that of the cognoscibility of God.51 Among the divine predicates that human reason gathers from the consideration of nature, St. Paul 52 expressly mentions two: áídios avтov dúvaμus, i. e., the eternal power manifested in the creation of the universe, and Ocórηs, i. e., a Divine Essence differing from all created things. As a third predicate the Book of Wisdom 53 adds the attribute of divine "beauty." Elsewhere the Bible refers to God as "He who is," i. e., Who has the plenitude of being; the Eternal, the Allwise, the Immense, etc., all predicates which, if they were incorrect or untrue, would belie the Word of God.

b) The Eunomian contention, that unless we assume the possibility of man's forming an adequate idea of God, we are placed before the alternative of forming either a false conception of Him or no conception at all, is met by the Fathers with the retort that it rests upon a confusion of the separate and distinct notes of "imperfect" and "incorrect" on the one hand, and their contradictories, "perfect" and "correct," on the other. The Fathers insist that there is such a thing as a true though imperfect concept of God; that our knowledge of God, in spite of its inevitable defects, is true and remains true for the very simple reason, among others, that we are fully aware, and do so judge, that the perfections we ascribe to God exist in Him in a quite different way than they exist in His creatures and in the concepts of the human mind; that, whatever wrong elements may enter into our conception of God, are eliminated by an express judgment; while on the other hand the Eunomians themselves are open to the charge of counterfeiting the notion of God when 51 Supra, Ch. 1. 52 Rom. I, 20. 53 Wisd. XIII, 5.

they pretend to be able to conceive God and to comprehend Him as He is, though in matter of fact they derive their conceptions of Him from analogy.54

READINGS: Suarez, De Divina Substantia eiusque Attributis, lib. I, cap. 8-12.- Thomassin, De Deo, lib. IV, cap, 6-12.— Franzelin, De Deo Uno, thes. 10-13.- Chr. Pesch, S. J., Der Gottesbegriff, Freiburg 1886.-M. Glossner, Der spekulative Gottesbegriff in der neuen und neuesten Philosophie, Paderborn 1894.- Simar, Lehrbuch der Dogmatik, 4th ed., Vol. I, pp. 113 sqq.-W. Humphrey, S. J., " His Divine Majesty," pp. 16 sqq., London 1897.-M. Ronayne, S. J., God Knowable and Known, 2nd ed., New York 1902.-T. J. Gerrard, The Wayfarer's Vision, London 1909.

54 Cfr. Franzelin, De Deo Uno, thes. 13.

SECTION 2

MAN'S KNOWLEDGE OF GOD AS IT WILL BE IN

HEAVEN

When we arrive in the abode of the Blessed, our knowledge of God will change. It will be different from, and far more perfect than the knowledge we have here below. Our mediate abstractive knowledge of God will give way to immediate intuition, while at the same time analogical will be transformed into univocal knowledge, inasmuch as we shall see God as He is.

In this section we therefore propose to treat three important questions, viz.: (1) the reality and the supernatural character of the intuitive vision; (2) the necessity of the light of glory to the intellect of the Blessed; and (3) the relation between the intuitive vision of God and His incomprehensibility.

ARTICLE I

THE REALITY AND THE SUPERNATURAL CHARACTER OF THE INTUITIVE VISION OF GOD

I. PRELIMINARY REMARKS.-The expression "intuitive vision of God" is based on a metaphor

which likens the human intellect to the eye. Bodily vision has two peculiarities: first, the eye sees a material object immediately, and, second, it perceives it clearly and distinctly. Analogously we may say that the intuitive vision of God means, first, that we know Him immediately, without depending on the created universe as a medium or mirror; and secondly, that our knowledge of Him is clear and distinct-an apprehension in the proper sense of the word. The quality corresponding in God to our intuitive vision of Him, is His visibility (visibilitas Dei), which some dogmaticians treat as a separate divine attribute.

If we take the term vision" in its more extended sense, we shall be able to distinguish in abstracto a fourfold visibility, corresponding to the four different kinds of intuitive vision in God. There is (a) bodily vision (visio oculis corporeis), which, being metaphysically impossible when applied to God, can never take place, not even in Heaven; (b) that mode of spiritual vision by which we see God through the cosmos, or by an act of faith (visio abstractiva); this constitutes the sole mode of seeing God natural to all rational creatures, angels and men; (c) that mode of spiritual vision by which we envisage God immediately in His essence (visio intuitiva s. beatificia); it is in this the beatitude of angels and men consists; (d) the comprehensive or exhaustive vision of God (visio comprehensiva s. exhaustiva), which is denied even to the Blessed in Heaven, being reserved to the Almighty Himself.1

1 Vide infra, Article 3.

Corresponding to this fourfold manner of seeing God, we may distinguish a threefold invisibility. (To the bodily eye, both in its natural and in its glorified state, God is absolutely invisible). Since the created mind has no means of knowing God other than the abstractive-analogical apprehension proper to its limited faculties, God's essence and substance must ever remain invisible to the created intellect, except supernaturally, by means of the "lumen gloriae." But even in the light of glory God cannot be adequately conceived by His creatures, and therefore under this aspect, too, must ever remain invisible, i. e., incomprehensible, even to the holy Angels and the Elect in Heaven. God alone " sees" Himself fully and adequately to the limit of His essence and cognoscibility.

2. DOGMATIC THESES.-The subject-matter propounded in the above preliminary remarks may be reduced to three problems, which we shall endeavor to solve in as many theses; viz.: (1) the absolute impossibility of a bodily vision of God; (2) the natural impossibility of an intuitive vision of God; and (3) the supernatural reality, and consequent possibility, of the intuitive (beatific) vision of God in Heaven.

First Thesis. To the bodily eye, even in its glorified state, God is absolutely invisible.

This thesis is partly of faith, and partly represents a theological conclusion.

Proofs. To enable us to see God bodily, either God would have to appear in a material vesture,