Between creatures of mere existence
and things of life, there is a large disproportion of nature; between
plants and animals and creatures of sense, a wider difference; between
them and man, a far greater: and if the proportion hold on, between man
and angels there should be yet a greater. We do not comprehend their
natures, who retain the first definition of Porphyry, and distinguish
them from ourselves by immortality; for before his fall, it is thought
man also was immortal; yet must we needs affirm that he had a different
essence from the angels; having, therefore, no certain knowledge of their
natures, it is no bad method of the schools, whatsoever perfection we
find obscurely in ourselves, in a more complete and absolute way to
ascribe unto them. I believe they have an extemporary knowledge, and
upon the first motion of their reason do what we cannot without study or
deliberation; that they know things by their forms, and define by
specifical difference what we describe by accidents and properties; and
therefore probabilities to us may be demonstrations unto them: that they
have knowledge not only of the specifical, but numerical forms of
individuals, and understand by what reserved difference each single
hypostasis (besides the relation to its species) becomes its numerical
self.
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