1 Sentences, Distinction 37, Question 1 ( Thomas’ Commentary )
Whether God is in things.
Solution: I answer that it should be said that God is essentially in all things, not nonetheless so that he is mixed together with things as if he were a part of any thing. To make this evident, it is necessary to note three points. First, it is necessary that a mover and a thing moved and an operating agent and a thing made exist simultaneously, as is proven in Book 7 of the Physics. But this occurs in a different way in corporeal things and spiritual things. For, because a body by its essence, which is circumscribed by the boundaries of quantity, is determined to some position, it cannot be that a moving body and a moved body are in the same position. Hence, it is necessary that they exist simultaneously by contact, and in this way, a body causes change by its own power, because by all means it can, up to some point, change another thing which is unchanged that is immediately united to it. However, a spiritual substance—the essence of which is wholly independent of quantity or position and, consequently, a place—is not separated from that which it moves by place or position. But where the thing that is moved is, there is the mover itself. The soul, for instance, is in the body, and the power that moves the heavens is said to be on the right side of the sphere that it moves—motion begins from this point, as is established in Book 8 of the Physics.
The second point is that the being of any thing and of any part of it comes immediately from God, because, according to faith, we maintain that only God creates. To create, however, is to give being. The third point is that that which is the cause of being cannot desist from the operation by which being is given without the thing itself also ceasing to be. For, as Avicenna says in Book 1, Chapter 11 of the Physics, the difference between the divine agent and a natural agent is that a natural agent is only a cause of motion, and the divine agent is the cause of being. Hence, according to him, when any efficient cause is withdrawn, its effect is removed, and therefore, when a builder is withdrawn, a house’s being is not destroyed—the being whose cause is the weight of the stones that remains—but the house’s becoming is destroyed—the becoming whose cause was the builder. And similarly, when the cause of being is withdrawn, being is destroyed. For this reason, Gregory says in Book 16, Chapter 37 of Morals that all things would fall into nothingness if the hand of the omnipotent one were not preserving them. Hence, it is necessary that his operation by which he gives being be not intermittent but continuous, and for this reason, it is said in John 5:17, My father is at work until now, and I am at work. From all these points, it is plainly inferred that God is most intimate to every thing just as the being that is proper to a thing is most intimate to the thing itself, which can neither begin nor last except by God’s operation through which he is united to his work so that he is in it.
To the first, therefore, it should be said that, although the divine essence is not intrinsic to a thing as if it is a part entering into its constitution, it is nonetheless within a thing as if it is something that operates on and causes the being of each thing. In this way, it must be in every thing as an incorporeal agent, as is clear from what was said before.
To the second, it should be said that that which acts through its own absence is not the proximate cause of an effect, but the remote. For instance, the sun’s power exists at first and principally in the body united to it, and it exists in another way successively at every point until the farthest thing. This power is its light by which it acts on these lower things, as Avicenna says in Book 1, Chapter 2 of the Physics. Similarly, it is clear that a king giving an order is the primary cause of an effect, but the one executing the order is the cause that is proximate and united to the effect. God, however, operates immediately in all things. Hence, it is necessary that he be in all things.
To the third, it should be said that, as is clear from what was said before, a thing’s being cannot be conserved without a cause of being, just as motion cannot be conserved without a cause that moves. Hence, if a thing’s being is conserved without some agent, that agent will not be a cause of being, but only a cause of becoming, as a seal is the cause of a shape in wax. For this reason, when the seal is withdrawn, the shape remains, as was also said about a builder. This is an imperfect agent. Hence, the argument proceeds from false premises.
To the fourth, it should be said that, with respect to the same operation, there cannot be a twofold proximate cause in the same way, but there can be in a different way. This is clear from the following considerations. An operation is reduced as to its principle into two things: the agent itself and the agent’s power by which an operation goes forth, in a mediated way, from an agent. However, the more an agent is proximate and immediate, the more is its power mediated, and the power of the first agent is the most immediate. This is clear in the outer-most members of a series. A, B, and C are three ordered causes so that C is the last, which exercises an operation. It is then an established fact that C exercises an operation by its own power, and it is by the power of B and, more than that, by the power of A that C can do this by its own power. Hence, if it is asked why C operates, the answer is by its own power. And if it asked why by its own power, it is on account of the power of B. And it will be asked in this way until it is lead back to the power of the first cause…
If any one cares, this should prove that God’s creatures do not exist in His Mind
Linus2nd
Love this response!