Dist. 3, Part 2, Art. 1, Q. 2
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/3/q/bon-sent-II-d3-p2-a1-q2
----------------------------------------
### Question II. *Whether the angel in the first instant of its creation was evil by its own will.*

Secondly it is asked whether the angel in the first instant of its creation was evil by the act of its own will. And that [it was] so seems [the case]:

1. By the *authority* of the canonical [letter] of John, the third [chapter]: *The devil sins from the beginning*; but nothing is before the beginning in duration: therefore no creature preceded the angelic sin in duration.

2. Likewise, Augustine in the eleventh [book] *on Genesis according to the letter*: « It can not without reason be thought that in the beginning of time the devil fell by pride, and that there was no time before, in which he lived at peace and blessed with the holy angels, but that in the very first beginning of the creature he apostatized from his Creator ». If you say to me that he does not say this according to his own opinion, and [you say] well, because in the same place where Augustine sets down that opinion he also sets down others which he does not hold; *it is objected* that he said this according to his own opinion, because his opinion was that all [things] were created at once, and by *light* he understands the angelic creature [when] formed, by *darkness* he understands [it when] turned away from God: therefore if at once light was made and divided from darkness, at once with the first making of things was the sin of the angel; and so it seems that there was no delay at all there.

3. Likewise, *by reason* it seems [so]: there is some corporeal creature which at once and in the same instant both is and operates, as light, as soon as it is, shines; and Augustine says, « that light and splendor are coeval, and if light were eternal, splendor would be eternal »: therefore since the spiritual nature is more or equally actual as the corporeal: therefore it can be that in the first instant when it is, it is in its act. But its act is to will: therefore as soon as it is, it can will, so that being does not precede willing in time or duration, but only in nature; but by whatever reason it can will good, by the same reason [it can will] evil: therefore since one willing evil is evil, in the first instant it could be evil. If you say that it can have a coeval *natural* operation, but not *free choice*; *on the contrary*: « free choice is, under God, most powerful », as Bernard says, and it has nothing retarding in the angel nor binding, but as soon as it is, it is perfect and can have that operation.

4. Likewise, if an eye were created with the actuality of the visual power and the impression of the species, it would at once both be and see. Since therefore the angel from its first making had an agent intellect and innate species of things, as will afterwards be plain: therefore at once it both was and understood, by parity of reason also at once it both was and willed. If you say that *to understand* and *to will* come about in diverse instants; *on the contrary*: the *understanding* of the angel is simple and can be in an instant, likewise also the *willing*; but nothing prohibits two indivisibles from being at once: therefore nothing prohibits *understanding* and *willing*, since they are indivisible, from being at once at least by reason of the indivisible, as the last [points] of two contiguous lines [are] at once.

5. Likewise, this same [thing] is shown *through a likeness.* Because the rational soul is at the same time made and vitiated, nor is there any opposition there: therefore likewise it seems that it could be in the angel that it should at once be made and be vitiated, yet not by God, just as neither is original sin from God. Or if it is not alike, I ask the reason: why can the soul have these two at once, and not the angel? If you say to me that the soul is infected by an alien act, namely by the body, but the angel by itself; this is nothing, because the angel was just as quickly known by itself as by another: therefore by parity of reason it could just so be infected by its own act, as by an alien [one].

**But on the contrary:** 1. Ezekiel the twenty-eighth: *In the delights of paradise you were, full of wisdom*  *and perfect in beauty*, therefore etc.: therefore since this is understood of the devil, as the Glosses expound, he was therefore at some time without sin.

2. Likewise, this Augustine says in the eleventh [book] *of the City of God*, in the fifteenth chapter: « *In the delights of the paradise of God you were, adorned with every precious stone*; where he is understood to have been at some time without sin ».

3. Likewise, *by reason* it seems [so]: every actual sin goes forth into being through an act of deliberation; but where [there is] deliberation, there [are] comparison and succession of necessity: therefore if sin follows the deliberation of the angel, sin follows the angel not only in nature, but also in duration. If you say that the angel, on account of its deiform intellect, deliberates in an instant, and at once both sees and deliberates; *I show* that this cannot be. For the angel, in order that it might desire, necessarily foreknew three [things]: both the desirable, and that for which it desired, and the moving reason — for there was some reason which roused [it] — but these are diverse, and it is impossible by nature for any simple potency to be turned to several [things] at once and at one time; on account of which the Philosopher also says, « that we understand one only »: therefore if not at once, then it knew successively.

4. Likewise, the angel, when it was made, was either made *with* its actual operation, or *without* an actual operation. If *without* an actual operation: therefore after a time it sinned necessarily. If *with* its operation; but it did not befit God to co-create with anything except an operation befitting its nature: since therefore a deformed action is rather unbefitting to the nature, it is plain etc.

5. Likewise, these two [things] are true per se: that no one in that instant in which he sins can avoid the sin; and no one sins with actual sin in that which he cannot avoid; but if the angel sinned in that instant, it could not avoid [it] in that [instant], nor in any [instant] which was before it, nor after: therefore it could not avoid [it]. But if it could not avoid [it], it did not sin: therefore if it sinned in the first instant, it did not sin.

6. Likewise, evil is corruptive of good; but nothing is corrupted except what is or was: therefore in the angel there was something which it lost through sin. Then therefore I ask whether it sinned in the first instant, or not. If not, then I have what was proposed; if so, then it sinned suddenly. But since in a sudden change *to be made* and *to have been made* are at once, *to be corrupted* and *to have been corrupted* will be at once, and so *not to be*: therefore the good in the first instant is not. But it would not be corrupted unless it had been: therefore in the same instant it both was and was not, and so contradictory opposites are at once true. But this is impossible, and on account of this the Philosopher holds « that between contrary changes there is of necessity a rest in between »: therefore between the production and the removal of that good there was a rest in between, and so a delay. If you say — as is said of the rational soul, because it can be objected there likewise — that it does not remove the good which was present, but [the good] which would have been present, if it had not sinned; for it was never just and good, but would have been, if it had not sinned; *against* this is Augustine *On Rebuke and Grace*: « *He stood not in the truth*, it is said of the devil, because he was there, but he did not remain »: therefore that answer is worth nothing here.

### Conclusion

> There was a delay between the creation of the angel and its fall.

**I respond:** It must be said that there was an ancient position of some, that the devil at the same time was and sinned, nor was he ever [anything] but evil; and Augustine seems to approve it *on Genesis according to the letter*; and therefore some moderns held it. — But since, as Augustine expressly says in the eleventh [book] *of the City of God*, the aforesaid position approaches the first, which is heretical, and so as it were savors of heresy; the common opinion of the masters of Paris is that the making of the angel preceded the fall in duration; and by the common counsel of the masters the opposite position was excommunicated by the bishop of Paris. Therefore as the more true and catholic, and the more probable and common opinion, I say that this is to be held, that there was a delay between the creation and the fall, though a very small [one]. On account of which the Saints and the expositors and Scripture itself speak of the malice of the devil as if it had always been in him, because that little [delay] is reckoned as it were for nothing.

1. From this is plain the response to the first, because, as Augustine says, the sense is: *the devil sins from the beginning*, that is, immediately after the beginning.

2. To that which is objected concerning Augustine, I say that he speaks according to another's opinion; which is plain, because he says the contrary in the eleventh [book] *of the City of God*. — And to that which is objected, that he himself posited all [things] made at once; it must be said that it is true as to *natural being*, but not as to *well-being.* Whence he posited that corporeal light was at once and was divided from darkness, likewise that there is no order of material days; but he well posited an order of spiritual days according to the sevenfold conversion of the angelic intellect upon things.

3. To that which is objected, that it was at once in act; it must be said that some deny this in every creature; yet because Augustine seems to say the contrary regarding light and splendor, let us concede [it] also in the angel. But yet it was not at once in the act of *election*, because deliberation and the foreknowledge of several [things] precede it; because, as was said in the objecting, they cannot be at once, not on account of a repugnance of the acts or of the simplicities, but on account of the simplicity of the angelic intellect, because by one conversion the whole intellect is taken up by one object, so that there is incompossible in that instant a conversion to another object.

4. 5. And thus is plain the response to the two following [objections]. — But to that which is objected concerning the sin of the soul, it must be said that it is not alike, because sin in the soul does not come about through an actual deliberation, but comes about through union to infected flesh: and since the union is in an instant, [but] deliberation and comparison [are] not: therefore it is not alike on the one side and the other.