Chapter 33
Chapter 33 Arguments of Those Who Seek to Prove the Eternity of the World from a Consideration of Creatures
There are also other arguments, derived from the viewpoint of creatures, that seem to indicate the same conclusion.18
1. Things that have no potentiality to non-existence cannot be without existence. But among creatures there are some that have no potentiality to non-existence. For only creatures that possess matter subject to contrariety can have potentiality to non-existence, since potentiality to existence and non-existence is potentiality to privation and form, whose subject is matter; and privation is always connected with the contrary form, since matter cannot exist without any form at all. But there are certain creatures that have no matter subject to contrariety, either because they are entirely devoid of matter, such as intellectual substances, as will be shown later on,19 or because they have no contrary, such as heavenly bodies, as is proved by their move ment, which has no contrary. Hence it is impossible for certain crea tures not to exist. Of necessity, therefore, they must exist always.
2. Likewise, every thing endures in being in proportion to its power of being, except by accident, as in those things that are destroyed by violence. But some creatures are endowed with power to exist, not for a limited time, but forever. Such are heavenly bodies and intellectual substances; they are incorruptible because they have no contrary.
Consequently everlasting existence is their due; on the other hand, that which begins to exist, does not always exist. In the case of in corruptible things, therefore, a beginning of existence is out of the question.
3. Furthermore, whenever anything begins to be moved for the first time, either the mover or the thing moved or both must behave otherwise now, when there is movement, than previously, when there was no movement. For, according as a mover actually moves, it has a certain reference or relation to the thing that is moved. However, a new relation does not arise without some change in both or at least one of the extremes. But a thing that is in a different state now than formerly, is moved. Therefore, prior to newly initiated movement, another movement, either in the movable thing or in the mover, has to precede. Accordingly, every movement must either be eternal or must have some other movement preceding it. Hence there was al ways movement, and consequently there were always movable things.
]S These arguments are answered in 19 Chap. 50. chap. 30.
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And so creatures have always existed, since God Himself is absolutely immovable, as was proved in Book I.20
4. Besides, every agent that generates its like intends to preserve perpetual existence in the species, since existence cannot be perpetu ally preserved in the individual. But natural desire cannot be futile.
Therefore the species of things capable of generation must be per petual.
5. Further, if time is everlasting, motion, too, must be everlasting, since time is the measure of motion.21 Consequently movable things also must be everlasting, since movement is the act of the movable.22
But time must be everlasting, for time is inconceivable without a now, just as a line is inconceivable without a point. But now is always the end of the past and the beginning of the future;23 this is the very definition of now. And so any given now has time preceding and fol lowing it. And thus no notv can be either first or last. Consequently movable things, which are created substances, must exist from eternity.
6. Again, we must either affirm or deny. Therefore, if the affirma tion of a thing is implied in its negation, that thing must always exist.
Such a thing is time. For if we say that time did not always exist, we assert that it did not exist before it existed; similarly, if time is not to exist always in the future, its non-existence must come after its existence. But there can be no before or after in duration unless there is time, since time is the measure of before and after.-4 And thus time would have to exist before it began, and continue into the future after it ceased. Accordingly time must be eternal. Now time is an accident, and an accident cannot exist without a subject. Its subject, however, is not God, who is above time; for He is absolutely immutable, as was proved in Book I.25 Consequently some created substance is eternal.
7. Moreover, many propositions are of such a kind that he who denies them must affirm them. For instance, whoever denies that there is truth, supposes that truth exists, for he supposes that the negative proposition he utters is true. The case is similar with him who denies the principle that contradictories are not simultaneous, for by denying this he asserts that the denial he voices is true and that the opposite affirmation is false, and thus that both are not verified about the same thing. Therefore, if a thing whose denial entails its affirmation must exist always, as we have just proved, the aforesaid propositions and all propositions derived from them are eternal. But these propositions are not God. Therefore something besides God must be eternal.
23 Cf. Aristotle, Physics, IV, 13 (222b 20 Chap. 13.
21 Cf. Aristotle, Physics, IV, 11 (219b 1).
24 Cf. Aristotle, Physics, IV, 11 (219b 1).
22 Cf. Aristotle, Physics, III, 2 (202a 7).
1).
25 Chap. 13.
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1 hese arguments, then, and others like them can be adduced on I the part of creatures to prove that creatures have always existed.
Chapter 34 Arguments to Prove the Eternity of the World from the Viewpoint of the Creative Action
Other reasons can be alleged on the part of the creative action itself to prove the same conclusion.26
1. What is commonly asserted by all, cannot be wholly false. For a false opinion betrays a certain weakness of intellect, just as a false judgment about a proper object of sense results from a weakness in the sense. But defects are accidental, because they are outside the in tention of nature. What is accidental, however, cannot exist always and in all beings; thus the judgment which every taste registers about flavors cannot be false. Accordingly a judgment that is pronounced by all men about a truth cannot be erroneous. Now it is the common opinion of all philosophers that nothing is made from nothing.27
Consequently it must be true. Therefore, if anything is made, it must be made from something. And if the latter thing is also made, it, too, must be made from something else. But this process cannot go on indefinitely, for then no generation would ever be completed, since an infinite number of stages cannot be traversed. Hence we must come to some first thing that was not made. But every being that has not existed forever must have been made. Therefore that being from which all other things were originally made must be eternal. But this being is not God, because He cannot be the matter of anything, as was proved in Book I.28 Consequently something outside of God must be eternal, namely, prime matter.
2. Moreover, if a thing is not in the same state now as before, it must have undergone some change, for this is precisely what we mean by mutation: that a thing is not in the same state now as before. But everything that begins to exist anew, is not in the same state now as before; and the reason is, that some motion or change has taken place.
All motion or change occurs in some subject, for motion is the act of a movable thing.29 Since motion precedes that which is brought about by it, seeing that motion terminates in such a thing, some movable subject must exist prior to anything that is made. And as an infinite
211 These arguments are refuted in chap. 2S Chap. 17.
37. 29 Cf. Aristotle, Physics, III, 2 (202a 27 Cf. Aristotle, Physics, I, 4 (187a 7).
28).
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