 The difference between the pre-philosophical and the philosophical knowledge of God is that the latter is one which is based on a “scientific demonstration” (Approches de Dieu, p. 19 [Engl. tr., p. 23])—on empirical facts—and involving analogy, from which we have terms that can be properly predicated of the divine. On the other hand, pre-philosophical knowledge is “intuition”—an approach to knowledge, though not a “way”, (ibid., p. 20 [Engl. tr., p. 24]) a proof, or a demonstration. This knowledge is based on a natural reasoning which cannot be expressed in words. Yet, it is important also to realize that while Maritain allows that certain truths “are grasped by the common sense before being the object of philosophical concern” (ibid., p. 24 [Engl. tr., p. 30]), philosophical proofs of the existence of God are not only “established and justified philosophically” at the level of philosophy itself, but are already “valid and efficacious” at the level of this “incohative and spontaneous” philosophy. (ibid., p.  24 [Engl. tr., p. 30]), and that what one arrives at by means of such an approach is (as it is in philosophical demonstrations) knowledge of the truth of a proposition.