Wis 11:20

“Therefore, because fire overflows and boils, water also overflowed on the earth, lest the heat of the rising sun and the burning stars should scorch it, and an unusual vapor should harm the tender beginnings of things. How many springs, rivers, and lakes water the lands; is it not because some internal fire sends up vapor within them? For from where would trees sprout, or grain and crops break forth or be ripened, unless an inner fire also gave them life? This fire is often struck out from stones, and frequently leaps out even from wood itself when it is being cut. Therefore, just as the creation of fire is necessary so that things may remain ordered and arranged, and the kindness of heaven may temper the harshness of the waters; so also the abundance of waters is not superfluous, lest one should consume the other, because unless there is a suitable measure of each, just as fire dries up water, so also water extinguishes fire. And so He has weighed and measured all things; for even the drops of rain are numbered for Him, as we read in the book of Job (Job 28:25). Knowing that there would easily be either a lack of things or the dissolution of the universe if one should prevail over the other, He has so balanced the losses of both; that fire should not consume too much, nor water overflow: but there should be a moderate reduction of each, which would remove the excess and preserve what is necessary.”

“Everything was made through the Word, from the angels to the smallest worm. What among creatures is more exalted than an angel? What is easier to overlook than a worm? Well, he who made the angel also made the worm. The angel, however, was made for heaven, the worm for the earth. This was how the one who created them arranged it. If God had put the worm in heaven, you might criticize him. Likewise, if he had wanted the angel to be born of corruptible flesh. And yet God does something similar to this, and there is nothing to reproach him for. What, in fact, are human beings born of the flesh, if not worms? And God makes these worms into angels. If the Lord does not hesitate to say, "I am a worm and not a man," who would hesitate to say what is written in the book of Job, "How much more are human beings rot, and their children worms?" First he says, "human beings are rot," and then, "their children are worms." The man is rot and his child a worm, because worms are born of decay. See what he who in the beginning was the Word wanted to do for you—the Word who was with God, the Word who was God. And why did he lower himself like this for you? So that you might feed on milk, given that you were still unable to nourish yourself on solid food. And therefore, brothers and sisters, it is in this sense that you must understand the words, "Everything was made through him, and without him nothing was made." Every creature, without exception, was made through him, the smallest just as the greatest, things above us just as things below us, things spiritual just as things corporeal—everything was made through him. There is no form, no cohesion or harmony of parts, no substance that can be measured by weight, number or height—nothing exists except through that Word and originates from that creator Word, to whom the word of Scripture refers, "You have arranged all things in number, weight and measure."”

“When we read that God brought all his works to completion in six days and, in considering the number six, discover that it is a perfect number and that the order of the creatures that were made is arranged in such a way as to appear to be the progressive distinction of the very divisors that comprise this number, the expression addressed to God in another passage of the Scriptures should come to mind: "You have arranged all things with measure, number and weight." We must further ask ourselves (and we can if we invoke God's help, which will allow us to do so, infusing in us the strength) if these three properties—measure, number and weight, according to which the Scripture says that God has arranged all things—in some way existed before the universe was created, or were they also created and, if they already existed, where were they. In fact, before the creation nothing existed besides the Creator. They were therefore in him—but how? In fact, we read that these things also, which are created, were in him. Should we perhaps identify these properties with God, or should we perhaps instead say that the works of the creation are, so to speak, in him who guides and governs them? But how can these properties be identified with God? He is in fact neither measure nor number nor weight, nor all of these properties taken together. Or should we perhaps think that God is to be identified with these properties as we know them in creatures and therefore limit in things we measure, number in things we count and weight in things we touch? Or should we alternatively think that, in the sense that measure assigns to each thing its limit, number gives to each its specific form, and weight draws everything to its rest and stability, it is God who is identified with these three perfections in a fundamental, true and unique sense, since it is he who limits and he who gives specific form and order to all things? That is why the phrase, "You have arranged all things by measure, number and weight," according to the way that human intelligence and language could express itself, means nothing other than, "You have arranged all things in yourself."”

“I must confess that I do not know why mice and frogs were created, but I nonetheless understand that all things are beautiful in their kind, even if, because of our sins, they seem otherwise to us. Truthfully, I cannot consider the body and limbs of a living being without finding a measure, a proportion and an order that contribute to a harmonious unity. I do not understand where all these properties come from except from that supreme measure and proportion, and that supreme order, that exist in the absolutely perfect, unchanging and eternal essence of God.… When you see in all these beings their measure, their proportion and their order, look for the Creator in them, since you will find none other than the One in whom is supreme measure, supreme proportion and supreme order, that is, God, of whom Scripture says with absolute truth, "You have arranged all things with measure, number and weight." In this way, in the smallness of an ant you may find more reason to praise God than in crossing a river astride a tall beast of burden.”

“This uncreated Trinity put some indications of the Trinity in its creation. As it is written, "You arranged all things with measure, number and weight." In fact, any body, small or large, can be quantified according to the number of its parts, can be measured and has weight. And quantity cannot exist without weight, nor measure without weight and quantity. None of these properties can exist without the other two. It is easy, however, to observe weight, quantity and measure in material objects; let us see if they can be found in incorporeal objects. In the human soul one finds memory, thought and will. In fact, you think what you want, and this is what your memory contains. Your will is your love. That is, you remember what you bear with love in your thoughts. Memory, intellect and will (which we have said is love) are three inseparable aspects—one of these cannot exist without the others. A certain Father once elegantly mentioned how all three are in the soul when praying to God: your memory, your intellect and your desire, and in this the image of God has been shown. The human soul is therefore an image of God: not born but created, not equal but similar.”

“The writers of secular letters held that arithmetic was the first among the disciplines, given that music, geometry and astronomy, which follow it, have need of arithmetic for the explanation of their laws. For example, the relationship between simple and double, which is proper to music, has need of arithmetic. Geometry, since it has the triangle, the rectangle and other similar figures for its object, needs arithmetic. Astronomy as well, since it calculates the positions and movement of the stars, needs arithmetic. However, no one would affirm that music, geometry and astronomy need to exist for there to be arithmetic. One therefore concludes that arithmetic is the source and mother of the other sciences. We know that Pythagoras celebrated this to the point of recalling that everything was created by God under the laws of number and of measure, also saying that some things were created in motion, others at rest, though in such a way that nothing has substance except the things mentioned above. I think that Pythagoras, like many philosophers, took his cue from the prophetic saying that "God arranged all things by measure, number and weight."”

“Weight and measure govern and administer all things by the Lord. For when He had set the limit of life to one hundred and twenty years for those who lived in the time of Noah, after He saw sin increase and overflow, He did not wait for the prescribed limit, but cut it short and made it briefer, and in the hundredth year brought the flood upon all. So also to Abraham, He foretold that his offspring would be strangers, and He teaches the reason. For He says, the iniquities of the Amorites are not yet complete up to this point. They have not yet, He says, committed those sins which deserve to perish utterly; therefore I will not allow them to be handed over to you to be completely destroyed now, but I await the measure of iniquity. For our sins, which occur in time, fall under a measure, up to a certain quantity; and now our righteous Judge God inflicts punishments, to whom be glory and dominion forever and ever. Amen.”

“The whole of the world-machine was produced into being in time and from nothing by one first, sole, and supreme principle: whose power, although it is immense, nevertheless disposed all things in a certain weight, number, and measure. The creature is the effect of the creating Trinity under a threefold genus of causality: efficient, from which there is in the creature unity, mode, and measure; exemplary, from which there is in the creature truth, species, and number: final, from which there is in the creature goodness, order, and weight. Which indeed are found in all creatures as a vestige of the Creator, whether corporeal, or spiritual, or composed of both. Every creature is established in being by the efficient cause, is conformed to the exemplar, and is ordered to the end: and through this it is one, true, good: modified, beautiful, ordered: measured, distinct, and weighted: for weight is an ordinative inclination.”

“There is a certain order in these things. For God creates all essences "by measure and number and weight." And by giving these, He gives mode, species, and order. Mode is that by which a thing exists; species, that by which it is distinct; order, that by which it is fitting. For there is no creature that is not endowed with measure, quantity, and inclination. And in this a trace may be seen, and wisdom is manifested, as the foot is shown by the trace. And this trace leads to that Wisdom in whom there is mode without qualification, number without quantity, and order without ordination.”

“For even without these etc. Nor could you punish them only in this way, for even without these, that is, without the aid of these beasts, they could have been killed by a single breath: Gloss: "That is, by a single indignation or command." So breath is understood where it is said in Genesis 6: "My spirit shall not remain in man," that is, my indignation, etc. Or: by a single angelic breath, as happened to Sennacherib and his army, as is clear from Isaiah 37. Having suffered persecution, namely as from a meritorious cause, from their own deeds, so that they would be destroyed by their own works, just as a viper perishes by its own offspring: Luke 3: "Offspring of vipers," etc.; in the Psalm: "Render to them according to the works of their hands." And scattered, namely through diverse places outside their own land, by the spirit of your power. This can be understood intransitively, and then it is understood of the uncreated Spirit; or transitively, that is, effectively, and then it can be understood of a created spirit: Job 4: "I saw those who work iniquity perish by the blast of God, and be consumed by the spirit of his wrath." But all things etc. Here he shows that he punished out of mercy and punished less than he could have: and first by this, that he did not punish beyond what the magnitude of the fault required, because in measure; second by this, that he did not punish beyond what the multiplicity of the fault required, because in number; third, because not beyond what the condition or quality of the sinner required, because in weight. I have rightly said that you do not punish according to the immensity of your power, that is, to the extent that you could; but all things etc., as if to say: not only the creatures themselves, but also their retributions and penalties or punishments, you have disposed in measure, so that they do not exceed the magnitude of the fault; and in number, so that they do not exceed the multiplicity of the fault; and in weight, so that they do not exceed the condition of the sinner or the circumstance of the sin. That he punishes according to measure: Revelation 18: "As much as she glorified herself in delights, so much give her torment and mourning"; likewise Isaiah 27: "In measure against measure, when she shall be cast off, you shall judge her"; likewise Luke 6: "With what measure you measure, it shall be measured back to you." That according to number: Revelation 18: "Double unto her double according to her works"; likewise Isaiah 40: "She has received from the hand of the Lord double for all her sins," that is, a twofold punishment, namely the punishment of loss and the punishment of sense, or exterior bodily punishment and interior spiritual punishment, that is, the remorse of conscience. That according to weight is clear from above, chapter 6: "To the little one mercy is granted, but the mighty shall suffer torments mightily." Otherwise it can be explained thus: all things, namely corporeal things with respect to their nature, you have disposed in measure, number, and weight, because the measure of all corporeal things is the four elements, which have number, weight, and measure, as is evident. Or otherwise: weight refers to the power of the one operating; number to the wisdom of the one ordering; measure to the clemency of the one preserving; Romans 11: "From whom are all things," with respect to the power of the Father; "through whom are all things," with regard to the wisdom of the Son; "in whom are all things," with regard to the clemency of the Holy Spirit. According to the Gloss of Rabanus: "In measure, quality; in number, quantity; in weight, reason." According to Augustine, the measure of a creature is its determinate quantity by which it is called great or small or middling; number, a determinate quality by which it is distinguished from another; weight, the property by which it rests in its own place; whence according to Augustine, measure is the same as mode; species is the same as number; order is the same as weight. "These three," namely mode, species, and order, "where they are great, are great goods; where small, small; where none, none," as he himself says. Or this can be explained concerning measure, number, and weight in uncreated things thus: in measure, that is, in you measuring all things, that is, prefixing a mode to each thing; in number, that is, in you numbering all things, that is, bestowing upon each thing its proper species; in weight, that is, in you weighing all things, that is, assigning to all things their proper and certain order. With this agrees a certain exposition of Augustine, who says: "In measure, that is, in yourself, who are measure without measure, prefixing a mode to each thing; number without number, furnishing a species to every thing; weight without weight, drawing every thing to stability." The first in the nature of the efficient cause, the second in the nature of the exemplar, the third in the nature of the final cause. Morally thus: In measure, against the vice of superfluity; in number, against the vice of singularity; in weight, against the vice of levity. But it is objected: if he disposed all things in measure, number, and weight, then he disposed measure in measure, etc., and so on to infinity. It can be said that, speaking of number, weight, and measure in uncreated things, the distribution is universal; but speaking of created things, the distribution is accommodated, namely such that the distribution is understood to be made for things measured, numbered, and weighed. Or: All things, that is, complete beings, not concreated in another. But measure, number, and weight are not such things; rather they are concreated in other things, since they are not beings subsisting by themselves and complete.”

“In the first mode, the gaze of the one contemplating, considering things in themselves, sees in them weight, number, and measure: weight with respect to the position toward which they incline, number, by which they are distinguished, and measure, by which they are limited. And thereby it sees in them mode, species, and order, as well as substance, power, and operation. From which one can rise as from a vestige to understanding the immense power, wisdom, and goodness of the Creator.”