Cap. 3
by St. Bonaventure
Source text: Public Domain Mark 1.0. English translation/apparatus/encoding: CC BY-NC 4.0, Wroot Press.
https://bonaventure.wrootpress.com/browse/6/d/3/q/bon-itin-c3
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### Ch. III. *On the speculation of God through his image stamped with the natural powers.*

1. But since the two aforesaid steps, by leading us into God through his *vestiges*, through which he shines back in all creatures, have led us by the hand as far as this, that we should re-enter into ourselves, that is, into our mind, in which the divine *image* shines back; hence it is that now in the third place, entering into our very selves and as it were leaving the outer court behind, we ought to strive to see God through a mirror *in the holy place*, that is, in the *forward* part of the tabernacle; where, after the manner of a candlestick, the light of truth shines back upon the face of our mind, in which, namely, the image of the most blessed Trinity shines forth.

Enter therefore into yourself and see, since your mind *loves* itself most ardently; nor could it love itself unless it *knew* itself; nor would it know itself unless it *remembered* itself, because we grasp nothing through the understanding which is not present to our memory; and from this you advert that your soul has a threefold power, not by the eye of the flesh, but by the eye of reason. Consider therefore the *operations* and the *relations* of these three powers, and you will be able to see God through yourself as through an image, which is to see *through a mirror in an obscure manner*.

2. Now the *operation* of *memory* is the retention and representation not only of things *present*, *corporeal* and *temporal*, but also of things *successive*, *simple* and *sempiternal*. — For memory retains things *past* by recollection, things *present* by reception, things *future* by foresight. — It retains also *simple* things, such as the principles of continuous and discrete quantities, as the point, the instant and the unit, without which it is impossible to remember or to think of those things which take their beginning from these. — It retains nonetheless the *principles and axioms of the sciences* as *sempiternal* and sempiternally, since it can never so forget them, so long as it uses reason, but that it approves them when heard and assents to them, not as though it perceived them anew, but as recognizing them as innate and familiar to itself; as is clear if there be proposed to anyone: « Of anything whatever, affirmation or negation »; or: « Every whole is greater than its part », or any other axiom whatever, which one cannot contradict « as regards the interior discourse ».

From the *first* retention, therefore, the actual retention of all temporal things — of the past, that is, the present and the future — it has the effigy of *eternity*, whose indivisible present extends itself to all times. — From the *second* it appears that it has not only to be formed *from without* through phantasms, but also *from above*, by receiving and holding within itself simple forms, which cannot go in through the gates of the senses and the phantasies of sensible things. — From the *third* it is had
that it has an unchangeable light present to itself, in which it remembers unvarying truths. — And thus through the *operations* of memory it appears that the soul itself is the image of God and a likeness so present to itself, and having him present, that it actually grasps him and by its power « is capable of him and can be a partaker of him ».

3. Now the *operation* of the *intellective* power lies in the perception of the intellect of *terms*, of *propositions* and of *inferences*. — The intellect grasps the *things signified by terms* when it comprehends what each thing is through its definition. But a definition has to be made through higher things, and those have to be defined through higher, until one comes to the highest and most general, which being unknown, the lower cannot be understood *definitively*. Unless therefore it be known what *being per se* is, the definition of any particular substance cannot be *fully* known. Nor can *being per se* be known unless it be known together with its conditions, which are: *one*, *true*, *good*. But since being can be thought of as *diminished* and as *complete*, as *imperfect* and as *perfect*, as being *in potency* and as being *in act*, as being *in a certain respect* and as being *simply*, as being *in part* and as being *totally*, as being *transient* and as being *abiding*, as being *through another* and as being *through itself*, as being *mixed* with non-being and as being *pure*, as being *dependent* and as being *absolute*, as being *posterior* and as being *prior*, as being *mutable* and as being *immutable*, as being *simple* and as being *composite*: since « privations and defects can in no way be known except through positions », our intellect does not come to *fully resolve* the understanding of any created being unless it be *aided* by the understanding of the being most pure, most actual, most complete and absolute; which is *being simply* and *eternal*, in which are the accounts of all things in their purity. But how would the intellect know that this is a defective and incomplete being, if it had no knowledge of the being that is without any defect? And so of the other conditions touched on above.

Now the intellect is said truly to comprehend the understanding of *propositions* when it knows with certitude that they are true; and to know this is to know, since it cannot be deceived in that comprehension. For it knows that that truth cannot be otherwise; it knows therefore that that truth is unchangeable. But since our mind itself is changeable, it cannot see that truth shining back thus unchangeably except through some light radiating altogether unchangeably, which it is impossible should be a mutable creature. It knows therefore in that light *which enlighteneth every man that cometh into this world*, which is the *true light* and the *Word in the beginning with God*.

But our intellect truly perceives the understanding of an *inference* when it sees that the conclusion follows *necessarily* from the premisses; which it sees not only in necessary terms, but also in contingent ones, as: if a man runs, a man is moved. And it perceives this necessary relation not only in things that are, but also in things that are not. For as, when a man exists, it follows: if a man runs, a man is moved; so also when he does not exist. The *necessity of an inference* of this sort, therefore, does not come from the existence of the thing in *matter*, since that is contingent, nor from the existence of the thing in the *soul*, since it would then be a fiction if it were not in the thing: it comes therefore from exemplarity in the eternal art, according to which things have an aptitude and a relation to one another according to the *representation* of that eternal art. Therefore, as Augustine says in *On True Religion*, the light of everyone *truly reasoning* is kindled from that truth and strives to arrive at it.

— From which it manifestly appears that our intellect is conjoined to that eternal truth itself, since it can grasp nothing true with certitude except through her teaching. You can therefore see through yourself the truth which teaches you, if concupiscences and phantasms do not impede you and interpose themselves like clouds between you and the ray of truth.

4. Now the *operation* of the *elective* power is attended to in *counsel*, in *judgement* and in *desire*. — *Counsel* lies in inquiring which is better, this or that. But nothing is called better except by approach to the best; and approach is according to greater assimilation: no one therefore knows whether this be better than that unless he knows that it is more assimilated to the best. But no one
knows that something is more assimilated to another unless he knows that other; for I do not know that this man is like Peter unless I know or am acquainted with Peter: to everyone *taking counsel*, therefore, the notion of the highest good is necessarily impressed.

Now certain *judgement* about the matters of counsel is through some law. But no one judges with certitude through a law unless he is certain that that law is right, and that he ought not to judge it; yet our mind judges concerning itself: since therefore it cannot judge concerning the law through which it judges, that law is higher than our mind, and through this it judges, according as it has been impressed upon it. But nothing is higher than the human mind except he alone who made it: therefore in judging our *deliberative* power reaches to the divine laws, if it resolves by a *full resolution*.

*Desire*, however, is principally of that which most of all moves it. Now that most moves which is most loved; and what is most loved is to be blessed; and to be blessed is not had except through the best and the ultimate end: nothing therefore does human *desire* seek after except because it is the highest good, or because it is toward it, or because it has some effigy of it. So great is the force of the highest good that nothing can be loved by a creature except through desire of it, which creature is then deceived and errs when it accepts the effigy and the simulacrum for the truth.

See therefore how near the soul is to God, and how memory leads into eternity, understanding into truth, and the elective power into the highest goodness, according to their operations.

5. Now according to the *order*, the *origin* and the *relation* of these powers it leads into the most blessed Trinity itself. — For from memory *arises* understanding as its offspring, since we then understand when the likeness which is in the memory issues forth in the edge of the intellect, which is nothing other than a word; and from memory and understanding love is breathed forth as the bond of both. These three, namely the *generating mind*, the *word* and *love*, are in the soul as regards memory, understanding and will, which are consubstantial, coequal and coeval, mutually interpenetrating one another. If therefore God is a perfect spirit, he has *memory*, *understanding* and *will*; he has also a *Word* begotten and a *Love* breathed forth, which are necessarily distinguished, since one is produced by the other — not *essentially*, not *accidentally*, therefore *personally*.

While therefore the mind considers itself, it rises through itself as through a mirror to speculate upon the blessed Trinity of the Father, the Word and Love — three persons coeternal, coequal and consubstantial, in such wise that each one is in each of the others, yet one is not the other, but those three are one God.

6. For this speculation, which the soul has of its principle three and one through the trinity of its powers, by which it is the image of God, it is *aided* by the lights of the sciences, which perfect and inform it and represent the most blessed Trinity in a threefold way. — For all philosophy is either *natural*, or *rational*, or *moral*. The first treats of the cause of being, and therefore leads into the *power of the Father*; the second, of the ground of understanding, and therefore leads into the *wisdom of the Word*; the third, of the order of living, and therefore leads into the *goodness of the Holy Spirit*.

*Again*, the *first* is divided into metaphysics, mathematics and physics. And the first is concerned with the essences of things, the second with numbers and figures, the third with natures, powers and diffusive operations. And therefore the first leads into the *first principle*, the *Father*, the second into his *image*, the *Son*, the third into the *gift of the Holy Spirit*.

The *second* is divided into grammar, which makes men able to express; into logic, which makes them keen to argue; into rhetoric, which makes them apt to persuade or to move. And this likewise intimates the mystery of the most blessed Trinity itself.

The *third* is divided into the monastic, the economic and the political. And therefore the first intimates the *unbegottenness of the first principle*, the second the *familiarity of the Son*, the third the *liberality of the Holy Spirit*.

7. Now all these sciences have certain and infallible rules, as lights and rays descending from the eternal law into our mind. And therefore our mind, irradiated and suffused with such splendours, unless it be blind, can be led by the hand through its very self to contemplating that eternal light. But the irradiation and consideration of this light suspends the wise in admiration, and on the contrary leads the unwise, who
do not believe that they may understand, into disturbance, that there may be fulfilled that word of the prophet: *Thou enlightenest wonderfully from the everlasting hills; all the foolish of heart were troubled.*

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