St. Augustine’s Cosmological Arguments on Transcendent Beauty

Based on the Christian doctrine of creatio ex nihilo, Augustine argues that God created all forms from nothing, and the physical-temporal world simultaneously sprang into existence when corporeal forms were created and motions occurred; thus, time and space are creatures. In order to argue for the intelligent design of the world, Augustine investigates the attributes of formless matter, corporeal form, and intelligent form in the order of creation, which is logical order rather than temporal order. All forms, which are good and beautiful in different degrees, contain the triad (beauty, measurement, and order) as the common good and constitute universal harmony, manifesting the transcendent beauty of God. The human form is superior to all other corporeal forms because it is a combination of the corporeal and intelligent forms; thus, not only can it reason the unchangeable principles (metaphysical forms) underlying physical phenomena, but it also can receive the ethical beauty existing in the commandments of the Creator.