Dist. 43, Art. 1, Q. 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/1/d/43/q/bon-sent-I-d43-a1-q3
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### Question III. *Whether the divine power extends to an actually infinite effect.*

Thirdly, inquiry is made concerning the infinity of the divine power with regard to its work — namely, whether the divine power extends to an actually infinite effect. And that it does is shown as follows.

1. Power stands proportionate to its work, so that so great a power extends to so great a work: therefore a greater power to a greater, and an actually infinite power to an actually infinite work.

2. Likewise, every power that operates from its whole self, if it is infinite, produces an infinite, since it operates from its whole virtue; but the divine power, being most simple, operates entirely from itself: therefore it seems that it produces an infinite effect. If you say that this cannot be because of the defect and limitation of the effect itself; on the contrary: a power is in vain that is not reduced to act; whence also the Philosopher says that an active power to which no passive corresponds is in vain: therefore either the divine power is in vain infinite, or there corresponds to it an infinite effect and an infinite passive power.

3. Likewise, every power can manifest itself; therefore the divine power, since it is infinite, can manifest its own infinity; but infinity is not manifested except in an infinite effect: therefore etc. If you say that it is manifested in the production of the Son and the Holy Spirit, then it is objected that the Holy Spirit has an infinite power: therefore it can manifest the same, but not in the production of an infinite person: therefore in the production of a creature.

4. Likewise, every possible is positable into being; but God can produce infinites: therefore that infinites be produced is possible, and therefore positable. But «when the possible is posited in being, nothing inconvenient follows»: therefore, supposing that God should make infinites, nothing inconvenient follows. But God can do everything that it is not inconvenient to be able to do or to make: therefore God can make there be actually infinite things.

5. Likewise, let A be called every creatable thing; then I ask: A is either finite or infinite. If finite, and God can do nothing except A: therefore He can do nothing but finite things: therefore His power is finite. If infinite, and God can make A: therefore He can make some actually infinite things.

6. Likewise, «the continuum is divisible to infinity»; I ask whether God can reduce the potency of the continuum to act. If He cannot, then the potency of the continuum exceeds God's power, which is absurd, since then the divine power would be finite. If He can reduce it to act altogether — but this is not the case unless it be actually divided into infinite parts: therefore etc.

**On the contrary:**

1. That He cannot effect a thing infinite in intensity is shown thus, since nothing is greater than the absolutely infinite: therefore if He produces an infinite effect, then nothing is greater than that effect: therefore God is not greater. If, then, it pertains to the highest nobility in God that nothing can be equated with Him, to produce such an effect is against the nobility of the divine power: therefore etc.

2. Likewise, everything that is actually infinite is supremely simple. For if there is any composition, then there is contraction and limitation in it. If, therefore, God produces an infinite effect, that effect is most simple; but in what is most simple, essence, goodness, and power are the same: therefore if the effect is infinite in power and goodness, then it is the highest good, therefore not good on account of another, therefore not good on account of God, therefore neither from God, since «the Lord has wrought all things for Himself», and the end is the same as the first

principle. Therefore if it is infinite, it is not from God: therefore it is not an effect; and thus it is plain etc.

3. Likewise, if God can extend to an actually infinite effect, I ask you whether He can extend to another. If not, then in acting He loses power, and His power is weakened by acting. If, therefore, He can extend to another effect like that one, suppose that He should make it; let it be supposed, then. These two effects are similar in nature, therefore they are in the same genus: therefore if they are in the same genus, then they have something further in which they agree, and certain things proper to each in which they differ; therefore they are exceeded by something, and contracted by something. But all such things are finite: therefore etc.

4. Likewise, that He cannot make actually infinite things is shown thus, since there is nothing more than the infinite: therefore if He produced actually infinite things, He could not produce more: therefore God is impotent. But nothing can make God impotent: therefore etc.

5. Likewise, where there is actual infinity according to number, there fails standing and order and distinction; but the divine wisdom does not suffer that God should make anything without measure and mode: therefore etc.

### Conclusion.

> *The divine power can make an infinite in potency, but in no way an infinite in act.*

**I respond:** It must be said that the infinite is twofold, namely in act and in potency. An infinite in potency God can make and does make; an infinite in act He neither can make nor does make. He cannot, I say, make one, because it is fitting neither to Himself nor to the creature.

*To Himself it is not fitting:* for since He is supremely good, He cannot make anything except what is good, and so He cannot make anything except a thing ordered to Himself. Since, therefore, order presupposes number, and number presupposes measure — because things are not ordered to anything except as numbered, and they are not numbered unless limited — therefore it was necessary that God should make all things in number, weight, and measure, nor could He nor can He make them otherwise, neither an infinite nor actually infinite things.

The reason is also that this is in no way fitting to a creature. For the actually infinite is pure act; otherwise, if it had anything of limitation and contraction, it would be finite; but what is pure act is the highest being by essence, and nothing such receives being from another essence nor from nothing. If, therefore, a creature, by the very fact that it is a creature, is from elsewhere and from nothing, in no way can it be pure act, in no way can it be infinite. — And if one infinite thing cannot exist, in no way can infinites exist according to number, since it is necessary that those several be reduced to some one creature; but for infinites to be reduced to a finite is impossible: therefore it is plain etc. And that they are necessarily reduced to some finite is plain: since it is necessary to posit an ordering in creatures, not only toward God but also toward one another.

The sum, therefore, of the answer is, that it does not become God to make a creature without order and measure; and the reason is on the side of the creature, since it is necessary that every creature be limited, by virtue of being from nothing and by the very fact that it is composite.

**To the arguments:**

1. To that which is objected, that so great a power extends to so great an effect or work: it must be said that there is *work-as-operating* and *work-as-operated*: work-as-operating, as creating; work-as-operated, as the creature. It must be said, then, that the work-as-operating is infinite, as the Creator Himself, but the work-as-operated must of necessity be finite. As to what is objected, that the work is proportioned to the power: if this be understood of the work-as-operating or of action in general, it is true; but if it be understood of the work-as-operated, it does not hold, except when cause and effect stand toward one another by univocation and are of one genus; but that is not the case here.

2. To that which is objected, that God operates from His whole power: it must be said that an agent acting from its whole power either acts by nature, and this acts only as much as it can and as much as it itself is — where the production is of like to like; or it acts by deliberation and will, and such an agent acts only according to order and as much as it wills: whence from the same power it makes a great thing and a small thing; and so God acts. — To that which is objected, that a power that is not reduced to act is in vain: this is true of a power which is completed in act; but the divine power is not completed by act, and therefore is not in vain, even if it has no corresponding passive

power. Yet that proposition is understood not to hold true of a power that extends to infinites, if it be understood that it should be wholly reduced to act; it is nevertheless reduced, and can be reduced, in part; and therefore it is not in vain.

3. To that which is objected, that the divine power, since it is infinite, ought to manifest its own infinity in an infinite effect: it must be said that God manifests His infinity in an infinite according to power, as is plain, since, as has been shown above, an interminable duration manifests an infinite virtue. In an infinite according to act, however, it cannot be manifested simpliciter, because it is not becoming, but only proportionally, since being exceeds non-being to infinity; and yet God makes being out of nothing, between which there is infinite distance.

Whence since the divine power is called infinite in three ways: by the eternity of its duration, by the immensity of its virtue, and by the generality or numerosity of its effects — the first is manifested through what is infinite in duration, which is finite in act, infinite in potency; the second through creation from nothing, where there is infinite distance because of complete disproportion; the third is manifested partly by position, partly by privation, since He has made so many and can still extend to more, and He has not made so many that He could not still extend to more; yet this is manifested by another infinity, by the twofold manifest infinity. And thus it is plain that it is not necessary that there be an actual infinite.

It can nevertheless be said, as has been touched on, that the virtue of the Father is manifested in the production of the Word, and consequently the whole divine virtue, since the virtue of the Son and the Holy Spirit is one, and they are equal in virtue.

4. To that which is objected concerning the possible, that it can be posited: it must be said that there is what is *possible from an infinite power*, and what is *possible according to a finite power*. *That which is possible according to a finite power* can be posited, since it can altogether be reduced to act; but *that which is possible according to an infinite power* cannot be posited, since it is always in being reduced and never in having-been-reduced.

5. To that which is objected, that A be called every creatable thing: granted. As to what it asks, whether A is finite or infinite, I say that it is infinite, but not actually infinite — only potentially; and therefore it does not follow that if God extends to A, He extends to the actually infinite. And if it be said: let it be supposed that God should make A — it must be said that it is not positable, for the reason already given.

6. To that which is asked, whether He can reduce the potency of the continuum to act: it must be said that just as in the continuum the passive potency is infinite with respect to division, so in God the active is infinite. Whence just as the continuum can be divided to infinity, yet it is impossible that it be totally divided, otherwise it would not be infinite; so to divide to infinity is possible, but to reduce to act [is not]; but as it is impossible that the divine power be terminated, so it is impossible that it be at the term of division. Whence God can reduce the potency of the continuum to act, since He can be in reducing and always in reducing, such that the power never extends itself more than the divine action: but yet the continuum can never be in having-been-reduced, just as neither can God be in having-reduced.

It must be granted, therefore, that it is impossible that anything be actually infinite save only God and His power. And this is what Hugh of St. Victor says: «As time does not equal the eternity of God, nor place His immensity, so neither does sense equal His wisdom, nor virtue His goodness, nor work His power». Whence when it is said that God can make infinites, infinity is noted with respect to the power, not with respect to the work. Whence some have distinguished thus: *the continuum can be divided to infinity*, since that determination can determine either the verb *can*, or the verb *be-divided*. Yet in whatever way it be distinguished, it must always be understood that actual infinity is proper to God alone.