of the efficient cause, we love
certain men because, for instance, they are the sons of such and such
a father; and in respect of the disposition which is reducible to the
genus of a material cause, we speak of loving something for that
which disposed us to love it, e.g. we love a man for the favors
received from him, although after we have begun to love our friend,
we no longer love him for his favors, but for his virtue.
Accordingly, as regards the first three ways, we love God, not for
anything else, but for Himself. For He is not directed to anything
else as to an end, but is Himself the last end of all things; nor
does He require to receive any form in order to be good, for His very
substance is His goodness, which is itself the exemplar of all other
good things; nor again does goodness accrue to Him from aught else,
but from Him to all other things. In the fourth way, however, He can
be loved for something else, because we are disposed by certain
things to advance in His love, for instance, by favors bestowed by
Him, by the rewards we hope to receive from Him, or even by the
punishments which we are minded to avoid through Him.

Reply Obj. 1: From the things it knows the soul learns to love what
it knows not, not as though the things it knows were the reason for
its loving things it knows not, through being the formal, final, or
efficient cause of this love, but because this knowledge disposes man
to love the unknown.

Reply Obj. 2: Knowledge of God is indeed acquired through other
things, but after He is known, He is no longer known through them,
but through Himself, according to John 4:42: "We now believe, not for
thy saying: for we ourselves have heard Him, and know that this is
indeed the Saviour of the world."

Reply Obj. 3: Hope and fear lead to charity by way of a certain
disposition, as was shown above (Q. 17, A. 8; Q. 19, AA. 4, 7, 10).
_______________________

FOURTH ARTICLE [II-II, Q. 27, Art. 4]

Whether God Can Be Loved Immediately in This Life?

Objection 1: It would seem that God cannot be loved immediately in
this life. For the "unknown cannot be loved" as Augustine says (De
Trin. x, 1). Now we do not know God immediately in this life, since
"we see now through a glass, in a dark manner" (1 Cor. 13:12).
Neither, therefore, do we love Him immediately.

Obj. 2: Further, he who cannot do what is less, cannot do what is
more. Now it is more to love God than to know Him, since "he who is
joine