Scotus Academicus, Tomus secundus: De Deo Intelligente et Volente

Since every act of knowledge necessarily presupposes a formal object moving the intellect to form it, otherwise something would be known without a reason for knowing it: so whenever the knowledge is certain, it likewise requires a formal notion in the object that is altogether certain, otherwise the object would be known more perfectly than it is knowable. It is asked, therefore, in the present circumstances, what that certain and infallible formal notion may be which has so necessary a connection with the uncertain future contingent that it infallibly moves the divine intellect to the knowledge of it. In resolving this difficulty the most keen-sighted theologians labor diligently, and so that their various and manifold opinions may appear more clearly

Note 1. Future contingents are conceivable in two ways, namely either in themselves, or in their causes. In themselves, indeed, either by reason of the determinate truth which they have in themselves and in their objective or entitative being, or by reason of the presence and existence which they have; or in the divine Essence in which they are represented, or in the divine ideas. In their causes, however, either in the proximate and created causes by which they are to be produced, or in the uncreated cause, insofar as they are contained virtually in the divine Omnipotence, which can bestow on them true and real existence. Moreover, according to either mode they can be considered either antecedently to the divine decree, or in the divine decree itself, or after the divine decree: whence the various opinions of the theologians concerning the resolution of the present question can be reduced chiefly to three heads. For some affirm that future contingents are known by God in their objective truth; others, in the divine ideas; others, however, in their entitative being antecedently to the divine decree, namely through that infinite power of God's understanding which penetrates and knows what each created will placed under any state and condition will determinately will. Some judge that they are known in the divine decree foreseen before it is in fact formed. Finally, the rest contend that they are seen by God only in the divine Essence and Omnipotence, the divine decree about their futurity being first presupposed; but what is to be held more truly will appear below.

Note 2. In order that something may be able to have the character of a means leading to the knowledge of another thing, two things are chiefly required. First, that it precede by at least a priority of nature and causality the very thing which it makes known: for if it were purely concomitant and correlative to it, it could not lead to the knowledge of that thing; because since correlatives are simultaneous in knowledge and in nature, they would be known simultaneously, and either could be the reciprocal reason for knowing the other, as is evident in the case of mutual relations, namely Paternity and Filiation. Second, that which has the character of a means of knowledge with respect to another thing must have a necessary, or at least an infallible, connection with it; otherwise it would not be lawful to infer the one from the other: for since the knowledge of one thing from another, or in another, is equivalent to a virtual discourse; and since no discourse is legitimate unless the consequent has an infallible connection with the means and the antecedent: it is necessary that the means which certainly and infallibly leads to the knowledge of another thing have a necessary, or at least an infallible, connection with it.

Note 3. Propositions about a future contingent are determinately true, or false, from eternity for every real instant; so that no real instant can be assigned in which God has not determined Himself, absolutely or conditionally, concerning the futurity or non-futurity of all possible things. Whence, when it is asked whether God knows future contingents before or after the decree, by those particles before and after is signified not a real priority and posteriority, but a priority and posteriority of reason with some foundation in reality, namely by reason of dependence on, or independence from, the decree. Whence to affirm that God knows future contingents before the decree is the same as asserting that He knows them independently of the decree. Hence three signs or instants of reason can be distinguished in the divine Knowledge, in the first of which God knows Himself with knowledge wholly divine, namely by intuitively beholding His divine Essence and all His divine excellencies. In the second He knows all possible things through the knowledge of simple intelligence, antecedently to any decree of His will, namely by determining nothing concerning the futurity and existence of things. In the third, however, He knows future things with the knowledge of vision, namely with a decree about their production going before.

It is asked, therefore, whether in the second sign of reason, in which a decree about the futurity of things is not yet conceived as formed, God knows future contingents either in esse entitativo, which they will have in themselves, or in esse obiectivo which they have in Himself, or in the decree to be formed, but not yet formed and exercised, about their futurity, or in the divine ideas representing future things; or finally whether He knows them only after His divine decree has been formed, and insofar as they are contained virtually in the divine Omnipotence, or in the divine Essence representing them.

Since, however, it would be too laborious, and foreign to our undertaking, to discuss each of those opinions individually, therefore, striving for brevity and deeming it worthwhile to strengthen our own opinion rather than to overthrow the foundations of others, let this suffice:

Only conclusion. — God infallibly and determinately knows future contingents in His Essence, the decree about their futurity being first presupposed. This is the common opinion among the faithful interpreters and followers of St. Thomas and of the Subtle Doctor: and the Subtle Doctor openly teaches it in 1. dist. 39. q. unica n. 23., where, after he had expressly proved that the divine will and the divine decree are the primary root and cause of the futurity and contingency of things, he proposes two ways in which the divine intellect can be said to have known those future contingents: First, that God sees in Himself the decree and volition about the things to be produced, and likewise sees that the divine will is immutable and cannot be impeded; and consequently sees that those things which He decrees to be future are truly future: He proposes, however, another way of speaking, namely that those future contingents are known only in the divine Essence, after the decree about their futurity has been formed, and this by a simple intuition. He rejects, however, the former way as less probable, because it seems to argue some discourse in God; for this knowledge, which God would thus have of future contingents, seems to be deduced in this manner: It is decreed that this be future; but what is decreed is invariable, because my will is immutable; therefore this will certainly be future; which inference is truly discursive and unbecoming to God. Whence the Doctor, proposing another more probable and truer way of speaking, says:

It can be put otherwise, that the divine intellect either offers simple things, one of which is contingent in reality: or if it offers a complex, it offers it as neutral: and the will choosing one part, namely the conjunction of these for some now, in reality makes that determinately true: this will be for that now. This being determinately true, the Essence is the reason for the divine intellect to understand that truth: and this naturally, as far as it is on the part of the Essence. So that just as it naturally understands all necessary principles, as it were before the act of the divine will, because their truth does not depend on that act, and they would be known by the divine intellect if per impossibile it were not willing: so the divine Essence is the reason for knowing those things in that prior instant of nature, because then they are true. Not indeed that those truths move the divine intellect, nor even their terms, to apprehend such truth: because then the divine intellect would be debased, since it would suffer from something other than its essence: but just as the divine Essence is the reason for knowing simple things, so also such complexes; but then they are not true contingents, because there is nothing then through which they have determinate truth. Once, however, the determination of the divine will is posited, they are now true, namely for that second instant, and this same will be the reason for the divine intellect which there was in the first (of understanding those things) which are now true in the second instant, and would have been known in the first instant, if they had been in the first instant.

By these words the Doctor lays open the whole order which the divine intellect and the divine will observe in decreeing and certainly knowing the futurity of contingent things; so that first the divine intellect offers to the will the concepts of possible things, which can exist or not exist, namely if the decree of the will comes or is denied: Then, the divine will freely determines itself to produce some of them, and decrees their futurity; which being done, the Essence, from its infinite power of representing any true being, immediately exhibits and represents to the divine intellect the futurity of those things as to be certainly known; and so, in the mind of the Doctor, the divine intellect does not know certainly and infallibly the futurity of contingent things except in the divine Essence and with the divine decree presupposed. — The Angelic Doctor embraces and defends the same opinion, as the more skilled modern interpreters of him contend; and Gonet confirms the matter with many texts and arguments of that Angelic Doctor, Disp. 1. De Scientia futurorum contingentium, art. 5., but especially from lib. 1. Contra Gentes cap. 68. in the second argument, where the Angelic Doctor reasons thus:

God, by knowing His essence, knows other things, just as effects are known through the knowledge of the cause; therefore God knows all things by knowing His essence, to which His causality extends; it extends, however, to the operations of the intellect and of the will; therefore God knows the thoughts and affections of the mind. And in argument 3. he speaks thus: Just as the being of God is first, and through this the cause of every being: so His understanding is first, and through this the cause of every intellectual operation. Just as, therefore, God by knowing His being knows the being of anything whatsoever: so by knowing His understanding and willing, He knows every thought and will, that is, nolition. Finally he concludes: And so causality remains in the first cause, which is God, with respect to the movements of the will, so that God, by knowing Himself, can know things of this kind.

From these passages that argument can be deduced according to St. Thomas: God knows the free acts of our will in His essence as in a cause: but the divine Essence is not their cause except as determined through the free decree of His will, since God is not a natural agent but a free one; therefore, according to St. Thomas, God knows the free acts of our will in His decree.

The Conclusion is proved. First, indeed, by the authority of the holy Fathers expressly affirming that the foreknowledge of future things is founded on the decree of the divine will; and this first from St. Dionysius, already often praised, affirming that God knows all things in His essence as in a cause; but the divine Essence is not the cause of futurity except insofar as it is determined through the free decree of the divine will. For God does not act from the necessity of nature, but from the good pleasure of His will, according to that saying of the Apostle to the Ephesians 1. He works all things according to the counsel of His will: therefore God knows all future contingents in His essence, the decree of His will being first presupposed. — It is confirmed from St. Hilary 9. De Trinitate: What God, he says, decreed to do, He knew in His will. Likewise from St. Augustine, lib. 26. Contra Faustum cap. 4., where, giving the reason why he does not know whether something will be future, he says: Therefore I do not know, because what the will of God holds concerning this matter is hidden from me: that, however, does not escape me, that it will without doubt be future, if the will of God holds this. Which consequence would be null, if the foreknowledge of good works were not founded on the decree of the divine will: therefore it is truly so.

It is therefore proved by reason. Future contingents cannot be known before they have the character of future; but they do not have it without the divine decree being presupposed; therefore they cannot be known before the divine decree. The major is evident, for a thing is knowable in the way in which it is, and so future things cannot be known determinately before they are conceived to have determinate futurity. The minor is proved; The decree of God is the first root and first principle of the determinate futurity of things: therefore antecedently to it things can neither be, nor be conceived as, determinately future. The Antecedent is proved: that is the first root and first principle of the determinate futurity of things which first leads them from the state of possibility to the state of futurity: but that is the divine decree itself: for since God is not a natural agent but a free one, He does not operate, nor does He produce anything, except from the free determination of His will; and consequently, since possible things are of themselves indeterminate to existing or not existing, they are not determined to future existence except through the divine will. — It is confirmed: creatures can be considered in a threefold state, namely of possibility, of futurity, and of existence; in which states they necessarily depend on God as on the first Principle; in the state indeed of possibility they depend on the divine intellect first producing them in esse intelligibili, and completely on the divine omnipotence, which can produce them; in the state of futurity they depend on the divine decree, determining the power of God to bestow on them existence at such a determinate time: in the state, however, of existence, they depend on the actual influx of God producing and conserving them in esse: therefore, just as it is repugnant that something be possible independently of the intellect and power of God, and existent independently of the actual influx of God: so likewise it is repugnant that something be, or be conceived as, future independently of the divine decree, whether absolute or conditional.

Proof 2. If contingent things were determinately future antecedently to the absolute or conditional decree of God, such futurity would belong to them either from themselves and from their own nature, or from the causality of God, or from the efficacy of another cause; but neither of these can be asserted. Not indeed the first; then because it would follow that those future things would be necessarily and ex natura rei, not indeed freely and contingently; and so God could not bring it about that future things were not; for what belongs to something from itself and from its own nature belongs to it necessarily, nor can it be impeded by God. Then because things have futurity from eternity from the same principle from which they have existence in time; but future contingents do not have existence in time from themselves, nor from their own nature; therefore neither futurity from eternity. Not even the second; for since God is not a natural agent but a free one ad extra, no causality can be in Him, nor any conceived, antecedently to the decree and free determination of His will. Not, finally, the third; for since secondary causes depend on the determination and concurrence, if no causality and determination concerning creatures existed in God, as in truth none exists before the divine decree about producing them, likewise no efficacy can be conceived in the secondary causes from which that determinate futurity of things could proceed.

Finally; This same truth is proved from the brief but efficacious overthrow and refutation of the other opinions. If future contingents could be known by God before the decree, then chiefly first either in His Ideas, as Egidius Romanus teaches in 1. dist. 38., asserting that God knows future contingents before the decree in His ideas, or in His essence precisely, insofar as it has the character of an idea or of an impressed species; or secondly in the supercomprehension of secondary causes and of free choice, as Molina asserts in Disputation four, saying that God, antecedently to His decree and the determination of His will, by His infinite power of understanding penetrates and knows what each created will placed under any state and condition will in fact will, and toward which part it will incline; which penetration and most perfect knowledge of the human will he therefore calls supercomprehension, so that the divine knowledge may be distinguished from the angelic, which, although it comprehends the will of man, nevertheless does not know in it our free acts; or thirdly; He would know them in the decree as future and to be formed in the following sign or instant of reason, as Suarez teaches lib. 2. De Scientia Dei, cap. 8.; or finally in the objective truth of those future contingents, which Vasquez and some other recent authors say they have independently of the divine decree; but neither of those can truly be affirmed; therefore it remains that those future and free contingents be known in the divine Essence, with the divine decree presupposed.

The minor is proved with respect to the first part. God cannot know creatures either in His ideas, or in His Essence having the character of an idea, except in the way in which they are represented in it; but antecedently to the decree creatures are not represented in the divine Essence as future, but only as merely possible; therefore in it they cannot be known as determinately future, but only as merely possible. The major is evident. The minor likewise; then because all things antecedently to the divine decree are in the state of mere possibility, and are indifferent to futurity or non-futurity; then because the divine Essence antecedently to the decree represents naturally and necessarily, and such representation belongs to the natural knowledge and that of simple intelligence, not indeed to the free knowledge and that of vision; and so such knowledge would be necessary, not indeed free. Nor does it matter that the divine Essence antecedently to the decree has infinite power in representing; for from that it follows only that it represents all things which are representable, and in the way in which they are representable. Whence, since antecedently to the divine decree about the futurity of things nothing is representable as future, but only as possible: therefore neither can they be known in them certainly and infallibly. The foundations of Molina will be proposed and solved, by overthrowing middle knowledge, of which he boasts so greatly, but vainly, as devised by himself. — The third part of the same aforementioned minor likewise appears false: then because the decree of God cannot be conceived as future: therefore neither can God know future contingents in His decree as future in the following sign: then because, in order that God might foreknow His decree, He would have to distinguish, in our manner, instants of reason in the indivisible instant of eternity: but this is repugnant to the perfection of the same divine intellect, namely that it should distinguish those things which in reality are not distinct a parte rei: then because if God, in a sign of reason antecedent to the existence of His decree, knows it as future, He will know it as future necessarily and not freely: but this is absurd and repugnant to divine freedom: The sequel of the major is clear: because what is known as future must be known as determined in its cause to exist in the following instant: but in that sign, in which God would know His decree as future, that decree would not be determined freely but necessarily; otherwise it would have to be determined through another decree, and so on to infinity; for every free determination of the divine will is a decree: therefore, etc.; then finally because if the divine decree had the character of future, it would have it either in its actual entity, or in its termination: not the first, for this is repugnant to divine immutability: not even the second, because in the termination futurity is not understood unless futurity is also understood in the term; but in the term of the divine decree no futurity is understood prior in reason to the decree being posited: then because the term, or object, of the divine decree is the futurity of created existence: but created existence has this futurity prior in reason to the decree being posited: then because if such an object had the being of futurity before the decree, it would have that being either from itself, or from another: but neither can be said, as was proved above: therefore it can in no way have future being antecedently to the decree.

— Fourthly, finally, the same minor is clear with respect to the last part, namely that future contingents cannot be known in their objective truth antecedent to the decree: then because objective truth consists in the connection of the predicate with the subject; but in the sign antecedent to the divine decree no such connection can exist, since there is no cause, neither divine nor created, which joins them together: not indeed a created one, as is clear; not even a divine one, because this would be either the divine intellect or the divine omnipotence; but not the intellect, for that is not the cause of the futurity of things: nor even the omnipotence, which does not operate concerning creatures except consequently to the divine decree: therefore likewise in that sign there is no determinate objective truth of things contingently future: then because every determinate objective truth is necessarily founded in some being; for truth is a property of being: but there is no being in which that objective truth of contingent things could be founded before the decree: for it would be founded either in esse which they have in themselves, or in esse which they have in their causes. Not the first, for contingents, as long as they are future, have no being in themselves. Not even the second, for since the secondary causes, from which they could proceed, are indeterminate and impedible, neither can they have certain and determinate being in them.

THE FOUNDATIONS OF SUAREZ ARE SOLVED.

He objects 1. Suarez: God conceives by reason that His will can will, before He conceives it as willing: therefore He can also conceive by reason that it will will, before conceiving it as now willing. It is confirmed by the example of an Angel, whom if God had created from eternity as operating, God could know him by reason beforehand as about to will for another sign, because He would first have known that he could will, before that he de facto wills. — I deny the consequence: For more is required to conceive something as to be posited, than to conceive it as positable: for to this latter is required something determining the positable itself to being posited: but with respect to the divine decree nothing can be conceived that would determine it to being posited, or from non-future to being future. — To the confirmation: I deny the parity; for on the hypothesis that God had created the Angel from eternity as operating, v. g. as loving, He would de facto indeed first know such dilection as posterior, and in a certain way future with respect to the nature of that Angel, because in creatures being is prior to operating; and this especially since the substance of the Angel and its dilection are measured only per accidens by eternity, as by a measure not proper and essential to them: but it is otherwise with God, in whom being is not prior to operating, and whose essence as well as operation and decree are measured by eternity, as by a measure proper and essential to Him.

He objects 2. For the divine decree to be known as in the future, it suffices that in some sign it abstract from actual existence; and in this way it truly abstracts in the first sign of eternity, in which it is not yet conceived as posited: therefore in this first sign, by reason before it is posited, it is conceived as future: the minor is evident, for in that sign of reason the divine will is not yet conceived as determined to create, v. g., man; for it is conceived as determining itself to this creation only in a posterior sign. — I answer 1. by denying the major: for that something in some sign be seen as future, it does not suffice that for that sign it abstract from being; for precisely from the fact that it abstracts from being, it is not deemed more future than not future; since even non-futures and mere possibles abstract from being. Therefore beyond the abstraction from being, there is required for the notion of future that something be given from which it can be determined from possible to futurition: but nothing before the divine decree can so determine: therefore neither can it have the notion of future. — I answer 2. That would indeed be true if that instant were a real sign and in quo, but not if it were a sign of reason and a quo, as in fact it is. For that sign in quo the divine will is conceived as indifferent to forming the decree about creating or not creating man is not a real sign, but one of reason, and therefore does not suffice for the true notion of future; otherwise the Son could be said to be future with respect to the Father, because in the sign of origin and of reason the Father is conceived before the Son.

He objects 3. In that prior sign, in which God precedes His free decrees and is conceived as having the knowledge of simple intelligence, this proposition, God will not decree in the following sign to create the world, is false: because it is not conformed to its object and consequently its contradictory, namely, God will decree in the following sign to create the world, is true: therefore the decree about the creation of the world in that prior sign is determinately future, and consequently is knowable as such by the divine intellect. — I answer 1. God does not precede His free decrees by some priority and instant in quo, but only a quo. Second, it is false that of contradictory propositions one is determinately true and the other false in a sign preceding the divine decree, because nothing is future before that decree. Third I say: indeed one or the other of the contradictories must be verified for any instant of real duration; but not for any instant of nature, or of reason; for in that prior sign one can prescind from both; which is evident by the example: for in the prior sign, in which humanity is prior to risibility, there is neither risibility, otherwise the nature itself would not be posterior, nor non-risibility, otherwise it could not belong to humanity:

Finally he objects: God for that sign of reason in which He is not yet conceived as having the free decree, comprehends His essence and will: but He cannot comprehend it unless in it He knows His decrees as future in the following sign; since comprehensive knowledge is most perfect, it must extend to everything that is contained in its object: therefore since the decrees are directly contained really in the will and essence of God, God cannot know His essence and His will without likewise knowing His decrees.

I answer 1. That inference would be true if some priority in a real instant were given between necessary and free acts; and it would be true that God in a real instant would first know Himself, before He formed the decrees; but since that supposition is false, that also which is inferred from it is false.

I answer 2. That although God in that prior sign, in which only natural acts are conceived, and free acts are not yet conceived, comprehends His essence; yet He is not said to know His decrees as future; for since the divine will in that sign is conceived as indifferent and indeterminate toward the production of things, it cannot be a means for determinately knowing those decrees; for in an indifferent and indeterminate principle, a certain and determinate effect cannot be known.

The foundations of others are set forth, and are resolved.

The Assertors of the last opinion object: the reason and force of contradiction necessarily brings it about that one of two contradictory propositions is determinately true and the other determinately false, as these propositions, If Paul be called at such a time and occasion, he will truly consent: And if he be called at such a time and occasion he will not consent, are truly contradictory for that prior sign antecedent to the divine decree; therefore for the sign prior to the divine decree, one of them is determinately true and the other determinately false, and consequently it is knowable by God before the decree.

I answer 1. By distinguishing the major: the reason of contradiction requires that one of the contradictories be determinately true and the other determinately false for every real instant, I concede: for every instant of reason, I deny: and the minor being conceded, I deny the consequence.

I answer 2. By denying the minor: namely that those propositions in the sign antecedent to the divine decree are contradictory, because for a contradiction, the essence of the proposition must necessarily be supposed. But since before the decree nothing at all is future, or not future; therefore neither is there then the essence of a proposition which would enunciate the thing as future or not future for that sign, and so neither is there a contradiction.

They insist: Truth and falsity are properties of the proposition, as is taught in Logic: therefore they must belong to the proposition for every imaginable sign in which this proposition can be conceived: but those propositions can be conceived antecedently to the divine decree: therefore in that sign they are true, or false.

I distinguish the major. truth and falsity are properties of the formal proposition, I concede: of the material, I deny: but in that sign antecedent to the divine decree they are not propositions formally, but only materially. Or otherwise, truth and falsity are respective properties of the proposition, I concede: absolute, I deny: for just as equality together with inequality are properties of quantity, not indeed absolute, but respective; because one quantity is said equal or unequal by order to another which it exceeds, or by which it is exceeded: so likewise truth or falsity are said to be respective properties, because they are taken by order to the object, so that from the conformity or difformity which they have to it, they are true or false. Whence if the object in some sign of reason is not determinately future, or not future, even the propositions will not be determinately true or false, but indifferent to truth and falsity.

You will object 1. In general against the Conclusion: if divine Knowledge of contingently future things were founded in the divine decree and presupposed it, it would follow that the Knowledge of Vision is formally distinguished, and is a divine attribute distinct from the Knowledge of simple intelligence: but the consequent is false: therefore also the antecedent. The sequence of the major is evident, for the distinction of the sciences is sought from the part of the means and motive; but the motive of each science would be diverse: for that one would know possible things in omnipotence, but this one would know them in the decree.

I deny the sequence of the major, and I distinguish its proof. The sciences are distinguished by diverse motives and means in quibus, I concede; a quibus, I deny: that is, they are indeed distinguished by diverse means in which they are formally represented, but not by those a quibus such representation is, as it were, causally. But those sciences behold their objects in the same means, namely in the divine Essence, which represents possible and future things, the former indeed to be seen through the knowledge of simple intelligence, the latter through the knowledge of vision. Therefore although the motives a quibus are diverse, namely because things are not completely possible except through omnipotence, nor are they future except through the divine decree; yet they should not be distinct sciences, because both Omnipotence and the Decree of God are only, as it were, conditions applying His intellect to seeing possible and future things through that distinct Knowledge of simple intelligence and of vision.

You will object 2. God knows future sins: but He does not know them through His decree: therefore He does not know future things through the decree. The minor is evident; for God does not decree future sins, otherwise He would be the author of sin. — I distinguish the minor. God does not decree future sins by an absolute and positive decree, I concede; by a permissive decree, I deny: and so the divine decree is twofold, one indeed Positive, which decrees to concur positively to the physical entity of any action, whether good or evil: the other Permissive, by which He has determined to permit the malice of sin, namely by not suspending His concurrence to that physical action from which such malice follows; because it is of the notion

of universal Providence, that it permits some defects both in the natural and in the moral order, so that from this the beauty of the universe may shine forth more, and the order of justice may appear. Whence St. Augustine in the Enchiridio, c. 5: Nothing is done unless the Omnipotent wills it to be done, either by Himself doing it, or by permitting it to be done: by the former decree He does not decree sin, but only by the latter.

You will press: For something to have the notion of a means leading to the knowledge of another, it must have a certain and infallible connection with it; but the permissive decree does not have a certain connection with future sins: therefore through it God cannot certainly foreknow sin. The major is evident: The minor is proved: The permissive decree imports two things, namely the purpose of concurring to the entity of sin, and of conferring on the part of the first cause everything that is necessary for the second cause to act. Moreover, it also imports the suspension of efficacious help for resisting temptation, or for performing the commanded act of virtue: but the permissive decree in neither of these ways has a necessary connection with future sin: not indeed because of the suspension of help, otherwise it would follow that the human will with only the general concurrence would be determined to evil, and could not produce any moral good; nor yet because of the purpose of concurring to the entity of sin, otherwise God would be the author of sin, because He would cause that from which the malice would necessarily be caused: therefore through the permissive decree He cannot know future sin.

I deny the minor. and also the minor of that proof, for God in both ways sees future sin: first indeed by reason of the denied efficacious help, because to such denial sin infallibly follows, not by a physical consequence and of causality, but by a consequence, as it were, logical and of inference. For since that will cannot overcome grave temptations without efficacious help, it follows that at its denial the will is overcome and consents to sin. God likewise sees the same in the purpose of concurring to the physical entity of sin, because since this entity has a connection with the sinful moral act, it follows that in concurring to this entity God also sees that moral deformity which is connected to it. Yet it does not thence follow that He is the cause of sin, because He does not per se concur to that deformity; for the reason that that is not an effect, but a defect, as we will open more fully in the following Disputation on the divine will: