Acts 12. 7.
5. And as that which is not understood of the blessed and elect Angels must needs be unknown unto the faln Angels, so likewise there are many things known to the good Angels, that are hidden or but conjectured at by the bad ones, as may be manifest in these instances. 1. The blessed Angels know and see the face of the Father in beatifical vision, as saith the Text: Take heed that ye offend not one of these little ones; for I say unto you, that in heaven their Angels do alwayes behold the face of my father, which is in heaven. Upon which Beza hath this note: Loquitur more seculi hujus, ubi consistere in conspectu regis faciemq; ejus perpetuò videre posse, signum est domesticæ intimæq; familiaritatis. But the faln Angels are totally deprived of this blessed Vision, being cast forth of Heaven, as saith the Text. And the great Dragon was cast out, that old Serpent, called the Devil and Satan, which deceiveth the world: he was cast out into the earth, and his Angels were cast out with him. And S. Peter tells us, that God spared not the Angels that sinned, but cast them down to hell, and delivered them into chains of darkness. 2. And as they have lost the vision and fruition of the mercies of God, so they have utterly lost the knowledge of his will, concerning his Covenant of Grace and mercy to the elect, for they are only ministring spirits sent forth to tempt to sin, to afflict and punish, and have still enough for the advancing of the Kingdom of darkness, but have no knowledge of saving grace nor the mysteries of the Gospel, but are all enemies and adversaries to God and the Kingdom of Christ, and goeth about seeking continually whom he may devour. But it is the blessed elect Angels that are ministring spirits, sent forth for to minister to them, who shall be heirs of Salvation. 3. The good Angels have the blessed messages revealed unto them for the assisting and delivering of the godly. So an Angel did comfort Joshua, and another warned Joseph to take the child Jesus, and to fly into Ægypt, thereby to preserve the childs life; and an Angel delivered the Apostles forth of prison, and many such happy errands are made manifest unto them, and they imployed about them, of all which the faln Angels are utterly ignorant, and they are concealed from them.
6. There are some things that the evil Angels know of, which the blessed ones have no sensibility of, that is the knowledge of their own guilt, and the experimental sense of the loss of Gods Favour, Love, Grace and Mercy.
Jude 6.
De Civitat. Dei, l. 9.
2. The second thing that we proposed to handle, is, that the knowledge that the faln Angels have is dark and confused, which is plain because they are reserved in chains under darkness, unto the judgment of the great day. Now those that are kept or reserved in darkness, must of necessity have their knowledge dark, and consequently confused; and he also that is the Prince of darkness, and the Father and Author of the works of darkness, must needs like his children have his understanding darkned also. And therefore we will conclude this point with the opinion of S. Augustine who speaking both of the Angels that stood, and those that fell, saith thus: Ante peccatum autem tam isti quam illi perfectè omnia intelligebant. Accessit igitur istis propter peccatum aliquid tenebrarum. Proindè etiam tenebræ appellantur, & in tenebris esse dicuntur, cœlesti illa luce destituti, & in locum caliginosum præcipitati. Ut indè intelligamus nonnihil tenebrarum naturali etiam illorum menti accessisse, in pœnam admissi peccati in Deum, Deiq; filium. But we shall only here speak of their knowledge in reference to things acted in this elementary and sublunary world, and that in these particulars.
1. Though they retain the same faculty of understanding that they had before their fall, of the generation, motion and mutation of natural things here below, yet is it much darkned, and far inferior to the knowledge of the good Angels in natural things, the one sort living and abiding in light, and the other being shut up in darkness.
2. What knowledge soever they have by their natural faculties, or that they may be supposed to gain by acquisition, is by them gotten or learned for no other end, but for the hurt and destruction of mankind, and not as the good Angels who make use of theirs for the benefit of those that shall be heirs of Salvation. For as a good Physician labours and studies to know the nature and virtues of Animals, Vegetables and Minerals, and their parts and products, for the good and benefit of mankind, but a Witch or poysoner laboureth to know their virtues thereby to destroy and kill; even so do the evil Angels, and not otherwise.
John 8.44.
2 Thes. 2. 9, 10, 11.