rs say that under the
word, "earth," Scripture is accustomed to include all the four
elements as (Ps. 148:7,8) after the words, "Praise the Lord from the
earth," is added, "fire, hail, snow, and ice."

Reply Obj. 3: In the account of the creation there is found something
to correspond to the words, "God saw that it was good," used in the
work of distinction and adornment, and this appears from the
consideration that the Holy Spirit is Love. Now, "there are two
things," says Augustine (Gen. ad lit. i, 8) which came from God's
love of His creatures, their existence and their permanence. That
they might then exist, and exist permanently, "the Spirit of God," it
is said, "moved over the waters"--that is to say, over that formless
matter, signified by water, even as the love of the artist moves over
the materials of his art, that out of them he may form his work. And
the words, "God saw that it was good," signify that the things that
He had made were to endure, since they express a certain satisfaction
taken by God in His works, as of an artist in his art: not as though
He knew the creature otherwise, or that the creature was pleasing to
Him otherwise, than before He made it. Thus in either work, of
creation and of formation, the Trinity of Persons is implied. In
creation the Person of the Father is indicated by God the Creator,
the Person of the Son by the beginning, in which He created, and the
Person of the Holy Ghost by the Spirit that moved over the waters.
But in the formation, the Person of the Father is indicated by God
that speaks, and the Person of the Son by the Word in which He
speaks, and the Person of the Holy Spirit by the satisfaction with
which God saw that what was made was good. And if the words, "God saw
that it was good," are not said of the work of the second day, this
is because the work of distinguishing the waters was only begun on
that day, but perfected on the third. Hence these words, that are
said of the third day, refer also to the second. Or it may be that
Scripture does not use these words of approval of the second day's
work, because this is concerned with the distinction of things not
evident to the senses of mankind. Or, again, because by the firmament
is simply understood the cloudy region of the air, which is not one
of the permanent parts of the universe, nor of the principal
divisions of the world. The above three reasons are given by Rabbi
Moses [*Perplex. ii.], and to these may be ad