De auxiliis divinae gratiae et humani arbitrii viribus et libertate

Name: De auxiliis divinae gratiae et humani arbitrii viribus et libertate
Author: Diego Álvarez

De auxiliis divinae gratiae et humani arbitrii viribus et libertate, ac legitima eius cum efficacia eorundem auxiliorum concordia

First published 1610

Diego Álvarez’s twelve-book treatise on divine grace and human free choice. This edition contains Book I: the prooemium and five preliminary disputations on Pelagian and Semi-Pelagian teaching, Manichaean and Reformation positions, Catholic theologians, and the authority of Augustine and Thomas Aquinas. Latin from the Rome 1610 edition, with a new English translation.

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Prooemium: division of the whole work

ON THE HELPS OF DIVINE GRACE AND ON THE POWERS AND FREEDOM OF HUMAN FREE CHOICE, AND ON ITS PROPER HARMONY WITH THE EFFICACY OF THOSE SAME HELPS.

The First Book.

IN WHICH THERE ARE SET FORTH BEFOREHAND

Certain preliminary discussions of matters to be treated in this entire work.

BY THE MOST REVEREND LORD, FRIAR DIDACUS ALVAREZ

Metimnensis, Archbishop of Trani and Salpi, chosen from the Province of Spain, of the Order of Preachers.

PREFACE IN WHICH THE DIVISION OF THE ENTIRE WORK

is touched upon, and the rationale for the order of its parts is given in part and explained.

As we are about to treat the helps of divine grace, with confidence in divine help, so that we may gather within certain bounds all those matters concerning this subject that are disputed in various places of the Summa Theologica of St. Thomas or in other Opuscula by different writers, arrange them in due order in this volume (which contains twelve books), and explain our opinion briefly and clearly, insofar as it shall have been divinely granted to us, it is necessary to set forth beforehand a general division of those same helps, so that afterward we may proceed step by step to the particulars to be discussed in their proper places.

The helps of divine grace, then, are of two kinds, as is clear from the common opinion of the Scholastics.¹ Some are extrinsic, because, speaking formally, they posit nothing in created free choice; they exist only in God himself or in another subject external to that free choice. Thus predestination is not in the person predestined, but in God who predestines, as St. Thomas teaches 1. par. q. 23. ar. 2.. For since, according to St. Augustine, predestination is the foreknowledge and preparation of God's benefits, by which all who are delivered are most certainly delivered,² and since foreknowledge and preparation are not in the things foreknown but in the one who foreknows and prepares, it follows that predestination is formally in the one who predestines, not in the one predestined. It is clear, moreover, that predestination is wholly gratuitous, as will be shown below, and consequently must be reckoned among the divine gifts.³ Likewise, the love and election by which the predestined are chosen and loved by God are an extrinsic gift to those loved and chosen. Sacred Scripture⁴ bears witness with the clearest testimonies that this is a gratuitous gift: God loved the predestined not for any merits of ours that came before, but through his mercy; and from the many infected by the mass of perdition he chose them by his sheer will, which may be hidden but is not unjust. For the Apostle says: Before they had been born or had done anything good or evil, so that God's purpose according to election might stand—not from works but from the one who calls—it was said to her: “The elder shall serve the younger,” as it is written: “Jacob I loved, but Esau I hated.”⁵ Hence St. Tho. 3. par. q. 7. art. 13. ad 1. says that Augustine there, that is, in lib. On the Predestination of the Saints, cap. 15, calls grace the gratuitous will of God, freely bestowing benefits. From God's love, as the same St. Thomas observed, all good things come to creatures.⁶ Moreover, love is an act of the divine will, and so is election, as St. Thomas teaches 1. p. q. 23. ar. 4.. Therefore it must formally be in God, not in the intellectual creatures who are loved and chosen; and for this reason it is called an extrinsic gift, because it formally implies nothing inhering in a creature. The sacred Scriptures also belong among the extrinsic helps, for they teach us what we ought to embrace and what to avoid; so too does the example our Savior left us, the preaching of the Gospel, and tribulations, by which people are drawn back from evil and led to good; as do creatures, which show forth the divinity of their one Creator, as the Apostle says: For the invisible things of God, understood through the things that have been made, have been seen since the creation of the world: his eternal power and divinity as well, so that they are without excuse.⁷ More will be said about this prompting in disp. 75, n. 1.

Intrinsic helps, which are more properly called helps, are those that formally imply something inhering in intellectual creatures, whether on the part of the intellect, the will, or another rational power. And these, as St. Thomas often says, are of two kinds. Some are habitual helps, such as justifying grace, the habit of charity, and the other infused habits. Others are actual helps, such as a motion received in the intellect and will, by which God moves free choice to the act of faith, hope, and charity, and to other supernatural acts. ⁸ ⁹

Therefore, since the extrinsic gifts, which are in God himself, precede the intrinsic helps in the order of nature and causality, the right order of teaching requires that we treat first the extrinsic gifts, and afterward the helps inhering in created free choice. Since in God knowledge, which pertains to the intellect, precedes in the order of reason and is understood as prior to matters pertaining to the will—for nothing is willed unless it is foreknown—we must first discuss God's foreknowledge, before his will and general concurrence. Afterward we shall speak of providence and gratuitous predestination, so that in due order we may proceed to explain the intrinsic helps by which rational creatures can reach, or in fact do reach, the supernatural end. Next we must treat reprobation and the reprobate, who fall short of that same end. Finally, we shall establish the proper harmony of free choice with divine foreknowledge, providence, and predestination, and also with the efficacy of the helps of grace, noting what will be better suited to explaining that same harmony.

But before all these things, it is necessary to set forth certain preliminary discussions that open the way to an easy understanding of this subject.

First, we must determine what the error of the Pelagians was concerning the necessity of grace and the natural powers of our free choice.

Second, we must explain which assertions constitute the Semi-Pelagian position, and how in some matters they depart from the error of Pelagius, Celestius, and Julian, although on the principal question—which the holy Father Augustine, the preacher and defender of grace next after the Apostle Paul, disputed against Pelagius and Celestius—they fell into their condemned heresy. Here the error of Faustus and Cassian concerning the necessity of grace and the natural powers of our free choice is laid open.

Third, what the Lutherans and Calvinists held concerning the necessity of grace and the natural powers of our free choice.

Fourth, what certain more recent theologians thought concerning the necessity of that same grace and the natural powers of free choice, and concerning the harmony of free choice with divine foreknowledge, providence, and predestination.

Fifth, how much authority the opinion of St. Augustine has concerning the matter of predestination and grace, and whether it is permissible to depart from it. Here the authority of the teaching of St. Thomas is also discussed.

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Book One

Prooemium: division of the whole work

Disputatio I: Whether the Pelagians ever admitted that any inward grace, or any supernatural help from God, is divinely given for salvation or for fulfilling the precepts of the law

Disputatio II: What grace the Semi-Pelagians admitted as necessary for salvation, and where their view agrees with or departs from the error of the Pelagians

Disputatio III: What the Manichaeans formerly held, and the Lutherans and Calvinists hold in our time, about the necessity of grace and the natural powers of our free choice

Disputatio IV: What certain Catholic Doctors hold about the natural powers of free choice and its concord with divine foreknowledge, providence, predestination, and the efficacy of the helps of grace

Disputatio V: How much authority Saint Augustine’s teaching has concerning predestination and grace, and whether it is permissible to depart from it

Book Two

Introduction

Disputatio I: Whether the knowledge of God is suitably divided into the knowledge of simple understanding and the knowledge of vision.

Disputatio II: Whether the knowledge of God is sufficiently divided into knowledge that is merely natural and knowledge that is merely free; or whether, besides both, middle knowledge must be posited in God with respect to conditional future things that depend on the human will.

Disputatio III: Whether all future things are actually present in eternity according to the proper existences they will have in their own measure.

Disputatio IV: Whether God certainly knows future contingents because of their real presence in eternity before they come to be, and whether an existence of this kind contributes anything to the certainty and infallibility of the divine knowledge.

Disputatio V: Whether God certainly and infallibly knows all future contingents in the decree, or predetermination, of his divine will.

Disputatio VI: Whether God certainly and infallibly knows future sins in some decree of his divine will.

Disputatio VII: Whether God certainly and infallibly knows future contingents in the predetermination of secondary causes, especially when the secondary causes are free.

Disputatio VIII: Whether, setting aside every predetermination of the divine will and existence in eternity, another ground for the certainty of divine knowledge can be assigned, namely, on the part of the truth of the object.

Disputatio IX: Whether God certainly knows future contingents before the decree of his will, as future, in their ideas.

Disputatio X: Whether there is in God a conjectural knowledge of what, in particular, a created will will do if placed in such circumstances.

Disputatio XI: Whether this causal proposition is true: “Because this is future, it is foreknown by God”; or, conversely: “Because God foreknows something to be future, therefore it is future.”

Disputatio XII: Whether God produces things outside himself immediately through his knowledge, that is, through his intellect; or whether, besides intellect and will, a third executive power must be posited in him, through which things are produced immediately.

Book Three

Introduction

Disputatio I: Whether God’s actual motion, which all secondary causes need in order to produce their effect or operation, is an immediate influx into the secondary cause itself; or whether instead it is only an immediate influx, together with the secondary cause, into its effect.

Disputatio II: What that prior motion is by which God moves and applies secondary causes to act.

Disputatio III: Whether God’s general concurrence, by which he helps secondary causes constituted in first act through supernatural forms to produce supernatural acts, is supernatural; or whether it is of the same order as general concurrence with merely natural acts.

Disputatio IV: Whether God’s general concurrence, especially with respect to acts that depend on created free choice, is indifferent of itself.

Disputatio V: Whether, by an absolute and efficacious decree of his will, God truly predetermines as an efficient cause all secondary causes, both natural and free, to their operations after the manner of a physical cause, while preserving their nature and freedom.

Disputatio VI: Whether, by a prior motion inhering in the created will, God moves, applies, or predetermines it after the manner of a physical cause to all its good acts in particular, while preserving its freedom.

Disputatio VII: Whether, by a prior motion, God truly premoves as an efficient cause free choice after the manner of a physical cause to the act of sin, insofar as it is an act and insofar as it is a being.

Disputatio VIII: Whether all contingent and free acts predetermined by God necessarily occur with the necessity of infallibility, or with necessity on the supposition of the predetermination of the divine will.

Disputatio IX: Whether the first root of contingency is the efficacy, or omnipotence, of the divine will.

Disputatio X: Whether any effect can be called formally contingent in relation to God’s causality, especially when it is produced immediately by him.

Book Four

Introduction

Disputatio I: Whether God has providence not only over all genera and species, but also over all individuals in particular, according to all circumstances of place, time, etc.

Disputatio II: Whether the evils of punishment are willed by an absolute and efficacious will, and predetermined in particular, through divine providence, or are only permitted.

Disputatio III: Whether the nature of divine providence includes not only the ordering of means to an end, but also the attainment of the end intended by God.

Disputatio IV: Whether contingent and free secondary causes can withdraw themselves from, or depart from, the order assigned to them by divine providence.

Disputatio V: Whether created free choice can resist almighty God, or strive against the order of divine providence.

Book Five

Introduction

Disputatio I: Whether all the explanations that St. Augustine gives of those words of the Apostle, “God wills all human beings to be saved,” are legitimate.

Disputatio II: What God's antecedent will is, what his consequent will is, and whether antecedent will formally entails some conditional act or wish in God.

Disputatio III: What predestination is, and in which act it formally consists: an act of the will, or rather an act of the intellect.

Disputatio IV: Whether the good use of the aids of grace, insofar as it proceeds from free will, is an effect of predestination.

Disputatio V: Whether the good use of free will, proceeding from the aid of grace, is a cause, reason, or necessary condition of predestination in adults.

Disputatio VI: Whether the predestination of infants depended on, and presupposed, foreknowledge of the good use of the free will of their parents or of others through whom they came to the grace of baptism.

Disputatio VII: Whether the foreseen merits of Christ are the cause of our predestination with respect to its entire effect.

Disputatio VIII: Whether the grace of the state of innocence was conferred on Adam through the merits of Christ.

Disputatio IX: Whether predestination, with respect to the attainment of its effects, is certain and infallible with the certainty of the order and causality of the means.

Disputatio X: Whether anyone, apart from divine revelation, can know with infallible certainty that he or another is among the predestined, or infer this from certain signs.

Disputatio XI: Whether, at least among the faithful, there are more elect than reprobate.

Book Six

Introduction

Disputatio I: Whether the children of Adam contract original sin through seminal propagation, such that it truly and properly has the character of guilt in them.

Disputatio II: Whether through original sin man was only deprived of original justice and supernatural gifts, or also wounded in his natural powers.

Disputatio III: What wounds man incurs through original or actual sin.

Disputatio IV: Whether free will in fallen nature, apart from the aids of grace, has the same natural powers for good that it would have had if it had been created in a state of pure nature.

Disputatio V: Whether man can, by the powers of nature alone and without the aid of grace, know every truth pertaining to the natural order.

Disputatio VI: Whether man can, by the powers of nature alone, assent to all the supernatural mysteries proposed and explained to him as revealed by God, with assent that is certain and firm on the believer’s part.

Disputatio VII: Whether, without the aid of grace, man in fallen nature can perform a moral act that is truly good in relation to the ultimate natural end and is an act of true virtue.

Disputatio VIII: Whether man in fallen nature can, by the powers of nature alone together with God’s general concurrence, elicit an absolute, purely natural act of loving God above all things, with an absolute resolve to please him in everything.

Disputatio IX: Whether free will, with general concurrence alone, can elicit attrition or contrition with respect to the substance of the act alone.

Disputatio X: Whether man can, by the natural powers of free will, restore the good connatural to him that he lost through sin.

Disputatio XI: Whether fallen man can, without the aid of grace, keep all the commandments and resist, at every moment, all the temptations he encounters, even the gravest, which must be overcome to keep the natural law.

Book Seven

Introduction

Disputatio I: Whether man can, without the aid of grace, dispose himself at least remotely to obtain grace by asking, seeking, knocking, and so forth.

Disputatio II: Whether those who do all that lies in their power by nature alone receive from God, infallibly and according to a fixed law, the aids of prevenient grace by which they carry it out as required for salvation.

Disputatio III: Whether greater effort of free choice obtains greater or more intense aids of rousing and prevenient grace.

Disputatio IV: Whether someone who does all that lies in his power with the earlier aids of prevenient grace receives subsequent aids infallibly and according to a fixed law.

Disputatio V: Whether someone who does all that lies in his power with efficacious aid, that is, who elicits an act of charity and contrition, receives justifying grace infallibly and according to a fixed law.

Disputatio VI: Whether acts of charity equal to the preexisting habit, or even less intense acts, obtain an increase of habitual grace, charity, and essential glory infallibly and according to a fixed law.

Disputatio VII: Whether deadened merits obtain for the penitent, infallibly and according to an established law, greater habitual grace and a right to more intense essential glory.

Disputatio VIII: Whether greater effort or influence of free choice, with equal aid of assisting grace, obtains for one person greater justifying grace than for another.

Disputatio IX: Whether a naturally more perfect intellect, with equal light of glory, produces a more intense act of beatific vision than another.

Disputatio X: Whether the beatific vision, insofar as it is formally a vital act, is efficiently caused by the light of glory as the principle by which it is produced, or by the intellect alone according to its innate power.

Disputatio XI: Whether acts of believing, hoping, and loving God as the author of grace are supernatural in substance and in the being of nature, or only in their manner and in the moral order.

Disputatio XII: Whether the final disposition to habitual grace proceeds by way of efficient causation from grace itself, or from actual aid alone, that is, from the will elevated by that aid.