Dist. 11, Art. 2, 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/2/d/11/q/bon-sent-II-d11-a2-q3
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### Question III.

### *Whether the Angel incurs any harm from the damnation of the one in his custody.*

Third, it is asked whether the Angel incurs any harm from the damnation of the one in his custody. And that he does, it seems:

*To the opposite.* 1. Third [Book of] Kings, chapter twenty: *Guard this man; if he should fall, your soul will be for his soul;* from which it is gathered that the Lord commits [the man] to be guarded on this pact, that, if the one guarded is lost, he shall be required from the hand of the guardian. If therefore a man is lost, it seems that the Angel guarding him incurs danger to his own salvation; and this seems

to be what Origen says on that text of Numbers chapter twenty-five: *They were initiated to Baal-Peor;* the Gloss: «A good Angel is set over [him], who is blamed for offenses and praised for things well done».

2. Likewise, Isaiah chapter thirty-three: *The Angels of peace shall weep bitterly;* it is clear, however, that they weep only on account of the misery and damnation of men: therefore if they sympathize most with those whom they guard, it seems that from the damnation of those they incur groan and lamentation, and so some loss of joy.

3. Likewise, «if the opposite is the cause of the opposite, also the proposed of the proposed»; but the salvation of men in their custody generates joy and congratulation in the guarding Angels: therefore damnation will generate groan and compassion.

4. Likewise, just as the completion of desire delights the soul, so frustration saddens it; but the Angel, because he desires that the one he guards be saved, rejoices when he is saved, because his desire is fulfilled: therefore when from his damnation he is frustrated, it seems etc.

5. Likewise, the punishment of Arius always grows on account of the multiplication of those whom by his error he draws to damnation: therefore on the contrary, from our salvation grows the reward of the Angels guarding us. If therefore we are damned, since they themselves ought to glory in us or about us, it seems that they suffer loss of glory.

6. Likewise, the evil angels rejoice when they can drag a man to torments, and this is because they hate men, whom they harass and tempt: therefore if the good Angels love those whom they guard, it seems that on the contrary they grieve.

**On the contrary:** *Fundamental [arguments].* 1. The good Angel is blessed; but the blessed is he to whom all things succeed according to his nod; and to him who is of this sort, nothing harmful can befall: therefore it seems that from the damnation of those whom they guard, they incur no harm.

2. Likewise, the good Angel conforms his will to the divine will: therefore if God does not will to save except the predestinate, it seems that neither does the good Angel: therefore if no predestinate is damned, no one is damned whom the good Angel does not will to be damned: therefore it seems that from no one's damnation is he saddened.

3. Likewise, grief and sadness are not without punishment, and punishment is not without prior fault; but in the blessed Angels there was never fault: therefore neither was there nor can there be sadness.

4. Likewise, the Angel does not merit more in ministering to the good than to the evil, since out of equally good will he ministers to each: therefore if recompense is weighed according to merit, the Angel is not less recompensed when he guards a foreknown [reprobate] than when he guards a predestinate: therefore it seems that from the [reprobate's] damnation the Angel incurs no harm.

*Incident question 1.* Adjoining this it is asked whether the Angel *wills* him whom he guards to be saved, when it has been revealed to him that he is foreknown [as a reprobate]. If he does not will him to be saved, then it seems he guards him unwillingly; if he does will it, then it seems that his will is not conformed to the divine will nor even fulfilled.

*Incident question 2.* Likewise, when he guards a foreknown [reprobate], I ask: what reward is given to him from this? *Substantial* not, it is clear; *accidental* not, as it seems, because that consists in the salvation of those whom they guard, as is clear in the reward of the *aureola* which preachers have.

### Conclusion.

> *The Angels from the damnation of those whom they guard neither conceive a groan nor incur any loss of glory.*

**I respond:** For the understanding of what has been said it must be noted that on this matter different [authors] have held differently.

*Opinion 1.* For some have wished to say that the blessed Angels, from the damnation of those whom they guard, although they incur no *loss of glory*, nevertheless conceive a *groan of mercy*. For although by the sublimity of glory they are immortal and impassible, they are nevertheless not incompassionate. And they take this from a certain word of Bernard, who seems to say this; and they say that the text of Isaiah quoted above is to be so understood. — *It is disproved.* But this does not seem intelligible, how anyone can *suffer with* and not *suffer*. Nor does it seem probable that the Angels are moved by any piety and mercy toward the reprobate, since they themselves most greatly zealously pursue justice and the divine glory, as those who are now already established in the perfect

state of justice. On account of which Gregory in a certain homily says that toward the reprobate the souls of the just have no compassion. For he speaks thus: «The souls of the just, although by the goodness of their nature they have mercy, even now, joined to the justice of their Author, are constrained by such rectitude that they are moved by no compassion toward the reprobate»; he is speaking of the Blessed.

*Opinion 2 and the conclusion.* And on account of this there is another position, that the guarding Angels, from the damnation of those whom they guard, neither conceive a *groan* nor incur any *loss of glory*. They do not conceive a *groan* on account of the plenitude of joy, which is so perfect that in no way does it admit the admixture of a contrary. They also do not suffer *loss* on account of the stability of the good they have attained: for they have nothing which they could lose, neither on the side of *merit* nor on the side of *reward*, since they are confirmed in glory and in justice. And since *loss* names the loss of some good [already] had, therefore from no event can they suffer any loss. — And the reasons advanced for this are to be conceded.

*Solution of the opposing [arguments].* 1. 2. To what is objected, that God will require the soul of the guarded from the hand of the guardian; it must be said that this is true when [the guarded] perishes through the guardian's negligence. And because in the blessed Angels no negligence falls, therefore from their hand no damned [soul] is required. And for this reason the word of Origen which follows, if taken simply, is false. For in no way will the good Angels be blamed nor brought to judgment; unless perhaps someone should say that this is to be understood thus: that they will be brought to judgment not for their own condemnation, but to make manifest that the reprobate are damned from their own malice, not from their guardians' negligence; or unless someone understands Origen's word in such a way that *Angels* are there called *prelates*. — And by this mode the text of Isaiah which follows can be understood or expounded, so that *Angels of peace* are there called *good prelates*. If, however, someone understands [it] of the blessed Angels according to the truth, the bitterness of weeping does not indicate true grief, but notes some conformity in outward sign or effect; and that can be understood as said by *anthropopathy*, just as God is said to *have been touched with grief of heart inwardly*, Genesis chapter six.

3. To what is objected, that if the opposite is the cause of the opposite etc.; it must be said that this maxim has an exception where the other [opposite] is present by nature or in the manner of nature, just as also the maxim that *opposites are by nature [apt] to come about concerning the same [subject]*. And since the blessed Angel is susceptible of joy, but not of sadness, therefore he can rejoice over salvation, although he is not saddened by damnation.

4. To what is objected, that frustration of desire saddens; it must be said that a desire is then frustrated when someone wants something in *every event* or *absolutely*, and that does not come about; but when he wants it *under a condition*, and that condition does not stand, if what he wants does not come about, on this account the desire is not said to be *frustrated*. And so it is in the matter at hand. For the Angel desires the one he guards to be beatified, if he himself shall faithfully wish to cleave to Christ; and this never fails to come about. And because the one who is damned departs from the appended condition, therefore in the Angel's desire he places no frustration when he does not arrive at that which the Angel desired for him.

5. To what is objected, that from our salvation the reward of the Angels grows; it must be said that it is true that the *accidental* reward grows; nevertheless it does not follow from this that from the failure of salvation the Angels incur harm or damage, because *harm* or *damage* is with respect to a thing already *had*. But if it is with respect to a thing *to be had*, this is only when from some impediment some need and imperfection remains in him who is impeded. But this is not so in the matter at hand, because, however much the one who is guarded be damned, nevertheless the *Note.* Angel has his reward intact both as to the joy which he has in *God*, and as to the joy which he has *in himself* or from his own good — for he will rejoice over the good works which he did concerning the one whom he guarded — and as to the joy which he has in *another*, because when one falls, another *receives his crown*, as was expounded in the first book; and so, if the angelic ruin is not repaired by the one he guards, it will be repaired by another. Although therefore on account of the fault of that one, lest he rejoice over him, he suffers an *impediment*, and from such a figure of speech perhaps Origen says he is to be blamed; nevertheless from this he incurs no *loss*.

6. To what is objected, that the evil angel rejoices over damnation: therefore etc.; it must be said that the case is not similar, because, just as it is not [possible] to find evil entirely unmixed with good, but it is [possible] to find good entirely unmixed with evil; so the reprobation of the angels in some way admits joy, though impure, but perfect beatification suffers with it no torment or groan.

From what has been said there appear those two things which were last asked, namely concerning the *will* and *reward* of the Angels

guarding the evil. — *To incident question 1.* For they will, by an *absolute* will, that the evil whom they know to be foreknown [as reprobate] be damned; but as far as *in themselves* lies, they would wish them saved; and therefore they do not guard them unwillingly, because, although they know they labor *in vain* to lead them to salvation, nevertheless they know that they labor *fruitfully* in this, that they hold them back lest they incur greater damnation. — *Four effects of custody concerning souls.* For a fourfold principal effect of angelic custody is wont to be assigned concerning souls. One is that the soul should advance in the good of grace; another, that it should not fall into the evil of fault; a third, that if it fall, it should afterward rise again; a fourth, that it should not fall into evil as often or as deeply as the adversary incites. — *Another solution.* It could also be said otherwise, that it is not revealed to the Angels which of those whom they guard ought to be saved or damned; this however is not certain.

*To incident question 2.* On the *reward*, however, it must be said that just as the end of the craftsman is twofold: one *in himself*, and another *in another*, as is clear in the rhetorician, whose end is to speak ornately, and this is the end *in himself*, and another, to persuade another, and this is the end *in another*; so also the accidental reward of the Angel is twofold: one by which he rejoices over the *good works* which he did; another, by which he rejoices over the *salvation of him* whom he guarded. And just as a craftsman, if he have the first end and lack the second, is nevertheless said perfectly to have his *method*, if he has omitted nothing of the contingencies; so the Angel who has faithfully guarded one who is damned by his own fault, has perfect merit and reward, while he glories in his own good works. But that joy which is over the multiplication of good works is not the *substantial* reward, since it is not of the highest good, but the *accidental*; nor however is it the *aureola*, because not every accidental reward is the *aureola*, but only that which has *pre-excellence*.

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