Question Four of Chapter One of the Third Decade
On the interval between the creation and the fall of the angels
It is asked how much time after their creation the demons fell.
To this it is answered that different persons have thought different things concerning the interval between the creation and the fall of the angels.
For Lord Henry of Assia, upon Genesis, reporting an opinion which follows Origen, sets down three things concerning the interval before the fall of the angels.
The first is that not all the angels were made evil before the sin of the human being, although some angel sinned before the human being.
The second is that, although each angel sinned in an instant, nevertheless not all sinned in the same instant, but successively.
The third is that before the demons fell, they were for some time just and good, praising God, according to that saying of Ezekiel, chapter 28: “You walked perfect in your ways from the day of your creation until iniquity was found in you.”
Walking, however, is a continuous motion requiring some interval.
Job, chapter 38, also appears to intimate this when it says: “Where were you when the morning stars praised me together and all the sons of God rejoiced?”—that is, the good and evil angels.
What Origen says upon Genesis also supports this: that the ancient serpent did not immediately walk upon its breast and belly.
There is another, second opinion concerning the interval before the fall of the angels, that of Lord Landulfus in Book II of the Sentences, distinction 4. He places four intervals from the creation to the fall of the angels.
The first is that in which the angels were created perfect in natural things, in original justice, without grace making them pleasing, during which interval they could not proceed into the use of free choice.
The second is the interval in which the good turned themselves toward God and the evil toward their own natural goods, loving themselves most ardently.
Therefore, during this interval the good received grace. The evil, however, placed an obstacle and impediment before it by turning themselves toward natural goods, and therefore they did not receive grace.
The third interval is that in which the evil performed various sins, tempting the good; and during this interval there was a conflict in heaven, Revelation, chapter 12, about which it was said above in the Second Decade. The good performed many good things and resisted manfully.
The fourth interval is that in which the good received the best rewards and the evil punishments.
And this Lord Landulfus places some interval between the creation and fall of the angels, because he imagines that during the first interval the demons were good with the other angels, according to that saying of Genesis, chapter 1: “God saw all the things which he had made, and they were very good.”
In the second interval they placed an obstacle and impediment before grace making them pleasing.
In the third, recoiling from God, they sinned and fell.
The fourth interval is that in which the good were rewarded and the evil punished.
And Landulfus himself distinguishes these four intervals by small coexistences of time and from the distinction of the states and operations or variations of the angels themselves.
Lord Bonaventure and Lord John Scotus in the same place also hold this opinion.
There is also a third, more probable opinion of Saint Thomas, more consonant with the sayings of the saints. He says that immediately after the first instant of his creation the angel sinned.
For just as the good angels were confirmed in grace in the second instant of their creation, so the evil angels in the second instant of their creation fell, obstinate in fault.
And just as the good angels in the second instant, through one meritorious act of adherence to God, were confirmed in grace and merited beatitude, so the evil angels in the second instant, through one demeritorious act of nonadherence to God, merited eternal punishment, confirmed in fault.
But if it is said by Scotus against Thomas that between any two instants there falls an intervening time, according to Book VI of the Physics, while you place one instant in which the devil sinned after the instant in which he was created, and therefore there was some interval between the creation of the angel and his fall, as Landulfus maintains above, Thomas responds to this in the First Part, question 63, article 6, reply to the fourth objection.
He says that the statement that there is an intervening time between any two instants has truth insofar as time is continuous, as is proved in Book VI of the Physics.
But in the angels, who are not subjects of celestial motion, time is taken according to the succession itself of operations of the intellect or even of effects.
Therefore, in the first manner an interval falls between two instants; in the second manner, by no means.
These things are from Thomas and Henry cited within this little question.