without your Father. But the very hairs of your head are all numbered. Fear not, therefore; better are you than many sparrows" (Matt. x. 29–31). 3. God's providence executes its designs also by means of secondary causes, i.e., by means of created things. Though God is directly active in all things, preserving them, and exercises a still higher influence on the activity of His rational creatures, in order to lead them to their supernatural end, yet the co-operation of His creatures is by no means excluded; else God would have given them their forces and faculties in vain. By this mutual co-operation of God's creatures towards the attainment of their respective ends a wonderful unity and harmony is produced. Every creature receives, as it were, a divine prestige by the fact that it serves to carry out the designs of God's providence. 4. Neither the permission of moral evil, or sin; nor of physical evils, or suffering and affliction; nor, finally, of the trials of the just with adversity in this life, while the wicked often enjoy temporal prosperity, is incompatible with God's providence. a. Though free will involves the possibility of transgressing the moral law, and forfeiting our end, yet it is good in itself, and, consequently, a gift of God's goodness. God's intention was not its abuse for evil, but its right use for good. And God, being free in the dispensation of good, is not obliged by all possible graces to secure man against the abuse of his free will. He displays His wisdom and goodness sufficiently by giving man sufficient means to enable him to make good use of his freedom. Hence we understand how God's providence can permit evil without intending it. Moreover, God knows how to draw good from evil. For, apart from the fact that the sin of one is the occasion of virtue to another, even final impenitence glorifies God's justice, which is displayed in the punishment of the impenitent sinner. Yet sin and final impenitence are not permitted with the intention that good might come. God's original will (voluntas antecedens) always is that good, not evil, should be done; if, notwithstanding, evil is done, He, consequently, in His justice decrees punishment (voluntas consequens). Thus the last end of creation, which is the glory of God, is attained in either case. God's antecedent will was that rational creatures should glorify Him by the free and loving acknowledgment of His perfections; His consequent will is that they should glorify Him by suffering punishment, and thus necessarily recognizing His infinite majesty, if they refuse Him this free and loving tribute of recognition. b. Much less is the permission of physical evils incompatible with divine providence. For these are not evils in the strict sense of the word, because they may be the means of acquiring the greatest good, that is, eternal happiness. And indeed they should be for the wicked the means of conversion, and for the good the means of acquiring virtue and merit. By the fact that God does not prevent the natural course of things, but permits temporal prosperity and adversity to fall to the lot of all without distinction, He shows us, according to St. Augustine (de civ. Dei, I. c. 8), that we ought not, on the one hand, to strive too eagerly for temporal goods, but that we should esteem them rather of little account, since they are given even to the wicked; and that, on the other hand, we should not dread temporal misfortunes, since these fall also to the lot of the just. c. If at times it seems that Providence favors the wicked by heaping temporal blessings upon them, and chastises the good by sending them temporal afflictions, we must bear in mind that not this life, but the life to come, is the time of retribution. If God does not withhold His goodness from the wicked, His intention is to bring them back to Him, and to instigate the good to the imitation of His own goodness. Hence He "maketh His sun to rise upon the good and bad, and raineth upon the just and the unjust" (Matt. v. 45). His liberality towards the wicked may, at the same time, be a proof of His justice; for although God owes nothing to any one, least of all to the wicked, yet He may reward the little good they do here on earth; and that all the more since, if they persevere in sin, they have no recompense to expect hereafter. But although the wicked as well as the good shall receive their due recompense in the life to come, yet sins and crimes are not unfrequently punished, as virtues are also rewarded, in this life. This partial retribution is given, not only by voice of conscience, but also by misfortunes, on the one hand, and by a special protection on the other. It sometimes happens that this kind of retribution is meted out here on earth, but not always, lest we might imagine that no punishment awaited us after death (S. Aug. de civ. Dei, I. c. 8). But if, on the other hand, God were never to punish sin in this world, many who are weak of faith might be tempted to doubt of God's providence. Similarly, if God were never to bestow temporal blessings upon the virtuous, or if, despite their prayers, He never delivered them from their afflictions, we might be tempted to think that He was not the giver of this world's goods; whereas if He were always to reward virtue with earthly favors many would serve Him only for the sake of this temporal recompense. II. THE VARIOUS GRADES OF CREATION. 100. The variety displayed in the three grades of creation. bespeaks the wisdom of the Creator. As creator of the universe God is also the author of the different orders of being which make up the entire creation: the spiritual world, the material world, and man. How befitting the divine wisdom such variety of creatures is may be seen from the motive and end of creation. (1) God created the world of His own free choice (95). His freedom of action is manifested in the multitude and variety of His creatures. For, a being that acts of necessity, as do the heavenly bodies, always acts in the same way, while a free agent, as man, varies the mode of its actions. (2) God intended thus to exercise His goodness in behalf of His creatures (96). But He could not have done this to the same extent if He had produced only one order of creatures, or if He had bestowed the same perfections on all; for without multiplicity and variety the universe, as a whole, would have been less beautiful, and, consequently, less perfect. (3) God created the world for His own external glory (97). But the multitude and variety of His attributes could not be so perfectly reflected by a single order of creatures as by three different grades, the highest and lowest of which-the spiritual and the material-again embrace various intermediate grades. A. The Spiritual World. 101. God created angels, i.e., pure spirits gifted with superior endowments. By the term angels we designate purely spiritual beings. They are called angels (messengers) because God uses them as His ministers to proclaim and execute His will among His rational creatures. 1. The existence of spiritual, i.e., of incorporeal, beings endowed with understanding and free will is testified by the Scriptures of the Old and New Testaments. The angel Gabriel was sent to Mary (Luke i. 26), angels came and ministered to Our Lord (Matt. iv. 11). "To which of the angels hath God said at any time: Thou art My son, to-day have I begotten thee? . . . And let all the angels of God adore Him. . . . To which of the angels said He at any time: Sit on My right hand?... Are they not all ministering spirits, sent to minister for them who shall receive the inheritance salvation?" (Heb. i. 5, 6, 13, 14.) It is evident that Scr.p ture here speaks of personal beings (endowed with understanding and free will), distinct from God, but inferior to Him, and by no means mere personifications of God's attributes; for His attributes are neither distinct from G d nor inferior to His Son. Nor does Scripture here speak f p rsonifications of God's promises, or of the forces of natur; for St. Paul does not mean to contrast the Son of God with such, but with real, personal beings, in order thus to show His preeminence. Besides, it is well known that at the time of Christ and the apostles the word angel meant a personal being; for the ruling sect of the Pharisees upheld their existence, while that of the Saducees denied it. Therefore, when Christ and the apostles made use of the same word there is no doubt that they meant the same thing. Moses, it is true, does not expressly mention the creation of the angels. But since he makes repeated mention of them in his subsequent narrative we are justified in saying that the creation of the angels is implied in the words: "In the beginning God created heaven and earth." The multitude of the angels is repeatedly mentioned in Scripture: "The Lord came from Sinai. and with Him thousands of saints. In his right hand a fiery law" (Deut. xxxiii. 2). We read elsewhere of legions (Matt. xxvi. 53) and of many thousands of angels (Heb. xii. 22). 2. The angels are pure spirits. Scripture calls them simply spirits, which is true only in the case that, unlike men, who are spirit and matter, they are simply immaterial. "A spirit hath not flesh and bones" (Luke xxiv. 39). If at times they appeared in visible form (Tob. v. 5), that form was only assumed; and if Scripture speaks of them as visible beings (Ezech. i. 10), it is only to illustrate their invisible qualities to sensuous man. The Lateran Creed teaches that God created the "spiritual and corporeal world, viz., the angels and the visible universe; and then man, composed of soul and body." Here the angels, who are pure spiritual beings, are contrasted with man, who is not a purely spiritual being; they are, consequently, represented as incorporeal. 3. From their mission as ministering spirits, or the executors of the divine decrees, it follows that the angels are naturally more perfect than human sculs, though the latter are also spirits. Scripture extols particularly their power as reflected in their works (Ps. cii. 20; Is. xxxvii. 36; Dan. iii. 49; xiv. 35). But their power is the outcome of the perfection of their nature. Reason cannot strictly demonstrate the existence of purely spiritual creatures; yet it is manifest to reason that they complete the harmony of the universe. For, since purely material beings compose the lowest grade of creation, and man, composed of spirit and matter, forms a higher grade, there is reason to suppose that there should be a still higher, purely spiritual, order of creatures, to crown the Creator's work. Thus creation begins with mere matter, and ends with pure spirit. Besides, man, as the combination of two natures, forms the binding link between a material and a purely spiritual world. It is, furthermore, befitting that God, who is a pure spirit, should also manifest His perfections by the creation of pure spirits, which are the most perfect natural image of His divine nature; nor would that harmony which we perceive in the visible universe seem complete if the gradation closed in man, midway, as it were, between the material and purely spiritual world. 102. The angels originally enjoyed a kind of natural happiness, but were destined for a supernatural happiness. 1. The angels from the first moment of their existence in a certain sense enjoyed a natural happiness. This natural happiness consisted in the perfect development of the natural faculties, and, most of all, in as perfect a knowledge of God as they were naturally capable of; for as pure spirits endowed with high intellectual powers, they attained to all the truths which they were capable of understanding in a single moment without the labor of investigation (S. Thom. I. q. 62, a. 1.). Had their wills been in harmony with this perfect knowledge, had they loved God above all things as their last end, their state might be called in the full sense a state of natural happiness, though it lacked an essential element, viz., the certainty that it would last forever. 2. But the angels, as we see from the lot of the faithful ones (103), were destined for a supernatural happiness, which they too, like man, were to merit by their works; for Scripture always represents that supernatural happiness as the reward of loyalty to God. And indeed it would be less perfect if it were a mere gratuitous gift, and in no wise a merited reward |