At the heart of St. Thomas’s doctrine of analogous names for God is that the thing named speaks to the same thing in God and creatures. This presupposes that while we get an idea of various perfections like goodness, justice, truth, sublimity, etc from the senses, nothing in the senses satisfies the understanding we attain of the perfections themselves.
Similarly, we imagine that our ideas or virtues are somehow more abstract than a stone, when in fact they are more actual, insofar as they are loftier perfections of loftier subjects. The structure of our knowledge gives a definite direction to human understanding. We are made to move towards what exists more, though this strikes us at first as a move away from what most exists.
Phil said,
June 12, 2008 at 5:29 am
Great new format for the blog.
Finally, the first volume of the works of De Koninck arrived yesterday, at last.
a thomist said,
June 12, 2008 at 10:42 am
Mine came a few days ago, but I can’t retrieve it till the 21st.
My wife nixed my first new blog skin, but she liked this one, which was similar enough. The font’s a bit smaller than I’d like and the links are too far down, but it has a pleasant, clean and luminous quality that I like quite a lot.
Phil said,
June 12, 2008 at 10:58 am
Only a minor comment on the format, and your wife’s good judgment (and proximity) obviously ruling, but possible to have a dark background with light writing? Otherwise reading a heavy text on a light background is rather like staring at a light bulb.
Dale said,
June 12, 2008 at 4:49 pm
Nice shift of format.
While I agree that white backgrounds can be ‘like staring at a light bulb’, I prefer a lighter background (light grey/blue/etc.) to black.