Perfect reason is that which exhibits the knowledge of all
6. Letter 160
Perfect reason is that which exhibits the knowledge of all things and especially of the things of eternity, which are comprehended by the intellect. This reason is eternal, it must be eternal, and reason itself teaches that the eternal is that which has neither beginning nor end nor change nor variation. Reason must be eternal, then, not only because it teaches and demonstrates what is eternal, but much more because eternity itself could not exist without reason; it would not be eternity, I think, if reason itself were not eternal. Secondly, reason itself demonstrates that God exists, or must necessarily exist, and that it must be that He cannot be other than God. Evidently, then, whether there are persons who know this or not, since God is eternal, it cannot be doubted that reason is eternal, since it observes that God must necessarily exist, and thus it proves that it is co-eternal with Him.
There are, however, some truths which reason must take for granted, so that reason precedes and the effect follows of a happening which reason shows in the future, as for example, when the world was made, reason held that there might be a world. Therefore, reason existed before the world. Therefore, too, the things which reason knew were to happen were subsequent to reason, so that reason was first, and afterward came the making of the world. Now, then, since reason shows that God exists or must necessarily exist, what are we to suppose before Him so that God could exist? Do we suppose reason before God t 7 i 'i}
4 ; 4 as reason before the world, or God before reason, since it is absolutely improbable that God should exist without reason? For, if God 1s eternal, it is through reason that He is and is eternal, and reason is, then, God or of God, as reason itself teaches. But, if reason is God, it demonstrates
Faith and Reason 157 that God is reason, and these can be coeval and co-eternal. Reason itself shows that for God to be such is not possible if He is not God. But, if reason is removed—a forbidden thing to say—there will be no God if there is no reason to prove that God must necessarily exist. God therefore is, since the reason of Him is that He should be. Since there is a God, without doubt there is reason which teaches that He is.
What, then, if it can be said, is first in God: reason or God? But, God will not exist unless reason exists to teach that God must necessarily exist; there will be no reason if there is no God. Therefore, there is neither first nor last. This divine nature possesses somehow and at the same time both reason and God. One begets one: either reason begets God or God begets reason. But, perhaps reason and God might be said to be subordinate or in a subordinate state? God and reason are one in one. It is well said that God begets reason because reason shows that God exists. God is known by reason as the Son by the Father, and reason is known by God as the Father by the Son. For reason itself with God is God. God was never at any time without reason, or reason without God. God exists, then, if reason exists, and the Son exists if the Father exists. Consequently, if reason is removed—to say what it is forbidden to say—then not even God exists, for through reason His act and operation by which He is God also exist. Let us repeat the same arguments. If there was no reason, there was no God; if there is no God, there was no reason. Reason, then, and God are an eternal fact; God and reason are likewise an everlasting fact. But the joining and uniting of reason to God and of God to reason, of the Father to the Son and of the Son to the Father, show forth their beginnings, so to speak, and the causes of their existence, because one cannot exist without the other. Words fail, and what is said is only said to ward off silence. But are we to say that God is the source of reason or reason the source of God, since there can be no fruit without root, nor is the root anything without fruit? Let us draw a comparison, so as to form some idea of God: in the grain of wheat there exists a principle of fertility which keeps it from being unproductive; but, if there were no grain of wheat, the principle would have nothing from which to produce its effect.
Therefore, since reason which is God either manifests that God is reason or reason is God, the one, so to speak, manifesting the other; and the Father is not manifested except by the Son, and the Son is not manifested except by the Father, so that the Father is seemingly in silence when we come to the Father by the Son, and the Son is seemingly in silence when we come to the Son by the Father; and if one is in some way hidden, the other is manifest in such wise that the one manifesting Himself manifests the other, also, and that one cannot be known while the other remains unknown, we have undertaken an exceedingly toilsome and difficult task in trying to comprehend something about God in spite of our lack of comprehension. Nevertheless, as none of the things which exist are intelligible or knowable without some external appearance, so it is much more true that nothing is known without the Son, that is, without reason. What more? Was the Father irrational at any time, being bereft of reason? Who would dare say it? Therefore, it must be known by reason that God is One of one, or One in one and at the same time One, because God is One and love must necessarily reside in Him, because reason itself teaches that it must always possess love, or God commands that love is always to be made manifest.
V ELE HUMAN CONDITION