Sect. 74God, the Objective GoodnessGod, the Objective Goodness
I. Whatever creatures are or possess, comes to them from without; hence they are not sources of goodness, but rather subjects capable of being made good by the accession of new perfections. Creatures never contain in themselves all their goodness; their internal goodness is but part of their total goodness, or is a means of acquiring and enjoying external goods. God, on the contrary, being essentially the fulness of perfection, appears to our mind as good,—containing eminently all that is worth desiring or possessing. He is not perfectible by the accession of external goodness. All extra-Divine goodness is merely a communication or outflow from the Divine abundance of perfection. He is not a good of some kind or class; He is the Good pure and simple, the essential Goodness.
II. The infinite Essence of God is not only the good of God Himself, wherein He finds all He can desire and possess, but is, besides, the good of all other things; that is to say, it is the inexhaustible source from which all other things draw their goodness, and which all other things, because of their self-insufficiency, desire to possess. The Divine Goodness is the good of all others, because it contains more than the equivalent of all others, and produces all others, and is what we desire, or tend to, when we desire all other goods. It is, moreover, the only necessary and all-sufficient good, and the sovereign and highest good; it is the first and fundamental good, and the end and object of all good; all other goods must be desired as coming from God, and must be possessed as a participation of the Divine Goodness itself.
III. It is especially in relation to His intelligent creatures that God appears as the highest Good, and as the end of all goodness. He is the good of irrational creatures, inasmuch as He communicates to them existence and its concomitant created perfections; whereas to reasonable creatures He communicates Himself, to be possessed by means of knowledge and love. In this capacity God is the highest good of His reasonable creatures, standing out above all their other goods, surpassing them all in perfection, and alone able to gratify all the desires and to realize all the aspirations of the created mind. He stands out as the end of all other goods because these either are not objects of enjoyment or are not merely such, but at the same time means for attaining the fruition of the Divine Good. The Schoolmen express this doctrine by saying that God is bonum fruendum, “the Good to be enjoyed;” whereas creatures are bona utenda, “goods to be used.”
The classical texts from the Fathers on the Divine Goodness are St. Augustine, De Trinitate, l. viii., n. 4, 5; Dionysius (Vulg.), De Div. Nom., c. iv., esp. § 4; St. Anselm, Proslog., cc. 23–25.
IV. God is also eminently good and lovable, because He actually possesses in an infinite degree whatever is good and lovable, and because nothing outside Him is good and lovable except in as far as it partakes of the Divine Goodness.
I. Whatever creatures are or possess, comes to them from without; hence they are not sources of goodness, but rather subjects capable of being made good by the accession of new perfections. Creatures never contain in themselves all their goodness; their internal goodness is but part of their total goodness, or is a means of acquiring and enjoying external goods. God, on the contrary, being essentially the fulness of perfection, appears to our mind as good,—containing eminently all that is worth desiring or possessing. He is not perfectible by the accession of external goodness. All extra-Divine goodness is merely a communication or outflow from the Divine abundance of perfection. He is not a good of some kind or class; He is the Good pure and simple, the essential Goodness.
II. The infinite Essence of God is not only the good of God Himself, wherein He finds all He can desire and possess, but is, besides, the good of all other things; that is to say, it is the inexhaustible source from which all other things draw their goodness, and which all other things, because of their self-insufficiency, desire to possess. The Divine Goodness is the good of all others, because it contains more than the equivalent of all others, and produces all others, and is what we desire, or tend to, when we desire all other goods. It is, moreover, the only necessary and all-sufficient good, and the sovereign and highest good; it is the first and fundamental good, and the end and object of all good; all other goods must be desired as coming from God, and must be possessed as a participation of the Divine Goodness itself.
III. It is especially in relation to His intelligent creatures that God appears as the highest Good, and as the end of all goodness. He is the good of irrational creatures, inasmuch as He communicates to them existence and its concomitant created perfections; whereas to reasonable creatures He communicates Himself, to be possessed by means of knowledge and love. In this capacity God is the highest good of His reasonable creatures, standing out above all their other goods, surpassing them all in perfection, and alone able to gratify all the desires and to realize all the aspirations of the created mind. He stands out as the end of all other goods because these either are not objects of enjoyment or are not merely such, but at the same time means for attaining the fruition of the Divine Good. The Schoolmen express this doctrine by saying that God is bonum fruendum, “the Good to be enjoyed;” whereas creatures are bona utenda, “goods to be used.”
The classical texts from the Fathers on the Divine Goodness are St. Augustine, De Trinitate, l. viii., n. 4, 5; Dionysius (Vulg.), De Div. Nom., c. iv., esp. § 4; St. Anselm, Proslog., cc. 23–25.
IV. God is also eminently good and lovable, because He actually possesses in an infinite degree whatever is good and lovable, and because nothing outside Him is good and lovable except in as far as it partakes of the Divine Goodness.
Seção 25% da obra, de A Manual of Catholic Theology (Wilhelm & Scannell, sobre a Dogmatik de Scheeben). Ver o original.