7. Again, acts are diversified through their objects: but the soul turns toward God under the concept of the true through cognition, and under the concept of the good through love: if therefore these are formal objects, and these acts are formally different: it seems etc.
8. Again, in the divine esse there is power, wisdom, and will: therefore either I say something more through these three than through one of them, or not. If not: then one who says that God has only power detracts nothing from God, which is false: if something more, and all of that is in God: therefore there is also composition.
9. Again, either power is knowledge, or not. If not: then in the divine esse there are diverse things: if so: then to know is to be able. But God knows evil things: therefore He can do evil things: but this is absurd: it remains therefore that they are distinct: therefore it seems that it is composite.
10. Again, the divine will restricts power; for God does not do all things that He knows and can do, but only those that He wills: but nothing restricts itself: therefore power and wisdom and will are one thing and another: therefore the divine nature is composite.
11. Again, nothing altogether simple is participated according to more and less; but the divine esse is participated according to more and less both by wayfarers and by the Blessed, who participate in and see it in itself: therefore it is impossible that it be altogether simple.
12. Again, nothing altogether simple has a multiform operation, because "the same thing, remaining the same, is always disposed to do the same thing"; and further, a multiform action either is the agent itself, and thus it is not simple: or not, and thus it is still not simple: but God has a multiform operation, namely to create and to govern and to reward: therefore etc.
If you say that they differ by reason of effects; to the contrary: action does not come from the effect, but rather the reverse: therefore that power is diversified rather according to the diversity of actions than according to the variety of effects.
13. Furthermore, nothing entirely simple simultaneously exercises operations that are entirely disparate and infinite, because what is simple, toward whatever it turns itself, turns itself totally, and for an infinite action no power less than infinite suffices: but God simultaneously creates the soul of one and justifies the soul of another, which are disparate and infinite actions: therefore etc.
14. Furthermore, nothing entirely simple is multiform in species or in likeness; but in the divine being there is a plurality of ideal reasons, because "man was made by one reason, and horse by another": therefore the divine being is not most simple.
If you say that the plurality of ideas is a plurality of relations: to the contrary: the likeness of things is considered not according to relation, but according to form: if therefore ideas are called likenesses in the divine mind, and nothing that is the same and according to the same has likeness to diverse things: it is necessary therefore that there be composition in the divine art and wisdom.
CONCLUSION.
The divine being is most simple.
I respond: It must be said that the divine being is most simple. — For the evidence of this matter, two things must be considered, namely the perfection of the divine conditions and the modes of our considerations.
If we consider the modes of the divine conditions, the divine being, by the very fact that it is first, is most simple. For by the very fact that it is first, all things flow from it, and by the very fact that they flow from it, they return and are led back to it as to the ultimate end, and from this it has that it is the Alpha and the Omega, the First and the Last, the Beginning and the End. Because therefore these things, which seem most distant, come together into what is in every way one, it is necessary that the divine being itself be most perfect, as a kind of intelligible circle: it is also necessary that it be most simple.
For something falls short of supreme simplicity in three ways: either because it is composed from others, or because it is composed with another, or because it is composable in aptitude. But the divine being, from the fact that it is first, is not composed from others, for it has nothing prior before itself; from the fact that it is most perfect, it is not composed with another, for what is perfect does not come to the constitution of a third: from the fact, moreover, that it is ultimate, all other things are ordered to it as to a quieting terminus: and thus it is most absolute, and through this it not only lacks actual composition, but also possible composition, and thus to be most simple belongs to God truly and properly, for these three cannot be found together in anything else.
It also belongs [to God] perfectly from this threefold condition. For because it is most perfect, it has all the conditions of nobility; but because it is the ultimate and the best, on account of which all things exist, it has all those conditions in the highest degree; because it is the first, in which there is no diversity, it is necessary that all be one in it, and thus most simple through the exclusion of all composition and the inclusion of all perfection. Therefore all the conditions of nobility are in God, namely power and wisdom and will, goodness, truth and unity, being, living and understanding, and other similar things, truly, perfectly, and supremely under their proper and perfect nature; yet they are one to such a degree that they introduce no composition nor diminish from simplicity. - Which no one clearly sees unless he similarly understands concerning the divine being the highest simplicity together with the highest immensity: how this can be grasped will be able to be investigated in what follows, but for now it ought to be presupposed as certain and indubitable, so that we may rightly understand the divine simplicity according to the requirement of the divine conditions.
It is also necessary to see the diverse modes of our considerations.
For since three things necessarily concur for consideration, namely the one understanding, the things understood, and the medium or ground of understanding, some mode can be attributed to our intellect in a threefold way: either such that it posits that mode concerning the thing, and then it is true if it is found in that thing, as when it spiritually understands spiritual things; or such that it posits that mode concerning itself, as when it abstractly understands conjoined things, and yet it is not false, because, as the Philosopher says, "there is no falsehood in those who abstract"; or it posits it concerning the ground through which it understands, as when it understands one thing in a manifold way through many things.
It should be known therefore that our intellect completely resolves every understanding of a thing into an understanding of its whereby it is and what it is, and when it understands a composite thing, then it posits that resolution concerning itself and concerning the thing: but when it understands a thing that is altogether simple, then it posits that resolution not concerning the thing, but concerning itself, because it cannot understand otherwise. Whence our intellect, when it understands God, entirely understands that in him there is all simplicity and no composition, no concretion, yet it understands by way of the whereby it is and the what it is; nor however is it false, because it does not posit that mode concerning the thing, nor vain, because truly something corresponds on the part of God, although not something diverse. For truly there is in God essence and supposit, but yet they are one; truly will and power, yet they are not many things, but are known through many things.
And hence it is that "it is more truly than it is understood, and it is more truly understood than it is spoken," as Augustine says. For this reason every intellect falls short of understanding the divine being, and yet nonetheless the faithful intellect concerning it understands nothing but one thing, when it understands the one in a multiform manner, the abstract concretely, the simple in a complex way, the immense finitely, the eternal temporally, because, as has been said, it does not attribute these modes to the intelligible object itself, but to itself as understanding or to the manner of understanding. Therefore the true intellect confesses by the proper light of reason that the divine being is altogether most simple.
Hence the arguments that show this are to be granted.
1. To that which is first objected to the contrary, that the divine being differs supremely from created being: it must be said that this is true; but as to what is further inferred—therefore it differs by many differences—it can be said that this does not follow, because the highest genera differ supremely, and yet they differ by themselves. The differences also that immediately divide a genus itself differ by themselves, and yet they are maximally distant from one another.
And if you object that the more things agree in many respects, the more similar they are—therefore the more things differ in many respects, the more different they are—it can be said that the divine being differs from created being by many differences, which indeed posit plurality and real difference on the part of the creature, but not on the part of God, because those things which exist in the creature through multiformity and real difference are found much more perfectly in God through most simple identity, as is clear from what has already been said and will be said below.
2. To that which is objected, that being entirely abstract from a supposit is simpler than concrete being: it must be said that the supposit is twofold: one which adds something beyond the nature, and another which does not add. Concerning the first supposit, which adds something beyond the nature, contracting and distinguishing it, this holds true; but in this way we do not posit a supposit in the divine things, because there is no distinction there through any addition made to the nature, but through the origin of one person from another; whence there is no concretion there according to real inherence, but only according to our understanding.
And if one objects that either something corresponds to that understanding on the part of the thing, or nothing: the response is already clear, that something does correspond. For there is in the divine things truly a nature and truly a supposit, that is, deity and one having deity; whence although the intellect understands this by way of a certain difference, it is not however false, because it posits that mode concerning itself or concerning the manner of understanding, but not concerning the thing which it understands; or if it is posited, some real difference is posited between the supposit and the nature, and such a difference is one that introduces no composition, as will be more clearly shown in the following question.