Supernatural Mysteries
Chapter XI.—Supernatural Mysteries
Existence of an order of Supernatural truth and life in God, i.e., of an order of Supernatural mysteries.
I.—Heterodox opinions and the teaching of the Church.
(1) Rationalists, Pantheists and Semi-Rationalists deny the existence of any order which exceeds objectively the powers of human reason.
(2) Pelagians and Semi-Pelagians deny that the Supernatural Order exceeds subjectively the powers of reason: if, for instance, external revelation be supposed, internal grace would not in their opinion be necessary for belief, or at least for the beginning of Faith.
(3) Early Protestants, as well as Baius and Jansenius, deny that the Supernatural Order exceeds the exigency of our nature; they claim that grace is due to nature.
These errors have been condemned. Catholic doctrine holds: (1) that not even by the absolute power of God could an intellect be created which, by its natural powers, could see God as He is in Himself, nor (2) could there be created a supernatural substance to which the light of glory would be natural.
II.—On the proof of the existence of a Supernatural Order of truth and life in God.
1° Is this proof possible?
How can it be shown that there exists in God not only an order of natural mysteries (e.g., prescience of future contingent events; compatibility of Divine liberty and Divine immutability, etc.), but an order of Supernatural mysteries (e.g., Trinity) which, unless revealed, cannot become known, and after revelation remain undemonstrable?
Since the Supernatural cannot be known naturally either in itself or in its effects, no direct proof of its existence can be given; an indirect proof drawn from the limitations of a created intellect may be given. This proof will manifest the existence of such an order not positively, but negatively and relatively, namely, that there is in God an order of truth and life exceeding the limits of natural knowledge. But since the proof takes the form of defence after the fact of Revelation, it will be more accurate to say that by reason alone a defence can be given of the truth that there are in God not only natural mysteries, but an order of Supernatural mysteries.
2° What are the limits of human knowledge?
The limits are twofold: (1) as regards extension, (2) as regards intension or penetrative power.
Future contingent events exceed the extension of our natural knowledge, but when they come to pass they do not exceed the penetrative power of the intellect, if their cause be easily known. On the other hand the metaphysical doctrine of Aristotle often exceeds the penetrative power of students, whose intelligence is not yet sufficiently developed.
Whence then come the limits?
(a) The limits of the extension of knowledge come from its objective medium. The objective medium is that through which knowledge reaches different objects—a telescope, for instance, enables the sensitive faculty of sight to see many objects, otherwise invisible; again, a principle, in which conclusions are virtually contained, enables the intellectual faculty to extend its knowledge so as to reach explicit comprehension of implicit truths. Extension of knowledge is as wide as the extension of the objective medium used by the intellect. The objective medium is that which is known, and also that through which other truths are known, whereas in the discussion of sensitive perception treated in Epistemology, the subjective medium of knowledge (a representative image for example) is that by which an outward object is known. An illustration of this teaching is given in the fact that the order of vegetative life cannot be known from principles of physics and chemistry. These principles (objective media) are not sufficiently extended to include the nature of vital action. The order of intellectual life cannot be known from the principles of Sensism. Hence the failure of Empiricism, contrary to the teaching of which an idea is not a compound image, a judgment is not an association of images, reasoning is not merely the attainment of empirical conclusions.
Is there then in God an order of truth exceeding the virtuality of the natural principles of reason? The Church teaches that the intimate life of God transcends the order of natural reason, as vegetative life transcends mechanical order.
(b) Limits of intension or of penetrative power arise from the vigour of the intellectual faculty and from its training. The same teaching given to several auditors is understood by some and not by others. Natural penetrative power is, like the poet, born not made, but improvement of penetrative power undoubtedly comes from study and training.
The question therefore is twofold:
(1) Does there exist in God an order of truth exceeding the objective medium of created intellect?
(2) Does there exist in God an order of truth exceeding the penetrative power of created intellect?
If the first response is affirmative, the second will also be affirmative, because that which exceeds the natural objective medium of a faculty exceeds also the natural penetrative power of the faculty. Thus a metaphysical conclusion exceeds the objective medium of mathematics, and consequently mathematicians grasp with difficulty a metaphysical demonstration, because they accept quantitatively what should be understood qualitatively.
3° What argument may be adduced from the standpoint of God?
Some writers argue thus from God’s infinitude: The order of supernatural truth is an order exceeding the natural knowledge of any created intellect. But God because of His infinitude exceeds the natural knowledge of any created intellect. Therefore there exists in God an order of supernatural truth.
This syllogism proves that there exists in God an order of natural mysteries, the nature of which exceeds any created intellect, but the existence of which is naturally knowable without revelation, e.g., prescience of future contingent events. From the infinitude of God it follows that every Divine attribute naturally knowable has an eminent and infinite mode of being, and this mode cannot be known naturally in a positive way, but only in a negative way, (e.g., wisdom, not finite) and in a relative way (e.g., supreme wisdom). Hence because of the imperfection of natural knowledge, every Divine attribute is a natural mystery, and the intimate compatibility of attributes remains hidden, although we know without revelation that all Divine attributes are compatible and indeed identical in God.
But is there in God an order of supernatural mysteries which, unless revealed, cannot be known, and which remain after revelation undemonstrable?
Argument on this subject must be drawn from the intimate life of God. It is not sufficient to reason from the infinitude of God, unless infinitude is understood, not as a mode of being of Divine attributes, but as a negative expression of the Deity as such.
III.—Demonstration of existence of a supernatural order exceeding objectively the natural powers of created intellect.
Major: God in His intimate nature cannot be known positively from creatures.
Minor: But the natural objective medium of every created intellect can only be a creature.
Conclusion: Therefore no created intellect from its natural objective medium, can possibly know those truths which belong to the intimate life of God, and these truths constitute an order of supernatural truth.
The major is proved:
From creatures God is known positively as regards those perfections which are analogically common to Him and to creatures, but as regards perfections which belong exclusively to Him, He is known only negatively and relatively. Now, God, in His intimate nature, is regarded from the standpoint of perfections exclusively belonging to Him. Therefore He, in His intimate nature, cannot be known from creatures positively.
(A) Creatures are so inferior to God that they cannot have with Him any resemblance either generic or specific, but only analogical.
(B) Perfections which belong exclusively to God can be known from creatures only negatively and relatively:
God is Being, not finite, not changeable, not temporal, etc.
God is Being, supreme, first, most perfect, etc.
Hence God in His intimate life cannot be known positively from creatures, just as mechanics cannot make known the life of a plant, nor vegetative life explain sensitive, nor sensitive the higher perfection of rational life.
The minor is proved:
The natural objective medium of a created intellect must be a creature.
(A) Indirect proof.
If the natural objective medium of created intellect is not a creature, but the Divine essence immediately seen, then the created intellect would receive its specification from the same formal object as the Divine intellect. But things which are specified by the same formal object are of the same nature. Hence the created intellect would be of the same nature as the Deity, i.e., God would be a creature.
(B) Direct proof (St. Thomas, Iᵃ q 12 a 4).
A spiritual essence, whose mode of immateriality exceeds the mode of immateriality of the nature that knows, cannot be known by that nature naturally and immediately. But the Divine essence has a mode of immateriality infinitely exceeding that of every created intellect. Therefore the Divine essence cannot naturally and immediately be known by any created intellect, and it follows that only a creature can be the objective medium of a created intellect.
The natural objective medium of a created intellect will be a creature either concretely accepted or abstractedly, e.g., genera, species, transcendentals, etc. Even an angel naturally knows God not immediately, but as it were in a mirror, because angelic nature mirrors to some extent the Divine perfections (Iᵃ q 56 a 3). “Behold the great God who vanquishes our knowledge” (Job xxxvi. 26).
“King of kings and Lord of lords who inhabiteth light inaccessible” (1 Tim. vi. 16).
“What man knoweth the things of a man but the spirit of man that is in him? So the things also that are of God no man knoweth but the Spirit of God” (1 Cor. ii. 11).
IV.—The Supernatural Order exceeds subjectively the penetrative power of any created intellect.
This thesis is formulated against Pelagians and Semi-Pelagians who taught that external revelation by Gospel preaching is sufficient for believing the mysteries of Faith, or at least for the beginning of Faith and that the internal light of Faith strengthening the intellect is not necessary.
The penetrative power of a cognoscitive faculty receives its specification from its natural objective medium and is proportioned to it. A faculty has an essential relation to its act, and the act receives its specification from its object. But the intimate mysteries of Divine life exceed the natural objective medium of created intellect. Hence they exceed also its penetrative power. In order that a created intellect should see God there is need not only of the objective manifestation, but of subjective strength. Hence the “lumen gloriæ.”
V.—The Supernatural Order exceeds the exigency of the creature.
This thesis is directed against Baius, Luther, Calvin, Jansenists and Modernists.
That which absolutely exceeds the natural objective medium of created intellect exceeds at the same time its natural end, and that which exceeds its end and natural perfection exceeds its exigency.
VI.—Between natural and supernatural truths there can be no conflict.
1° No conflict. Thesis directed against:
Averroists of XIII Century, and followers of XV Century.
Semi-Rationalists. XIX Century. (Günther claimed that philosophy might understand God and the soul better than Faith understands them).
Fideists and Bonnetty XIX Century (who claim that reason is so weak as possibly to lead us to opinions contrary to Faith).
The Vatican Council points out that the semblance of conflict is due to one of two contingencies, either (1) dogmas of Faith are not understood according to the mind of the Church, or (2) false opinions are taken as pronouncements of reason.
There can be no conflict, because supernatural truths are founded upon the intimate life of God, and natural truths are founded on God the author of nature. If being is taken in an equivocal sense, i.e., to signify things essentially different and not even analogically similar, then the principle of contradiction would not have validity, and contradiction and confusion would ensue between the two orders.
2° No pantheistic confusion between the two orders.
If being is taken in an univocal sense, there would be no essential difference in being, because univocal things (like generic) are not distinguished except by extrinsic differences. Consequently just as being, taken equivocally, leads to contradiction between natural and supernatural orders, so being, taken univocally, leads to pantheistic confusion between them.
3° There is harmony and subordination between natural and supernatural truth. The whole treatise on Divine Revelation abundantly testifies to this fact.
VII.—Examination of Ontologism.
The essential principle of Ontologism may be thus expressed. God is the first object which the human mind constantly and immediately sees from the beginning of its creation. Ontologists do not explain this immediate intuition in the same way.
1° Ontologism of Père Malebranche (1638-1715). Necessary and universal truths are seen by us in God. God is the immediate cause of our sensations of which exterior things are only the occasions. (Occasionalism.) We do not see the Divine essence as it is in itself. The Divine essence is seen as the archetype of those things which fall under sensitive and intellectual cognition. The Divine archetypal ideas of man, substance, spirit, mathematical quantity, etc., and attributes relative to them are seen. These Divine ideas and attributes are really one and the same as the Divine essence, but are distinguished virtually from it, and this distinction suffices for the visibility of Divine ideas and attributes whilst the Divine essence remains invisible.
Malebranche’s argument may be stated thus: material objects cannot act upon the immaterial soul. What is higher cannot be affected by what is lower. Accordingly corporeal objects are only the occasion of our vision; God is the cause. Moreover the necessary, universal, eternal element in intellectual knowledge cannot come from individual contingent things. Hence a clearer and simpler explanation of our thoughts is to say: we see all things in God. All intelligible things are in God in a necessary, universal and eternal way, and God is intimately present to us. Since God is the first loved, He ought to be the first known.
St. Thomas anticipated the errors of Ontologism.
(1) The abstraction of the universal from individual things cannot be questioned.
(2) God is intimately present to us as Cause, but not as object known.
(3) God is our last end, but not, therefore, the first object known or loved.
(4) Ontologism makes the sense organs useless.
(5) There is no intrinsic distinction between Divine ideas and Divine essence.
Thus Ontologism confuses natural and supernatural orders, and leads to Pantheism. If God alone works, it follows that God alone exists. “Operatio sequitur esse.” Malebranche’s fundamental error consists in confusing “being in general” with “Divine being.” “Being in general” is the natural adequate object of our intellect, the object in which we know first principles.
2° Moderate Ontologism.
The individual object—immediate object of the sense—is seen in itself contrary to Malebranche’s teaching, but the universal which is necessary, eternal, immutable, must be in God, and is seen in God by immediate intuition. Ubaghs and others held this view.
3° Ontologism of Rosmini.
That which other Ontologists taught concerning universal, Rosmini applied to transcendental being, which falls first under the apprehension of the intellect.
Rosmini (1) confounds “being in general” with Divine being. His system (2) depends upon extreme realism. Universal or transcendental being has in his system an objective formal existence, and is identified with Divine being. Hence (3) being is not predicated analogically of God and creatures, but univocally—a view which leads to Pantheism.