Whether an Angel Is in a Place?
Objection 1: It would seem that an angel is not in a place. For
Boethius says (De Hebdom.): "The common opinion of the learned is
that things incorporeal are not in a place." And again, Aristotle
observes (Phys. iv, text 48,57) that "it is not everything existing
which is in a place, but only a movable body." But an angel is not
a body, as was shown above (Q. 50). Therefore an angel is not in a
place.
Obj. 2: Further, place is a "quantity having position." But
everything which is in a place has some position. Now to have a
position cannot befit an angel, since his substance is devoid of
quantity, the proper difference of which is to have a position.
Therefore an angel is not in a place.
Obj. 3: Further, to be in a place is to be measured and to be
contained by such place, as is evident from the Philosopher (Phys.
iv, text 14,119). But an angel can neither be measured nor contained
by a place, because the container is more formal than the contained;
as air with regard to water (Phys. iv, text 35,49). Therefore an
angel is not in a place.
_On the contrary,_ It is said in the Collect [*Prayer at Compline,
Dominican Breviary]: "Let Thy holy angels who dwell herein, keep us
in peace."
_I answer that,_ It is befitting an angel to be in a place; yet an angel
and a body are said to be in a place in quite a different sense. A
body is said to be in a place in such a way that it is applied to such
place according to the contact of dimensive quantity; but there is no
such quantity in the angels, for theirs is a virtual one. Consequently
an angel is said to be in a corporeal place by application of the
angelic power in any manner whatever to any place.
Accordingly there is no need for saying that an angel can be deemed
commensurate with a place, or that he occupies a space in the
continuous; for this is proper to a located body which is endowed with
dimensive quantity. In similar fashion it is not necessary on this
account for the angel to be contained by a place; because an
incorporeal substance virtually contains the thing with which it comes
into contact, and is not contained by it: for the soul is in the body
as containing it, not as contained by it. In the same way an angel is
said to be in a place which is corporeal, not as the thing contained,
but as somehow containing it.
And hereby we have the answers to the objections.
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