Hence also, by comparison with the angels, he was called archangel. For he was created first by pre-eminence of order, not by quantity of time. That the devil held the primacy among the angels, from which confidence he fell, so that he slipped without recovery. The excellence of his pre-eminence the prophet announces in these words: 'The cedars were not higher than he in the paradise of God, the fir trees did not equal his height, no tree of paradise was likened to him, for God made him more comely.' The condition of the angel differs from the condition of man: for man was founded to the likeness of God; but the archangel who fell was called the seal of God's likeness, the Lord testifying through Ezekiel:
'Thou, the seal of likeness, full of wisdom, perfect in beauty, wast in the delights of the paradise of God.' For the more subtle his nature was, the more fully was he expressed to the likeness of the divine truth. That the devil fell from heaven before man was founded. For as soon as he was made, he broke out into pride and was cast down from heaven. For according to the testimony of Truth, he was a liar from the beginning and stood not in the truth, because, as soon as he was made, he fell. He was indeed founded in truth, but by not standing he straightway lapsed from truth. By one fall of pride, when they exalted themselves against God by swelling, both man and the devil fell. But man, turning to repentance, acknowledges that he is inferior to God.
The devil, however, not content only with this, that thinking himself equal to God he fell, moreover even says himself superior to God, according to the Apostle's words, who says of Antichrist: 'Who opposes and exalts himself above all that is called God or is worshipped.' The devil therefore no longer seeks pardon, because he is not pricked to repentance. But his members often make entreaty through hypocrisy, which nevertheless, because of an evil conscience, they do not deserve to obtain. Let human misery learn that God is the more quickly moved to grant pardon when He has compassion on weak man, because man himself drew from the lower part the infirmity of sinning — that is, from the flesh, in which the enclosed soul is held.
The apostate angels therefore have no pardon, because they were burdened by no infirmity of carnal frailty so as to sin. But men, after sin, therefore return to pardon, because from the clayey matter they drew the weight of infirmity. And therefore, on account of the weak condition of the flesh, a return to salvation lies open to man, as the psalm also says: 'He Himself knows our frame. Remember, O Lord, that we are dust.' And again: 'Remember,' he says, 'what my substance is.' After the apostate angels fell, the rest were made firm by the perseverance of eternal blessedness. Hence also, after the creation of heaven, in the beginning it is repeated:
'Let there be a firmament,' and the firmament was called heaven — showing indeed that after the ruin of the angels, those who remained merited the firmness of eternal perseverance and of the blessedness which before they had received in lesser measure. After the casting down of the devil, there was conferred upon the holy angels the perseverance of holiness and the blessedness which they had received in lesser measure. Whence it must be recognized that the iniquity of the evil serves the humility of the holy, because whence the evil fall, thence the good advance. The number of the good angels, which was diminished after the ruin of the evil angels, will be filled up from the number of elect men. Which number is known to God alone.
Among the angels there is a distinction of powers, and according to the dignity of degrees ministries have been distributed to them, and some are set before others both in the summit of power and in the knowledge of virtue. Therefore some minister at the commands of others, and obey their orders. Hence also to the prophet Zechariah an angel sends an angel, and commands whatever he ought to announce. That there are nine distinctions or orders of angels the Holy Scriptures testify: that is, angels, archangels, thrones, dominions, virtues, principalities, powers, cherubim, and seraphim. The number of these orders the prophet Ezekiel also describes under just as many names of stones, when he spoke of the primacy of the apostate angel:
'Every precious stone,' he says, 'was thy covering: the sardius and the topaz and the jasper, the chrysolite and the onyx and the beryl, the sapphire, the carbuncle and the emerald.' By which number of stones the orders themselves of the angels were designated, which the apostate angel, before his fall, had fixed as it were upon the garment of his adornment. From whom, at his separation, when he beheld himself brighter than all, he straightway swelled and lifted up his heart to pride. The angels always rejoice in God, not in themselves. But the devil is evil from this: that he sought not the things which are God's but those which are his own. And there is no greater iniquity than for anyone to wish to glory not in God but in himself.
The angels know all things by the Word of God before they come to be in fact, and the things which are yet future among men the angels, God revealing it, already know. The transgressing angels, even with holiness lost, nevertheless did not lose the lively perception of the angelic creature. For they are strong in the keenness of foreknowledge in a threefold manner: that is, by the subtlety of nature, by the experience of times, and by the revelation of the superior powers. As often as God is angry with this world by any scourge, the apostate angels are sent to the ministry of vengeance. Yet they are restrained by divine power lest they harm as much as they desire. But the good angels are appointed to the ministry of human salvation, that they may administer the cares of the world and govern all things at God's command, the Apostle testifying:
'Are they not all,' he says, 'ministering spirits, sent for ministry on account of those who shall receive the inheritance of salvation?' The angels take the bodies in which they appear to men from the upper air, and they induce a solid appearance from the celestial element, through which they may be more manifestly shown to human sight. Individual nations are believed to have angels set over them, which is shown by the testimony of the angel speaking to Daniel: 'I,' he says, 'came to announce to thee, but the prince of the kingdom of the Persians withstood me.' And after other things: 'There is none who helps me except Michael your prince.' Likewise all men are proved to have angels, the Lord speaking in the Gospel:
'Amen I say to you that their angels always see the face of my Father who is in heaven.' Hence also Peter, in the Acts of the Apostles, when he knocked at the door, the apostles within said: 'It is not Peter, but it is his angel.' If the angels behold and see God, why does the Apostle Peter say: 'Upon whom the angels of God desire to look'? Likewise, if they do not behold Him nor see Him, how is it that, according to the Lord's sentence, their angels always see the face of the Father who is in heaven? But both are well: for we truly believe that the angels both see God and desire to see Him; and they both have and hasten to have; and they both love and strive to love.
For if they so desire to see that they do not enjoy the effect of their desire, this desire involves necessity. This necessity is penal, and from the blessed angels all penalty is far removed, because penalty and blessedness never come together at once. Again, if we say that they are sated by the vision of God, satiety is wont to have loathing, and we know that they cannot loathe the vision of God which they also desire. What then is there, except that in a wondrous manner we believe both at once — that they both desire and are sated? But they desire without toil, and are sated without loathing. For lest there be necessity in the desire, in desiring they are sated; and again, lest there be loathing in the satiety, being sated they desire.
The angels therefore see the face of the Father through satiety, but because this satiety knows no loathing, the angels desire ever to gaze upon Him. Wherever in the Holy Scriptures an angel is put for God, it is understood to be not the Father, not the Holy Spirit, but the Son alone, on account of the dispensation of the incarnation. Before the coming of the Lord's incarnation there was discord between angels and men. But Christ, coming, made peace in Himself for angels and men. For when He was born the angels cried out: 'On earth peace to men of good will.' Through the incarnation of Christ, therefore, not only was man reconciled to God, but also peace was reformed between men and angels.
That there was discord between men and angels before the coming of Christ is recognized above all by this: that in the Old Testament the angels, when greeted by men, scorned to be greeted by them. Yet in the New Testament, when this was done by John, the angel not only reverently receives it, but even forbids him to do it. For this reason man is scorned in the Old Testament and is not greeted in return by the angel, because man had not yet passed over into God. But man is received by God and is reverently greeted by the angel; for we read that the angel Gabriel greeted Mary, and to John, who was greeting the angel, it is said by that same angel: 'See that you do not do it, for I am your fellow servant, and of your brethren.'
By this it is recognized that through the Lord's incarnation peace was restored to men and to angels. XI. On Man. All things beneath heaven were made for the sake of man, but man for his own sake. Hence too all things are referred, by way of figure, to his likeness. All natural things are common to man together with all the things that exist, and in man all things are contained, and in him the nature of all things subsists. Man is a certain great portion of the whole of creation, and he is by so much more excellent than the rest as he is nearer to the divine image. How far man surpasses the rest of creatures in the dignity of his worth is learned from the very reverence shown at his creation, since of all things God said: 'Let it be made,' and they were made;
but He willed to create man by a certain deliberation of eternal counsel, saying: 'Let us make man to our image and likeness.' For since we were by nature created good, we have in a certain manner, by the desert of our fault, been made contrary to nature. Just as God foreknew that man would sin, so also He foreknew in what manner He would restore him by His grace, who by his own choice was able to perish. In their origin Adam and Eve were created together. But specially, afterward, the woman was formed from the man's side. Both, therefore, were created together in the order of reason, though not together in a single point of time. Man was made to the image of God, but woman was formed to the image of man, whence also by the law of nature she is made subject to him.
Likewise, man was made for his own sake, but woman was created for man's assistance. Man was then handed over to the devil on account of sin, when he heard: 'You are earth, and into the earth you shall go.' For then it was said to the devil: 'You shall eat earth.' Whence also the prophet says: 'To the serpent, dust is his bread.' For the serpent is the devil, and the dust the ungodly; and these are the food of the devil. Because by a depraved will we sink down to the depths, rightly it is with labor that we rise up to act well; which would not be so had not delight persuaded the first men to their crime, for whom, to live well, merely to will would have sufficed, and without difficulty action would at once have obeyed.
That there is division and strife in man's soul is the penalty of sin, propagated from the first man into all his children, so that he who was unwilling to be united with God should be divided within himself, and he who was unwilling to be subject to the commanding Lord should become to himself a rebel and adversary. Whence he will not be able to subdue himself unless he has first been made subject to God, and he will serve himself unwillingly who was unwilling to serve God willingly. How variously, through diverse things, has the human race flowed away, while it withdrew itself from the one stable and ever-abiding solidity of the divine nature!
For while man eagerly seeks the work he desires, as though to fix there at last the rest of his mind, when it does not suffice him, with changed intention he passes on to other and yet other actions; and while through diverse things he seeks solid rest and does not find it, he lives wretched in toil and inconstancy, and remains empty of rest. Although this same mutability was not created together with man, but accrued to him by the desert of the first transgression, yet it has now become natural, since in origin, from the first man, just as death also, it passed into all men. XII. On the Soul and the Other Senses. The life of the body is the soul, the life of the soul is God. And just as the body is dead without the soul, so the soul is dead without God.
The soul of man is not the man, but the body, which was made from the earth—that alone is man. Yet by dwelling within the body, the soul, from that very participation in the flesh, received the name of man, just as the Apostle also speaks of the inner man. It is the soul, not the flesh, that was created to the image of God. Wrongly, therefore, is it believed by some that the soul of man is corporeal, which was made to the image of God for this end: that, if it could not be immutable like God, it might yet exist incorporeal like God. As the angels, so also the souls: for they have a beginning, but no end; for some things among things are temporal, some perpetual, some indeed sempiternal. Temporal are those in which there is a rising and a setting; perpetual, those which have a rising but no term;
sempiternal are those which have neither beginning nor end. The soul is not part of the divine substance or nature, nor does it exist before it is joined to the body, but it is created at the time when the body also is created, to which it is seen to be joined. The opinions of the philosophers say that the soul exists before it is born in the body. But this is proven true by no evidence. For whether we existed before we ourselves do not know, nor let any man say we possess such knowledge. It is not, therefore, to be inquired into, which by inquiry is only the more to be laughed at. The Gentiles and heretics attempt to dispute about the soul, but how can they rightly perceive anything about it, who have not known its Author, to whose image it was made? And therefore they have said many things worthy of error.
The soul is mutable not with respect to place, but with respect to time, in its affections. But the body is mutable both in place and in time, since it is both changed in time and altered in place. What the change of places is to the body, that the mutability of thoughts is to the soul. This variety of evil motion clung to the mind then, when, withdrawing from the contemplation of eternal things, the first man was unwilling to stand in Him from whom he wickedly withdrew, and by a just condemnation, inconstant, he flowed away through the variety of the snatching of things. The soul possesses much splendor from its own nature, but it is darkened by the admixture of the flesh in which it is held enclosed. For on its part it is turned toward the weakness of sinning, as Solomon teaches:
'The corruptible body weighs down the soul, and the earthly habitation presses down the mind that muses on many things.' XIII. On the Senses of the Flesh. It is not by the strength nor by the sense of the body, but by the reason of the mind, that we excel the other animals. For using bodily things the sense of the flesh suffices, but not for grasping spiritual things. But men enticed by the use of bodily things think nothing exists otherwise than as they conceive it by the sense of the flesh. Just as the bodily senses surpass one another by diversity of location, so also they surpass one another by the power of sensing. For smell is more excellent than taste, both by the position of its place and by the distance of its sensing; so the ears than smell: for we hear farther than we smell; so the eyes than the ears:
for we see farther than we hear. But the mind is borne above all these senses, both in place and in worth. For, set in the citadel of the head, what these do not corporeally attain, it beholds intellectually. The sense of the eyes surpasses the other senses still more, since even of things which pertain to the other senses we say 'see': as when we say 'see how it sounds,' 'see how it tastes,' and so with the rest. Just as the eye, so also the mind sees the other things, but does not behold itself. For it foresees the origins, kinds, and magnitudes of other things, but concerning itself it is stained with such ignorance of the truth that in all these matters it contemplates nothing with less certainty than itself.
O man, you who marvel at the height of the stars and the depth of the sea, enter into the abyss of your own mind and marvel, if you can. Musing on many things without the sense of the flesh and without living images, we behold them by the mind alone, and we hold them by memory, the mind forming them for itself. Many things also we understand by the sense which we cannot express with the tongue. Infants are harmless in deed, but not harmless in thought, since the motion which they bear in mind they cannot yet carry out in deed. And by this, in them the age is feeble, not the mind. For the frailty of the body does not yet obey them at the beck of their will, nor can they harm by deed so much as they are moved by thought. From its cause thought (cogitatio) received its name.
For from compelling (cogendo) the mind to recall what has been committed to memory, it is called thought (cogitatio). Memory is the treasury of all things: for it is the guardian of things discovered and of things thought. Concerning it, it is difficult for anyone to dispute clearly, because its intricacy is vast, and the mind itself is memory. An image, removed from the senses of the body, leaves in the memory a likeness of its own kind. But a likeness we recall not by images, as we do other things, but as we recall joy without an image. When we remember forgetfulness, it is not present through itself, for if it were present through itself, we would surely forget. Memory is common to man and to animals.
But no understanding is present in an irrational animal, except only in man endowed with reason. For in the rest, in that very quality of their perception, there is the sense of the flesh, not the intelligence of the mind. XIV. On Christ. The perfect nativity of the Son of God neither began to be nor ceased—lest it be past if it ceased, and lest it be imperfect if it is still coming to be; but let it be eternal, and let it be perfect, so that in that nativity both eternity and perfection may be held. From the womb of the Virgin, Christ is said to be less than the Father; He is so called according to the human assumption, not according to the divinity. Christ in the form of a servant is a servant, and in the form of a servant is not a servant. For in the form of a servant He is the servant of the Lord, in the form of a servant the Lord of men.
Christ in the form of a servant, on account of the excellence of His conception, is Lord of men, because, although He assumed flesh, yet not from the lustful contagion of the flesh. The Mediator of God and men, the man Christ Jesus, is by no means one in humanity and another in deity, but in both natures He is one and the same. Nor was He conceived a mere man, nor brought forth a mere man; nor did He afterward receive the merit of being God, but God the Word, the immutable essence which is coeternal to Him with the Father and the Holy Spirit remaining, assumed flesh for human salvation, in which He, the impassible, could suffer and, the immortal, die, and, eternal before the ages, could be shown as temporal.
The Mediator of God and men, the man Christ Jesus, although it is one thing that He is from the Father and another that He is from the Virgin, yet He is not one who is from the Father and another who is from the Virgin, but He Himself is eternal from the Father, He Himself temporal from the mother. He Himself who made, He Himself who was made; He Himself from the Father without a mother, He Himself from the mother without a Father; He Himself the temple of the Founder, He Himself the Founder of the temple; He Himself the author of the work, He Himself the work of the author. Remaining one out of both and in both natures, neither confused by the coupling of the natures, nor doubled by the distinction of the natures. Therefore God came in man, because through Himself He could not be known by men. But whence He took counsel for us, thence He bore contempt, because the weakness which He took up for our sake, proud man despised.
For this reason He chose the weak and foolish things of the world, that He might confound the stronger and wiser things by which He was not known. Just as a weak infant cannot take strong food unless first, brought forth by the mother, it is turned into the juice of milk, so that what it could not use as food it may drink by sucking in the milk through the flesh, so also we, while we were too weak to behold the eternity of the Word, that Word itself was made flesh, so that, nourished through the flesh and made stronger, we might be sated by contemplating solid food—that is, the true God, sempiternal with the Father—as the angels are. The first gifts of God are those by which He shows us that we are guilty to ourselves, we who, while we lay under the guilt of fault, believed ourselves to be righteous.
He came, laid open the wound, composed Himself, and from His own death fitted a medicine for us, that He might be not only the one who shows the wound, but the one who heals it. First Christ came to Jerusalem, as He Himself also says: 'I was not sent except to the sheep that were lost of the house of Israel.' For He came first to the people of Israel, but that they would not believe, the prophet did not keep silent, saying: 'First to Zion He says, "Behold, here I am," and to Jerusalem I will give an evangelist; and I looked, and there was no one, nor among these any who took counsel, and being questioned would answer a word.' But because He passed over to the Gentiles, there follows: 'Behold my servant, I will uphold him, my chosen one; my soul has been well pleased in him.
I have put my Spirit upon him, he shall bring forth judgment to the Gentiles.' Although the devil did not know the order of our liberation, yet he knew that Christ had come for the salvation of men; but that He would redeem us by His own death, this he did not know; whence too he slew Him. For if he had known that Christ would redeem the human race through death, he certainly would not have destroyed Him. That the devil knew Christ had come for the salvation of the human race is taught by the testimony of the Gospel; for when he saw Him, recognizing Him he was terrified, saying: 'What is there between us and you, Son of God? Have you come before the time to destroy us?'
Christ, just as He did not commit sin which is worthy of punishment, so He took upon Himself the penalty of our sin, that by His undue penalty He might wash away our due fault, that by this the devil might lose those whom he held as guilty, since he slew one who had committed no sin; and therefore he lost those whom he justly held, because he unjustly slew our Redeemer. The devil was mocked by the Lord's death as a bird is. For Christ, having shown the mortality of His flesh which the devil desired to destroy, hid His divinity, so that with a prudent snare He might entrap him, as a bird, in the noose. For if the harmless Christ had not been slain, man, made over to the devil through his transgression, would not have been set free.
The devil, while in Christ he assailed the flesh of humanity which lay open, was as it were caught by the hook of His divinity which lay hidden. For in Christ the divinity is the hook; the bait, moreover, is the flesh; the line, the genealogy that is recited from the Gospel. And He who holds this line is God the Father, of whom the Apostle says: 'The head of Christ is God.' And Luke, weaving the line of Christ's generation from the lowest to the highest, begins from Joseph and completes it in God, when he says: 'Who was of Heli'; and finishing the line of the lineage he says: 'Who was of God.' For this reason the Lord descended into hell, that He might open a way of returning to heaven for those who were not held by Him in punishment, according to the testimony of the prophet Isaiah who says:
'You have made the depth of the sea a way, that the delivered might pass over.' For Christ made a way in the depth of the sea when, descending into hell, He showed the saints the road of returning to heaven. The saints, from the time of Christ's resurrection, as soon as they go out of the body, straightway ascend to the heavenly habitation, which was not granted to the ancient fathers. For before the coming of the Savior, although without the pain of torment, yet not in heaven, but in hell, the souls of the saints were held. For the loosing of these the Lord descended into hell. Christ, ascending into heaven, departed indeed in the flesh, but is present in majesty, according to that which He says: 'Behold, I am with you always, even to the consummation of the age.'
Christ sits at the right hand of the Father—not that the Father has a corporeal right hand, but the right hand of the Father is blessedness, just as the left is misery. XV. On the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit is Creator, just as the Father and the Word, the prophet bearing witness: 'The Spirit of the Lord made me, and the breath of the Almighty gave me life.' The Holy Spirit is of the Father and of the Son, and therefore the Father and the Son are one, because the Father has nothing which the Son does not have. For one thing consubstantial to two could not proceed at once from them and be present together in them, unless those from whom it proceeds were one.
The Church received the Holy Spirit as a pledge, that through Him believers might become one in one body—the Spirit through whom the Father and the Son are essentially one, the Savior Himself saying to the Father: 'That they may be one, as we also are one.' Christ testifies that He was sent not only by the Father but also by the Holy Spirit, the prophet saying: 'Draw near to me, and hear: from the beginning I have not spoken in secret. From the time before it came to be, I was there, and now the Lord has sent me, and his Spirit.' The Holy Spirit is called the Paraclete, in that He is the Comforter, for in Latin paraclesis means consolation. And truly, while He distributes the gifts of the sacraments, He furnishes consolation to the soul.
I believe indeed that he feels great gladness who says anything by the revelation of the Spirit. The gift of the Holy Spirit is distributed among the members of the Church one by one, and to individuals individual gifts are bestowed. But Christ had all the fullness of graces, of whom it is thus read: 'Full of grace and truth.' In Christ, therefore, is all the fullness of graces, for to the individual elect individual gifts are given. In the Holy Spirit consists all the grace of gifts. For He, as He wills, bestows the grace of gifts; to some giving the word of wisdom, to others of knowledge, to others faith; and thus to each, by the power of the Holy Spirit, a portion of the graces is given, and in all the same one Spirit is held.