Chapter XXI
Truth, Freedom, and Evil evil, since it is not other than the evil which is nothing. But the nature in which there is injustice is something evil, since such a nature is something and is something other than the injustice which is eviland nothing. Therefore, what is something is made by God and is His; but what is nothing, i.e., what is evil, is made by an unjust creature and is his.
S. To be sure, we must confess that God makes every nature; but who will allow that He makes the singular actions of evil wills, as for instance, the depraved movement of the will by which an evil will moves itself?
T. Why is it so strange for us to say that God causes those singular actions which occur by means of an evil will, since we already say that he causes those individual things which come into being by means of an unjust willing or dishonorable action?
I don't have anything to argue against this. For indeed, I am unable to deny actions in general to be something, and I do not wish to deny that whatever has being comes from God. Nor does your argument in any way accuse God or excuse Satan; rather, it completely excuses God and accuses Satan.
Chapter XXI That the evil angel w^as not able to foreknow that he was going to fall.
S. Now I wish to know whether the angel who deserted justice foreknew that he would desert it.
T. When you ask whether the angel who did not stand firm in the truth foreknew that he would fall, what kind of knowledge are you talking about? For if you are talking about the knowledge by which we know something with certainty, then
I answer that what was able not to happen couldn't be thus known. For what is able not to happen cannot be known with certainty by rational inference.
Therefore, it is evident that Satan was not at all able to foreknow his fall, since it was not necessary for this event to occur in the future. For let's suppose that his fall had not been going to happen.
If his fall had not been going to happen, do you think that his fall could have been foreknown?
The Fall of Satan
It seems that what is foreknown must happen in the future, and that what is able not to happen in the future can't be foreknown.
Yet I am reminded now of that famous question about divine foreknowledge and free choice. Although it is asserted with great authority that divine foreknowledge and free choice are not incompatible, and although this teaching is held to be so useful that we ought not doubt it, nevertheless, as far as reason can view the matter, the two don't seem to get along with each other very well. So we see that some men, when dealing with this question, incline so much towards one of the alternatives that they completely desert the other and perish under a wave of unbelief; other men try to maintain both terms, but alternatively, as if being blown here and there by contrary winds. Yet since it is evident that there is divine foreknowledge of all things which are done by free choice, and since none of these things occurs by necessity, it seems that what is foreknown is able not to happen in the future.
T. ril give a quick answer to this. The foreknowledge of God is not properly called foreknowledge. For all things are always present to Him, and so He does not have foreknowledge of future things, but knowledge of present things.
Therefore, since the definition of foreknowledge of a future thing is different from the definition of knowledge of a present thing, it is not necessary that the divine "foreknowledge" and the foreknowledge which we are asking about entail the same consequences.
S. Agreed.
T. Then, let's return to the question which we were previously discussing.
S. Your answer sounded good, but it's not quite a reply to my question. So don't refuse to tell me as much as God will deign to show you. For the solution to this problem is quite necessary, if one can be given. It may already have been given somewhere; but I confess that I have nowhere read an argument which would satisfy me as a solution—leaving aside what is said in Scripture, which I believe without doubting, of course.
T. When we come to this question—if by chance we do come to it—the solution will be whatever God gives. Now, because Satan's fall might not have happened, it is clear that Satan could not have foreknown his fall by means of that foreknowl-
Truth, Freedom, and Evil edge which entails the necessity of an event; and to this argument I shall add another one which also excludes his having had any premonition, not only by foreknowledge, but by any thought or suspicion whatsoever, that he would fall.
I await this.
T. Let us suppose that while Satan was persisting in a good will he foreknew that he was going to fall in the future, then either he would have been willing for it to happen or he would not have been willing for it to happen.
S. One of these must be true.
T. Now, if together with this foreknowledge of his fall, Satan were ever willing to fall, he would already be fallen because of that evil will itself.
S. What you say is clear.
T. So if we suppose he were willing to fall, it would not be the case that he knew he was going to fall before he did fall [since to be wilhng to fall is to be already fallen].
S. There can be no objection to your conclusion.
T. On the other hand, if Satan were not willing to fall when he foreknew he was going to fall, then he would have been wretched with grief to the same degree that he wished to remain upright.
It can't be denied.
T. But the more he willed to remain upright in justice, the more just he was; and the more just he was, the more he should have been happy because of it.
S. This can't be denied either.
T. Therefore, if he foreknew that he was going to fall and if he were not willing to fall, he would have been as wretched as he should have been happy. But this is not consistent.
S. I'm not able to deny that this conclusion follows logically; but it is well known that persons who deserve happiness often are not happy. And situations like this occur not merely without contradiction, but even with our approval and by God's grace.
For many times—to recall only a few things regarding the troubles of the righteous—the more just someone is, the more he is afflicted with the sadness of sympathy for the misfortunes of another. Often, too, we see that the more steadfast a person is in justice, the more injury he suffers from unjust persecutions.
The Fall of Satan
T. The argument is not the same with respect both to men and Satan. For human nature, because of the sin of our first parent, was made capable of suffering unnumbered troubles; from this passibiHty, of course, grace works incorruptibility in us in many ways. But Satan had not yet deserved to suffer evil because of any preceding sin.
S. You have met my objection. For your argument excludes not only Satan's foreknowing his fall, but even his imagining it.
T. There is something else which seems sufficient to show me that Satan could in no way have thought of his future transgression before it occurred. For he would have thought himself to be either compelled or free. But there was no way in which he might suspect himself ever to be compelled, and as long as he willed to persevere in the truth, there was no way in which he could think himself going to desert the truth solely by his will. For I have shown above that as long as he had an upright will, he willed to persevere in this will; and as long as he willed always to keep what he had, I see no way in which he could even have suspected that he would desert what he had by changing this will, in the absence of some other intervening cause.
I don't deny that he knew he could have changed the will that he had; but I say he was not able to think that at some time, without the intervention of any other cause, he would freely change that will which he was willing constantly to keep.
S. Whoever carefully understands what you are saying sees clearly that Satan was in no way able to know or to think that he was going to do what he so evilly did.
Chapter XXII That he knew he should not will what it was sin to will, and he knew that he ought to be punished if he sinned.
I want you also to show me whether Satan knew that he should not will whatever was a transgression to will.
T. You ought not be in doubt with regard to this question, if you consider what we have just said. For if he hadn't known