Prima Pars
86. Sweet and Right: A Psalm Commentary on God's Mercy and Justice, and Whether All Things Fall Under Providence (Summa I, Q.22 a.2)
Class of 2007-05-24
https://berquistcourse.com/course/theology/10-prima-pars/086-sweet-and-right-a-psalm-commentary-on-gods-mercy-and-justice/

[0:00] In the Name of the Father, the Son, of the Holy Spirit, Amen. God our enlightenment. Guardian angels strengthen the lights of our minds, order and illumine our images, and arouse us to consider more correctly. Saint Thomas Aquinas, angelic doctor, help us to understand what you've written. the Father, the Son, Holy Spirit, Amen.

[0:25] So, being that it's kind of a hot day here, I thought we should have a scriptural excursion. We just got through a little while back, talking about how there's mercy and justice in all of God's works, huh? And one of the texts that Thomas had quoted here was from Psalm 24 in the correct numbering. And before he comes, or before we come to that particular line which is quoted in the Summa Theologiae, he says about God here, the scriptural Latin text says,

[1:05] that God is dulcis et rectus, okay? And dulcis is going to be understood by Thomas as referring to God as merciful, and rectus is being what, Just, huh?

[1:25] Now, in this text, he also explains dulcis or dulcedo, which is a metaphor. Now, a metaphor, as you know, is one of the most important figures of speech, huh? And when we speak figuratively, the meaning of the speaker is not the meaning of his words, but there's a connection between the meaning of the word and the meaning of the speaker. And in the case of metaphor, the connection is one of likeness, huh?

[2:06] So, in his commentary on this 24th Psalm, Thomas explains the metaphor of dulcis or sweet, and he says sweetness is said properly or nonfiguratively in bodily things, but it's said metaphorically in spiritual things.

[2:31] Whence he says is necessary in spiritual things that likeness that sweetness be taken to the likeness of the bodily sweetness. And then he sings symbols out there, sings out three things about the bodily sweetness, huh? Now, this is what bodily sweetness has: that it refreshes the bodily taste, huh? It quiets it down. And it what delights it, pleases it.

[3:10] Likewise, spiritual sweetness quiets and refreshes and delights spiritual taste. So he sees three things in the metaphor sweet. huh Now, I often say to the students when I was teaching in college, the best explanation of the metaphor sweet, or even the more particular metaphor honey or something like that, is given by Thomas's commentary in the Psalms. Even the romantic use of the word sweet. So if you call somebody sweet or honey, it's someone who who's your sweetheart maybe, someone who loves you, and it's pleasant to be what loved by somebody.

[4:00] It's also refreshing to be loved by somebody, as opposed to being hated by somebody, kind of wears you down. Okay, it's unpleasant to be hated by people. Uh, William of Ockham spoke one time of the tenacious ill will of some of his opponents. I thought pleasant to have people with tenacious ill towards you. And it also is what it's restful, right? You get rest with someone who loves you.

[4:33] Now Shakespeare sometimes speaks of your sweet form, and then sweet there is a metaphor for not love, but a metaphor for beautiful. Your beautiful form, right? Now we often define the beauty beautiful by its effect. We say the beautiful is that which pleases with seeing, right? So it's like the sweet insofar as it pleases, right? We also speak of a beautiful girl as a sight for sore eyes, which means that the beautiful refreshes our eyes.

[5:14] And I hear people say when they see beautiful scene, ah, how restful, you know. They can rest in that. So those three things are said. So if you use the word dulce as a metaphor for the divine mercy,

[5:32] that metaphor is based upon a certain likeness between the divine mercy and the sweetness of the candy. It's certainly very pleasing for God to have this will to remove our misery, right? And we can rest in God's mercy, and it's refreshing sort of thing, and so on.

[5:57] Now, coming back for a moment here, huh? Thomas goes on and says, "But among men, sweetness is said in so far as they satisfy either themselves or others, often in bad things or in sins. But in God, not except except in the good. And therefore he joins and rectus domino, right.

[6:32] Thus, that tocedo pertains to mercy, rectitude to what justice. So Thomas explains then the words of Scripture. God is dulcis et rectus. He's sweet and right. That he's both merciful and just. So it's saying the same thing that he teaches us in that article in the Summa that God is both, or question the Summa, that God is both merciful and just.

[7:01] Now, we're on that, let's just stop for a moment and notice something about this. When Thomas explains just said of God and mercy said of God, justice is said properly of God, the word just originally, because justice is a virtue in the will, and God has a will, and that will is just. He has to explain that it's distributive justice, not commutative justice, right? But it's properly speaking distributive justice there.

[7:41] But then we don't have a proper word originally anyway for mercy, because mercy first names an emotion, a feeling, the one that Aristotle talks about the rhetoric and the poetics and so on. It's sadness over the misfortune of another, but there's no sadness in God.

[8:10] So although the word mercy might, for want of another word, eventually come to be used properly, right, to name the divine will to relieve our misery and so on. Nevertheless, the word originally would be used in a kind of metaphorical sense, as distinguished from the word just.

[8:36] You know, if you didn't have the word just and you use the word anger for God's justice, okay, well that's a metaphor. There's not anger properly in God.

[8:50] So if you said God is angry and and and merciful, but the point is, although Scripture sometimes does metaphorically name the divine justice anger. You don't have to do that in the Summa, right? Because the Summa is not symbolic theology. It's not that book that Dionysius called symbolic theology, which is about the metaphors and what it says metaphorically about God. But you have its own word. So Thomas takes up the idea that God is is just, right?

[9:25] He uses the word just. Doesn't use the word anger there, though. he might have some other context. Talk about that metaphor. Now here he doesn't use the word merciful. He uses the word sweet. There's some likeness there, right? That mercy here, even more explicitly than the Summa, is being named metaphorically, and justice seems to be named more properly. rectus. That's a nice connection between the two, huh?

[10:00] But now another thing that strikes us about this. Is that the order here in the twenty fourth psalm is the reverse of the order in the summa.

[10:15] In the first article that question on justice and mercy, the first article shows that God is what just, right. And the second article is showing that sometimes God's justice is called truth, right. Then the third article shows that God is merciful. And then the fourth article is showing that there's justice and mercy in everything that God what does, right. So justice of God is shown before His mercy.

[10:50] And but in the psalm, the mercy is spoken of before the what justice. Any reason for that? Mercy is more attractive, perhaps, or the sweetness.

[11:11] Yeah. But it's more attractive more attractive. Why doesn't Thomas speak of God's mercy first? In the in the order of reason, it's more apparent that God is truth or just. Yeah. Yeah. It's more known that God is just, right? Because we know God has a will but no emotions. And justice is a virtue of the will. And the by mercy is first naming a passion, right? And that's that's clear.

[11:39] They belong to God, right? How can even be said about God, right? Because there's no sadness in God, right? So Thomas in the sense of showing that God is just before he shows that he's merciful seems in a way to be following the order of what is more known to us and what is less known to us, huh? As the old man says, there in the Republic, you know, he says when you get to be an old man.

[12:06] Doesn't apply to any of us here, of course. Uh. You begin to think a little bit, you know, but maybe there is some kind of accounting after death, right?

[12:15] You're thinking a little bit of you know justice, right? Maybe there is a something of scores afterwards afterwards, huh? But as Thomas explains, huh?

[12:30] In some ways, mercy is more fundamental than justice, huh? Because you couldn't owe anything to anybody or distribute anybody what is their due unless there's someone there to distribute it to. And so in the very beginning, prior to justice is mercy, right? So in the things themselves, you might say mercy is more fundamental than justice, and that's the order here, okay.

[13:03] Now, in the next verse, there is where you find the quote that was used in the Summa there to show that there's both justice and mercy in God's works, right? And the Latin says, in this eighth verse, "Universae viae Domini misericordia et veritas," right?

[13:37] That's a text and one reason why we had to have another article there about how veritas can be used to mean justice one of its meanings.

[13:48] And Thomas here in the text he quotes another one from Tobias, chapter three, verse two. All your ways are mercy and truth. Well, notice you had the same order there, right? You don't use the metaphor sweetness, but use the word misericordia, right? But that's given before veritas, which there stands for what? Justice.

[14:31] Now, another little text here. This is kind of going a little bit into again the metaphor of dulcedo, right? This is in the Psalm thirty Psalm thirty, the correct numbering, number sixteen.

[14:52] And he says, "Sweetness is said in spiritual things transumptive, okay? " And he has a big metaphor. For just as bodily sweetness delights the taste of the flesh, so that is called sweetness which delights the mind inwardly.

[15:18] But it happens, it says, sometimes that the sense of taste of the flesh is not well disposed, and delights in some bad taste, in corrupto sapore. And then it's false delight. And thus the affection of man, when it is not well ordered, delights in a thing which is not truly delightful. But if it is well disposed, it delights in the true good, which is the divine good.

[15:49] And therefore, the substantial goodness of God is called the what? Sweetness of God. And he quotes Wisdom sixteen twenty one. Your substance shows the sweetness that you have in your sons.

[16:13] Or Thomas says the sweetness of God is said in that way in which someone is said to have a bitter affection. And he thinks how he can sadden others. And he quotes Ephesians chapter four thirty one. Let all bitterness be taken away from you Saint Paul saying. Therefore, by the contrary, the sweetness of the soul when one proposes to console others.

[16:45] Whence the sweetness of God is the proposal by, in which he is said, or by which he is said to wish all men to be saved. He's quoting there one Timothy two four.

[17:00] Taste and see how sweet is the Lord Psalm thirty three. And he quotes again dulcis et rectus going back to another psalm right. And in whatever way he says sweetness is taken, it contains what delectation pleasure delight. Because although it is one and simple in itself, nevertheless it is the root and the fountain of all goodness. And therefore whatever delights in the world, the whole of it is in God.

[17:33] Now you can go on in that text text, but we were talking before I remember about the wine there. And how Thomas in the explanation of the the wine was growing short. But the sense of the letter is that the wine is growing short. They ran out of wine. But the spiritual sense, huh? As we explained before, is that the wine of justice, the wine of wisdom, and the wine of charity were all running short.

[18:04] And Thomas explains a likeness between wine in each of those three right. And it's not for the same reason right? In so far as wine bites and stings, it's a metaphor for justice. In so far as it delights the heart of man. You know how the French corrected the scriptural text there.

[18:32] The text that says wine rejoices the heart of man. And and Thomas you know quotes that passage from I think it's the book of wisdom you know that there's no bitterness at all in wisdom right. Sorry. And then so far as warm, wine intoxicates us and warms us. It's a metaphor for charity love. Well, what comes out in this text here, I think you can expand on it, is that.

[19:01] Sweetness can be a metaphor for more than one thing of God, Even though the one thing of God. We saw in the other text how sweetness can be a metaphor for the divine mercy, right? But here it can be a metaphor for the divine goodness, the substantial goodness of God.

[19:24] So when we were back in in the treatise on the substance of God, right, you had the question of the goodness of God, and you found out that God is good and He's more than that, goodness itself, and so on. If you were in symbolic theology, you could speak of that goodness of God as the sweetness of God.

[19:45] Now, obviously, the good is going to be pleasing when you have it, right? What does Augustine say Thou hast made us for thyself, and our hearts are restless until they rest in thee, huh so that the... um. quidditas he says is one of the reasons for the likeness of this metaphor. Right, you find rest in that, right? And then come to me, and I'll refresh you, you were burdened, right?

[20:13] So the divine goodness is pleasant, is refreshing, and it quiets the heart. The only thing that quiets the heart. But it seems to me you could apply the metaphor also to the divine beauty. You know, how Augustine says in the beginning of the Confessions, I think it is, who regrets the time he's lost. He says something like, "Too late have I come to know thee, thou ancient beauty."

[20:45] Okay, that's kind of appropriate, if you know Plato's Socrates' discourse on the higher love matters, right? Which lead up to the beautiful itself, and this is really God Himself. It's the same as the good itself, the beautiful itself, but the meaning is a little bit different of good and beautiful. But we're speaking before how would Shakespeare speak of your sweet form, your beautiful form. It's something that pleases the eye, refreshes the eye, it it quiets the eye.

[21:16] How restful the scene is, you know. See a beautiful scene, how restful. Well, this is a fortiori true of the divine beauty, right? Okay, that to see the divine beauty is going to be extremely pleasing, right? The torrent of delight that you have in this, but you will be completely at rest, right? That's like anything else.

[21:40] And and then finally, it will refresh you, right? You won't get tired. Look at this, it's so beautiful. So anything else that that that sweetness can be a metaphor, can be a metaphor for the divine mercy, can be a metaphor for the divine goodness, the divine beauty, which or are in the treatise on the substance of God, right? Anything else that could be a metaphor for?

[22:21] Okay, okay. But in God Himself, though, anything else could be metaphor. Yeah, yeah. And maybe in Fort you could say the divine love, huh? Okay.

[22:37] So you know, in our metaphor, sweetheart, right? Actually, sweetheart has got two figures of speech. There's a synecdoche, right? Because the heart is only a part of this person, right? So you're naming that person from a part. That's the figure of speech called synecdoche. But this heart is said to be sweet because this heart loves you, right? And then those three elements of the metaphor is sweet.

[23:12] It's pleasing to be loved by somebody. It's refreshing; it refreshes you, you know. And and it you're restless with someone who loves you, right? And you can see that by its opposite. It's painful to be hated by somebody, and it makes you kind of you know a little bit nervous to be hated, you know, and and it's not very restful, and and it kind of wears you down.

[23:37] It doesn't refresh you at all. It's you know. Question. Yeah. What about divine truth? Can sweetness be said metaphorically to divine truth? I suppose you could, yeah.

[23:57] If so, how does that reflect on our discussion of justice and mercy as we were connecting veritas with justice, yeah, and rectus, yeah, and dulcis, yeah, mercy. Well, the reason I was what I was trying to point out that point with the text dulcis and rectus, the one likeness between that text, right, and the Summa, is that dulcis is said metaphorically, right? While rectus seems to be said more properly, than just, right?

[24:35] And that's like the words in the Summa, because justice said properly of God, right? Mercy could perhaps be said properly of God, but originally it would name a what emotion, a passion, right? So mercy, in a sense, is to the divine will. It's naming the divine will to relieve our misery, a little bit like anger names the divine what justice, right? But in the case of justice, we have its own its own name, right?

[25:06] And you know, if you go back, you know, and the second point I wanted to make was that if you go back to the article there in the first question, Summa, why does Scripture use metaphors, right? It uses metaphors because these things are beyond us, right? So the fact that Scripture in that 24th Psalm, or even Thomas in the question on Ratio and justice, uses a word that is a metaphor, right, or at least as first a metaphor, is a sign that this is less known to us, or kind of more beyond us, right?

[25:40] Okay, as if we could understand the divine justice better than the divine mercy, right? Okay. So, but by truth there is not, I don't think, a metaphor. But go back to that article. But at least the first article is where he shows that God is just using the word just, right? He's going to make some distinctions there. It's going to be, as we said before, distributive justice and not commutative justice, right?

[26:10] Okay. Okay. But as I say, maybe the divine truth, which you know, which you're thinking of, I think, was truth in another use of the word, right? Truth comes up in the treatise on the what? Understanding with God, right? Okay. This is kind of a peculiar use of the word truth to name the divine justice.

[26:39] Could also be a comparison, as you pointed out before, the two ways our Lord speaks and why he came into the world, why he speaks properly and how he speaks metaphorically. He says, "Properly, this I was born to bear witness to the truth. Well, that you don't have. This is no metaphor;

[27:03] that is no figure of speech. That's just to say it's proper speech. Whereas elsewhere he says, "I've come to cast fire on you. " Well, that's not properly speaking; speaking metaphorically, he's come with a box of matches. I can't guess.

[27:25] So then, are there attributes or aspects of divine simplicity of which we cannot metaphorically predicate sweetness? For instance, justice. God's justice. Is God's justice not sweet, or is it sweet? I don't think you'd be apt to call the divine justice sweet, you know. Certainly, in the text that we have, sweetness is kept for the mercy and something else for the just, right? But I mean, part of what we've just done is find a number of different applications.

[28:05] I mean, we've named two of the transcendentals, yeah, as found in the divine, as being able to say sweetness of, and even of divine truth, which we call three.

[28:19] So, I mean, certainly locally in this text, there is. Yeah, but you'd speak of the divine justice as being moderated, so to speak, or sweetened by the divine mercy, and speak of the justice so much as being sweeter because that

[28:36] as being more severe. I think in the Divine Comedy, Dante presents the saints as having some kind of delight in God's justice that we can't have right now because we can't. We we don't have the understanding that the saints have, so when they see even you know the sinners in hell suffering, and then they see all God's providence, they can delight in the justice therein. Whereas for us now, we can't see everything, and so when we see suffering, it's difficult for us to see the providence present.

[29:11] So it's more apt to say that His mercy is sweet right now than to say that His justice is sweet. Although I think strictly speaking, you can say sure it's sweet too. You know, those with bit of vision. Yeah, I mean the poets. You go back to Greek poets. I mean they speak of revenge is sweet, right? And I'm not so sure we should we should find that sweet, but but they all speak about you know it's being oh, really satisfying, you know.

[29:37] So I kind of avoid that way of speaking a little bit. Okay. Okay, this is a reference here. Looking a little bit now towards us. Um in the Psalm here, 31, tenth part here,

[30:13] he's talking about again the divine mercy. He says, "Ipsum misericordia circumdabit." the one who hopes in the Lord, the one who hopes in God, right, or hopes in the Lord, right. Okay. Now,

[30:32] the one hoping in him. Now, sometimes Thomas will speak of the divine mercy as being an object more of our hope, right, and the divine justice as being an object of our what? Fear. Yeah. And a couple texts where this comes up a little bit. We'll see eventually here.

[31:19] Okay, but this is another little text here. Going back to the Summa, as you mentioned before, there are four articles in the question on the justice and mercy of God, right? And the first one was that the justice of God, that God is just. And the second article was that the divine justice is called truth, right? Okay. Well, in the Psalm thirty-five, in the correct numbering, interesting little text here, where the word is used in another slightly different way.

[31:55] And I read you the thing in Latin here a little bit. Can stand my Latin here. Second verse. Domine in caelo, in the heavens, misericordia tua, mercy is in the heavens. et veritas tua, and your truth, usque ad nubes, as far as the what? Clouds. Justitia tua, secret montes, the mountains of God. Okay.

[32:31] Now, there Veritas is taken as a third thing there, besides the mercy and the what? Justice, huh? Okay. And Thomas comment on this, huh? Whatever God does in us is either from justice, or from mercy, or from truth.

[32:58] From justice, when he renders us something for our merits; from truth, when he renders what he promised; from mercy, when he excels our merits and his promises. Okay.

[33:21] Now he says the justice of God is alta, is high, because no one so much merits, but that God gives him more than he merits. But the truth is higher, because God promises and gives things which we never merited, right? Such as the incarnation itself, and other things which pertain to the mystery of redemption. But mercy is altissima, the highest, because those things which we are not able to think are given.

[33:58] Eye eye has not seen, ear has not heard, and he doesn't even quote the whole thing? Just such a common thing. And therefore, justice is compared in that text I read you to the mountains, truth to the clouds which are above the mountains, which are higher, and mercy to the heavens which are above all things.

[34:21] Okay. And he quotes another psalm there, huh? Domine in celo misericordia tua. God in the heavens is your mercy, which is the cause of all our good things.

[34:45] And he has an interesting quote there from Isaiah, What's Isaiah? I recall the mercies of God and his truth, usque ad nubes, and his justice as the mountains of God. That's a beautiful text, huh? No,

[35:13] that's a beautiful text. I mean, it gives a little another use of the word, the word truth, huh? Yeah. Now this is from the Psalm twenty-seven, number five. Here,

[35:54] it should be known that man frequently sins. You didn't know that, do you know it now? What? And from this he encourages the guilt of punishment,

[36:07] and because through the many works of the divine justice, man is provoked to what? Fear. So there, okay. And through the works of mercy, he is provoked to hope, right? Sometimes he's converted to penance and he's healed, huh? Okay. Well, there you have

[36:33] mercy of God being the object of our hope, right? The justice of God being the object of our what? Fear, right? And you have a lot of texts in Scripture and in the prayers of the Church that follow that, right? But occasionally you reverse it, right? Okay. And when I was gathering this, I couldn't remember the text in the in the Psalms, but it's I remember it's in this commentary in the Psalms where Thomas says that if you hoped in God's mercy but didn't have fear of His justice, you would become presumptuous.

[37:14] But if you feared God's justice and had no hope of His mercy, you would despair. So you need a balance of hope and what? Fear. And

[37:26] that's kind of a key to the spiritual life, and I suppose if you're a confessor or something of that sort, you have to try to give the one confessing this balance of hope and fear, right?

[37:42] So if a woman realizes what she's done, having had an abortion or something like that, right, I would think that would tend to lead to kind of despair about one's own condition or something like that. So you might have to strengthen her hope, right? Huh? And but other times we feel that somebody is, you know, he's a good guy. He's going to let us all go home, and you know, at a wake sometimes he'd say, well, his suffering is over.

[38:09] And my usually remark is, I hope, so. I hear it for nothing. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And you heard me speak before of how in other context there there's other kinds of hope and fear. We need a balance, right? And I mentioned the great dialogue, the Phaedo, there, where Socrates is showing the need for a balance between the hope of finding the truth and the fear of being mistaken.

[38:42] And one place in the Phaedo where his friends are starting to get discouraged and kind of despair they're going to find the truth about the immortality of the soul, Socrates very beautifully. Very impressively leads them out of this despair, right, and back to the investigation, and then he takes up the objections of Simmias and Cebes, and first objections of Simmias, and bang, bang, bang, three syllogisms, each knocking down the premise of Simmias it's over.

[39:10] and then, Socrates says, No, no, it's not going to be so easy to answer Cebes, right? You see. And finally, he he succeeds in answering Cebes, and Cebes is even convinced that the soul is immortal. And then Simmias also says no, these are difficult. Wait a second. Yeah, we can think about these some more. I can't today. I got to die. But it's necessary to get that balance between hope and fear, right?

[39:35] I mentioned, I think, you know, my story. My teacher, Kasurik told me under the great Monsignor Dion, you know, and how, you know, he went to see him after class one time, he was a diligent student, and went to the office and talked to Dion, and Dion talked much differently in the office. He said, Why are you talking so differently here? And he said, Well, it's the business of the teacher to encourage the student.

[40:00] But here's a guy you didn't need To encourage, right? You had to, you know, slow him down, right? When I was, you know, writing my doctoral thesis, I wrote it under Monsignor Dionne on and so on, and I came in with the outline of what I was going to do and so on. And he proposed a little change, in it, you know, The minute he proposed it, right, I could see it was improvement.

[40:21] In fact, it was so good I could write the thing by myself from then on. But the minute he did, I said, "Oh, yeah, it's not good the way it is." Oh, I don't have any evidence," he says. Here he's suggesting something that once I had, I could, you know, write the thing by myself, really. And he gave me the thing. Oh, I don't have any evidence.

[40:38] I'm just, you know, like I had to be a little too quicky, you know. But so you have to have that balance of hope and fear. And they say about a politician, he has to run scared, right? But if he had no hope of getting elected, he's not going to, you know, run much of a campaign, right? But if he's, you know, overconfident and doesn't have a certain fear that the the voters might turn them out as they do the rascals from time to time.

[41:09] Yeah, yeah, yeah. Variety is a spice of life. You heard the famous defense by Aesop, you know, the guy who was made money off the thing, so on. Remember that story? Yeah, he said there was there was an animal crossing the river, and he jumped between the rocks, and he fell down between the rocks and got wedged in there. He started to bleed, right? And so the insects are coming down, and they were feasting on the blood there.

[41:47] And some other little animal came by, and he was too small to push him out. He said, "You want me to chase the bugs away?" And he said, "No, no, no, no, no. They've had all they're going to eat, you know. If you chase them away, other ones will come and take the rest of the blood that's left." So he says, "By my client, he says he's made his money now.

[42:03] He's not going to take much more money out of the public till, you know. But you remove him and put somebody else in, he's got to take the rest of the money that's in the till." It's pretty damn good defense, though. Come on, man. He's made his money now. He's not going to take much more from the public treasury.

[42:20] Society is an animal that's fallen between rocks. Yeah, it's quite true. This is on texture from the Psalm 39, number two here. Unless there is hope to fear, man would flee from God.

[42:53] And therefore, it's necessary that there be fear by which he flees sin, and hope by which he accedes to what God. That's my little scriptural excursion there, right from the. Treatise on, or the question on the mercy and justice of God. Getting a little break now before we go back to the text of Thomas. I mean, we usually get a break to for the weaker brethren. Yeah.

[43:21] Ratje had a question on the providence of God. The question twenty two, article two, I believe, right? So we'll. It's a good place to do a break. Guys, ask one quick thing before you jump into the break. Yeah. Just would you tie up then the sweetness you mentioned at one point? The sweetness could be tied tied clearly with the predestination of the elect, and then the justice with the with the reprobate.

[43:47] You had spoken, I think, of that. Would we say that? Yeah, yeah. If you go to hell, you go there because of God's justice, right? Yes. Even though it's tempered a little bit by His mercy, right? He doesn't punish you as much as you deserve. Right. Right. Okay. But if you go to heaven, it's more God's mercy than His justice. Although there's some reward for merits of some sort, right?

[44:11] But still more mercy than justice, right? Yeah. So it's not as if in one of these was found only justice and the other only mercy, right? But one is more predominant in one than in the other, right? Okay. Yeah. Great. The question twenty-two, Article two. We'd seen the first article last time, and that's showing that providence belongs to God. right?

[44:50] Now, just tie in with your your question about the poets, right? Now, where does the word providence come from? What's what's the English word for providence? Foreseeing, Foresight. Foresight. Yeah, yeah. Now, if you look at the treatise on prudence in the Secunda, Secundae, where Thomas takes up the composing parts, integral parts of prudence, right?

[45:20] There's an objection because providentia is said to be a part, right, of prudence, and one of the objections to saying providence is a part of prudence is it the same thing? And I guess this is you know not an Isidorian etymology. This is a true etymology. Well, that St. Thomas just quoted Isidore. Yeah, but if you go to the Latin, right, prudentia does come from providentia, the contraction of it.

[45:47] So that the proper name for this virtue in English is not prudence, but foresight, which is the word you find churchill people like that using, you know, people who are have foresight. And now, what's interesting about foresight is that it's a perfection of reason, right? And what's reason?

[46:14] Sight. No. Shakespeare tells us in Hamlet, it's the ability for a large discourse looking before and after. So foresight is related to what reason is, looking before and after. Now, it's something done from the poet, right?

[46:36] But one of the great editors of Shakespeare back in the 18th century said a phrase almost Homeric, which Shakespeare has, looking before and after. And if you go back to the Iliad, you'll see this is exactly what Homer has, almost. But you'll say looking before and behind yourself, right? Okay. So now, if you know the two, these are two great poets of ancient and modern times, but they both see reason as characterized as looking before and after.

[47:09] It helps you to understand the word foresight, doesn't it? Yeah. See. So if you don't read Homer and Shakespeare, you're not going to be able to understand what the appropriateness of speaking of foresight in God. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Okay. So for your penance, read two

[47:28] books of Homer. Okay, but now we come to the second article. It seems that not all things are subject to the divine providence. Some things escape his providence. It seems.

[47:46] For nothing foreseen is fortuitous. If, therefore, all things are foreseen by God, nothing will be fortuitous, and thus there will disappear or perish from the world chance and fortune, which is against the common opinion, against the truth, you might say, too.

[48:12] Moreover, everyone who is wise, everyone who is a wise provider, excludes defect and evil so far as he can from those things of which he has care. But we see many bad things to be in things. Either, therefore, God is not able to impede them, and thus he is not omnipotent or he must not have care about all things.

[48:43] Moreover, those things that happen from necessity do not require providence or what prudence. So the words are using them as kind of synonymous. I mentioned that as they say in the in the question on the integral parts of prudence in the secunda secundae right? Providentia is one of the integral parts that memory is and so on. And as they say, the words are basically the same word.

[49:17] Whence, according to the philosopher, and that's the figure of speech called what? The Dominicans. I have the English. What's figure of speech? He's being used there. Instead of calling him Aristotle, he calls him the philosopher. Capital P. Is that apostrophe? No. That's a neat, got terrible word. What? Antonomasia. Yeah, yeah. That's a very common figure of speech in the Bible, right? Because the Bible is named by antonomasia.

[49:50] Because Bible means the book, right? That's antonomasia. Gospel is named by antonomasia. Good news, right? Could you parse that word down for us? Antonomasia. Well, actually, see, the names of these figures of speech were invented by the rhetoricians, not by the philosophers, right? Okay. And so you can go and examine the the words, but in most cases they don't really illuminate that particular figure of speech. Oh, really?

[50:19] Okay. You see what I mean? I've done that. I mean, you find that, right? Okay. Yes. But you will find this, like in the you know big Oxford dictionary, you'll find the word antonomasia. Okay. Okay. But antonomasia is giving the name of the general to the particular, or the reverse, right? Okay. Yeah. So instead of calling somebody a lover, I might call him a Romeo, right? Okay.

[50:47] Instead of calling this guy Aristotle, he calls him the philosopher, right? Yes. Aristotle calls Homer the poet. Okay. In our forefathers, they refer to Shakespeare sometimes. Say, as the poet says, they expect you to know who the poet is, son. So he calls him the philosopher. And our soldiers are only of one. Well, that's a little different. Okay. Whence, according to the philosopher in the sixth book of the Ethics, prudence or foresight is right reason about contingent things,

[51:30] about such things as there is counsel and choice. Whence, since many things happen in things from necessity, not all things are subject to what providence, huh? That's kind of understanding the divine providence, like our providence, right? Necessary things. Well, what's going to be is going to be. You know, can't do anything about that. It's something that that can be or not be that you're going to take counsel about.

[52:01] Um. Moreover, whoever leaves something to somebody dismisses something to somebody. Uh, is not under the providence of the one governing, but God leaves men to themselves, right? According to the text of Ecclesiasticus 15. God from the beginning constituted man and left him in the hand of his counsel. Am I speaking in the hand of his counsel?

[52:31] And especially the bad, he he lets them go according to the desires of their heart, right? Therefore, not all things are what subject to the divine providence.

[52:46] Moreover, the apostle says 1 Corinthians that God has no care about the. lox. And the same reason about other irrational creatures. Therefore, not all are under the what divine providence, huh? So this is an unusual number of objections. I usually don't get in the Summa. Five, huh?

[53:13] The question of disputatio you might have fifteen, but Summa usually, you know, there's three is usually enough, but occasionally you get, you know, kind of a sign of the difficult to the matter.

[53:27] But against this is what is said in wisdom, the eighth chapter, verse one, about divine wisdom, that reaches from end to end strongly and disposes all things what sweetly. Here we get the word sapientia huh? Sweetly.

[53:49] Thomas explains sapientia is coming from what? Sapida scientia, savory knowledge, huh? Savory knowledge, sweet to me, savory. So let's go to Thomas's body of the article here. I answer it should be said that some totally deny providence, right? Like Democritus and the Epicureans. I guess the Epicureans followed Democritus in his atomic theory, right? Although you think of the Epicureans mainly working In ethics, right? But they have a

[54:34] they presuppose a certain doctrine about the world, laying down the world to be made by what chance, huh? And some moderns do that too.

[54:49] But some lay down that incorruptible things only are subject to divine providence, huh? But corruptible things, not at least according to the individuals, right? But maybe according to species, where thus they have a kind of incorruptibility,

[55:11] from whose person it is said in the book of Job, huh? He hides behind the clouds, and he walks around the poles of the heavens, nor does he consider our things.

[55:26] Now, from this generality of corruptible things, Rabbi Moses accepts accepts men, huh? On account of the splendor of understanding which they partake, huh? Don't know how splendid it is, but.

[55:45] But in other corruptible individuals, he followed the opinion of others, right? So Thomas is mentioning how some entirely take away divine providence, right? Others take it away more or less from corruptible things, at least as far as individuals are concerned, but maybe not men or something, right? But Thomas is going to say divine providence extends everyone. But it is

[56:14] necessary to say that all things are subject to the divine providence, not in general only, but also in the very what singular, the very hairs of your head. How many of you have you got left? Are numbered, right?

[56:33] Which in this way can become clear. For since every agent acts on account of an end, Thomas says this in the Summa Contra kind of gentiles at the beginning of the third book has a whole chapter on that, right? Since every agent acts on account of an end, so far extends the ordering of effects to the end as extends the causality of the first agent, the first mover, the first maker.

[57:06] Now, from this, it happens in the works of some agent that something comes about not ordered to the end, because the effect that effect follows from some other cause, apart from the intention of the agent, huh? Its causality doesn't extend everything. But the causality of God, who is the first agent, extends itself to all beings. He is a cause of being as such, and not only regards the principles of the species, but also regards the individual principles.

[57:46] Not only of incorruptible things, but also of what corruptible things. So he's arguing from the universal causality of God extending all the way down to his providence extending down to all because every agent acts for an end, right? So, as causality extends to all things, the order to the end from him extends to all things. Hence, it is necessary that all things which have in any way existence are ordered by God to an end.

[58:19] And according to that of the apostle, now that's a figure of speech. Yeah. Can't say for Saint Paul, right? I guess if you read even the canonical epistles and so on, it's Saint Paul and Saint Peter who call themselves apostles, right? The others don't, then. So by antonomasia they're called the the apostles, right? You know how how John Paul II would call Peter and Paul the princes of the apostles, right?

[58:52] Okay, so not the only apostles, but the apostles by antonomasia, right? And so on. My wedding day there, June 29th, right? The feast of Peter and Paul, right? We had a feast in Rome, you know, where these two guys are foundation of the Church of Rome there.

[59:11] Since, therefore, the divine providence is nothing other than the reason of the order of things to their end, it is necessary that all things, in so far as they partake of existence or of being, so far they are subject to the what divine providence.

[59:31] Okay, so that's his basic argument. Now, in the next paragraph, he's going to give kind of another argument, right? Another way of seeing it. Likewise, has been shown above that God knows all things, not only in universals but also the what particulars. And his knowledge is compared to things as the knowledge of the artist to the artificial things, as has been said.

[59:58] Is necessary that all things come under his order, just as all artificial things are ordered under the or subject to the order of the art. Okay. So Thomas says it's clear now if you followed me here in the body of the article that the divine providence extends to everything, even in particular, right? All the way down to the what. Contingent things, huh? So there must be an answer to these five objections, right?

[1:00:35] Okay. So let's see if he can answer them, huh? Marvelous, you know, getting all these objections from Thomas because, when I was just teaching college, in, St. Mary's College in California, had one class of very good students, right? Almost every class they come in with some objection, right? And you know, he poses the objection like that, And I answered it with no problem. Because I had heard the objection before, he answers, you know, I can see him now.

[1:01:06] You know, he's finding him now. He's relaxing. I see, his whole body, you know, kind of relaxing. He saw it when he answered his objection, right? And so, one time when the course is over, I happen to be talking to him, you know, he says, "I always came in thinking I was going to get you today, you know." He doesn't realize how common these objections are, and how many times I've heard them, and how many times I've read Thomas to reply to them, and not just in this text, but some other texts, right?

[1:01:37] And so I mean, like you know, it's out of the blue this objection, you know, that I never, never heard it before, you know. But to him, it's you know, amazing he's got an answer to you've heard the famous division of human thinkers, following the great Hesiod the poet. Hesiod divides us into three kinds, huh? And Aristotle follows that, huh? In the the Nicomachean Ethics, right? Thomas Aquinas follows it.

[1:02:17] Basil gives it one time, follows it, right? Even Machiavelli follows it, okay? But there's three minds, huh? There's minds that can make by themselves great discoveries, huh? But they are very few and far between. Then there's a second group of minds that can't make by themselves great discoveries, but they can learn them from the great minds. And then there's a third group which can neither discover the great things by themselves nor learn them from the great minds.

[1:02:52] And those are useless wits, as the English translation said of the Hesiod thing. And Thomas's commentary is moderate, so he says useless as far as the acquisition of knowledge is concerned. Not useless, period. Might be good to cook or to wash the floor or something, but so kind of playfully, I decided to give a name to these three. And so I called those who can make the great discoveries by themselves the wits.

[1:03:25] In the older sense of wit, huh? Reminds us of Saul Wit Winston. Then those who can't make the great discoveries but can learn them from the great minds, I called them the dimwits.

[1:03:38] And then finally, those who can neither make the great discoveries themselves nor learn them from those, I classified as the nitwits. And so I classified myself as a dimwit. But I remember one time, usually in a public talk, and said, "I sometimes don't like when I'm quoted out of context."

[1:04:01] But subsequently, I made a distinction among the dimwits between the lower and the upper dimwits. And the distinction is that the upper dimwits know who the wits are, like they know that Thomas is one of the wits. The lower dimwits don't know who the wits are, and so they don't get very far.

[1:04:25] So I classified myself as an upper dimwit. To be perfectly exact about myself. Could you then be upgraded to half wit? Half full or half empty? Okay.