45. But the Apostle does not neglect to say with what manner of confession we should bear witness of God. O the depth of the riches both of the wisdom and of the knowledge of God! How unsearchable are His judgments, and His ways past tracing out! For who hath known the mind of the Lord? Or who hath been His counsellor? Or who hath first given to Him, and it shall be recompensed unto him? For of Him, and through Him, and in Him are all things. To Him be the glory for ever and ever793    Rom. xi. 33–36.. No earthly mind can define God, no understanding can penetrate with its perception to sound the depth of His wisdom. His judgments defy the searching scrutiny of His creatures: the trackless paths of His knowledge baffle the zeal of all pursuers. His ways are plunged in the depths of incomprehensibility: nothing can be fathomed or traced to the end in the things of God. No one has ever been taught to know His mind, no one besides Himself ever permitted to share His counsel. But all this applies to us men only, and not to Him, through Whom are all things, the Angel of mighty Counsel794    Isai. ix. 6 in the LXX and Old Latin., Who said, No one knoweth the Son save the Father: neither doth any one know the Father save the Son, and him to whom the Son hath willed to reveal Him795    St. Matt. xi. 27.. It is to curb our own feeble intellect, when it strains itself to fathom the depth of the divine nature with its descriptions and definitions, that we must re-echo the language of the Apostle’s exclamation, lest we should attempt by rash conjecture to snatch from God more than He has been pleased to reveal to us.

45. In cogitandis Dei rebus Apostoli exemplum.---Caeterum non ignorat Apostolus, cujusmodi de Deo confessionis voce testandum sit, dicens: O profundum divitiarum et sapientiae et scientiae Dei! quam incomprehensibilia sunt judicia ejus, et investigabiles viae ejus! Quis enim cognovit sensum Domini? aut quis consiliarius ejus fuit? aut quis prior dedit, et retribuetur illi? Quoniam ex ipso, et per ipsum, et in ipso sunt omnia; ipsi gloria in saecula saeculorum. (Rom., XI, 33, etc.) Non circumscribitur Deus mente terrena (V. lib. IV, n. 14), neque hoc sapientiae suae profundum sensu intelligentiae penetrantis attingitur, 0429C nec judicia constitutionum suarum perscrutantium ingenio apprehenduntur, nec viae cognitionis ejus investigabiles se consectantium studiis derelinquunt. In comprehensum profundum demersa ejus omnia sunt, nihilque de rebus ejus reperietur, nihil consectabitur. Sensum enim ejus nemo cognovit: et consilio non eguit externo. De nobis autem nunc omnis hic sermo est, non etiam de eo, per quem omnia sunt, qui est magni consilii Angelus 0430A (Esai., IX, 6), qui et ait: Nemo novit Filium, nisi Pater; neque Patrem quis novit, nisi Filius, et cui voluerit Filius revelare (Matth., XI, 25). Sed adversum imbecillas mentes nostras, et se ad definiendae circumscribendaeque naturae divinae demergentes profundum, confessione apostolicae protestationis utendum est: ne temeraria opinio aliquid sibi de Deo, praeter quam docetur, usurpet.