le's concept of God seems valid as a pre-scientific explanation of the universe; however, he seems to ignore God's embodiment of moral goodness and man's ability to think and act freely and still be good. He believes that all goodness comes from within God and that the goodness in man is drawn toward God and nothing else. Aristotle's ideas on God seem, from a modern point of view, effective only as explanations of the supernatural and even of the miracle of life. St. Augustine links God with rational thought and states that human knowledge of truth depends upon man's relationship to God. His argument moves him from existence of the self to the objectivity of truth and finally to God's reality. Augustine assumes that God is a rational being and that the rational and the good are identical. Only God could be superior to truth, he says, and therefore must be the ultimate good; therefore, truth, goodness, and God are one and the same. His argument seems fairly clear-eyed and rational, for he does not approach God's goodness dogmatically or automatically assume God's existence. Instead, he works toward that end by evaluation the rationality of truth and goodness, and he casts God in that role as the ultimate embodiment of both. In general, Augustine implies, God represents goodness and occupies the pinnacle of the concept like unity and twoness). He considers unity and goodness the combined center of his system of Ideas and stated that the Ideas had to be more real and concrete than any objects of ordinary experience. Aristotle, meanwhile, agreed with Plato's notion that the immaterial (form) and the material (matter) were distinctly separate entities; however, he did not share Plato's belief that all forms were permanent, freestanding truths; he felt that form correlated to matter. Ideas, he stated, correlated to something material and were thus changeable and often dependent upon the observer. In general, Aristotle refutes Plato on the gro...
