Palladium theologicum, Tomus quintus: De virtutibus

On Charity.

ON CHARITY, the Seraphic Bonaventure left monuments of his divine nature indeed brilliant and worthy, written as if with solar rays, that they might gleam in the eyes of all, everywhere in his Opuscula, and in other books; but especially in the Diaeta salutis, tit. 5. c. 2. he illustrates it with various comparisons, by which he symbolically epitomizes whatever he has said of it more fully elsewhere, reducing the whole to its figurative Type, its virtual act, and its final fruit.

TRULY, since these things serve more for inflaming the affections than for Scholastic erudition, I refer the reader to that place, where he will admire Charity as gold proved, most precious; as burning iron, everywhere Ductile; as wine seasoned, always sweet. He will also behold it as a noble bird, ever flying upward and touching the earth only by necessity of sustenance; as a laden ship, sailing over the sea of this world by the breath of the Holy Spirit alone; as, finally, death slaying the wicked sense of the flesh, or Carnality. But here, as the gift of the school, we shall discourse on Charity, as the Seraphic Doctor handed it down in the various distinctions, on the books of the Sentences.

What CHARITY is.

I ASSUME first, that Charity is here taken for supernatural love. For it can be assumed for natural love, which is divided into Friendship and Concupiscence. Second, for supernatural love, which is divided in the same way. I omit the third member of the division, of shameful love, which is indeed improperly called Charity, Judges 9. You shall strike him with the charity of my lips, that is, with lips simulating while speaking a flattering love.¹ See D. Bonaventure Lib. 5. Compend. Theol. cap. 24. Charity is truly so called from charis, which signifies grace in Greek, as D. Bonaventure notes dist. 27. question 3.

Now Charity, Dilection, and love of God are the same, as D. Bonaventure notes de profectu Religiosi, Book 2. cap. 23. Therefore Charity is love.

For this reason Christ first asked Peter: Dost thou love me more than these? and afterward: Lovest thou me? Wherefore St. Dionysius, and St. Augustine, cited below at D. Bonaventure in primo, dist. 10. dub. 1., reprehend those saying that Love signifies a libidinous affection, but Dilection an ordered one. Yet the Holy Doctor finds some distinction among these three: that Love signify the adherence of the affections to the beloved; whence St. Dionysius cap. 4. de divin. nom. says: We call love unitive. Dilection moreover signifies election; for dilection is so called from choosing among many, as we have Can. 5. Dilectus meus, electus e millibus. Charity, however, adds a pre-esteemedness; for that is called charum which is esteemed greatly on that account.² Thus the Apostle 1. Timot. 1. calls the faithful charissimi (most dear). The same the Holy Doctor teaches, in primo, in the exposition of the Prologue, dub. 4. which pertains to the Etymology of Charity; but as to love and charity together dist. 10. of the first Sent. dub. 4. I shall bring other distinctions below.

I assume second, with D. Bonaventure in primo, dist. 17. part. 1. question 1. and 2., as I shall show also in question 4., as I showed in the prima secundae, tract. 5. disp. 3. q. 2., that Charity is a created habit. But the Apostle bears witness, Rom. 5. it is poured forth in our hearts by the Holy Spirit, who is given to us, where he speaks of the charity by which we love God, as D. Augustine teaches Lib. de Spiritu, et littera, cap. 32. and 1 Corinthians 13. Faith, Hope, Charity remain, these three: but the greater of these is Charity. Whence the Council of Trent sess. 6. cap. 7. defines that in justification faith, hope, and inhering charity are infused. They define it in many ways, as the Holy Doctor relates in 3. dist. 27. dub. 1.

It is defined by D. Augustine Lib. 1. de moribus Ecclesiae, cap. 11. Charity is the most just affection of the soul, joining us with God, and in the soliloq. Charity is the virtue by which we desire to see God and to enjoy him, and Lib. de Spiritu, et anima, cap. 16. Charity is the life coupling the lover with the beloved, and by the Apostle, 1 Timot. 1. the end of the precept is charity from a pure heart, a good conscience, and an unfeigned faith.

But to explain these definitions, he sets up something against each.

Against the first. Dilection and charity are the same; therefore, since the Master defines charity by dilection, he defines the same by itself. Moreover, this definition befitted natural love in the state of innocence: therefore it is not proper to charity.

Against the second, because the affection of the soul is from the soul: but Charity is from God. Moreover, this definition can befit Hope: therefore it is not proper to Charity.

Against the third. Vision corresponds to faith, and fruition to every virtue: therefore charity is ill-defined by seeing and enjoying. Moreover, desire is in the absence, and something imperfect; but Charity is most perfect: therefore it is ill-defined by Desire.

Against the fourth it is, because to unite the lover with the beloved befits every love, as D. Dionysius teaches, cap. 4. de divin. nomib. part. 4. Therefore it is not proper to charity. Moreover, life is an absolute perfection: the coupling of the lover with the beloved is a respective quality: therefore it is ill-defined: Charity is the life coupling.

Against the last he objects. Charity is the root of the virtues, and the principle of merit: therefore it is not the end. Moreover, purity of heart is from faith, as is said Acts 15. faith purifying hearts: therefore it is not from charity.

The Holy Doctor answers. That Charity is defined in a manifold way according to its manifold comparison.

For Charity is compared to the object, and in this way it is defined by the Master. Although love and dilection are the same really, yet they differ formally in reason. For Dilection is broader than Charity. Whence it is customary to say: Love is of nature; dilection of the deliberative will; and Charity of grace. Moreover, Charity names the habit: Dilection names the act; and thus Charity is defined by dilection, as the less common by the more common, and the habit by its act; nor did it befit in the state of innocence as to the motive, but as to the formal reason.

Second, Charity can be compared to its proper act, and thus it is defined by D. Augustine de moribus Ecclesiae, and Lib. de spiritu, et anima; and when it is said: It is an affection of the soul, there is a causal predication, nor does it befit Hope, whose property is to raise up, not to unite: for it belongs to Faith to direct; to Hope to raise up; and to Charity to unite: to couple also, in an autonomastic way, befits charity, as he says in the act second of the relation.

Third, it can be compared to the ultimate end, and thus it is defined by D. Augustine in the soliloquies: for the desire of seeing God is from charity. Charity of the way is defined, which is imperfect: Or say, that desire is posited, with distaste excluded, which is also toward a thing present, as D. Peter says of the Angels, epist. 1. Into which things the Angels desire to look.

Fourth, it can be compared to the habit, which is the principle of charity. Thus it is defined by the Apostle. Nor does it repugn that it be the form, and the end, and the efficient: for these causes can coincide. For the form is the end of generation, and the efficient of the operations of the composite.

The Holy Doctor brings the same definitions of charity Lib. 5. compend. cap. 23., where he expresses the Apostle's description more fully. It is called the end, that is, the complement of the law, and the end to which all the precepts are ordered, that charity itself may be increased. It is said: from a pure heart, that is, intellect, or intellection, as the Gloss says; for the act of charity is caused from intellection: for the more purely and more perfectly a man understands God, the more apt he is to love. It is said: from a good conscience, that is, a pure conscience, which whoever has, hopes securely; and an unfeigned faith, that is, not fragile, nor feigned, but strong amid adversities.

There he brings a full description of Charity from D. Prosper Lib. 3. de vita contemplativa, cap. 13. Charity is the right will utterly turned away from all things earthly, present, and future, joined to God inseparably, and united, kindled by a certain fire of the Holy Spirit, from whom it is, and to whom it is referred, wholly alien to every defilement, knowing not how to be corrupted, subject to no vice of changeableness, raised above all things that are loved carnally, most powerful over all affections, avid for divine contemplation, always unconquered in all things, the sum of good actions, the health of morals, the end of the celestial precepts, the death of crimes, the life of the virtues, the virtue of those fighting, the palm of the just, the armature of holy minds, the cause of good merits, the reward of the perfect: without which no one has pleased God, with which no one could displease him, fruitful in penitents, joyful in those progressing, glorious in those persevering, victorious in Martyrs, laborious in all the faithful without exception, from which whatever of good work there is, lives.

This definition embraces the perfections of charity for every state, but not for the way alone. He defines it again in the opusc. Declaratio terminorum Theologiae: Charity is the virtue by which God is loved for himself; and the neighbor for God: but he says that Love is a natural affection, common to rational and irrational beings: that Dilection is the affection of rational beings. He has the same definition of charity in the opusc. de tribus ternariis pecc. cap. 4.

But he hands down the definition of Charity most exactly in the septem Itineribus aeternitatis, itinerary 4.

First, moreover, he prefaces that in divine matters Love, Dilection, and Charity can be taken for the same, as have St. Dion. cap. 4. de divin. nominibus, and D. Augustine Lib. 8. de Trinitate, cap. 10.

But that he may the more segregate Divine love, he observes that many loves are given. The first is natural, which is an inclination to a good, not supposing cognition; thus all things love their own conservation. Whence Job 37. The clouds desire the grain, that is, it has a natural inclination to this good. The second is animal love, supposing sensible cognition, and this is in animals alone. The third is intellectual love, supposing intellective cognition; and this is twofold: one supposing an intellective cognition merely natural, or light; and it is from a will not deliberated; another supposes a deliberated cognition with respect to a good related to another, as end; and this is elective love: the former is still called natural. But if that love be toward a supernatural good, it will be from supernatural charity, as it is founded on the supernal cognition of faith. This also in the Angel is Angelic.

Therefore Love is the unitive virtue of the lover with the beloved proportionally, in the ways said.

But that he may the more separate the dross of other affections from the gold of charity, he again distinguishes in man five loves.

The first is natural affection, such as that of anyone toward his own body: For no man ever hated his own flesh, Ephes. 5. Likewise of a mother toward her son, of which Isa. 49. Can a woman forget her infant, the child of her womb? Indeed, as it is impossible for this affection not to harm unless bridled by reason, so that it not follow is the height of virtue.

This affection always gladly embraces the delicate, but shuns the rough. Of this immoderate one Christ speaks, Ioan. 12. He who loves his soul shall lose it. Whence St. Augustine tract. 51. If thou lovest ill, then thou hatest; if thou hatest well, then thou hast loved. Hence you will grasp the saying of Cicero de amicitia: The charity that is between parents and children cannot be broken, except by a detestable crime. For he speaks as to the natural moderate inclination.

The second is carnal affection, which is twofold. One is a certain propensity toward some habit of someone, as the sweetness of eloquence, the elegance of countenance; thus Exodi 2. the daughter of Pharaoh loved Moses, an infant of elegant countenance, and adopted him as a son. The other, however, allures to things noxious; such was David's 2. Reg. 11. and Solomon's 3. Reg. 11. St. Dionysius de Ang. Hier. cap. 2. calls this affection a distant Idol of true love, and it is full of anxiety; but Charity is delightful.

The third affection is dutiful, or official, as Richard says de Trinitate, Lib. 3. cap. 3., which inclines souls to services and duties, which is a sign of a grateful mind: therefore it is to be admitted, though it be perilous. From this affection charity differs, which does not seek the things that are its own, 1 Corinth. 13.

The fourth is Rational, of which D. Gregory Lib. 10. moral. cap. 4., which arises from the consideration of another's virtue. This is the affection that animates the soul, from the splendid deeds of elders, to undergo eminent things. It differs from charity, which arises from the interior breathing of the Holy Spirit.

The fifth is spiritual affection, and this is threefold: one breathed in by a malignant spirit; another by the human spirit; another by the Holy Spirit. By a malignant spirit Amnon burned for Thamar, 2. Reg. 13. and Judas for gold against Christ Ioan. 13. From the human spirit arise spirits resembling charity; thus many laid down their life for their fatherland and citizens, as D. Augustine relates Lib. 5. de civit. cap. 18. and Cicero Lib. 1. de offic., where he relates that there were two precepts of Plato, given to those willing to benefit the Republic. The first, that they so defend the utility of the citizens that whatever they do they refer to it, forgetful of their own advantages. The second, that they care for the whole body of the Republic principally, lest while they defend some part they desert the rest. From the Divine spirit, however, the affection of charity is infused.

Truly this differs from the others. First in origin, because it is infused by God alone, as is said Rom. 5. The natural is born with nature, and the other is acquired. Second it differs formally, because it is the life of the soul; not so that one. Third, because it is the form of the other virtues; not so that one. Fourth in end, because it is toward a supernal end, leading out of guilt and conducting into grace; not so the others. These differences St. Bernard serm. 50. in Cant. and D. Bonaventure in the place cited intimate.

From this doctrine St. Bonaventure elicits what Charity is: Charity is a created supernatural virtue, by which men love God inasmuch as he is a certain Good looking to a supernatural order for himself; and so its object is the goodness of God immediately; therefore it is a Theological virtue. So commonly the Theologians, at D. Thom. question 23. Valencia disp. 3. question 1. part 1. Palau tract. 6. disp. 1. p. 1. Caspesius tract. 17. disp. 1. sect. 2. Morandus tract. unico, question 21.

The name of charity in Hebrew is חבה: Haabat. Not Nabaa, as Valencia reads disp. 3. question 1. part 1. it signifies gratuitous love, Hierem. 31. In perpetual charity I have loved thee.

Therefore charity is defined, Virtue, which indeed is in the genus of a good habit: but I shall prove it to be a habit, and a good, and to be a special Theological virtue. It is called supernatural Haabat. Then it is said that God is loved by charity for himself, as he is good, not for me, but in himself. Although St. Augustine in primo solil. cap. 6. say that charity is the desire of seeing God, it does not stand in the way; for this desire also refers beatitude to God himself, as I shall say with D. Bonaventure question 17., and Caspesius notes disp. 1. sect. 1. num. 5. Moreover, the Definition will be expounded in the questions.

I assume from what was said in the Tract. de fide, that the object of the Virtues is twofold: the Material, which is the thing that is looked at; and the Formal, which is the reason under which it is looked at. Of both I inquire.

THE COMMON opinion is, that the material object of charity is God, and the neighbor, and whatever can be loved for God, as the end is supernatural; yet so that God is the principal object of attribution, on account of which the rest are loved: for thus it was found in Hope, and in faith. And yet we do not confuse the material object with the formal, as Arriaga disp. 31. sect. 2. thinks; for the formal object is the reason under which God is loved, namely, as good in himself, as I shall say; and also as good to us: for the formal object is that which is the motive and specificative of the act itself, or determinant of the potency and habit toward acting about the material subject, as Mastrius disp. 6. question 20. num. 516. observes.

I ASSERT first, that the material object of the attribution of Charity is God.

IT IS PROVED first by the Holy Doctor dist. 27. in dubiis litt. and dist. 28. question 6. First from the definitions of charity brought above question 1.

THEN from Deuter. 6. Matth. 20. Lucae 10. Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with thy whole heart, etc. Which the Holy Doctor pursues at length on Lucae 10.

IT IS PROVED second by the Holy Doctor 3. dist. 26. art. 2. question 4. Because the virtues looking to God immediately look to God distinctly, as an immediate object; such is Charity: Therefore.

IT IS PROVED third by the Holy Doctor, the same dist. question 5. That Theological virtue which is reformatory of the will; and stands in the will as concupiscible, is borne toward the highest Good, God: Charity is such a Virtue: Therefore.

IT IS PROVED fourth by St. Bonav. dist. 28. question 6. and D. Thom. question 25. art. 1. That is the first object of Charity, in which goodness first shines forth: such is God: therefore. This Fulgent. lib. 3. cap. 9. urges.

I ASSERT second, that other things also pertain to the material object of charity, namely those which can have fellowship in the supernatural end, namely the neighbor, in whom we ourselves are included, as also our bodies look to it, and other men, as I shall say in question 28.

IT IS PROVED first by St. Bonav. in the places brought from the Scriptures, which place the neighbor also in the precepts of charity. This the Holy Doctor pursues at length in cap. 14. and following of Ioannis.

IT IS PROVED second by the Holy Doctor dist. 28. question 1. He who loves God wills him the good of his; but we with the neighbor can be loved in order to God, as his good: Therefore we can love the neighbor by the act of charity, by which we love God, and will him good. Whence Ioan. 1. cap. 4. If we love one another, the charity of God is perfect in us. D. August. 10. de Trinitate, cap. 8. consents. Whence Matth. 25. What you have done to one of these my least, you have done to me. For if Christ reckons as his goods those goods that are conferred upon men, men act most prudently when they will good to men, that in those the same goods may be attributed to God. I confirm it, because the neighbor is a something of God, partaker of beatitude: but it belongs to perfect friendship not only to love him with whom friendship is contracted primarily and principally, but also on account of him the things that pertain to him: for thus a friend loves a friend, and for him also the friend's son; yet this love of friendship does not extend by the same reason to the friend's Dog, as the Holy Doctor observes, who thence elicits that irrational things are not loved with charity, because they do not communicate with us in the supernatural good.

Wherein Caspensis disp. 3. sect. 1. with D. Bonav. loc. cit. and dist. 9. art. 2. question 4. observes that the neighbor can be honestly loved in two ways. First, on account of God's goodness alone, that is, from the desire of the divine good, because the good bestowed on the neighbor is in a certain way the good of God, and this dilection manifestly pertains to Theological charity; for it is one act by which we love God, and the neighbor for God, as the Holy Doctor notes ad 3. and D. Thom. question 25. art. 1., and therefore it pertains to the same virtue. In another way the neighbor can be loved, either on account of the likeness in rational nature, or on account of the virtues, etc. and this dilection is not Charity, as D. Thom. also teaches question 103. art. 3. ad 2. Vasquez lib. 1. de ador. disp. 6. cap. 2. and lib. 3. disp. 1. cap. 6. Caspens. loc. cit. num. 3. Valencia disp. 3. question 1. p. 1. at the end.

I ASSERT third, that the formal object of Charity is God as good in himself. So D. Bonav. 3. dist. 26. art. 2. question 4. and 5. and dist. 27. and 28. passim, and frequently in the opuscula, and commonly the Theologians.

IT IS PROVED first by the Holy Doctor. The dilection by which someone is loved for himself ought to be absolute; but this dilection of charity is of this kind: Therefore.

IT IS PROVED second, because Charity is the virtue perfecting the will in order to God, therefore as object; but it is the object as good: Therefore.

But in truth, because also Natural love loves God's goodness, it is necessary to find something formal by which Charity is distinguished from it.

COMMONLY the Thomists teach with the Angelic Doctor 1. 2. question 109. art. 3. ad 1. that the formal object of charity is God, inasmuch as he is in himself good, with a goodness pertaining to the supernatural order, or with the goodness by which God is the principle of supernatural goods. So Suarez disp. 1. sect. 2. Casp. disp. 1. sect. 1. Amicus, and other Recentiores, and it seems D. Bonav. de septem Itineribus aeternitatis, Itinere 4. cap. 2. and dist. 27. dub. 1. litt. around the definition of charity, from D. Aug. soliloq. 1. cap. 6. in haec 3. sent. and more fully dist. 28. question 1. whole, and dist. 27. question 2. ad 3.

MANY, however, say that the formal reason of the object of charity is expanded more broadly, and that it is the goodness of God, by which he is in himself infinitely good and perfect, according to every reason of being. Whence they infer that the same supernatural habit inclines to loving God as a natural end, and as the author of natural and supernatural goods. So Vasquez p. 2. disp. 195. cap. 2. and 3. Coninch. disp. 21. dub. 2. For which opinion they bring Scotus 3. dist. 27. question unica, §. contra primam viam. And §. quantum ad istum articulum, and Arriaga judges it probable disp. 31. sect. 2. and 3. and Mastrius 3. disp. 6. question 20. num. 519. with Bassoli 3. dist. 28. question un. art. 1. Poncio disp. 32. question 1. and other Scotists. This opinion seems to be D. Bonav.'s dist. 28. question 1. ad 3. and dist. 26. art. 2. question 4. fund. 1.

I ASSERT, that God is the formal object of Theological Charity, inasmuch as he is a supernatural good in himself.

IT IS PROVED, otherwise supernatural Charity would not be distinguished from natural love; because it would not have a distinct formal object; but this repugns the Fathers. It is confirmed; for God has a different lovableness, inasmuch as he is a natural end, and as a supernatural end. Of this I have treated sufficiently disp. 1. question 28. See there. It is confirmed by D. Bonav. dist. 26. dubio 1. from the definition of Charity, which is the desire of supernatural beatitude, or of having God. It is confirmed by the Holy Doctor in Cantic. 3. p. sect. 40. Charity is the virtue ultimately rectifying the will in order to its object: therefore to the highest good under the reason of the highest; but this is the ultimate attainment of supernatural beatitude: Therefore.

Mastrius answers num. 529. That God also, as the author of creatures, can be the object of supernatural charity; whence the Saints were often roused from the love of creatures to the love of God, and since they burned so ardently into the love of God, it is incredible that they elicited only acts of natural love, as Coninch. notes disp. 5. dub. 3. It is confirmed by D. Bonav. lib. 2. Pharetrae, cap. 25. around the middle from D. August. lib. 10. confess. cap. 6. where he cries out: Lord, thou hast struck my heart with thy love, and I loved thee. But heaven and earth, and all things that are in them, behold, on every side they say to me, that I should love thee, nor do they cease saying to all, that they may be inexcusable, and there St. Augustine pours himself out, rising from the creatures into the love of God, from the light, from music, from foods, from odors; and Lib. de spiritu et anima, cap. 17. Wretched I, how much I ought to love my God, who made me when I was not, redeemed me when I had perished. I was not, and from nothing he made me; not a stone, not a tree, not a bird, or any of the animals; but he willed me to be a man: he gave me to live, to sense, to discern, and to understand. I had perished, and he descended to the mortal, took on mortality, endured the passion, conquered death, and thus restored me.

The same St. August. epist. 3. to Volusianus, at D. Bonav. loc. cit. Pharetrae: Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind: and thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself. Here is the Physica: because all the causes of all natures are in God the Creator. Here is the Ethica: because the good and honest life is formed from nothing else than when the things that are to be loved are loved as they ought to be loved, that is, God, and the neighbor. Here is the Logica: because truth, and the Light of the rational soul, is nothing but God. See other things there in the Holy Doctor.

You can bring with the Seraphic Doctor the example of St. P. Francis, who rose from the creatures to the Creator: Commanding praise to praise him, praise was always present to him; I say, the praise of the Savior: he invites the birds, the beasts, and the other creatures to the praise of the Creator. Although he loved them with a love not of charity, but of piety, as the Holy Doctor says dist. 28. question 1., yet from thence he flew upward to the supernal love of God.

Truly, however, charity regards both reasons of goodness, so that as to the supernatural it needs the supernal light, as the Holy Doctor notes loc. cit. de 4. Itinere aeternit. cap. 2.; nevertheless it can, from the natural object known, with the light of faith added, rise to a supernatural act.

For indeed disp. 1. de fide, question 28. I have already maintained that supernatural acts are distinguished from natural ones by the objects. Therefore the answer to the authorities is, that the Saints rose from the creatures to God by natural love, by which they were disposed, that they might be raised up to God, as a supernatural end.

Scotus objects, and with him Mastrius num. 519. That God, by the power of charity, is to be loved so, that he would still be loved even if he were never willing to be for us the cause of supernatural gifts: and in this way the Saints, burning with charity, love God. Otherwise, however, the Thomists, constituting God the object of Charity as he is the author of supernatural goods, make charity to be a love of concupiscence.

Yet this argument is weak, as Arriaga himself notes: for we do not say that we love God with charity only as a good for us; but as in himself a good diffusive of supernatural goods, or naturally communicable as to supernatural things; and under this reason he can excite a love of friendship.

Mastrius presses num. 520. That God, even if he were not communicable in this way, would still be lovable by Charity, because in himself good, he is infinitely perfect.

It is answered, that he is lovable as good in every way, but with natural love also; whence it does not follow that he ought to be the object of supernatural charity, otherwise the natural and supernatural habits would be confounded; and if the natural can attain the supernatural object, in vain would the Councils, and the Scriptures, have required help through Christ, as I argued at length disp. 1. question 28.

From the fact that God in himself is the object of Charity, it seems that charity is a friendship between God and men.

Some have denied that there is friendship between God and men.

Yet the true opinion is affirmative. So D. Bonav. 3. dist. 27. art. 2. quaest. 2. and in 1. dist. 48. quaest. ult. argumento 3. which D. Thom. concedes quaest. 23. art. 1., whom others commonly follow, as Valencia reports disp. 3. quaest. 1. p. 2., Casp. Tract. 17. disp. 1. sect. 2., Mastrius disp. 6. quaest. 20. num. 535., Tannerus disp. 2. quaest. 2. dub. 1., Fulgent. lib. 3. cap. 8., Bassaeus v. Charit. I discussed this question p. 1. tract. 1. disp. 17. quaestione 3.

I assert with this opinion that there is friendship between God and just men.

It is proved by D. Bonav. ad 14. Ioan. with those words: You are my friends.

It is proved secondly by S. Doct. loc. cit. in 3. and by Aristotle 8. Eth. cap. 10, where he says: The friendship of sons toward parents, and of men toward God, is like that toward something excellent. And in lib. 10. cap. 8 he says: The wise, whose Wisdom extends to an honest life, are most dear to the Gods.

Now friendship is not of equality, but of excellence toward one supernal end, by communicating in goods; for equality is not essential to friendship; a Geometric proportion suffices. Moreover, Scripture asserts this friendship of God with men: Iudit. 8. Abraham was made the friend of God. Psal. 138. Exceedingly honored are your friends, O God. Sap. 7. They were made partakers of the Friendship of God. Isa. 41. The seed of Abraham, my friends. Lucae 12. But I say to you, my friends, where he also adds the mutual love of benevolence, which is the foundation of friendship, according to Ioan. 16. The Father himself loves you, because you have loved me.

Then Ioan. 15. at those words: I will no longer call you servants, but friends, he puts another condition of friendship, which is communication in goods, and therefore says: All things whatsoever I have heard from the Father, I have made known to you. Hence also D. Peter: You shall be made partakers of the divine nature. And Rom. 8. You have received the spirit of adoption, in which we cry: Abba (Father.)

That he be loved by the Lord for our own good is proved from the form of the precept: You shall love the Lord your God, etc. As the Father has loved me, so have I loved you.

That this love exists, fourthly, is clear from Rom. 8. The Spirit gives testimony to our spirit, etc., that is, in that moral mode by which it can stand firm while we are on earth.

Thus the conditions of friendship, set out broadly by Aristotle 8. Eth. c. 3. 4. 5. and 9. and D. Thom. here, are proved. See Gregory of Valencia disp. 3. quaest. 1. puncto 2.

Whether Charity is a created Habit.

The MAGISTER, 1. dist. 17, is seen to assert that the charity by which we love God is the Holy Spirit himself, moving the will of man to love without any infused habit; yet he is interpreted most benignly by S. Doct.: not because the Holy Spirit is the form of the soul disposing it to love, but because he moves the affection immediately without a habit. Yet even in this he falls short.

I assert therefore that Charity is a habit. This is the common view of Theologians, and after the Council of Trent certain from faith.

IT IS PROVED by D. Bonav. That which has the ratio of a form infused by God, or by the Holy Spirit, is something created, distinct from its efficient cause, namely from the Holy Spirit; but the Charity of God is poured forth in our hearts by the Holy Spirit, who is given to us from cap. 5. ad Rom. The Major is evident: for God cannot be a form, otherwise he would be an imperfect inexisting part, and every cause differs really from its effect. By this argument the Council of Trent, session 6, defines, cap. 7, The charity of God is poured forth in the hearts of those who are justified, and inheres in them. And can. 11 defines that men are not justified by the sole remission of sins, with grace and charity excluded, which is poured forth and inheres in their hearts. Again, the Minor is proved from the Council of Orange, can. 25. It is altogether a Gift of God to love God; for the Spirit of the Father and the Son pours charity into our hearts, whom we love with the Father and the Son. The same is proved in the Council of Vienne, as is related in Clement. unica, de summa Trinitate. The Minor is confirmed again; for as Faith and Hope are ordered to reforming the mind, so much more is Charity, which is the life of the soul: therefore a form. But God cannot be a form, because he cannot enter into composition with another being, as is necessary for the esse of a form.

IT IS PROVED by S. Doct. fundamento 4. from all the Scriptures which assert that Charity grows, diminishes, is lost, and recovered. Prima Ioan. 2. Whoever keeps his word, truly in this the Charity of God is perfected. Philip. 1. This I pray, that the Charity of God may abound more and more. Apoc. 2. You have left your first Charity. Be mindful therefore from where you have fallen: and do penance.

IT IS PROVED lastly. That which distinguishes the just man from the impious not only in act but also in rest, and which those who cannot have proper acts, such as infants, must have, must be created and inhering habitually: for the first cause is related in one way to all; such is Charity according to the Councils cited, defining that it is therefore also infused into infants. Only the Council of Vienne does not define it.

IT IS PROVED also in corpore by S. Doct. If the Holy Spirit were charity, he would be unifiable, and then either by nature or by grace: not by nature, as is evident. If by grace, then again by means of something else, etc.

IT IS PROVED there also by the argument which Valencia uses: That by which the will, as principal cause, elicits the act of love must be created; but Charity is that by which it elicits, etc. Therefore.

YOU OBJECT first. No accident is better than a substance: Charity is better than the soul, for it elevates and perfects it, and nothing is better than it, from D. August. lib. 1. de moribus Ecclesiae: Therefore.

S. Doct. answers that Charity is better as the medium without which the soul lacking it cannot be ordered to the supernatural end: for it is proper to accidents to perfect a substance accidentally. But those things infused by God above nature perfect it intimately, of which they are the illustrious similitude and participation. Such an accident is charity, as is said in 2 Peter, 1, as Valencia notes with D. Thomas.

YOU OBJECT secondly. No created goodness is equivalent to beatitude; but charity is equivalent to Beatitude; for by it we merit glory: Therefore.

S. Bonav. answers that it is equivalent by divine estimation, which deems the work of charity worthy of eternal life.

YOU OBJECT thirdly. Every created good is good by participation, and therefore can fail to be good: therefore lacking order.

IT IS answered that the thing ordered is one thing; the order another; and this cannot fail to be good.

YOU OBJECT fourthly. The Holy Spirit can inflame the affection by himself; therefore a habit is required in vain. The Antecedent is proved: for God is charity, prima Ioan. 4. Therefore prima Cor. 6. it is said: Who cleaves to God is made one spirit with him.

S. Doct. answers that God himself is signified there, and yet Charity is required, informed by which we may work: For we are God's helpers, prima Cor. 3. Therefore inhering charity is posited not from a defect of divine power, but so that we may cooperate with God in a connatural mode, moving through something formally determining.

YOU OBJECT fifthly. A natural virtue is farther from God than the will; but God moves nature immediately: Therefore.

S. Doct. answers that nature, because it operates uniformly and necessarily, determined to one thing, does not need a regulating habit; unlike the will, which moves non-uniformly, being indifferent. Next, the soul is moved only within the limits of nature; but the will above nature, therefore it needs an elevating habit.

YOU OBJECT sixthly. Where there is a first mover, another virtue is superfluous; but God always moves the soul: Therefore.

IT IS answered that another virtue is required for operating in the connatural mode, that it may be formally perfected.

YOU OBJECT seventhly. No lesser virtue is necessary for reforming than for creating; but an infinite virtue is required for creating: Therefore also for reforming: but reformation is done through charity: Therefore this is the infinite Virtue of God.

S. Doct. answers that reformation is from God as efficient, but because this is an elevation to works above nature, some disposing form is required.

YOU OBJECT eighthly. No vanity can be united to God; every creature is vanity: Therefore it cannot unite to God; but charity unites to God: Therefore it is not a creature.

S. Doct. answers that grace, as a creature, is empty; but as it is a Divine influence it is not vanity.

YOU OBJECT ninthly. That which orders to the ordered love must be proportioned; but charity orders to loving God, who is an infinite good: Therefore infinitely: Therefore it must be something infinite.

S. Doct. answers that Charity does not make us love God as much as he is lovable, but as much as he ought to be loved by us, so that he be esteemed above all creatures, which could be infinite in number; and for this finite supernatural Charity suffices, that it be preferred in estimation to the other goods.

From what has been said you have what censure was owed to those denying that charity is a habit: for I judge with Valencia here, and Soto lib. 2. de natura, et gratia, cap. 17. et 18., Bannes quaest. 23. art. 2., that it is indeed not heresy to deny it, from the Council of Vien. loc. cit. and Innocent, cap. Maiores de Baptismo, where the denying opinion is not condemned; but only the opposite is asserted as more probable. Yet I say it is rash, and proximate to error, as Valencia notes with Gabriel dist. 23. art. 2. quaest. 2.

For the Church in the Council of Trent seems to define this equivalently. And the Scriptures speak of charity as of a permanent habit: Charity never falls away, prima Corinth. 13. There remain Faith, Hope, Charity, these three: Apoc. 2. You have left your first Charity, etc. But if charity were not a habit, it would not incline so perfectly, easily, and delectably to loving God, as D. Thom. also argues with D. Bonav. ad argumenta; for potencies do not have a perfect connection to acts except through habits, which were instituted by God for eliciting acts, giving the potency a mode of facility; and if they are supernatural, they elevate the potency even to sustaining acts.

From these you will understand what the Magister opposes from prima Ioan. 3. God is charity, and he who abides in charity abides in God, and God in him. He means to say that God is the author of charity. For it is said also: our Patience, causally, and he who abides in charity, namely infused, etc. It is thus expounded by S. Doct. opusculo Reductio artium ad Theologiam; et de septem donis, de Dono intellectus, cap. 5. et de 7. Itineribus aeternitatis, dist. 6.

There WERE some with D. Bonau. asserting that all the Virtues are indivisibly one substance, multiplied in acts, yet in such a way that one has the acts of the others; whence Justice is prudent, and Prudence is just, Faith loves, Charity believes, and especially Charity, which, as the Apostle says, 1. Corinth. 13. is patient, is benign, and enumerates there fifteen works of virtue. They strongly lean on this opinion of D. August. from his saying de moribus Ecclesiae, where he says: Virtue is nothing but the highest love of God.

OTHERS said that Charity, since it perfects the concupiscible power, which is diffused through all the other powers, is a general virtue, embracing the rest.

The TRUE opinion is that Charity is a special Virtue, distinct from the others. So S. Bonau., D. Thom., and the rest of the Theologians.

I ASSERT first that Charity is a special virtue, distinct from the others.

IT IS PROVED by D. Bonau. first from the Apostle 1. Cor. 13. There remain Faith, Hope, Charity, these three: but the greater of these is Charity. Since therefore he calls charity one of the Theological virtues, and greater than the others; he admits that it is distinct, as Valencia also notes disp. 3. quaest. 1. p. 1.

IT IS PROVED secondly by S. Doct. with the reason used by D. Thom., Valencia loc. cit., Caspensis disp. 1. sect. 3., Fuliens. lib. 3. cap. 8. That is a special virtue which has a special formal object. Such is charity: Therefore. The Minor is proved, because it tends to God insofar as in himself he is the highest good of the supernatural order, which cannot be had naturally. But no other Virtue regards this formal ratio, neither a moral one, as is evident per se, nor a Theological one; for Faith and Hope, which are Theological virtues, regard God under other ratios. For Faith regards him as he is the first and highest Truth: Hope regards God as a supernatural good, and the object of our beatitude, not in any way whatever, but as arduous to attain.

IT IS PROVED thirdly by S. Doct. from the acts. Habits are found to differ by diverse acts; but the acts of charity are altogether diverse from the acts of the other virtues: Therefore.

IT IS PROVED fourthly by S. Doct. from the subject. The Theological virtues are ordered to rectifying the powers in relation to God; but charity rectifies a different power, namely the concupiscible; as Faith the rational, and Hope the irascible: Therefore.

IT IS PROVED fifthly by S. Doct. by comparison to its opposite. Because the vice opposed to charity, namely the hatred of God, is distinguished from all the others: Therefore by reason of a special habit of one opposed Virtue; for one thing is opposed to one.

IT IS PROVED sixthly by comparison to the reward. When some things are so related that when one is perfected the others are evacuated, those habits must differ essentially; but the habit of Charity is perfected and consummated in the fatherland; while the habit of Faith and Hope is evacuated, as is said in prima Corinth. 13. Therefore.

IT IS PROVED seventhly in corpore from the principle which it represents. That the image of God be in the soul expressly, it is necessary that three distinct potencies be found; and that, reformed supernaturally, they have similitude, it is necessary that they be clothed with supernatural habits toward God; but on account of the image of creation they are one essence in three potencies, representing one Divine essence in three Persons: Therefore that it may express the supernatural similitude, for which it was created Genes. 1. God created man to his Image and similitude, it is necessary that the essence be endowed with sanctifying grace, and the three potencies with Theological habits: the Intellect indeed with Faith; Memory with Hope; and the Will with Charity. See disp. 6. quaest. 10. in calce.

YOU OBJECT first, prima Corinth. 13. Charity is patient, benign, etc. Therefore it is general.

S. Doct. answers that the acts of the other virtues are elicited by them; but commanded by charity, which also elicits its proper acts of loving God.

YOU OBJECT secondly: Charity is that Virtue by which every thing to be loved is loved, as D. Hieronymus says.

S. Doct. answers that this definition is causal, because Charity moves all the virtues to operating, and what is chief, meritoriously; for without charity nothing profits for eternal life, as is said 1. Cor. 13.

YOU OBJECT thirdly, from D. Bernardo lib. de diligendo Deo, and D. August. lib. 15. de civit. cap. 22. Virtue is nothing other than the order of love.

S. Doct. answers first that this is a causal definition; for charity is the commanding Cause, and thus even the efficient of the acts of the other virtues. It is also a form; for it gives to all their perfect being in the genus of merit. Finally it is the End of the whole law and of the precepts, and joins to the ultimate End.

RESPONDET: S. Doct. answers secondly that that love which is put in the definition of Virtue is the love of whatever virtue, not charity.

You object fourthly. As the precept of charity is related to the other precepts, so the habit of charity to the other habits: but the precept of charity embraces the other precepts: Therefore also the habit of charity all the other habits.

S. Doct. answers that Charity comprehends the other precepts not by identity, but by a certain reduction, in that they are reduced to the root of charity, as D. Gregor. says, homil. 27. in Evang.: not that the other virtues do not fulfill the precepts in their own genus, as Temperance abstaining from fornication; but because the other virtues without charity do not execute the precepts according to the divine execution.

You object fifthly. As the object of charity is related to the objects of the other virtues, so the acts of charity to the acts of the other virtues; but the object of charity is the good, which is the common object of all the objects of the other virtues: Therefore the habit also is common.

S. Doct. answers that Charity does not regard the Good as it is a passion of being, but the highest good immediately; and this is its material object, by which it is distinguished from the Cardinal virtues, which regard created good: Nor does it regard a good begun in any way whatever, but under the formal motivating ratio, as I said quaest. 2.

You object sixthly. That which is superfluous is not admitted by God and nature; but the other virtues are superfluous: Therefore. The Minor is proved; for Charity suffices for merit. Therefore D. August. says Hold charity, and do whatever you wish. It suffices also for beatitude; for to enjoy is to adhere in love, as D. August. says, lib. 1. de Doctrina christ. cap. 4. Therefore either the other virtues are superfluous; or Charity itself is General.

S. Doct. answers that charity is said to suffice for merit and for reward on account of the connection it has with the other virtues and dowries. For whoever has Charity has the other virtues; and whoever has the corresponding dowry has also the other dowries. Therefore it is not rightly inferred that the others are superfluous, because no one can merit unless he believes and hopes; nor is he fit for believing and hoping except through Hope and Faith.

Whether Charity is one most special species.

I assert that it is one ultimate in species. So the Theologians commonly hold, as at Tanner disp. 2. quaest. 2. dub. 1. num. 19.

It is proved first by D. Bonaventure. Just as Faith regards God as the highest truth, so Charity regards him as the highest goodness; but because the first Truth is one, Faith is one, as the Apostle says Ephes. 4. One faith: Therefore. It is confirmed by 1 Corinth. 13. And now there remain Faith, Hope, Charity, these three: where Faith and Charity are said to be one in the same way. With this argument Valencia deals in disp. 1. quaest. 1. p. 1.

It is proved secondly by S. Thomas. As the rational power is related to the true, and the irascible to the arduous, so the concupiscible is related to the good; but the rational power is perfected by one virtue in believing the truth, and the irascible in hoping for the arduous: Therefore also the concupiscible in loving the good; but this virtue is charity: Therefore.

It is proved thirdly by S. Thomas. The more unitive a thing is, the more one it is in itself; but Charity is the bond of perfection from 3. ad Coloss. Therefore.

It is proved fourthly by S. Thomas. In every genus in which there is an order of motions, the first mover must be one; but charity is the mover of all the virtues, commanding all the others: Therefore it is altogether one in species in all.

It is proved fifthly by S. Thomas in corpore. If the ultimate object is one and the principal act is one, the habit is one; but the object of charity is one as ultimate, because it is the highest good, and the act of willing that highest good is one: Therefore, although that highest good be willed — God loved for his own sake, and for itself, and for the neighbor — there will be one Virtue; and by this the opposite argument is resolved, which labors to multiply charities because Charity is borne toward God and the neighbor.

For S. Thomas answers, and Valencia with him, that both are loved for the sake of one thing under one formal aspect, by which the habit is unified and distinguished.

And if you say that charity wills for the neighbor not only the highest good but also other goods.

S. Thomas answers that the principal act is to will the highest good; the others only secondarily; and not elicited, but imperative, commanding the other virtues, say almsgiving, that it may give succor, etc.

You will object secondly. Where there are two diverse precepts, there are several habits enabling; but there are two precepts of charity: Therefore.

S. Thomas answers that those two precepts are diverse materially, not formally; because one is included in the other. Hence it does not follow that the habit of charity is diversified formally.

You will object thirdly. Where there are diverse acts, there are diverse habits; but the acts of loving God for himself and the neighbor for God are diverse in genus: Therefore.

S. Thomas answers that that diversity comes from a diverse comparison of the same formal object, not from a diversity of object, which is one; and therefore it does not follow that the formal object is diverse.

You will object fourthly. Wisdom, which is about eternal things, is another habit than science, which is about temporal things: And likewise Latria, which is the worship of God, is another virtue than Dulia, which is the worship given to one superior: Therefore by equal reason, the virtue by which God is loved is other than that by which the neighbor is loved.

S. Thomas answers by denying the parity: for Wisdom deals with eternal things according to eternal reasons; Science with temporal things, with a motive diverse from wisdom, namely according to temporal reasons; but Charity has one motivating aspect, namely the Divine goodness, which, since it is supremely lovable by any will whatsoever, not only as it is in itself but as it is participated by a creature, loves it under both aspects under one formal motivating aspect. The same diversity is found between Dulia and Latria, which worship with diverse motives.

You will object fifthly. Just as the Contemplative and the Active life differ from each other, so the acts of the contemplative and the active life ought to differ more than the acts of the contemplative life among themselves: Likewise the habit rectifying contemplation ought to differ more from the habit rectifying action than two habits rectifying contemplation itself differ; but Faith and Charity rectify contemplation and action, and they are not diverse; as appears from 1 Corinth. 13. Therefore charity does not differ in species according as it regards God or the neighbor, but only as the motive differs, according as it bears on contemplation or action.

S. Thomas answers that "contemplative" and "active" denominate a state or the exercise of the virtues; but the diversity of state does not induce a diversity of habits, which arises rather from the diversity of objects. Hence the same virtues direct men in both lives. Thus Faith directs toward both lives. Likewise Charity; hence it is not necessary that there be several.

You will object sixthly. Love of friendship and love of concupiscence are objects of Charity; but these two loves are diverse in genus: Therefore.

Responds S. Thomas that Charity cleaves to the Highest Good with both loves, of concupiscence and of friendship, the latter indeed being principal, as D. Augustine says de moribus Ecclesiae, cap. 14. to which the other love of concupiscence is reduced; for something is loved with the love of concupiscence by him who is loved with the love of friendship. Therefore, because the formal object is one, namely God as good, to be united to whom, as D. Dionysius says cap. 4. de divin. nominibus, p. 1. according to the opinion of Hierotheus; Therefore there is one virtue in both loves, of friendship and of concupiscence.

Whether Charity is the most excellent of the virtues.

I assert that Charity is the most excellent of the Virtues.

It is proved by D. Bonaventure first in 3. dist. 23. dub. 6. from 1 Corinth. 13. where it is said: And the greater of these is Charity. He gives the reason, because it alone is the mother, giving the form of virtue to the other virtues for merit, and giving them life, as S. Ambrose says in the epistle to the Romans.

It is proved secondly by D. Bonaventure in 3. dist. 36. dub. 3. and in 1. dist. 17. dub. 4. and art. un. dist. 36. quaest. 6. because it is the form of the other virtues, as I shall show in the following question: It is the bond of perfection. Coloss. 3. It is the end of the law. 1 Timothy 1. Hence in Matth. 22. it is said: This is the great first commandment. For although in Rom. 13. it is said: He that loveth his neighbor hath fulfilled the law, S. Thomas answers 3. dist. 36. dub. 5. that the Love of God is contained in it, or that it is contained in the love of God, to which it is ordered.

It is proved thirdly by D. Bonaventure first dist. 17. p. 1. dub. 6. for D. Augustine 15. de Trinitate, cap. 17. and serm. 35. de Tempore, and tract. 5. in 1. epist. Ioan. says that charity alone distinguishes between the children of the kingdom and the children of perdition, and that it is the precious evangelical Pearl.

It is proved fourthly by S. Bonaventure here, with the reason which D. Thomas also uses art. 6. That virtue is the most excellent of all which regards God under the most excellent formal aspect: Such a virtue is Charity, which regards God as good in himself, which is the most excellent aspect according to our manner of understanding: Therefore. He pursues the same argument in dist. 15. p. 1. dub. 4. and with him Tanner disp. 2. quaest. 2. dub. 1. num. 23.

It is proved fifthly by S. Thomas 3. dist. 34. p. 1. quaest. 3. from that text 1 Corinth. 12. Yet I show unto you a more excellent way. The Gloss indicates the reason brought forward: I show you a way of going to God, that is, Charity. He adduces the same in dist. 26. quaest. 5. adding that: The greater of these is Charity, 1 Cor. 13.

S. Thomas runs through the excellence of Charity with brilliance in the Diaeta, tit. 5. cap. 2. and proves it from that text 1. Cor. 13. And now there remain faith, hope, charity, these three: but the greater of these is charity. Apoc. 3. I counsel thee to buy gold tried in the fire; for charity is among the virtues as gold is among the metals. See, I beseech you, S. Thomas, who shows it compared in the Scriptures with many noble things. See also the Pharetra, lib. 2. cap. 25. where he gathers many most excellent things from the Fathers. Read the same in lib. 5. Compendii Theologiae from cap. 23. to 27. which is an Encomium of Charity. And in the de septem Itineribus aeternitatis, the fourth Journey.

Observe, that it is called the wedding garment, of which Matth. 22. speaks, and he who lacked it was cast out, as D. Bonaventure saw in the Diaeta, tit. 5. cap. 2. after the middle; for so it is expounded by the Fathers, as Valencia also notes disp. 31. quaest. 1. p. 3. So D. Gregory homil. 18. in Evangelia. Indeed Christ, who is the bridegroom, has it; but he has not faith, which the Sectarians wrongly understand by that wedding garment.

You will object first. Scripture ascribes to faith the power of justifying, as is seen in the Apostle to the Romans and Galatians, and it is called the foundation of the spiritual edifice. Hebr. 11. Charity is its cause.

S. Thomas answers dist. 31. quaest. 1. ad 1. and dist. 23. passim, that faith is called the foundation of the rude edifice, which rises and is erected through Hope, and is made firm in Charity. Moreover, justification is ascribed to faith as a disposition for grace, and form to charity, as I shall show in dist. 36. quaest. 6.

Whether Charity is the Form of the Virtues.

The Sectarians laugh foolishly, hearing this title asserted by the Catholics.

Nevertheless it must be observed with caution, with D. Bonaventure, in what sense Charity can be called the form of the Virtues, as I said also in disp. 1. quaest. 19. where I treated this question more fully.

¶ For the Virtues can be considered in three ways. First in order to the object, and in this sense, since they are specified or known by it, they must be formed by it, not by another extrinsic habit. Secondly they can be compared in order to the subject in which they are. Thus, although they are informing forms, they can nevertheless be perfected and actualized in order to God, inasmuch as, with Grace and Charity supervening, they are living and efficacious for meritorious works. Thirdly they are compared to the end; thus they are disposing forms, yet they are perfected and directed by charity, which is the directing weight. For the end, as end, is a good, which is the object of charity; and so, as regards this tendency, the remaining virtues are directed and completed in order to the end.

I assert therefore, in the last two senses, that Charity is the form of the Virtues.

It is proved by D. Bonaventure first, from that text to the Galatians 5. where the first fruit of the Holy Spirit is said to be Charity, as the life, according to 1 John 3. He that loveth not, abideth in death. And chapter 4. He that abideth in charity, abideth in God. And James 2. As the body without the spirit is dead, so also faith without works is dead. Where the Apostle speaks of the works of Charity, according to that text Galat. 5. Faith, which worketh by charity. Hence D. Augustine, in the book on the knowledge of the true life, cap. 28. says: Faith is animated by love, as the body is vivified by the soul. And Dionysius, cap. 2. de Eccl. Hierarch. says: Charity most fittingly gives form to the habits of our soul. And D. Bernard, serm. 2. de resurrect.: Faith (he says) is animated by love, and charity is the life of faith.

It is proved thirdly by D. Bonaventure. That which rectifies the principle of works also actualizes and perfects the works; but charity rectifies the affection, which is the principle of the works of the other virtues, which depend on it: Therefore it also perfects and informs.

It is proved fourthly. In moral matters the complement and the species are considered in order to the end; but the love of the highest good is that which makes the others tend toward their due end: Therefore the love of the highest good gives form and complement to all the gratuitous habits and to their works; but that love is Charity: Therefore. The same holds in Fulgentius, lib. 3. cap. 8. Basil, see Charitas, num. 3.

Hence it remains explicit by what reason Charity is the form of the Virtues; for it does not accomplish this by informing intrinsically, but by producing its own acts and commanding the others with the due ordination to the supernatural end, to which the studious life is ordered; the acts of the other virtues are rendered in the genus of completed operation when they are rightly ordered to the end of eternal life. So D. Thomas also holds, 2. 2. quaest. 4. art. 3. ad 2. and quaest. 23. art. 8. ad 2.

¶ But it does not inform intrinsically, because it is not joined intrinsically to the other virtues or to their acts, as a part; as Capreolus notes, disp. 1. sect. 5. num. 35. with D. Bonaventure in corpore, where he explains it outstandingly.

Therefore charity is called the form of the remaining virtues, either because it gives to their acts a certain moral dignity and meritorious being; or inasmuch as it refers them to the highest end they can have, that is, to God, inasmuch as he is good in himself. Thus S. Thomas explains it, also with respect to the arguments which are solved by this distinction: that Charity is not the intrinsic form constituting the Virtues in essential being; but only in right operation toward merit, as the end of eternal life; and accordingly they are not informed intrinsically, since all have their form in order to the objects, but only in order to the operations. From which it follows that faith and the other virtues without charity are still virtues, as I showed concerning faith in disp. 1. quaest. 21.

Here the Doctors dispute: Whether Charity is distinct from the grace of God. This I have sufficiently done in the prima secundae, Tract. de Gratia, disp. 2. quaest. 3. But S. Thomas inquires into it under a certain Title, dist. 27. quaest. 3. Whether the Habit of Charity is merely gratuitous. Here indeed an opening is given to another controversial question, which is treated under another title, namely:

Whether besides infused Charity there is another charity, acquired by our acts.

Many questions are enclosed in this one. The first is: Whether besides the acts of supernatural charity there are given acts of natural charity. Next, whether, if such acts are given, a habit of natural charity is generated from them. The other question: Whether besides the infused habit a natural habit is acquired from supernatural acts, a new habit of charity.

As to the first question: whether there is given a natural love of God as the author of nature, distinct from the supernatural, there was a variety of opinions.

The negative opinion is defended by Vasquez in the prima secundae, 1. 2. disp. 195. adducing others from the school of D. Thomas, especially Bannez 2. 2. quaest. 23. art. 1. Likewise Alvarez 2. p. quaest. 30. memb. 1. art. 2. §. 2. ad 1. Albert 2. p. tract. 4. quaest. 14. memb. 4. art. 2. Scotus in 3. dist. 27. quaest. 1. but wrongly, as Tannerus notes, disp. 2. quaest. 2. dub. 2. num. 37. And indeed Vasquez himself recognized that this was a novelty.

The true opinion therefore is, that a twofold love of God is given, certainly of friendship; one, God being the natural end; the other, the end being supernatural. So D. Bonaventure in 2. dist. 3. p. 2. art. 3. quaest. 1. in corpore, and ad 3. which he referred to this. And in the prima secundae, tract. de Gratia, disp. 7. quaest. 11. §. Nota secundo. The same thought Alvarez 2. p. quaest. 131. membr. 3. and quaest. 91. membr. 1. ad 7. Alexander of Hales lib. 2. summae, tract. 1. cap. 4. Richard 2. dist. 3. art. 7. and dist. 28. art. 1. quaest. 1. Astim. in 2. dist. 39. quaest. 1. art. 2. Abul. in cap. 19. Matth. quaest. 177. Soto lib. 1. de natura, et gratia, cap. 22. Cajetan, Conrad, Medina, and other more recent Thomists on the prima secundae quaest. 109. art. 3. Cano relect. de poenit. p. 5. Valencia tom. 2. disp. 1. quaest. 1. p. 4. Tannerus disp. 2. quaest. 2. dub. 2.

The same S. Thomas taught most clearly in p. 1. quaest. 60. art. 5. and in the prima secundae, quaest. 109. art. 3. ad 1.

And indeed that it is given is defined by Pius V. and Gregory XIII., condemning proposition 34. of Michael Baius, who denied this division.

It is proved also by the reason brought forward in the prima secundae, in the place cited, because God can be known under both aspects, and precisely as the author of nature, as the Philosophers acknowledged him: and as the author of grace and glory, as faith teaches: Therefore the will, under these distinct aspects, can pursue him with love, namely of friendship, since the end is twofold, and a good, and therefore to be loved, as S. Thomas argues ad 3.

Vasquez answers, cap. 4. that the goodness of God is indeed known by natural reason; but that it is not shown here that he is to be loved with the love of friendship, since not even among the gentiles is any trace of such love found; indeed Aristotle denied friendship between God and men.

But Aristotle in 8. and 9. Eth. conceded from this chapter true friendship between God and men, inasmuch as God is loved as an end; although from another chapter he may assert it is not entirely complete, since it is a total sharing in goods; and indeed you will find no philosopher denying that God is loved for himself as a natural end, as Tanner noted, num. 42.

You will object first, that this twofold love is not found in Scripture or the Fathers, as is seen in D. Augustine on Ps. 53. I will sacrifice to thee willingly, and epist. 113. and in Bernard in the book on loving God.

It is answered, that a twofold love is found in exercise; for the Scriptures and the Fathers preach that God is to be loved from diverse motives and from a twofold principle, whether from the benefits of nature or from the gifts of grace: For thus also they propose a twofold faith to the objection, as Tanner noted, num. 47.

You will object secondly. That love could be had without grace, and yet the love of God as friendship is repugnant to mortal sin.

It is answered, that this is not inconvenient; nor does every love of friendship conflict with sin, but only the supernatural one.

Whether, however, from this a natural habit of the love of God is produced; Cajetan denies it, prima secundae, quaest. 62. art. 3. and quaest. 109. art. 3. and Valencia here p. 1. §. 4.

But more correctly Aragon affirms it: 2. 2. quaest. 25. art. 1. ad ult. Tanner disp. 2 q. 2. dub. 2. n. 52. where he says it is the common opinion. Otherwise the foundation for finding acquired habits would vanish for us; and as to this, Meldula argues well, 3. disp. 6. quaest. 23. num. 589. since we find by clear experience that such habits are acquired. But those err, as I shall soon prove, who will that they are acquired by acts.

It can moreover be inquired, with Tanner, num. 64. Whether the habit and acts of charity, granted above, always differ in the formal object.

I assert that natural and supernatural acts can indeed have the same material object, but the adequate formal object must always be distinct. So D. Bonaventure and the others cited above, as Tannerus notes, to whom Curielem adds, p. 1. quaest. 109. art. 3. For acts are specified by the object, or are known as specified by it: But the acts of natural friendship have as object the goodness of God as it is the end of nature; but the acts of supernatural charity have as object the goodness of God inasmuch as it is a supernatural end. It is confirmed; for acts bear an intrinsic order to the formal object. What is objected on this will easily collapse.

As to the other question: Whether from supernatural acts a new habit of charity is acquired, distinct from the infused one; or whether that habit is perfected by those acts, with new degrees added: And indeed I shall inquire into the latter in quaest. 11.

As to the former part, some hold that from the acts of Faith, Hope, and Charity new habits are generated, which are not Theological virtues, since they are not infused by God; yet they are Theological, because they are concerned immediately with God. So the Nominalists, and Scotus in 3. dist. 23. and 26. whom his disciples follow, Arretinus disp. 27. art. 6. Poncius disp. 26. quaest. 2. Mastrius disp. 6. quaest. 23. and other Scotists.

The same think Aversa quaest. 55. sect. 7. Coninch. lib. 1. de virtutibus, disp. 7. dub. 3. Oviedo 1. 2. tract. 3. controv. 2. p. 4.

The second opinion denies that an acquired Charity is given. So D. Thomas 1. 2. quaest. 51. art. 4. ad 3. and the Thomists. This seems to be the opinion of D. Bonaventure 3. dist. 27. quaest. 3. in corpore, and in the de septem Itineribus AEternitatis, Itinere 4. cap. 3. at the end, where he always persists, that from the acts of the supernatural habit of charity one indeed advances in the perfection of the same habit, but no new one is produced; but that habits produced anew are from natural acts.

The same think Vasquez p. 2. disp. 79. cap. 10. Caspens. de charitate, dist. 2. sect. 2. and commonly, as Tanner relates, disp. 2. quaest. 2. dubio 4.

I assert with this opinion, that no acquired habit of Charity is given.

It is proved. Either that habit, acquired from the acts of the infused habit, would be of the same species as the infused habit, or of a diverse one. Not the first, because an infused habit is such that it cannot be made by nature: Nor the second, because a habit is made from acts of the same species.

I urge: Either this habit, acquired from the acts of the infused virtue, would be natural, or supernatural; not the first, because it would not be of the same species as the acts from which it is obtained; but a natural habit is of the same species as the acts from which it is generated. Nor the second, because otherwise it would not be made from our acts.

Mastrius answers, that it would be a natural habit, because the acts of these virtues are supernatural only as regards the manner, not the substance.

But this answer was refuted in disp. 1. quaest. 27.

You will object, because a Catholic, accustomed to elicit acts of faith and charity, acquires facility in believing; but this does not come from the infused habit, because it would produce the same effect in a Neophyte. Next it is proved, because a heretic, after the supernatural habit is lost, retains the same facility regarding those things which he still believes: Therefore from a habit acquired by supernatural acts. The same argument holds for Hope and Charity; for the same heretic experiences himself prompt to love and to hope.

S. Thomas answers, dist. 27. cit. from D. Augustine in the book de spiritu, et anima, near the beginning, that by the acts of the infused virtue the infused habit is perfected and increased by God, but no new one is acquired. So the other Thomists also answer. And indeed, as it has its origin from God, so it is increased by God, as D. Bonaventure teaches, 1. dist. 17. p. 2. quaest. 2. Therefore by supernatural acts the increase of charity is measured out to man, as D. Augustine teaches, epist. 106. cited by S. Bonaventure, fundamentum 1. and I shall show in quaest. 11. That something of facility remains in the heretic; it is answered that this is done through the acts of the natural order, which are usually elicited together with the supernatural ones.

Whether Charity can be formless.

I assert that Charity is never formless.

It is proved by St. Bonaventure. A virtue which makes a man beloved of God, and just and perfect, is always formed: such is Charity: Therefore. The minor is proved from John 14: He that loveth me, shall be loved of my Father. Colossians 3: Above all these things have charity, which is the bond of perfection. First Corinthians 13, where the perfections of charity are described, and without it the remaining virtues are counted as nothing, as if without form. Therefore the form of the virtues cannot be formless: Charity is the form of the virtues, from what was said in question 8. Therefore.

It is proved secondly. That virtue by which a man is perfectly converted to God, loving Him above all things and keeping His law, cannot be formless: such is charity, which is the end of the Law, First to Timothy 1, the bond of perfection, Colossians 3. The same is said in Matthew 22 and Luke 10: Thou shalt love the Lord thy God, etc. And thy neighbor as thyself: on these two commandments dependeth the whole law; this do, and thou shalt live.

It is proved thirdly from the Saintly Doctor. That virtue which is opposed to every mortal sin is always formed; such is Charity: Therefore. The major is evident. The minor is proved first from St. Augustine, de libero arbitrio, cap. 3, where it is said that every sin arises from concupiscence. Then it is proved from the Saintly Doctor, from St. Augustine, 14 de civitate Dei, cap. 18, where he says: that every affection arises from love, and the city of the devil is built up from disordered love; but the city of God from right love.

That which he objects to himself, the Saintly Doctor easily resolves from the doctrine brought forward, drawn from the nature of charity, which either is sanctifying grace; or, if distinct, as is more certain, it always stands together with it, and accordingly, although there can be Fear, Faith, Hope, and the other virtues, it does not therefore follow that there can be Charity, which is the form and perfection of the virtues. Wherefore it implies a contradiction to have charity and to be impious.

From all these questions we have that Charity is supernaturally infused, and cannot be had by the powers of nature. For so it is said in Romans 5: The charity of God is poured forth in our hearts; or infused, as Cyprian signifies in libro de exhortatione ad Martyrium, cap. 9, and as the Council of Trent understands and defines, session 6, cap. 9, and in other places above.

The REASON of St. Bonaventure is formed from all the questions brought forward, especially from this one, thus: That virtue which infallibly raises to a supernatural end, and to supernatural friendship with God, is an infused supernatural virtue, or entity; such is Charity, from what has been said: Therefore. That it is from God as efficient cause, the Scriptures testify, Romans 5, 2 Timothy 1, First John 3 and 4.

IOVINIANUS established by this heresy that there is no augmentation of charity, but that all are equal in merits and all in reward; which error I refuted in prima parte, Tract. 1. disput. 11, and prima secunda, Tract. de Gratia, disput. 4. Thus also I expelled, as infected, the Sectarians.

OTHERS with St. Bonaventure said that Charity is increased by another diverse one succeeding, as days are said to grow, not by addition to the days, for instance of April, but by others of May succeeding.

Others said that charity is increased, but by a deeper rooting alone in the subject. Thus the Thomists with St. Thomas here, and Valencia quaest. 1. p. 3.

The TRUE opinion of the Theologians, however, is that charity is increased by the addition of degrees: to this Cajetan tries to reduce St. Thomas.

St. Bonaventure observes, however, in quaest. 5. that augmentation is a passion of quantity, which is twofold: one of bulk, the other of virtue, from St. Augustine libro de quantitate animae, cap. 3. In spiritual things, indeed, that is virtue which in bodily things is bulk. Increment is also given in qualities according to the intension of degrees, as in heat up to the eighth; and in this way the question is raised about the augmentation of charity: whether it is increased according to intension and virtue, which is truly a physical augmentation, by which other forms also grow. But a moral augmentation can also be given, by which the subject, growing morally in the order of merit, meritoriously causes such an augmentation; and in this sense St. Augustine spoke, epist. 106, apud D. Bonav.: Charity merits to be increased, that, when increased, it may merit to be perfected.

Secondly, the Saintly Doctor observes, in the following question, that some said charity is increased by the sole diminution of the contrary concupiscence: but he himself asserts outright that it is increased by the intension of itself; otherwise it could not have been increased either in the Angels or in innocent man.

I ASSERT first that Charity is intensified substantially and meritoriously.

It is PROVED first by St. Bonaventure with the argument of St. Augustine epist. 106, which the Council of Trent uses, sess. 6. de Iustificatione cap. 10. The increment of charity is made by merit in Charity itself, which the just man has on the way, and it is perfected in the fatherland: but this is the true physical Charity, poured forth in our hearts: therefore. This argument supposes first that we can merit the increment of charity, which is proved from 4. ad Ephes.: Let us grow in charity. Philip. 1: This I pray, that your charity may more and more abound; and first Thessal. 3: May the Lord multiply you, and make you abound in charity. Apoc. 1: He that is just, let him be justified still. Eccles. 18: Fear not to be justified even to death. Prima Cor. 9: He will increase the growths of the fruits of your justice. Whence St. Augustine above: Grace merits to be increased, that, when increased, it may merit to be perfected. And St. Gregory, homil. 15. in Evang.: Every virtue is increased, as it were, by certain degrees; and thus, by the increments of merits, it is led to the summit. Finally Iacob. 2: You see that a man is justified by works, and not by faith only.

Next, the argument supposes that the augmentation of the same charity is brought about, which the cited passages of Scripture prove; and therefore the Church prays: Grant us, O Lord, the increase of faith, hope, and Charity; and the philosophical reason is at hand, for intension is the addition of a new degree, or of virtue, to the same thing, as Aristotle teaches 1. de Gener. text. 31, and St. Bonaventure observes quaest. 2. fund. 2.

THIRDLY it supposes that the same charity is perfected in the fatherland,¹ which is asserted in prima Cor. 13: Charity never falleth away. And therefore the Apostle says, prima Corinth. 15, speaking of merit and reward, to which it corresponds: One is the brightness of the sun, another the brightness of the moon, another of the stars. For star differeth from star in brightness: so also is the resurrection of the dead. It is sown in corruption, it shall rise in incorruption. It is sown in ignominy, it shall rise in glory.

The MINOR is of faith, proved in prima secunda, Tract. de Gratia, disp. 3. This argument is strengthened also by the other foundations of the Seraphic Doctor.

THE SECOND foundation, therefore, is: Every motion from lesser to greater, the thing remaining, is an augmentation: but Charity, remaining essentially the same that it is on the way, is increased in the fatherland: Therefore. The major is evident. The minor is proved from 1. Cor. 13: Charity never falleth away.

THE THIRD foundation. To the quantity of the charity of the way there corresponds the reward of glory and of the charity of the fatherland; but in the fatherland the rewards will be unequal, as I showed from prima Cor. 15. Therefore.

THE FOURTH. A being which is not the highest can be made better: Charity is not the highest good; otherwise it would be the same in each individual, and accordingly would have equal effects in all and each, which is false; for in one just man it works more and higher things than in another. Nor is it the highest, that it could be, since it is the perfection by which a man is formally constituted on the way toward the ultimate term of the fatherland. Whence the Saintly Doctor forms the argument thus, which St. Thomas also uses, art. 4. That perfection by which a man is formally constituted on the way toward a term can be increased; but Charity is that perfection by which a man is constituted on the way toward beatitude, which is the ultimate term: Therefore. The major is evident; for it belongs above all to a wayfarer that he be able to advance on the way. The minor is proved by St. Bonaventure quaest. 2. fundamento 3, because Charity is as it were a Light, growing from the dawn of grace to the most brilliant noon of glory. Therefore Proverb. 4: The path of the just, as a shining light, goeth forward, and groweth even to the perfect day. Valencia uses the same reason disp. 3. quaest. 2. p. 3.

I ASSERT secondly that this augmentation is physically from God.

IT IS PROVED IT IS PROVED by St. Bonaventure, quaest. 2, fundamento 4, and his reply. A thing is increased by the same by which it is produced: but charity is infused by God: Therefore. The major is proved, because the same virtue is capable of acting upon the essence, and upon the degrees of the essence, and its accidents; the minor is proved from Romans 5: The charity of God is poured forth in our hearts by the Holy Ghost, who is given to us. Second Timothy 1: God hath given us the spirit of love; first John 3: Behold what manner of charity God hath given us, that we should be called, and be, the sons of God; and cap. 4: Charity is of God. Cajetan uses this argument on art. 6 of St. Thomas, and Valencia, disput. 3, quaest. 2, p. 3, assert. 7, where he discusses: whether, at least by God's absolute power, man could be, at least instrumentally, the physical cause of the augmentation of charity: and indeed he himself asserts it, thinking that charity is not created. But this was exploded in p. 1, Tract. 3, disputation 1, where I showed that infused habits are created.

You will object first. Every form is unchangeable, consisting in something indivisible.

The Saintly Doctor answers that this is true as to universal essences, and even singular ones as to what is essential, but not by reason of the subject, against Scotus, 1. dist. 17, quaestione 4. The Saintly Doctor does not will that the form be changed essentially in subjects, but by a certain substantial perfection of the individual, as is clear in the rational soul; but he wills that it be varied accidentally by intensive degrees per se.

You will object secondly. Simplicity does not admit magnitude.

He answers that it does not admit magnitude of bulk; but of virtue.

You will object thirdly. Augmentation in bodily things is according to accident, from 5 Phys. t. 8.

The Saintly Doctor answers that quantity is accidental to the how-much; but the augmentation of quantity is substantial to it; for it is made from its own entity by degrees, which in moral virtue are essential.

He answers secondly that the term of augmentation in bodily things is a quantity perfect per se; but per accidens it is increased also by the addition of substance, unless it comes about by rarefaction or protension; for when quantity is increased, the subject also is increased, in which it may be, although the formal term of augmentation is the quantity itself; so therefore in spiritual things the quantity of virtue is increased in Charity, which is indeed an accident, but one consubstantial with that form; as the third degree of heat, and the following ones, according to which it is intensified.

You will object fourthly. If Charity is increased substantially, it is changed substantially; but Charity never falleth away, from prima Cor. 13. Therefore.

The answer is made that Charity remains with respect to its being of itself; yet it is simply increased by degrees.

You will object first, to prove that charity is increased by itself, because it is more powerful than fire; but fire by its own heat increases itself by combustion: Therefore.

The Saintly Doctor answers that Charity is not active as to creation.

You will object secondly, with St. Thomas, to prove that it is not increased by the addition of degrees, because it is simple.

The Saintly Doctor answers that Charity has degrees of perfection, and therefore can be increased; nor do degrees according to intension repugn to a quality, even if it be a simple quality, for thus also heat is intensified. In the same way the Saintly Doctor answers in 2. dist. 27. art. 2. quaest. 2. ad 1.

You will say: The point has a quantity of virtue, and yet cannot be increased.

The Saintly Doctor answers that this happens because the point is complete in an indivisible of its genus, whence nothing can be united to it so as to be increased, because it is essentially such.

NEXT he answers that the point is indivisible in the genus of quantity of bulk; but in the genus of quantity of virtue, no perfection is indivisible simply, except the Divine. Moreover, the point is an act, imperfect in the genus of quantity, which is not perfect in act; but only terminative with respect to lines; therefore it has not an infinite active power, but passive; whence it cannot produce lines, but terminate them; wherefore it is not compared to the Divine virtue, nor can it be augmented, as Charity can.

You will object secondly. Every addition implies composition, and this induces a diminution of virtue: Therefore, the greater the addition, the feebler charity becomes; and the feebler, the less.

The Saintly Doctor answers first that as much as is added of formal parts to anything, so much is added of act and virtue; otherwise a lesser fire would be more powerful than a greater; and a syrup composed of many things would be feebler than one of its ingredients. Therefore charity is increased according to the degrees of the form.

He answers secondly that increased Charity is not more composite, but more simple; for things stand in a contrary way in the quantity of bulk and in the quantity of virtue; for in the quantity of bulk the simplest is the least and weakest, as the point; and therefore in that genus approach to simplicity is diminution; but recession from the simplicity of the point is by addition: but in the how-much of virtue, the simplest is the greatest, namely God; therefore approach to simplicity is by addition; for the more degrees of perfection a creature has, the more it approaches the perfection, and accordingly the simplicity, of God: thus the Soul and the Angel excel the other creatures in the imitation of God, and yet do not exclude the simplicity of quantity. Therefore also charity, the more perfect, the more like to God.

You will object thirdly. If some degree is added to charity; either it is charity, or it is not. If not: Therefore it does not increase it. If the first: Therefore the first charity, with respect to the incoming charity, is material: Or if they do not stand thus, one will not be made, because one is not made out of many, unless one be as matter; the other, as act.

The Saintly Doctor answers that the imperfect stands in the manner of the material with respect to a more perfect degree; thus heat as four stands with respect to itself intensified as eight; and in this way charity as four stands as in potency to the eighth degree, nor is there any inconvenience.

¶ From this the argument of Valencia assert. 4. is resolved, by which he strives to prove that charity is not increased by the addition of some degree of charity, otherwise there would be several charities: for by those degrees one intensified quality is made; as from several degrees of heat one heat is made as four, or as eight.

¶ But what he himself teaches, assert. 5. that the augmentation of charity is made by a certain mode of perfection actualizing the subject; I confess to be unintelligible to me, because a natural virtue always acts with its whole self in the same subject: ergo, remaining the same, it always does the same: Therefore the just man is not apt to elicit more perfect acts, even if he grows in charity, as the Saintly Doctor argued in quaestione 1, fundamento 5. For the greatness of the effect comes from the greatness of the virtue; and the greatness of the virtue from the greatness of the essence. For either that virtue is the essence itself, or not. If the first: Therefore, the virtue being increased, the essence is increased. If the second: Either that virtue has an essence from which it flows, or not; if it has one; either it is the essence itself of charity, or another; if the essence itself of charity: Therefore, the virtue being increased, charity must have been increased; but if it has another essence, I ask about it: whether it is charity or not; and then it will be necessary either to go on to infinity, or to arrive at some new entity of charity, which may be the cause of that virtue.

It is confirmed by St. Bonaventure fundamento 1, and quaest. 2, fundamento 4, because the moral act by which that charity is increased is new, from St. Augustine epist. 106. Likewise the physical act of God influencing: Therefore a new entity of Charity is produced.

Valencia answers that it is enough if a new effect, formally distinct, accede to the new act. Thus to a new local motion a new mode accedes.

Against this, first, because he equivocates: for that place, or Ubi, is an entity making in itself a new predicament, while with respect to the located thing it is a mode. Therefore let him concede to me that a new entity accedes to charity, which, since it is a virtue, must also accede with the new entity of Charity; and not a solitary new mode in the subject, without a new addition made to charity.

Therefore let there be the third Assertion, and proved, that the augmentation of charity is made by a newly added degree of charity. It is common to the Philosophers, and to almost all the Theologians.

Here many things are disputed by the Doctors. First: whether grace and charity are increased by whatever works of whatever Virtues; but of this I treated in t. 2, Tract. de Gratia, disp. 4. quaest. 4. Next: whether by every work, or act, the remission and the augmentation of charity are acquired together. Of this I treated loc. cit. quaest. 12. Thirdly: whether this augmentation accedes immediately. Of this I discoursed there, disp. 3, from quaest. 2, against Scotus; and it is the common opinion of the Theologians, according to Turrianus disp. 68. dub. 4. Therefore the Council of Trent, sess. 6. cap. 10. defines that the justified, by the observance of the commandments, grow in justice itself by the grace of God received: and therefore it says that the Church prays: Grant us the increase of faith, Hope, and Charity. And indeed the arguments brought forward above show that this augmentation is made immediately after meritorious acts, as it were through moral causes, upon whose operation God physically infuses charity. Therefore, on account of the authority of the Council of Trent, Mastrius asserts, in 2. disputatione 7. numero 359, that the opposing opinion cannot be sustained, and he reprehends Faber.

You will say: If the augmentation is conferred immediately after the first instant: Therefore, if the act of charity is continued for some time, in which there are infinite instants, it will be increased to infinity.

It is answered with Suarez opusc. de revivisc. merit. disp. 2. sect. 5, Caspensis disp. 2. sect. 6, from St. Bonaventure dist. 17. quaest. ult. that the augmentation is finite, because it is not reckoned according to duration by the division of time and of the act into aliquot parts; but according to the succession, or instantaneousness, of the work, in a physical manner; and works are done in a finite time; and according to the instants of the equal parts in which there is the operation; for as to the aliquot parts, to which finite things correspond, there are infinite instants, to which the aliquot parts of acts correspond; but they are not measured in this way, but according to a scarcely determined time.

From what has been said also, Disp. de merito, in the questions cited, especially 8, and from what is said here, that question lies resolved: whether the augmentation of Charity, of merit, and of glory grows from the inequality of the works which are commanded by Charity; so that, if charity, the same as four, commands two acts, one of Temperance, the other of Faith, the merit is increased from the mere inequality of these works, even though the commanding charity is equal.

And indeed the opinion of Bannes is false, quaest. 25. art. 6. dub. 5, saying that it grows only unto an accidental reward. But the true opinion is that of Victoria relect. de augmento charit. num. 11, Valencia disput. 3. quaest. 2. p. 3, and Caspensis sect. 7, after St. Thom. p. 2. quaest. 114. art. 4. ad 2, that merit grows substantially.

It is proved from the said cited passages. As simply corresponds to simply, so more to more: but merit simply is had from the acts of the other virtues: Therefore also its augmentation. Therefore in the Council of Nicaea, in which the heresy of Jovinian was condemned, excluding the inequality of merits, when the Pontiff had condemned it, he writes to Ambrose, Bishop of Milan, and to the others, epist. 81: The rustic, that is, the howling of wolves, is he who maintains no grace of virginity, no order of chastity, abolishing for different persons the degrees of different merits, as if there were one palm, and the titles of rewards did not abound. Here he beats back Jovinian, who wished conjugal continence from unlawful things to be as meritorious as virginity, which is against the Apostle, prima Corinth. 7: He that joineth his virgin in marriage doth well: and he that giveth her not in marriage doth better, which words the Council adduces, and subjoins: Better is virginity, by which the inheritance of the heavenly kingdom is acquired, and the succession of heavenly merits is found. By which it is shown that he speaks of the reward, and of essential merit: for he names virginity simply better, as the Saintly Doctor also observes, in 4. dist. 31. quaest. 1.

This is also expressed in those words Matth. 19: There are eunuchs who have castrated themselves for the kingdom of heaven, which St. Jerome uses, lib. 1. cont. Iovinianum. The same St. Bonaventure uses in Diaeta, titulo 6. capite 2.

The same is proved by St. Bonaventure ad 21. Lucae, by the example of that Widow, who, one mite cast into the Gazophylacium, pleased God more than those who were throwing in whole gold coins; but this was done because she cast in of her want: Therefore merit grows from the force of the work, as St. Gregory, homil. 5 in Evang., and Beda upon those words expound.

Bannes answers that she prevailed by a greater charity: it is confirmed by him from St. Gregory loc. cit., and the Glossa Interlin. on this passage, and St. Vincent, serm. 4. in septuag., saying that God weighs, not how much is offered, but from how much affection, as St. Bonaventure relates on that passage.

But it teems with equivocation: for they wish to say that God regards not only that which is given, but rather with what affection, which indeed is not only from charity, but from the object of that virtue. Therefore Christ says Matth. 10: Whosoever shall give a cup of cold water to one of the least of these, shall not lose his reward, as the Saintly Doctor observes on that passage of Luca, where he brings forward other passages of Scripture proving that even the affection of the other virtues pertains to essential merit. Thus 66. Isaia: Upon whom shall I look, except upon the poor, and the contrite of heart, and trembling at my words. Psalm. 101: He hath regarded the prayer of the humble. And Eccl. 35: Do not the tears of the widow go down to the cheek? for from the cheek they go up even to heaven. And Tobiae 4: If thou have but little, be studious to impart even a little gladly.

Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole strength; but this precept is fulfilled with perfect execution only in the fatherland. Therefore it must be granted that it is then fulfilled completely when there is no other capacity in the heart; otherwise it would not be said with the whole heart. Nor is it true that a more intense quality makes the nature of the subject more disposed beyond its capacity; but within its limits. Therefore, if some subject is apt to receive so much heat as 4, it will not be able for 5 to accede. Thus therefore neither does the supernatural disposition dilate the power of capacity to infinity, but unto a limited term.

It is PROVED secondly by the Saintly Doctor. What in bodily things is bulk, that in spiritual things is virtue, and they stand proportionally, as St. Augustine teaches de quantitate animae, cap. 3. but in the quantity of bulk, by reason of the subject, the whole augmentation has a certain fixed state, because, as Aristotle says, 2 de anima, textu 41: Of all things constituted by nature there is a term, and a ratio, of magnitude and of augmentation: Therefore similarly in the quantity of virtue. Gallus uses this reason 3. dist. 13. quaest. 1. cap. 3, and the author of the controversiae, Sotus contr. 10, secunda Pars.

But the reason is taken in both genera also from the finitude of perfection; for as the quantity of bulk is finite according to the natural and ordinary course, so also grace, which is a participation of God. Therefore it is said Sap. 11: Thou hast ordered all things in number, measure, and weight. Thus Scotus also argues. For it is a finite participation of the infinite; otherwise heat could be infinite. By which the response is refuted, diff. to. Phys. quaest. 4. n. 65: That the fire of hell can grow on the part of the receptive subject.

Cajetan answers that the reason is not the same concerning natural things and supernatural things: for heat, for example, is a participation of the infinite, not with formal congruence; but Charity is with formal congruence; for God is formally Charity, but heat is not formally God. Further, concerning natural things Aristotle indeed says, 2 Animae text. 41: Of natural things also the augmentation has a state.²

BUT this response is cold; for it seems to suppose that Charity, by which we are perfected, is God himself, and not a created habit, which is an error. But suppose that God is formally Charity; nevertheless he himself is not that Charity by which we are perfected by habit, or act. Whence the parity runs, that since Charity is a created participation of God, it has a finite and terminated perfection. But that the object of love is infinite makes nothing, as the Saintly Doctor observes ad ultimum; for the object is God, infinite, with whom our created Charity is not commensurate.

Caspensis answers that the habit is not varied by the multiplication of the parts continuing it, and participating the same nature, but by the diversity of the essential degrees, of which the quiddity and the species of it consist; and this has more place in acts, which regard an infinite object. Mastrius answers the same loco citato, Scrin 3. disp. 2. quaest. 3. art. 1.

BUT this response is frivolous: for in accidental beings the degrees of intension are substantial, for example in heat eight degrees signify the summit of the perfection of heat, nor can it ascend to nine; for the virtue arises from the essence, nor does it transcend it. Therefore the degrees of Charity, since they arise from a finite essence, must be finite, as the Saintly Doctor argues; for an effect is not nobler than its cause. But although acts regard an infinite object, nevertheless they regard it, as the habit also does, according to their own capacity, and virtue, which is created; and accordingly from a finite potency they have a finite intension. This argument, however, is not to the taste of the Saintly Doctor, as I said p. p. Tract. 5. disp. 8. quaest. 5.

It is PROVED thirdly. That is perfect to which in its genus no addition is possible: but there is given a perfect Charity in the fatherland: Therefore. The major is Aristotle's, primo caeli, textu 12. The minor is proved from prima Corinth. 13: When that which is perfect shall come, that which is in part shall be done away; but this perfect, he says, is Charity.

It is PROVED fourthly by the Saintly Doctor. The more perfect anything is among creatures, the more it is joined to an end: but Charity is perfect: Therefore; but if it were augmentable to infinity, it would have no end.

St. Thomas ANSWERS that Charity has an end, but in the other life. Yet this does not resolve it, because an end, which is a terminus, must be given to each finite thing in itself.

They have ONE reason only, taken from the infinity of God the agent, and from the part of the object, which is infinitely lovable.

BUT these are worn away by St. Bonaventure. For although the object be infinitely lovable, nevertheless the power of the creature is finite; whence, as it is infinitely intelligible, nevertheless the intelligibility is limited by reason of the created intellective power; so also in our matter. But that the principal agent is infinite makes nothing; otherwise all the effects of God would be infinite; but they are limited by their own capacity; for God does not act as much as he can act, as the Saintly Doctor observes.