De potestate et voluntate Dei
by Hugh of Saint Victor
Source text: Public Domain. English translation/apparatus/encoding: CC BY-NC 4.0, Wroot Press.
https://migne.app/pl/176/de-potestate-et-voluntate-dei/
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## On the Power and the Will of God

[0839A]It is asked concerning the power of God, whether it be greater than his will. For if God can do more than he wills, his power would seem greater than his will. But if his power is greater than his will, there would seem to be something unequal in him, and God would not wholly agree with himself. How then is the whole that he is one, if greater and lesser are there? But if to be able and to will are the same for him, then his power and his will are the same. And if to be able and to will are the same for him, then whatever he wills he can do, and whatever he can do he wills. Now he wills everything that he does, because he does nothing against his will — he who does voluntarily whatever he does. Again, everything that he wills he does, because the power for all things is present, since the will is not lacking. If therefore God cannot do more than he wills, nor wills to do more than [0839B] he does, it stands beyond doubt that he cannot do more than he does. Furthermore: if God can do more than he wills, he can act against his own will, and do what he does not have in his will, and his power is contrary to his will. Whence it seems to follow that everything which he can do and wills, he does; just as everything which he does, he can do and wills. Thus everything that he can do he wills, just as everything that he wills he can do. But if this is accepted, that God can do nothing other or otherwise than he does, then he works all things by necessity, and is bound and constrained by the law of his own works, so that the condition of his work rules over him; but this it is impious to confess. How then, they say, are willing and being able the same for God, if his power is greater [0839C] than his will? See what they say. Greater, they say, according to you, is God's power than his will. Why? Because you say that God can do more than he wills. Attend. If God's power ought to be called greater than his will on this ground, that he can do many things which he does not will to do, then let his will also be called greater than his power, because there are many things which he can do but does not do, since he does not will to do them. For if power is called greater because it transcends the will, let the will also be called greater because it constrains the power. But just as power is not narrowed by the fact that it works nothing without the will, so too the will is not surpassed by the fact that it does not extend itself to all things that are within its power. There are three things: affect, effect, and respect. Will and power in God, then, are one both in affect and in effect, [0839D] but in respect they are not directed to one. How are these two one in God in affect? Because in him neither is the will without power, nor is power [0840A] without will. Power would be without will if it ever had a power which it would not will to have. Again, will would be without power if it ever willed something not from strength but from weakness. Since therefore in him power is always voluntary, and the will is powerful (because whatever he can do, all his ability he wills; and whatever he wills, he wills entirely from power), therefore in him neither is power without will, nor is will without power. Likewise, in effect, neither can the will be separated in any way from power, nor power from will. For whatever God does by will, he does also by power; and again, whatever he does by power, he does also by will. Because all things that he does, he does both by will and by power. Therefore in every work of his God exercises both will and power; nor do [0840B] they divide themselves in the work, which cannot be divided in the worker. Thus therefore the power and will of God remain undivided both in affect within him and in effect through him, but in respect outside him they show themselves differently. For because God is truly said not to will everything that he can do — since he can do many things which he does not will to do, but wills to do nothing which he cannot do — therefore his power has regard to certain things to which his will does not have regard. But to all things to which his will has regard, his power has regard. Thus therefore the divine power, in respect, is sometimes disposed toward other things than the will is, but in itself it has nothing other than the will, because it has nothing against the will.

[0840C]But they say: If God can do something that he does not will, he can do something against his own will. But if he can do something against his own will, he is not omnipotent — he who can be compelled and led to that which he does not will. But see how what they say holds together: that if God can do something which he does not will to do, then he can do something against his own will. For he would act against his own will if he did what he would not will to do. But it is not the case that, because he can do something which he does not will to do, he can therefore act against his own will; for if he did that which he can do but does not will, he would then already will to do that which he did — just as now, because he does not will to do it, he does not do what nevertheless he could do, if he willed. So foreknowledge and predestination in [0840D] God, if they are considered according to respect, are disposed differently, although in God they are one. For foreknowledge is disposed toward both evils and goods. Predestination [0841A] toward goods only. For he foreknew all future things, but predestined only the elect. Likewise predestination too, when it is taken for disposition, yet cannot be made equal in respect to foreknowledge, because God's foreknowledge pertains both to those things which he is going to do and to those which he is going to permit. But predestination [0842A] only to those things which he is going to do. For Ambrose says: « God predestined the hell of the impious, but did not predestine the guilt of the impious. » For what he was going to do, he predestined; but what he was not going to do, but to permit, he did not predestine, but foreknew.
