SECOND ARTICLE: WHETHER GOD CONSERVES EVERY CREATURE DIRECTLY

Reply. God directly conserves the very being of things inasmuch as it is being, but other agents, subordinate to God, conserve being as such being, for example, the sun conserves the light in the atmosphere. Similarly the influence of other subordinate causes is necessary for the conservation of vegetative and sensitive life on the surface of the earth; and the succession of day and night and of the four seasons, without which there would be no generations or conservation of life, depends on the regular movement of the stars.

In the spiritual order God directly conserves spiritual souls in being, and under God the angels and the saints in their way illumine souls and assist them to know and love divine things and to conserve the principles of the spiritual life.[958]