11

From these two initial steps by which we are led to seeing God in His

traces, as if we had two wings falling to our feet, we can determine that

all creatures of this sensible world lead the mind of the one contemplating

and attaining wisdom to the eternal God; for they are shadows, echoes, and

pictures, the traces, simulacra, and reflections of that First Principle

most powerful, wisest, and best; of that light and plenitude; of that art

productive, exemplifying, and ordering, given to us for looking upon God.

They are signs divinely bestowed which, I say, are exemplars or rather

exemplifications set before our yet untrained minds, limited to sensible

things, so that through the sensibles which they see they may be carried

forward to the intelligibles, which they do not see, as if by signs to the

signified.