A. Determination of the Question

11. I reply by setting aside logical power or possibility (which refers to a mode of combining terms done by the intellect), and power said metaphorically (of the sort found in geometry, in the way geometers themselves imagine a point having power for a line and a line for a surface) [cf. Metaphyscis 5.17.1019b30-32, Ord. I d.7 n.27]:

12. Power (as said in I d.7 nn.28-29) is properly taken in one way as it is a differentia of being, the differentia opposed to act, in another way as it signifies the same thing as principle does (as the Philosopher speaks of it in Metaphysics 5.17.1019a19-20). And power taken in this second way is divided into active and passive, and in each way -however it is taken - it can be understood either for the relation itself that it signifies in the power, or for the proximate foundation of that relation.

13. As for the issue at hand. It is plain that one should posit active power in God, since he is an efficient principle (from I d.2 nn.43-58), and it is about this power that the Master is speaking in the present distinction.

14. Equality in power of this sort can also be understood in two ways: either as to the extent of possible objects to which the power is extended, or as to the intensity of the very power in itself. An example: a power to heat is said to be equal in extent if it is extended to an equal number of heatable things (and in this way all charity is equal and is extended to everything that can from charity be loved); it is said to be equal in intensity if the power is equally perfect and is capable of an act that is equally perfect, although not as many things be subject to it as to another power, as is plain from positing the case that was posited in I d.7 n.41, that heat possessed of a heating adequate to it would produce another heat.

15. And these two equalities frequently accompany each other; each can however be understood without the other. Now, when speaking of equality of extent, no difficulty arises save about the notional acts [sc. the acts that concern the production of the divine persons], and about the terms of those acts, because the two terms are not producible by all the persons, but the Son is producible only by the Father while the Holy Spirit is producible only by the Father and the Son.