Highlights
[first paragraph of the “I Answer That” talks about two kinds of knlowedge which come from grace: speculative and effective. Effective is in relation to love, which is related to wisdom]
“…the intellective power of the angel extends to understanding all things: because the object of the intellect is universal being or universal truth.” It
Quantity is twofold. There is quantity of bulk or dimensive quantity, which is to be found only in corporeal things, and has, therefore, no place in God. There is also quantity
I answer that, The name of Word in God, if taken in its proper sense, is a personal name, and in no way an essential name.
To see how this is true, we must know that our own word taken in its proper sense has a threefold meaning; while in a fourth sense it is taken improperly or figuratively. The clearest and most common sense is when it is said of the word spoken by the voice; and this proceeds from an interior source as regards two things found in the exterior word — that is, the vocal sound itself, and the signification of the sound. For, according to the Philosopher (Peri Herm. i) vocal sound signifies the concept of the intellect. Again the vocal sound proceeds from the signification or the imagination, as stated in De Anima, ii, text 90. The vocal sound, which has no signification, cannot be called a word: wherefore the exterior vocal sound is called a word from the fact that it signifies the interior concept of the mind. Therefore it follows that, first and chiefly, the interior concept of the mind is called a word; secondarily, the vocal sound it- self, signifying the interior concept, is so called; and thirdly, the imagination of the vocal sound is called a word. Damascene men- tions these three kinds of words (De Fide 1 Orthod. i. 17), saying that word is called the natural movement of the intellect, whereby it mind. e. is moved, and understands, and thinks, as