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 CREATION

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CREATION

acquitted (1682), was transferred to the Archdiocese of Tuam in 1686. He followed James II to the Con- tinent, was appointed Archbishop of Dublin in 1693, but was never able to return and take possession. He became Coadjutor Bishop of Strasburg, where he died (July, 1705).

Bkady, Epixcopril Succrssinniii Ireland (Rome, 1S76): Beg- LEY, Histo,., ; ;■,. r> ; T m. rick (Dublin, 1906); Ware- Harris, 7Vi ' " / I iiil.lMi, 1764); Renehan, Co«ec- Honsof In I. < 7 i n Im, 1S81); &TV\m, Historical Memoirs vf .1 ./,,,,;/,, .-l ( ,,ii\hn! (Dublin, 1900); Moean, Spicilegium Ussonrnse lUulihn, 1S74), I; O'Sullivan Beare, Catholic History of Ireland (partly translated from the Latin by M. J. Byrne, Dublin, 1903); Hamilton and Carew, Calen- dars of State Papers (1509-85); O'Reilly, Memorials of those who suffered for the Catholic Faith in Ireland (London, 186S).

E. A. D'Alton.

Creation (Lat. creatio). — I. Definition. — Like other words of the same ending, the term creation sig- nifies both an action and the object or effect thereof. Thus, in the latter sense, we speak of the "kingdoms of creation", "the whole creation", and so on. In the former sense the word sometimes stands for produc- tive activity generally (e. g. to create joy, trouble, etc.), but more especially for a higher order of such efficiency (e. g. artistic creation). In technically theological and philosophical use it expresses the act whereby God brings the entire substance of a thing into exist- ence from a state of non-existence — productio totius substantice ex nihilo sui et subjecti. In every kind of production the specific effect had as such no previous existence, and may therefore be said to have been educed ex nildlo sui — from a state of non-existence — so far as its specific character is concerned (e. g. a statue out of crude marble) ; but what is peculiar to creation is the entire absence of any prior subject-mat- ter — ex nihilo subjecti. It is therefore likewise the production totius substantice — of the entire substance. The preposition ex, "out of", in the above definition does not, of course, imply that nihil, "nothing", is to be conceived as the material out of which a thing is made — materia ex qud — a misconception which has given rise to the puerile objection against the possibil- ity of creation conveyed by the phrase, ex nihilo nihil fit — "nothing comes of nothing". The ex means (a) the negation of prejacent material, out of which the product might otherwise be conceived to proceed, and (b) the order of succession, viz., existence after non- existence. It follows, therefore, that (1) creation is not a change or transformation, since the latter pro- cess includes an actual underlying pre-existent subject that passes from one real state to another real state, which subject creation positively excludes; (2) it is not a procession within the Deity, like the inward emission of the Divine Persons, since its term is ex- trinsic to God; (3) it is not an emanation from the Divine Substance, since the latter is utterly indivisi- ble; (4) it is an act which, while it abides within its cause (God), has its term or effect distinct therefrom; formally immanent, it is virtually transitive; (5) in- cluding, as it does, no motion, and hence no successive- ness, it is an instantaneous operation ; (6) its immedi- ate term is the substance of the effect, the "accidents" (q. V.) being "con-created"; (7) since the word crea- tion in its passive sense expresses the term or object of the creative act, or, more strictly, the object in its en- titative dependence on the Creator, it follows that, as this dependence is essential, and hence inamissible, the creative act once placed is coextensive in duration with th(! creature's existence. However, as thus con- tinuous, it is called conservation, an act, then'fore, which is nothing else than the unceasing influx of the creative cause upon the existence of the creature. In- asmuch as that influx is felt immediately on the crea- ture's activity, it is called concurrence. Creation, conservation, and concurrence are, therefore, really identical and only nolionally distiuguishe<l. Other characteristics there are, the more important of which will come out in what follows.

II. History op the Idea. — 1. The idea of creation thus outlined is intrinsically consistent. Given a per- sonal First Cause possessing infinite power and wisdom, creative productivity would a priori be nec- essarily one of His perfections, i. e. absolute independ- ence of the external limitations imposed by a material subject whereon to exert His efficiency. Besides, the fecundity which organic creatures possess, and which, in the present supposition, would be derived from that First Cause, must be found typically and eminently in its source. But creative productivity is just the trans- cendent exemplar of organic fecundity. Therefore, a priori, we should look for it in the First Cause. How the creature is produced, how something comes from nothing, is of course quite unimaginable by us, and ex- tremely difficult to conceive. But this is scarcely less true of any other mode of production. The intimate nexus between cause and effect is in every case hard to understand. The fact, however, of such a connex- ion is not denied except by a few theorists; and even they continually admit it in practice. Consequently the indistinctness of the notion of creation is no valid reason for doubting its inner coherence. Moreover, though the idea of creation is not, of course, based upon immediate experience, it is the product of the mind's endeavour, aided by the principle of sufficient reason, to interpret experience. Creation, as will presently appear, is the only consistent solution that has ever been given to the problem of the world's origin.

2. On the other hand, though the idea of creation is self-consistent and naturally attainable by the mind interpreting the world in the light of the principle of causality, nevertheless such is not its actual source, The conception has a distinctly theological origin, The early Christian writers, learning from Revelation that the world was produced from nothing, and seeing the necessity of having a term to designate such an act, chose the word creare, which theretofore had been used to express any form of production, e. g. creare con- sulem (Cicero). The theological usage afterwards passed into modern language. Probably the idea of creation never entered the human mind apart from Revelation. Though some of the pagan philosophers attained to a relatively high conception of God as the supreme ruler of the world, they seem never to have drawn the next logical inference of His being the abso- lute cause of all finite e.xistence. The truth of crea- tion, while not a mystery — not supernal tiral in its very nature (quoad essentiam) — is supernatural in the mode of its manifestation (quoad inodum). Implicitly natural, it is explicitly revealed. The distinct con- ception of his created origin which prunitive man, as described in Genesis, must have received from his Creator was gradually obscured and finally lost to the majority of his descendants when moral corruption had darkened their understanding; and they substituted for the Creator the fantastic agencies conjured up by polytheism, dualism, and pantheism. The overarch- ing sky was conceived of as divine, and the heavenly bodies and natural phenomena as its children. In the East this gradually gave rise to the identification of God with nature. Whatever exists is but the mani- festation of the One — i. e. Brahma. In the West the forces of the universe were separately deified, and a more or less esoteric conception of the Supreme Being as the father of the gods and of man was feebly held by some of the Egyjjtians and ])nibably by the Greek and Roman sages and priests. The Creator, liowever, ilid not leave Himself without witness in the race of men The descendants of Sem and .Vbraham, of Isaac ant! Jacob, preservctl the itlea of creation clear and pure and from the ojiening verse of Genesis to the closing book of the Old Testament the doctrine of creation runs unmistakably outlined and absolutely undefilec by any extraneous element. '' In the beginning Goc created tlie heavens and the earth." In this, the first, sentence of the Bible we see the fountain-head of th«