Chapter 13
345 | Text and Translation Chapter 13 How he alone is unlimited and eternal, although other spirits are unlimited and eternal But all that is in any way confined by place or time is less than that which no law of place or time constrains. Since, therefore, nothing is greater than you, no place or time contains you, but you are everywhere and always. And since this can be said of you alone, you alone are unlimited and eternal. How, then, are other spirits also said to be unlimited and eternal? No doubt you are alone eternal, since, alone of all things, even as you will not cease, so too you did not begin to be. But how are you alone unlimited?
Or is it that a created spirit is limited in comparison to you but not in comparison to a body? Surely, that which, while existing somewhere as a whole, cannot at the same time be elsewhere, is by all means limited—which is clear of bodies alone. That is unlimited, however, which is simultaneously everywhere wholly—which can be understood of you alone. That, however, is at the same time limited and unlimited which, while it is wholly somewhere, can simultaneously be wholly elsewhere but not everywhere—which is known to be true of created spirits. For if the soul were not wholly in each of the members of its own body, the soul as a whole would not have feeling in each of them.
Therefore, you, lord, are uniquely unlimited and eternal, and yet other spirits are both unlimited and eternal.
| PROSLOGION
CAPITULUM XIV
Quomodo et cur videtur et non videtur Deus a quaerentibus eum An invenisti, anima mea, quod quaerebas? Quaerebas
Deum, et invenisti eum esse quiddam summum omnium, quo nihil melius cogitari potest; et hoc esse ipsam vitam, lucem, sapientiam, bonitatem, aeternam beatitudinem et beatam aeternitatem; et hoc esse ubique et semper. Nam si non invenisti Deum tuum: quomodo est ille hoc quod invenisti, et quod illum tam certa veritate et vera certitudine intellexisti?
Si vero invenisti: quid est, quod non sentis quod : invenisti? Cur non te sentit, Domine Deus, anima mea, si invenit te? An non invenit, quem invenit esse lucem et veritatem? Quomodo namque intellexit hoc, nisi videndo lucem et veritatem? Aut potuit omnino aliquid intelligere de te, nisi per Jucem tuam et veritatem tuam?
Si ergo vidit lucem et veritatem, vidit te. Si non vidit te, non vidit lucem nec veritatem.
Ps 42:3
An et veritas et lux est quod vidit, et tamen nondum te vidit, quia vidit te aliquatenus, sed non vidit te sicuti es?
1Jn 3:2
Domine Deus meus, formator et reformator meus, dic desideranti animae meae, quid aliud es, quam quod vidit, ut pure videat quod desiderat. Intendit se ut plus videat, et nihil videt ultra hoc quod vidit, nisi tenebras; immo non videt tenebras, quae nullae sunt in te, sed videt se non plus posse videre propter tenebras suas.
] Jn 1:5
Cur hoc, Domine, cur hoc?
Tenebratur oculus eius infirmitate sua, aut reverberatur fulgore tuo?
Sed certe et tenebratur in se, et reverberatur a te.
Utique etobscuratur sua brevitate, et obruitur tua immensitate.
Vere et contrahitur angustia sua, et vincitur amplitudine tua.