the holy angels have always enjoyed from the time of their creation._
And since these things are so, those spirits whom we call angels were
never at any time or in any way darkness, but, as soon as they were
made, were made light; yet they were not so created in order that
they might exist and live in any way whatever, but were enlightened
that they might live wisely and blessedly. Some of them, having
turned away from this light, have not won this wise and blessed life,
which is certainly eternal, and accompanied with the sure confidence
of its eternity; but they have still the life of reason, though
darkened with folly, and this they cannot lose, even if they would.
But who can determine to what extent they were partakers of that
wisdom before they fell? And how shall we say that they participated
in it equally with those who through it are truly and fully blessed,
resting in a true certainty of eternal felicity? For if they had
equally participated in this true knowledge, then the evil angels
would have remained eternally blessed equally with the good, because
they were equally expectant of it. For, though a life be never so
long, it cannot be truly called eternal if it is destined to have
an end; for it is called life inasmuch as it is lived, but eternal
because it has no end. Wherefore, although everything eternal is not
therefore blessed (for hell-fire is eternal), yet if no life can be
truly and perfectly blessed except it be eternal, the life of these
angels was not blessed, for it was doomed to end, and therefore not
eternal, whether they knew it or not. In the one case fear, in the
other ignorance, prevented them from being blessed. And even if
their ignorance was not so great as to breed in them a wholly false
expectation, but left them wavering in uncertainty whether their
good would be eternal or would some time terminate, this very doubt
concerning so grand a destiny was incompatible with the plenitude
of blessedness which we believe the holy angels enjoyed. For we do
not so narrow and restrict the application of the term "blessedness"
as to apply it to God only,[467] though doubtless He is so truly
blessed that greater blessedness cannot be; and, in comparison of His
blessedness, what is that of the angels, though, according to their
capacity, they be perfectly blessed?