Whether Angels Know Secret Thoughts?
Objection 1: It would seem that the angels know secret thoughts. For
Gregory (Moral. xviii), explaining Job 28:17: "Gold or crystal cannot
equal it," says that "then," namely in the bliss of those rising from
the dead, "one shall be as evident to another as he is to himself, and
when once the mind of each is seen, his conscience will at the same
time be penetrated." But those who rise shall be like the angels, as
is stated (Matt. 22:30). Therefore an angel can see what is in
another's conscience.
Obj. 2: Further, intelligible species bear the same relation to the
intellect as shapes do to bodies. But when the body is seen its shape
is seen. Therefore, when an intellectual substance is seen, the
intelligible species within it is also seen. Consequently, when one
angel beholds another, or even a soul, it seems that he can see the
thoughts of both.
Obj. 3: Further, the ideas of our intellect resemble the angel more
than do the images in our imagination; because the former are
actually understood, while the latter are understood only
potentially. But the images in our imagination can be known by an
angel as corporeal things are known: because the imagination is a
corporeal faculty. Therefore it seems that an angel can know the
thoughts of the intellect.
_On the contrary,_ What is proper to God does not belong to the
angels. But it is proper to God to read the secrets of hearts,
according to Jer. 17:9: "The heart is perverse above all things, and
unsearchable; who can know it? I am the Lord, Who search the heart."
Therefore angels do not know the secrets of hearts.
_I answer that,_ A secret thought can be known in two ways: first, in
its effect. In this way it can be known not only by an angel, but also
by man; and with so much the greater subtlety according as the effect
is the more hidden. For thought is sometimes discovered not merely by
outward act, but also by change of countenance; and doctors can tell
some passions of the soul by the mere pulse. Much more then can
angels, or even demons, the more deeply they penetrate those occult
bodily modifications. Hence Augustine says (De divin. daemon.) that
demons "sometimes with the greatest faculty learn man's dispositions,
not only when expressed by speech, but even when conceived in thought,
when the soul expresses them by certain signs in the body"; although
(Retract. ii, 30) he says "it cannot be asserted how this is done."
In another way thoughts can be known as they are in the mind, and
affections as they are in the will: and thus God alone can know the
thoughts of hearts and affections of wills. The reason of this is,
because the rational creature is subject to God only, and He alone
can work in it Who is its principal object and last end: this will be
developed later (Q. 63, A. 1; Q. 105, A. 5). Consequently all that is
in the will, and all things that depend only on the will, are known
to God alone. Now it is evident that it depends entirely on the will
for anyone actually to consider anything; because a man who has a
habit of knowledge, or any intelligible species, uses them at will.
Hence the Apostle says (1 Cor. 2:11): "For what man knoweth the
things of a man, but the spirit of a man that is in him?"
Reply Obj. 1: In the present life one man's thought is not known
by another owing to a twofold hindrance; namely, on account of the
grossness of the body, and because the will shuts up its secrets.
The first obstacle will be removed at the Resurrection, and does not
exist at all in the angels; while the second will remain, and is in
the angels now. Nevertheless the brightness of the body will show
forth the quality of the soul; as to its amount of grace and of
glory. In this way one will be able to see the mind of another.
Reply Obj. 2: Although one angel sees the intelligible species of
another, by the fact that the species are proportioned to the rank of
these substances according to greater or lesser universality, yet it
does not follow that one knows how far another makes use of them by
actual consideration.
Reply Obj. 3: The appetite of the brute does not control its act, but
follows the impression of some other corporeal or spiritual cause.
Since, therefore, the angels know corporeal things and their
dispositions, they can thereby know what is passing in the appetite
or in the imaginative apprehension of the brute beasts, and even of
man, in so far as the sensitive appetite sometimes, through following
some bodily impression, influences his conduct, as always happens in
brutes. Yet the angels do not necessarily know the movement of the
sensitive appetite and the imaginative apprehension of man in so far
as these are moved by the will and reason; because, even the lower
part of the soul has some share of reason, as obeying its ruler, as
is said in _Ethics_ iii, 12. But it does not follow that, if the
angel knows what is passing through man's sensitive appetite or
imagination, he knows what is in the thought or will: because the
intellect or will is not subject to the sensitive appetite or the
imagination, but can make various uses of them.
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