II. To the Principal Arguments

18. To the first principal argument [n.1] I say that there is not there [sc. in divine reality] a quantity of bulk but of virtue; and if the name of quantity is made proper to magnitude of bulk (but if magnitude is not made proper to magnitude of bulk), then one could concede that there is magnitude there without quantity; and this magnitude is truly the foundation of transcendent equality, because every being is in this way great or small, and equal or unequal, although the magnitude is not a foundation of equality as equality is a property of quantity, which is a category.

19. But against this an argument is made that it does not seem anything can be said of God unless what belongs to the understanding of that thing is said of him; therefore, since quantity belongs to the understanding of magnitude, then magnitude cannot be conceded of God and quantity denied of him.

20. Again, when asking how great God is, one may well reply that he is immense; but if there is no quantity in God, no such question would arise.

21. Again, a property common to every being does not belong to any being by a specific difference; equality is a property common to every kind of quantity; therefore it does not belong to anything by any specific difference in the category of quantity, - and thus one cannot posit in God any difference in the category of quantity by saying that the category of quantity is not there but that there is there, by a difference in quantity, the idea of equality.

22. To the first [n.19] I reply that magnitude is equivocal according as it is a species of quantity distinct from multitude (Metaphysics 5.13.1020a7-10) and according as it is opposed to smallness and as its concrete from - that is, ‘great’ - is opposed to small (this distinction is sufficiently got from the Philosopher Metaphysics 10.6.1056b3-14 in the likeness ‘about long and short, great and small, many and one’). In the first sense magnitude is not applied to God, nor its difference as something belonging to him, as is plain from I d.8 nn.124, 136, because then the genus included in it would be applied to him; nor is magnitude in the second sense applied to him, in the way ‘great’ is taken properly and states a property of quantity, because a property proper to a thing does not exist without its proper subject. But magnitude taken in another sense is a property of being, and it is distinct from small, and in this way one or other extreme exists in every being; this is plain from the Philosopher in Metaphysics 5.13 1020a23-26, in the chapter on quantity: “But great and small, greater and smaller, are said absolutely and in relation to another; absolutely indeed they are properties of quantity; these names are also applied to other things” (as if he were to say: ‘properly taken’ they state properties of quantity, ‘commonly taken’ they state common properties of being).

23. As to the other [n.20] - how great God is - a rational question should be denied if quantity is denied of God; but if a rational question is conceded then a quantity of virtue should be conceded in God, not a quantity of bulk.

24. The third argument [n.21] only concludes that equality as it is a property in the category of quantity does not belong to God by any difference in the category of quantity, and that it is not applied to divine reality; and I concede that no difference in the category of quantity belongs to God; nor does any property in that genus belong to him, but a transcendent property does so belong.

25. To the next [sc. principal argument, n.2] I say that perfection simply, that is, a perfection that could formally be infinite, only asserts that in divine reality which can be essential to it and self-referred (and such is what is in some way pre-understood in the relations of origin), of which sort are wisdom and goodness     etc . But equality is not preunderstood in the relations of origin, nor can it be self-referred; for the Father is not equal to himself but to the Son, and therefore      equality in this way does not state a perfection simply; yet it does state a perfection which, in the case of every nature - when comparing it to something of the same nature -, is better than its opposite, because its opposite of necessity states imperfection; for no inequality in the same nature exists unless a second individual has the nature imperfectly. From the fact, then, that a relation can exist between supposits in that nature, an inequality of imperfection might exist in them because it might posit a diminished perfection in one of them; but equality of imperfection does not exist there, nay rather equality first requires perfection simply, because it first requires a nature that is perfect and that exists perfectly in each of the terms of the relation. And this is what Augustine says in his book On the Quantity of the Soul ch.9 n.15 when he speaks to the disciple: “Equality,” he says, “you rightly put before inequality, nor do I reckon there is anyone endowed with human sense to whom this would not be apparent.” This is indeed true, when making comparisons with things in the same nature; and things with which equality is compossible are simply more able to be perfect than things with which equality is not compossible, because in the latter case one or other of them is imperfect.

26. Next, as to the proof about perfection in creatures [n.2], - I reply that some things are necessary for perfection in creatures that do not state a perfection simply; and this is because creatures - being of themselves imperfect - cannot without these things have perfect perfection (as much perfection as they can have and of the sort they can have), and therefore these things in some way make up for the imperfection of creatures, as was said above in I d.7 n.64 where it was denied that the specific difference of anything was a perfection simply. Thus I say that limited perfection cannot be as great in one limited nature as it can be in several natures that are ordered; and so there an order of nature, that is an order of unequal perfection, is necessary for the greatest perfection they are capable of, - but it is not simply necessary for the greatest perfection, because that can exist in the most perfect unlimited nature, without an order of imperfection.

27. And if you argue that order belongs to perfection and that order seems to require inequality, - I make reply: I say that an order of origin stands along with perfection but that an order of inequality does not stand along with perfection. Therefore not every order belongs to perfection, but some order stands along with perfection in the same nature and some order does not.

28. To the third [principal argument, n.3] I say that sometimes equivalent opposite relations are founded on a common relation, just as if one were to speak of ‘the assimilating and the assimilated’. These state a relation of the active to the passive, founded on this common relation of ‘likeness’; for the assimilating is what causes likeness as the whiten-ing is what causes whiteness, and the assimilated is what is caused as to likeness just as the whitened is what is caused as to whiteness. There is here, then, a relation of active to passive in the assimilating and the assimilated, just as in the whitening and the whitened; but, in the case of the whiten-ing, that on which the relation of the active is founded is something absolute, but here - namely in the case of the assimilating - that on which the relation of the active is founded is the relation of equivalence. And such a name imports two relations of the following sort: one common and one of nonequivalence. As to the common relation, it exists in mutuality with the correlative of the relation; but it does not exist in mutuality with the correlative according to a relation of non-equivalence. - So also here, to be made co-equal imports the relation of the coequaled with the co-equaling, and so the equality is mutual; for the Son, who is made coequal with the Father, is equal with the Father and conversely. But the other relation, by way of what is passive, namely ‘to receive equality from another’, is not mutual but belongs precisely to the Son, and the opposite relation of non-equivalence - namely to make co-equal - belongs to the Father, that is ‘to give equality to the Son’. The image then [i.e. the Son] is equal, and conversely, but only the image is made co-equal in the sense of the two aforesaid relations.