temporal events must have a beginning, thereby invalidating the position of those who maintain that the world is beginningless.

Once this position is invalidated, the argument supporting it is necessarily invalidated as well. Thus, this argument is invalid on either assumption, which entails that it is unsound in itself.

[The third argument]

It may be said:

For every observable temporal event, either the causal efficacy that produces it is present from eternity, or it is not.

If the former is true, temporal events must proceed from the beginningless cause without anything newly arising, and the argument is invalidated.

If the latter is true, the causal efficacy producing it becoming complete after not having been so is itself a temporal occurrence. Thus, the completeness of that causal efficacy depends on this completion.

Now, either the agent’s state when its causal efficacy for producing the second event is complete is the same as its state when its causal efficacy for producing the first was complete, or it is not. If the former is assumed, it follows that this second event, and the next, and the next, come into existence without any cause arising that necessitates their occurrence. For the acting essence is in the same state at the first event as at the second and third. Consequently, if it does not produce the second event at the time of the first, it does not produce the third at the time of the second, since nothing has newly arisen to necessitate its occurrence.

Furthermore, the essence itself is not, from eternity, a complete necessitating cause of any temporal event, and it has always remained as it was. It follows that it will never be a necessitating cause of any temporal event; otherwise, this would entail bringing something into existence without a newly arising cause.