Quotes About Thomas Aquinas

Two subsequent Franciscans would use Aristotle to push secular knowledge to new intellectual altitudes Thomas Aquinas never imagined. The first was Roger Bacon. He was born around 1215, the same date as the Magna Carta.

In order for a war to be just, three things are necessary. First, the authority of the sovereign. Secondly, a just cause. Thirdly, a rightful intention.

Saint Thomas declared that woman was an "inessential" being, which, from a masculine point of view, is a way of positing the accidental character of sexuality.

For Ayn had built up a comprehensive systematic philosophy, which she calls Objectivism, and which, once you accept its first premises, is the most closely reasoned, rigorously logical and consistently interlocking world view and explanation since the great synthesis of Thomas Aquinas.

What was the secret that the serpent told Eve? That she could eat a certain fruit? Pah. That was a euphemism. The fruit was carnal knowledge, and everybody from Thomas Aquinas to Milton knew it. How did they know it? Nowhere in Genesis is there even the merest hint of the equation: Forbidden fruit equals sin equals sex. We know it to be true because there can only be one thing so central to mankind. Sex.

Love must precede hatred, and nothing is hated save through being contrary to a suitable thing which is loved. And hence it is that every hatred is caused by love.

He that obstinately denieth the truth before men upon earth, wilfully refuseth his soul's health in heaven.

The human mind may perceive truth only through thinking, as is clear from Augustine.

People like Thomas Aquinas would say we can't talk about God as a creator because we can only have in our heads the idea of a human creator and that can't apply to God. We can't even say that God exists because our notion of existence is too limited to apply to God. People were instructed to think about this in those terms.

Bestow upon me, O Lord my God, understanding to know thee, diligence to seek thee, wisdom to find thee, and a faithfulness that may finally embrace thee.

Despite the fact that England was nominally a Christian country, the church had no reservations about capital punishment, with St Paul and Thomas Aquinas enlisted in its defence.

If ... the motion of the earth were circular, it would be violent and contrary to nature, and could not be eternal, since ... nothing violent is eternal.... It follows, therefore, that the earth is not moved with a circular motion.

It is possible to demonstrate God's existence, although not a priori, yet a posteriori from some work of His more surely known to us.

The human mind may perceive truth only through thinking, as is clear from Augustine.

Thus the sun which possesses light perfectly, can shine by itself; whereas the moon which has the nature of light imperfectly, sheds only a borrowed light.

It must be said that charity can, in no way, exist along with mortal sin.

The splendor of a soul in grace is so seductive that it surpasses the beauty of all created things.

Reason in man is rather like God in the world.

Now the maximum in any genus is the cause of all in that genus; as fire, which is the maximum heat, is the cause of all hot things. Therefore there must also be something which is to all beings the cause of their being, goodness, and every other perfection; and this we call God.

A capacity as such is directed to an act. Wherefore we seek to know the nature of a capacity from the act to which it is directed, and consequently the nature of a capacity is diversified as the nature of the act is diversified.

If, however, we understand by the firmament that part of the air in which the clouds are collected, then the waters above the firmament must rather be the vapors resolved from the waters which are raised above a part of the atmosphere, and from which the rain falls.

In Hebrew, His name is Jesus, in Greek, Soter, in Latin, Salvator; but men say Christus in Greek, Messias in Hebrew, Unctus in Latin, that is, King and Priest.

We now inquire into the place of the angels. Touching this there are three subjects of inquiry: (1) Is the angel in a place? (2) Can he be in several places at once? (3) Can several angels be in the same place?

The Philosopher says (Metaph. ii, 2) that "to suppose a thing to be indefinite is to deny that it is good." But the good is that which has the nature of an end. Therefore it is contrary to the nature of an end to proceed indefinitely. Therefore it is necessary to fix one last end.