Thursday, October 26, 2006

Q53 A1: Whether an angel can be moved locally?

Yes. Because as a body successively, and not all at once, quits the place in which it was before, and thence arises continuity in its local movement, so likewise an angel can successively quit the divisible place in which he was before, and so his movement will be continuous.

And the angel can also all at once quit the whole place, and in the same instant apply himself to the whole of another place, and thus his movement will not be continuous.

The continuity of movement is according to the continuity of magnitude; and according to priority and posteriority of local movement, as the Philosopher says (Phys. iv, text 99).

But an angel is not in a place as commensurate and contained, but rather as containing it. Hence it is not necessary for the local movement of an angel to be commensurate with the place, nor for it to be according to the exigency of the place, so as to have continuity therefrom; but it is a non-continuous movement.

For since the angel is in a place only by virtual contact (Q52, A1), it follows necessarily that the movement of an angel in a place is nothing else than the various contacts of various places successively, and not at once; because an angel cannot be in several places at one time (Q52, A2).

Nor is it necessary for these contacts to be continuous. Nevertheless a certain kind of continuity can be found in such contacts, because there is nothing to hinder us from assigning a divisible place to an angel according to virtual contact (Q52, A1), just as a divisible place is assigned to a body by contact of magnitude.