the imperfect mode proper to the creature must be excluded from the meaning of the name."" God is not simply intelligent, but He knows all things at once; "every intellect that understands one thing after another, is sometimes potentially intelligent and sometimes actually... But the Divine Intellect is never potentially, but always actually intelligent, hence it does not understand things successively, but it understands all things at once. Prof. Royce says, the Being that is Omniscient "would behold answered, in the facts present to his experience, all rational, all logically possible questions. That is, for him, all genuinely significant, all truly thinkable ideas would be seen as truly fulfilled, and fulfilled in his own experience. Again, "His experience then, would form one whole, but the whole as such would fulfil an all-embracing unity, a single system of ideas.'' 13 But in what way is He all this? Here Prof. Royce goes astray. It is true he admits, that God has "richer ideas than our fragments of thoughts"; and he also truly remarks, "these things, wherein we taste the bitterness of our finitude, are what they are because they mean

11 Quandocumque nomen sumptum a quacumque perfectione creaturae Deo attribuitur, secludatur ab ejus significatione omne illud quod pertinet ad imperfectum modum qui competit creaturae. Ibid., ad-1.

14

more than they contain, imply what is beyond them, refuse to exist by themselves, and at the very moment of confessing their own fragmentary falsity assure us of the reality of that fulfilment which is the life of God." We can not, however, admit his statement when he enters into details, for he seems to find realized in his Omniscient Being things that St. Thomas was careful to exclude, by his method of remotion. The absence of this discrimination leads Prof. Royce to say, "the total limitation, the fragmentariness, the ignorance, the error,-yes (as forms or cases of ignorance and error), the evil, the pain, the horror, the longing, the travail, the faith, the devotion, the endless. flight from its own worthlessness,-that constitutes the very essence of the world of finite experience, is, as a positive reality somewhere so experienced in its wholeness that this entire constitution of the finite appears as a world beyond which in its whole constitution, nothing exists or can exist."15 "Evil, pain, horror”, are not known as a "positive reality" for they are negations and imperfections, and hence find no place in God except through a knowledge of their opposites-"because God knows bona He also knows mala", for evil is "privatio

14 Ibid., pp. 14, 15.

15 Ibid., pp. 46, 47.

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boni". All imperfection and limitation must be removed from the Omniscient, the above quotation limits the Omniscient to the sole experience of the finite in its entirety, "beyond which, in its whole constitution, nothing exists or can exist." We have then in the Concept of the Omniscient according to St. Thomas, the ideas of immateriality and actuality, the requisites for knower and known. Our knowledge is perfect as it approximates to the full expression of these qualities; we know only through material conditions, we remove these and arrive at a knower, who, because He is on the apex of immateriality, is likewise on the summit of cognition.

God is Omnipotent. This attribute is but the extension of the action of the will. Apart from the identity of all perfection in God, St. Thomas frequently unites the ideas of intelligence and power. "Power is not attributed to God as something really different from His knowledge and will, only conceptually; power means the principle of executing the command of the will and the direction of the intelligence. These three are one in God." 17 Practically the same reasons

16 Sum. Theol., I. q. 14, a. 10.

17 Potentia non ponitur in Deo ut aliquid differens a scientia et a voluntate, secundum rem; sed solum secundum rationem; inquantum scilicet potentia importat rationem principii ex

that lead us to ascribe Omniscience to God lead us to attribute Omnipotence to Him. We see the evidence of will in rational creatures, and we see the natural inclination of all things to an end; the short-comings and imperfections manifested in our endeavors, for we are often thwarted and only attain success by overcoming obstacles, bring us to a will where all this is absent, and where execution is co-extensive with rational determination. The idea of cause runs though the whole presentation of this attribute, and thus largely repeats what we have already said. "It is further manifest that everything according to its actuality and perfection is the active principle of something... God is pure act and simply and universally perfect, nor is there any imperfection in Him. . . In God therefore, is the highest power." 18 God is a cause that the effect cannot fully express, as we saw in the discussion of similitude. "God is not a univocal agent, for nothing agrees with Him

18 Manifestum est enim unumquodque secundum quod est actu et perfectum, secundum hoc est principium activum alicujus. Deus est purus actus, et simpliciter et universaliter perfectus, neque in eo aliqua imperfectio locum habet. Unde maxime ei competit esse principium activum, et nullo modo pati. Ibid., q. 25, a. 1.

equentis id quod voluntas imperat, et ad quod scientia dirigit. Quae tria Deo secundum idem conveniunt. Sum. Theol., I. q. 25, a. 1 ad 4.

specifically or generically... But the power of a non-univocal agent is not wholly expressed in the production of its effect." Thus effects or creation do not express the limit of His power, for there is nothing to contrain Him to this full expression. We have then, a conception of free, infinite power, arrived at from a consideration of limited and imperfect power here below. The limitations are removed and we have Omnipotence.

God is a Person. The attribution of Personality to God sums up briefly the whole method of divine predication according to St. Thomas. 'Person means what is perfect in all nature, viz., subsistence in a rational nature. Whence, since whatever partakes of perfection is to be attributed to God because His essence contains all perfection in itself, it is proper that this name person be predicated of God, but not in the same manner as it is said of creatures, but in a more excellent way.' The word person is not given

cum

9, 20

19 Deus non est agens univocum. Nihil enim aliud potest eo convenire neque in specie, neque in genere... Sed potentia agentis non univoci non tota manifestatur in sui effectus productione. Ibid., a. 2 ad 2.

20 Persona significat id quod est perfectissimum in tota natura; scilicet subsistens in rationali natura. Unde cum omne illud quod est perfectionis Deo sit attribuendum, eo quod ejus essentia continet in se omnem perfectionem, conveniens est ut hoc nomen persona de Deo dicatur; non tamen eodem modo quo dicitur de creaturis, sed excellentiori modo. Ibid., q. 29, a. 3.