II. To the Initial Arguments

402. To the first argument [n.308] one can say that Augustine understands by it that what is ‘most blessed’, that is the greatest perfection of beatitude, “is what is most certain always to be thus,” - greatest, I say, in extension. And what follows is not taken for the act of certitude but for the object, as though Augustine were to say ‘perpetual continuation itself, about which certitude is had, is something greatest in beatitude, because it is quantity of extension superadded to quantity of intension; and it is called ‘greatest’ because it includes something and superadds something further. Thus this extension includes perfection of intension.

403. As to the next [n.309], the answer is plain from the first article of the solution [nn.325-326], because no finite form can exclude all privation from the susceptive subject. Yet beatitude, to the extent it is most perfect, does most of all exclude from its subject privation of perfection; and this suffices for it to be the intrinsic end (which is necessarily finite), but does not suffice for incorruptibility.

404. To the next [n.310], about the Philosopher, I say that his genius was never able to attain to the true felicity of human nature, whether by denying it or affirming it; not by denying it because what is false cannot be demonstrated; not by affirming it because things of sense do not sufficiently lead to it. Hence he seems, as if in doubt, now to think that what misery could succeed to would not be true happiness, and now that there cannot be another happiness for man; for he did not know about a life other than this one, and in this life happiness is not impossible of being lost. Therefore, one should not rely on his authority in this matter.

405. As to the next [n.311], I concede that to the three theological virtues in the wayfarer succeed three perfections in the blessed, whether virtues or acts I care not. But it is not necessary that this succeeding be of the essence of beatitude in the way we take beatitude for the supreme perfection of a beatifiable nature, joining it supremely to its most perfect object.