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We have completed the second part of the treatise, which
deals with the divine persons in particular, and now we
begin the third part, which treats of the divine persons:
in comparison with the essence; 2. in comparison with
the properties; 3. in comparison with the notional
acts, namely, generation and active spiration; 4. and
in comparison with each other.
At first sight it will appear to many readers that St.
Thomas is again saying what he said in the first part of
this treatise, when he treated of the persons absolutely
in common and then went on to the two processions and the
relations founded on the processions. St. Thomas,
however, is not making a new beginning of the treatise.
What in the first place he had considered analytically,
first in common and then in particular, he now considers
synthetically, that is, by comparing with each other all
that has been determined theologically in the light of
revelation. This treatise is a kind of circle, beginning
with the processions, going on to the persons, and
returning to the terminus a quo, that is, the divine
processions. This "circular" contemplation may appear
to be returning always to the same things but in reality it
seeks always to penetrate more deeply into the matter just
as the eagle high in sky seems to be making the same circle
again and again, looking up into the sun and in the light
of the sun above looking down on the vast expanse of the
earth below. "This circular movement is the movement
around the same central point. Dionysius ascribed to the
angels a circular movement since they, uniformly and
unceasingly, without beginning and without end, look upon
God, just as circular movement has neither beginning nor
end and uniformly moves about the same center."[524]
We will understand the necessity of this synthetic part
when we come to the theory of appropriation, which cannot
be explained until we have determined those things which
are proper to each person, and when we consider the
notional acts, active generation and active spiration,
which presuppose the persons from whom these acts proceed.
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