Second: Suppose we posit an eternal effect. The factor that necessitates it in pre-eternity must, in that very pre-eternity, be a complete cause for it, entailing it by its very essence; for were this not so, the effect could not be eternal, since nothing eternal exists except through itself or through that which, by virtue of its own eternality, necessitates it. Now, such a cause—which is complete—cannot bring into being something that is perpetually in motion, for the effect must correspond to the cause. It is therefore impossible for what has been forever in motion to issue from that in which there is absolutely no motion, because the cause’s relation to every segment of those motions is identical at all times. To single out one moment rather than another while the necessitating cause remains in one and the same state throughout all times is impossible; and if one permits this, one is allowing an act to proceed from the cause after previously not proceeding from it.

Moreover, the cosmos embraces many diverse kinds, and it is impossible for such diversity to proceed from a simple Necessary Being, whether one says they are produced through an intermediary or without one. If the intermediary is a single entity, diverse things would then proceed from a single source; and if it is not single, diverse things would have issued directly from the simple Being itself.

Someone may object, “He produced the second through the mediation of the first.” This does not dispense with the difficulty, for if both are said to have emanated from Him together, it still follows that multiple, diverse entities have issued—even if one is made a condition for the other. And if it is claimed that one issued from the other, then, inevitably, diversity has issued from what is simple.

Furthermore, the second celestial sphere is studded with a multitude of stars; it therefore contains many diverse realities, while above it, according to them, there exists only what is simple, from which diversity cannot proceed. However they frame the matter, their error becomes plain.

And if they assert—as many of their principal spokesmen do—that contingent events occur within the Lord Himself,