II. To the Principal Arguments

16. To the first principal argument [n.2] I say that the heaven is not said to be assumed, because an angel does not assume the heaven for any special assumption or form, and especially that whereby he intends to appear visibly to us; likewise, an angel that moves the heaven moves it perpetually and so does not assume a body temporarily. The ‘assuming’ in question here is appropriated for a body that is moved for a time, and moved for the sake of some effect that will visibly appear to men.

17. To the second [n.3] I say the answer is clear from what has been said [n.9], that an angel assumes a body imperfectly mixed - which indeed the angel himself does not bring into existence by his own power, but he only unites mixable things with each other and in respect of the heaven, in such proportion as such form can be induced through the virtue of the heaven and the mixable things.

18. To the third [n.4], it is plain [nn.10-12] that no act of the vegetative or cognitive power belongs properly to an angel in a body, or even to the body, but only acts of the motive power do; not, to be sure, acts of the organic motive power, of which sort is the motive power of an animate body (because its acts belong to the composite, as do also acts of the cognitive and vegetative powers), but acts of a higher motive power whereby an angel can move from place to place a body that does not disproportionately exceed the angel’s motive power.