HOMELY VIRTUES ASSIMILATE US TO DIVINITY ONLY PARTIALLY.
It would not be proper to attribute to Him the homely (or, civil) virtues, such as prudence, which "relates to the rational part of our nature"; courage, which "relates to our irascible part"; temperance, which consists of the harmonious consonance of our desires and our reason; last, of justice, which "consists in the accomplishment by all these faculties of the function proper to each of them," "whether to command, or to obey," (as said Plato[338]). But if we cannot become assimilated to the divinity by these homely virtues, that process must demand similarly named virtues of a superior order. However, these homely virtues would not be entirely useless to achieve that result, for one cannot say that while practising them one does not at all resemble the divinity as they who practise them are reputed to be godlike. These lower virtues do therefore yield some resemblance to the divinity, but complete assimilation can result only from virtues of a higher order.
THE DIVINE NEED NOT POSSESS THE LOWER VIRTUES BY WHICH WE ARE ASSIMILATED TO HIM.
Virtues, even if they be not homely, are therefore ultimately ascribed (to the divinity). Granting that the divinity does not possess the homely virtues, we may still become assimilated to Him by other virtues for with virtues of another order the case might differ. Therefore, without assimilating ourselves to the divinity by homely virtues we might nevertheless by means of virtues which still are ours, become assimilated to the Being which does not possess virtue.
This may be explained by an illustration. When a body is warmed by the presence of fire, the fire itself need not be heated by the presence of another fire. It might be argued that there was heat in the fire, but a heat that is innate. Reasoning by analogy, the virtue, which in the soul is only adventitious, is innate in Him from whom the soul derives it by imitation; (in other words, the cause need not necessarily possess the same qualities as the effect).
Our argument from heat might however be questioned, inasmuch as the divinity really does possess virtue, though it be of a higher nature. This observation would be correct, if the virtue in which the soul participates were identical with the principle from which she derives it. But there is a complete opposition; for when we see a house, the sense-house is not identical with the intelligible House, though possessing resemblance thereto. Indeed, the sense-house participates in order and proportion, though neither order, proportion, nor symmetry could be attributed to the idea of the House. Likewise, we derived from the divinity order, proportion and harmony, which, here below, are conditions of virtue, without thereby implying that the divinity Himself need possess order, proportion, or harmony. Similarly, it is not necessary that He possess virtue, although we become assimilated to Him thereby.
Such is our demonstration that human assimilation to the divine Intelligence by virtue does not (necessarily imply) (in the divine Intelligence itself) possession of virtue. Mere logical demonstration thereof is not, however, sufficient; we must also convince.
THERE ARE TWO KINDS OF RESEMBLANCE.
2. Let us first examine the virtues by which we are assimilated to the divinity, and let us study the identity between our soul-image which constitutes virtue, and supreme Intelligence's principle which, without being virtue, is its archetype. There are two kinds of resemblance: the first entails such identity of nature as exists when both similar things proceed from a same principle; the second is that of one thing to another which precedes it, as its principle. In the latter case, there is no reciprocity, and the principle does not resemble that which is inferior to it; or rather, the resemblance must be conceived entirely differently. It does not necessitate that the similar objects be of the same kind; it rather implies that they are of different kinds, inasmuch as they resemble each other differently.