Dist. 37
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/37/q/bon-sent-I-d37-littera
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### DISTINCTION XXXVII.

### PART I.

#### Chapter I.

*In what ways God is said to be in things.*

And since it has been shown in part how all things are said to be in God, it seems that there must here be added in what ways *God is said to be in things*, if at all the human mind is able worthily even in part to think it, or the tongue suffices to speak it. — It is therefore to be known that God, immutably always existing in Himself, is by presence, by power, by essence in every nature or essence without His being defined [by it], and in every place without circumscription, and in every time without mutability. And besides He is more excellently in the holy spirits and souls — namely as indwelling by grace — and most excellently in the man Christ, in whom *the fullness of divinity dwells corporeally*, as the Apostle says. For in Him God dwelt not by the grace of adoption but by the grace of union. Lest however certain men, because these things exceed the capacity of human understanding, should presume to charge them with falsity, they seem to me to be fortified by the authorities of the Saints. Blessed Gregory on the Song of Songs: « Although God is in all things in a common manner — by presence, by power, by substance — He is nevertheless said to be in a more familiar manner by grace in those who consider the magnificence of God's works more keenly and more faithfully ». For concerning this same [matter] Augustine to Dardanus, in the book *On the Presence of God*, says: « Since God is an incorporeal nature and immutably living, abiding in Himself with eternal stability, He is wholly present to all things, and wholly to each; but those in whom He dwells have Him according to the diversity of their capacity, some more, some less — those whom He Himself builds up for Himself as a most beloved temple by the grace of His goodness ». Hilary too, in the eighth book *On the Trinity*, most plainly teaches that God is everywhere: « God, he says, of immense virtue, a living power, who is nowhere not present, nor anywhere absent, makes Himself wholly known through His [works], so that where His [works] are, He Himself is understood to be. Yet not in a corporeal mode — as though, when He is somewhere, He should not also be believed to be everywhere — since He does not cease to be in all things ». Ambrose, in the first book *On the Holy Spirit*, proves that the Holy Spirit is not a creature because He is everywhere, which is proper to divinity, saying thus: « Since every creature is circumscribed by certain limits of its own nature, how should anyone dare call the Holy Spirit a creature, who has no circumscribed and determined power, who both in all things and everywhere always is? — which is, indeed, proper to divinity and lordship ». The same in the same [work]: « It is the Lord's [work] to fill all things, who says: *I fill heaven and earth*. If therefore it is the Lord who fills heaven and earth, who then can judge the Holy Spirit to be without share in lordship and divine power, who has filled the orb [of the world]? and what is more, has filled even Jesus, the Redeemer of the whole world ». From these and many other authorities it is openly shown that God is everywhere in every creature essentially, by presence, and by power.

#### Chapter II.

*That God does not dwell wherever He is, but conversely.*

But in the Saints He also dwells, in whom He is by grace. For not wherever He is, does He there dwell, but where He dwells, there He is. He dwells in the good alone, who are His temple and His seat. Whence through Isaiah the Lord says: *Heaven is My seat, but earth is the footstool of My feet*; for in the elect, who are heaven, God dwells and reigns — those who, devoted to His will, obey [Him]; but the wicked, who are earth, He treads down by the rigor of judgment. Whence also in the book of Wisdom it is said, *The throne of wisdom is the soul of the just*, because in the just He is more specially than in other things, in all of which nevertheless He is whole. « Just as the soul, says Augustine in the Epistle to Jerome *On the Origin of the Soul*, is wholly present at once through all the particles of the body — neither lesser in lesser parts, nor greater in greater, but yet operating in some more intensely and in others more remissly, since in the individual particles of the body it is essentially whole »; so also God, since He is in all things essentially and whole, is nevertheless said to be more fully in those whom He inhabits, that is, in those in whom He so is that He makes them His temple. And such [men] are with Him already in part, but in beatitude perfectly; the wicked, however, even though they are there where He Himself is, who is nowhere absent, are nevertheless not *with* Him. Whence Augustine on John: « It was not enough to say, *Where I am, let them too be*, but He added *with Me*; because the wretched too can be where He also is, who is nowhere absent — but the Blessed are *with* Him, because they are not blessed except from Him ». *With* Him are those who enjoy Him and see Him as He is; the wicked however are not *with* Him, just as the blind in the light are not with the light. Nor are the good now so with Him as to see [Him] face to face, although they are in some manner with Him by faith. But how God dwells in the good, you will be able to understand to some degree from those things which were said above, when [the question] was treated of the temporal procession of the Holy Spirit, where there is set out, although in part — *for in part we know, and in part we prophesy* — how the Holy Spirit dwells in us, who does not dwell without the Father and the Son.

#### Chapter III.

*Where God was before there was a creature.*

But if you ask where God dwelt before the Saints were, we say that He dwelt in Himself. Whence Augustine in the book *Against Maximinus*: « *In His own temple*, he says, *God dwells* », « namely in the Saints, who are God's temple now, walking by faith; and they will be God's temple at some [future] time also after the manner of vision — in which [way] the Angels too are now God's temple. But someone will say: before God made heaven and earth, before He made the Saints, where was He dwelling? In Himself God was dwelling, with Himself He was dwelling, and with Himself He is. Therefore the Saints are not so the house of God that, if they were taken away, God would fall; rather God so dwells in the Saints that, if He Himself were to depart, they would fall ». — It must also be known that, as Augustine says in the book to Dardanus, it cannot be said save most foolishly that the Holy Spirit has no place in our body, since our soul has filled the whole [of it]. More foolishly still is it said that the Trinity is hindered somewhere by narrow [bounds], so that the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit cannot be together somewhere. « But that is much more wonderful, that, although God is everywhere whole, He yet does not in all things

dwell. Who, moreover, would dare to opine — unless he were utterly ignorant of the inseparability of the Trinity — that the Father and the Son could dwell in something in which the Holy Spirit does not dwell, or the Holy Spirit in something in which the Father and the Son do not dwell? It must therefore be confessed that God is everywhere by the presence of [His] divinity, but not everywhere by the grace of [His] indwelling. For on account of this indwelling of grace we do not say *Our Father, who art everywhere* — although this too is true — but *who art in heaven*, that is, in the Saints, in whom He is in some more excellent mode. — « That too is wonderful, that, as Augustine says in the same [work], God is the indweller of certain men *not yet knowing God*, and not [the indweller] of certain men *knowing God*. For these latter do not pertain to the temple of God — *who, knowing God, did not glorify [Him] as God*. To the temple of God pertain the little ones sanctified by the Sacrament of Christ and reborn by the Holy Spirit, who are not yet able to know God. Therefore He whom those [adults] could *not* know nor have, these [little ones] could have before they could know. But most blessed are those for whom this is to *have* God, [namely] to *know* [Him] ». — Here Augustine in some measure opens up how God dwells in someone — that is, is had — namely when He so is in someone that He is known and loved by him.

From the foregoing it is plain that God is everywhere whole by essence and dwells in the Saints by grace. And although it has been shown above, however slightly, by what reason He is said to dwell in certain ones, the order of treatment would urgently demand that this also be assigned, namely how He is everywhere by essence and whole, were it not that the sublimity and immensity of this consideration altogether exceeds the sense of the human mind. For as Chrysostom on the Epistle to the Hebrews says: « Just as we understand many things about God which we are utterly unable to put into speech, so we speak many things which we are not fit to understand — for example, that God is everywhere we know and we say; but how He is everywhere, we do not grasp by our understanding. Likewise, that there is a certain incorporeal power which is the cause of all good things, we know; but how, or what this is, we are utterly ignorant ».

Some men nevertheless, presuming to measure the immense by their own ingenuity, have handed down that this is so to be understood: that God is said to be everywhere by essence not because God's essence is properly in every place and in every creature, but because every nature, and everything which is naturally [something], in whatever place it be, has its being through Him — and [so does] every place in which that thing is. The same men also say that God is therefore said to be everywhere by presence or by power because all places are present to Him and the things which are in them, and He does not cease to operate something in them. For the places themselves, and whatever is in them, cannot remain unless He Himself preserves [them]. In them, therefore, God is said to be by substance, as they say, because by the power of His own substance He brings it about that the places too should *be*, and all things which are in them. — But although these things are true which they assert in setting out the meaning of the foregoing, in those words nevertheless by which God is said to be everywhere by essence, more is to be believed to be contained — [more] than living man is able to grasp.

#### Chapter IV.

*That God, although He is in all things essentially, is nevertheless not defiled by the filth of things.*

It is also wont to be asked by these same [men], how God can substantially be in all things, and yet not be touched by the defilements of corporeal filth. Which [question] is so frivolous that it is not even worthy of an answer — since even a created spirit cannot be defiled by the filth even of a leper's body, or however polluted [a body]. The sun also pours out its rays without polluting itself upon places and bodies not only clean but even unclean and stinking with filth, by contact with which men and certain other things are infected; but the rays of the sun, undefiled and uncontaminated, [continue to] exist while touching them. It is no wonder, therefore, if the divine essence — altogether simple and immutable — fills all places, and is in all creatures essentially, and yet is neither contaminated nor touched by the filth of any thing whatsoever. Whence Augustine in the book *On the Nature of the Good*: « Although in God, he says, are all things which He has created, those nevertheless who sin do not defile Him. Concerning whose Wisdom too, *which reaches mightily from end to end*, it is said: *It reaches all things on account of its own purity, and nothing defiled enters into it*. Some men fear what cannot happen, namely lest the truth and substance of God should be defiled by human flesh; and yet they preach that this visible sun scatters its rays through all dregs and filth and that those [rays] are kept clean and pure. If therefore visible clean things can be touched by visible unclean things and not defiled, how much more the invisible and immutable Truth »? Finally, let them answer what rather of God they think is to be answered: that He is nowhere by essence, or that [He is] everywhere, or somewhere — yet so that not everywhere? But who would dare to say either that the divine essence is nowhere, or that it is somewhere and not everywhere? For if it is so somewhere as not to be everywhere, then it is local. Therefore the [divine essence] is everywhere whole, [the essence] which contains the whole and penetrates the whole — which neither can be divided on account of its simplicity, nor stained on account of its purity, nor in any way comprehended on account of its immensity. Whence Augustine: *God is everywhere, to whom we draw near not by places but by actions*.

### PART II.

#### Chapter V.

*Although God is everywhere and always, yet [He is] not local, and is moved neither by place nor by time.*

And since the divine nature truly and essentially is in every place and in every time, He is yet not moved through places or through times, nor is He local, nor temporal. He is not local, because He is in no way circumscribed by place — since He is not so in one place as not to be in another, nor does He have dimension, like a body, to which according to place is assigned a beginning, middle, and end, and front and back, right and left, up and down, [a body] which by the interposition of itself makes the surrounding [parts] distant.

> *What it is to be changed according to time.*

To be changed through time is to be varied according to inner or outer qualities which are in the very thing which is being changed — as when it undergoes a vicissitude of joy, of grief, of knowledge, of forgetting, or a variation of form or of some outer quality. For this change which takes place according to time is a variation of qualities, which takes place in a corporeal or spiritual creature, and is therefore called *time*.

But concerning change of place, a great dispute is engaged among inquirers. For there are those who say that no spirit can in any way be changed by place — wishing universally to remove place from every spirit, since they assert that place consists only in dimension and circumscription, and they say that that alone is local, or in a place, which receives dimension and makes distance in place. And they say that Augustine held this — attributing change of time only to the spiritual creature, but [change] of place and of time to the corporeal. Whence Augustine on Genesis: « God, he says, omnipotent, in immutable eternity, will, [and] truth, always the same, moves the spiritual creature through time; He moves also through time and place the corporeal creature, in order that by that motion He may govern the natures which He has founded. When therefore He does any such thing, we ought not to opine that His substance, by which He is God, is changeable through times and places, or movable through times and places — since He Himself is both interior to every thing, because in Him are all things, and exterior to every thing, because He Himself is above all and more ancient than all, since He Himself is before all things; and newer than all, because He Himself is the same after all things », namely after the beginnings of all things. — Behold, here it is openly shown that God is changed or moved neither by places nor by times. The spiritual creature however is moved through time, but the corporeal also through time and place.

#### Chapter VI.

*In what ways something is said to be local or circumscriptible.*

But, as we said above, a thing is said to be local or circumscriptible in two ways, namely either because it receives dimension and makes distance, or because it is defined by the limit of place — both of which apply to the corporeal creature, but only the latter to the spiritual. For, as we said above, the corporeal creature is local or circumscriptible in such a way that it is determined by definition of place, and that — receiving dimension — it makes distance; the spiritual, however, is enclosed only by definition of place, since it so is somewhere, that it is not elsewhere; but it neither receives dimension nor makes distance in place, because if many spirits were here, they would not so cramp the place by themselves that it should contain less of bodies. And therefore Augustine attributes change of place to body, not to spirit, because, although a spirit passes from place to place, yet not in such a way that, circumscribed by dimensions, by the interposition of itself it should make a distance of [the parts] standing around, as does a body.

For in these two ways something is said in Scripture to be local or circumscriptible, and conversely: namely either because, receiving the dimension of length, makes distance of height and breadth in place, like a body; or because it is defined and determined by place, since, when it is somewhere, it is not found everywhere — which fits not only a body but also every created spirit. Every body therefore is in every way local; but a created spirit is in a certain way local, and in a certain way is not local. Local indeed it is called, because it is bounded by definition of place, since when it is present somewhere, it is not wholly found elsewhere; but it is not so local that, receiving dimension, it should make distance in place. Only the divine essence therefore is altogether non-local and incircumscriptible — which is moved neither by places in any way (namely either by finite determination, or by received dimension) nor by times (namely by affection and cognition). For by these two modes, namely by place or by time, takes place the change of the creature, who is far from the Creator.

#### Chapter VII.

*Whether created spirits are local and circumscriptible.* <!-- = Quaracchi Cap. VIII; see Latin note above -->

Created spirits therefore are in a place, and they pass from place to place, and they are in a certain way local and circum-

scriptible — but not in every mode in which corporeal creatures are. The uncreated Spirit, however, who is God, is indeed in a place and in every place, but altogether non-local and incircumscriptible. Whence Bede on Luke says: « When Angels come to us, so do they outwardly fulfill their ministry that nevertheless they assist inwardly before God by contemplation; because, although an angel is a circumscribed spirit, yet the highest Spirit, who is God, is uncircumscribed — within whom the Angel runs, wheresoever he is sent ». — Behold, here it is said that an angelic spirit is circumscribed, but the Spirit who is God is uncircumscribed. Elsewhere also Ambrose, showing the distance between the uncreated Spirit and the created spirit, says that the Seraphim pass from place to place, saying thus in the book *On the Trinity*: « Isaiah said: *That one of the Seraphim was sent to me*. And the Holy Spirit indeed is said to be *sent*, but the Seraphim *to one*; the [Holy] Spirit, however, to all. The Seraph is sent in ministry, the Spirit works the mystery. The Seraph passes from place to place — he does not fill all things — but he himself is filled by the Spirit ». — Here it is openly shown that the Angels are in a certain way local.

#### Chapter VIII.

*That God is everywhere without local motion.*

Let us therefore confess that the divine nature, on account of its immensity, is nowhere absent — and that it alone, altogether non-local and incircumscriptible, is enclosed by no place, but *reaches from end to end* — yet not by spacious magnitude nor by local motion, but by the immensity and immobility of its own essence. Whence Augustine to Dardanus says: « Let us not opine, as if by spacious magnitude, that God is diffused through all things as soil or this light is diffused, but rather as in two wise men, of whom one is greater than the other in body but is not wiser, the wisdom is one, and is not greater in the greater nor lesser in the lesser, nor lesser in one than in two: so also God, ruling and containing the world without labor, is whole in heaven, whole on earth, and whole in both, and contained by no place, but in Himself everywhere whole ». The same too, on the Psalm, says: « It pertains to the Word of God to be not in part, but to be everywhere through Himself. For this Wisdom of God, which *reaches mightily from end to end*, [does so] yet not by local motion but by its own immobility — just as if some stony mass should fill some place, it is said to *reach from* the end of that place *unto* the end, while yet it does not desert one [end] by occupying another. The Word, therefore, has no local motion; and that Wisdom is solid and is everywhere ». — From the foregoing it appears that God is so everywhere by essence that He is neither diffused by spacious magnitude, nor, [when] one place is left, occupies another — because He has no local motion. And therefore Augustine, wishing to cut off from God's purity every local motion and local circumscription, rather says that all things are *in Him*, than that He Himself is in [them] — and yet that He Himself is not anywhere, [and that] place, which is not in place, is [not where He is] — in the book of the *Eighty-Three Questions* saying thus: « *God is not anywhere*. What is anywhere is contained by place; what is contained by place is body; but God is not body: therefore He is not anywhere. And yet, because He is, and is not in a place, all things are rather in Him than He Himself anywhere; nor yet so [are they] in Him, as if He Himself were a place. For place is in space, which is occupied by the length and breadth and height of body; nor is God any such thing. All things therefore are in Him, and place is not. The temple of God is, however — improperly — called *place* of God, not because He is contained by it. But that [temple] is understood to be nothing better than a clean soul ». — Behold, here he says that God is not in a place. But it must be understood that He is not in a place *locally* — namely because He has neither circumscription nor local motion.

To this however it is wont to be objected thus: Daily there come to be creatures which were not before, and in them God is, although He was not before in them: therefore He is where He was not before, and on this account seems mutable. — But although daily He begins to be in creatures in which He was not before, because they were not, this nevertheless takes place without any change of Himself — in the same way as He began to be in the world, which He made, yet without any mutability of Himself; and likewise He ceases to be in [things] in which before He was, without any change of Himself; nor yet does He Himself desert the place, but the place ceases to be.

It seems already to have been sufficiently shown how all things are said to be in God, and God in all things — a discussion which we have taken up almost incidentally, because the matter about which our discourse was turning seemed to demand it. For we were treating of the science or wisdom of God, and when we said that God knows all things, the question was raised whether on account of the cognition which He has of all, all things are said to be in God, or [whether] Scripture said this for some other reason. The occasion of this question therefore led us into the foregoing discussion.

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