SUMMA CONTRA GENTILES

1 The Catholic Primer s Reference Series: OF GOD AND HIS CREATURES An Annotated Translation (With some Abridgement) of the SUMMA CONTRA GENTILES Of ST. THOMAS AQUINAS By JOSEPH RICKABY, , Caution regarding printing: This document is over 721 pages in length, depending upon individual printer settings. The Catholic Primer Copyright Notice The contents of Of God and His Creatures: An Annotated Translation of The SUMMA CONTRA GENTILES of St Thomas Aquinas is in tpublic domain. However, this electronic version is copyrighted. The Catholic Primehe r, 2005. All Rights Reserved. ided that the following conditions are adhered to. This electronic document may not be tion with any other document, pon of any type or manner, or used as a gift for contribution express consent of The Catholic Primer. Notwithstanding the preceding, if this product is transferred on CD-ROM, DVD, or other similar storage media, the transferor may charge for the cost of the media, reasonable shipping expenses, and may request, but not demand, an additional donation not to exceed US$25.

2 Questions concerning this limited license should be directed to This electronic version may be distributed free of charge provided that the contents are not altered and this copyright notice is included with the distributed copy, provoffered in connecroduct, promotion or other item that is sold, exchange for compensatis, including charitable contributions without the . This document may not be distributed in print form without the prior consent of The Catholic Primer. Adobe , Acrobat , and Acrobat Reader are either registered trademarks or trademarks of Adobe Systems Incorporated in the United States and/or other countries. The Catholic Primer: 2 OF GOD AND HIS CREATURES An Annotated Translation (With some Abridgement) of the SUMMA CONTRA GENTILES Of ST. THOMAS AQUINAS By JOSEPH RICKABY, , Lond: Oxon., Author of "Aquinas Ethicus" &c. &c. 3 BURNS & OATES B. HERDER ORCHARD STREET 17 SOUTH BROADWAY LONDON W ST LOUIS MO PIAE MEMORIAE LEONIS XIII SACERDOTIS MAGNI QUI IN VITA SUA SUFFULSIT DOMUM ET IN DIEBUS SUIS CORROBORAVIT TEMPLUM 4 Preface SOME years ago, a priest of singularly long and varied experience urged me to write "a book about God.

3 " He said that wrong and imperfect notions of God lay at the root of all our religious difficulties. Professor Lewis Campbell says the same thing in his own way in his work, Religion in Greek Literature, where he declares that the age needs "a new definition of God." Thinking the need over, I turned to the SUMMA CONTRA GENTILES . I was led to it by the Encyclical of Leo XIII, Aeterni Patris, urging the study of St Thomas. A further motive, quite unexpected, was supplied by the University of Oxford in 1902 placing the SUMMA CONTRA GENTILES on the list of subjects which a candidate may at his option offer in the Final Honour School of Literae Humaniores, -- a very unlikely book to be offered so long as it remains simply as St Thomas wrote it. Lastly I remembered that I had in 1892 published under the name of Aquinas Ethicus a translation of the principal portions of the second part of St Thomas's SUMMA Theologica: thus I might be reckoned some thing of an expert in the difficult art of finding English equivalents for scholastic Latin.

4 There are two ways of behaving towards St Thomas's writings, analogous to two several treatments of a church still standing, in which the saint might have worshipped. One way is to hand the edifice over to some Society for the Preservation of Ancient Monuments: they will keep it locked to the vulgar, while admitting some occasional connoisseur: they will do their utmost to preserve every stone identically the same that the mediaeval builder laid. And the Opera Omnia of St Thomas, handsomely bound, may fill a library shelf, whence a volume is occasionally taken down for the sole purpose of knowing what St Thomas said and no more. Another thirteenth-century church may stand, a parish church still, in daily use; an ancient monument, and something besides; a present-day house of prayer, meeting the needs of a twentieth-century congregation; and for that purpose refitted, repainted, restored, repaired and modernised; having had that done to it which its mediaeval architects would have done, had they lived in our time.

5 Nothing is more remarkable in our old English churches than the sturdy self-confidence, and the good taste also lasting for some centuries, with which each successive age has superimposed its own style upon the architecture of its predecessors. If St Thomas's works are to serve modern uses, they must pass from their old Latinity into modern speech: their conclusions must be tested by all the subtlety of present-day science, physical, psychological, historical; maintained, wherever maintainable, but altered, where tenable no longer. Thus only can St Thomas keep his place as a living teacher of mankind. For the history of the CONTRA GENTILES I refer the reader to the folio edition printed at the Propaganda Press in 1878 cura et studio Petri Antonii Uccellii, pp. xiii-xxxlx. Thomas Aquinas (1225-1274) came to the University of Paris in 1245, and there for three years heard the lectures of Albertus Magnus, taking his Bachelor's degree in 1248. He returned to the University in 1253, took his Master's degree in 1257, and thereupon lectured in theology for two or three years, leaving the University in 1259 or 1260.

6 He wrote the SUMMA CONTRA GENTILES in Italy, under the pontificate of Urban IV (1261-1264), 5at the request of St Raymund of Pennafort. He went for the third time to the University of Paris in 1269, finally returning to Italy in 1271. Though the SUMMA CONTRA GENTILES was written in Italy, there is reason to believe that the substance of it was got together during the Saint's second residence at Paris, and formed the staple of his lectures in the University. The more celebrated SUMMA Theologica was a later work. The SUMMA CONTRA GENTILES is in the unique position of a classic whereof the author's manuscript is still in great part extant. It is now in the Vatican Library. The manuscript consists of strips of parchment, of various shades of colour, contained in an old parchment cover to which they were originally stitched. The writing is in double columns, minute and difficult to decipher, abounding in abbreviations, often passing into a kind of shorthand. Through many passages a line is drawn in sign of erasure: but these remain not less legible than the rest, and are printed as foot notes in the Propaganda edition: they do not appear in the present translation.

7 To my mind, these erasures furnish the best proof of the authenticity of the autograph, which is questioned by S. E. Frett, editor of Divi Thomae Opera Omnia (Vivs, Paris, 1874), vol. XII, preface iv-vi. An inscription on the cover states that the manuscript is the autograph of St Thomas, and that it was brought from Naples to the Dominican convent at Bergamo in 1354: whence its name of the `Bergamo autograph.' Many leaves were lost in the sack of the convent by the armies of the first French Revolution; and the whole of Book IV is missing. The frequent erasures of the Saint himself lend some countenance to the omissions of his translator. Re-reading his manuscript in the twentieth century, St Thomas would have been not less ready than he showed himself in the thirteenth century to fulfil the Horatian precept, saepe stylum vertas. J. R. Pope's Hall, Oxford, Michaelmas 1905 6 Nihil obstat: T. M. TAAFFE , Censor deputatus Imprimatur: GULIELMUS PRAEPOSITUS JOHNSON, Vicarius Generalis Westmonasterii, die 12 Septembris 1905 7 CONTENTS BOOK CHAPTER I--The Function of the Wise CHAPTER II--Of the Author's CHAPTER III--That the Truths which we confess concerning God fall under two Modes or Categories20 CHAPTER IV--That it is an advantage for the Truths of God, known by Natural Reason, to be proposed to men to be believed on CHAPTER V--That it is an advantage for things that cannot he searched out by Reason to be proposed as Tenets of CHAPTER VI--That there is no lightmindedness in assenting to Truths of Faith, although they are above CHAPTER VII--That the Truth of reason is not contrary to the Truth of Christian CHAPTER VIII--Of the Relation of Human Reason to the first Truth of CHAPTER IX--The Order and Mode of Procedure in this CHAPTER X--Of the Opinion of those who say that the Existence of God cannot he proved.

8 Being a Self-evident CHAPTER XI--Rejection of the aforesaid Opinion, and Solution of the aforesaid CHAPTER XII--Of the Opinion of those who say that the Existence of God is a Tenet of Faith alone and cannot be CHAPTER XIII--Reasons in Proof of the Existence of CHAPTER XIV--That in order to a Knowledge of God we must use the Method of Negative CHAPTER XV--That God is CHAPTER XVI--That in God there is no Passive CHAPTER XVIII--That in God there is no CHAPTER XX--That God is CHAPTER XXI--That God is His own CHAPTER XXII--That in God Existence and Essence is the CHAPTER XXIII--That in God there is no CHAPTER XXIV--That the Existence of God cannot he characterised by the addition of any Substantial CHAPTER XXV--That God is not in any CHAPTER XXVI--That God is not the formal or abstract being of all CHAPTER XXVIII--That God is Universal CHAPTER XXIX--How Likeness to God may be found in CHAPTER XXX--What Names can be predicated of CHAPTER XXXI--That the Plurality of divine Names is not inconsistent with

9 The Simplicity of the Divine Being predicated of God and of other CHAPTER XXXII--That nothing is predicated of God and other beings CHAPTER XXXIII--That it is not at all true that the application of common Predicates to God and to Creatures involves nothing beyond a mere Identity of CHAPTER XXXIV--That the things that are said God and Creatures are said CHAPTER XXXV--That the several Names predicated of God are not CHAPTER XXXVI--That the Propositions which our Understanding forms of God are not void of CHAPTER XXXVIII--That God is His own CHAPTER XXXIX--That in God there can be no CHAPTER XL--That God is the Good of all CHAPTER XLII--That God is CHAPTER XLIII--That God is CHAPTER XLIV--That God has CHAPTER XLV--That in God the Understanding is His very 8 CHAPTER XLVI--That God understands by nothing else than by His own CHAPTER XLVII--That God perfectly understands CHAPTER XLVIII--That God primarily and essentially knows Himself CHAPTER XLIX--That God knows other things besides CHAPTER L--That God has a particular Knowledge of all CHAPTER LI--Some Discussion of the Question how there is in the Divine Understanding a Multitude of CHAPTER LII--Reasons to show how the Multitude of intelligible Ideal Forms has no Existence except in the Divine CHAPTER LIII--How there is in God a Multitude of Objects of CHAPTER LIV--That the Divine Essence, being One.

10 Is the proper Likeness and Type of all things CHAPTER LV--That God understands all things at once and CHAPTER LVI--That there is no Habitual Knowledge in CHAPTER LVII--That the Knowledge of God is not a Reasoned CHAPTER LVIII--That God does not understand by Combination and Separation of CHAPTER LIX--That the Truth to be found in Propositions is not excluded from CHAPTER LX--That God is CHAPTER LXI--That God is pure CHAPTER LXII--That the Truth of God is the First and Sovereign CHAPTER LXIII--The Arguments of those who wish to withdraw from God the Knowledge of Individual CHAPTER LXIV--A list of things to be said concerning the Divine CHAPTER LXV--That God Knows Individual CHAPTER LXVI--That God knows things which are CHAPTER LXVII--That God knows Individual Contingent CHAPTER LXVIII--That God knows the Motions of the CHAPTER LXIX--That God knows infinite CHAPTER LXX--That God knows Base and Mean CHAPTER LXXI--That God knows Evil CHAPTER LXXII--That God has a CHAPTER LXXIII--That the Will of God is His CHAPTER LXXIV--That the Object of the Will of God in the First Place is God CHAPTER LXXV--That God in willing Himself wills also other things besides CHAPTER LXXVI--That with one and the same Act of the Will God wills Himself and all other CHAPTER LXXVII--That the Multitude of the Objects of God's Will is not inconsistent with the Simplicity of His CHAPTER LXXVIII--That the Divine Will reaches to the good of Individual CHAPTER LXXIX--That God wills things even that as yet are CHAPTER LXXX--That God of necessity wills His own Being and His own CHAPTER LXXXI--That God does not of necessity love other things than CHAPTER LXXXII--Arguments against the aforesaid Doctrine and Solutions of the CHAPTER LXXXIII--That God wills anything else than Himself with an Hypothetical CHAPTER LXXXIV--That the Will of God is not of things in themselves CHAPTER LXXXV--That the Divine