Scotus Academicus, Tomus primus: De Deo in se subsistente

It is now sufficiently clear that the Blessed see not only the divine essence, but also all the things that are in God formally, clearly and intuitively. Since, moreover, God also contains creatures as much eminently, on account of His infinite reason of being, as causally, namely by reason of the omnipotence productive of all things, and of the ideas to whose likeness Creatures must be formed, hence the question arises whether, and in what manner, those Creatures can be seen in God; to resolve which,

Note 1. A threefold knowledge can be distinguished in the Blessed. The first, by which they intuit God and the things that are God's formally. The second, by which they behold Creatures in the divine Essence, or, as the Doctors are wont to speak with St. Augustine, by which they see Creatures in the divine Word as in a known object, or as the means of knowing; for since the divine Word is appropriately called divine Wisdom, the spotless mirror, and the splendor of eternal glory, therefore the things that are represented and seen in the divine Essence are said to be seen and represented in the Word. Finally the third, by which the Blessed know Creatures in themselves, that is, through their own proper species and representation. The first knowledge can be called noonday knowledge, of which the Spouse in Canticorum 1. says: Tell me, you whom my soul loves, where you pasture, where you rest at midday, which passage St. Bernard in sermon 33. on the Canticles expounds thus:

Your face, O Lord, is midday, and the clear midday is the intuitive vision of You. O truly midday, fullness of fervor and light, the Sun's station, the extermination of shadows, the drying up of the marshes, the driving away of foul odors! O perpetual solstice, when the day will no longer decline! O noonday light!

The second is called by St. Augustine, lib. 1. De Genesi ad litteram c. 29. and lib. 11. De Civit. Dei. c. 29., daytime or morning knowledge, because things are known more clearly and more perfectly in the Word and in the divine Essence than in themselves: whence St. Augustine ibidem calls the third knowledge evening knowledge. Hence in lib. 22. De Civit. c. 2. he says: The knowledge of the Creature in itself is more faded than when it is known in the wisdom of God, as in the art through which it was made. By these words he so distinguishes the six days of the creation of the world, as if they were not so many natural days; but six different kinds of produced things are signified, ordered to the sixfold knowledge of the Angels, who knew those things which are reported as created on the individual days, as soon as they were made, in the Word of God; and since this knowledge is prior and clearer, it is called morning knowledge. Then they knew those created things in themselves through their own proper species, and since this knowledge is later and less evident, it is called evening knowledge. It is not however called night, says the same St. Augustine, lib. 4. De Genesi ad litteram cap. 29., because in that evening knowledge the Angels did not linger, but referring it to the praise of the Creator, they made evening immediately recur into morning, that is, from the knowledge and inspection of creatures in themselves, they immediately directed their intellect to the knowledge of the same creatures, insofar as they are represented in the Word.

Note 2. Creatures can be said to be known in the beatific vision of God in three ways. First indeed, according to the eminent being which they have in the divine Essence, which, since it is infinite entity and the source of all beings, also contains and represents eminently all other entities whatsoever. Second, causally, insofar as God produces in the intellect of the Blessed the species of the Creature, namely by revealing to the Blessed the existence of such a Creature, and this as an efficient cause, namely by creating the species representative of that Creature and impressing it upon the blessed intellect itself, so that the blessed intellect perceives the Creature not as formally represented in God, but only through that species and revelation. Third finally, formally: Creatures are said to be seen in God by the Blessed when they are said to be known by the same vision and the same light by which God Himself is seen, namely by reason of the beatific knowledge which they have.

Note 3. Creatures can be understood to be known formally in God in two ways. First indeed, as if by a single act and a single principle God and the Creature were seen together, without one being the formal notion of seeing the other, just as the Angel is said by some Theologians to know Peter and Paul through a single impressed species, and yet Peter is not for him the formal notion of seeing Paul. Second, as if God, being seen, were the medium and the formal motive notion for the vision of the Creature, namely on account of the connection and dependence which the Creature has in God Himself; for, given the connection and containment together, God will be the notion of seeing Creatures, just as parts are seen in the whole, properties in the essence, and conclusions in the premises, which are the formal motive and the medium previously known in which the conclusion can be seen.

With these things premised, a threefold question chiefly presents itself to be resolved. First, whether, God being seen, Creatures can be seen intuitively according to their own proper being. Second, whether they are seen by the same vision of God, and as in a medium previously known, and formally by the power of that vision itself. Third finally, which Creatures can be seen by the Blessed, and are in fact seen.

First conclusion. — The Blessed, in seeing God, also see some Creatures according to their own proper being. This is common among Theologians, and

Proof 1. Ioannis 17. This is eternal life, that they may know You, the true God, and Jesus Christ whom You have sent. But Jesus Christ includes not only the Divinity, but also the humanity, which is something created: therefore it pertains to eternal life to know something created. The same is confirmed from the Council of Sens, first part, in the decrees on Faith, c. 13., where, against Luther and other Innovators saying that the Saints are not to be invoked because they do not perceive our prayers, it is asserted: But how dissonant this is not only from truth but also from the Scriptures, he will easily understand who is not ignorant that that all-form mirror of the Divinity is open to the Blessed, in which whatever concerns them shines forth. And if the Angels are not lacking — Gabriel to Daniel, and Raphael to Tobias, to the latter because men are more sluggish — who stand by us from the beginning of our prayers, so that they may soon offer to them those whose aid we implore. By these words the Council openly teaches that the Blessed see our prayers in the very mirror of the Divinity, and so certain creatures are seen together with God Himself.

The holy Fathers clearly prove this very thing. St. Gregory indeed, lib. 2. Moralium cap. 2., where he has this well-known sentence: What do those who know the one who knows all things not know of those things which are to be known? Likewise homil. 14.: They who see their Creator in clarity — nothing is done in a creature that cannot be seen. And St. Prosper, lib. 3. cap. 36.: Not only the notion of all Creatures, he says, but also the very eminence of their own Creator they will behold with revealed face. But of all, St. Augustine teaches this truth most clearly in several places, but especially lib. 11. De Civit. Dei cap. 29., where, after he had enumerated the various kinds of Creatures, he subjoins:

All these things are known by the Angels in one way in the Word of God, where they have their causes and their reasons, that is, the reasons according to which they were made, abiding unchangeably; and in another way in themselves: there with a clearer knowledge, here with a more obscure one, as of the art and of the works. But when those works are carried over to the praise and veneration of the Creator Himself, it shines like morning in the minds of those contemplating.

But he proves this truth more evidently in lib. 4. De Genesi ad Litteram cap. 29. and the following, where, after he had said,

Would he say — or if anyone should say it, he is a stranger — that that heavenly city among thousands of Angels, either does not contemplate the eternity of the Creator, or is ignorant of the mutability of the Creature, or does not praise the Creator from a certain lower knowledge of it as well? All this they can do at once, all this they do at once; they can, and they do; therefore they have at once both day, and evening, and morning.

By these words, as we have said, he distinguishes a threefold knowledge of the Blessed: morning knowledge, by which they see created things in the Word; evening knowledge, by which they see them in themselves through their own proper species; and daytime knowledge, which is made by the repeated application of the intellect, from Creatures known in themselves, to seeing the same Creatures in God. Whence he subjoins, that in the blessed homeland

It is always day in the contemplation of the unchangeable truth, always evening in the knowledge of the Creature in itself, always morning, even from this knowledge, to the praise of the Creator. For evening is made not by the withdrawal of the superior light, but by the distinction of the inferior knowledge; nor does the morning knowledge follow upon a night of ignorance, but because it raises even the evening knowledge to the glory of the Creator.

Finally it is proved by reason. The blessed vision answers to the merits of Faith: but by faith we believe many things which pertain to Creatures: therefore the Blessed ought to see those Creatures. Next, it is established that the Blessed see God, and Creatures eminently contained in Him: but they cannot so see Creatures according to eminent being, without likewise seeing them according to their own proper notion, for the container is not perfectly known unless the contained is likewise known: therefore Creatures cannot be known eminently in the divine Essence, without being likewise known according to their own proper being. Finally, that is seen in God together with the vision of Him which either is contained in Him formally, or has a necessary connection with Him: but Creatures are contained in God formally, at least objectively, and have a necessary connection with Him. Therefore they too are seen together with this vision of Him.

You will say 1. What is known in another is not known intuitively, nor immediately, nor through its own proper species: therefore either the Creature is not known in God, or it is not known as it is in itself.

I answer. Something can be known as it is in itself in two ways. First indeed terminatively, when namely it terminates the knowledge as it is in itself, and is conceived and seen according to its own proper formal notion. Second motivatively, when through itself it moves the intellect to its knowledge and vision. But for the vision to be intuitive, it suffices that the object be known as it is in itself terminatively, not however motivatively; and Creatures are so known in God, because they truly terminate the beatific knowledge according to their own proper notion, although God alone moves the intellect to that knowledge.

You will say 2. A Creature cannot be known according to its own proper being in God, unless it is known formally, that is, according to its formal notion, which it would have in God: but a Creature cannot be known formally in God, because it is not in Him formally and distinctly: therefore neither can it be known in Him according to its formal and proper being, but only according to the eminent being which it has in God.

I distinguish the major. The Creature does not have proper being, nor is it in God according to its formal notion, as a form intrinsically affecting God — I concede; as something having a necessary connection with Him — I deny: and so, in order that something be seen in God, it must either be in Him formally and intrinsically, as the divine attributes and relations are, or at least it must have a necessary connection with Him, such as Creatures have with God the Creator; all of which will be set forth more clearly

Second conclusion. — Creatures are seen in God formally as in a medium previously known. This is common among Theologians, against the Nominalists and Vasquez.

Proof 1. By the authority of the holy Fathers, and indeed by the already expressed sentences of St. Augustine, by which he distinguishes a twofold knowledge in the Angels: morning knowledge, by which things are known in the Word, and evening knowledge, by which they are known in themselves; and accordingly he judges that things are known formally in the Word. Then, because otherwise he would not rightly assert that Creatures are seen in the Word, unless they were seen formally as in a medium previously known. For to be known in something, is to be known by means of another, just as a conclusion is said to be known in its principles, Caesar in his image, an object in a mirror, so that the act of seeing is terminated at the mirror and the image of the object received in it. But if the Word only caused the vision in the Blessed seeing it, as the Nominalists hold, things would not properly be said to be seen in the Word, just as we do not say that some thing is seen in an intelligible or sensible species, although that species is the cause of the vision. Then, because St. Augustine says that the Creature is known in one way in itself, in another way in the Word. Hence he calls the knowledge of Creatures in themselves more faded than that which is known in the wisdom of God: but unless the Creature were known in the Word formally, it could not be said to be seen in the Word otherwise and better and more vividly than in itself; otherwise one and the same knowledge would be said to be more perfect, clearer, and better than itself, which is absurd. Then finally, because the same Augustine, lib. 13. Confessionum, cap. 15., speaking of the Blessed one seeing the divine Essence, says: *He has no need to look up at the firmament; this is known by seeing Your Word, for he sees Your face always, and there he reads without the syllables of time what Your will wills.

With this agrees St. Bernard, lib. 2. De Consideratione, cap. 2:

The creature of Heaven does not need a ladder of Creatures, in order to ascend into Heaven, as the creature of the world does; for what need is there of a ladder for one who holds the throne? He sees the Word, and in the Word the things made through the Word. But if the Blessed saw the will of God and creatures not formally in the Word, but only outside the Word, they would have to read in the syllables of times, and to look upon creatures in themselves; for what is formally seen and read in itself must be looked at in itself, by whomsoever such an aspect and reading may at length be caused.

The same is proved by reason. First indeed, God in Himself, as motive and known object, knows creatures formally, as St. Dionysius openly teaches, lib. De Divinis Nominibus, cap. 7., around the middle: therefore in a similar way the Blessed can see creatures in God. Add that the superior Angels illuminate the inferior ones concerning those things which they know in the Word, as the same Dionysius affirms, lib. De Coelesti Hierarchia, cap. 6. 7. and 8. Therefore he judges that the superior Angels see creatures in the Word formally. Moreover, God Himself in His Essence and Omnipotence sees all creatures: therefore the Essence of God and His Omnipotence can be the medium for the knowledge of creatures. — Second, whenever some effect has a necessary connection with the cause in which it is contained according to all its proper notions, it can be known in the cause, as in the formal object of knowledge; for what is it to be a medium, except to be necessarily connected, and to contain? For that is the notion on account of which properties are known in the Essence as in a medium, and conclusions in principles: but creatures have a necessary connection with God, and are contained in Him as in a cause and idea, both proximate and remote: therefore God is the medium for the knowledge of creatures. It is confirmed. As being is disposed to being, so it is disposed to being known: but creatures according to their entity are contained in the Essence and Omnipotence of God: therefore they are also contained according to their cognoscibility, and so can be known in it. — Finally, Creatures must be said to be seen in the Word formally, if this vision involves no repugnance; but so it does not repugn. I prove it: If there were some repugnance, it would be sought either on the part of the object, namely the divine Essence, which could not represent creatures, or on the part of the act, which could not itself tend to various objects, namely to God and Creatures, or on the part of the faculty and power, which could not at once attain a double object: but it repugns on neither part. Not indeed on the part of the object, for the divine Essence and Omnipotence have infinite power of representing any entity whatsoever, and in fact represent it to the divine intellect, as we have already said: therefore they can also represent every uncreated and created entity to the created intellect. Not even on the part of the act, for even the most distinct objects can be perceived by a single act, especially when they have some necessary subordination or connection to one another. For the first truth and the revealed things are perceived by the same act of faith, the end and the means are attained by the same act of knowledge, the image and the prototype are seen together: but God and the creature have a connection not only in the notion of cause and effect, but also in the notion of primary and secondary object, that is, in the notion of motive and terminative object: therefore God and the Creature can be seen by the same act. Finally, it does not repugn on the part of the power: for if various objects can be attained by the same act, the faculty also will be able to tend to those objects.

You will say 1. Between the medium of knowing and the thing known there must be a necessary connection and proportion: but this is not found between the divine Essence and possible creatures: therefore the former cannot serve the intellect of God or of the Blessed as a medium for knowing the latter. The major is evident. The minor is proved. First, because one thing cannot have an intrinsic connection with another on which it does not depend: but the divine Essence is altogether independent of possible creatures: therefore it is not intrinsically connected with them. Second, the supremely necessary cannot be connected with the less necessary: but God, as being by essence, is more necessary than creatures, which are beings from another and by participation: therefore He has no connection with creatures. Third, even if no creature were possible, the divine Essence would no less have all that it has de facto: but then it would not be the formal notion of seeing creatures: therefore neither now.

I distinguish the major. Between the medium of knowing and the thing known there must be a necessary connection, through the mutual dependence of each extreme on the other — I deny; through dependence in one, and superiority and eminence in the other — I concede. Similarly I distinguish the minor: between the divine Essence and creatures there is no necessary connection of dependence on the part of both extremes — I concede. There is no connection of dependence on the part of the Creatures, and of superiority on the part of God — I deny the minor. Whence to the first proof the major must be denied. For a cause has a necessary connection with its effect, and a premise with its conclusion, from which however they do not depend. To the second proof likewise the major must be denied: for the truth of principles is more necessary and evident than the truth of the conclusion, yet the latter depends on the former. Finally to the third likewise the major must be denied. For in that case in which creatures would be impossible, certainly God would not have that power of representing nor of producing, and consequently it is not true that whatever God has de facto, He would also have in that impossible case. Nevertheless in that case God would always be God, because He would always be of infinite virtue both in understanding and in willing ad intra, not however ad extra.

You will say 2. If the Blessed, in seeing the divine Essence, saw in it formally some possible Creatures as in a cause and medium previously known, they would also have to see absolutely all creatures; for there is no stronger reason why they should see this one rather than that one, since all are equally contained and represented in the divine Essence as in a cause: but it is impossible that the Blessed see all possible Creatures, which are infinite in number: therefore they see none.

I deny the consequence. For although the divine Essence formally represents absolutely all Creatures, nevertheless since this representation is made through the free will of God, it follows that it represents those which He wills; for just as God, although infinitely visible, is not however seen naturally by a Creature, but only through His free descent, when He wills, and as He wills, so also He wills it; for which reason it is called by the Subtle Doctor in 3. dist. 11. q. 2. n. 20. a voluntary mirror — a mirror indeed in this alone, that just as a mirror when seen exhibits another object which it represents, and so is the cause why it is seen, so the divine Essence when seen exhibits the Creature to be seen, and is the cause and reason why it is seen. It is called voluntary, however, because it does not represent necessarily, as a corporeal mirror does, or as an impressed species does, but only freely; and so it is not necessary that, the divine Essence being seen, absolutely all Creatures be seen.

You will say 3. Creatures cannot be seen by the same vision by which the divine Essence is seen, if God can be seen without Creatures being seen: but God can be seen without Creatures being seen: therefore they are not seen by the same vision. Next. There is not the same vision where one is caused by another: but the vision of the Creature is caused by the vision of God. For this causal proposition is true: Creatures are therefore seen, because God is seen: therefore God and the creature are not seen by the same vision. Finally: If the vision of God and of the Creature is one and the same, and yet the Creature is seen by the force of the vision of God, it follows that the creature is seen by the force of the vision of itself, which is absurd.

I answer. The vision terminated at God and Creatures is one altogether and indivisible, so that if God were seen, and not the Creature, that vision would also be said to be changed; for by the change of the secondary object the vision can be said to be changed. Whence the minor must be denied, unless perhaps someone should say that God can be seen without the Creature precisely, that is, through extraordinary power, in the way in which we said the Essence can be seen without the attributes. Hence likewise it must be denied that the vision of God is the cause of the vision of the Creature, since the vision of both is one and the same, although the Creature is seen by the force of the vision of God itself, just as the secondary object is seen by virtue of the primary object. Nor yet for this reason should it be said to be seen by the force of itself, because it is not of itself the primary and motive notion for its own vision; but it has that only from the divine Essence, by which He represents creatures, and moves the intellect to their vision.

Third conclusion. — The blessed see in the Word all those things which pertain to their state, perfection, and satiety.

This is common, not only among the Doctors, but also among the holy Fathers. Proof. Beatitude is a supremely perfective and satiating state: therefore the blessed ought to see all those things which pertain to their satiety and perfection. Now the blessed one can be considered in three ways. First, as he is elevated to the order of grace. Second, insofar as he is a part of the universe. Third, as he is such a person constituted in a particular dignity, for instance, Supreme Pontiff, supreme Monarch, Founder and Patriarch of a religious Order, father of a family, etc. Hence it is that according to this threefold consideration he especially desires to know three things: first indeed the mysteries of faith; second, the nobler species and parts of the universe, such as the Angels, the Heavens, the Elements, etc. In the third way, he desires to see those things which pertain to the dignity and ministry which he exercised: but he sees all these things: therefore he sees all those things which pertain to the perfection and satiety of his state.

Proof of the minor. First, that the blessed see the principal mysteries of faith. For the beatific vision succeeds to faith, just as comprehension succeeds to hope, and fruition to charity: therefore all those things which are here obscurely revealed to us through faith are manifested to the blessed in the homeland in the Word, according to that saying of Psalmi. 47. As we have heard, so have we seen, in the city of the Lord of hosts. To this is consonant that saying of Augustine, lib. 22. De Civit. Dei, cap. 29, who says:

Blessed are the clean of heart, for they shall see God, and all those things which we now see; but believing according to the measure of human capacity, we think of them far less than they are, and incomparably: and you shall see, and your heart shall rejoice: here you believe, there you shall see.

To this is consonant St. Gregory, lib. 18. Moral., cap. ultimo. That vision which is now begun in faith, he says, will then be perfected in species, when we drink the coeternal wisdom of God, which we now take in through the mouths of preachers as through running streams, at its very source; the same is indicated by St. Paul, 2. ad Corinth. 3. But we, beholding the glory of the Lord with unveiled face, are transformed from clarity to clarity; that is, from the clarity of faith to the glory of eternal contemplation, or, as he says in lib. 15. De Trinit. cap. 8, we are transformed from form to form, that is, from the obscure to the lucid, from the glory of faith to the glory of the species. Hence Lessius, lib. 2. De summo Bono, cap. 9, thinks that each of the blessed clearly knows all the secrets of the Scriptures, all the figures, all the mystical senses, all the traditions and definitions of the Church. Note, however, that the blessed do not see in the Word all the mysteries of faith as regards all the circumstances of time and place: whence although the Angels from the beginning of their beatitude knew in the Word the mystery of the Incarnation as regards its substance; they nevertheless did not know it according to the circumstances of time and place, which they learned in the succession of time, as St. Paul seems to suggest, Ephesiorum 3. He sent me, he says, to enlighten all men, what is the dispensation of the mystery hidden from ages in God, who created all things: that the manifold wisdom of God may be made known to the Principalities and Powers in the heavens through the Church. Hence St. Chrysostom, on those words, says: the Angels did not know this mystery; for if the Principalities did not know it, certainly much more the Angels: whence then were they to know it? By whom revealing it? When, namely, Paul knew it, then through him also they: whence he concludes, Paul, the Evangelist of the Angels, enlightened them here. To this St. Ambrose agrees on the same words: He gave this teacher, he says, not only to the Gentiles, but also to the Angels: For, as St. Cyril of Alexandria says, when Paul preached, the Angels learned the mysteries of the Gospel; not indeed as regards their substance, but as regards the circumstances: and this not by the vision by which they see God, but through special revelations and illuminations, either from God himself, or from the superior Angels, or from preaching men, to whom those mysteries were first revealed. Whence St. Dionysius, cap. 7. Coelestis Hierarchiae brings in the heavenly minds making inquiry of the soul of Christ concerning the work undertaken for us, and Jesus himself teaching and enlightening them. And consequently, although the blessed see all the mysteries of faith, they nevertheless do not see all their circumstances. Hence they will also see the free decrees of God and his hidden counsels, yet not all of them; but as befits each of the blessed, as St. Augustine teaches, lib. 13. Confess. cap. 15. They see your face always, and there they read without syllables of times what your eternal will wills. To this is consonant St. Bernard, lib. 5. De Consid. cap. 4, teaching that in the blessed Vision the heart of God is so seen that it is proved what is the will of God, good, well-pleasing, and perfect; the bowels of mercy lie open, thoughts of peace, riches of salvation, mysteries of good will, eternal benignity.

The same minor is clear as regards the vision of the nobler species of the universe; because, says St. Thomas, lib. 3. Contra Gentes, cap. 59.

the vision of the divine substance is the ultimate end of any intellectual substance: but when any thing has arrived at its ultimate end, its natural appetite rests; it is necessary that the natural appetite of an intellectual substance seeing the divine substance rest altogether: but the natural appetite of the intellect is to know all the genera and species and powers of all things, and the whole order of the universe: which the human pursuit of each of the aforementioned things demonstrates; therefore anyone seeing the divine substance knows all the aforementioned things.

He confirms this in the same place from the fact that the Lord answered Moses, who was asking for the vision of the divine substance: I will show you all good, and from that saying of the great Gregory, 4. Dialogorum, cap. 33. What is it that they do not know, who know the One who knows all things? Which at least must be understood of all things which pertain to this universe.

To this is consonant St. Bernard, in the Sermon on the threefold kind of goods, near the end: O wisdom, he says, by which we shall then know most perfectly all things that are in Heaven and on Earth, drinking in the knowledge of all things at the very source of wisdom! That is, as much as it is to each one's interest to know, as the reason indicates which he premised in these words: But if nothing will be lacking to us, yet something has been hidden from us, will the glory be consummated? Therefore nothing will be hidden from us.

With this agrees the Seraphic Bonaventure, in the book Soliloquiorum, cap. 4.:

O soul! he says, which naturally desirest to know, longing to see this mirror of the Divinity, in it thou desirest to study and read, because to have seen it once is to have learned all things. There truly will be seen, and will be counted as folly, the Theory of Plato, the Philosophy of Aristotle, the Theorems of Empedocles, the Inquiries of Hippocrates, the Astrology of Ptolemy, etc.

Hence some holy Fathers, especially Augustine, lib. 22.¹ De Civitate Dei, cap. 29, think that the blessed see in the Word all the thoughts and affections of the other blessed.

Our thoughts too, he says, will lie open to one another, for then will be fulfilled what the Apostle says; for when he had said: Judge nothing before the time, he immediately adds, until the Lord comes, and enlightens the hidden things of darkness, and makes manifest the thoughts of the heart, and then there will be praise to every one from God.

He has the same in Epist. 6. When the Lord has come, he says, and enlightened the hidden things of darkness, and made manifest the thoughts of the heart, then nothing will be hidden from a neighbor in his neighbor, nor will there be anything that one opens to his own, hides from strangers, where no one will be a stranger.

Thirdly, finally, the same minor is clear as regards the knowledge of those things which pertain to the ministry, dignity, and state of each of the blessed. For, says William of Paris in the first part of his Summa, Tractate De Immortalitate animae, cap. 9. Whatever it will be fitting or delightful for them to see, they will see. Whence the Supreme Pontiffs will see all things which pertain to the present or future state of the Church, which they once administered. St. Francis, and the other Patriarchs of religious Orders, see all those things which pertain to the glory, sanctity, and renown of their Orders. St. Louis, King of the French, and the administrators of any other principality abroad, behold especially those things which are done for the glory of God, the increase of Religion, and the promotion of piety in their kingdoms. Simply, all fathers of families behold in the Word those things which are done in their family by their wives, children, friends, and parents.

You will say. If each of the blessed saw all those things which pertain to his own state, it would follow that someone of lesser merit would be more blessed than one who is of greater and more eminent merit and virtue: but this consequence is absurd: therefore also that from which it follows. The consequence of the major is clear: he is to be judged more blessed who sees more things in the Word, or whose vision is broader and greater: but some blessed one of lesser merit, e. g. a King and Emperor, could see more things in the Word than some solitary and hermit, who, although of more excellent merit, would have nothing pertaining and relating to himself to see: therefore the latter would be less blessed than the former.

I distinguish the consequence of the major. That he would be more blessed intensively and essentially, I deny: extensively and accidentally, I concede. For essential or intensive beatitude, which corresponds to merits, consists in the more excellent and more evident vision of God, who is the essential object of beatitude, not however of Creatures, which are only secondary objects. Whence St. Augustine, lib. 5. Confess., cap. 4.: Blessed is he who knows you, even if he does not know those things, namely, created things; but he who knows both you and them is not more blessed on account of them, but only blessed on account of you. Add that that broader extensive beatitude in the King, God can equal in the hermit by manifesting to him other Creatures, or the decrees of his will, or other things whose vision will not only equal, but will be able to surpass, the vision of the King.

You will say 2. St. Augustine, lib. De cura pro mortuis, cap. 15. et 16. teaches at length that the spirits of the dead do not know the state of the wayfarers, for in cap. 15 he says:

Hence it must be confessed that the dead indeed do not know what is done here; but while it is being done, they afterwards hear from those who go from here to them by dying, not indeed all things: but those which they are permitted to indicate, which they are also permitted to remember, and which it is fitting that those to whom these things are indicated hear. The dead can also hear something from the Angels, who are present to the things that are done here, which He judges each of them ought to hear, to whom all things are subject.

Whence in cap. 16 he concludes that the holy Martyrs help those whom it is certain are aided through them, by praying generally for the neediness of the suppliants, just as we pray for the dead, to whom we are certainly not present, nor know where they are, or what they do: therefore St. Augustine thinks that the blessed do not see in the Word the things that are done on earth, nor consequently know those things which pertain to their state.

With him agrees the Author de spiritu, et anima, in his Tomo 3, saying in cap. 29.:

There the spirits of the dead are, where they do not see, nor hear, the things that are done or happen to men in this life. Yet they have such care for the living, although they wholly do not know what they do, just as we have care for the dead, although we certainly do not know what they do. The dead indeed do not know what is done here; but while it is done here, they can afterwards hear from those who go from here to them by dying, not indeed wholly, but as much as it is permitted them to indicate, and it is fitting that they hear. They can also know from the Angels, who are present to us here, and carry our souls to them. With the Spirit of God also revealing, they can know the things that are done here, which it is necessary for them to know. Certain ones also from the dead can be snatched to the living, not through their own nature; but through divine power; whether, however, these things are done through their presence, or through Angels assuming their persons, I do not dare to affirm.

I answer. St. Thomas, first part, q. 89.² art. 8: St. Augustine said this while doubting, because in cap. 13 he premised, as anyone is wont, he will take what I say. But it openly appears from the cited words that Augustine speaks not doubtfully, but assertively; for he says that it must be confessed that the dead do not know what is done here, which are not the words of one doubting, but of one affirming.

Augustine indeed doubts in cap. 16 how the Martyrs help those whom it is certain are aided through them. Whether they themselves are present by themselves at one time in places so diverse, and separated by such great distance; or, while they themselves are in a place congruent to their merits, removed from all intercourse with mortals, and praying generally for the neediness of the suppliants, just as we pray for the dead, to whom we are certainly not present, nor know where they are, or what they do, almighty God, who is everywhere present, hearing the prayers of the Martyrs through the angelic ministries spread everywhere, provides those consolations to men — which thing he says is higher, so that it can be attained by himself, and that he does not dare to define it. And so Augustine indeed doubts how the Martyrs can help us, but he does not doubt — rather he denies — that they can detect our affairs by themselves; for he compares the knowledge of those absent ones with our knowledge, so that, just as we do not know how the dead fare, so also the Martyrs do not know how the affairs of the living fare.

And so I answer 2. Augustine does not absolutely deny that the blessed see some things in the Word; for in cap. 15, when he had said that the spirits of the dead learn some of the affairs of the living, after they have happened, from souls migrating from earth to Heaven, or from the Angels assisting us, he adds a third way by which they can also detect those things, namely, through the revelation of God. The spirits of the dead can also, he says, know, with the Spirit of God revealing, some things that are done here, which it is necessary for them to know, and which it is not necessary for them to know — not only past or present things, but even future ones. By which words he confesses that the blessed souls, with God revealing, know those things which pertain to their state; although, however, these words could be understood of revelation outside the Word, nevertheless they are more easily and more suitably taken of vision within the Word.

But that these things may be more easily perceived, it must be known that St. Augustine in this book intends chiefly two things. First indeed, that the prayers of the living profit the souls of the Dead departing in grace. The second is, that for the souls themselves it profits or harms nothing by themselves whether, and where, their bodies are buried. But when he had raised the question, if the burial of bodies profits the souls nothing, why then do they sometimes appear to the living in dreams, demanding the due burial of their bodies? He answers in cap. 11. et 12. that the souls themselves are not present to the dreamers, nor are they seen in sleep, but dreams of this kind are caused, by God commanding or permitting, by the evil or good Angels. Then in cap. 13 and the following he disputes at length that the souls of the dead are not involved in the affairs of the living, nor consequently know by their own presence what the living do, or what they suffer; which to confirm, he says it is not necessary that the blessed souls be present to the affairs of the living in order to know their neediness, so as to relieve it with their prayers. Nay, he judges this absurd, since they can take care of those affairs, either by praying generally for the living, as he says in cap. 16, or by knowing that neediness specially through the holy Angels, or souls migrating from here, or through divine revelation, as he affirms in cap. 15. And so St. Augustine does not deny that the blessed know in the Word those things which pertain to their state, but he only wills that it is not necessary that those souls be present to the living, in order to see their affairs, since they can know them either from the Angels, or from souls migrating from here, or from God revealing, that is, manifesting them in the Word. — In the same way the authority drawn from the book de Spiritu et anima can be solved.

Fourth conclusion. — Creatures are seen by the blessed formally in the divine Essence itself, insofar as it has the infinite power of representing any entity which it contains, either formally or virtually.

This seems to be more in conformity with the mind of the Doctor in 1. d. 35. q. unica, and q. 14. Quodlibetica, where he refutes the other ways assigned by the Doctors by which God could be said to know creatures as in a formally known medium.

It is proved first. To the divine Essence is to be attributed every perfection which most befits it, and which can be attributed to it without any repugnance and indecency: but that infinite power of representing is a simply simple perfection, since it imports with itself and signifies infinite entity in every genus, and infinite activity and fecundity both ad intra and ad extra; and this involves no indecency nor repugnance: therefore it is to be attributed to God.

Secondly: That is the formal notion by which the blessed spirits see Creatures, through which God, and in which he himself formally knows such Creatures: but God himself knows them in his Essence, not only as in a primary object, but also formally, insofar as it has the infinite power of representing, as will appear below and be proved in the Tractate De Scientia Dei: therefore the divine Essence, insofar as it has the infinite power of representing any entity, is the formal notion of seeing Creatures.

Thirdly, finally. If any other formal notion of this vision of Creatures could be assigned, it would especially be either their idea existing in the divine mind, or the divine Essence itself under another notion than the notion and power of representing infinitely; but neither can be said. Not indeed the idea, because either the idea would be the formal notion of seeing Creatures according to its absolute being, which it has in itself; or according to its relative being and the transcendental relation which it has to the Creatures that are ideated, that is, whose Idea it is: but according to neither of these two notions can the idea be the formal notion of seeing Creatures. Not indeed according to its absolute being; for the idea entitatively either is the Creature in objective being, that is, insofar as it has being-known in God, or it is the formal cognition of the Creature in God, or finally it is the divine Essence itself insofar as it is imitable and participable by a Creature according to the various opinions concerning the notion of the divine Idea, which we will weigh at greater length in the Tractate De Scientia Dei: but according to these acceptations the idea cannot be the formal notion of seeing Creatures. Not insofar as it is the creature itself in known and objective being, because thus the Creature itself is already supposed to be known; and so as such it cannot be the formal notion by which it is known. Add that nothing can thus be a medium with respect to the cognition of itself: therefore besides the Creature in objective being, another notion must be assigned, which is the medium of that cognition. — Not even insofar as the idea is the formal concept, or the cognition of the Creature in God: for the divine cognition, just as the divine science, cannot be the formal notions of knowing Creatures by the blessed; because, as the Doctor says in the cited Quodlibet question, since vision and science formally represent the object, it can represent it only to the intellect in which it inheres, not however to another intellect, even if it sees that vision: for just as formal causality is not exercised except with respect to the prior subject, e. g. whiteness does not whiten except the subject in which it inheres; so formal representation cannot formally represent the object, except to that intellect which elicits such vision or formal representation; and so divine cognition cannot have the notion of formally representing, except with respect to the divine intellect alone, which forms that cognition.

Further: if the idea is the divine Essence itself insofar as it is an exemplar imitable by a Creature, it follows that Creatures are not known in God according to their own being; because thus they would be known formally through the very entity of the divine Essence. Moreover: the contingent truths concerning the actual being of Creatures could not be known in God; for this contingent being does not have a necessary connection with the divine Essence itself, as the divine Essence is. Finally: since Creatures only imitate the divine Essence according to certain common and transcendental grades, for instance of being, substance, living, intellectual, and the like; but do not imitate it according to their own proper differences and peculiar modes by which they are ultimately constituted, and differ both from God and from one another, and in which they involve limitation and imperfection: it follows that according to these differential grades they do not participate in the divine Essence, nor imitate it; but recede from it and become unlike it: therefore according to this notion they cannot be formally seen in the divine Essence having the notion of idea: and so they cannot be seen formally in the notion of idea according to the absolute being of the idea itself.

— But neither can Creatures be seen formally in the notion of idea according to its relative being: both because, for something to lead into the cognition of another as a known medium, it is not necessary that it formally have a relation to the other, but it suffices that according to its absolute being it have a connection with the other, either in the notion of cause and effect, or in any other notion: for thus God is known a posteriori through Creatures, not only by reason of the real transcendental respect which the Creatures themselves have to God; but also by reason of their absolute entity, which depends on God no less than their relative being, and so leads into the cognition of God himself no less than that: and because, although the relatives themselves, insofar as they are relative, cannot be known without one another, nevertheless the one is not the notion of knowing the other; for the foundation and the terms are themselves the notions and means of knowing each relative; and consequently the idea according to its relative being cannot be the formal notion of knowing Creatures, as the Doctor proves at greater length in 1. dist. 32. quaest. unica.

— Nor even can the divine Essence itself be the notion of formally knowing Creatures under another respect than under the infinite power of representing; for if it were such a notion under some other respect, it would especially be insofar as it contains Creatures eminently and virtually; but under this respect it is not the formal and immediate notion of seeing Creatures; but only remote and fundamental, so that the reason why it belongs to God to be able to represent all things is none other than that he himself is the cause of all things, and infinite entity, eminently involving and containing any entity whatsoever. Whence it must be asserted that the virtual and eminential containment of created things in God is the foundation of why the divine Essence is representative of them: so that this power of representing is not precisely the virtual or eminential containment itself, but is the infinite entity itself, insofar as, namely, just as the divine Essence contains created things virtually and eminently as regards being, so also as regards being represented: and thus all the authorities can be solved, both of the Doctor and of the other Ancients, when they affirm that the divine Essence according to eminential and virtual containment is the notion of representing Creatures: They can be solved, I say, by saying that they are to be understood of the fundamental and remote notion of seeing, not however of the proximate and immediate.

You will say. Saint Augustine, lib. 83. Quaestionum, quaest. 46, says that the rational soul is suited to the ideal vision, and becomes most blessed by the vision of the ideas: therefore Saint Augustine thinks that the idea is the notion of seeing Creatures in the Word.

I deny the consequence. Both because, as the Doctor observes in 1. dist. 35. quaest. unica n. 13, St. Augustine is not to be understood as if the soul were most blessed in the vision of the ideas insofar as the ideas are, but insofar as they are contained in the primary object, namely, in the divine Essence, which is the formal notion of the most perfect beatitude: for beatitude cannot be most perfect in the vision of the ideas alone, as Augustine himself confesses in 5. Confessionum, saying, Blessed is he who knows you and those things, nor more blessed on account of them. And because Saint Augustine, where he says that Creatures are seen in the art and wisdom of God, also affirms that they are seen in the Word of God: and so he thinks that, just as Creatures are not seen in the Word by property, as if the Word of God under the formal notion of Word were a special notion of representing Creatures, but only by appropriation, because the Word proceeds through the divine intellect and cognition; so also Creatures are seen in the art and wisdom of God, not by property, as if the Art and Wisdom of God under the formal notion of art and wisdom were a peculiar notion of objectively representing a Creature: but by appropriation, because namely, since the divine science and art is the act of the divine intellect, the cognitions of the works of God ad extra are appropriated to it, just as to the divine love, that is, to the holy Spirit are appropriated all those things which pertain to the divine love.