Proslogion: Chapter 12/Chapter 13
BASIC WRITINGS
both the good and the wicked as they deserve is more just than one who does so only for the good. Therefore, O just and benevolent God, it is just in relation to you both when you punish and when you pardon. Thus indeed "all the ways of the Lord are mercy and truth,"25 and yet "the Lord is just in all his ways."26 And there is no inconsistency here, for it is not just for those to be saved whom you will to punish, and it is not just for those to be condemned whom you will to spare. For only what you will is just, and only what you do not will is not just. Thus your mercy is born of your justice, since it is just for you to be so good that you are good even in sparing the wicked. And perhaps this is why the one who is supremely just can will good things for the wicked.
But even if one can somehow grasp why you can will to save the wicked, certainly no reasoning can comprehend why,from those who are alike in wickedness, you save some rather than others through your supreme goodness and condemn some rather than others through your supreme justice.
Thus you are indeed percipient, omnipotent, merciful, and impassible,* just as you are living, wise, good, happy, eternal, and whatever it is better to be than not to be.
Chapter 12 That God is the very life by which he lives, and so on for similar attributes
But clearly, you are whatever you are, not through anything else, but through yourself. Therefore, you are the very life by which you live, the wisdom by which you are wise,and the very goodness by which you are good to the good and to the wicked, and so on for similar attributes.
Chapter 13 How he alone is unbounded and eternal, although other spirits are unbounded and eternal Everything that is at all enclosed in a place or a time is less than that which is not restrained by any law of place or time. Therefore, since nothing is greater than you, you are not confined to any place or time; you exist everywhere and always. Since this can be said of you alone, you alone are unbounded and eternal. So how can other spirits also be said to be unbounded and eternal?
And indeed you alone are eternal,because you alone of all beings do not cease to exist, just as you do not begin to exist. But how are you alone unbounded?
25 Psalm 25:10 (24:10).
26 Psalm 145:17 (144:17).