Dist. 37, Part 1, 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/37/q/bon-sent-I-d37-p1-a1-q1
----------------------------------------
### Article I.
#### *That to be everywhere is fitting to God.*

### Question I.
#### *Whether God is in all things.*

That [God], however, is in all things, is shown thus:

1. The Philosopher in the *first [book of the] Philosophy* [says]: "The simpler something is, the more it is needed by many and is found in many things"; but God is most simple at the limit of simplicity: therefore he is found in all things. But he is not found except where he is: therefore he is in all.

2. Likewise, the prior the cause, the more universal; therefore the first cause is the most universal; but the more universal something is, the more it flows into many things: therefore since the first cause is the most universal, it flows into all things. But everything which flows into something is present to it according to power — for nowhere and never does an agent operate except through the presence of [its] power — but God by reason of his simplicity is the same as his power: therefore since the power of God is in all things, his substance also is in all things.

3. Likewise, this is seen by the impossible: because everything which is in one limited thing in such a way that it is not in another, is limited and constrained; but this is impossible concerning God: therefore he is not in one thing without being in all.

4. Likewise, if God is in one thing in such a way that he is not in another, either he can be in that in which he is not, or not: if he cannot, then he is not omnipotent; if he can be, and is not, since the thing is not changed, then he can be changed. Therefore if God is not in all things, either he is not omnipotent, or [he is] not unchangeable; both of which are impossible.

**On the contrary:**

1. The more something is separated from a dark nature, the more it is unmixed and knows under a more noble light; but God knows most clearly: therefore he is most separated from a dark nature. But every creature is darkness: therefore God is in no, or in very few, created things.

2. Likewise, the more a mover is distant from the movable, the more sufficiently it moves — whence the soul moves more sufficiently than a natural form, and the Intelligence than the soul — but God is the most sufficient mover and operator: therefore he is supremely distant from every movable thing: therefore either he is in no things, or in few.

3. Likewise, "every united power is more infinite than [a power] multiplied"; but the divine power is most infinite: therefore most united. But the more something is united, the less diffused and found in fewer things: therefore etc.

4. Likewise, it is asked: what necessity is there to place God in all things? It seems, that none on God's part. For it belongs to nobility in an agent, that it can act where it is not, likewise, that it can make an effect standing by itself — otherwise the works of God are weaker than the works of created [agents], of artisans, which are preserved in being when they themselves are absent — therefore if there is no necessity, it seems then to be a superfluity. But it is impossible that there be superfluity in God: therefore etc.

### Conclusion.

> *God is in all things, the reason for which is both his own perfection and the indigence of things.*

**I respond:** It must be said that God is in all things, just as David himself testifies, saying: *If I ascend into heaven, thou art there* etc.

The necessity, however, of God's existing in all things is taken both on the part of his perfection, and on the part of the indigence of things. On his own part, on account of the highest immensity and the highest power;

and the ground of both is the highest simplicity. For because he is supremely simple, constrained to nothing, therefore he is found in all things as immense; because he is supremely simple, therefore [he is] infinitely most powerful, and therefore his power is in all things; and the power is the same as the substance, and therefore it is necessary that he be in all things.

On the part of the creature there is necessity, because the creature has in itself both possibility and emptiness, and the cause of both is that it has been produced from nothing. For because the creature is and has received being from another, who made it to be, since previously it was not; from this it is not its own being, and therefore is not pure act, but has possibility; and by reason of this it has fluxibility and variability, therefore it lacks stability, and therefore it cannot be except through the presence of him who gave it being. An open example of this is in the impression of the form of a seal in water, which is not preserved for a moment except with the seal present. — And again, because the creature has been produced from nothing, therefore it has emptiness; and because nothing empty is supported in itself, it is necessary that every creature be sustained through the presence of Truth. And there is a similar [example]: if someone were to place a heavy body in the air, which is as it were empty, it would not be sustained. So also in the matter at hand.

1. To that which is objected concerning distance and unmixedness, it must be said that something is united to something else in three ways: either according to presence only, or according to presence and dependence, or according to presence and dependence and concomitance in matter. In the first way is the [sun's] ray in the air, in the second way the soul in the body, in the third way liquid in liquid. What is in something in the first way is not mixed [with it], likewise what is [in it] in the second way is not properly mixed, but only what is [in it] in the third [way]. And in the first way indeed God is in things, not in the second or third.

2. To that which is objected concerning the distance of the mover from the movable, it must be said that there is distance through absence, and this impedes, [it does] not help motion; and there is distance through independence, and this helps, since the more perfect and more absolute the mover is, the less it depends and the more sufficient it is; and in this way God is distant even [while] present.

3. To that which is objected, that a united power is more infinite; it must be said that the unity of a power, which makes for its magnitude, is *per se* attended to with respect to the subject, *per accidens* with respect to the object. With respect to the subject it is attended to according to the simplicity of the subject, but with respect to the object according to non-distance from the power, since a power is the more potent the closer to the object. Since therefore the divine power in [its] substance is most simple and is never separated from the substance, therefore in many things it is most infinite, since most united in many [things], as in one. "For everywhere is the center of that power," as Trismegistus says.

4. What is objected last has already been solved, since the necessity is on the part of God and of the creature, as has been seen. — As for what is objected, that a created agent operates where it is not and produces an effect which stands without it; it must be said that it is not similar in God. For if this is observed in a created artisan, this comes from a defect of perfection: because a created agent is limited, and differs from its power, it can operate through [its] power where it is not; again, since it acts on a presupposition and cannot [act] as to the whole, therefore the effect does not totally depend on it. But God has the opposite conditions, since [he is] infinite, and the power and the substance in him are the same, and he produces the whole; therefore [the case] is not similar.