Whether these days are sufficiently enumerated?
Objection 1: It would seem that these days are not sufficiently
enumerated. For the work of creation is no less distinct from the
works of distinction and adornment than these two works are from one
another. But separate days are assigned to distinction and to
adornment, and therefore separate days should be assigned to creation.
Obj. 2: Further, air and fire are nobler elements than earth and
water. But one day is assigned to the distinction of water, and
another to the distinction of the land. Therefore, other days ought
to be devoted to the distinction of fire and air.
Obj. 3: Further, fish differ from birds as much as birds differ from
the beasts of the earth, whereas man differs more from other animals
than all animals whatsoever differ from each other. But one day is
devoted to the production of fishes, and another to that of the beast
of the earth. Another day, then, ought to be assigned to the
production of birds and another to that of man.
Obj. 4: Further, it would seem, on the other hand, that some of these
days are superfluous. Light, for instance, stands to the luminaries
in the relation of accident to subject. But the subject is produced
at the same time as the accident proper to it. The light and the
luminaries, therefore, ought not to have been produced on different
days.
Obj. 5: Further, these days are devoted to the first instituting of
the world. But as on the seventh day nothing was instituted, that day
ought not to be enumerated with the others.
_I answer that,_ The reason of the distinction of these days is made
clear by what has been said above (Q. 70, A. 1), namely, that the
parts of the world had first to be distinguished, and then each part
adorned and filled, as it were, by the beings that inhabit it. Now
the parts into which the corporeal creation is divided are three,
according to some holy writers, these parts being the heaven, or
highest part, the water, or middle part, and the earth, or the lowest
part. Thus the Pythagoreans teach that perfection consists in three
things, the beginning, the middle, and the end. The first part, then,
is distinguished on the first day, and adorned on the fourth, the
middle part distinguished on the middle day, and adorned on the fifth,
and the third part distinguished on the third day, and adorned on the
sixth. But Augustine, while agreeing with the above writers as to the
last three days, differs as to the first three, for, according to him,
spiritual creatures are formed on the first day, and corporeal on the
two others, the higher bodies being formed on the first these two
days, and the lower on the second. Thus, then, the perfection of the
Divine works corresponds to the perfection of the number six, which
is the sum of its aliquot parts, one, two, three; since one day is
assigned to the forming of spiritual creatures, two to that of
corporeal creatures, and three to the work of adornment.
Reply Obj. 1: According to Augustine, the work of creation belongs
to the production of formless matter, and of the formless spiritual
nature, both of which are outside of time, as he himself says
(Confess. xii, 12). Thus, then, the creation of either is set down
before there was any day. But it may also be said, following other
holy writers, that the works of distinction and adornment imply
certain changes in the creature which are measurable by time; whereas
the work of creation lies only in the Divine act producing the
substance of beings instantaneously. For this reason, therefore,
every work of distinction and adornment is said to take place "in a
day," but creation "in the beginning" which denotes something
indivisible.
Reply Obj. 2: Fire and air, as not distinctly known by the
unlettered, are not expressly named by Moses among the parts of the
world, but reckoned with the intermediate part, or water, especially
as regards the lowest part of the air; or with the heaven, to which
the higher region of air approaches, as Augustine says (Gen. ad lit.
ii, 13).
Reply Obj. 3: The production of animals is recorded with reference to
their adorning the various parts of the world, and therefore the days
of their production are separated or united according as the animals
adorn the same parts of the world, or different parts.
Reply Obj. 4: The nature of light, as existing in a subject, was made
on the first day; and the making of the luminaries on the fourth day
does not mean that their substance was produced anew, but that they
then received a form that they had not before, as said above (Q. 70,
[A. 1] ad 2).
Reply Obj. 5: According to Augustine (Gen. ad lit. iv, 15), after all
that has been recorded that is assigned to the six days, something
distinct is attributed to the seventh--namely, that on it God rested
in Himself from His works: and for this reason it was right that the
seventh day should be mentioned after the six. It may also be said,
with the other writers, that the world entered on the seventh day
upon a new state, in that nothing new was to be added to it, and that
therefore the seventh day is mentioned after the six, from its being
devoted to cessation from work.
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