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Second proof.

Compare with this Rosmini's definition of life as given under 124. We cannot here quote all that Rosmini advances on the subject of creation; but the following passage may suffice to show the tendency of his doctrine. Speaking of the exemplar of the world, he says, “This exemplar is the work of the creative liberty of God. Creative liberty is a virtue, a power belonging to absolute being in its subjective form. Absolute being in its subjective form infinitely loves itself as understood in its objective form. Being infinitely loves being. This love leads it to love being in all the modes in which it is lovable, in which it can be loved. In order to love it in all its modes, it loves it not only as absolute and infinite being, but also as relative and finite being. This love is the creative act. It, therefore, creates for itself, through the expansion of love, a lovable finite object, and this is the world. In order to create this world, it must, first, conceive it, both because this creative principle is intelligence and because that cannot be loved which is not known; second, it must realize it, because if it were not real in itself, the object of love would not exist, but would merely be possible, and what is loved, seen in its possibility, is desired to exist. Hence the two elements of essence and real, born at one birth, and forming mundane things" (Theosophy, vol. i. § 460).

156.

A second proof of the creation of the world is drawn from the analysis of perception. This analysis shows us that everything that comes under feeling, i.e. ourselves and the world, would necessarily remain unperceived, that is, would not be being, if the mind did not see it united to the essence of being. It is this essence, therefore, that imparts to all things the act of being, lends it to them, as it were, creates them.

It follows from this that creation does not mean production from nothing, but from non-being. From absolute nothing, which is the negation not only of being, but of the possibility of being, even Omnipotence itself could not create being. Since being is cognizability, it follows that creation is the act whereby God knows the existent. This creative being, however, is not related to man in the same way as it is related to God. In God, this being is subject as well as object, whereas in man it is merely object. "The object of reason. . . may be communicated to created things, not in the sense that created things may also be that object which belongs to God alone, but in the sense that it may be intuited by them as something different from them. . . . It is communicable merely as object, and therefore initial being exists in the human mind in a different way from that in which it exists in the divine mind, from which it is undistinguished. If the absolute object were communicated to the creature, such creature would see the Divine Word [the λóyos], which is not possible in the order of nature, but only, through grace, in the supernatural order. . . Man seeing this initial being. does not see God, although he sees in it an appurtenance of the divine essence" (Theosophy, vol. i. § 490).

157.

In our consciousness of ourselves, as well as Third proof. of every sensation and perception, we find a third proof that contingent being is created. We feel that we subsist, but we do not feel the force that causes us to subsist. Therefore, we feel that we do not subsist through ourselves.

158.

The nature of contingent being becomes more The knowledge of clear when we explain its essential limitations. the essen

Y

tial limitations of contingent being completes our knowledge

of its na

ture.

From the study of these proceed most important corollaries, one of which is the doctrine of the possibility of evil.

The doctrine of limitations is considered by Rosmini in the first volume of the Theosophy, §§ 679-728. The following passage will give, perhaps better than any other, the gist of this doctrine :-" The principle of being is essentially simple and one, but it is determined variously according to its terms, which may be reduced to three supreme classes or categoric terms: (1) absolute being; (2) the felt; (3) the willed. This principle constitutes the finite being as one, a subject purely real, but determined by its relation to these categoric terms. The diversity of beings, however, arises from the diversity of terms, which, united with the real and proper principle, constitute the being. In order that these beings may be diverse, this diversity must exist from the first moment when the being begins to be, and must be such as potentially to contain all the accidental subsequent development of the being" (Theosophy, vol. i. § 722; cf. Psychology, vol. i. §§ 164–180). On the possibility of evil, see Theodicy, vol. i. §§ 169–203.

Sublime questions to which

the theme of creation gives occasion.

159.

From the doctrine of the essential limitations of the universe, science passes to the most sublime questions. Do creatable or possible things exist distinct in God? If not, how do they come to be distinct outside of God? Are they finite or infinite? How was God moved to create? It is impossible to give a summary explanation of such lofty questions, with a solution of the difficulties to which they give birth in the mind.

We will not attempt what seemed impossible to Rosmini. A discussion of most of these questions will be found in the Theosophy, Theodicy, and Psychology. To one point we may advert, viz. the question whether the number of real beings-let us say, atoms-is infinite. Rosmini replies in the negative on the following grounds :—

"(1) If the number of possible limitations were infinite, inasmuch as they could not all be created, a selection would have to be made by the creator, and this selection would be impossible, . . . having to be made from an infinite number [cf. under §§ 26, II., and 103].

"(2) If the number of possible limitations were infinite, inasmuch as they could not all be created, because an infinite number of beings is a contradiction in terms, the power of God would be limited and exceeded by the sphere of possibility of things.

"(3) But beings in infinite number cannot even exist in the concept of the mind, because an infinite number is a contradiction in terms.

"(4) . . . The first substance from which all possible finite beings have to be drawn is a first finite. Therefore . . . it is evident that possible finite beings cannot be infinite, but are only finite, in number" (Theosophy, vol. i. § 723).

160.

part of

The second part of Cosmology divides up the Second universe into (1) pure spirits, (2) souls, (3) bodies, Cosmoand treats each of these parts in relation to the whole.

logy.

161.

of Cos

Finally, in the third part, which deals with the Third part order of the universe, we undertake to explain the mology. cosmic laws, that is, the laws common to all con

tingent beings, and thus we are able to conclude the argument, begun in the preceding parts, with reference to the goodness of the world and to its destinies.

This branch of cosmogony Rosmini treats in his Theodicy, in which, in a popular, rather than a scientific, style, he seeks "to justify the ways of God to man."

Cosmology connected with Ontology and Theology.

162.

But these indications show sufficiently that Cosmology cannot be fully treated except in connection with Ontology, and especially Theology. How, indeed, can we treat the nature of being as contingent and limited, without at the same time treating, or having previously treated, of necessary and unlimited being? How can we treat of the way in which the world began to exist without treating of the nature and operation of its author? How can we understand temporal things without understanding those that are eternal? How can we explain transient acts without having recourse to immanent acts? We, therefore, consider it impossible to make Cosmology a complete science by itself. I believe it can only be part of a higher science, which expounds the doctrine of being— being both as abstract and universal, and as, in its act, complete and absolute.

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