Page:Essays on Catholicism, Liberalism, and Socialism.djvu/129

But, if sin did not deprive them of this excellence, it disturbed the sovereign harmony that the divine creator established among them, that delicate connection and perfect order with which they were united the one to the other, and all to God, when they were brought forth from chaos by an act of God's infinite goodness. In this state of perfect order and admirable connection, all things tended toward God with a determined and irresistible impulsion. Impelled by the law of love, the angel, a pure spirit, gravitated with an ardent and impetuous desire toward God, as the center of all spirits. Man, less perfect but not less loving, was drawn by the same attraction to become associated with the angel in the bosom of God, the center of angelical and human gravitation. Even matter, agitated by a secret power of ascension, followed the gravitation of spirits toward the supreme creator, who sweetly attracts all things to himself. And thus, as all these things, considered in themselves, are the exterior manifestations of the essential good which is in God, so the manner of being we have just indicated is the exterior manifestation of God's manner of existence, and is, as his very essence, perfect and excellent. Things created had a perfection susceptible of change, and another perfection which was necessary and inadmissible. Their inadmissible and necessary perfection was the essential good that God imparted to every creature, and their perfection which is contingent and liable to be lost, was that manner of being which God gave to them when he created them out of nothing. God wished that they should always be what they are, but he did not wish that they should necessarily exist in the same manner; he withdrew the essences from all jurisdictions except his own, and he placed for a time