1. Exposition of the Opinion

463. There is another opinion [Thomas Aquinas, Sentences IV d.12 q.1 a.2, ST IIIa q.77 a.5] that posits return of the matter.

463. The exposition, however, is that the opinion cannot be understood of the matter that was previously annihilated, “because what has been reduced to nothing cannot return numerically the same.” Nor can it be understood either of matter previously converted into the body of Christ, because this matter cannot return again unless the body of Christ or the matter of the body of Christ were, contrariwise, converted into the matter of bread, just as neither could the converted bread return unless the body of Christ were converted into bread.

465. But if this opinion is to be sustained with any probability, the understanding of it needs to be that God creates new matter. And one must not posit a new miracle, because this comes from the original miracle (lest faith lose its merit), and consequently so that every change that could be brought about if the accidents were in a substance could be brought about by a natural agent. Nor would the substance of bodily matter then simply be diminished, nor the matter created in the beginning increased, by the return of this substance, because as much of matter is created, or as much returns here, as was converted from matter into the substance of the body of Christ.