1 Objection 1: It would seem that the first man saw God through His Essence. For man's happiness consists in the vision of the Divine Essence. But the first man, while established in paradise, led a life of happiness in the enjoyment of all things, as Damascene says De Fide Orth. ii, 11). And Augustine says De Civ. Dei xiv, 10): If man was gifted with the same tastes as now, how happy must he have been in paradise, that place of ineffable happiness! Therefore the first man in paradise saw God through His Essence.
1 Ad primum sic proceditur. Videtur quod primus homo per essentiam Deum viderit. Beatitudo enim hominis in visione divinae essentiae consistit. Sed primus homo, in Paradiso conversans, beatam et omnium divitem habuit vitam, ut Damascenus dicit in II libro. Et Augustinus dicit, in XIV de Civ. Dei, si homines habebant affectus suos quales nunc habemus, quomodo erant beati in illo inenarrabilis beatitudinis loco, idest Paradiso? Ergo primus homo in Paradiso vidit Deum per essentiam.
2 Objection 2: Further, Augustine says De Civ. Dei xiv, loc. cit.) that the first man lacked nothing which his good-will might obtain. But our good-will can obtain nothing better than the vision of the Divine Essence. Therefore man saw God through His Essence.
2 Praeterea, Augustinus dicit, XIV de Civ. Dei, quod primo homini non aberat quidquam quod bona voluntas adipisceretur. Sed nihil melius bona voluntas adipisci potest quam divinae essentiae visionem. Ergo homo per essentiam Deum videbat.
3 Objection 3: Further, the vision of God is His Essence is whereby God is seen without a medium or enigma. But man in the state of innocence saw God immediately, as the Master of the Sentences asserts Sent. iv, D, i). He also saw without an enigma, for an enigma implies obscurity, as Augustine says De Trin. xv, 9). Now, obscurity resulted from sin. Therefore man in the primitive state saw God through His Essence.
3 Praeterea, visio Dei per essentiam est qua videtur Deus sine medio et sine aenigmate. Sed homo in statu innocentiae vidit Deum sine medio; ut Magister dicit in I distinctione IV libri Sent. Vidit etiam sine aenigmate, quia aenigma obscuritatem importat, ut Augustinus dicit, XV de Trin.; obscuritas autem introducta est per peccatum. Ergo homo in primo statu vidit Deum per essentiam.
4 On the contrary, The Apostle says 1 Cor. 15, 46): That was not first which is spiritual, but that which is natural. But to see God through His Essence is most spiritual. Therefore the first man in the primitive state of his natural life did not see God through His Essence.
4 Sed contra est quod apostolus dicit, I ad Cor. XV, quod non prius quod spirituale est, sed quod animale. Sed maxime spirituale est videre Deum per essentiam. Ergo primus homo, in primo statu animalis vitae, Deum per essentiam non vidit.
5 I answer that, The first man did not see God through His Essence if we consider the ordinary state of that life; unless, perhaps, it be said that he saw God in a vision, when God cast a deep sleep upon Adam Gn. 2, 21). The reason is because, since in the Divine Essence is beatitude itself, the intellect of a man who sees the Divine Essence has the same relation to God as a man has to beatitude. Now it is clear that man cannot willingly be turned away from beatitude, since naturally and necessarily he desires it, and shuns unhappiness.
Wherefore no one who sees the Essence of God can willingly turn away from God, which means to sin. Hence all who see God through His Essence are so firmly established in the love of God, that for eternity they can never sin. Therefore, as Adam did sin, it is clear that he did not see God through His Essence. Nevertheless he knew God with a more perfect knowledge than we do now. Thus in a sense his knowledge was midway between our knowledge in the present state, and the knowledge we shall have in heaven, when we see God through His Essence.
To make this clear, we must consider that the vision of God through His Essence is contradistinguished from the vision of God through His creatures. Now the higher the creature is, and the more like it is to God, the more clearly is God seen in it; for instance, a man is seen more clearly through a mirror in which his image is the more clearly expressed. Thus God is seen in a much more perfect manner through His intelligible effects than through those which are only sensible or corporeal.
But in his present state man is impeded as regards the full and clear consideration of intelligible creatures, because he is distracted by and occupied with sensible things. Now, it is written Eccles. 7, 30): God made man right. And man was made right by God in this sense, that in him the lower powers were subjected to the higher, and the higher nature was made so as not to be impeded by the lower. Wherefore the first man was not impeded by exterior things from a clear and steady contemplation of the intelligible effects which he perceived by the radiation of the first truth, whether by a natural or by a gratuitous knowledge.
Hence Augustine says Gen. ad lit. xi, 33) that, perhaps God used to speak to the first man as He speaks to the angels; by shedding on his mind a ray of the unchangeable truth, yet without bestowing on him the experience of which the angels are capable in the participation of the Divine Essence. Therefore, through these intelligible effects of God, man knew God then more clearly than we know Him now.
5 Respondeo dicendum quod primus homo Deum per essentiam non vidit, secundum communem statum illius vitae; nisi forte dicatur quod viderit eum in raptu, quando Deus immisit soporem in Adam, ut dicitur Gen. II. Et huius ratio est quia, cum divina essentia sit ipsa beatitudo, hoc modo se habet intellectus videntis divinam essentiam ad Deum, sicut se habet quilibet homo ad beatitudinem. Manifestum est autem quod nullus homo potest per voluntatem a beatitudine averti, naturaliter enim, et ex necessitate, homo vult beatitudinem, et fugit miseriam.
Unde nullus videns Deum per essentiam, potest voluntate averti a Deo, quod est peccare. Et propter hoc, omnes videntes Deum per essentiam, sic in amore Dei stabiliuntur, quod in aeternum peccare non possunt. Cum ergo Adam peccaverit, manifestum est quod Deum per essentiam non videbat. Cognoscebat tamen Deum quadam altiori cognitione quam nos cognoscamus, et sic quodammodo eius cognitio media erat inter cognitionem praesentis status, et cognitionem patriae, qua Deus per essentiam videtur. Ad cuius evidentiam, considerandum est quod visio Dei per essentiam dividitur contra visionem Dei per creaturam.
Quanto autem aliqua creatura est altior et Deo similior, tanto per eam Deus clarius videtur, sicut homo perfectius videtur per speculum in quo expressius imago eius resultat. Et sic patet quod multo eminentius videtur Deus per intelligibiles effectus, quam per sensibiles et corporeos. A consideratione autem plena et lucida intelligibilium effectuum impeditur homo in statu praesenti, per hoc quod distrahitur a sensibilibus, et circa ea occupatur. Sed, sicut dicitur Eccle. VII, Deus fecit hominem rectum. Haec autem fuit rectitudo hominis divinitus instituti, ut inferiora superioribus subderentur, et superiora ab inferioribus non impedirentur.
Unde homo primus non impediebatur per res exteriores a clara et firma contemplatione intelligibilium effectuum, quos ex irradiatione primae veritatis percipiebat, sive naturali cognitione sive gratuita. Unde dicit Augustinus, in XI super Gen. ad Litt., quod fortassis Deus primis hominibus antea loquebatur, sicut cum Angelis loquitur, ipsa incommutabili veritate illustrans mentes eorum; etsi non tanta participatione divinae essentiae, quantam capiunt Angeli. Sic igitur per huiusmodi intelligibiles effectus Dei, Deum clarius cognoscebat quam modo cognoscamus.
6 Reply to Objection 1: Man was happy in paradise, but not with that perfect happiness to which he was destined, which consists in the vision of the Divine Essence. He was, however, endowed with a life of happiness in a certain measure, as Augustine says Gen. ad lit. xi, 18), so far as he was gifted with natural integrity and perfection.
6 Ad primum ergo dicendum quod homo in Paradiso beatus fuit, non illa perfecta beatitudine in quam transferendus erat, quae in divinae essentiae visione consistit, habebat tamen beatam vitam secundum quendam modum, ut Augustinus dicit XI super Gen. ad Litt., inquantum habebat integritatem et perfectionem quandam naturalem.
7 Reply to Objection 2: A good will is a well-ordered will; but the will of the first man would have been ill-ordered had he wished to have, while in the state of merit, what had been promised to him as a reward.
7 Ad secundum dicendum quod bona voluntas est ordinata voluntas. Non autem fuisset primi hominis ordinata voluntas, si in statu meriti habere voluisset quod ei promittebatur pro praemio.
8 Reply to Objection 3: A medium of knowledge) is twofold; one through which, and, at the same time, in which, something is seen, as, for example, a man is seen through a mirror, and is seen with the mirror: another kind of medium is that whereby we attain to the knowledge of something unknown; such as the medium in a demonstration. God was seen without this second kind of medium, but not without the first kind. For there was no need for the first man to attain to the knowledge of God by demonstration drawn from an effect, such as we need; since he knew God simultaneously in His effects, especially in the intelligible effects, according to His capacity. Again, we must remark that the obscurity which is implied in the word enigma may be of two kinds: first, so far as every creature is something obscure when compared with the immensity of the Divine light; and thus Adam saw God in an enigma, because he saw Him in a created effect: secondly, we may take obscurity as an effect of sin, so far as man is impeded in the consideration of intelligible things by being preoccupied with sensible things; in which sense Adam did not see God in an enigma.
8 Ad tertium dicendum quod duplex est medium. Quoddam, in quo simul videtur quod per medium videri dicitur; sicut cum homo videtur per speculum, et simul videtur cum ipso speculo. Aliud medium est, per cuius notitiam in aliquid ignotum devenimus; sicut est medium demonstrationis. Et sine tali medio Deus videbatur, non tamen sine primo medio. Non enim oportebat primum hominem pervenire in Dei cognitionem per demonstrationem sumptam ab aliquo effectu, sicut nobis est necessarium; sed simul in effectibus, praecipue intelligibilibus, suo modo Deum cognoscebat. Similiter etiam est considerandum quod obscuritas quae importatur in nomine aenigmatis, dupliciter potest accipi. Uno modo, secundum quod quaelibet creatura est quoddam obscurum, si comparetur ad immensitatem divinae claritatis, et sic Adam videbat Deum in aenigmate, quia videbat Deum per effectum creatum. Alio modo potest accipi obscuritas quae consecuta est ex peccato, prout scilicet impeditur homo a consideratione intelligibilium per sensibilium occupationem, et secundum hoc, non vidit Deum in aenigmate.