This is like willing an act without having the power to bring about what is willed: it is not an attribute of perfection. Someone who wills something but is incapable of it is deficient. But if he has the power to accomplish what he wills, then willing together with power is an attribute of perfection.

If someone were to ask, “Is willing, by itself, a perfection or not?” then, if it is said to be a perfection, this is contradicted by the willing of someone powerless, who merely wishes and laments. If it is said not to be a perfection, it follows that He possesses something that is not a perfection.

He may be told: “Willing together with power is a perfection.”

Likewise, it might be argued that His saying “Be” is either an attribute of perfection or it is not. If it is an attribute of perfection, then it ought to be a perfection for the servant as well. Yet it is well known that if a servant said “Be” to something nonexistent, he would be talking nonsense, not displaying perfection. If it is not a perfection, then the Lord cannot be described as possessing it.

He may be told: Saying “Be” is a perfection when it comes from One who has the power to bring things into existence—who, when He says to a thing “Be,” it comes to be. Coming from anyone else, it is a deficiency.

Likewise, anger is either an attribute of perfection or it is not. If it is a perfection, then everyone who is angry should be praised. If it is a deficiency, how can the Lord possess it?

He may be told: Anger towards someone who deserves it, on the part of one who has the power to punish him, is an attribute of perfection. But the anger of someone powerless, or the anger of someone unjust, cannot be called a perfection. There are many similar examples.

Since this is so, His having the power to perform successive acts, and His performing them one after another, is an attribute of perfection. Each of these acts is a perfection conditional upon the others. As for any one of them