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State of the question. In the sed contra St.
Augustine is quoted as saying that the Father and the
Son love each other by the Holy Ghost.[487] But
the difficulty arises because the Father and the Son
cannot love each other by the Holy Ghost either by
essential love or by notional love, just as we do not say
that the Father understands the Son by the Son or begets
by the Son. But the Father and the Son have no other
love than essential and notional love.
Reply. Nevertheless the reply is in the affirmative:
the Father and the Son love each other by the Holy
Ghost with notional love as a tree is said to flower with
flowers.
1. Proof from authority. The text of St.
Augustine, quoted in the argument, had been explained in
several ways by Scholastics prior to St. Thomas as is
indicated in the beginning of the body of the article.
2. Theological proof. A distinction is made between
essential and notional love. If love is understood
essentially, the Father and the Son do not love each
other by the Holy Ghost but by the divine essence because
the Holy Ghost is not essential but personal love. By
essential love the three divine persons love one another in
one and the same act of the divine will, and this act of
essential love is identified with the divine essence. But
if love is understood notionally, that is, as denoting
the third person, then love is nothing else than the
spiration of personal love just as enunciation is the
production of the word and flowering is the production of
flowers. So as we say that a tree flowers with flowers
and the Father understands Himself and creatures by the
Word, so the Father and the Son are said to love
themselves and us by the Holy Ghost, that is, by
proceeding love. As we have said, this notional love is
mutual although there is but one active spiration and one
spirator with two who spirate.
St. Thomas, explanation is more satisfactory than those
proposed by earlier Scholastics who understood the
ablative "spiritu Sancto" (by the Holy Ghost) either
as a sign of mutual love and thus weakened the sense of the
expression; or as a formal cause, as if the Holy Ghost
were the mutual love of the Father and the Son and thus
identified the Holy Ghost with active spiration and then
there would be no third person; or as the formal effect,
and this last approaches closest to the truth.
Therefore we must say that the Father and the Holy
Ghost love each other by notional love inasmuch as the
Holy Ghost is the terminus of this love. Confirmation
is found in a rather remote analogy: parents are said to
love each other by their son since the son is the terminus
of their love in the sense that we say that a tree flowers
with flowers. We refer the reader to the third paragraph
of the body of the article.
Reply to the second objection. "Whenever the
understanding of any action implies a determined effect,
the principle of the action can be denominated by the
action and the effect."
Reply to the third objection. "The Father loves not
only the Son but also Himself and us by the Holy Ghost
as He enunciates Himself and every creature by the Word
which He generates." This is so "because the Holy
Ghost proceeds as the love of the first goodness according
to which the Father loves Himself and all creatures."
Hence the Holy Ghost proceeds not only from the mutual
love of the Father and the Son but also from the love of
the first goodness, which the Father loves in Himself
and in the Son and which the Son loves in Himself and in
the Father. In this way many difficulties proposed
recently on this point are solved.
Doubt. From the love of which things does the Holy
Ghost proceed?
Reply. The Holy Ghost proceeds per se from the love of
all the things that are formally in God, and per accidens
and concomitantly from the love of creatures. This is
because the Holy Ghost proceeds from the most perfect
love. By this love whatever is in God is necessarily
loved and by it God freely loves creatures. But the
Holy Ghost does not proceed from the love of possible
creatures since God is not said to love possible creatures
because He does not will for them the good of existence.
This suffices to explain why the Holy Ghost is properly
called love, namely, personal Love.
Corollary. The expression sometimes heard, "incarnate
love," is not admissible as is "incarnate Word,"
because it seems to imply the incarnation of the Holy
Ghost.
We may recall here how beautifully the liturgy makes use
of metaphors to express this doctrine, particularly in the
hymn Veni Creator:
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Thou who art called the Paraclete,
Best gift of God above,
The living spring, the living fire,
Sweet unction, and true love!
O guide our minds with Thy blest light,
With love our hearts inflame,
And with Thy strength, which ne'er decays,
Confirm our mortal frame.[488]
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Since, as St. Thomas says, those things which pertain
to love are unnamed, the liturgy has recourse to various
metaphors, some of them opposed to the others, as the
spring of living water and fire, but whatever is said
dividedly is finally united in spiritual love.
In the sequence, Veni, Sancte Spiritus, the liturgy
amasses antithetic metaphors about the Holy Ghost:
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Thou in labor rest most sweet,
Thou art shadow from the heat,
Comfort in adversity.
What is soiled, make Thou pure;
What is wounded, work its cure;
What is parched, fructify;
What is rigid, gently bend;
What is frozen, warmly tend;
Strengthen what goes erringly.[489]
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In the preparation for Mass among the seven prayers to
the Holy Ghost we read: "Inflame, O Lord, our
reins and our hearts with the fire of the Holy Ghost;
that we may serve Thee with a chaste body and please Thee
with a pure mind."[490] As we have a consecration
to the Most Sacred Heart of Jesus and to the Blessed
Virgin Mary we should also consecrate ourselves to the
Holy Ghost.
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