and form itself, the one Self
and the sole underived being (nn. 40-46); and that God created the
universe and its contents from Himself, and not from nothing (nn. 282-284
). It follows that every creature and above all the human being and the
love and wisdom in him, are real, and do not exist only in idea. For were
God not infinite, the finite would not be; were the infinite not all, no
particular thing would be; and had not God created all things from
Himself, nothing whatever would be. In a word, we are because God is.

47. We are considering divine providence and at this point how it regards
what is infinite and eternal in all that it does. This can be clearly
told only in some order. Let this be the order:

i. The infinite and eternal in itself is the same as the Divine.
ii. What is infinite and eternal in itself cannot but look to what is
infinite and eternal from itself in finite things.
iii. Divine providence looks to the infinite and eternal from itself in
all that it does, especially in saving mankind.
iv. An image of the infinite and eternal offers in an angelic heaven
formed from a redeemed mankind.
v. The heart of divine providence is to look to what is infinite and
eternal by fashioning an angelic heaven, for it to be like one human
being before the Lord, an image of Him.

48. (i) _The infinite and eternal in itself is the same as the Divine._
This is plain from what was shown in many places in the work _Divine Love
and Wisdom._ The concept comes from the angelic idea. By the infinite,
angels understand nothing else than the divine _esse_ and by the eternal
the divine _existere._ But men can see and cannot see that what is
infinite and eternal in itself is the Divine. Those can see this who do
not think of the infinite from space and of the eternal from time; those
cannot see it who think of infinite and eternal in terms of space and
time. Those, therefore, can see it who think at some elevation, that is,
inwardly in the rational mind; those cannot who think in a lower, that is,
more external way.

[2] Those by whom it can be seen reflect that a spatial infinite is an
impossibility, so likewise a temporal eternity or an eternity from which
the world has been. The infinite has no first or final limit or
boundaries. They also reflect that there cannot be another infinite from
it, for "from it" implies a boundary or beginning, or a prior source.
They therefore think that it is meaningless to speak of an in