felicity, that those who fell were not aware that they would
fall, and that those who stood received assurance of their own
perseverance after the ruin of the fallen._
From all this, it will readily occur to any one that the blessedness
which an intelligent being desires as its legitimate object results
from a combination of these two things, namely, that it uninterruptedly
enjoy the unchangeable good, which is God; and that it be delivered
from all dubiety, and know certainly that it shall eternally abide in
the same enjoyment. That it is so with the angels of light we piously
believe; but that the fallen angels, who by their own default lost that
light, did not enjoy this blessedness even before they sinned, reason
bids us conclude. Yet if their life was of any duration before they
fell, we must allow them a blessedness of some kind, though not that
which is accompanied with foresight. Or, if it seems hard to believe
that, when the angels were created, some were created in ignorance
either of their perseverance or their fall, while others were most
certainly assured of the eternity of their felicity,--if it is hard to
believe that they were not all from the beginning on an equal footing,
until these who are now evil did of their own will fall away from the
light of goodness, certainly it is much harder to believe that the
holy angels are now uncertain of their eternal blessedness, and do
not know regarding themselves as much as we have been able to gather
regarding them from the Holy Scriptures. For what catholic Christian
does not know that no new devil will ever arise among the good angels,
as he knows that this present devil will never again return into
the fellowship of the good? For the truth in the gospel promises to
the saints and the faithful that they will be equal to the angels of
God; and it is also promised them that they will "go away into life
eternal."[469] But if we are certain that we shall never lapse from
eternal felicity, while they are not certain, then we shall not be
their equals, but their superiors. But as the truth never deceives, and
as we shall be their equals, they must be certain of their blessedness.
And because the evil angels could not be certain of that, since their
blessedness was destined to come to an end, it follows either that the
angels were unequal, or that, if equal, the good angels were assured of
the eternity of their blessedness after the perdition of the others;
unless, possibly, some one may say that the words of the Lord about
the devil, "He was a murderer from the beginning, and abode not in the
truth,"[470] are to be understood as if he was not only a murderer
from the beginning of the human race, when man, whom he could kill by
his deceit, was made, but also that he did not abide in the truth from
the time of his own creation, and was accordingly never blessed with
the holy angels, but refused to submit to his Creator, and proudly
exulted as if in a private lordship of his own, and was thus deceived
and deceiving. For the dominion of the Almighty cannot be eluded;
and he who will not piously submit himself to things as they are,
proudly feigns, and mocks himself with a state of things that does
not exist; so that what the blessed Apostle John says thus becomes
intelligible: "The devil sinneth from the beginning,"[471]--that is,
from the time he was created he refused righteousness which none but a
will piously subject to God can enjoy. Whoever adopts this opinion at
least disagrees with those heretics the Manichees, and with any other
pestilential sect that may suppose that the devil has derived from some
adverse evil principle a nature proper to himself. These persons are so
befooled by error, that, although they acknowledge with ourselves the
authority of the gospels, they do not notice that the Lord did not say,
"The devil was naturally a stranger to the truth," but "The devil abode
not in the truth," by which He meant us to understand that he had
fallen from the truth, in which, if he had abode, he would have become
a partaker of it, and have remained in blessedness along with the holy
angels.[472]