De causa Dei: Book III, Chapter 30
Thomas Bradwardine, De causa Dei contra Pelagium (1344). English translation: Wroot Press, CC BY-NC 4.0; machine-learning use permitted with attribution (https://bradwardine.wrootpress.com/rights/).
Source: Henry Savile's edition, London 1618, 744C–755B; Latin from EEBO-TCP A16626 (public domain).
Canonical: https://bradwardine.wrootpress.com/3/30/
Status: draft translation, not yet reviewed.

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CHAPTER XXX. It argues against it [n1] on the falsity of its hypothesis, by a way taken from the necessity and freedom of the divine will, which always necessarily remains uniform and equal.

Now that the first error has been set right, namely the one about the insufficiency of the response of 26 of this book, set out above, [n2] it remains to do the same for the second. This is the error that arises from the non-subsistence of the hypothesis which it supposes. For this hypothesis supposes seven things. The first: that what is now future can, by a possibility excluding every kind of necessity, now and as of now [n3] not be future. The second: that what has always been future can in like manner never have been future. The third: that what is now not future can likewise now and as of now be future. The fourth: that what has never been future can likewise always have been future. The fifth: that, none of these things standing in the way, everything that now is, necessarily now is. The sixth: that everything that was, necessarily was. The seventh: that everything that is or was, necessarily was always before future.

And about things foreknown and known by God, and in entirely corresponding fashion about his foreknowledge and knowledge, it posits seven similar ones. This error, however, must be met in two ways: first, by a way taken from God's intrinsic action; second, by a way taken from his extrinsic action. The first way has a twofold method, one from the divine will or willing, the other from his intellect or cognition; and each of these has in turn two paths of truth, one leading through necessity or contingency and freedom, the other tending through immutability or mutability. Along this path of truth, then, which leads through the necessity or freedom of the divine will, one proceeds in this way: if the seven premised propositions about things present, past, and future, foreknown

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and known, and about God's foreknowledge and knowledge, are true, then seven other similar ones, about things pre-willed and willed by God, and about his will or willing, will necessarily be true, as the topic from the like sufficiently proves. 18 of the first also plainly shows this, since God neither knows nor foreknows any of these things except with will going before. And this can be demonstrated item by item. For the first, namely that God now wills something, say that A will be, and can, by a free power (that is, one excluding in every way the necessity of contradiction), now and as of now not will that A will be, can be demonstrated in two ways: by the impossible, namely, and simply ostensively. Let the opposite be given, namely that God, as of now, cannot not will that A will be. Then it is necessary that, as of now, God will that A will be, and by 10 of the second it follows necessarily: God wills that A will be, therefore A will be. And the antecedent is necessary as of now, therefore so is the consequent, as the common rule of the logicians teaches, which can likewise be demonstrated by the impossible: for otherwise it would be possible for a falsehood to follow from a truth. But this hypothesis denies the necessity of the consequent thus inferred. To the same effect, ostensively, in this way: it follows, "A will not be, therefore, by 10 of the first,

God does not will that A will be"; and the antecedent is possible as of now, as the hypothesis says, so therefore is the consequent, as no logician fails to know. This too can easily be demonstrated by the impossible: for otherwise it would be possible for a falsehood to follow from a truth. The second, namely that God has always willed [n4] something future, say that A will be, and can by the power just mentioned never have willed that A will be, can be demonstrated as the first; it can also be demonstrated by the first. For if by the first it is posited that God now does not will that A will be, it follows by 10 of the first that he never willed that A will be, since A was never future, because it never was, is, or will be. The third, namely that God now does not will that A will be, and can by the aforesaid possibility will, as of now, that A will be, is proved as the first. To the same effect: if God can, as of now, not will what he now wills, by like reasoning he can, as of now, will what he now does not will. The fourth, namely that God never willed that A will be, and can by the power just mentioned always have willed that A will be, is proved as the one next to it, and is also proved by it, as the second by the first. The fifth, namely that, together with these, whatever existing thing God

wills to be now, it is necessary that he will it to be now, and that for everything that now is, it is necessary, as of now, that God will it to be now: as to the first part, this is demonstrated in two ways. First, ostensively, in this way. Let A be something now existing; then by the ninth of the first it follows necessarily: A is, therefore A is preserved in being by the divine will, and God wills this to be; and the antecedent is necessary as of now, as the hypothesis posits, therefore so is the consequent, as the proof of the first teaches. By the impossible, let it be given in this way. The opposite: namely that something, say A, which God now wills to be, can fail to be willed, as of now, to be; therefore by 9 of the first A can, as of now, not be, which this hypothesis denied. The second part of this follows from the preceding, with this added, that everything that now is, God wills now to be, as the ninth of the first taught. The sixth is that, of everything past which God willed to have been, it is necessary that he willed it to have been, and that of everything past it is necessary that God willed it to have been; this is proved as the fifth. The seventh is that, of everything that is or was, it is necessary that God always before willed it to have been future. For by 18

of this book it follows necessarily: this is or was, therefore it always was future; therefore everything that is or was always before was future; therefore by 14 of the first God always willed this. And by the hypothesis the antecedent is necessary, namely about everything existing and everything past ("this is," "this was"), therefore so is the consequent, as the proof of the first teaches. From these last three, that is, the fifth, sixth, and seventh, concerning necessity about the divine will, an eighth can be drawn, concerning impossibility about the same: namely, that God cannot now actively nill [n5] any existing thing (that is, by an act of nilling contrary to positive willing) to be now; nor can he will any existing thing, as of now, not to be; and that of nothing past can he actively nill that it was, nor will that it was not; and that of nothing present or past can he actively nill that it was future, nor will that it was not future. This follows most clearly from what has been said and from the hypothesis's own admission, with the tenth of the first joined. When these four, about the necessity and impossibility of the divine will concerning present and past things, have thus last been demonstrated,

four others like them, about the impossibility and necessity of the divine will concerning things not present and not past, can likewise be demonstrated. The first is that, whatever non-existing thing God does not will to be now, it is impossible that he will it to be now; and that, of everything that now is not, it is impossible that God will it to be now. The second is that, whatever thing is not past which God did not will to have been, it is impossible that he willed it to have been; and that, of everything not past, it is impossible that he willed it to have been. The third is that, of everything that neither is nor was, it is impossible that God ever willed it to have been future. The fourth is that, of everything that now neither is nor was, it is necessary that God actively nill it to be and to have been, and to have been future so that it would be now or earlier. All these will be shown by the topic from the like. They can also, like the preceding, be demonstrated by supposing, with the Philosopher in Peri hermeneias 1, the last [chapter], that for what is not, not to be, when it is not, is necessary [n6]

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when it is not; which this response too will not be able to deny. The fourth of these is proved by the same 22 of the first, with its corollary helping. With these, then, as it were distant matters touched on beforehand, we must approach more closely . Further: with respect to any extrinsic object whatever, the divine will is equally free or necessary; and with respect to any future object it is wholly free, as the hypothesis says; therefore with respect to any past or present object it is also wholly free, against the hypothesis. Or take it thus, with the same major: with respect to any past or present object the divine will is necessary according to the hypothesis; therefore also with respect to any future object, against the hypothesis so often mentioned. Again: however the will of God is intrinsically, with respect to some object, at some time, just so it always was before, and always will be after; but with respect to A as future the will of God is now wholly free according to contradiction, according to the hypothesis; therefore it will always be so; therefore when A has become present or past, against the hypothesis. Or thus, with the same major: with respect to A as present or past the will of God is

necessary according to the hypothesis; therefore it was always so before; therefore when A was future, which this hypothesis denies. Again, not in a different sense but in a different form: in whatever way God intrinsically wills or does not will actively, loves or hates, some object at some time, in just that way (if one may say so), and thus entirely intrinsically, he always did so before and always will do so after; but according to the hypothesis God wills and loves A as future now wholly freely and contradictorily; therefore he will will and love it in a wholly similar, free way when it has become present or past, against the hypothesis, since then he will do this necessarily, as the hypothesis admitted. Or with the same major: according to the hypothesis God intrinsically wills or loves A, present or past, now of necessity; therefore he always did so before; therefore when A was future, against the hypothesis so often recalled. All this, moreover, consists virtually in this one thing: that the divine will, with respect to any extrinsic object, is always equally free, or necessary, intrinsically as to willing; and that with respect to any object, when it is present or past, it is necessary; therefore always before,

while it was future, it was so; therefore by the same reasoning it is now necessary with respect to anything future; therefore of any future thing it is necessary that it will be. For by the tenth of the first it follows necessarily: "God wills this to be, therefore this will be," and the antecedent is necessary, therefore the consequent, as was shown above. Or, if with respect to the future object, when it is future, the will is contradictorily free, it will be likewise equally free with respect to it when it will be present and past. Here, however, all the men of this way answer in agreement by denying the major. For they say that when the thing is future the divine will is not necessary but free according to contradiction as to willing it, but when it has become present or past, then the contrary. But they do not notice that God then wills present and past things intrinsically otherwise than he willed them as future; so that God and his will are necessarily changed intrinsically, against 5 and 23 of the first. For he is changed intrinsically from one of a pair of opposites to the other, from free choice to what is not free, from the non-necessary

to the necessary, from the free according to contradiction to the necessary on one side only. Again, then God is intrinsically less free now than before, therefore not of infinite freedom but of freedom defined by fixed limits, and he is subjected to a new servitude as well. Again, then God is less powerful than he was, and therefore not omnipotent. For what he could yesterday will and nill, he cannot today; and the intrinsic act of will which he could yesterday produce or have, he cannot today; and what he could yesterday do, he cannot now. For yesterday he could will that A not be now or earlier, so that today the thing would never be, or have been, made, nor ever have been future; and today he cannot do so. Yesterday he could positively nill that A ever be, have been, or have been future; today he cannot do so. Yesterday he could produce or have such an act as "I will that A was never future, present, or past"; today he cannot, nor does he any longer have such dominion over his own will. And the same holds of the act of nilling that A was ever future, present, or past. Yesterday he could will and do concerning A that it was not yesterday and never was future, or would be yesterday, [n7] that it would be or would have been yesterday, and that it would always before have been future in order to be yesterday; today

he can do neither, nor have done it; which doubtless detracts from God's omnipotence. Hence also Lombard, Sentences 1, dist. 44, rejects the opinion saying that God cannot always [do] what he could once, [n8] and says: "Let us therefore confess that God can always do whatever he could once, that is, he has all that power which he once had, and the power over every thing over which he once had power, but he cannot always do everything that he could once do; he can indeed do, or have done, what he once could." Nor should it trouble anyone that he says that God cannot always do everything that he once could do. For he says this, as his discussion shows, not on account of any intrinsic diversification of the divine power, but only on account of the diversification of the signification of this infinitive verb,

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"to do," when taken with this verb of present tense, "can," and again with this verb of past tense, "could." For according to his logic there, with the first it signifies, along with present tense, a present doing, and with the second, along with past tense, a past one. Therefore he denies that God can now rise again and concedes that he could once rise again, because the one "can" is not the same as the other but different, as 24 of the first showed more fully in its like case. And if you object: "God could once rise again, and now cannot rise again; therefore something he could once do he now cannot," the answer, according to Lombard's logic set out above, is that in the first, with the verb of past tense, this infinitive "to rise again" stands, or is applied, for a past resurrection, and in the second, with the verb of present tense, for a present resurrection, and so it is taken for different things. Hence it is not correctly concluded for the same thing, namely that something the same which he could once do, he now cannot; but just as in the premises it takes "to rise again" for different things, so it can validly conclude for different things in this way: therefore God could once do one thing and now cannot do another; yet the same thing, a past rising, which he could once do, he can still do;

for he can now have risen at some past time, and this "to be able" is wholly the same as "to be able to rise at some past time." Or perhaps the distinction can be made otherwise in the first, in that "to rise again" can be taken for rising now or earlier, whereas in the second it cannot be taken except for rising in the present. Hence, taking "to rise again" uniformly in the premises, the argument concludes as to form but fails in matter, because the first is false; taking it non-uniformly, it does not conclude. This distinction, however, can be known more fully from 24 of the first. Lombard, then, on account of the reason set out above, the diversity of signification of the verbs, denies that God can always do whatever he could once do; he affirms, however, that God can always do what he could once, and can now have done whatever he could once do or have done. Again, yesterday God could have laid aside, or not had, that eternal willing by which he eternally willed A to be now, and have had a contrary eternal willing; and today he cannot do so. For now it is necessary that he eternally had that eternal willing, and therefore that he will eternally have it, since he is immutable intrinsically in every way, as 5 and 23 of the first teach. So God does not have as much freedom,

as much dominion over his own will, nor as much power within or without, today as yesterday; rather, as he grows old, so in these respects he diminishes and decays. That horribly mutilates and cuts short the omnipotent hand of God and his infinite power; or rather he strives in vain to do these things and cannot, since the Lord says through the Prophet: "Has my hand been shortened and made small?" Isaiah 50, and below 49: "Behold, the hand of the Lord has not been shortened." [n9] But let those who speak so beware, for his hand is still stretched out, above 5. Again, then God is not always supremely perfect, against the first supposition and the third part of the first corollary of the first. For it seems more perfect to have a will free toward the outside, as he once had, than one newly necessary, such as he now has with respect to present and past things; or, if this is more perfect, he was not supremely perfect before; but if he was equally perfect, he is changed intrinsically from one thing to another in vain, since according to the common saying of the Philosophers, whatever is done through more is done in vain if fewer suffice, especially if just as well; and yet according to the Philosopher, Ethics 1, 1, [n10] every act and choice seems to seek a good; and as the

philosophers, natural and metaphysical alike, [n11] show: every action is for the sake of an end, and every such end is a good, as 26 of the first alleges. But according to the Philosopher, On the Heavens and the World 1, 32, God and nature do nothing in vain. Hence also Ezekiel 6: "I the Lord have not spoken in vain." [n12] And if anyone says that God is thus changed not for his own good but for the good of the creature: how would the creature's good remain if God were to destroy the whole creation, never to create any, since then there would come to be and remain in him a necessity of willing that creatures had preceded and been annihilated? Nor is such a new necessity of God better for the creature than his ancient freedom. Again, in the divine will there is contingency to either alternative, without qualification, with respect to all present and past things. For, with everything naturally prior to that act of divine willing posited, it does not follow necessarily that it is produced, but this and that stand equally. For so it was while the things were future; and that act of divine willing is not now caused otherwise intrinsically than before, by reason of 5 and 23 of the first, nor otherwise extrinsically by anything, namely by something extrinsic acting as co-cause, by reason of the same,

and by reason of 20 of the first joined. The divine willing, then, with respect to present and past things, is without qualification contingent to either alternative, as is evident by 4 of this book and confirmed by the 11th truth of 5 of this book; hence also it is without qualification free according to contradiction, as is evident by the fifth truth of 5 of this book. Again, the divine will produces the act of willing present and past things freely according to contradiction, as it also did when they were future, as is evident by corollary 4 of this book with the deduction set out above; hence also in like manner contingently, as the fourth truth of the fifth of this book says. Again, contingency and freedom are said properly with respect to the present, as the seventh and eighth truths of the fifth of this book show; therefore God wills and does present things contingently and freely. Again, if God could not will, and could positively nill, that to be which he willed to be, and could will intrinsically in one way and then another, then, since [he would will] freely and necessarily through the successions and differences of times, it would be possible that yesterday he positively willed Peter to be saved, and willed him not to be saved but to be damned, and today wills him to be

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saved and not damned; and the same holds of God's nilling yesterday that A be, and willing today that it be. Therefore, by 10 of the first, yesterday Peter was not to be saved, and A was not future, and today Peter is to be saved, and A is future, against 18 of this book and against the reason of every man. Again, then God would will in one way and another according to temporal successions and differences, and would will temporally and successively, and not in eternity, or in the instant of eternity, immutably, indivisibly, and instantaneously, always all at once; or else there would be succession and some divisibility in eternity itself. Hence he would necessarily be mutable and not supremely self-sufficient: for he would need time in order to will. And this likewise is against all the authors who speak of eternity and of God's actions in it, as 1 of the first somewhat alleged. Again, then a new action could not proceed from the old will alone without a preceding intrinsic change in it. For he must will otherwise intrinsically when he produces the thing than before, as a man wills in one way that this will be, and in another that this be. For when

he produces the thing, he wills necessarily, and earlier he willed freely; but if he were to will in an entirely similar way intrinsically, then he would will then and earlier equally freely and equally necessarily, since an extrinsic thing does not necessitate God intrinsically to will. This, however, seems to be the error of Aristotle and Averroes, Physics 8, as the 34th part of the first corollary of the first showed more fully. Hence Stephen, bishop of Paris, justly condemned the article which wrongly says that from an ancient will nothing new can proceed without some preceding change. [n13] Nor can anyone say that that change and that necessity in the divine will follow naturally upon the production of the thing in being, and do not precede it, because this is more unfitting. For if that necessity were to follow necessarily and naturally the thing's potency in being, [n14] then the thing's potency in being is naturally prior to it and the cause of it, as 13 of the first has shown; therefore the extrinsic object necessitates the divine will to will, which is horrible and absurd. Moreover the extrinsic object is not a cause moving the divine will, as 20 of the first teaches, hence not a necessitating cause either. Now of these two necessities, one of which is in the produced thing,

and the other in the divine will, that in the divine will is the cause of the other; for this one is newly produced and is caused by that. Therefore it is prior to that in all respects, even in those in which God and creature agree; God is worthier and prior by nature, as the first supposition proves, which the Philosopher also teaches in Metaphysics 2, 4, and 7 of the same, 3, and Averroes in the same comments, as 2 of the first alleged more fully. This necessity, too, in the divine will is either the first necessity simply or nearest to it, as no one doubts; therefore it is prior, as the Philosopher says in Metaphysics 5, 16: [n15] "Things are called prior and posterior—some indeed—inasmuch as there exists in each genus something first and a principle, and that which is nearer the principle." Where also the text which Averroes expounds reads thus: "They are called before and after as the first being and principle in each genus, and what is nearer some determinate principle"; on which Averroes says: "Before is said universally of every determinate principle, and of everything nearer some determinate principle." It is also prior by nature that God will presentially, and in the mode of the present, that the thing be, than that it be. For this is the cause of that, therefore

it is prior by nature, as the Philosopher says in the Categories, in the chapter on the prior: [n16] of those things that are convertible according to the sequence of being, that which is in any way the cause of the other is rightly called prior by nature. And this willing presentially, in the mode of the present, in God, after he willed in the mode of the future, is a certain change in him, as follows from the hypothesis; therefore a change in God necessarily precedes the thing produced. Again, if God willed freely when the thing was future, and necessarily when it is present or has slipped into the past, there would be some cause why he wills necessarily then and not earlier, and it would be nothing but the presence or pastness of the thing made; therefore the thing made would necessitate God's will to will, which seems unseemly and unworthy for God. To this last argument, however, there are many responses. For some assign the cause on the side of the thing, others on the side of God, others on both sides together; and certain others say that nature is the cause of this. Among those who assign the cause on the side of the thing, some assign it on the side of the thing taken absolutely, some on the side of the thing taken relatively, or of a relation. The first say that the absolute thing itself, present or past, is the cause sought. But this is not true,

because by the twentieth of the first a posterior thing is not the cause of the divine will, nor does it cause anything there; therefore it does not necessitate it. Again, a past thing is nothing, therefore it causes nothing, therefore it does not necessitate the divine will either. Again, a future thing has as much being as a past thing, or more, because what has potential and past being does not have it in this way; [n17] therefore it necessitates as much or more. Again, if it were so, it would be because it is necessary that a present or past thing be or have been; therefore it is necessary that God will it to be or to have been; therefore, of these two necessities, one of which is in the thing, by which it is necessary that it be or have been, and the other in God, by which it is necessary that he so will, the necessity in the thing made would be naturally prior, because it is the cause of the other, which was rejected above. Again, God can will necessarily, but not future things (for these can always fail to be), only present and past things, because these cannot fail to be or to have been; therefore God can will

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in some way intrinsically, namely necessarily, and only on the presupposition of the aid of a thing outside, namely of time or a temporal thing, so that he seems miserably needy and not supremely sufficient to himself, against what was shown in 15 of the first. Hence also Augustine, On Genesis according to the letter 6, 19, "Did the maker of time need the help of time?" [n18] as if to say, in no way. And he wishes the same expressly in City of God 11, 30, which seems especially true of the intrinsic operations of his own will. Again, it seems more orderly and more fitting that the posterior and the effect draw necessity from its prior and cause than the reverse; and by 30 of the second the divine will is the first cause of all posterior effects. Again, supposing, according to this response, that the willed object moves the divine will, even so it does not do this immediately and per se by its real extrinsic being, but by its intrinsic knowable being, namely through its eternal likeness or idea, just as it moves a created will only through its likeness or species caused in cognition. But that likeness or idea in the divine mind is always equally clear, equally actual, and

equal in all respects throughout; therefore it always moves the divine will equally; therefore if it ever necessitates it, so always; and if it never necessitates it, never at all. Again, then a spider with its weakest thread could bind God inextricably, and so hold him through the ages as if in prison and in fetters. For if it should spin and bind anything, it is necessary that God then so will, and afterward through everlasting ages. Again, then any creature would seem stronger than the Creator. Again, by 3 of the second a willable object [n19] cannot necessitate a created will, which is infinitely weaker than the divine, therefore not the divine will either; or, if an object can necessitate the divine will and cannot the created, the divine will is weaker than the created. Again, let A be something not existing now, at instant B, nor earlier, which God could nevertheless have made now and earlier; now then, according to what was shown earlier, it is necessary that God actively nill that A be in B, and have been before B, and have been future so as to be in B or earlier, and so to have eternally nilled before and after, and to be going to nill. Or, to proceed more easily for the slower: let it be posited that God actively nills that A be at B, the present instant, which he could nevertheless have made

in B; then it is necessary that he so nill. The cause of this necessity cannot be assigned on the side of the thing nilled, since it does not exist, and hence does not cause. Again, the same case being retained, it is impossible that God will A to be in B, or to have been before B, or to have been future so as to be in B or earlier, and yet he could always before will these things. What, then, is the cause thus newly making the divine will impossible? Not that thing, a non-being, since it causes nothing at all, nor can it make a created will impossible. Again, it seems absurd, and execrable to everyone's ears, that some weak thing, and (what seems more unworthy) some pure privation of a thing, should force the Omnipotent into so great an impotence that he cannot now or ever in the future produce or have an intrinsic act of will which he could always before; nor now or ever will what he earlier could always will. For now he can neither produce nor intrinsically have such an act, even in the future. "I will that this day was never future, present, or past": now too, at no future times can he produce or have such an intrinsic act of will.

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I will that A was going to be in B, or before; I will that A be in B; I will that A was before B, and could always before produce and have such acts, not temporally but eternally, and so will eternally and not temporally. What, then, has irreparably stripped so great a power from the Omnipotent? What has so indissolubly bound what is insuperable? What has incurably mutilated his so great intrinsic dominion over his own will? What has inalienably subjected the highest freedom to the lowest servitude of such necessity and impossibility? Let no one even lightly think that some creature does this, or some privation of a creature. Of those who assign the cause of the aforesaid necessity on the side of the relation, some posit it as positive and some as privative. The first say that from the presence or pastness of the thing there arises a relation, real or of reason, which is the cause of this necessity in the divine will. But the arguments that hold against the former response can be brought back against this one. That relation, too, is either something or nothing. If nothing, it causes nothing and necessitates nothing; if something, it arises from an absolute thing, present or past; therefore that thing itself originally necessitates God in this way.

For whatever is the cause of a cause is the cause of the thing caused; so the first response comes back. Again, if that relation is something, God can destroy it. Otherwise God and a creature alike would be more powerful in making something than God himself in destroying the same thing, which does not seem so, since he is omnipotent for anything whatever; and once the relation is destroyed, this response is destroyed too. Again, there is no real relation of the past to the divine will, because there is no real extreme in which it could be founded, since the past has already passed over into not-being. Nor can it be founded in the divine will, because then it would rather be called a relation of the divine will to the past than the converse. And then a new real relation would attach to God, befall him, and inhere in him, so that he would be mutable, against the twenty-fifth and twenty-third of the first.

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Hence Augustine also, in On the Trinity 5, chapters 4 and 5, [n20] shows that not everything said of God is said of him according to substance, because some things are said of him according to relation, as is clear in the divine persons; yet nothing is said of him according to accident, because nothing is said of him mutably. Hence in chapter 4 he speaks thus: "Therefore nothing is accidental in God, because nothing in him is mutable or losable; nothing is said of him according to accident, because nothing befalls him; yet not everything that is said of him is said according to substance. But in created and mutable things, whatever is not said according to substance must needs be said according to accident. For all things befall those that can be either lost or diminished." And in chapter 5 it follows: "In God, however, nothing is said according to accident, because nothing in him is mutable or losable; yet not everything that God is called is said according to substance. For he is spoken of in relation to something, as father to son and son to father, and this is not an accident; because the one is always father and the other always son, and so always, since the son has always been born and never began to be son. If he had at some time begun to be son, or at some time were to cease to be son, it would be said according to accident. And because the father is not called father except from the fact that he has a son, and the son is not called son except from the fact that he has a father, these are not said according to substance; they are said with respect to each other, nor merely according to accident, because both what is called father and what is called son is eternal and unchangeable for them." And further on, in the last chapter of the same book, he raises the question about the temporal relations between God and creatures, by which they are referred to each other temporally: how are these not accidents, since nothing befalls God temporally, because he is not mutable? And he answers that this is so, not because anything befalls the substance of God temporally, but because it befalls the creature to which he is spoken of relatively. So he concludes in the end that when God begins to be called temporally what was not said of him before, it is clear that this is said relatively, not by an accident of God, as though something had befallen him, but plainly by an accident of that in relation to which God begins to be called something; it is that which is changed. [n21] But far be it that God love anyone temporally, as with a new love that was not in him before, with him with whom neither have past things passed away, nor are future things yet to be made, for they have already been made.

[750B–750D]
And by all this he hints at the third mode of those things that are said in relation to something, as the measurable to the measure, the knowable or known to knowledge, and the sensible or sensed to sense, as the Philosopher teaches in Metaphysics 5, 20. [n22] These are said relatively, to use the words of Averroes, not because the relation is in the substance of both relata, but in the substance of the one only, and in the other on account of another, that is, of the other: for example, the known or sensed is referred to knowledge or sensation only on account of the relation of the other relative to it. For since whatever is newly known or sensed, nothing new is caused in it, but only in the one sensing or knowing, and only through that is it referred to them: therefore there is no new real relation between God and the past that would necessitate him to will. Nor is there any new relation of reason either, because it is not in God, since he is altogether similarly disposed intrinsically at all times (otherwise he would be mutable, as the preceding showed); nor in present things (suppose, indeed, that God annihilates the whole universe); nor in past things, since they are altogether nothing, nor is any of those relations at all in them.

[750D–750E]
Again, the relation of the future to the divine will is as great as that of the past; therefore it necessitates just as much. Again, a relation, as Averroes says on Metaphysics 12, comment 20, is of weaker being than the other categories; but the other, absolute categories do not necessitate the divine will, as is clear against the earlier response. Again, if God is then necessitated to will that relation, he is necessitated either by the relation itself or by another. If by itself, then by the same reasoning he could be necessitated to will the absolute itself by that absolute, especially since the absolute is better and more willable [n23] and more apt to move the will. If by another, there will be a process necessarily without end. But those who posit a privative cause on the side of the relation say that God cannot will, of anything present, that it not be, nor of anything past, that it not have been, because this is not willable. But they do not rightly touch the cause sought. For what was first sought was the cause why it is necessary that God will this to be, or to have been, not why he cannot will the contrary. For although God could not will the contrary, yet, as it seems, according to that response he could fail to have this willing, just as a man can not will this to be even though he does not will this not to be.

Again, no created or extrinsic relation necessitates God to will, as was shown against the next response; therefore neither does the privation of any such relation necessitate him to not-willing, since such a privation is not more powerful over the divine will than the possession. Again, the cause why this's not-being is not for now willable is that this now is; wherefore for now it is also necessary that this be. For this affirmative is prior to that negative and the cause of it, since some affirmation must necessarily be, as the thirteenth of the first teaches. Therefore the existence of this thing is the original cause of the impossibility of God's willing this now not to be, and of the necessity of his not willing so. Hence an external thing is the cause of impossibility and necessity in the divine will, as the first response said.

[750E–751B]
Again, by the same reasoning it is necessary that God now will this to be, because this not-being cannot now be willable [n24] — and this is because {751A} it is now necessary that this being be willable, and this because it is necessary that this be, and this because this is. For this being is the original and primary antecedent, from which, a priori and causally, all these follow, as was deduced in the similar case just before; hence, etc., as there. Again, to argue more clearly: this response must say, as a consequence, that God therefore necessarily wills this to be because that being is necessarily willable, and the original cause of that is this's now being; therefore this's now being necessitates God to will, because whatever is the cause of a cause is the cause of the thing caused; and so the first response comes back. Again, then every existing thing necessitates God to will, and every active thing that can produce another can necessitate and make impossible the divine will, as the first response said. Again, a pure and sole privation is never the cause of anything positive, and so of no necessary act in the divine will. Again, this's now not being is willable by man, and at one time was willable by God, because it is not simply and per se non-willable or unwillable by him; and now it is not willable by God, but non-willable or unwillable. Therefore there is some cause of this change, {751B} and of this negation and privation there is some prior affirmation and potency and cause, as the thirteenth of the first teaches. And that cannot be posited except as this absolute thing now existing, or something respective in it; and so the first or second response returns.

[751B–751C]
But those who assign the cause of the aforesaid necessity on the side of God alone, and as intrinsic to God himself, differ in four ways. The first say that this comes from the divine nature: for God, as they say, is of such a nature that, with a thing present or past, he necessarily wills it to be or to have been. But if this is only purely naturally and intrinsically in God, then, since for an agent purely naturally disposed always alike, and a patient likewise disposed always alike, the action is always alike, because no cause of dissimilarity can be given (as the Philosopher also teaches in Metaphysics 9, 10), and since all purely natural things intrinsic to God are always similarly disposed, because by the fifth of the first he is immutable in nature, he is always equally necessitated to will. This argument is confirmed by the fact that, according to the Philosopher in On Generation and Corruption 2, penultimate chapter, what is the same and similarly disposed is always naturally apt to do the same; and {751C} Metaphysics 5, 2 shows that the same thing is the cause of contraries, but through different dispositions; but the divine nature is always similarly disposed. Nor can anyone say that the nature of God is intrinsically disposed otherwise when the thing is present or past than when it is future, because then he would be mutable, and because then this would come from the presence or pastness of the thing; so that thing would be the cause of necessity in the divine will, which was destroyed earlier.

[751C–751D]
The second group posit that this comes from the divine truth, which, just as the thing present and past is necessarily as it is, so necessarily demands that God always will conformably. But this response can be refuted like the former, because the divine truth, taken naturally and purely, is always altogether similarly disposed intrinsically. Again, according to this response the cause of this is the necessary truth on the side of the present or past thing, and the original cause of that truth is the existence of such a thing; therefore that existence too is the original cause of necessity in the divine will, which was rejected above. Again, God's intrinsic truth with respect to the future is as great, and is intrinsically altogether as similarly disposed, as it is with respect to the past or present; so that {751D} it is as necessary and as firm. For it could not be otherwise disposed intrinsically except on account of the existence or pastness of an extrinsic thing, which it cannot be, since it in no way depends on that thing or is caused by it, this being a lower truth and that a higher; this caused, that uncaused; this posterior, that prior, as the eleventh and twelfth of the first teach.

The third group believe that this comes from the side of the divine will, namely because he wills himself to be necessitated to will that a present thing is and a past thing has been. But if, when a thing has come and passed, he wills himself to be necessitated to will so, he wills this either necessarily or freely with respect to contradiction. [n25] If necessarily, whence comes that necessity for him? And the former difficulty returns, since an infinite regress in such volitions is not to be granted. If freely with respect to contradiction, he can not will so; and if that is posited, he is not necessitated, as this hypothesis says. Again, let A be the will by which God now wills freely with respect to contradiction that this be, and B the will by which he wills himself to be necessitated to A. Then B is either a will now new, or old and eternal. It is not now new, as the twenty-third of the first shows.

[751E]
If it is eternal, then either that eternal [willing] was eternally free beforehand in respect of contradiction,[n26] or it was necessary. If free, whence then is it now necessary? And the difficulty returns. If it was eternally necessary, then from it there would always have followed necessarily that A would now be, and from A that this would be. Hence, as was shown before, it was eternally necessary that A would now be and that this thing would now be, and so of any future thing whatever, the opposite of which the hypothesis supposed. Again, suppose that of these two willings of God, one of which wills the thing to be or to have been and the other wills that he himself be necessitated to such willing, he had only the first. He would still necessarily will the thing to be or to have been, just as the thing would necessarily be or have been. For suppose he had this willing alone, "I will that this be or have been": he would necessarily will thus. Again, God's will alone, by which he wills the thing to be future at A, a future instant, suffices to produce it in being at A, as the tenth of the first and its corollary teach, and because otherwise he would not be omnipotent. If this is granted, the response is overthrown.

[752A–752C]
[n27] Again, by the same reasoning he could likewise necessitate himself to will all future things and to produce all things. "Who, then, has known the mind of the Lord, or who has been his counsellor,"[n28] so that he would dare to say that he did not act so? Again, by the same reasoning he could likewise necessitate himself not to act, and make himself unable to do whatever he is not going to do. And so he could render the omnipotent so impotent that he could not lift a straw, namely by willing that he be necessitated to will never to lift a straw, or that he be made unable to will to lift a straw. Again, since God cannot be necessitated to will future things, though he can be to present ones, and since no cause intrinsic to God can be given, on account of his utter immutability, some extrinsic cause will have to be given, and none except a thing outside, as the first response said. Again, a present or past thing is necessarily presupposed to this necessity in the divine will; therefore it is some cause of that necessity, as had been shown in the fourth of the first, and so the first response comes back. The fourth group, moreover, affirm that this arises on the part of the mode of willing in God. For they say that he wills the future as if futurely, namely by such an act as "I will that this be future"; but the present and the past as if presently and pastly, that is, by such acts as "I will that this be," "I will that this have been." Of these modes, as they say, the first makes freedom in respect of contradiction, the others necessity on one side only. But this is not true, because he wills in wholly the same way, and not otherwise, intrinsically, first that this will be, second that this is, and third that this has been; otherwise he would be changed intrinsically, contrary to the fifth, the twenty-third and the twenty-fifth of the first. Again, if God willed past, present and future things differently, intrinsically, he would know them differently, intrinsically,[n29] contrary to what was shown before in the twenty-third and twenty-fourth of the first. Again, even if those modes of willing were different, no intrinsic cause could be assigned why one would be free and not another, since cognition, volitive power and all the intrinsic requisites are equally potent, equally efficacious, and in all respects equally firm with respect to the one as with respect to the other; nor can an extrinsic cause be assigned, because then the first response or the second would return. Again, God wills presently that this wayfarer is predestined, and pastly that he was predestined; therefore he wills by these modes necessarily; therefore this wayfarer is necessarily predestined, and so is necessarily to be saved, since both of these follow necessarily from a necessary antecedent. And likewise it can be argued of any future thing whatever that it will necessarily come, since of any such thing God both presently wills and pastly willed that such propositions are true and were true: "this will be" is true; "this will be" was true. Hence he necessarily wills and willed in these modes, whence it follows necessarily that this will be. And it is the same if A is posited as the willing by which God wills that this will be, and B as the willing by which he wills that A be or have been: then B is necessary, etc., as before. Hence others, perceiving that the cause of the aforesaid necessity cannot be sufficiently assigned on the part of the thing alone, nor of God alone, assign it as arising from both jointly.

[752C–752E]
But with the foregoing standing, this cannot stand, since every effect caused by two causes is caused either partly by the one and partly by the other, or by each as to the whole of it. Thus an act of the created will is wholly effected by the created will and wholly, likewise, by the uncreated, as the twentieth corollary of the second showed. But the aforesaid necessity is not caused in parts by these causes, because no partition can be assigned there. Nor can anyone imagine that a partition by likeness and in imagination, according to intension and remission, is to be posited there. For let A be that necessity, B its primary part, caused by God, and C the remaining part, caused by a second cause. Then either A is of infinite intension or only of finite. If infinite, then so are both B and C; for if one of them is not infinite but only finite, let that be C, as seems more likely, then B is simply infinite. Otherwise A would not be composed of it and C as simply infinite, because a finite joined to a finite makes only a finite, as can be demonstrated mathematically. It was also shown in the first of the first that no form can be simply infinite in intensity. Nor can it be conceded that B, a part of the aforesaid necessity A, is simply infinite, because it is of necessity finished off in its joining with C. For there is some degree of the necessity there, which is the common end and boundary of both, as there would also be some point in the continuation of two such lines. And because B is a part of A, B is also less than A. But no simply infinite is less or greater than another simply infinite, as the Philosopher attests in many places. If it is said, in the first place, that A is not simply infinite but only in a certain respect, this can be refuted by the same argument, since if both B and C are finite in every respect, then so is A, composed of them, as was argued above.

[752E–753B]
Hence perhaps it will be granted that A is simply and in every respect finite. But then A could be increased and be greater and better, since A is a good in God, because by the third part of the first corollary of the first, nothing else is in him. Therefore not every good in God is in him the best possible, nor supreme, contrary to the fourth part of the aforesaid corollary. Hence neither would God always necessarily remain the best, contrary to the sixth part of the corollary mentioned. Anselm also, Monologion 16: "It is plain," he says, "that whatever good the supreme nature is, it is that supremely. It is therefore the supreme essence, supreme life, supreme reason, supreme salvation, supreme justice, supreme wisdom, supreme truth, supreme goodness, supreme greatness, supreme beauty, supreme eternity, supreme immutability," and therefore also the supreme necessity aforesaid. Again, if God newly caused such a necessity in his will, even if only in parts, he would be mutable, as was shown above. Again, things subsequently willed are not the total cause, nor even a partial cause, of the divine will, as the twenty-first of the first teaches, nor do they act upon it at all, so they do not necessitate it in any way. It was also shown, against the earlier responses, that things outside are not the cause of this necessity, and so not even a partially effective cause. Nor can anyone say that God and things outside both cause this necessity, each as to the whole of it, because both have been rejected above, against the responses set out earlier. Again, God is disposed wholly in the same way, and in no way otherwise, so far as concerns himself intrinsically, now, with this thing existing, as before, as was shown above; therefore that new necessity in the divine will is wholly caused by a thing outside. Again, with every new causation removed on God's part, intrinsically, and with only the present thing posited, that necessity is posited, as the foregoing makes plain; therefore the positing of the thing alone is the sufficient cause of this necessity. Again, as to the claim that God, jointly with the present external thing, causes this necessity: either he does so freely in respect of contradiction, or necessarily. If freely, he can fail to cause it so while the present thing stands, and then either there will be no such new necessity, which is contrary to the first hypothesis, or, if there will be, it will be caused by the thing alone, which this response denies. If necessarily, whence does he have that necessity? etc., as against the sixth response set out above.

[753B–753E]
Again, as to God's causing a necessity of this kind jointly with the present thing: this is either purely naturally or voluntarily. If naturally, this will be rejected, as in the fourth response earlier. If voluntarily, let it be, then, that this is through a willing A, or intrinsic act of the will. Then either A is a new willing or an eternal one, etc., as against the sixth response in a similar argument. Again, if it were so, this would seem to happen above all because God causes the present thing, and that thing in turn causes this necessity in the divine will. Then the present thing, as an instrumental, intermediate and secondary cause, would cause the whole of this necessity, which has been destroyed above. Again, a past thing is nothing, and so causes nothing, and does not necessitate either separately or jointly. Also, a thing which now is not and never was, but could now be and have been before, is nothing and was nothing; therefore it causes nothing, separately or jointly, and hence does not in this way necessitate or disable the divine will, etc. These points are argued similarly against the first response. Others, however, seeing that no cause of such a necessity can reasonably be given, say that it has no cause, and so no cause of it is to be sought or assigned; and they confirm this by examples: God, they say, once created the world, but why then? God also is newly Creator and Lord of this thing, but why? What made him so? As if to say, no cause. But this cannot be said philosophically, nor logically, nor theologically; for every change has a cause, as all philosophy attests. Otherwise, with like levity, it could be said that no motion, no action or passion, and universally that no change, has any cause. But here there is a change, for passage from one of two contradictories to the other cannot occur without change; yet God was previously willing this freely and not necessarily, whereas now he is willing this not freely but necessarily. That passage from one of two contradictories to the other necessarily requires change, logic teaches clearly. For let A be "God is not necessarily willing this," B "God is necessarily willing this," and C "this instant," and let us take that very common logical dictum, "by the fact that the thing is or is not, the statement is true or false."[n30] Then if in C the condition of the thing signified by A and B is in every way wholly similar to what it was, and conversely, and A was true before C and B false, then A is also true in C and B false; or if A is false in C and B true, then likewise before. Hence this response makes contradictories simultaneously true, and also simultaneously false, and the same proposition simultaneously true and false. Again, B was previously false and is now true; therefore there is some cause of this, and it is necessarily so, because previously it was not so in reality, and now it is so. Therefore the situation on the part of the thing is otherwise now than before; therefore through some change, therefore through something changing, therefore also through a cause. It can likewise be argued to the same effect following the procedure of the Philosopher in Metaphysics 4, against those who deny first principles in disputation, by supposing that names have determinate and certain significations. For as long as the signification, or the thing signified, of any name remains whole, the name likewise remains, and conversely. They come and go together; therefore there is never acquisition or loss of any name without acquisition or loss of some signification, or thing signified, of it, and so not without some change of some kind. Again, their examples savor of neither philosophical nor theological truth.

[753E–754C]
Speaking philosophically, a rational agent acts outwardly at a certain time because he then wills. Hence the Philosopher, Metaphysics 9, 10, says that productive powers joined with reason are powers of contraries, and objects: "Therefore they will do contraries at once, but this is impossible." And he replies, implying that the inference does not hold, because something else is required to determine the power to one side, namely the will; and when the power is determined by it, then it does the one thing and not both. That determining will, therefore, is the cause why it then does this. Whence he answers thus: "Something else must be that which is decisive; I mean appetite or choice (prohairesis).[n31] For whatever it principally desires, that it will do, when it is in the condition to be able. Hence whatever is able according to reason must necessarily, when it desires that of which it has the power, and as it has it, do this." Now God, with reason and reasonably, made the world when he eternally willed to make it; therefore, because he then willed, he then also made it, which is also plain more fully from the ninth of the first. Whence also Apocalypse 4: "You created all things, and because of your will they were, and were created." And Augustine, On Genesis against the Manichees 1: "The will of God is itself the cause of all things that are. Whoever, then, asks why God made heaven and earth must be answered: because he willed. For the will of God is the cause of heaven and earth." Again, by the same reasoning they must say, consistently, of anything whatever created or made by God at any time whatever, that there is no cause why it is then made or created. And this seems to destroy the efficient and final cause in God, or to posit that he acts by chance and fortuitously at every time and instant. But the efficient cause in God the foregoing shows, and also John 1: "All things were made through him," together with the third, fourth and ninth of the first. And the final cause in God is proved by the many philosophical and theological authorities written down in the twenty-fifth of the first. Whence Proverbs 16: "The Lord has made all things for himself." And Apocalypse 1: "I am Alpha and Omega, the beginning and the end." That God does not act by chance or fortuitously, at any time or instant whatever, the eighth and ninth of the first, with the twenty-seventh, twenty-eighth and twenty-ninth, teach. Whence also Ecclesiastes 3: "All things have their time." But from whom, if not from him who arranges all things in measure, number and weight? Hence also Augustine, City of God 22, 2, says: "Before the time comes at which he willed that it should be done, what he foreknew and arranged before all ages, we say, 'It will be done when God wills.'" And if they still object that there is no cause of that will, and therefore none of the aforesaid necessity, this should move no one, because that willing of God is eternal, whereas that necessity is new, and so has some cause. That God is newly Creator and Lord also has a cause, a formal cause, I say, and likewise an efficient one. For God is said to be newly Lord of this thing relatively, and not by a new relation newly befalling God himself, but only the creature, as was shown above against the second response. That relation, then, arising from the creature, which is necessarily subject to the divine lordship, is the extrinsic and improper formal cause by which God is formally said to be Lord of this thing. This relation also has an efficient cause, namely that which produces this thing, from which that relation necessarily springs and emanates.

[754D–754E]
So when they ask who made God Lord of this thing, I say: he who made this thing. For he in a way makes that relation by which God is called Lord of this thing, just as the one who gives John this thing makes him lord of this thing, and one who sees or understands John makes John seen and newly understood. God, therefore, makes himself Lord of this thing by making this thing, from which the aforesaid relation necessarily arises, just as John himself makes himself lord of this thing by making this thing his own. Canonical Scripture often brings forward quite authentic examples of this. Whence Psalm 9: "The Lord has become a refuge for the poor"; 17: "The Lord has become my protector"; 29: "The Lord has become my helper"; 89: "Lord, you have become a refuge for us";[n32] and 117: "He has become my salvation," with many similar passages in many places. That God is newly said to be so in relation to a creature,[n33] therefore, is on account of a new cause and a new change on the part of the creature, as in anything whatever that is newly said relatively. For this is either on account of a new change in that which is thus newly spoken of, or in that to which it is newly so spoken of, as appears in relatives of the third mode, as can be had from the Philosopher, Metaphysics 5, 20, and from Averroes there, as was alleged above; and Physics 5, 10 holds that where there is a new relation there is change and motion, at least in one of the relata.[n34] Averroes gives an example there of a column which is first on Socrates' right and afterward turns to his left, by Socrates' being moved in place. Boethius, On the Trinity, last chapter, teaches the same view plainly.

[754E–755B]
So also Augustine, On the Trinity 5, last chapter, shows that when God begins to be spoken of in time relatively to a creature, this happens through a change in the creature, not in God. Whence he says: "From that immutable[n35] substance of God we must grasp that something is said relatively with respect to the creature, so that although it begins to be said in time, nothing is understood to have happened to the substance of God itself, but to that creature to which it is said. 'Lord,' he says, 'you have become a refuge for us.' God, then, is called our refuge relatively. For he is referred to us, and then becomes our refuge when we flee to him. Does anything then come to be in his nature which was not there before we fled to him? In us, then, some change comes about. So too he begins to be our Father when we are reborn through his grace; our substance is thus changed for the better when we are made his sons, and at the same time he begins to be our Father, but without any change of his substance. So when God begins to be called in time what he was not called before, it is manifest that he is called so relatively; not, however, that this is said according to an accident, as if something had happened to him, but plainly according to an accident of that [creature] in relation to which God begins to be called something: it is that which is changed."[n36] The examples of these people, therefore, do not contain the truth, nor do they fit what they are meant to exemplify. For those examples concern relations arising from the creature and extrinsic to God himself. But the aforesaid necessity in the divine will is caused by no creature, as was shown above, which this response too confesses, and it is intrinsic to God himself. These things, therefore, by the method of the freedom and necessity of the divine will, against the principal hypothesis.

NOTES

1. Savile's italic argument gives eam no antecedent. From the opening sentence of the chapter it is evidently the response of 26 and the hypothesis on which it rests. I keep the pronoun as written.
2. Bradwardine's cross-references are kept as written (Conv. §5.4): huius is this book (Book 3); primi, 1mi, secundi, 2di name Books 1 and 2. The numerals are chapters, corollaries, or parts of them, as in "the 34th part of the first corollary of the first". Hence "10 of the first", "30 of the second", and "5 of this book". I do not expand them.
3. Pro nunc is the scholastic idiom "as regards the present instant". I render nunc et pro nunc as "now and as of now" and use "as of now" for the bare pro nunc throughout.
4. The print's main text, set off by ‖, reads noluit ("did not will"), not the keyed voluit. Savile's margin gives voluit. Noluit cannot be construed here. The proposition is the second of the seven: what "always was future" can "never have been future". It is paired with a God who always willed something and can never have willed it, and the proof that follows ("he never willed that A will be") presupposes this. Following the Conventions (§2), I adopt the variant voluit and record it here. The keyed text has voluit in the text and again in the margin.
5. Nolle is "to nill": a positive act of will against something, opposed to velle ("to will"), not mere absence of willing. Bradwardine uses nolutio for the act and volutio for its contrary, "positive willing". I use the old English "nill" and "nilling" to keep the symmetry.
6. Aristotle, De interpretatione 9 (19a23–27), the last chapter of the first book in Savile's division: "What is, necessarily is when it is; and what is not, necessarily is not when it is not."
7. The Latin is elliptical: heri potuit velle et facere de A. quod non fuit heri, et quod nunquam fuit futurum, aut esset heri. quod ipsum esset aut fuisset heri… I take aut esset heri as introducing the opposite alternative, "or [that it] would be yesterday". The clauses after it spell that alternative out. The keyed text has a full stop after heri.
8. Peter Lombard, Sentences I, d. 44 (as Bradwardine cites it). The words Fateamur … potuit are given as Lombard's own. I have not collated the quotation.
9. Isaiah 50:2 ("Has my hand been shortened and made small, that I cannot redeem?"). The second text is Isaiah 59:1; the print's "49" is evidently an error for 59, and I leave the print's number. Supra 5 is Isaiah 5:25, "and his hand is still stretched out", a warning of judgment.
10. Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics I.1 (1094a1–2): "every art and every inquiry, and likewise every action and choice, seems to aim at some good." The keyed text omits bonum; the print has it (see Errata).
11. Print: sicut Philos. tam natural. quam metaphysical. ostendunt. The plural verb shows that Philos. abbreviates Philosophi, with naturales … metaphysici. I take the phrase as "the philosophers, natural and metaphysical alike". If it were singular ("the Philosopher"), the plural ostendunt would be unexplained.
12. De caelo I.4 (271a33): "God and nature do nothing in vain." Savile's "32" is not a chapter number; it is presumably a text number in the Latin Aristotle–Averroes edition. The second text is Ezekiel 6:10, "I the Lord have not spoken in vain."
13. Stephen Tempier, bishop of Paris, in the condemnation of 1277. I have not checked the article's number.
14. Potentia rei in esse: I read "the thing's potency in being" (its power or possibility of existing), but the phrase is compressed and the construal is not certain.
15. Aristotle, Metaphysics Δ (Latin book 5), ch. 11 (1018b9–14). Savile's "16" I leave as given; it is presumably the number of the text in the Latin Aristotle with Averroes.
16. Aristotle, Categories 12 (14b10–13), the chapter "On the prior". The words are not quoted verbatim.
17. quia esse potentiale et praeteritum non sic habet: the subject of habet is not stated. I take it as "what has merely potential and past being does not have being in the way a future thing does."
18. Savile's citations "6. super Gen. ad literam 19" and "11. de civit. Dei 30" are De Genesi ad litteram VI.19 and De civitate Dei XI.30. I have not traced the quoted words in either place.
19. obiectum volubile: volubile ordinarily means "rolling, changeable". Here it is evidently "that can be willed", an object of volition, to match volutum ("willed") above. I translate by sense.
20. Augustine, De Trinitate V.4.5 and V.5.6 (Bradwardine's "chapters 4 and 5"). The later passage, "in the last chapter of the same book," is V.16.17. Bradwardine abridges slightly.
21. ipse mutatur. I take ipse to refer to the creature (ad quod), the thing to which God begins to be called something. This is the sense of the argument, since the point is that the change falls on the creature and not on God. Savile's punctuation runs it on with the following Deus autem absit….
22. Savile cites Aristotle's Metaphysics by book and text number: "5, 20" is Δ (book V) 15, on the three modes of relation, and the other Aristotle citations in this chapter use the same scheme. They are kept as Savile gives them (Conventions §5.4).
23. volubile (and non volubile, involubile) is the object that can be willed. I use "willable" throughout, and "non-willable / unwillable" for the negatives, as the argument turns on this word.
24. Print: quia hoc non esse, non potest nunc non esse volubile, which read literally contains a doubled negation (this not-being cannot now not be willable) and would say the opposite of what the argument needs. The sense required by the context ("this's not-being is not for now willable," above, and "it is now necessary that this being be willable," 751A) is that this not-being cannot now be willable. I translate that sense and leave the Latin unemended.
25. libere secundum contradictionem: freely in the sense of being able to will either of two contradictory alternatives (to will that p or to will that not-p). I keep "with respect to contradiction" as a term.
26. Libere secundum contradictionem: free in the sense of being able to will either of two contradictory alternatives (to will p or not to will p). I render it throughout as "free in respect of contradiction". It is the standard scholastic opposition to "necessarily".
27. The Latin unit 751E ends with "Item", whose sentence runs on into 752A. To honor the rule that blocks break at sentence ends, I have moved "Again," to the head of the following block, together with the rest of its sentence.
28. Rom 11:34 (also Isa 40:13), in Vulgate wording: Quis enim cognovit sensum Domini? aut quis consiliarius eius fuit?
29. The margin offers forent for sciret, i.e. "they would be differently, intrinsically". I keep the main reading, which construes and fits the cross-reference to the first book (the chapters on God's knowledge). The variant is not adopted.
30. Cf. Aristotle, Categories 12, 14b14–22 (a statement is true or false by the fact that the thing is or is not). Bradwardine calls it "that very common logical dictum".
31. Aristotle, Metaphysics Θ.5, 1048a10–11 (Savile's "9, 10"), in the Latin version, which transliterates prohairesis (choice, deliberate decision). The Latin has prohaeresin; I give the Greek term in transliteration.
32. Savile's psalm numbers are Vulgate: Ps 9:10 [English 9:9]; Ps 17:19 [18:18]; Ps 29:11 [30:10]; Ps 89:1 [90:1]; Ps 117:14 [118:14].
33. The margin has an asterisk in the text and the single word Deus in the outer column. It is a variant or insertion at this place whose purpose is not clear. The main text construes without it, and the variant is not adopted.
34. Savile's references follow the divisions of the Latin Aristotle he used: Metaph. 5, 20 corresponds to Δ.15 (relatives, third mode: those not reciprocally dependent), and Phys. 5, 10 to the discussion of change and relation in Physics V. "Holds" (vult) has no stated subject. The context suggests Averroes's commentary, since the column example belongs to him. I have not verified the exact passages.
35. Both the keyed Latin and the 1618 print read commutabili ("changeable"), a misprint for Augustine's incommutabili (De Trin. 5.17). The argument requires "immutable", so I translate that.
36. Augustine's text is quoted with the stop missing after "substance" in the print and with ipse mutatur ("it itself is changed") clipped. I take ipse as the creature (the thing to which the accident belongs), consistently with the sentence just before. Augustine's own wording is looser.