De auxiliis divinae gratiae et humani arbitrii viribus et libertate
Diego Álvarez (1550–1631)
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.
✦ This work is being completed — add a section.
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.
Whether man can know every truth pertaining to the order of nature by the powers of nature alone, without the help of grace.
I. To explain this difficulty, it should be noted that natural truths are of two kinds. Some are purely speculative, such as that quantity is distinct or not distinct from the thing quantified, that the principles of natural things are three, and other truths of this sort. It is most certain, and established by experience, that man can know some natural truths without the special help of grace. The reason is that the natural light was not extinguished through sin, but only injured. Other truths are moral and concern good moral actions as such, for example: theft must be avoided; parents must be honored.
Practical judgment concerning particular actions to be done, and so forth, is concerned with these truths. Speaking of these truths, Gregory of Rimini in 2 Sentences, dist. 27, q. 1, dist. 1, and Capreolus in the same book, dist. 28, q. 1, conclusion 1, hold that after the Fall man cannot know any moral truth by the powers of nature alone, without the special help of grace. Their chief arguments are given by Medina, part 2, q. 109, art. 1, doubt 1. But this opinion is commonly rejected by theologians. Hence, for the resolution, let this be
II. The first conclusion. In fallen nature man can know some moral virtues without the special help of grace.1 It is proved by the argument already made: sin did not extinguish the dictate or light of natural reason, but only wounded and injured it. Therefore, by his own powers together with the general concurrence of God, a man can know some natural truth. It is also proved as follows: as will be clear in Disputation 50, fallen man can by the powers of nature perform some morally good work, such as planting vines or giving a small alms to a needy person. Therefore, much more can he know by the powers of nature alone that this work should be done. The consequence is clear, for, as St. Thomas says, part 2, q. 109, art. 2, reply to objection 3: Human nature is more corrupted by sin with respect to appetite for the good than with respect to knowledge of the true.
The second conclusion. After the Fall man cannot by the powers of nature alone know all moral truths pertaining to the order of nature, nor have certain judgment in every situation about what should be done or avoided. This conclusion is common; Medina proves it in the same place, conclusion 2. The chief reason is that a weak and wounded nature cannot do all that a sound and intact nature can do. But knowing what should be done and avoided in every situation belongs to a sound and intact nature. Therefore in fallen nature man cannot know all these things unless he is first healed and helped by the aid of medicine. Hence the Wise Man says: The thoughts of mortals are fearful, and our plans uncertain; for the corruptible body weighs down the soul, and this earthly dwelling presses down the mind that thinks on many things; we can scarcely judge what is on earth, and what is before our eyes we find with labor.2 See what was said concerning this conclusion in Disputation 46, no. 2.
III. The third conclusion. Even in intact nature, with habitual grace, every help, and every special gift set aside, man could not, morally speaking, know collectively everything knowable that pertains to the order of nature, so as to have at once knowledge of all natural things.3 To make this conclusion clear, it should be noted that, as St. Thomas teaches in I, q. 101, art. 1, if some children had been born in the state of innocence, they would not have been perfect in knowledge at once; rather, they would have acquired it successively through the ministry of the senses, by discovery or from a teacher, though without any difficulty. The reason is that, as Aristotle teaches in On the Soul 3, text 14, our soul by its nature is like a blank tablet on which nothing has been depicted. Therefore, with the gift of grace set aside, no man has knowledge, nor would he have it in that state, unless he acquired it. Our conclusion is therefore proved: morally speaking, even in that state it would be impossible for one man to use the ministry of the senses to know collectively everything that is knowable by nature. For the power of any human intellect is limited, and, with the gift of grace set aside, it must receive species from knowable objects. But while the intellect attends to one knowable object, it turns away from another. Therefore, morally speaking, it could not collectively know everything knowable that pertains to the order of nature.
It is confirmed: although there is no ignorance in the holy angels, there is nevertheless nescience with respect to certain things, as Dionysius teaches in Celestial Hierarchy, chapter 7. Therefore ignorance with respect to certain things knowable by nature could also be admitted in a man, if he had been born in the state of original justice, when the thing knowable did not pertain to his state.4
IV. But an argument is made against the second and third conclusions. All natural truths are proportionate to our intellect according to its natural power. Therefore, even with the help of grace set aside, it can know all those truths. The antecedent is most certain: all natural truths are contained within the limits of nature; therefore all are proportionate to our intellect. It is confirmed. All natural truths are knowable by nature; therefore they can be known by some intellect through nature; therefore there could be an intellect of some man so perfect that he might know all natural truths by the powers of nature without the help of grace.
It is replied that all natural truths, taken separately, are proportionate to our intellect in intact nature, but not if they are taken collectively. Thus prime matter is proportionate to all natural forms taken separately, and so can naturally receive all of them separately, but not collectively.
It is replied, secondly, that if the argument proceeds in fallen nature, it presents no difficulty, since the intellect was wounded by sin and therefore is not proportionate to everything knowable by nature. But if it proceeds concerning man in intact nature, we say that, with the gift of grace set aside, even if all natural truths taken collectively were proportionate to man’s intellect, metaphysically speaking, because they belong to the same order, they would nevertheless not be proportionate to it, morally speaking, for the reasons given above. To the confirmation it is replied that all natural truths taken collectively are knowable by nature to some intellect, even a created one, namely, the angelic intellect; but it does not follow that all are knowable by nature collectively to the same human intellect, at least morally speaking.5 Other matters pertaining to this difficulty should be seen in Medina, in the place cited above.
Next we must treat supernatural truths and explain what natural powers man has, especially in fallen nature, for assenting to truths of this kind.