A. Whether the Blessed Know our Prayers by Natural Cognition

169. The first was touched on in the solution of the second question of this distinction [nn.62-67], about how the separate soul can acquire knowledge not only abstractive but also intuitive, not only of sensibles (as the conjoined soul can [n.50]) but also of any intelligibles that are proportioned and proportionately present. What is proportioned to the separate soul is any created intelligible; therefore prayer, whether vocal (which the conjoined soul too could know through the bodily senses) or also mental (which will then be proportioned to the separate soul), it will be able to know intuitively for that ‘then’, provided however that extreme distance not get in the way, which was touched on in the second question [n.67].

170. Nor is it valid to say that the intellect’s own proper act is hidden from every creature, and its act of will hidden for equal reason, because these acts are intimate to the creature and consequently nothing can know them save what is intimate to the creature; such is God alone, who is immanent [in creatures]. This argument is not sound, because it is manifest that my intellect can know every act of my will; but another intellect, created more perfect, has power for the object that my intellect has power for, if a determinate order to other intelligibles, or defect of proportioned presence, does not get in the way.

171. Now the separate intellect is as equally perfect as the conjoined intellect, or more perfect, and it is not by any order determined to not knowing the operations of another intellect or will; nor is the requisite presence necessarily lacking, because this can exist without immanence; otherwise an angel could have no presence made demonstrable in respect of another than himself, since an angel is immanent to none, for this is repugnant to a creature.

172. As to your saying ‘such operation is intimate’ [n.170] - I reply: essence is more intimate to the intellect than operation, and yet another separate intellect can understand this essence. Nor is it valid to say ‘this is intimate by inherence or, what is more, by being, therefore nothing knows it save what is intimate by immanence’. Indeed, the reasoning seems to proceed as if what is extrinsic to a thing more than what is intrinsic and spiritual could be known by a separate intellect, which is not true; indeed the intelligible essence of a thing or its intrinsic operation is an object more proportioned to the separate intellect than any sense object, because to a pure intellect a pure intelligible is a more proportioned intelligible, provided however it is finite.

173. If you object that the conjoined and separate intellect have the same first object, but operation is not contained under the first object of the conjoined intellect, therefore not under the object of the separate intellect either - I reply: it was said elsewhere that the first object of the intellect as it is such a power is more general than the object that moves it in this present state; andPunctuating the Latin as in the translation and not as in the printed text, whose sense is obscure. ²³ any created being is contained under the first object taken in the first way but not under the object taken in the second way. And the reason is that now it is determinately moved by sensibles, or by what is abstracted from them, because of its immediate order to the imaginative power, which will not exist then. Taking first object in the first way, then, the major [sc. ‘conjoined and separate intellect have the same first object’] is true and the minor [sc. ‘operation is not contained under the first object of the conjoined intellect’] is false; taking it in the second way, the minor is true and the major false.