summa-contra-gentiles

CHAPTER LXXXIII
t43
to raise them to a better. Therefore it could not have been
by divine ordinance that the soul was united to the body.
Further. It is not in keeping with the order of divine
wisdom to raise up lower things to the detriment of higher.
Now bodies that are subject to generation and corruption
obtain the lowest place in the order of things. Therefore
it was not becoming the order of divine wisdom to raise up
human bodies by uniting pre-existing souls to them since
:
this could not be done without detriment to the latter, as
proved from what has been said.
Origen took note of this, and since he maintained that
human souls were created from the beginning, he said that
they were united to bodies by divine ordinance, but as a
punishment. For he was of opinion that they had sinned
before bodies were formed, and that according to the gravity
of their sin they were enclosed in bodies more or less noble
as in so many prisons.^
But this opinion cannot stand. Because punishment is
something contrary to a good of nature, and for this reason
is said to be evil. If, therefore, the union of soul and body
is
something penal, it is not a good of nature. Yet this is
impossible for : it is intended by nature, since it is the end
of natural generation. Moreover it would follow that to be
a man is not good according to nature; whereas it is said
(Gen. i. 31)
after the creation of man : God saw all the
things that He had made, and they were very good.
Further. Good does not result from evil except by
accident. Consequently, if it was appointed that the soul
should be united to the body on account of a sin of the
separate soul, since this union is a it
good, follows that it
is accidental. Therefore it was by chance that man was
made. But this is derogatory to divine wisdom, whereof it
is said (Wis. xi. 21) that It ordered all things in number,
weight, and measure.'
This is also clearly opposed to the teaching of the
Apostle. Eor it is said (Rom. ix. 11, 12) of Jacob and
* See reference on page 239.
* Vulg., in measure, and weight, and number.