ABSTRACT
This chapter analyses the area of controversy regarding suprapolitical truths of metaphysics and the temporal common good: namely, how Thomas Aquinas's metaphysical doctrine on providence stands in relation to political theology's conception of law and the common good. A correct interpretation of Aquinas must first note the way in which the metaphysics of Aquinas in fact describes the relation between law and providence in the mind of God. Therefore, any putative disjunction between law and prudence observed in human action must be seen in light of that to which human nature is oriented, that is, in light of the divine essence. The chapter considers three texts suitable for achieving a resolution and for deepening the understanding of Aquinas on providence, prudence, and natural law. Hence the perfection of charity, found in the perfectly good man, is that foretaste of the supernatural common good by which human nature is perfectly ordered to God himself.
