Job 34. 14, 15.
De Lithias. l. c. 8. p. 70.
And now let us examine the objections that are usually brought against this opinion, the strongest of which is to this purpose; that if Angels be Corporeal, then of necessity they must be mortal, alterable and destructible; to which I answer. 1. Because no Creaturely nature is or can be immortal, per se & ab intrinsecâ & propriâ naturâ, for God only is so as saith the Text, ὁ μόνος ἔχων ἀθανασίαν, Who only hath immortality; Therefore the Angels whether corporeal or incorporeal, are not immortal, neither by themselves or their intrinsick nature, either (as the Schools speak) à parte ante, vel à parte post, because God only is so, exclusively considered in regard of any Creature, and so the objection is of no force. 2. The Corporeity of Angels doth not at all hinder their immortality à parte post, for as God is only immortal in respect of Essence, Eternity, Infinity and Independency, so Angels nor any Creatures, are immortal in that point or respect, but only in regard of their dependency upon God, who by his conservative power doth keep them by Christ, that for the time or duration to come, they shall not die, perish, or be annihilated; and this he can and doth as well perform if they be corporeal as spiritual, even as he doth preserve and conserve the bodies of the Saints in their Graves until the general Resurrection, and in the World to come doth keep them in immortality; though they be changed and made spiritual bodies, yet they remain bodies still. For it is he that sustaineth all things by the power of his word; And it is he that doth vivifie or quicken all things: and if he gather unto himself his spirit and his breath, all flesh shall perish together, and man shall turn again unto dust. So that the objection is of no validity, because no Creature is kept in perpetual duration, à parte post, ab intrinsecâ naturâ, sed ex causis conservantibus, which is the goodwill, benignity, and blessed influence of Jehovah, and not from any internal creaturely power. 3. Every spiritual and incorporeal substance that is created, is as annihilable by the prime power that created it, as is a Corporeal created substance. And on the contrary, a Corporeal or material substance is no more capable of annihilation by any power or efficiency of second Causes, than an incorporeal and spiritual substance is; and therefore whether Angels be simply incorporeal, or that they be Corporeal, it neither maketh for nor against their immortality, which consists only in the benign emanation of the Divine conservative power of the Almighty: And therefore doth profound Bradwardine draw that invincible, and undeniable Corollary of verity, Quod necesse est Deum servare quamlibet Creaturam immediatiùs quacunq; causa creata. 4. Though the most of the bodies that are known unto us be divisible, alterable and discerpible, or dissipable in respect of our conceptions of them, yet actually we may find many bodies in nature that are not, nor ever were dissipated or dissevered secundum totum, though there may be alteration in their superficial parts, as the Earth, the Sun, Moon, the rest of the Planets, and those great and glorious bodies that we call Stars; so that for the duration of bodies à parte post we can conclude little of certainty. And as there are bodies that secundum suum totum, are not severed or dissipated, so there are some bodies that though they may suffer division and dissipation into smaller parts, yet do those parts though most minute, suffer no real transmutation, but remain of the same Homogeneous nature they were before, as is most manifest in Silver dissolved in Aqua fortis, wherein though it be so severed and dispersed, that it appear not at all unto the eye, yet may it be from thence recovered and redintegrated into its own nature as it was before. And also the Masters of the more abstruse Philosophy affirm to us upon their own certain experience, that though metallick Mercury may be divided into insensible and invisible Atomes, yet still it retains the nature of metallic Mercury, and that thus Helmont tells us: Si non vidissem argentum vivum eludere quamcunq; artificum operam, adeò, quod aut totum avolet adhuc integrum, aut totum in igne permaneat, atq; utrolibet modo, servet impermutabilem sui ac primitivam identitatem, identitatisq; homogeneitatem anaticam: dicerem artem non esse veram, quæ vera est, sine mendacio, atq; longè verissima. So also there are bodies which although they suffer division and separation by some other bodies dissevering of them, yet by motion of coition they soon close and redintegrate themselves, having thereby suffered no detriment at all, as is most apparent in the pure body of the Æther, the visible species of things, the images in a Looking-glass and in shadows, which are all bodies. So that seeing bodies, no more than Spirits to be annihilable by second causes, and that there are some bodies that are not dissipated secundum totum, and that there are others that though they are separable into more minute particles, yet do they remain in Analytical and Homogeneous Identity, and that there are others that though they be actually for a small moment divided, yet they do instantaneously coalesce, and by coition unite themselves; yet we may therefore rationally conclude, that corporeity, quatenus such, doth not at all take away immortality à parte post, because bodies as well as spirits may be kept in immortality by the conservative concourse of Divine Power, and so the objection utterly falls to the ground.
Object. 2.
Psal. 104. 4.
Heb. 1. 7.
2. There is only another argument that the persons of the other opinion have urged, such as Aquinas, and the rest of the Scholastick rabble, to wit, the Text in the Psalm, which is this: Who maketh his Angels spirits: his ministers a flaming fire. From whence they would positively conclude that they are spirits, and absolutely incorporeal; but fail of their purpose for these clear reasons. 1. The Text there cannot be rationally understood of their creation, or of their creaturely nature, but of their offices and administrations, because the word used there is not from בָּרָא to create, or form forth of nothing, but from עָשָא fecit, that is by ordering them in their offices and ministrations. And again the word רוּחַ doth not alwaies or of necessity signifie an incorporeal thing but that which is a body, as the winds, and so doth Luther and diverse others render it, and it is commonly attributed to beasts as well as Men, as in that of Solomon, Who knoweth the spirit of man that goeth upward, and the spirit of the beast that goeth downward to the earth? Where the word spirit, which is all one in the Hebrew, is attributed to beasts as well as to men, but no man (I suppose) will believe that the spirit of a beast is simply incorporeal, and therefore by the word spirit in the Psalm cannot necessarily be understood a simple incorporeal substance, and therefore the consequence is not necessary.
Metaphys. l. 2. c. 4. p. 222.
Vid. August.
Tom. 2. l. de spir. & an. c. 8.