, and most
repugnant to God's omnipotence.

Further (to say a word here concerning the intellect and the
will which we attribute to God), if intellect and will appertain
to the eternal essence of God, we must take these words in some
significance quite different from those they usually bear. For
intellect and will, which should constitute the essence of God,
would perforce be as far apart as the poles from the human
intellect and will, in fact, would have nothing in common with
them but the name; there would be about as much correspondence
between the two as there is between the Dog, the heavenly
constellation, and a dog, an animal that barks. This I will
prove as follows. If intellect belongs to the divine nature, it
cannot be in nature, as ours is generally thought to be,
posterior to, or simultaneous with the things understood,
inasmuch as God is prior to all things by reason of his causality
(Prop. xvi., Coroll. i.). On the contrary, the truth and formal
essence of things is as it is, because it exists by
representation as such in the intellect of God. Wherefore the
intellect of God, in so far as it is conceived to constitute
God's essence, is, in reality, the cause of things, both of their
essence and of their existence. This seems to have been
recognized by those who have asserted, that God's intellect,
God's will, and God's power, are one and the same. As,
therefore, God's intellect is the sole cause of things, namely,
both of their essence and existence, it must necessarily differ
from them in respect to its essence, and in respect to its
existence. For a cause differs from a thing it causes, precisely
in the quality which the latter gains from the former.

For example, a man is the cause of another man's existence,
but not of his essence (for the latter is an eternal truth), and,
therefore, the two men may be entirely similar in essence, but
must be different in existence; and hence if the existence of
one of them cease, the existence of the other will not
necessarily cease also; but if the essence of one could be
destroyed, and be made false, the essence of the other would be
destroyed also. Wherefore, a thing which is the cause both of
the essence and of the existence of a given effect, must differ
from such effect both in respect to its essence, and also in
respect to its existence. Now the intellect of God is the cause
both of the essence and the existence of our intellect;
therefore, the in