What up to here has been said is what the Holy Scriptures preach to us of the immensity and greatness of our Creator. Now we shall proceed in this same matter by the works that he has made in this world, as well by those that he has revealed to us in Holy Scripture, as by those that are attained by the light of reason, because these give clear testimony of the greatness of their author. But before we descend to these works, I shall point out here one principal difference, among many others, that there is between the Creator and his creatures. And this is that all creatures have their limits and terms as far as their nature and virtue extends, so that they have limited being, and thus power, and
knowledge, and virtue, and all the other faculties that follow from this being; and this limit is according to the measure that the Creator wished to distribute to his creatures, giving to some more and to others less, as it pleased his divine will. But he, as he had no superior who created him, so neither had he anyone who limited for him his being, or his power, or his knowledge, or his goodness, or his happiness, or any of his other perfections. And for this, just as he lacks limit and term, so in all and through all he is infinite. In such manner that his being is infinite, and his power infinite, and his knowledge infinite, and his goodness infinite, and his beauty, his glory, his riches, his mercy, his justice, and all his perfections are infinite. And therefore he is in himself incomprehensible and ineffable, whose greatness no creature created, nor to be created, can comprehend, because he alone perfectly knows and comprehends himself.
For this we have a very accommodated example in the kings of the earth, who in their kingdom distribute charges and offices to diverse persons as it seems to them, limiting to each one the jurisdiction that he can use without prejudice to that of another. But the king who limits these jurisdictions has supreme and universal jurisdiction in all his kingdom, without recognizing a superior. And therefore there cannot be pointed out nor taxed to him any jurisdiction and faculty so great that it does not extend itself to more and more, without term or measure. And this manner of jurisdiction is called infinite in this sense, that you cannot point out to it any term in which it cannot pass farther on in matter of lawful jurisdiction. Then by this example we shall easily understand what has been said, making comparison of the Creator to his creatures as of the king to his officers. It is true that in this the comparison fails, because the jurisdiction of the king is in a certain manner infinite, as we declared, but that of the Creator is fully and in all manners infinite, which is still proved by another reason. For according to the common sentence of philosophers and theologians, God is a thing so great that not only can there not be another greater, but neither can a greater be thought. Then since it is a greater thing for the perfections to be infinite than finite and limited, if the perfections of God were in this manner limited, already we could think other perfections greater than his, which is impossible by the aforesaid sentence, which is that God is a thing so great that another greater cannot be thought.
But before we enter into this sanctuary, where things so great have to be explained, I shall take as theme and foundation of them those words of an angel, who represented the person of God, who, being asked by the father of Samson what he was called, responded: “Why do you ask for my name, which is admirable?” This is a word that comes so proper to the greatness of God and of all his works that there is none so small that, if it is well considered, it does not suspend our spirits in admiration of its Maker, and does not make us say: Why do you ask for my name, which is admirable? Tully, great orator, says that no account is to be made of eloquence that does not arrive at putting the hearers in admiration. Then if human wit, helped by only study and human diligence, can arrive at making a discourse so perfect and finished that it puts in admiration as many as hear it, what must be presumed of the works traced and fabricated by that infinite Wisdom (in comparison with which all the wisdom of the cherubim is ignorance), especially in the greater works of which here we shall begin to treat? Of which, whoever does not wonder and does not remain as astonished considering them, it is because he does not understand them totally, because the majesty and splendor of them blinds his sight.
Beginning, then, with the work of creation, I say that although what Saint Augustine says were true (and Ecclesiasticus appears to feel the same), that God created all this great fabric of the world with all that there is in it together, yet with all that, with supreme and divine counsel Moses divided the works of Creation into six days. For since it is true that God created all things for love of himself, that is, for manifestation of the greatness of his perfections, our understanding could not have embraced a thing so great and that comprehended so many and so great things as this whole world, and thus it would have fainted with the consideration of so many and so great things together. And therefore the Prophet divided it into many parts, chiefly because each work of these six days by itself is so great and has so much to consider, that each one of them could be divided into many other parts in order to be considered perfectly.
It is also to be noted here that to create, speaking properly, is not to make from one thing another, because this is called generation, but it is to make from nothing something, which is a thing so proper to God that it cannot be communicated to any creature, however most perfect it may be.
For we see in the changes of natural things that, the greater the distance is from one extreme to another, so much the greater virtue is required to cause this change. And thus we see how much more difficult it is for earth or water to be changed into fire than air. Then since the distance that there is from not being to being is infinite, because another greater cannot be imagined, it follows that infinite power is necessary for this work, and this belongs to God alone, who calls the things that are not as if they really were.
I
Beginning, then, to treat of the works of the six days in which God created all things, on the first day it is said that he created heaven and earth: by which we understand the heavens together with the four elements that are beneath them: earth, water, air, and fire. I do not wish to heighten here the greatness of the power that sufficed so that from nothing, that is, without any preceding matter, this so great body of the earth should come to light, with all its mountains and hills, because this whole body is no more than a point in comparison with the greatness of the heavens, but of the greatness of them alone, which is such that if those who determine it were not so wise and so exercised in the science of astrology, it would not be credible. It is true that to him who attends to the immensity of the power of God (he having created these bodies to show in them the greatness of his power) what is written of this greatness will not be incredible, always presupposing that the superior heaven is much greater in quantity than its inferior, and thus ascending through all of them up to the Empyrean, whose greatness cannot be explained, which is the royal palace and dwelling of God and of all his chosen ones. Then from what quarry, let us see, did God bring to light these so great heavens? And descending lower, from what abyss did he draw out these so great seas? From what place did he draw out this so great body of the earth, and place it in the middle of the world? Who, says God by holy Job, opened the foundations of the earth, and seated it in its place by weight and measure? Upon what bases is it firmly seated?
Let us not stop at the ninth heaven, which they call the first mobile, which with its movement snatches and moves all the other inferior heavens, and makes them make one turn around the world in a natural day, nor also at the Empyrean heaven, which is above all, whose greatness is so much greater than that of all its inferiors, as it occupies a greater place, nor are there indications in mathematical science with which this can be settled. Let us stop only at the greatness of the starry heaven, where there is so much infinity of stars of very different greatnesses. Then let us estimate now: what will be the power that with a simple sign of his will brought to light, from the darknesses and abysses and from nothing, all this so great machine, and not of one heaven alone, but of so many heavens together? Men, to make a house, must first gather the materials from which it has to be made, and masters who make it, and laborers who serve the masters, and diverse tools for the work, and plans and models before it is made. And with all this after much time they give end to this work. For Solomon spent seven years in the fabric of the temple, bringing to it one hundred and fifty thousand men who were occupied in the work, with three thousand and three hundred masters who governed the people. And with all this apparatus so great a king made a house that, compared with the rest of the world, is scarcely a nest of ants. But that most omnipotent Creator, without any of these aforesaid things, in an instant, with a single word, created these bodies of such incredible greatness. But it becomes credible, considering the greatness of the stars, among which there is none so small that it is not much greater than all the earth, given that from here they appear so small, because of the very great distance that there is from the earth to the eighth heaven, where they are, which can be understood by the thickness of the heavens. Wherefore those who treat of this matter say that, if God should convert the earth into a star, and should put it, not already in the eighth, but lower, in the sixth heaven, it would not be seen by our eyes because it is so small. Then let him who has discretion consider now how great the number of the stars of heaven is, among which there are some of so notable greatness that they are one hundred times greater than all the earth. Then according to this, how great will the heaven be where there is so much infinity of stars, and so many spaces where many more could fit? And all this so admirable machine the Creator formed from nothing with only this word, Fiat. This is a thing that the philosophers of the world could never finish believing, because they did not understand how it was possible for something to be made from nothing, chiefly considering that in all natural changes they saw that there was always presupposed something from which another should be made. For which either they believed that the world had been ab aeterno, or they said that God and prime matter, which they called chaos, from which they believed all things to have been made, were ab aeterno. But the Catholic faith, taught by God, preaches to us that his power is infinite, and that thus he can make from nothing something, and that with that power he could create a thousand worlds in a point, if he wished. For to all this and much more the immensity of his power extends. This is a marvel that suspends and exhausts all understandings, and makes them unable and incapable of being able to estimate a thing so great, and thus they fall as if stunned, because they cannot wade this so deep sea. And thus they come to reprehend their daring of wishing to measure and think things so great, chastising themselves with those words of the angel: Why do you ask my name, which is admirable? This, then, is the work of the first day.
Let us come to that of the second. On this day the whole earth was covered round about with water, as the lighter element that had its seat and natural place and as its own center over the body of the earth. And because, the earth being thus, it did not give place to the habitation
of men, for whose profit the elements had to serve, with all the other creatures, the Creator commanded the waters to leave this their position and natural place, and to gather themselves into another bosom, and to leave the earth uncovered. And the waters, as if they had sense to know, and ears to hear, and feet to flee, suddenly abandoned the earth and the natural position that belonged to them, and moved to the place that they now have, which is neither natural, nor can it be called violent, because there is no violence where the creature obeys the commandment of its Creator. And what is more: without his making walls or barriers so that the water should not run to its natural place, it remains quiet and fixed, having no more barrier than loose sand. And although its waves rise one after another up to the clouds, so that they seem to come to cover the earth, on arriving at the sands they recognize the terms and the law that is set for them and, breaking there all their fury, they pass no farther. Which marvel God heightens many times in Holy Scripture, especially in chapter 38 of Job, which we already alleged, and more particularly in Jeremiah, saying: “Will you not fear me, nor tremble at my presence, who was powerful to put the sand as term and wall of the sea? And its waves shall grow fierce and shall swell, and they shall not pass over it.” And since the Creator himself so much amplifies the greatness of this power, with reason we can here repeat the words of the angel: “Why do you ask for my name, which is admirable?”
Let us come to the work of the third day, which has more differences of things to consider than the second, which is when the Creator commanded the earth to produce every kind of plants and groves. Then with this commandment alone of the Creator, without more seeds, without more labor, without influences of the sun and of the planets and stars, which were not yet created, the earth produced so many differences of plants, of herbs, of flowers, of trees, for so many uses and profits of human life as we declared above, and therefore we do not repeat it in this place. For the eyes of that Lord, to whom all the future is present, saw the things of which our life had necessity, and for all he provided remedy. But among so many species and differences of trees, which have neither count nor number, one of those that should give us knowledge of his providence are the great pines that grow in some parts, chiefly in Germany, so great, so long, so thick, and above all so straight, that neither with rule nor plummet could they come out straighter, which serve for masts of great ships and galleons that sail from West to East (which are five thousand leagues of water) through very tempestuous seas, of which I saw one lying on the bank of Lisbon, of so strange a greatness that it put me in admiration. Whereby it appears that the Creator saw that these so great seas had to be navigated, and from the beginning of the world, among other infinite differences of trees, he also created these so great, so straight, so beautiful, and so accommodated to the end for which he created them. For by this means faith also sails together with merchandise to the end of the world.
II
Nor is less admirable, but much more, the work of the fourth day, where God said, “Let there be lights in the heaven, so that they may give light to the earth.” And by the virtue of this word alone there came to light the sun, the moon, the morning star with the other planets, and all the other
infinity of innumerable and resplendent stars that beautify, more than the flowers and roses of spring, that so great vault of heaven, whose number, greatness, virtue, and efficacy who will be able to explain? And after it has been explained, who will be able to believe it? Who will believe that the sun is one hundred and sixty-six times greater than all the circle of the earth together with the water, appearing from here as small as the head of a man? Who will believe the frightful lightness that the Creator gave it to move? For we see that, when in the morning this our world begins to be discovered, in less than a quarter of an hour all of it is discovered, which is to run so many leagues and so much space as the circle of the earth occupies, multiplying this space one hundred and sixty-six times, which is the quantity that the body of the sun occupies. Then what ray falls from heaven that moves with such lightness? And if the earth, as the mathematicians say, has in roundness six thousand and three hundred leagues, let whoever knows this multiply this number of leagues all these aforesaid times, and he will see how many thousands of leagues this planet runs in so brief a space as that in which it is discovered when it is born. And considering this, he will not be able to fail to remain astonished, knowing by this the greatness of the omnipotence that could give such lightness to this star, or to speak better, to the heaven where it is, by whose movement it is moved. But the marvel does not stop here. For a much greater marvel is to consider the lightness with which the ninth heaven moves, which is above the heaven of the stars, which they call the first mobile, which makes one turn around the world in the space of twenty-four hours, and snatches and moves together with itself all the other inferior heavens. For we presuppose that the higher one heaven is than another, so much the greater space and place it occupies, and so much with greater lightness it moves. Then this first mobile being five heavens above the sun, it follows that it will move with more than doubled lightness than the fourth heaven, where the sun is. And if the lightness of the sun so much frightens us, how much more will that of the ninth heaven frighten us, which moves with so much greater lightness? What ray will there be so light that it is not the step of a tortoise, and much less in comparison with it? Then what understanding will there be that does not faint, considering the greatness of the power that could cause such lightness? And over this marvel there is another no lesser, and it is that one single angel is the one who, applying his virtue to this so great machine of the ninth heaven, moves it from the beginning of the world until today without ceasing, and without tiring, and without another changing turns in this office, and this with so great a measure that after the Creator delivered this charge to him until today, he has not lost a single point of this measure, nor by this care does he lose a point of the glory that he enjoys seeing the face of his Creator. And by reason of this measure the astrologers hit upon the eclipses of the sun and of the moon many years before, because this movement is so regular and so infallible. Then what is the power that gave such power to a creature? Who will not humble and prostrate himself and make himself a little worm before so great a Majesty? Who will have daring to offend so powerful a Monarch and Lord of heavens and earths? Who will not see with how much reason that angel said in the person of God: “Why do you ask for my name, which is admirable?”
The greatness of the sun, which we have already said, is attained by the measures and rules that the astrologers have for this. But that it is greater than the body of the earth, together with the water, is seen by sight through this experience: if you put before a lighted torch a hat, which is a body greater than the light of this same torch, the shadow of this hat, the farther it goes forward, the more and more it will always go extending and widening. But if you should put in place of it an apple, which is a body smaller than the
flame of the torch, its shadow on the contrary will always go diminishing and narrowing until it is entirely undone. Then this we see by experience: that when the sun at night is on the other band of the world beneath the earth, the shadow of it goes always narrowing, so that it reaches no farther than the heaven of the moon, and therefore it eclipses it when it happens to place itself beneath the earth opposite it, but there this shadow ends, so that it does not reach to the third heaven, where the morning star is, which is not eclipsed, because the shadow of the earth does not reach to it. Which openly declares the Sun, which appears so small to us, to be greater than all the body of the Earth and water, since, when it is beneath the earth, the shadow of it always goes narrowing in such manner that it does not pass beyond the heaven of the moon, which is the one that is nearest to us.
Then the greatness of its virtue, of its heat and clarity, who will explain it? Anaxagoras, distinguished philosopher, was so amazed at the virtue and clarity of this planet that, asked for what he had been born, he responded that it was to see the sun: so much did he marvel at the beauty and efficacy of this star. Then what was the virtue of that Lord who, by only commanding, kindled a lamp that gives light to all that he has created, excepting hell, because the earth impedes it, and the Empyrean heaven, because this has another more excellent manner of light, which is the Lamb of God, as Saint John says?
III
Nor is it a thing of lesser admiration to have created so great a number of stars, which only he, who created them, can count. And if each one of the stars is greater than this lower world that we understand by sea and earth, what will it be for him to have created innumerable stars, except to have created innumerable worlds, so much more beautiful and precious than this one, as the matter of the stars is more excellent than that of the elements? And all of them, together with the Sun and with the Moon, were created with a single word.
Let us come to the fifth day, when God said: “Let the waters produce fish and birds in their genera and species.” And leaving infinite things that there are here to consider, of which we have already said something, one alone I wish to ponder. Let man consider how many differences of birds of diverse conditions and species fly through the air, and from there let him descend to the sea, and look at that admirable fecundity of so many differences of fishes and shellfish, and of so many figures and forms of them, some so great that they frighten with their greatness, and others of so strange a make that they no less frighten with their artifice and figure, some of them as armed as a man is with jointed armor, and others unarmed, which serve as maintenance for the others. And let him also consider the great fecundity of the fish that are contained beneath one species, which surpasses that of the animals of the earth and of the birds of the air. For these are found in certain places, but the sea is almost entirely curdled with fish. But because of this matter we have already treated something, at present I shall say no more than one thing of greater admiration than all, and this is that, the species of the birds of the air, of the fish of the sea, and of the animals of the earth being almost infinite, all the philosophy of the world did not find a single one that was not most perfectly fabricated in its species, without there being in them a thing that is superfluous or that is lacking. From which flowed those four signal sentences of philosophers, of which one is that the works of nature are fabricated by
an intelligence (that is, by a most perfect and supreme wisdom) that does not err in what it does. Another is that the author of nature always does what is better and more perfect. Another is that nature does not fail in necessary things, and another that God and nature do not make a superfluous thing. From these two last sentences it is inferred that in all this infinity of species of fish and birds and animals there will not be found a thing of which it can be said “this is superfluous,” or “this is lacking,” but that all are complete and perfect, each one in its genus.
Then let the discreet reader now consider what may be the power and the knowledge of that Lord who without labor, without instruments, without materials, and without space of time, with a single word created this infinity of species of birds and of fish with so much perfection and with so much provision of members and abilities for their conservation, that if he had been thinking for a thousand years, in a manner of speaking, how he could fabricate each creature of these, he would not have made it in another manner than he made it, since his wisdom does not grow with years and with time. And if he preserved this perfection in one single species of animals, it would not be so admirable a thing, but to preserve it in so great an infinity of animals, which almost surpasses the number of the stars of heaven, and for all of them to come to light in a moment, with only an “I will,” this is a thing that surpasses all admiration. And although the work of the fourth day, when the stars and planets of heaven were created, by which the world is governed, is admirable, yet it appears to me that this of the fifth day is more so. For although the stars have singular properties and virtues for influencing the bodies of the earth, yet in figure there is little difference of some from others except that some are greater and others lesser; but in the bodies of the fish, and still more of the birds, there is so much variety of members, of organs, and of senses to conserve themselves in their being, that almost all that rigging and harmony of members that we placed in the human body is in each one of these birds.
And if the fabric of the human body, which God formed on the sixth day, is so admirable, how much more will that of so many thousands of bodies of animals be, which with one word were created on the fifth? This is a thing of so much admiration that it alone, in the judgment of Solomon, is sufficient cause to induce men to the fear and reverence of so great a Majesty. Conformably to which, he says: “There is nothing that can be added or taken away from the things that God created in order to be feared.” He means to say that all the works of God are made with so much perfection that there is not in any of them a thing that can be added as necessary, nor that can be taken from it as superfluous. And for this to be found in so great an infinity of creatures, without one single species being able to be pointed out in which there is an error or a point more or less, who does not see this to be a work that incites us to an admiration of so great power and knowledge, and to fear and reverence of so great a Majesty, who did all that he wished with so much facility in heaven and on earth and in the sea and in all the abysses?
IV
This is the knowledge that the work of Creation, chiefly of the heavens, gives us of the greatness of the power and of the wisdom of the Creator, of whom the Prophet says that the heavens preach the glory of God, and that there are no tongues, nor nations so barbarous that they do not understand this language. Upon which Saint Chrysostom says: “What is this? How do the
heavens preach this glory? They have no voice, no tongue, no mouth: then how do they preach?” This, he says, they do by representing the greatness, the height, the beauty, the site, the form, and the constancy of them, by which in so many thousands of years they have neither aged nor been worn away with such continuous movements, nor altered the course of them; and when we see this, we adore him who created such beautiful bodies, and with such sight we know the greatness of that Majesty.
Let us now see this same thing by the work of the general resurrection, which faith proposes to us, which holy Job by special revelation of God, before the Gospel and before the law, knew and testified by these memorable words: “Who would give me that these my sermons were written? Who would give me that they were sculpted in a book with an iron pen, or on a plate of lead, or on living rock. For I know that my Redeemer lives, and on the last day I have to rise again, and again I have to be surrounded with this skin of my body, and in this flesh of mine I have to see God, whom I myself have to see, and my eyes have to see him, and not another than the one I now am. This hope I have kept in the bosom of my soul.” This so great mystery could not have been represented with greater clarity and greater apparatus of words than those of this holy man. Then this that faith preaches to us reason also testifies, because this is conformable to the rectitude and fulfillment of divine justice, so that since the body together with the soul, while in this world they lived, were occupied either in serving God or in offending him, it is just that in the other they be rewarded and punished. Then let us now consider how great the power may be that in one point and, as the Apostle says, in the space of a shutting and opening of the eye, will resurrect on that fearful day of judgment all the bodies of men, and they will be joined with their proper souls, so that thus the whole man, who is composed of body and soul, may rise again, either for pain or for glory. Then how so great will be the power of that Lord who, by the ministry of an archangel and terrible sound of a trumpet that will sound through all the regions of the world, will resurrect the bodies, of which some will have been made earth, others ashes, others eaten by birds, others by fish, and others by other men! And all these have to rise again. And those who were eaten by other men will rise again, both the eaten and the eaters. And the teeth and skulls and bones that at that time shall be whole, although they be scattered through all the world, will come to recognize one another, and to be joined as brothers and fitted into their proper places, as they were when they lived. Let us think, then, now how many teeth of men will be scattered at the hour of the general resurrection in all parts of the world, outside their skulls. These will perhaps be more than the stars of heaven, and God knows where they are, and to what head they belong, in order to come to join themselves with it. And with these teeth being so similar among themselves, some will not be exchanged with the others, but all will recognize their owners and their proper places, and in them they will return to be fixed. Then what is the power and the knowledge that extends to here?
Eusebius recounts in book V of the Ecclesiastical History that in a persecution that there was in the time of the emperor Antoninus Verus in Lyons and Vienne, cities of France, where the martyrs who suffered were innumerable, not content with this, the tyrants burned and turned into ash those sacred bodies, and cast it into the Rhone River, so that it might carry it away. And in this manner it appeared to them that they finished conquering our God, and took away from us the hope of the resurrection. For they said: These hope
that sometime they have to rise from the sepulchers, and for this, deceived with this vain superstition, they offer themselves to torments and to death. Then now let us see if they will rise again, and if their God will be able to avail them and deliver them from our hands. Then this being so, what is that power and that knowledge that will know how to make difference among so much confusion and multitude of ashes, in order to know which part of them belongs to the body of one martyr, and which to another, in order to change that ash into its proper body? Then who does not go out of judgment considering and adoring and being stunned by this so great power and knowledge?
But with this being a thing so great that it surpasses all admiration, it does not surpass the faith that the faithful ought to have of it. For which serves the example that, for confirmation of this truth, the Apostle brings, of the virtue that the Creator placed in all the seeds of herbs and trees, in each one of which he placed virtue so that from it may be born the plant from which the seed proceeded: and what is more: it is fitting that this seed die so that, dying, it may rise again and fructify. Farther on we shall explain this example more entirely, by which it will be seen how worthy of faith this mystery is, although it appears so arduous. For to the rectitude and perfection of divine justice, as we say, it belongs that the same body that was instrument and companion of the soul in evil or in good, be participant with it in its evil or in its good. For otherwise the evil, as Eusebius Emisenus says, could pamper their bodies with every kind of vice, presupposing that other new bodies had to be tormented, and not theirs. And for this it is fitting, as the Apostle says, that this corruptible body rise incorruptible, and that which now is mortal clothe itself with immortality, so that thus it may receive its due punishment or reward. Then in this work no less, but perhaps much more than in the past one, is seen the immensity of the wisdom and omnipotence of the Creator, because to know where are the ashes and the relics and the matter of as many bodies as there have been, from the beginning of the world until it ends, and where are those who died drowned in the sea in the time of the flood and in the other shipwrecks that have happened and hereafter will follow, who does not see how frightful a work this is? And if these bodies were whole with all their frame, like that of Lazarus four days dead, or like that of the widow’s son whom the Savior resurrected, it would not frighten us so much, but they being already eaten by fish or birds or men, and converted into the substance of them, this is a thing that exhausts all human understandings, because for this, the Apostle preaching this mystery in Athens, the Athenians mocked him, saying that he was a “preacher of new demons.” But to this Saint Augustine responds, saying: “Let us concede that God can do something that we cannot understand.” And Solomon also responds, saying: “Just as you do not attain the manner in which the body of a child is fabricated in the womb of the pregnant woman (where there is so great an infinity of members and organs and senses, and all so concordant and proportioned to the service and use of the human body), so you cannot attain the marvels and secrets of the works of God, who is the Maker of all things.” Holy Job also responds, who says that God does great and admirable things, and such that human understanding cannot scrutinize nor understand how they are possible. Then by this marvel, which surpasses all understanding, it is known how incomprehensible is the majesty and greatness of that sovereign Lord who knows and can do such things, and with how much reason that angel who represented him said: “Why do you ask for my name, which is admirable?”
Let us come to another work in part similar to this one, which also serves for confirmation of the past one, which is the admirable virtue that the Creator placed in the seeds of all things, as well of plants as of all animals, which, as a great philosopher said, also exhausts all understandings, like the past one, and serves much for the faith and belief of it, as we have just said. How admirable a thing it is that a seed so small of an orange has within itself virtue so that from it may be born a tree so beautiful as an orange tree, so fragrant when it is flowered, and so showy when it is loaded with fruit. Nor is it a lesser marvel that in a little pine nut there is virtue to produce so great a tree as a pine. This marvel grows still more, as the Savior declares in the Gospel, in the little grain of mustard, which, being so small, has virtue so that from it may be born a tree so great that the birds of the air can sit in its branches. Who, then, was powerful to place in a thing so small so great a virtue? Then from this virtue that there is in seeds the Apostle profits to persuade the mystery of the resurrection. Let us pass to the animals. How admirable is the virtue that the Creator placed in the egg of a peahen, from which in so brief a space is born a bird so beautiful as the peacock, with all that fineness of feathers that we declared above! But let us come to man and, leaving Absalom with his hair of gold, and his brother Adonijah, no less beautiful than he, and Queen Helen, because of whom Troy was lost, let us set our eyes on holy Judith, and on Queen Esther, and on Tamar, daughter of David, and on the three last daughters of holy Job, whose beauty the Holy Scriptures magnify, and passing in haste over the matter from which this so great beauty was forged, and marveling at this, let us consider what may be the power of that sovereign artificer, who from a thing so vile could form a thing of so great beauty, which many times has sufficed to make the judgments of infinite men go astray. And thus their strayings come to be testimonies of this admirable artifice of the Creator. For so great is the perversity of many men that, from where they had to take motive to glorify the painter of such a figure, they take it to offend him and lose judgment, health, and at times life, and above all their souls.
To this example I shall add another no less admirable. We see in the eggs that every day we eat a white streak attached to the yolk and white of the egg. Then in that streak so small is the formative virtue of the chicken that is born from the egg, in which there is almost all that we placed in the fabric of the human body. And if we look at the egg of a dove, that little streak is so much smaller than the other, as its egg is smaller than that of the hen. And if we pass to that of a swallow, it will come to be as small as the head of a pin. Then in that so very small streak the Creator placed virtue to fabricate from that little egg a body of a little bird, which, though being so small, has all that fabric and rigging of members and organs and senses that above we placed in the human body, with its stomach, liver, spleen, lungs, guts, veins, nerves, arteries, and with a heart in which there fit passions of sadness, fear, and wrath, and imagination, and sense in part spiritual, because lifting its eyes to the hawk, it knows that it is its enemy, and has fear of it. And there will not be lacking someone who holds this for a marvel so much greater than the fabric of our body, as this little body is of lesser quantity, since for this greater artifice and subtlety of it is required, as above we declared treating of the mosquito. Then of all this fabric the master, who is the efficient cause, is that white little streak that we said. For just as to make a chest or a chair the matter is necessary, which is the wood from which it is to be made, and the officer who makes it, so in this little egg that we said both things are present, because the
matter is the egg, and the efficient cause of this fabric is that white little streak that we said, because here is the formative virtue of this body. Then how so great is the omnipotence of him who could give to so small a substance so great virtue and faculty? Then what understanding is not exhausted considering the greatness of this power? Who does not reverence and adore this so great Majesty, who was powerful to give virtue to a substance so small (as we said) as the head of a pin, so that in the space of fifteen or twenty days it should finish so great a fabric, that neither the labyrinth of Daedalus nor the palaces of Solomon, which he built in the space of three years, had so many compartments, and offices, and chambers, and inner chambers as the body of this little bird has? Truly, Lord (says the Prophet), admirable are your works, and my soul knows it much. Then this marvel declares to us that he will be able to resurrect a body from the ashes that remained of it, who could give virtue to so small a matter for this so great fabric.
Then what shall I say of the little egg of a shad, from which without other industry is born so great and so savory a fish? And if this puts us in admiration, much greater admiration should the little egg of a sardine put in us, which will be little greater than the point of a pin, from which is born a sardine, which in so small a body has so many instruments and senses, as well to swim as to seek its maintenance, as any other great fish. And when the body and the little egg are smaller, so much the greater is this marvel. Nor even is the fecundity and fruit of this little fish less admirable, since it is common maintenance of the sea and of the earth, as we said above.
V
Let us pass from here to another marvel no lesser than the past one. The philosophers say that the soul that we have comes from outside, and does not come out of the matter of our body as the souls of the other animals do. For since it is spiritual substance in the manner of the angels, it cannot proceed from a material or bodily thing, since there is no proportion from the one to the other. But they saying this that reason attains, do not declare whence this soul comes, since it comes from outside. But this that they did not attain the Christian religion teaches us, saying that God by himself creates souls and infuses them into the bodies after they have been organized in the entrails of their mothers. And it is held that the body of the male, at forty days after its conception, is organized, and that of the female at sixty.
And at the point that this fabric is finished, which is like building the house with its offices for lodging of the soul, at that point and moment it is by God created and infused into the body. Then let us now begin to philosophize upon this. And let us now extend our eyes through all the universe world, which is through the three principal parts of it, which are Asia, Africa, and Europe, and in the fourth that now has been discovered in the Western Indies, which they call the New World, and let us run through all the islands of the archipelago and through all those of the Ocean Sea, and through all the lands of barbarians and black people who dwell beneath the torrid zone, and finally through all that the Sun surrounds, and let us look how many women will be pregnant in all these hemispheres, and how many boys and girls will have arrived at this point at which the soul has to be infused into them, and we shall see that by day and by night God has to be creating
souls, and infusing them into the little bodies, and this without lacking one single point of the time in which they arrive at this disposition. And this he does not only in this present century and age, but from when he created the world until today. And it will happen that many of these organized little bodies are at the same point, some in the East and others in the West, that is, in most distant places, and God assists without lacking a point, and without making lack in one part by assisting another. And this he does, not by virtue of the influences of heaven nor by ministry of angels, but by himself alone. And neither by this so continual and punctual occupation does he lose that most blessed peace and happiness in which he lives, nor does this put him in care and solicitude to assist so many parts. Then I ask now: what is the wisdom of such a Lord, who knows the disposition in which all the children of the world are in the wombs of their mothers, in order to assist at the point that they are organized to infuse into them the souls, since the same mothers do not know it? And what is the universal assistance, without ever lacking at the appointed term? And what is the power of the Lord who creates from nothing a substance so spiritual and so beautiful, in which the image of God shines forth? This is a thing that conquers all our admiration and understanding, and declares to us how much that most blessed Substance differs from all human power and knowledge.
With this marvel I wish to join another very similar, although in a more excellent matter, which is the consecration of the body and blood of our Redeemer. For we hold as an article of faith that, when the priest has finished pronouncing the words of the consecration, at the point when he finishes the last of these words, which are the form of this most divine Sacrament, the divine presence and omnipotence assists there to work (as Saint Thomas says) the greatest of all his miracles, changing the substance of the bread into his most sacred body, with which together is his most holy soul with all the Divinity, and this, which is another marvel, is not only in all the consecrated host, but also in any particle of it. For which reason many times (when hosts are lacking) we receive communion with one of these particles. Then let the discreet reader now consider how many masses will be said each day in all the churches of Christendom, some in the parts of the East and others of the West, and others in other places, and how great is the wisdom of this great God who knows all the points at which the last word of the consecration is finished in all parts of the world, without lacking one single moment, and what may be the power of him who suddenly changes one substance into another. This is a thing that suspends and surpasses all understanding, given that what true philosophy has to confess of the creation of souls, of which a little while ago we spoke, is no small argument for the faith of this mystery. For he who can assist so punctually (as we said) to create so many souls, and infuse them into the little bodies at the point that they finish being organized, can also assist at this transformation of the material bread into his most sacred body. But without these examples faith alone suffices, as the Church sings, to confirm our heart in the belief of this mystery, protesting that the power of that most high God is so great and so incomprehensible that he can do infinite things that we cannot understand, as holy Job testifies. Then what remains here except to reverence and adore that immense Majesty, and by the greatness of this power know the height of the being whence this power is born, and confess that, as our understanding faints in the knowledge of the power, so, and much more, it faints in the knowledge of the being?
VI
But I wish to give end to this matter by proposing another singular marvel of our Creator, which is the general assistance to all created things. For which it must be presupposed that there are two manners of efficient causes, some that serve only to make the work, and do not pass farther on after it has been made, as the master who makes the house or the painter who paints the figure, and others that not only make the things, but also after they have been made conserve them in the being that they gave them, as the Sun does, which produces from itself the rays of the light, and itself is conserving them in that clarity that it gave them, in such manner that, if it should fail to produce them, at this point they would cease to be. Then in this second manner the Catholic faith confesses that that sovereign Lord is cause of all created things, because he by his sole goodness and will gave them the being that they have, and he himself is conserving them in that same being that he gave them. And this with so great dependence that, if he ceased one point from this office, all of them would return into that nothing from which they were made. So that just as, the weights of a clock stopping, all the wheels of it would stop, and all that movement and concord of giving its hours would cease, so this whole machine of the world would stop and would be annihilated, if that sovereign Lord who sustains all things, with the word of his virtue, should cease to conserve them.
For which it is necessary that he be within all of them, conserving them in their being, not only by his presence and power, but by his very essence. For the understanding of which it is to be noted that all the other causes produce their effects by means of the virtue that they have, as fire heats by means of the heat that proceeds from it, and the stars and planets by means of their influences; but in God there is not this distinction of essence and of virtue, because in that most high and most simple nature no accident can fit, because all that there is in God is God, without mixture or composition of another thing. And therefore, wherever there is something of God, there he is, since neither does this supreme simplicity suffer division, so that part of him can be in one place and part in another. And because the cause and the effect have to be together and touch one another, and being is the most universal and most intimate effect of all things, since there is none that lacks it, it follows that God is in the most intimate part of all of them, touching the being that they have and conserving it. For which reason the same Lord says that he fills the heavens and the earth. This is a marvel and excellence of that most high substance, that, being most simple, it is all in all the world, and all in any part of it, since there is no created thing that has being by itself, except he alone, who depends on no one.
But the business passes still farther on. For he is not only conserving cause of the being of creatures, but also of all the acts and natural movements that there are in them. So that no one can move the foot nor the hand, nor open the mouth, nor close the eyes, except by virtue of him. And thus he is more cause of all these acts and movements than the man himself who makes them. Avicenna said that God did no more than assist at the order and movement of the heavens, and that by this means he governed the things of this lower world. But Christian philosophy passes farther on, confessing that the first cause, which is God, concurs with all the other inferior causes, as well universal as particular, all of which are instruments of the first cause, and thus all their effects are attributed more to the principal cause that makes them than to the instruments with which he makes them, since it is more properly said that the painter paints the image than the brush with which he paints it.
Then according to this, what can we think that Being is, which not only fills heavens and earth, as we already said, but also concurs as principal cause with all the acts and natural movements of all the creatures of heaven and earth, and neither is this able to diminish one point of his happiness and blessedness with the care and providence of assisting so great an infinity of things? Then whoever considers these marvels, how will he not see with how much reason that angel said “why do you ask for my name, which is admirable?”
Then from the consideration of all these greatnesses that we have here declared, there follows in the soul a great amazement and admiration of that divine Being, knowing that he is immense, infinite, incomprehensible, and ineffable, and that not only whatever can be said, but whatever can be conceived and understood of his greatnesses, is almost nothing in comparison with what remains to be known. For what the creature, even though it be angelic, can know, is finite, just as it is finite, but the greatness of him is infinite. And thus there is no proportion between what is understood and what remains to be understood. For this David said that “God surrounded with darkness the tabernacle of his dwelling,” to signify that no created understanding can come to comprehend the height of his divine essence. And this is represented to us by the same Prophet saying of him that “he ascends above the cherubim, and that he flies upon the wings of the winds,” to give to understand that even those sovereign spirits, in whom the treasures of divine wisdom are deposited, remain low in this knowledge, and that they lose from sight him who flies upon the feathers of the winds. And this same thing those two seraphim figure to us whom Isaiah saw at the two sides of God, who with their wings covered his feet and his face, to represent this same incomprehensibility of God, whom they see in such manner that they do not reach from end to end, nor comprehend how much there is in him.
What up to here has been said opens the way for us to negative theology, of which Saint Dionysius is a great master. For which it is to be known that in this life we have two manners of knowledge of God, one that they call affirmative, and another negative. The affirmative is when, tracing by the perfections and beauties that we see in the heavens, sun, moon, and stars, and in all the other creatures, we lift ourselves to know how much more perfect and beautiful will be the Creator who formed them, in whom all of them are together with infinite eminence and advantage. This we call affirmative knowledge, because it affirms and confesses that all these perfections are in God. But negative is that which, presupposing how low and limited all our concepts are, denies all these perfections of God in the manner that we conceive them and attribute them to him, saying that God is not great in that manner, nor beautiful, nor wise, nor powerful, etc., as our understandings conceive him, because he is in another very different manner great, beautiful, wise, and powerful, which all created understandings cannot attain. And in this manner, denying these perfections that we conceive of God, we praise and glorify him more, confessing that his greatness is infinite, immense, incomprehensible, and ineffable.
VII
And to form in our souls some concept, although confused, of that most high Substance, we must take as foundation a common sentence of the same Saint Dionysius, who says that in each one of the creatures there are three things, which are being, power, and working. Which are so consequent among themselves that by the one we know the others. For by the works we know the greatness of the power, and by this the greatness of the being, whence they proceed. Then these same three things, which are being, power, and working, we consider in God our Lord, although in him all are one same thing. Then of his works we have treated up to here, and by the admirable greatness of them we know the greatness of the power whence they flowed, and by the greatness of this power we know that of the being, given that the one does not equal the other, because that being extends to much more than the power declares. For with the facility with which he created this world he could create with a single word another thousand worlds as great and greater than this, as ahead we shall declare. Then let us estimate now what that being will be in whom this so admirable and frightful power fits. What comparison is there of every other created power, since none is powerful to create an ant?
Understood, then, the infinite distance and difference that there is from the power of the Creator to every other created power, we shall understand that which there is from created being to the being of the Creator. And conformably to this we say that that most high substance differs infinitely from every other substance, which has another manner of being, and of power, and of greatness, and of wisdom, and of beauty, and other infinite perfections that no created understanding can comprehend. And for this, to know something of him, we must leave beneath our feet all the creatures of heaven and of earth, and pass in flight over all that can be sensed and imagined and understood, in order to arrive in some manner at that Substance that surpasses all senses and understandings, and differs and infinitely has advantage over all else, which neither has figure, nor quantity, nor quality, nor any other bodily sense, nor by any of them can it be sensed, nor has it need of light, nor is it subject to any division or diminution, nor is it soul nor power of the soul, nor body nor form of body, nor can it cease to be, nor be more than what it is, because in him is all being, nor is it reason nor intelligence in the manner that we can understand, although it is another manner of reason and of intelligence and of life; nor is it great, nor good, nor wise, nor powerful, nor beautiful in the manner that we imagine, because he is in another very different manner great, and good, and powerful, and beautiful, and wise.
For which reason not only Saint Dionysius, but also Plato, who was before him, although a gentile philosopher, when he treats of the divine perfections, uses these terms: superhuman, superpowerful, superbeautiful, superwise, giving to understand by this manner of speaking the supereminence and advantage of the divine perfections over all that our understandings can attain, because he is a substance above every substance, and a life above every life, and a light above every beauty, which our understandings do not attain, and a sweetness that surpasses every sweetness, which our senses do not attain, and not only ours, but also those of all the angels, cherubim, and seraphim. So that the perfections that all created understandings attain of the Creator fall so short of him, that with more truth we shall deny them to him than attribute them to him. Which theology Ecclesiasticus declared to us by these words: “Glorify God as much as may be possible for you, because he is greater than all that you can say of him, and you who
bless the Lord, exalt him as much as you can, because he surpasses all praise. Who saw him, so that he can recount his greatnesses? And who will be able to exalt him as much as he deserves? Many other things there are that are hidden from our understandings, because few are his works that we have seen.”
Then the religious soul considering this, and seeing that no title, nor name, nor attribute, nor praise comes to explain what God deserves, and all the perfections and praises of men and angels remain infinitely low to explain what he is, already desists from these names, and understands that there remains to it an immense sea and abyss of incomprehensible greatnesses into which to enter, and thus it remains in a holy silence and fright of such greatness, and with this, not understanding, it understands, and not knowing, it knows, because it knows this Lord to be incomprehensible and ineffable. And with this it praises him more than with all the names and excellences that it can attribute to him. Which the Royal Prophet signified when, according to the translation of Saint Jerome, he said: “To you, God, praise is silent in Zion,” giving us to understand that the most perfect praise of God is this holy silence and fright that we say, with which the religious soul remains as if absorbed and stunned with a great admiration of so incomprehensible a Majesty.
This is the theology that Saint Dionysius repeats so many times. And thus in one place he says: “The darkness and shadows in which God is said to dwell is an inaccessible light, which, as the Apostle says, no man saw, nor can see.” And by the very case that he neither sees nor knows, he joins himself familiarly to that Lord who surpasses all knowledge. And in another place he says that in this holy ignorance is the true knowledge of that Lord who is above every understanding and every substance. Wherefore this supreme theologian concludes the matter saying that we shall see this great secret of the sovereign Deity, which transcends all understandings, with a sacred reverence of our soul and with a chaste silence. And he calls chaste silence that which dismisses from itself all curiosity of understanding, and remains in an amazement and admiration of so great a Majesty, which ties the tongue and the understanding, and leaves it as if sunk in the sea and abyss of this greatness, where no bottom is found, and then it sings with the Prophet: “To you praise is silent, God, in Zion.”
All that up to here has been said serves so that, in some manner, according to our rudeness, we may understand some small part of the immensity and greatness of our sovereign God and Lord, which those seraphic spirits that assist before his Majesty know in such manner that they are as if prostrate and sunk before it, holding themselves for some vile little worms in the presence of such greatness, and thus they adore, reverence, and tremble before it. And for this it is said in the book of holy Job that “the columns of heaven, which are those sovereign spirits who govern the world, tremble in the presence of so great a Majesty.” Although this trembling is neither painful nor servile, but filial and reverential, because, knowing the immensity of that greatness, they understand that, just as to the greatness of Goodness supreme love is owed, so to the height of Majesty supreme reverence and fear.
But let us come to consider in our God not only his greatness, of which up to here we have treated, but his magnificence and liberality, and the dependence that we have on him,
since, as has been said, in him we live, and we move, and we are, and our life is hanging as from a little thread of his will alone. Which he signified by Isaiah when he said that he was the one who gave power to breathe to the men who dwell on the earth, signifying by this that he is the one who is always sustaining and conserving us, which is like always creating us, always doing what he once did, and providing us for this conservation with all the gifts and benefits of his providence; and even the very angels who see his beauty he did not wish to be exempt from our guard. Finally, all that we are and possess and hope, to him we owe it, in such manner that, if he did not maintain us, we would die of hunger. If he did not dress us, we would perish of cold. If he did not defend us, we would be killed at the hands of our enemies. If he did not govern us, we would eat one another alive. If he did not illumine us, at every step we would fall through the darknesses of our ignorance. If he did not console us, we would soon be consumed with anguish and sadnesses.
VIII
Let us begin, then, now to philosophize upon this doctrine. The greatnesses of our Lord God being so sovereign and so incomprehensible as we have seen, and his benefits being so many and such, and the dependence that our being and life have on him being so great, it follows that nothing can be imagined more obligatory, more just, more due, more necessary, more important, more honest, and more excellent than to serve, honor, love, reverence, praise, and adore this Lord. And this obligation is so great that all those that we have to parents, friends, and benefactors, or to the kings and princes of the earth, or to any other excellent person, joined in one, are not called obligations, compared with this one, just as all their excellences and perfections, compared with the divine ones, are not called perfections. This follows from what has been said.
And it also follows that, just as that sovereign Father is always conserving us and sustaining us without ceasing one point from this office, so it was just that the creature should always be occupied in his praises and service. And just as to fulfill this obligation is the most due and most just thing of as many as there are in the world, so not to fulfill it is the most unjust and worst in the world, whence is born that any offense made against that sovereign Majesty is of infinite gravity. And the reason is clear. For it is a notorious thing that, the higher a person is, so much the graver is the injury made against him, in such manner that as many as are the degrees of the dignity of the person offended, so many are those of the offense committed against him. Whence it is inferred that, since the Majesty of God is infinite, so too is the gravity of the fault committed against it. And truly it is so, and as such there corresponds to it in the other life infinite pain, both because it deprives man of an infinite good, which is God, and because it has to last for an infinite space, which is forever, while God shall be God.
Then this being so, what tears, what feeling, what words will suffice to explain so great an evil as it is to see the facility of those who believe and confess all this, in offending this so great Lord, and provoking to wrath the eyes of his Majesty? What blindness is this? What amazement, what bewitchment with which the demon has overturned the hearts of
men, so that they do not know this so great evil? How do they forget him who always carries them in his arms, whose is the air with which they breathe, whose is the earth that sustains them, and the sea that maintains them, and the sun that illumines them, and the other elements that serve them, and the angels who guard them? How do they dare to offend that immense and infinite Majesty, whose offense is of as much gravity as is the greatness of his being? How are they almost always offending him who is always sustaining and governing them? How do they dare to offend a Lord whom the principalities adore, and before whom the powers tremble, and the columns of heaven shake? How do they dare to offend him who, after the body is dead, can cast the soul into the hells? This is that fright with which Isaiah began his prophecy, saying: “Hear, heaven, and hear also, you earth, because God has spoken. Children (he says) I have raised and exalted, and they have despised me. The ox knew his possessor, and the ass the manger of his lord, but Israel has not known me, nor has my people understood: Woe to the sinful nation, and to the people loaded with wickednesses, evil seed and perverse children! They abandoned the Lord, blasphemed the Holy One, estranged themselves from him, and turned backward.” This forgetfulness and contempt of God there was in that people, and this we see in thousands of Christians in this time. And for this I do not marvel that that just judge scourges us with so many manners of calamities, with so many hungers and pestilences and deaths and wars and uprisings of peoples and, what is worse, with so great an infinity of heresies with which so great a part of Christendom is stained and, over all this, with his having permitted that so many kingdoms and nations of Christians, where at one time the faith and worship of God so flourished, are now occupied and vassalized and tyrannized by most cruel infidels. For, as God is just, just as sins grow in all parts, so at the same pace the scourges are multiplied. Among which the greatest is not to know by the scourges the wrath of him who scourges us, nor to understand that this comes because of sins, nor for that reason to have more amendment of them. This declares that there are evil spirits, enemies of the human race, deceivers and overturners of hearts. And this also is an indication to us of divine wrath, which by its secret judgments permits this so strange amazement and blindness in men, so that “having eyes they may not see, and ears they may not hear, and with heart they may not understand, and having faith and judgment they may not profit from the one nor from the other, and seeing men die every day, they may not remember that they are mortal, and being so acute for the businesses of the world, and so sensitive to their grievances, they may be so insensible to the mortal wounds of their souls.”
Then just as by what has been said we understand how great an evil it is to offend that sovereign Majesty, so also we understand how necessary true religion is, which, all sins abhorred and abominated, is employed in serving and honoring the same God. For according to the rules of philosophy, the more evil a thing is, so much the more good is its contrary; and since it is so great an evil to offend God, by this it will be understood how great a good it is to honor and serve him, which is the proper office of true religion, to which not only the divine and human laws incite us, but also nature itself, as all the nations of the world show us, among which there is none so barbarous nor so fierce that it does not have some knowledge of God, and does not offer him some manner of worship and reverence, although it does not know which is the true God. From which it is inferred that necessarily there has to be in the world some true religion, with which the true God may be duly and holily honored and venerated. For otherwise, vain would be this
natural inclination, if this religion were lacking. This, then, is the sum and the conclusion of the First Part of this book, to which all that is written in it is ordered.
For for this reason we have treated in it so at length of the greatnesses and perfections of God, and of the multitude of his benefits, according as they shine forth in all creatures, so that clearly may be seen the obligation that we have to venerate and reverence this so great Majesty and Goodness, which is the proper office of religion.
It remains now to inquire which is the true religion and worship with which he has to be honored. For there have been seen in the world many manners of ceremonies with which blind men have pretended to honor those whom they held for gods. Of which some were superstitious, others vain, which had no power, others bloody, in which they sacrificed men, others foul and dishonest, in which they prostituted virgins for honor of the goddess Venus, others most shameless, as those that they made to the goddess Flora and to the god Priapus, of which mention is made in Holy Scripture, and others extravagant and mad, as those that were made to the god Bacchus, men making themselves drunk, and doing a thousand outrages and madnesses. Then what can we say of all these manners of religions, except that they were such as the gods who by them were venerated, who were the demons? And from such gods, what other religions could be expected?
And that these religions are false, and unworthy of God, is shown clearly by this reason. For the true religion has to be with works that please and honor God, and nothing among as many things as there are in the world pleases him except to hold high thoughts of his greatnesses and perfections and to imitate him in holiness and purity of life, because this makes man similar to God, who is holiness and purity itself. And since likeness is cause of love, it follows that those who have this holiness and purity of life will be those who will please and honor him, whence it is also inferred that only the Christian religion is the true one, since it is the one that holds the highest thoughts of the greatnesses of God and of his divine perfections, and the one that professes and teaches greater holiness and purity of life. And besides this we shall show here that all the conditions that the true religion has to have, in it alone are found with so much perfection that another greater cannot be imagined. Which we shall manifestly declare in the Second Part that follows. And in this will be seen how this First Part is ordered to the Second. But because in this Second Part there is treated of the excellences of the Christian faith and religion, before we treat of them, it will be necessary to declare what faith is, and of two manners that there are of faith.
FIN