Dist. 36, Art. 1, Q. 1
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/1/d/36/q/bon-sent-I-d36-a1-q1
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### Article I.
#### *On the existence of things in God.*

### Question I.
#### *Whether things were in God from eternity.*

That things, however, were in God from eternity, appears thus:

1. Because a knowing agent acts through the species of a thing which it has within itself; but a thing is in the soul, since its likeness is in it: therefore likewise also in God.

If you say that that exemplar is nothing of the thing, therefore according to it the thing ought not to be said to be in God; on the contrary: the exemplar which is cognitive and productive contributes more to the being of a thing than that which is produced by the thing: if therefore by reason of an exemplar produced by the thing the thing is in the soul, much more strongly ought it to be said to be in God by reason of the producing exemplar; but this from eternity: therefore etc.

2. Likewise, a produced likeness is not truly something, but [is] of something; but the exemplar through which God knows is truly God himself: therefore the exemplar of a thing is more truly in God than in the soul: therefore much more strongly is a thing in God than in the soul, and so etc.

3. Likewise, since a thing can come forth from matter, the thing is in matter, and yet it is not totally in the potency of matter, but rather of the agent: therefore if things which are in the potency of God are totally there, much more strongly ought they to be said to be in him, and so etc.

**On the contrary:**

1. What comes forth through creation is utterly nothing before it is created; but creatures so come forth: therefore they are utterly nothing before they are produced. But what is not is neither here nor there: therefore it is not in anything, and thus not in God either.

2. Likewise, what is in something is in it either according to itself, or according to something of itself; but a thing is not in God according to itself, since then the essence of the thing would be in God; nor according to something of itself, since nothing of it is eternal but the whole [is] from time: therefore etc.

3. Likewise, what is in something is in it according to actual being, or potential; but a creature is not in God according to actual being, since then it would actually be: therefore if it is in God, it is according to potential being. But every potential being, insofar as it is such, is changeable: if therefore a creature is in God from eternity according to potential being, from eternity it is in God according to changeable being. But this is false: therefore so is the first.

4. Likewise, if a creature is said to be in God because it can be from God: therefore since for anything to be from God from eternity is impossible, a creature will not be in God from eternity by reason of potency.

### Conclusion.

> *Things are in God from eternity according to the presence of a likeness and according to causative potency, but not according to real existence.*

**I respond:** It must be said that something is said to be in something else in three ways: either according to actual

existence, or according to the presence of a likeness, or according to causative potency. In the first way things are in the universe, in the second way in a knowing substance, in the third way in their cause. In these last two ways things are in God, since he is one knowing things before they come to be, and able to produce [them]. Hence because he knew from eternity, and the potency by which he produced [them] in time was in God from eternity, therefore things are said to have been in God from eternity.

1. To that which is objected: that what is nothing is not in anything; it must be said that this is true according to the first mode of existing, but false according to the second and according to the third, since that which now is nothing, God can make.

2. To that which is objected, that what is in something, is in it according to itself etc.; it must be said that as to the second mode things are in God according to something of themselves, since according to an exemplar. But "something of a thing" can be said in three ways, namely essentially, effectively, and causatively, as a part, an effect, or a cause. In this third way that exemplar is something of the thing. — As to the third mode, namely causative potency, the thing in itself is not in act, but in potency, since its being can be produced by God.

3. Likewise to the next [objection], it must be said that by reason of the exemplar things are actually in God; by reason of creation potentially, since they can be produced.

What is objected: that what is in God is unchangeable; it must be said that this is true of that which is actually in God; but what can be produced by God is changeable. Or it must be said that the possible has comparison to the divine potency, which is unchangeable, and thus is unchangeable; or to the connoted temporal [thing] outside, and thus has changeable being.

4. To that which is objected concerning creation, it must be said that although the act of creating could not have been from eternity, nevertheless the potency of creating was in God from eternity.