VI. To the Arguments for the First Opinion

63. To the arguments for the first opinion [nn.12-25].

To the first [n.12] I say that both ways [nn.11, 33] save the saying of Augustine. For as the first way says that ‘the creature always essentially depends equally on God’, so that the conservation of a thing is as it were one continuous causation (or there are infinite causations), and thereby it always actually causes the thing in the way it caused it in the first instant (although the causation, as it is in the first instant, be called creation and in the other moments conservation) - so the second position [n.33], not seeing a reason for continuation in this causation (because not seeing any continued form), nor seeing so much reason for a distinction (because not seeing that distinction either in the causer or in the caused, as far as concerns the formal term) [n.16], says that one action ‘persisting always in respect of the creature’ is creation insofar as it is understood to coexist with the first ‘now’ of time, which ‘now’ of time was immediately preceded by the non-being of the caused thing; and that the same action persisting is called

‘conservation’ insofar as it coexists with the other parts of time, parts not immediately following not-being but following the pre-had being along with the parts of time - and so the action is a sort of continuation of what was pre-had, without comparing it to not-being (where there is no before and after), but comparing it to the parts of time with which it coexists.Henry of Ghent Quodlibet 5 q.11, “But different are the things on which caused things depend not only as to their coming to be but also as to their being, as the creature universally depends on God and light in the air on a luminous body. In the case of such things the caused altogether does not persist in the absence of the truth of its cause; not because the agent by a different action in reality gives being and conserves it once given (as the opinion already stated maintains [sc. the opinion of Bonaventure]), but because the action does not have any co-agent for the coming to be of its being..., such that, as the acting virtue itself...remains the same in number, so its action about the caused thing is the same, remaining one and the same in number; and likewise, the caused thing itself.is first said ‘to be a caused thing coming to be’ and next there is conservation of it. Yet the agent has not done by the first causing of coming to be anything other than it is doing now by the causing of being conserved (nor conversely), such that, as on the part of the agent ‘to make’ and ‘to conserve’ are the same in reality, so on the part of the caused ‘to come to be’ and ‘to be conserved’ are the same in reality and different only in reason. Rather (as it seems) ‘coming to be’ and ‘making’ should not be spoken of save as regards the first instant, wherein the caused leaps into being at the presence of its cause - but afterwards, as regards the whole succession of time, ‘conservation’ of the persisting thing should be spoken of, without any making.” “And as to what Augustine said...about ‘always coming to be’, he did not understand the ‘coming to be’ of the thing itself considered in itself and absolutely, but according to a certain respect to time, where there is before and after.” ²⁰

64. But, apart from the intention of Blessed Augustine, the reason there adduced [n.16] seems to have the difficulty that, namely, the thing has being by one causation with one ‘now’ and by another causation with another ‘now’, because ‘being is not had in its completion by any causation, the opposite of which seems to stand when such causation is posited’ [n.16].

I reply. This proposition [sc. ‘being is not had.. .such causation is posited’] is to be distinguished as to composition and division; and in the sense of composition it is true, because ‘it is not had in its completion by any causation the opposite of which stands when such causation stands, such that these are simultaneous’; but in the sense of division it is false, because even the conservation itself is able not to be, although the causation, by which the thing has its being to the ultimate, has been posited - and so, although the causation of an angel has been posited, yet the non-existence of the angel can stand with this causation (when it has been posited) in the sense of division, but not in the sense of composition.

65. And hereby is plain the response to the like argument, that ‘an angel’s being created and being annihilated cannot stand together, therefore being created and being conserved are not the same thing - because when an angel is being conserved it can be annihilated, but not when it is being created.’

I reply. Just as an angel’s being created and being annihilated do not stand together in the sense of composition, so neither does an angel’s being conserved and being annihilated stand together in the sense of composition; but in the sense of division it does stand that, as concerns an angel, creation or conservation at some point are and yet that they can at some point not be (and thus annihilation can be) - just as was said in the matter of God’s predestination and foreknowledge, that in the sense of division there is potency for one opposite when the other opposite persists, yet not that there is potency for the opposite when the other opposite persists at the same time [1 d.40 nn.4-7, or Lectura 1 d.40 nn.4-8 and d.39 nn.53-54 - there being no d.39 in the Ordinatio].

66. To the second argument [n.18] I say that, on the part of an angel, there is no difference between its being, its having been, and its going to be, yet these indicate a different relation of the angel to time - because, just as was said in 1 d.9 n.17 and d.40 n.9, about being generated and having been generated, that these co-signify the ‘now’ of eternity insofar as it coexists with the diverse parts of time, so too they would state of the ‘now’ of aeviternity that the same ‘now’ can be and coexist with all the parts of time.Henry of Ghent Quodlibet 5 q.13, “Hence the fact that the [angelic] creature has, in the said way, its whole being at once does not in any respect derogate from the simplicity of the being of God. Hence it is false to say that the being of the creature yesterday and tomorrow is not the same and simultaneous; for it is simultaneous as far as concerns itself and on the part of aeviternity. But if it is understood not to be simultaneous, this is according to the mode of our understanding, extending aeviternity to the parts of time; for the intellect seems to exist with the continuous and with time in such a way that it cannot understand things, which are in themselves fixed according to the whole of time, without understanding their being to be extended according to the differences of time - and in this regard our intellect is altogether defective... In that which has being at once and from itself, there is no difference at all between ‘to be’ and ‘to have been’ and ‘to be going to be’ - but these differ in anything that has being at once but from another, so that, when it has been according to the extension of past time, it is thereafter impossible for it not to have been according to that past; simply however it is impossible for it not to be going to be, on the supposition that there was no extension made.” ²¹

67. And when in the argument it is said that ‘God cannot make an angel not to have been’ [n.18], this is denied as it is said of the thing signified by the ‘have been’ -because the thing signified by the ‘have been’ is the same being as what the angel has.

68. And if it be said that ‘the past cannot not have been’, the minor that would be co-assumed [sc. ‘an angel has been’] is denied, because it is not past in itself.

An example of this would be if the Son of God, along with his being generated in eternity, were to receive, per impossibile, another nature in accord with which he would depend on the Father - then the ‘being generated’ and the ‘having been generated’ would state the same in him, and this being of the Son could absolutely not be; and insofar as this being would as it were follow its not-being, it would be called ‘being generated’, and insofar as it would as it were mediately follow its not-being, as coexisting with the other parts of time, it would be called ‘having been generated’. And so conservation and production (or creation) differ only by the action of the intellect; and the ‘having been conserved’ is able not to be when this being is being conserved, and when it is being produced, in the sense of division.

69. And if it be thus argued that ‘the past is able not to have coexisted with it, therefore it is able not to have been’ - this seems to be the fallacy of figure of speech, by changing ‘when’ into ‘what’.Tr. The sense seems to be that since an angel, or anything aeviternal, is (according to this opinion) only said ‘to have been’ relative to the parts of time, if there was no time, or no past time, then the angel would not have the ‘when’ of past time. Yet he would still have the ‘what’ of his existence. So the angel would still exist in the way he was said to have been, though there would no longer be a ‘when’ relative to which his ‘have been’ could be said. So there is a fallacy of figure of speech in inferring absence of the ‘what’ from the absence of the ‘when’. ²²

70. As to the confirmation of this second reason, about contradictory things willed in eternity [n.19] - one can say that although God willed me to sit at moment a and not to sit at moment b, yet the objects willed by him are naturally prior to the things that measure the ‘now’, and one must look in the prior stage for the non-contradiction of the things willed; otherwise a contradiction of this sort does not seem it could be taken away by the adding on of those posterior ‘nows’. Although therefore God might will an angel to be for this ‘now’ and not to be for that ‘now’, one must look first for the possibility of how he might will an angel to be and not to be.

71. I say then that if the ‘now’ is posited in any even aeviternal thing as proper to it, God wills it to be in that ‘now’ positively - and he wills it not to be negatively by willing that ‘now’ not to be; and then if there is another aeviternal thing in whose ‘now’ both of the former come to be, this is accidental to those ‘nows’, for the ‘now’ of that aeviternal thing is not the proper measure of them - just as neither is eternity a measure, in which there can be contradictories that succeed to each other in the case of every measure.

72. Or if there is not posited in any aeviternal thing some ‘now’ different from the actual existence of the thing (as will be said in the following question [nn.122-123]), then God wills it to be along with eternity and wills it not to be along with eternity. He does not however will it to be along with the whole of eternity ‘according to all the being present of eternity’, nor not to be along with the whole of eternity in this way, because then there would be a contradiction; but there is no contradiction when comparing these to eternity ‘not in accord with the whole idea of eternity’s infinite present’.

73. To the third [n.20] I say that in order to be obliged to infer, from the coexistence of some virtual quantity with some quantity properly - namely some quantity of bulk -, to the infinity of the virtual quantity [n.21], the virtual quantity must necessarily coexist with all the parts of the other quantity. The proof is that ‘the other quantity’ [sc. the quantity of bulk] would not be infinite unless it had all the parts possible to it (just as time, if it were simultaneous, would not be actually infinite unless it had all the parts possible to it); therefore nothing is deduced to be infinite virtually from the coexistence of it with the whole of time unless it necessarily coexist with all the parts of time. But aeviternity is not such. I say then that although aeviternity has wherewith it can coexist with the infinite parts of time, there is no need - for this reason - that it be in itself infinite, because it does not have formally wherewith it necessarily thus coexists.

74. And as to the likeness about immensity [n.22], I say that there is no likeness -because, in the case of immensity, that which could be present to every place would exist in every place at once, and not through any conservation by an extrinsic cause. In the issue at hand, however, an aeviternal thing does not have wherewith it may coexist with all the parts of time save through conservation by an extrinsic cause; and it would have nothing through which it might coexist unless it were caused to be quasi-continuously the same by the extrinsic cause, although not by a different causation; so there would be more a likeness of this [sc. aeviternity] with that [sc. immensity] if the coexistence of the latter with different places - if this were possible - were caused by the same causation. However, in order to coexist simultaneously, it would never have infinite presence to place, and so it would never be immense. So it is in the issue at hand.

75. On the contrary: a finite thing cannot coexist together with a total infinite thing, such that it have in itself wherewith it could coexist with it; therefore because it does coexist it is infinite. - I reply: the antecedent is denied of an infinite which is infinite by succession, and denied of a finite formally having what it has always by the same action, such that it does not have it without such action.

76. As to the fourth [nn.24-25], that one aeviternal thing succeeds to another is conceded, and that the existence of an aeviternal thing succeeds to its opposite (that is, one is after another) is conceded, but from this there is not deduced any succession in any single existence of some aeviternal thing.

77. And from this is plain the answer to all the arguments:

As to those two angels [n.25], about these a ‘before’ and ‘after’ are conceded (because one remains after the other); if however a third were to coexist with the two of them, there would be no ‘before’ and ‘after’ in the existence of that third - just as, though today and tomorrow coexist with eternity, not for this reason is there a ‘before’ and ‘after’ in eternity.

78. Likewise [n.24], it is conceded that the nature of an angel would be prior to his guilt, such that this existence (namely under innocence) would be with the opposite of that existence, and from the second existence would follow the opposite of the first; however the existence of the angel in its own nature would not have any succession, neither as it is existent under innocence nor as it is existent under guilt - but there would only be a succession in accidents (that is, that the existence of one act would be after the existence of the other), without however a diversity in the other in itself.

79. The authorities adduced for this opinion [nn.26-32] I concede, because no creature is independent of the first cause, but is always dependent on the cause - not however with a continuous dependence, nor with difference dependences, but with the same dependence; and, because of this same dependence, any creature can have being with one part of time and not with another part, and to this extent it can as it were fall under time, that is, so as to coexist with one part and not coexist with another, and in this way it may be said ‘to have been’ and ‘not to be going to be’, and thus not something eternal.