existent, and when they are existent, their existence is necessary. It is therefore known that they depend upon an agent when their existence is necessary through another (1), not in the state in which they warrant neither existence nor nonexistence.

Seventh: Even if it were conceded that this quiddity is established in external reality and that, insofar as (2) it is what it is, it depends upon an efficient cause, this would not prove that it must be beginningless, or even that this is possible. Since it does not prove this, it is not impossible that this dependence should apply to it only in conjunction with origination, and that origination should be a condition of this dependence (3).

Eighth: Even if we concede that possibility is the cause of dependence upon an agent, what people generally understand by possibility is the possibility that a thing may exist and that it may not exist (4). Such possibility is inseparable from origination. It is therefore inconceivable that a thing should be beginningless and eternal, necessary through another, yet nevertheless dependent upon an agent. This is (5) precisely what they claim.

Ninth: If they hold that necessity precludes dependence upon another, even when it is an originated necessity, then eternal, beginningless (6) necessity has an even greater claim to preclude dependence upon another. According to them, the celestial spheres are necessarily existent without beginning or end, and this necessity