But, if we call them "reasons," we are departing
has bestowed upon them. The cause of things, therefore, which makes but is not made, is God; but all other causes both make and are made. Such are all created spirits, and especially the rational. Material causes, therefore, which may rather be said tobe made than to make, are not to be reckoned among efficient causes, because they can only do what the wills of spirits do by them.
DIVINE IDEAS AS PROTOTYPES*
Plato is known as the first to have named the 46.1. Ideas. Not that if this name were nonexistent before he established it, the things that he called Ideas would not have existed, or would not have been understood by anyone—but they were probably called by different names by different people. It is permitted to give to any known thing that lacks an accepted name, whatever name one wishes. ... But enough has previously been said about the name; let us examine the thing which is principally to be considered and understood, leaving each person free, as far as the terms are concerned, to give whatever name he wishes to the object of his knowledge.
So, in Latin we may call Ideas forms or species, to 2. make it clear that we are translating word for word. But, if we call them "reasons," we are departing somewhat from a strict translation; reasons are called logoi in Greek and not Ideas. However, if a person chose to use this term, he would not be far from the real meaning. In fact, Ideas are the primary forms, or the permanent and immutable reasons of real things, and they are not themselves formed; so they are, as a consequence, eternal and ever the same in themselves, and they are contained in the divine intelligence. And since they never come into being or go out of it, everything that can come into being and go out of it, and everything that does come. into being and goes out of it, may be said to be formed in accord with them.
It is denied that the soul can look upon them, unless it be rational, in that part whereby it excels, that is, in its mind and reason, as it were in its face or interior and intellectual eye. And for this vision not everyone is suitable but only that rational soul which is holy and pure, that one
* Eighty-three Different Questions, q. 46, 1-2; trans. V.J.B.
THREE LEVELS OF REALITY 63 which keeps the eye in which such objects are seen, healthy, clear, serene and like unto those objects to which its view is directed. What religious man, infused with the true religion, even though not yet able to contemplate these objects, would nevertheless dare to deny and even refuse to confess that all things that are—that is, whatsoever things are constituted with a nature of their own in their proper kinds— were created by God as their source, so that they might exist? And that all living things are alive by virtue of the same source? And that the whole of things is preserved, and the very order in which they change, as they manifest their temporal courses according to a definite pattern, is maintained and governed, by the laws of the highest God? When this is established and admitted, who will dare to say that God established all things in an irrational manner? Now if this cannot be said or accepted in any proper sense, the conclusion remains that all things were founded by means of reason. Not that a man is based on the same reason as a horse; this would be an absurd notion. So, each one of these is created in accord with its own reason. Now, where would we think that these reasons are, if not in the mind of the Creator? For He did not look to anything placed outside
Himself as a model for the construction of what he created; to think that He did would be irreligious, Now, if these reasons for all things to be created, or already created, are contained in the divine mind, and if there can be nothing in the divine mind unless it be eternal and immutable, and if Plato called these primary reasons of things Ideas—then not only do Ideas exist but they are true because they are eternal and they endure immutably in this way; and it is by participation in these that whatever exists is produced, however its way of existing may be.
GOD SET SPIRITUAL CREATION ABOVE THE CORPOREAL*
Living, then, in immutable eternity, He has created 20.39. all things together, and from them periods of time flow, places are filled, and the centuries unroll in the temporal and local motions of real things, Among these things, He has established some as spiritual and others as corporeal, giving form to the matter that He Himself created without * Literal Commentary on Genesis, VII, 20.39; 25.46; 26.48; trans. V.J.B. form but capable of being formed—matter which was made by no other being but which did have a Maker. This matter preceded its formation, not in time but in its origin. Now, He set the spiritual creature above the corporeal one, because the spiritual could be moved only through time, while the corporeal was movable through both time and place. For example, the mind is moved through time when it recalls what had been forgotten, or learns what it did not know, or wills what it had rejected—but the body is moved through place, either from earth to sky, from sky to earth, from west to east, or in any other similar way. Now, it is impossible for anything that moves through place to avoid being moved, by the same fact, through time; however, not everything that moves through time must also be moved through place.
So, just as the substance that is moved only through time takes precedence over the substance that is moved through both time and place, so does that substance which is moved neither in place nor in time take precedence even over it. As a result, just as a body moves through time and place, while the motion of a created spirit is only through time—so, He moves the created spirit through time but the Creator Spirit moves neither through time nor through place. However, the created spirit moves itself through time and its body through time and place; while the Creator Spirit moves Himself apart from time and place, and the created spirit through time apart from place, but body through time and place....
So, the nature of the whole corporeal universe is 25.46. not helped in a corporeal way by anything extrinsic to it. The reason for this is that outside it no body exists; if there were, it would not include the whole of bodies. From within, however, it is assisted incorporeally; for God moves it in such a way that it remains entirely natural (since all things are from Him, through Him, and in Him). Yet the parts of this universe are helped both intrinsically, im an incorporeal way (or rather, they are made so that they may exist as natures, and they were extrinsically helped, in a corporeal way, so that they may become better; thus the provision of food, agriculture, medicine and even the decorative arts, is made not simply for protection and greater growth but also so that man may live more decently....
With these points established, [it is evident that] 26. 48. God, the omnipotent and all-supporting, Who is unmoved in time or place and ever the same in the