, who, while denying that intuitive vision of God was granted to Moses, affirm in general that no pure man ever saw God in this mortal life.

It can also be proved by a twofold argument, which the Doctor has in 1. dist. 19. q. 12. n. 1. et 5, where he proves that beatitude cannot consist with the state of mortality: which he proves first, because the sensitive appetite in a mortal man is born to draw the intellective appetite along with itself to anything delightful that is disordered and contrary to right reason: but beatitude does not tolerate this disorder, since it is itself a most perfect order: and consequently beatific vision cannot subsist with the mortal state.

Secondly, he proves from repugnance. Because, he says, although the body is not beatifiable with beatitude properly so called, according to Augustine, Epistola 36. ad Dioscorum, which beatitude namely consists in the act of the intellect and of the will, nevertheless it is beatifiable in a certain respect, whether that beatitude of the body be immediately from God, or from the superabundance of the beatitude of the soul; since therefore the beatitude of the body cannot stand with mortal life, it is repugnant that the effect of perfect beatitude be in mortal life. Whence he concludes: That without a miracle beatitude cannot be in mortal life, and not only is it a miracle in this, that beatitude is given, which is supernatural, but also because a natural thing is impeded from its naturally consequent effect. Hence in n. 7. he says: Concerning Christ it must be said, that it was always a miracle until death that beatitude and mortality were in Him, because of the repugnance of the effects: therefore he judges that neither that beatitude, nor consequently intuitive vision, was granted to any wayfaring man. I confess, however, that these arguments do not press. Therefore

I prove 3. Individually, concerning each of those set forth in Note 3, namely by showing that none of them saw God intuitively. And first indeed concerning Moses: for in Exodus 33., when Moses had begged the Lord: Show me Your glory, and the Lord had answered: I will show you all good, He immediately adds: You will not be able to see My face; for no man shall see Me and live, that is, no man shall see Me in mortal life.

Nevertheless, so that He might console Moses with some sign of the future beatific vision, He adds: While My glory passes, I will place you in the cleft of the rock, and I will protect you with My right hand, until I pass; and I will take away My hand: and you will see My back parts; that is, you will see the back of the assumed body, namely with the cloud that shaded it removed; and since these back parts of the body had a light more tempered than His eyes and face, they could for that reason be looked upon more easily, but not the face itself, namely because of its excessively radiant splendor. Whence God adds: You will not be able to see My face.

By which it clearly stands that Moses did not see God intuitively, but only either the Angel of God acting in His place in an assumed body, as St. Stephen affirms, Actorum 7.; for where in Exodus 3. the Lord is said to have appeared to Moses in a flame of fire from the midst of the bush, St. Stephen says: There appeared to him in the desert of Mount Sinai an angel in the flame of fire of the bush.

Or he saw the divine Word, which appeared in an assumed body to the Prophets and Patriarchs, as Tertullian affirms, lib. 1. adversus Marcionem: He Himself, he says, then appeared with the angels to Abraham in truth indeed of flesh, but not yet born, because not yet to die, but already learning to converse among men.

Nor does it matter that in the same chapter of Exodus it had been said before: And the Lord spoke to Moses face to face, as a man is wont to speak to his friend: for by 'face' there is not understood there an intuitive knowledge of God, which St. Paul calls facial, saying: We now see through a mirror, and in an enigma, but then face to face; but there is only designated the almost daily apparition of God, by which namely He made manifest to Moses His will, and His decrees and judgments toward the Jewish people, namely in that familiar manner in which among men a friend sets forth and declares to his friend all the concepts of his mind and all the secrets of his heart.

Add. That even if Moses saw intuitively, face to face, him with whom he spoke, it does not however follow from this that he saw the divine Essence, and that he clearly intuited God; since, as we have said, he was only speaking with the Angel, who acted in God's place and was His messenger to Moses, to signify to him the divine will, as St. Stephen again expressly brings out, adding: This is Moses, who was in the Church in the wilderness with the Angel, who spoke to him on Mount Sinai.

St. Augustine excellently confirms this very thing, tract. 3. in Ioannem, where, weighing those words: No one has ever seen God, he says: What did Moses see? Moses saw a cloud, saw an Angel, saw fire: all that creature bore the type of its Lord, it did not exhibit the presence of the Lord Himself. A little after: Therefore, most dear brethren, an Angel bearing the type of the Lord spoke with Moses: and all those things which were so done through the Angel promised that future grace and truth.

You will say. Moses seems to have obtained the intuitive vision of God which he had asked for in Exodus 33., for in Numbers chapter 12. the Lord, addressing Aaron and Miriam, said: If there be among them a prophet of the Lord, I will appear to him in a vision, or I will speak to him through a dream: but not such is My servant Moses... for I speak to him mouth to mouth, and plainly, and he sees the Lord not through enigmas and figures. Whence one may argue thus: otherwise

Moses saw God, than the other Prophets: but the other Prophets saw Him in an enigma through figures, and only by the benefit of the Angel addressing them, and did not truly behold His essence clearly and intuitively: therefore, since Moses saw God in a more excellent way, the consequence is that he saw Him intuitively.

I distinguish the major. Moses saw God otherwise than the other Prophets: that is, he beheld His divine essence clearly and intuitively, I deny: that is, God manifested Himself to him in a nobler manner and by a more excellent light, and namely indicated His wills to him more clearly, and conversed with him with greater familiarity, I concede. Nor does it matter that the Septuagint Interpreters read the cited passage of Numbers thus: I will speak to him mouth to mouth in a species; he saw the clarity of the Lord, not through enigmas. For apart from the fact that the Latin Vulgate version alone is authentic, and hence the only one to which we owe faith; it can be answered that by 'species' is understood the species and image of the assumed body; and by 'clarity,' that sensible light which the Angel had in the assumed body, in which namely he spoke to Moses in God's place. — Secondly: the same is to be said of St. Paul: for although he himself affirms in 2. Corinth. 12. that he was rapt up to the third Heaven, namely the seat of the blessed, which third Heaven is so called with respect to the sidereal and ethereal or aerial Heaven, and which he therefore also calls Paradise, and heard secret words which it is not lawful for man to utter; yet from these words it can in no way be inferred that he intuited the divine essence; for to hear secret words is not to behold God intuitively, but only to perceive certain great things exceeding human sense: which Paul not only heard, but perhaps also saw in that ecstasy, in which he affirms that he was rapt to the third Heaven. Add that St. Paul himself testifies in 1. ad Timotheum 6. that God is invisible to mortals, Whom no man, he says, has ever seen: but certainly he would not speak truly, if he himself had intuited God: therefore it is a sign that he did not see the divine essence, which is especially true in the opinion of those who think that the ecstasy and rapture of St. Paul up to the third Heaven happened at the time of those three days in which, at the beginning of his conversion, he was at Damascus, neither eating nor drinking. Whence, since he afterwards wrote in Epist. ad Timotheum that no man has seen God, the consequence is that St. Paul himself did not see God in that ecstasy of his. — Thirdly: the same is clear concerning St. Benedict: for although St. Gregory affirms that he saw the whole machine of the world in a heavenly ray, he does not however say that that ray was some splendor of the Divinity itself, in which all creatures shine. Nor does it matter that he brings forward: To one seeing the Creator every creature is narrow: for by it he intends only that God granted St. Benedict some supernatural light, in which all these things were represented; and since that light was a certain participation of God, for that reason St. Benedict, by beholding it, is said to have looked upon God. — Fourthly: concerning St. Augustine, it is clear from his own testimony that no mention is made of the beatific vision; for he only compares the sweetness of that contemplation which he had with the sweetness of the beatific contemplation, of which that one seemed to be a certain participation and communication: whence he says of that sweetness: Is this not, enter into the joy of your Lord? As if he would say: is this not similar to the joy of the Lord, into which the blessed enter? — Finally, concerning St. Francis, it is clear that he indeed saw a Seraph bearing the image of the Crucified, and agitating him into an ecstasy of divine love; but he did not see God Himself. Nor did St. Bonaventure mean anything else in the place cited by Felix; for there he explains the vision of St. Francis in terms of his supreme contemplation.

For by the six wings of the Seraph, he says, can rightly be understood the six suspensions of illuminations, by which the soul is disposed as by certain steps and journeys, so that it passes over to peace, through the ecstatic excesses of Christian wisdom. But it is not so, except through the most ardent love of the Crucified, which so transformed Paul, rapt to the third heaven, into Christ, that he would say: With Christ I am nailed to the cross: I live, now not I; but Christ lives in me; which so absorbed the mind of Francis, that the mind showed through in the flesh, while he carried the stigmata of the most sacred passion on his body for two years before death.

By which it is clear that he is speaking not of an intuitive vision of God, but of the supereminent contemplation which the Seraphic Father Francis had, when at the sight of the Seraph he burned with the most ardent love, and was rapt into the most sweet contemplation of the suffering Christ the Lord.

Note 1. The dispute among the holy Fathers about the resolution of the present Question was always famous, even from the very first beginning of the nascent Church. For some, from Apocalypse 20 itself: Blessed is the Saint, who has part in the first resurrection: in these the second death has no power, but they will be priests of God and of Christ, and will reign with him a thousand years, and when the thousand years are finished, Satan will be loosed from his prison, etc., affirmed that after the universal resurrection Christ the Lord would reign with the Saints in the holy city of Jerusalem. Whence they were called Chiliasts, or Millenarians, from these thousand years of empire. St. Jerome, in the book De Viris illustribus, makes the author of this opinion a man celebrated for piety and doctrine, named Papias; Papias, he says, a hearer of John, Bishop of Hierapolis, is said to have published the Jewish παραδόσεις of the thousand years, whom Irenaeus followed (who in lib. 5. cap. 38. affirms that he drew this opinion from Papias), and Apollinaris, and the rest, who say that after the resurrection the Lord will reign in the flesh with the Saints. Tertullian also, in lib. De spe Fidelium, and Victorinus of Pictavium, and Lactantius are led by this opinion: the same holds with respect to cap. 65. of Isaiah: whence in lib. 1. In Ieremiam he does not dare to condemn this opinion, Which, he says, although we do not follow it, nevertheless we cannot condemn it, because many of the ecclesiastical men, and martyrs said these things: and let each one abound in his own sense, and let all the judgments of the Lord be reserved: but so that it may become more clearly known what, and of what sort, was the opinion and view of the Millenarians, or Chiliasts.

Note 2. The Chiliasts, or Millenarians, held various opinions, as may be seen in Lactantius, lib. 7. Divinarum institutionum, where he discloses his own, and the other Millenarians', opinion in these words:

He will come, he says,the Son of the most high and greatest God, and judge the living and the dead: and when he has destroyed injustice, and has made the greatest judgment, and has restored to life the just who were from the beginning, he will dwell among men for a thousand years, and will rule them with a most just empire. Then those who will be alive in their bodies will not die; but through those same thousand years they will beget an infinite multitude, and their offspring will be holy, and dear to God. But those who will be raised from the dead will rule over the living, and will be judges: but the Nations will not be utterly extinguished: but some will be left for the victory of God, that they may be triumphed over by the just, and be subjected to perpetual servitude. At the same time, the Prince of the demons, who is the contriver of all evils, will also be bound with chains, and will be in custody a thousand years of the heavenly empire, in which justice will reign in the world, lest he contrive anything evil against the people of God. After whose coming the just will be gathered from all the earth, and, once the judgment is completed, a holy City will be established in the middle of the earth, in which God himself the Creator will dwell with the just who rule. And when he had said that that time would be the golden age sung by the poets, and had elegantly proved it, he adds: Men will therefore live a most tranquil, and most abundant life, and will reign together with God: and the kings of the nations will come from the ends of the earth with gifts, and offerings, to adore, and honor the great king, whose name is renowned, and venerable to all nations which will be under the heaven, and to the kings who will rule on the earth. But when the thousand years of the kingdom have made their end, the prince of the demons will again be loosed, and, sent out of custody, will go forth, and will stir up all the nations, which will then be under the dominion of the just, to bring war upon the holy City. After a little: But when the thousand years have been completed, the world will be renewed by God, and the Heaven will be folded up, and the earth will be changed, and God will transform men into the likeness of Angels: and they will be white as snow, and will always move in the sight of the Almighty, and will sacrifice to their Lord, and will serve him in eternity. At the same time will take place that second, and full resurrection of all, in which the unjust will be raised to everlasting torments: these are they who worshipped idols made by hand: who either did not know, or denied, the Lord of the world as their parent: but also their Lord will be seized together with his ministers, and will be condemned to punishment: together with whom all the crowd of the impious, for their crimes, in the sight of the Angels, and of the just, will be burned with perpetual fire in eternity. This is the doctrine of the holy Prophets, which we Christians follow: this is Christian wisdom.

But how far Lactantius, together with the other Millenarians, strayed from Christian truth will be proved below.

Note 3. This celebrated dispute of the Millenarians, often agitated by the Fathers and Doctors of the Church, especially around the year 1331., when John XXII. was administering the Christian world and the pontifical dignity, was renewed again more vehemently, and more ardently in the Pontifical Curia, with certain most learned theologians asserting that the souls of the Saints, after their separation from their bodies and their reception into heaven, immediately behold God face to face; with others, however, denying that this deifying vision is to be granted to the blessed minds before the universal judgment: but when Pope John observed that the arguments of the denying side had not been so diligently examined; since he himself was most devoted to the study of the sacred Letters, he began with the greatest solicitude to gather from everywhere arguments for strengthening that denying side, and to weave together various testimonies from the holy Fathers, and to set them forth publicly as a private Doctor, and to repeat them often, so that the prelates and Doctors might discuss those arguments more diligently. This gave occasion to the malevolent followers of the Bavarian schism to tear apart on every side with calumnies the faith and doctrine of the Pontiff, as if he had defined, and pronounced ex Cathedra, that the divine essence is not seen by the Blessed before the judgment. Whence soon those schismatics with wicked zeal appealed to a general Council, so that John might be deprived of the Pontifical dignity, and be condemned as a heretic: for these things they objected to him, as may be seen in the manuscript of the Vatican library, n. 1009.:

Lord John, in the year of our Lord one thousand three hundred thirty-one, on the feast of All Saints, in the sermon which he publicly made, which begins: Remember the works of the Fathers, which they did in their generations, etc.; and in another sermon, which he publicly made the same year on the third Sunday of Advent, which begins: Rejoice in the Lord always, etc.; and in another sermon, which he publicly made in the year of our Lord one thousand three hundred thirty-two, on the vigil of the Epiphany, which begins: Arise, take the child and his mother, dogmatized that the Saints in Heaven do not see, nor will see until the day of the general judgment, and the future resurrection of the bodies, the face of God or the divine essence: but only see, and will see until the future universal judgment, the humanity of Christ.

But how falsely the enemies of the Pontiff defined these things to have been said by John will be clear below.

Single conclusion. — The souls of the departed, who live in sanctifying grace in this life, and have nothing to purge, immediately enjoy the intuitive vision of God. This was defined in the Florentine Council, sess. ultima, in the decree of Union, in these words:

We define that the souls of those who, after receiving baptism, incurred no stain of sin at all: those souls also, which after contracting the stain of sin have been purged, either in their bodies, or divested of those same bodies, are received into Heaven with no delay, and behold God himself, Three and One.

The same is established from the Council of Trent, sess. 5. On Original Sin. Likewise sess. 25. On the invocation of Saints presupposes this as certain and determined in these words: But those who deny that the Saints, enjoying eternal happiness in Heaven, are to be invoked, etc., are altogether to be condemned, as the Church already long ago condemned them, and now also condemns them.

It is proved first from various places of Scripture: first indeed Luke 23., where Christ the Lord says to the thief dying with him, and begging the participation of his kingdom: Today you will be with me in Paradise: by which name of Paradise the Scripture of the New Testament often uses to signify the beatific vision, or the place destined for the blessed minds seeing God intuitively. Add that in this place, by the name of Paradise, the Earthly Paradise cannot be designated, as some, even among the holy Fathers, interpreted, especially Justin in question 15.: both because that earthly Paradise can confer nothing of delights upon souls loosed from the body, since it was created and destined only for receiving and refreshing bodies: and because by those words Today you will be with me in Paradise, Christ the Lord promises his companionship to the thief: but that adorable Savior did not dwell in the earthly Paradise: therefore neither

the Thief dwelt in it. Neither is the bosom of Abraham to be understood by the name of Paradise, because it is the common, and usual expression of the Scriptures, that the holy minds, which were received into the bosom of Abraham, are rather said to descend into Hell, than to proceed into Paradise. Whence Christ himself, having descended into the very bosom of Abraham, in order to free Abraham himself together with the other faithful souls, is said to have descended into Hell. Finally, by the name of Paradise there is not only signified the empyrean Heaven, destined for the beatific vision; since Christ was to ascend into Heaven itself only after forty days, who nevertheless, dying, promises to the thief the entrance into Paradise on that very same day. It remains, therefore, that by the name of Paradise the beatific vision was promised to the thief, and that his soul, as departing in sanctifying grace, was granted it immediately after its separation from the body. Durandus, Bishop of Meaux, proved this same truth by several other texts of Scripture, in the little book which, consulted by John XXII about the resolution of the present question, he sent to him; and he urges this especially from the fact that Christ is said to have descended into Hell:

Christ, he says, did not descend into Hell according to the body, because it lay in the sepulchre the whole triduum, until the resurrection; nor according to the Divinity, because according to it he is everywhere; therefore he descended according to the soul. But the soul of Christ did not penetrate into Hell, except to free the souls of the holy Fathers, and of the others, which were in Limbo, according to that of Zachariah 9.: But you, in the blood of your testament, have led out your prisoners from the pit: therefore the soul of Christ descended into Hell, to rescue the holy souls dwelling there. But in Hell there is only a double punishment, namely of sense and of loss: but in the Limbo of the Saints there was no punishment of sense, but only the punishment of loss, which is the want of the divine vision, from which no one can be freed, and delivered except through the divine vision itself; because a privation is not removed, except by the opposite act: therefore if the descent of the soul of Christ into the Limbo of Hell was for the liberation of the holy souls, which were shut up in it, it is necessary that he freed them from the want of the divine vision, which could not be done except by the beatific vision itself being communicated to them.

Whence he rightly infers, that he who denies that the souls of the Saints of the Old Testament, which were in Limbo, see God with the beatific vision, denies the article of faith of the descent of Christ into Hell. He confirms it with the example of Lazarus, whose soul, carried into the bosom of Abraham by the Angels, enjoyed the greatest consolation before Christ freed him together with the other holy souls: what therefore did the descent of the soul of Christ into Hell confer upon him? Either it granted the divine vision and fruition itself; or only a greater joy and consolation than he had before. If the first, the intent is had; if the second, truly Christ did not free those souls, for to give great or small consolation is not to free from bonds, nor to lead out of prison, as the prophecy of Zachariah bore: it remains therefore, that he led those holy souls to the beatific vision of God. — He confirms the same moreover by several other arguments, but especially by the general authority and rite of the Church, which says of the Apostles: He gave them everlasting glory: but this glory is not the glory of the body that will come through the resurrection, but the glory of the soul, which consists in the clear vision of God: the Church brings forward the same of the holy Martyrs, of whom it sings: They possess a blessed life. Durandus subjoins other things of this kind: From which it is clear, he says, that the general rite of the Church, which in such matters has the greatest authority, confesses, praising God, that the saints after death, and before the resurrection, are glorified as to the soul.

The same truth is proved from the holy Fathers; the principal of whom expressly affirm that the holy souls are given the beatific vision. Thus Gregory of Nyssa, in the funeral Oration on Pulcheria, the little daughter, as I think, of the Emperor Theodosius:

Therefore, he says, if the girl has departed from you, yet she has run back to the Lord: she closed her eye to you, she opened it to the everlasting light of things: she has slipped away from the table, but she has been joined to the Angelic one. Hence she is a little plant torn away, and has been planted among the things of Paradise. She has been transferred from Kingdom to kingdom. She has put off the purple garment: but she has put on the vesture of the heavenly kingdom; and you forthwith grieve, that the beauty of that body is no longer seen; for you do not behold the true beauty of that soul, which is now hidden in the festive assembly of the heavenly beings — how beautiful is that eye which received God!

— Likewise Gregory Nazianzen, in Oration 10., which he wrote on his brother Caesarius: He says that his soul not only penetrated into heaven, and awaits the dances of the Angels and the splendor of the blessed men, or rather dances and exults together with them; but also that it stands by the great King, and is filled with the light shining forth from there: which he then says is the reward of the labors, and of the good works, and the end of our sacred Mystagogy. Which he also indicates more clearly at the end of the eleventh Oration; where, making a speech about the beatitude of Gorgonia his sister and enumerating its several heads, he says: It is permitted to contemplate the purer and more perfect illumination of the supreme truth, which no longer pours itself into the mind joined, and dissipated through the senses: but offers itself wholly to the whole mind to be contemplated and held, and shines upon our souls with the whole light of the Divinity. — Likewise Chrysostom, Homil. 71. on the holy Philogonius, relating his beatitude, says: Having left these feasts, he was translated to the celebrated assembly of the Angels: in which celebration, and in the midst of the assembly, the King himself is present, whom all see, as much as they can grasp, both present, and illuminating with the splendor of his Majesty all who are with him; by which he asserts that the souls of the Saints not only possess the companionship of God, but also behold him himself, which is the head of perfect happiness. — Likewise from the Latins St. Augustine, who although he seems doubtful in this matter, nevertheless in lib. 20. De Civit. Dei, cap. 9. says: Although not yet with their bodies, nevertheless already their souls reign with him, while those thousand years run their course. Likewise in cap. 21. Meditationum, addressing the saints, he says: I ask you by him himself, who chose you, who made you such, of whose beauty you are already satiated: of whose immortality you are already made immortal: in whose most blessed vision you always rejoice. — Saint Cyprian expressly signifies that the heavenly glory is not deferred until the outcome of the last judgment; but is presented immediately from death, for he closes the exhortation to martyrdom thus:

How great is the dignity, and how great the security, to go forth from here joyful, to go forth amid pressures, and straits glorious: to close in a moment the eyes with which men and the world were seen; and to open the same immediately, that God and Christ may be seen! With how great swiftness does one migrate so happily? You are suddenly withdrawn from the lands, so that you may be placed in the heavenly kingdoms.

In which he embraces two heads of beatitude, namely the heavenly habitation, and the intuitive vision of God. — Likewise St. Gregory, lib. 4. of the Dialogues cap. 29., answering the question of Peter the Disciple asking whether, before the resurrection of the bodies, the souls are received into Heaven, says: That the souls of the just, as soon as they go out of the enclosures of this flesh, are snatched into the heavenly dwellings, according to that: Wherever the body shall be, there also the eagles will be gathered: because without doubt, where the Redeemer is in body, there also the souls of the saints are gathered. And in cap. 28. he says:

That the souls of the saints are in heaven, you have believed on the testimony of the sacred eloquence; it is fitting that you believe to be true in all things, that the souls of the wicked are in hell: because from the retribution of eternal justice, from which the just already glory, it is necessary that in all things the unjust be tormented: for just as beatitude glorifies the elect, so it must be believed, that the eternal fire burns the reprobate.

By which St. Gregory openly affirms, that the blessed souls enjoy the clear vision of God. Whence this same truth is proved by reason: God is more ready to reward the good, than to punish the bad: but the bad, departing in mortal sin, are immediately punished with all that punishment with which they will be tormented forever as to the soul: therefore much more the good, departing with sanctifying grace, are to be crowned with all that beatitude with which it is fitting that they rejoice in eternity, especially as to the soul. Then God himself commands in Leviticus 19.: The work of the hireling shall not abide with you until the morning: therefore he himself must rise up in the precept which he commanded, and confer the reward, which he promised to his workers once the time of the work is finished. But this promised reward is the intuitive vision of God: therefore he must render it to the holy souls immediately after their exit from the body. It is confirmed from that of James first: Blessed is the man who suffers temptation: because when he has been proved, he will receive the crown of life. But the whole proving of man is in this mortal life: therefore, once it is completed, it is fitting that the proved men receive the crown of life, which will be nothing other than the clear and intuitive vision of God.

You will say 1. That oracle of Apocalypse cap. 20., which gave the Millenarians occasion of erring, and has until now redoubled the greatest difficulty for the Catholic Interpreters; for when St. John had asserted that he had seen an Angel descending from Heaven, having the key of the abyss, and a great chain in his hand, who seized the ancient serpent, who is the Devil and Satan, and bound him for a thousand years: and cast him into the abyss, and closed, and sealed over him, that he might no longer seduce the nations, until the thousand years are consummated: and after these things he must be loosed for a little time, he adds in verse 4. that he likewise saw the souls of those beheaded for the testimony of Jesus, and for the word of God, and who did not adore the beast, nor his image, nor received his character on their foreheads, or in their hands, and they lived and reigned with Christ a thousand years. He adds indeed in verses 5. and 6.: The rest of the dead did not live, until the thousand years are consummated. This is the first resurrection. Blessed, and Holy, is he who has part in the first resurrection: in these the second death has no power: but they will be Priests of God, and of Christ, and will reign with him a thousand years. The Millenarians interpret these Prophetic words in such a way, that they want this prediction not to be fulfilled before the persecution of Antichrist has raged. So that, when he is dead, the Church of Christ is to be given the greatest peace and happiness, and Christ himself is to descend with the heavenly Jerusalem to the earth, and in it to reign peacefully with the just rising from the tomb for a thousand years. Meanwhile, while the millennium itself runs, Satan will be bound, lest by his cunning, and the storms of his temptations, he disturb the tranquility of the Church. But when those thousand years are completed, then finally those things will follow, which we wrote in the first Note from Lactantius. From which the Millenarians openly infer, that the Saints are not to be given perpetual beatitude nor the intuitive vision of God before the final judgment. — But this interpretation of the Millenarians labors with a threefold error.

First indeed, because it supposes a double future resurrection of the Saints; one a thousand years before the universal Judgment, so that they may lead a blessed and tranquil life on earth with Christ; another after the general conflagration of the world, by which all the dead, both the good and the reprobate, must be raised, so that they may be presented to the supreme Judge to be judged. But it is constant that Scripture makes mention of only one final resurrection. Thus Job 19.: On the last day I shall rise from the earth, etc. and Paul, 1. to Corinth. 15. says that we will rise in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet. Which John also indicates not obscurely in the praised chapter of the Apocalypse v. 13. where he says: The sea gave up the dead, which were in it: and death and hell gave up their dead, which were in them, and judgment was made of each one according to their works. It is false, therefore, that a true resurrection of the bodies will take place before the world has been purified by the universal conflagration.

Secondly, it supposes that the souls of the Saints, after having received their bodies in the resurrection, will enjoy carnal delights; which directly militates against that Oracle of Christ Matth. 22.: In the resurrection they will neither marry, nor be given in marriage: but they will be like the Angels of God. Thirdly finally, this opinion falsely supposes, that by the first resurrection the holy John understands the bodies raised from the tombs, when nevertheless he speaks there only of the mystical and allegorical resurrection of souls, as openly appears from these words: I saw, he says, the souls of those beheaded for the testimony of Jesus, and of those who did not adore the beast, and they lived, and reigned with Christ a thousand years. They lived, I say, and reigned, understand: in spirit, of those beheaded; and therefore the holy John speaks there not of the corporeal, but of the spiritual resurrection, by which the souls of the Saints, putting off this mortal life, obtain the immortal one. Far, therefore, from the genuine understanding of St. John does the interpretation of the Millenarians wander.

The whole hinge of the present difficulty, therefore, turns on making it appear; first, what is that binding of Satan for a thousand years, and what freedom finally granted to him of raging against the just; second, from what point the reckoning of those thousand years is to begin, in which the just are foretold to reign with Christ; thirdly finally, what are the first and second resurrection: to which, that satisfaction may be given — I answer, omitting the various opinions of the sacred Interpreters, that that binding of Satan was made around the death of Christ the Lord, at which time, namely, the Demons were to be cast out and expelled from this world, and thrust down into Hell, Christ saying in John 12.: Now is the judgment of the world, now the Prince of the world will be cast out: whence Paul, to the Colossians 2., shows Christ the Lord hastening to the punishment of death, as the triumphant over the Demons, in these words: Despoiling the principalities, and powers: he led them away confidently, triumphing over them openly in himself. Hence St. Ambrose, lib. 10. in Lucam, said that Christ the Lord ascended the cross as a triumphal chariot: He ascended, he says, his chariot as a triumphant one, and not a tree fortified with trunks sought from the mortal enemy: but on the triumphal gibbet he hung the spoils captured from the world: for from the death of Christ the Lord all the power of the Demons over men was emptied. Whence Saint Augustine, lib. 20. De Civitate Dei, cap. 8.: The binding of the Devil was made not only from the time the Church began to be dilated into the nations, but is also made now, and will be made until the end of the age: because for each one of the faithful that strong one is then bound, when he is snatched from him as a vessel. To which fits that response of the Devil given to Saint Anthony, reported by St. Athanasius in the life of Saint Anthony himself: Why are you troublesome to me, men? Let them impute it to themselves, if they fall: for I can do nothing, unless they of their own accord subject themselves to me.

As a dragon, he has been hooked by the hook of the cross by the Lord, and bound with a halter as a beast of burden, and like a fugitive slave, bound with ring and armlet, his lips pierced, he is permitted to devour none of the faithful at all. Now the miserable one, mocked by Christ as a sparrow for sport, laid beneath the heel of the Christians, groans, he who applauded all the seas hidden from himself: he who promised that the orb of the earth was held in his hand, behold he is conquered by us. Behold, he cannot prevent me, disputing against him.

Wherefore aptly St. Augustine makes the devil like a bound dog, which can bark, but cannot bite, unless one who wills, and joins himself to him through consent and will. — Although, however, speech is there made of the binding of Satan alone, that is, of the Prince of the Demons, nevertheless the whole army of the Tartarean region was also bound and ensnared through the cross: so that neither the Prince himself, nor his deadly phalanx may in any way prevail against the Catholic Church; by hindering, namely, the public worship of God and the exercise of Religion: for what would it profit for this matter that only the Prince of the Demons be held in custody, if free access lay open to the other nefarious Spirits for vexing men, who of course could both consult their Prince, although ensnared, and rage at his command and counsel? Add that Satan is said to be held bound by the Angel; but the Angel would not seem able to hold a Demon fixed to some place, without the Angel himself likewise not departing from that same place. But it would be an excessive simplicity to persuade oneself, that the Angel will so remain in hell for a thousand years, as to retain there the bound Demon.

It is better, therefore, to say, that by this binding of Satan is understood the power of all the Demons emptied from the death of Christ, and the dissemination of the Church throughout the world, until the persecution of Antichrist himself; at which time, namely, Satan will be loosed from his prison, and will go forth, and will seduce the nations, says St. John in verse 7. — But that all these things may be more easily perceived, and may fit the text more evidently, it must be observed that a double binding of the Demon can be distinguished: one by which men were loosed from his power, when, namely, they were redeemed through the death of Christ, as Christ had foretold in Mark 3.: No one can enter the house of the strong man and plunder his goods, unless he first binds the strong man; the other, moreover, so that the Wife of the Lamb, namely the Catholic Church, may peacefully enjoy the happiness of her sacred marriage, and not be vexed by the infestations and savageries of the Demon. But this latter binding of the Demon was not put into execution, until the Roman Church triumphed over pagan Rome, the idolatry being thence utterly exterminated, and the faith of Christ being disseminated, and propagated throughout the whole world. Wherefore it must be asserted, that although Christ constrained the demon in his death, so as to take away the prey from him, by loosing men from those bonds; nevertheless he left him for some time as free, and loosed, so that he might rage through the nefarious Emperors against the Christians, namely until the conversion of Constantine, who introduced the public exercise of Christianity, the cult of the idols being extinguished, and all persecution being banished. — As to the thousand years, however, during which the demon is to be bound, lest he vex with his infestations the peaceful delights of the Church, spouse of Christ the Lord, and during which likewise the just are to reign with Christ, I judge to be signified all that time which flowed from the idolatry driven out of the Roman world, and the waves of the persecutions calmed, to the savagery of Antichrist rising against the faithful, by which almost all the peace, and all the tranquility of the Church will fall to the ground.

To this conjecture St. Augustine seems to give his assent, in book 20. De Civitate, cap. 7.:

The thousand years, he says, can, as far as it occurs to me, be understood in two ways: either because this matter is transacted in the last thousand years, that is, in the sixth millennium of years as in the sixth day, whose later spaces are now being unrolled, with the Sabbath to follow thereafter, which has no evening, namely the rest of the Saints which has no end: so that by the complete number of this millennium there might be signified the very fullness of time; for the millenary number renders the solid square of the denary number: for ten multiplied ten times make a hundred: which now is not a square figure, but a full one. But in order that it may rise in height and become solid, again a hundred is multiplied ten times, and a thousand is made.

— By these words St. Augustine not only indicates that by the thousand years expressed by St. John there is designated the entire interval of time from the death of Christ to the last day of the universal Judgment: but he also freely favors that opinion by which many of the more weighty Authors think that that interval of time from the passion of Christ to the end of the world is contained in two thousand years. Which opinion indeed can be confirmed by several conjectures and reasons. For first, the world ought to last as many thousands of years as it was created in days; but it was founded in six days: therefore it will endure for six thousands of years, and so, since four thousand have already flowed by before Christ suffered, it follows that only two thousand remain from His passion to the end of the world. They prove the major from this, that the seventh day, namely the Sabbath, on which God rested from all the work which He had made, signifies the day of the blessed rest of the Saints in the eternal Sabbatism after the general resurrection, namely the seventh millennium of eternity: therefore in equal proportion, the six days preceding the Sabbath designate the six thousands of years by which the duration and the motion and the labor of the world must precede that Sabbath of eternal beatitude; because Ps. 89.: A thousand years are before the eyes of God as yesterday's day. These words St. Jerome thus weighs: I think that from this place a thousand years are wont to be called one day; so that, namely, because the world was fabricated in six days, it is believed to subsist for only six thousands of years, and afterwards there comes the septenary and the octonary number, in which the true Sabbatism is exercised.

— The second conjecture is drawn from this, that St. John himself in this chapter six times names the thousand years, as if intimating that the world will last for six thousands of years. For in verse 2. he says: He bound him for a thousand years: in verse 3.: Until the thousand years are consummated; verse 4.: They reigned with Christ a thousand years; verse 5.: Until the thousand years are consummated; verse 6.: They shall reign with him a thousand years; verse 7.: When the thousand years shall have been consummated. For why does he six times repeat and inculcate the thousand years, unless to intimate that after six thousands of years there will be the consummation of the world and of all things? — Thirdly, in the world there have been three successive laws and states, namely the Law of Nature, the Law of Moses, the Law of Christ: but the time of the Law of Nature, which was from Adam up to Abraham, who received and instituted circumcision as the token of the Mosaic Law, lasted almost two thousand years; again the time of the Mosaic Law lasted likewise two thousand years, for precisely so many are from Abraham up to the Nativity of Christ. Therefore likewise the third Law and State of the World, namely the Law of Grace and of Christ, will also last two thousand years, so that the states of the world may be fulfilled in six thousands of years.

The same thing St. Gaudentius Brixianus expressly asserts, in tractate 10.:

We await, he says, that truly holy day of the seventh thousandth year, which will come after those six days, namely the six thousands of years of the world, which being completed, there will be rest for true holiness and for those faithfully believing in the resurrection of Christ. For there will be no fight there against the Devil, who then will certainly be held bound, fastened by his punishments.

In like manner many of the holy Fathers teach this, whom the praised Cornelius recounts and cites at length: with whom the Talmudists agree, lib. 4. tractate 4. which is inscribed Sanhedrim, that is, judgment. The world will be for six thousands of years, they say, and again it will be destroyed. Two thousand were of emptiness, that is, of the Law of Nature: two thousand of the Mosaic Law: two thousand of the days of the Messiah. — Therefore by the thousand years in which the demon is to be bound, in which likewise the souls, as well of the Martyrs beheaded for the name of Christ as of the Confessors and of the just who at the time of the persecution of Antichrist will not receive the character of the beast, nor adore its image, must reign with Christ and live a blessed and immortal life, there is rightly signified all that time from the death of Christ to the last judgment. — As for the first and the second death of the just, I say that it can be taken in two ways: first indeed mystically, as Alcazar explained it, saying that the souls of the beheaded Martyrs rise in the first resurrection, not in their own bodies, but in the infidels, who by their example and martyrdom have been converted to the faith of Christ, or confirmed in it. So that, he says, the same happens as with a grain of wheat, whose wonderful force and faculty is this, that when it has died and been buried, it nevertheless afterwards rises gloriously, and for one dead grain a hundred arise, in each of which that first grain, which had died, is said to revive, according to that oracle of Christ the Lord, John 12.: Unless a grain of wheat falling into the earth shall have died, it remains alone: but if it shall have died, it brings forth much fruit. With these words St. Paul affirms that the resurrection is adumbrated, in the first Epistle to the Corinthians 15. Hence therefore it has been touched upon that the blood of the martyrs was the seed of the Christians, says Tertullian, and so the spirit, religion, and holiness of the Martyrs rises again in the faith of those who are converted to Christ, and consequently to the glory and splendor of the Roman Church, until namely those blessed Martyrs obtain the second resurrection in their honored bodies. In like manner he explains what St. John subjoins, that the rest of the dead did not live, that is, the reprobate already dead were not celebrated and illustrious in the world, but their memory perished with a sound. — Or, more fittingly to the literal sense, I say that St. John opposes the Pious to the Impious, and the Elect to the Reprobate, in this namely, that the Pious and the Elect live in the first resurrection, that is, are blessed as to the soul, and reign with Christ, until the thousand years are consummated, that is, to the end of the world, so that then they pass to the second resurrection, and are blessed and glorious in soul and body: but the Impious and the Reprobate, when they die, pass into the first death, that is, fall into the punishment of hell; so that, the thousand years being consummated, rising on the day of judgment they pass into the second death, that is, the punishment of soul and body. — From which it is clear that St. John in no way favors the opinion of the Millenarians.

You will press. St. John expressly asserts in cap. 6. of the Apocalypse, that the souls of the Martyrs are not to be granted the beatific vision before the number of the Martyrs, who must be killed by Antichrist, is completed: therefore he judges that the souls of the Just do not see God before the day of Judgment.

The antecedent is proved. From verse 9., where John relates that when the Lamb had opened the fourth seal:

I saw, he says, under the altar the souls of those who were slain for the word of God, and for the testimony which they held. And they cried with a loud voice, saying: How long, O Lord, holy and true, dost thou not judge and avenge our blood on those who dwell on the earth? And there were given to each of them white stoles, and it was said to them that they should rest yet a little time, until their fellow servants and their brothers, who are to be killed even as they, are completed;

namely by Antichrist, whose time of cruelty will be brief, in which the number of the Martyrs and of the Elect, who are to reign with Christ forever, will be completed: therefore from this it is clear that the souls of those Martyrs who have already been killed are not yet granted beatitude.

I deny the antecedent. For it is established from St. John himself in the following chapter, verse 9., that the souls of the Martyrs are before the throne of God, and serve him day and night; and so it is likewise established that they enjoy the sight and vision of God. Then, those very souls of the Martyrs, whose vows to be fulfilled are deferred, are nevertheless granted white stoles, which are the symbols of the blessed vision and fruition of God, according to the promise of Christ in 3. of the Apocalypse, verse 5.: He who shall overcome thus, shall be clothed in white garments, and I will not blot out his name from the book of life. It is clear therefore that the souls granted white stoles enjoy the vision of God; for this beatitude is promised to the one who overcomes under the name of the stole, or white garment.

I answer 2. That the sense of the aforementioned text is not that which the Millenarians usurp: for St. John there speaks symbolically and by synecdoche, by which the part is put for the whole; namely the soul for the man, say for the Martyr: in that similar way in which Genesis 46. speaks of 70. souls, that is, men, going out from the thigh of Jacob. The souls of the Martyrs therefore cry out, either by themselves or by their bodies: they cry out, I say, by their bodies under the altar, because namely the martyrs were wont to be buried under the altar. First, so that they themselves might be honored in so sacred a place, as St. Ambrose indicates in Epist. 54., in which he admonishes Marcellina, his sister, that he has deposited the relics of Saints Gervasius and Protasius under the altar; Let the triumphal victims, he says, succeed into the place where Christ is the host: but he is above the altar, who suffered for all: these are under the altar, who have been redeemed by his passion. This place I had predestined for myself: for it is worthy that the Priest rest there where he has been wont to offer: but I yield the right-hand portion to the sacred victims: this place was owed to the Martyrs. Secondly, because, says St. Augustine, in sermon 11.:

Fittingly, and as it were for a certain fellowship, burial has been appointed for the Martyrs there, where the death of the Lord is daily celebrated. Not undeservedly, I say, is a tomb set up for those slain in a certain fellowship, where the members of the Lord's slaying are placed; so that those whom the cause of one passion had bound with Christ, the Religion of one place might also join together.

Thirdly and finally, the relics of the Martyrs under the altar are joined with the prayers. Wherefore the Priest, about to approach the altar, prays and says: We pray thee, O Lord, by the merits of thy Saints whose relics are here: and in the consecration of the altar the Pontiff says: You who have received seats at the Altar of God, intercede for us. By which it is established that the souls of the slain crying out under the altar are here taken for the bodies of the Martyrs and the sacred relics deposited under the altar, and imploring vengeance on their slaughterers, and demanding their rest and beatitude, just as the blood of Abel cried for vengeance, Genesis 1. Or if you should say that St. John is to be understood of the souls themselves: I shall reply that by the altar, under which the souls cry out, there is here understood the secret and heavenly sanctuary: namely the place of the happiness and glory of the Martyrs in Heaven, in which the souls of the Martyrs, translated after death, as it were rest, breathing forth a continual incense of praise to God. So that just as in the Temple of Solomon there was a double altar; namely the altar of Holocausts, which was in the court; and the altar of Incense, which was in the Sanctuary: so likewise there are as it were two altars under which the souls of the Martyrs cry out; namely the altars of holocausts, in which their bodies lie as slain victims; and the altar of incense, that is, the blessed seat in which the soul itself breathes forth to God the pleasing odor of praise and prayer. Which appears more clearly in Apocal. cap. 8. verse 3., where the Angel offers to God on the altar of incense the incense of the souls, that is, their prayers and praises. Therefore St. John wishes to indicate nothing else than that the souls of the Martyrs implore the glorification of their own bodies. To whom, however, it is answered, that they should sustain a little time, namely until the last day of judgment, on which the number of the Martyrs will be fulfilled, and at the same time they will be granted eternal beatitude also as to the body.

They press. Beatitude is the end of all our desires; and he who enjoys it has nothing further to desire, since it itself is a state made perfect by the aggregation of all goods: but from what has been conceded, the souls of the Just still long for and implore the raising up of their own bodies, and vengeance on their enemies: and so they do not yet obtain beatitude.

I answer. That beatitude is taken in two ways: first indeed, generally and integrally, for the aggregation complete on all sides of all goods. Secondly, essentially, for the most noble operation of the more excellent part of the rational creature, such as is the beatific vision. In the former way, nothing indeed remains to be desired by the Blessed one: but in the latter, he can still long for some good compossible with himself. The former beatitude will be granted only after the final Judgment, when namely the body together with the soul will be granted beatitude. The latter, however, is in fact granted to the blessed souls, which although they have nothing further to desire for themselves, yet have something to long for for their bodies, namely the resurrection.

They insist. Matth. 20. The father of the family commanded the steward to render to his workers their wage when evening had come: but by the particle evening, the final Judgment and the last day is understood: therefore from this it is clear that the wage is not to be conferred on the Blessed except after the final Judgment.

I answer first. That this particle, evening, in that parable of the workers in the vineyard, signifies precisely nothing; but is only added for the ornament and elegance of the narration; for many words are written in this parable which do not aim at the scope designated in it, as we said in the preceding Question, and therefore no force is to be made of that particle.

I answer secondly. That if anything can be inferred from this particle, only this can be gathered, that the wage of the just is to be conferred on their bodies after their resurrection, which will not happen before the final Judgment, and so the wage promised to them will be conferred only in the evening. It is otherwise, however, with the souls, which, if they have nothing to atone for, as soon as they are loosed from their bodies, are granted the blessed vision of God.

They press. From the same parable the denarius is promised and given only to him who labored in the vineyard of the Lord: but not the soul alone, nor the body alone, but the whole man labored in the vineyard of Christ: therefore only the whole man is to be granted the blessed wage; and so the soul cannot be beatified alone.

They confirm. The reward is owed per se to him to whom it belongs per se to merit such a reward; otherwise it would not be a condign and just retribution: but the soul does not merit per se, otherwise the separated soul could merit; nor can the body merit without the soul: therefore only the whole man, inasmuch as he consists of soul and body together, merits the reward, and so only the whole man can be granted the reward.

I distinguish the major. He who labored either denominatively or appellatively, or effectively, that is, as the principle of motion and labor, I concede: he who labored only denominatively and appellatively, I deny.

To the minor. Only the whole man labored appellatively and denominatively; because namely the whole man is called laboring and working, I concede the minor: he labored effectively or principiatively alone, I deny the minor.

The whole man indeed receives the denomination of the one laboring; but the soul and the body precisely are the effective principles of the labor and of the merit; the soul indeed is the principle which, but the body is the principle by which: and therefore since the soul, loosed from the body, is capable of the reward and the wage, and it has been the principal cause of the labor and of the merit; it also ought to be granted the wage and the reward immediately after its loosing from the body. And so the whole man will indeed be denominated blessed only after the resurrection; but his soul can before that be called and be made blessed, because namely it is immortal and capable of beatitude, even separated from the body.

Add. That the argument can also be turned back against the Millenarians, who confessed that the souls of the reprobate are immediately after death adjudged to eternal torments: to him the eternal punishment is to be attributed who was the author of the crime and of the sin: but not the body alone, nor the soul alone, but the whole man was the author of the crimes and of the demerit, and so not the soul, but the whole man is to be tormented: but the reprobate will not be the whole man before the resurrection: therefore if the consequence of the Millenarians about the blessed is true, that they are not to be rewarded before the souls have been united to their bodies in the resurrection, it will likewise be true about the souls of the reprobate, that they are not to be tormented before the resurrection. Which, however, they themselves think false.

They object. Finally, they also summon many of the holy Fathers in support of their opinion. First indeed St. Irenaeus, lib. 5. adversus haereses cap. 5., where he affirms that the souls of the just are immediately after death deposited in the Terrestrial Paradise, in which the first man had been created:

Wherefore, he says, the Presbyters, who are the disciples of the Apostles, say that those who have been translated have been translated thither. For Paradise has been prepared for just men, and for those having the Spirit: into which Paul the Apostle also, being carried away, heard unutterable words, as far as concerns us in the present: and that those who have been translated remain there until the consummation, awaiting incorruption.

Again, St. Chrysostom, hom. 39. in primam ad Corinthios, says that souls without the flesh will not enjoy those admirable goods of beatitude. Again, Theophylactus expressly asserts that the souls of the Saints are received into the Terrestrial Paradise, into which likewise the thief converted to Christ was admitted:

For just as, he says, those who have been condemned do not move about in the Palace at all, but are kept shut up in prisons appointed to their punishments, while those who are honored both enter the Palace and dwell in it for a time; afterwards, when the time for distributing the royal gifts arrives, they are bestowed upon them: so the Saints, although they do not yet grasp all that is perfect, are meanwhile nevertheless kept in those splendid and sweetly fragrant and royal, to say it in one word, Tabernacles, although they have not yet perfectly received the royal gifts: thus, therefore, that thief was in Paradise, and has not yet attained perfection, so that he should not be made perfect without us.

Finally, again, St. Bernard, sermon 3. de Sanctis, where he says there are three states: the first in the body as in a Tabernacle; the second, outside the body as in the courts of the house of God; the third, finally, in the house of God with the body taken up again; into which house of God, he says, the souls of the Saints will enter neither without us, nor without the flesh. I pass over the other holy Fathers thinking the same.

I answer. Indeed, several of the holy Fathers went over to that opinion, because the matter had not yet been discussed and determined by the Church, as it now is; wherefore it was free for each one to think as he wished: nevertheless it is an established truth that far more numerous are those who asserted that the souls of the just are received into Heaven immediately after their separation from the body, and are endowed with the blessed vision of God.

You will ask 2. What is to be thought of Pope John XXII., namely whether he really patronized the opinion of the Millenarians, and defined anything in its favor by Apostolic authority?

I answer. That he did not. And this is proved first: if there are any indications by which one may be allowed to conjecture and be persuaded that he patronized the aforesaid opinion, they are chiefly either because he published a little book filled with the authorities of Sacred Scripture and the holy Fathers, by which he seemed to prove that souls are not to be endowed with the intuitive vision of God before the Judgment: or because in his sermons and disputations he brought forward many things in assertion of this opinion: or finally because he reproached Philip, King of the French, for that, inflamed with the ardor of faith, he had forbidden, even under threat of death, that such an opinion be spoken or asserted by any of his subjects: but from none of these heads can it be gathered that John patronized this opinion, or that he defined anything in its defense by Apostolic authority. Therefore, etc. The minor, in which the whole difficulty lies, is proved first indeed from the Epistle to King Philip, given at Avignon on the 14th kalends of December, in the 18th year of his Pontificate, in which he testifies that he never said or wrote anything of his own that favored that opinion, but only collected those authorities of Sacred Scripture and the holy Fathers which seemed to patronize it; not that he defended that opinion from the heart, but so that, with the question weighed on both sides, the truth might appear more clearly and evidently: whence in the aforesaid Epistle he addresses the Most Christian King in these words:

Because, most beloved Son, we know what you intend in these and other things, that the truth may be brought to light, we ask your Royal benevolence that you cause to be announced through a faithful messenger or faithful messengers to the Masters in Theology and the Bachelors reading and residing at Paris, that, notwithstanding such threats having been made, anyone may be able to say, dispute, and preach what shall seem to him to be disputed and also preached according to Evangelical and Apostolic doctrine, until something else be ordered or even declared by the Apostolic See: for thus will the truth of the aforesaid question be able to be reached more readily.

The same thing is evident from the Epistle written by him to Peter Rogerius of Malo-Monte, Archbishop of Rouen, in which he commands and orders that the little book composed by himself, in which he had collected nothing of his own, but only the sayings of Sacred Scripture and the holy Fathers which seemed to favor the negative opinion, he should take care to have translated into the French idiom, and give it to Joan, Queen of France, to read, as well as to King Philip, so that it might be clear that he himself had defined nothing by Apostolic authority, nor written these things from his own opinion. Which he again did on the 2nd Ides of May of the year 1332., when he sent his aforesaid writing to Brother Gualterus of Divio, a Minorite, confessor of the aforesaid Queen, that he might read it, explain it, and suggest to the aforesaid Queen those authorities of the holy Fathers which he had gathered in favor of the negative opinion.

It is confirmed. Moreover, from the Epistle of the same John to the aforesaid King Philip, to repel the calumny branded upon him: the occasion of which indeed had been given by Gerard Otho, Minister General of our Order: for when he had been delegated by the Pope as Apostolic Nuncio, together with Brother Arnaldus of St. Michael of the Order of Preachers, Apostolic Penitentiary, to pacify Edward, King of England, and David, King of Scotland, who were attacking each other in hostile fashion, and when these Legates had arrived at Paris, the Procurator of the King of Scotland signified to them that they would proceed further in vain, for the reason that the King of Scotland had gone elsewhere outside the Kingdom, and had committed his role or power to no one for making peace with the English: wherefore they intimated these things to the Pope, from whom they received the reply, that they should return to him if they wished: but to Gerard he gives the power to set out on legations into any other parts for making peace. That Gerard, from the pulpit, brought forward some things in favor of that opinion which was being spread abroad under the name of Pope John. Thence the rumor spread that he had therefore been sent to Paris by Pope John, to disseminate that opinion. Whence it came about that there was a cry against him and the Pope from all, both Prelates and Masters of Theology, as against an assertor of heresy: and at length, when a complaint about this matter had been brought to King Philip, it was forbidden by him by public edict that anyone disseminate and defend that opinion. Then King Philip, together with Robert, King of Sicily, humanely warned the Pope that henceforth he should keep silent about the aforesaid opinion, reprobated by all learned men: and he intimated that it was murmured by many that he had sent Gerard to Paris to spread and defend this opinion, which calumny, that the Pope might wipe it away, he answers in the Royal Letters as regards this part thus:

We have further seen contained in the same Royal Letters that it was said by many that we had sent our beloved son Gerard Otho, General Minister of the Friars Minor, to Paris to teach and preach that souls separated from the body and purged from sins will not see the divine Essence until after the resurrection of bodies. To which we say and assert before God, that it never entered our heart nor went out from our mouth.

But this truth is especially established and confirmed by Benedict XII., the Successor of John, who, to cleanse and restore the shaken reputation of his predecessor, issued this public Diploma: which, because it is a most efficacious argument for establishing the present truth, it has pleased us to write out in full:

Benedict, etc. For an everlasting memorial of the matter. As the corruption of human nature brings it about that the saying of one man is easily followed by the multitude, and that lesser men frequently strive to interpret the sayings of their greater in the worse sense; so the order of right reason, to which the testimony of the holy Fathers lends its support, brings it about that truth always prevails over falsehood and an interpretation of this kind. Indeed, whereas it has now for some time been called into doubt by some whether souls separated from bodies and purged from sins and the punishments of sins see the divine Essence before the resumption of bodies, namely with that vision which the Apostle calls the vision face to face; and whereas on this matter, both in sermons and in other collations and conversations, many things had been said, recited, written, and preached by John XXII. of happy memory, our predecessor, and by many others in his presence; the same predecessor, wishing to meet the words and tongues of the malicious, on the third day of the month of January in the year from the Nativity of the Lord 1333., second indiction, said, asserted, and protested before the Cardinals of the Holy Roman Church, of whose number we then were, and many Prelates, and Masters in sacred Theology, and other persons and public notaries personally constituted before him in the Apostolic Consistory, under this form: Lest anyone be able to interpret sinisterly that we have thought or do think anything that runs counter to Sacred Scripture or the Orthodox Faith, we say and expressly protest, etc.; that whatever we said, alleged, or proposed in our sermons and collations on the question or matter of the vision of souls, namely whether the soul purged from sins and the punishments of sins sees the divine Essence with that vision which the Apostle calls the vision face to face, or whatever else about this matter; not intending to determine or decide or believe anything which would be in any way opposed to Sacred Scripture or contrary to the Orthodox Faith, but to hold and believe that only which can and could agree with Sacred Scripture and the Catholic Faith: and if perhaps in the aforesaid sermons or collations we said some things which were or seemed in any way opposed to Sacred Scripture or the Orthodox Faith, we say and assert that they were brought forth by us beyond our intention, and we expressly revoke them, not intending to adhere to them, nor to defend them at present, nor even in the future.

Benedict then sets out how the aforesaid John, enduring his final illness and near to death, in the presence of many Cardinals and several Prelates and public notaries present and specially summoned for this, caused a certain Letter to be read in his name, and likewise declared that he had believed and did believe; and he made the confession, revocation, and submission which were dealt with in that Letter, in these words:

Lest those things which, concerning the purged souls separated from bodies, whether they see the divine Essence, namely with that vision which the Apostle calls the vision face to face, before the resumption of bodies, have been frequently said, both by Us and by several others in our presence, by reciting and alleging Sacred Scripture, and the originals and sayings of the Saints, or by otherwise reasoning, should be able to be understood and said otherwise than they were said and understood by Us, and to be hammered into the ears of the faithful; behold that we declare our intention, which together with the holy Catholic Church we have and have held as certain, in the tenor of the presents, as follows. For we confess and believe that purged souls separated from bodies are in heaven, in the Kingdom of the Heavens, and Paradise, and are gathered with Christ in the company of the Angels, and see God and the divine Essence face to face clearly, in as much as the state and condition of the separated soul allows. If, however, other things, or otherwise, have been said, preached, or written by Us concerning matter of this kind, in whatever way we said, preached, or wrote them, by reciting the sayings of Sacred Scripture and the Saints, and by conferring and not determining, nor even holding, and thus and not otherwise, we will those things to have been said, preached, or written, etc.

That this profession of Faith on the beatific vision of souls was issued by John, even his Adversaries themselves agree, as may be seen in Raynaldus, tom. 15. ad annum Christi 1331. n. 38. That John however wrote not from the heart, but only for the sake of inquiring into and manifesting the truth, and said more in favor of the negative side, is further confirmed by the same Benedict XII., who in the little book which he published on the blessed vision against John's opinion, has among other things the following:

Although, however, my aforesaid Predecessor brought forward reasons and authorities in sermons and in writings only for that side of the aforesaid questions which I do not hold and have not held, and not for the side which I hold: nevertheless he frequently said publicly, both in sermons and in the Consistory, before a great multitude of people, that the things which he said about those matters he said only by way of conferring: and because for that side, in favor of which he brought forward reasons and authorities, little or nothing had been brought forward in the Sermons by others; therefore, so that the truth might appear more clearly from such a conferring, he brought forward the said proofs in favor of that side which until then seemed undefended. Which he declared toward the end of his life, and moreover commanded Letters to be made on this matter sealed with his bull, declaring that he had faithfully believed and did believe that the souls of the Saints, purged from sins and the punishments of sins, before the general resurrection and judgment, saw the essence of God face to face, according as their state allowed. Which I say, lest anyone think that he asserted and held the contrary of that which, now that I, although unworthy, have been assumed to the Apostolate after him, has been determined by me with the Council of Cardinals.

The heretics object: Peter of Ailly, then Master of the College of Navarre, afterwards Bishop of Cambrai, then Cardinal, who, writing against John Montesono, a Dominican, who had appealed from the sentence published against him by the sacred Faculty of Paris to the Supreme Pontiff, says thus in the tract published in the name of the Faculty against him, art. 1. concl. 6.: Likewise the aforesaid Faculty could lawfully do this against the Supreme Pontiff, therefore a fortiori against his subject and inferior (namely, to reprove his errors doctrinally). The assumption was evident in the time of John XXII.; because, as Master Nicolaus de Lyra reports in his tract on the beatific vision, almost forty Masters of the said Faculty concordantly determined the contrary of that which the Pope publicly asserted; and the said Master did the like, and similarly Master Guillelmus Okam wrote publicly against him, as is evident in his Dialogue: all which things in this regard were reputed to have been done lawfully, as appeared in the time of Benedict the Twelfth, his Successor. These things from a manuscript codex of the College of Navarre.

They confirm it. From the fact that Philip of Valois, King of France, then, since he felt himself fortified by the definition of the Parisian Theologians, wrote threatening Letters to John XXII., in which these words are found, that he should revoke himself, or he would have him burned, that is, that he should revoke his error, otherwise he would take care to have him consumed with fire; as Peter of Ailly, now Bishop of Cambrai, noted in a certain oration which is preserved in manuscript in the Library of St. Victor, and begins thus: The peace of God, which surpasses all understanding. Whence he adds: The Pontiff obeyed the King, revoked his error, and subjected himself to the Church, his mother and Lady.

I answer. Indeed, Aventinus, Plessaeus-Mornaeus, and other similar men assert this: but how wrongly, and how mendaciously they have devised this very thing, clearly appears from that supreme observance of Philip, the Most Christian Prince, toward John XXII., as well as from the splendid testimony of the sacred Faculty of Paris concerning the innocence of John himself, as appears from the deliberation of the same Faculty made on the second day of January, in the year of the Lord 1333., the tenor of which follows:

To the most Serene Prince, and Lord, the Lord Philip, illustrious King of the French, his devoted Chaplains by the same mercy. Peter, Patriarch of Jerusalem, Peter, Archbishop of Rouen, Guil. Bernardi, Chancellor of Paris, Ioann. de Blangiaco, Archdeacon of Vexin in the Church of Rouen, Nicolaus de Lyra of the Order of Minors, Ioannes de Menthono of the Order of St. Benedict, Matth. de Archis, Peter de Palma, Provincial Prior of the Friars of the Order of Preachers in France, Ioannes de Caricampo of the Cistercian Order, Peter de Casa, General Prior of the Friars of Blessed Mary of Mount Carmel, Simon de Meueriis, Guillelmus de Castro Reginaldi of the Order of Preachers, Germanus Celati, Galinus de Giaco of the Order of Preachers, Guillelmus de Brena Minor, Guillelmus Caleot of the Order of Preachers, Olivarius Saladini, Gerardus de Pergamo of the Order of Hermits of St. Augustine, Peter de Verberia of the Order of the Valley of Scholars, Nicolaus de Alexandria of the Order of Hermits of St. Augustine, Peter Herse of the Order of Carmelites, Nicolaus Boneti of the Order of Friars Minor, and Durandus de Aureliaco of the Order of Preachers, Masters of sacred Theology, with their most humble recommendation, so to pass through the governance of the temporal Kingdom as to arrive at the summit of the everlasting Kingdom. It pleased your Royal Majesty to convoke us on the 4th Sunday of the Advent of the Lord in your Manor in the wood of Vincennes to its presence, and to require of us that we be willing to take a bodily oath, that on the things asked of us concerning the state of the souls of the Saints divested of their bodies, we would faithfully and without any veil of palliation whatsoever say the truth which we felt, there being present at your Royal Highnessthe excellent Princes the Lords Philip by the grace of God King of Navarre, John your firstborn of Normandy, Louis, Duke of Bourbon, Charles your brother, Duke of Alencon, Guy, Count of Blois, and the reverend Fathers Guillelmus the Occitan, Archbishop, Guillelmus of Paris, Andreas of Arras, Guillelmus of Cominges, Peter of Rodez, Roger of Limoges, Bernard of Le Puy, John of Nevers, Bishops, Guillelmus elect of Evreux, Peter of Cluny, Guy of St. Denis, Peter of St. Germain of the Meadows, Hugh of Corbie, Abbots, and a copious multitude of others, as well of Clerics as of Barons, and Knights, your Counselors, Religious and Secular. Moreover, the aforesaid oath having been taken by us, two questions were proposed to us: the First, Whether the souls of the Saints existing in Heaven see the divine Essence face to face, before the resumption of bodies, and before the general Judgment. The Second, Whether the vision which they now have of the divine Essence will be made void on the day of the last Judgment, another succeeding. And because, most Serene Prince, we are bound to revere You as our most dear Lord, Founder and Guardian of the Parisian studium, and of our Faculty of Theology there, and as an excellent King, and to obey your commands; attending especially to that which we heard from your mouth there, that you sought nothing in this matter which could touch the most holy Father and our Lord John, by divine providence of God Supreme Pontiff of the sacrosanct Roman and universal Church, whose devoted servants and sons we are; nay rather, as his most devoted son, you were zealous for his honor in these and other things; and noting that we have heard by the report of many worthy of faith, that whatever his Holiness said in this matter, he brought forth not by asserting or opining, but only by reciting; and considering that, according to the doctrine of the Prince of the Apostles, we ought to be ready to render an account to everyone asking us of the faith and hope which is in us, we answer singly what we felt on the things asked, and we all agree in this opinion: that from the time of the death of Our Lord Jesus Christ, through which the price of the redemption of the human race was paid, all the souls of the holy Fathers, whom the same our Savior, descending into Hell, led out of Limbo, and the souls of the other faithful which have gone out of their bodies, having nothing purgable, or which are already purged in Purgatory, have been taken up to the naked and clear, beatific, intuitive, and immediate vision of the divine essence, and of the most blessed Trinity, the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit, which the Apostle, 1. ad Corinth. 13. cap., names the vision face to face, and perfectly enjoy the Deity itself, and already seeing what they believed, holding what they hoped, are blessed not in hope, but in reality: and that the said vision, which they now have, will by no means be made void, another succeeding, when bodies have been taken up again; but the same vision itself, since it is their life and nature, will remain in them perpetually. And because, renowned Prince! afterwards on the day of St. John the Evangelist you caused us to be gathered at Paris, and there we were required in your name, that we should put into writing, with our seals appended there, that which we had said on the said 4th Sunday of Advent in your presence; although we had begged that your Royal Highness deignto be content with those things which we had already said; or that, just as each one would answer singly, so it would be put into writing singly: nevertheless, not wishing to oppose your commands, we have judged that the present letters, under the apposition of our seals, should be granted to the Royal Excellence in testimony of the foregoing. And we, Guillelmus le Petit, Henricus de Somons, Provincial Minister of the Order of Friars Minor in France, Aegidius de Pestico, Ioannes of St. Denis of the Order of St. Benedict, Guillelmus Herees, Penitentiary of Paris, and Robertus de Bardis, Doctors of Theology in the same faculty, who were not present at the said Convention made in the wood of Vincennes, hindered by legitimate causes, afterwards in other Congregations required in your name, answer similarly in all things on the aforesaid questions with the aforesaid Fathers and Masters, and we believe and feel the same which they said in the aforesaid matter; in testimony of which thing we have judged that our seals, together with their seals, should be appended to the present letters. Given at Paris at St. Mathurin's, in our General Congregation of the Masters in Theology, Regent and Non-Regent, on the second day of January in the year of the Lord 1333.

From this public instrument, (whose original is preserved in the Archives of the sacred Faculty of Paris, from which I have transcribed these things) it appears more than sufficiently what was the reverence, both of the Most Christian King and of the sacred Faculty, toward the Supreme Pontiff, the Parent of all the faithful; and how the aforesaid John XXII., not by asserting, nor by opining, but only by reciting, wrote that the holy souls, for whom nothing remains to be expiated, are to be deprived of the clear vision of God until the day of Judgment.

It is also evident how wrongly our Nicolaus de Lyra is numbered among the condemners and impugners of John; since indeed he subscribed to the opinion of the aforesaid Faculty of Paris, and together with the other Masters asserted that the aforesaid John wrote the aforesaid opinion not assertively, but only recitatively.

Finally, it is evident with how little certainty Bzovius wrote, ad annum 1331., that Pope John, in building up that opinion, adhered to the opinion of the Friars Minor: for that the Franciscans earlier taught, held, or fostered it, or that John inclined to their opinion in this matter, is a mere fiction: since indeed no serious Historian attributes the origin of this opinion to the Minorites: nay rather, several Writers record that Pope John was the first author of this controversy: to which moreover this is an argument, that no Franciscan will be found who has left anything in writing in favor of this opinion.

That Guillel. Astiensis, Inquisitor at Avignon in the Pontifical court, cast into prison Thomas Valentein, an Englishman of the Order of Preachers, preaching the contrary opinion before the Pope; he did not therefore do this because he himself thought with John, but because the Preacher, less religiously and more rashly than was fitting, censured the Pope himself not obscurely (with Bzovius himself here and elsewhere as witness), imprecating divine malediction upon the assertors of that opinion: especially since at that time John defended nothing tenaciously, nor asserted anything constantly in this question. And so it was the irreverence of the Preacher, not the preaching of truth, that was the cause for which he was consigned to prison.

It is also evident how shamelessly Calvin lies, lib. 4. Institutionum, cap. 7, paragrapho 28., when he asserted that John XXII. thought that souls are mortal until the last day of judgment, and that he was therefore placed in the Catalogue of Heretics. What more shameless thing can be invented? Or what is more alien from John's opinion? Nevertheless Calvin heaps up this lie, when he calls Gerson (whom he unskillfully feigns to have been a contemporary of John, when he had not yet been born) as witness to the immortality of the soul denied by John. For Gerson did not even think that; but only from the beatitude attained by the thief immediately after death, he argues that the doctrine of John was false, which he falsely attributed to him, namely that the souls of the Saints would behold the Divinity only after the judgment. But of Gerson more fully below.

Finally, it is evident how much certain inept conjecturers rave, who will have it that John was snatched from life by divine intervention, lest he go astray in deciding this controversy. For what miracle does death have in a man of ninety, especially when it is preceded by a four-day illness? And what danger was there, since he was to be guided by the Holy Spirit in issuing the decree of faith concerning a question agitated and weighed on both sides?

They object 2. Adrian VI and Gerson, asserting that John XXII. was truly condemned by the sacred Faculty of Paris, as well as by King Philip: for thus Gerson addresses the Most Christian King in the Sermon on Easter: Wherefore moreover the falsity of the doctrine of Pope John XXII. appears, which was condemned with the sound of trumpets, or horns, before King Philip your uncle by the Parisian Theologians, concerning the beatific vision: and he believed rather the Parisian Theologians than the Curia: therefore truly John XXII. was condemned by the sacred Faculty of Paris.

I deny the consequence. For Adrian does not speak assertively, but from the common opinion, by which it was disseminated through the deceit of heretics: for he says It is reported of John XXII. etc. As for Gerson, however, I say that the aforesaid sermon does not seem to be a genuine, but a spurious offspring of his, as several, and those the gravest, considerations make credible. First, because Gerson was not ignorant of the aforesaid decree of the sacred Faculty justifying John XXII. Second, because the style of the aforesaid sermon is so lowly and barbarous, that it cannot be ascribed to any wise Gerson. But I bring forward one or another of the many: for while he wishes to restrict certain questions regarding the Resurrection, he says: curiosity, desiring to know, wanted to ask many other questions: then again toward the end: It was my intention rather to enter the matter; but the other orations of Gerson, especially those which he delivered before Kings, are of a nobler genius and of a more polished style. Third, that Peter Schotus affirms that some things were inserted into the works of Gerson by the fraud of the enemies of the Church; for instance, concerning images and indulgences, so that they might be able to stain the reputation of so great a man, and patronize their own errors; why should not the aforesaid sermon equally have been ascribed to him, especially since it scarcely smells of Gerson's genius?