Scotus Academicus, Tomus secundus: De Deo Intelligente et Volente

Note 1. By the name middle knowledge (concerning which a celebrated controversy arose before Clement VIII and Paul V in the Congregation de Auxiliis, between Father Thomas de Lemos, a Dominican, and Fathers Gregory of Valencia and Ferdinand de Vastida of the Society of Jesus) the more recent theologians understand the certain and infallible knowledge which God has of things conditionally future, before the actual and exercised decree by which He decides and predetermines their futurity. It is called middle knowledge, moreover, either first because (they say) it stands between the knowledge of simple intelligence and the knowledge of vision, and shares something of both; for it is necessary on the part of the subject, just as the knowledge of simple intelligence is, namely on the part of God, in that it precedes every actual free decree concerning the futurity of things, in much the same way as our first thoughts are said to be necessary because they precede all deliberation and choice of our will; it is also free on the part of the object, like the knowledge of vision, because it terminates at free objects, namely at conditioned contingents, which are known through that middle knowledge. Or, secondly, this knowledge is called middle, because through it God knows conditionally future things, which hold as it were a middle place between mere possibles, which are known through the knowledge of simple intelligence, and absolutely future things, which are attained through the knowledge of vision. Or finally, as some acknowledge, this knowledge is called middle because it seems to be a divinely inspired means for uprooting all the errors of the Pelagians, Semi-Pelagians, Lutherans, and Calvinists concerning divine predestination, the necessity and efficacy of grace, and the reconciliation of man's freedom with divine foreknowledge and efficacious grace; inasmuch as, namely, this knowledge holds that the choice and determination of the human will is foreseen by God under a condition, before He predefines or determines anything concerning the free acts of that same will which are absolutely future.

Note 2. All the advocates of this middle knowledge almost agree in this, that they affirm it to have been recently devised and unknown to the holy Fathers and the older theologians. For Molina, in the Concordia, on quest. 23, art. 4 and 5, does not hesitate to write that in those things which he himself had delivered concerning the middle knowledge of things future under a condition lies the entire way of reconciling the freedom of free choice with divine grace and predestination; which, if it had always been given and explained, perhaps neither would the Pelagian heresy have arisen, nor would the Lutherans have so shamelessly denied the freedom of our free choice, alleging that it cannot cohere with divine grace, foreknowledge, and predestination. He adds: This way of ours for reconciling the freedom of free choice with divine predestination has up to now been delivered by no one whom we have seen; therefore it must be set forth a little more fully. He subjoins: If it had been given and explained by Augustine, the Pelagian heresy would never have arisen, nor would so many of the faithful have been troubled by Augustine's opinion and his contests with the Pelagians, nor would they have lapsed to the Pelagians. Fonseca has similar things in quaest. 6 of the metaphys., sect. 8, where he boasts that he was the first to devise in God a certain knowledge, which he says is middle between the natural knowledge of God and the free knowledge of free acts future under a condition. And Vasquez, in the first part, disputation 67, cap. 7: Why do the scholastic theologians wonder, he says, if besides the knowledge of simple intelligence and of vision we posit another of which they themselves made no mention? Finally, Valentinus Herice, 1. part., disputation 7, cap. 10, says: Who does not know that this middle knowledge lay hidden from the Scholastics, and was dug out by our Fathers, by the diligent and assiduous reading of the Fathers, from the darkness in which it lay hidden. Suárez, however, more prudent and humble than the others, does not affirm it to be a new invention, but contends that it has flowed down to us without interruption from Augustine, although it did not always become known to theologians so perspicuously. — Although, however, almost all the Fathers of the Society of Jesus champion that middle knowledge, they nevertheless do not agree among themselves in explaining and proving it: for first they differ in assigning the medium in which it is grounded. For some, as was said above, concede with Molina and Becanus that God knows conditionally future contingent things in the super-comprehension of secondary causes, and in the most eminent knowledge of free choice. Some, with Suárez, in the decree as future in the following sign of reason. Finally, others, in the objective truth which conditionally future things have antecedently to the conditional decree. Secondly, they disagree among themselves in establishing the special character of this knowledge; for some want it to be truly middle between each of the two kinds of knowledge, of simple intelligence and of vision. Some think that it must be reduced to the knowledge of simple intelligence. Finally, the rest contend that it must be connected with the knowledge of vision.

Note 3. From Didacus Alvarez, Archbishop of Trani, disputation 7, De Auxiliis, n. 10, there were once certain Arian heretics who constituted this middle knowledge in God as the principal foundation of their error, so that, namely, from the part of the foreknowledge of the future good use of free choice they might assign the cause on account of which Christ alone — whom they asserted to be the Son of God by grace, not by nature — was, alone, I say, among men, raised to the very dignity of divine filiation. So relates Alexander, Bishop of Alexandria, in the Epistola ad Alexandrum Episcopum Constantinopolitanum, which is inserted among the acts

of the Council of Ephesus, whose words are:

When the opinion which follows next is objected to them, and they have spurned me because it plainly repugnates the nature of the Savior, who is by nature immutable, then, having cast off all piety and reverence toward God, they say: that God, since by foreknowledge and pre-sension He had known beforehand that he would by no means spurn Him, therefore chose him out of all: for they affirm that he had no prerogative by nature, nor anything beyond the other Sons (for they affirm that no one is a Son of God by nature, nor that there is anyone who is joined to Him by any property), but since he was of mutable nature and, on account of his singular diligence and zeal in rightly ordering his life and morals, did not turn aside to vices, God chose him, to such a degree that if either Paul or Peter had earnestly applied himself to this, they would have been Sons of God in the same way as he was. And in order to confirm their insane and pestilential doctrine, they also do violence to the Sacred Scriptures themselves, and twist to their own purpose the saying handed down in the Psalms concerning Christ, which reads thus, Ps. 44: You have loved justice and hated iniquity: therefore God, your God, has anointed you with the oil of gladness above your fellows.

The Semi-Pelagians admitted the same middle knowledge, in order to establish predestination from foreseen merits arising from the primary good use of free choice without the benefit of grace, as will be clear below. And so it is certain that middle knowledge is not recent, but a most ancient dogma, devised in the first place by heretics, by which they might the more easily patronize their errors.

Note 4. Although some advocates of middle knowledge affirm that our opinion can easily be reconciled with theirs concerning middle knowledge, nevertheless those opinions differ by the whole heaven, and they conflict not only in the manner of speaking, but also in reality itself. First, because our opinion constitutes in God an actually conditional decree of producing through free secondary causes the event which is announced as future, if the condition is fulfilled: but the opposite opinion constitutes in God no decree, even conditional, actually, on which the infallibility of the event that is announced as future may be grounded, if the condition is verified. Secondly, they differ, for the conditional decree on the part of the act of willing included in the condition itself, which the contrary opinion posits, is only the decree of creating free causes and of constituting them in such circumstances and with such sufficient helps, by which they can operate if they wish, and of offering on its part a simultaneous concurrence, whenever they themselves wish to operate, as is clear from what has been said: but we judge that, in order that the conditioned event be infallibly future ex hypothesi, that decree of creating free secondary causes and constituting them in such circumstances, with sufficient power to operate if they wish, offering them a simultaneous concurrence, as they posit, does not suffice; but beyond all these things, in order that the contingent event be infallibly future under a condition, it is necessarily required that there precede in God an actual decree, by which He willed that such an event be infallibly future, yet under a condition, namely, if the condition under which it is predicted to be future were fulfilled.

Only conclusion. — No middle knowledge is to be admitted by which God knows conditionally future things antecedently to His decree concerning their conditioned futurity. This is common among the Thomists and the Scotists, the more faithful of their Doctors'

interpreters and disciples: and it is gathered first from the doctrine of the Subtle Doctor, who in 1. dist. 38. n. 2, resolving that the knowledge of God concerning contingent things is not practical, says: If before the act of the divine will the divine intellect could have any such knowledge, it would have it merely naturally and necessarily, because every knowledge there preceding the act of the will is merely natural and by essence, as it itself is the merely natural principle of understanding. With these words the Doctor affirms that every divine knowledge preceding the decree is necessary, merely natural, and by essence, such as is the knowledge of simple intelligence: but such would not be that middle knowledge, and consequently the Doctor rejects it. Then, in dist. 41. n. 10, impugning the opinion of Henry, who says that the reason why God predestines one but reprobates another is the good use of free choice foreseen on the part of the predestined, and the evil use on the part of the reprobate, he says:

But on the contrary it is argued against this; First, because God does not foresee that he will use free choice well, except because He wills or preordains that this one use it well, because as was said in dist. 39, the certain prevision of future contingent things is from the determination of the divine will: if, therefore, two men equal in natural endowments are offered to the divine will, I ask why He preordains this one to use free choice well and not that one? There is no reason, as it seems, to assign for this except the divine will: and this is the first distinction between them, from which, according to you, election or reprobation follows. Therefore in the first distinction pertaining to predestination and reprobation, the only reason is the divine will.

With these words the Doctor plainly affirms that divine knowledge supposes the decree, and that things have the character of future things only dependently on the decree: and so he explodes that knowledge by which future things are said to be known antecedently to the divine decree concerning their futurity.

THE FIRST IMPUGNATION OF MIDDLE KNOWLEDGE FROM ST. AUGUSTINE.

The conclusion is therefore proved. First, indeed, by the authority of St. Augustine, who disapproves and rejects this middle knowledge, as I make evident by this argument: St. Augustine rejects and reprobates that knowledge which the Massilians, called Semi-Pelagians, championed in order to reconcile human freedom with the decrees of God: but they championed, for that purpose, that a middle knowledge preceding the divine decrees was necessary: therefore St. Augustine reprobates it. In order that the major may become more clearly known, I first prove the minor from the Epistles of Sts. Prosper, Bishop of Riez, and Hilary, Bishop of Arles, in which the errors and opinions of the Semi-Pelagians are reported and referred to St. Augustine himself, that he might write against them, as he did in Lib. De Praedestinatione Sanctorum et de Bono perseverantiae. St. Prosper therefore writes that the Semi-Pelagians unanimously taught that divine predestination is based on foreknowledge, and that God predestines no one except on the supposition of the foreknowledge by which He foresees what his will will do, placed with the very help of grace in such or such circumstances: for he says at the beginning of the Epistle:

This is their definition and profession: that every man, indeed, sinned when Adam sinned, and that no one is saved by his own works, but by the grace of God through regeneration; that nevertheless the propitiation which is in the Sacrament of the Blood of Christ is offered to all men without exception, so that whoever wills to come to faith and to Baptism may be able to be saved. But those who are going to believe, or who are going to remain in that faith which afterwards, through

the grace of God is to be helped — God, they say, foreknew before the constitution of the world: and He predestined into His kingdom those whom, freely called, He foresaw would be worthy of election, and would depart from this life with a good end.

But that he professed this divine foreknowledge to be anterior to the divine decree, he indicates by subjoining:

But that this purpose of the calling of God, by which either before the beginning of the world, or in the very condition of the human race, the separation of the elect and the rejected is said to have been made, so that according as it pleased the Creator, some were created vessels of honor, others vessels of dishonor, and takes away from the fallen the care of rising again and brings to the saints the occasion of time; because on both sides the labor is superfluous, if neither can the rejected enter by any industry, nor can the elect fall away by any negligence: for in whatever manner they conduct themselves, nothing else can happen to them than what God has defined, and under uncertain hope the course cannot be constant, since if the election of the one predestining holds something else, the intention of the one striving is in vain.

Hence they concluded: That therefore all industry is removed and virtues are taken away, if the constitution of God (that is, the decree) precedes human wills: and under this name of predestination a certain fatal necessity is introduced. Hence the same St. Prosper, among other things, asks St. Augustine to teach:

Whether the foreknowledge of God so remains according to the purpose, that those very things which are purposed are to be taken as foreknown: or whether these things are varied according to the genera of causes and the species of persons; so that, because the callings are diverse, in those who are saved without working anything, the purpose of God alone seems as it were to exist: but in those who are going to do some good, the purpose may stand through foreknowledge: or whether, uniformly, although divine foreknowledge cannot be distinguished from the temporal purpose, foreknowledge is nevertheless, by a certain order, subjected to the purpose.

That is, whether the foreknowledge of future things is anterior to the divine decree, or rather posterior to it, and grounded in it. From which it is clear that the discourse is instituted by St. Prosper concerning middle knowledge, inasmuch as it is even now asserted by the more recent theologians. — It is confirmed from the Epistle of St. Hilary written on the same matter to St. Augustine himself, in which, likewise relating the errors of the same Semi-Pelagians, especially that they asserted that God does not grant the gifts of grace except by supposing some beginning of a good will: and when they were pressed with the example of adults to whom the Gospel was preached, but to others it was not; which could not be refunded into a beginning of a good will, since all were concluded under the sin of infidelity:

But when it is said to them, he says, why it is preached to some, or in some places, or is not preached, or is now preached what at one time was not preached to almost all, just as now it has not been preached to some nations: they say that this belongs to divine foreknowledge, that the truth would be announced, or will be announced, at that time, and there, and to those: when and where it was foreknown that it was to be believed.

He adds:

And they testify that they prove this not only by the testimonies of other Catholics, but also by the more ancient disputation of Your Holiness, where nevertheless you taught the same grace with no less perspicuity of truth: as that which Your Holiness says in the question contra Porphyrium de tempore Christianae Religionis: that Christ then willed to appear to men and to have His doctrine preached among them, when He knew, and where He knew that there were those who would believe in Him.

By which it is established that the Semi-Pelagians asserted that divine foreknowledge, of which the discourse here is, is anterior to the divine decrees. The major is therefore proved, namely, that St. Augustine rejected that middle knowledge: for here, in cap. 9 of the lib. De Praedestinatione Sanctorum, responding to that which the Semi-Pelagians used to usurp from his own writings, both against Porphyry and in the Commentario in Epistolam ad Romanos, to assert that foreknowledge is anterior to the divine decrees; after he had reported all those things which he had said against Porphyry, he concludes that the Semi-Pelagians wrongly assert that he had willed that divine foreknowledge is anterior to the divine decrees; nay, he affirms that he taught there that it is supported by those very decrees;

You see, he says, that I, without prejudice to the hidden counsel of God and other causes, wished to say this about the foreknowledge of Christ, which seemed sufficient for convincing the infidelity of the pagans, who had objected this question? For what is truer than that Christ foreknew who, and when, and in which places, would believe in Him? But whether, with Christ preached to them, they would have faith from themselves, or would take it with God giving, that is, whether God only foreknew them, or also predestined them, I did not think it necessary then to ask and discuss. Accordingly, what I said, that Christ then willed to appear to men, and to have His doctrine preached among them, when He knew, and where He knew that there were those who would believe in Him, could also be said thus: that Christ then willed to appear to men, and to have His doctrine preached among them, when He knew, and where He knew that there were those who had been elected in Him before the constitution of the world.

With these words St. Augustine refers back to the decree of the divine will and to His election the knowledge by which God foreknew, with the Gospel preached at these or those times, who would believe in Him. He therefore holds that the knowledge of those conditioned things presupposes in God some decree of His divine will.

It is confirmed. there St. Augustine, cap. 10, says:

Predestination cannot be without foreknowledge, but foreknowledge can be without predestination: for by predestination, indeed, God foreknew those things which He Himself was going to do. Hence it is said: He made the things which are to come: but He is able to foreknow even those things which He Himself does not do, such as whatever sins.

Hence I argue thus: the things which God is going to do, He foreknows from predestination, that is, from His decree: therefore there is not given in Him a foreknowledge of future things independently of His decree. The antecedent is clear from the words of Augustine himself, establishing only this difference between foreknowledge and predestination, that predestination is only of those things which God is going to do, but foreknowledge is also of those things which He is not going to do, such as sins; and therefore in his mind the foreknowledge of the future things which He is going to do is posterior to the decrees, not anterior.

It is confirmed 2. from the same St. Augustine, in lib. De Bono Perseverantiae, c. 9, expounding that which St. John says, 1:

If they had been of us, they would surely have remained with us; where, answering: They were not of them, because they were not called according to the purpose, they were not elected in Christ before the constitution of the world, they did not obtain a lot in Him, they were not predestined according to the purpose of Him who operates all things: objecting to himself on the part of the Pelagians; Certainly God could, foreknowing that they would fall, before that happened, take them away from this life; he answers: Are we going to return to this, that we should still dispute with how great an absurdity it is said that men are judged even for those sins which God foreknew they would have perpetrated, if they had lived? Which is so abhorrent to Christian or altogether human feelings, that one would be ashamed even to refute it.

With these words he plainly disapproves the foreknowledge of those things which precede the decrees. Then in the same place he confirms those things which he had said in cap. 9 of De Praedest. Sanctorum, namely, that when he said that Christ then appeared to men, and preached His doctrine among them, when and where He knew who were going to believe in Him, he understood that without prejudice of the hidden counsel of God, and without exclusion of the divine decree: therefore he always supposes the divine decree to precede divine foreknowledge.

They reply. the advocates of middle knowledge say that St. Augustine in these texts speaks of absolutely future things, not however of conditioned ones.

On the contrary. St. Augustine speaks of those future things about which he had been asked by Sts. Prosper and Hilary, and about which the Semi-Pelagians were dealing, otherwise he would not answer to the point; finally, those about which he himself had made mention in the book De sex quaestionibus Paganorum: but those future things of which the discourse is are conditioned. Proof 1. from the Epistle of St. Prosper, who, after he had distinguished two genera of Semi-Pelagians, some of whom inclined more toward the Pelagians, concludes:

The opinion of almost all is found to be equal, and one, by which they received the purpose and predestination of God according to foreknowledge, so that on this account God made some vessels of honor, others of dishonor, because He provided the end of each one, and foresaw under the very help of grace in what will and action he would be.

By which it is clear that the Semi-Pelagians held that God certainly reprobates some, because He foresaw that they would not even consent to grace if they had it; therefore he does not speak of absolutely future things. Then St. Augustine himself sufficiently indicates that he speaks of conditioned future things: both because he explains the question, whether, if Christ had preached at an equal time and place among the Gentiles, they would have believed or not: which certainly is not future absolutely, but conditionally. Finally, in cap. 10 of De Praedestinatione Sanctorum, he says: For by predestination God foreknew those things which He Himself was going to do: but the things which God was going to do are not future absolutely, but conditionally; for things that are absolutely future, He is going to do absolutely, but He was not going to do them: therefore there he deals with conditionally future things. Add that there St. Augustine affirms divine foreknowledge to presuppose the divine decree, and consequently, even given and conceded that he dealt with absolutely future things, he would always exclude middle knowledge antecedent to the decree.

Others reply. that St. Augustine indeed rejects middle knowledge independent of the decree, not indeed as to its substance and good use, but as to the abuse and erroneous manner in which the Semi-Pelagians admitted it, inasmuch as, namely, they said that from it the motives of predestination and grace are exhibited to God.

On the contrary. First, St. Augustine rejects the foreknowledge independent of the decree in the same manner in which he had delivered it in the book De sex quaestionibus Paganorum: but he had delivered it there as to its substance; for there he had said that Christ then willed to appear to men, when and where He knew who would believe in Him: therefore he reprobates it not only as to the abuse, but also as to the substance. Secondly, he denies that foreknowledge before the decree, as it was asserted by the Semi-Pelagians: but they established that foreknowledge not only as to the motive of grace and predestination, but also for saving the freedom of free choice, as is clear from the words of St. Prosper: therefore he rejects it not only as to the abuse, but also as to the substance.

The rest reply. that although St. Augustine speaks of middle knowledge as to substance, he nevertheless does not assert that it supposes an absolute decree on the part of the subject, or of the one decreeing, but only a conditional one on the part of the act, which is consistent with middle knowledge itself, which precedes the absolute decree.

On the contrary. this reply directly militates against St. Augustine himself, already praised and saying, That God by predestination foreknew those things which He Himself was going to do: and accordingly that foreknowledge supposes an absolute decree on the part of the subject. Then, St. Augustine himself, in lib. De Bono Perseverantiae, cap. 17, speaking of the gifts which God gratuitously grants for persevering, says: These gifts of God, if there is no predestination which we defend, are not foreknown by God; but they are foreknown: this, therefore, is the predestination which we defend. With these words St. Augustine concludes foreknowledge from predestination, and accordingly from a presupposed absolute decree on the part of God decreeing. It is established, therefore, that St. Augustine explodes middle knowledge, and accordingly does not admit it.

MIDDLE KNOWLEDGE IS IMPUGNED, SECOND, BY THEOLOGICAL REASON.

Proof 2. The conclusion by theological reason. Middle knowledge is said to be a certain and evident cognition of future conditionals, antecedently to the divine decree and to the predestination of the divine will: but such cognition is repugnant to God: therefore it is not to be asserted.

The major is evident: for although the advocates of middle knowledge mutually fight among themselves in asserting the medium in which God knows future conditioned contingents antecedently to the decree, all nevertheless agree in this, that that divine cognition is certain and evident and prior to the divine decrees themselves.

The minor is therefore proved. That science is repugnant to God which implies a contradiction in terms: but the science of God about things conditionally future before the decree implies a contradiction in terms: therefore it is repugnant to God. The major is certain: for nothing contradictory and repugnant to itself ought to be attributed to God. The minor, however, is proved from those things which we have said, that the futurity of things depends on the divine decree, either absolute, if the futurity be absolute; or conditional, if it be conditional: therefore it requires an external cause, which may bring it from possible being to future being: but the principal cause of the futurity of things is the divine will itself, drawing some things out of possible being into future being; and so the futurity of things depends on the divine decree.

It is confirmed 1. The absolute decree of God is related to the future absolutely, just as the conditional decree is related to the future conditionally: but it implies a contradiction that something be future absolutely, unless the absolute decree of God decreeing that it be done precedes: therefore it equally implies a contradiction that something be future conditionally, unless the decree of God ordaining that that future thing be done, if the condition be present and fulfilled, precedes.

It is confirmed 2. A future conditional, the condition being fulfilled, passes over into a future absolute: therefore if before the decree of his will God knows certainly and infallibly that if Peter, v. g., be placed in such circumstances, he will consent to such an object proposed to him, then, that condition being fulfilled, before God decrees anything about the future act, he will know that it is future absolutely; and so in this hypothesis something could be future absolutely independently of the decree of the divine will, which no theologian will admit.

The advocates of middle knowledge reply. Indeed, things do not have futurity except from the divine decree; but this is the difference between things future absolutely and conditionally, that absolute futures depend indeed on a decree actual and exercised and actually elicited by God: conditionals, however, do not require a decree actually placed and existing in the divine will; but only a decree which would be and would be placed if the condition were placed. For the existence of the cause, they say, ought to have proportion with the existence of the effect: therefore just as it is necessary that the effect which is have a cause which is in act; and that to the effect which will be there be assigned a cause which will be; so likewise it is necessary that to the effect which would be there also be assigned a cause which would be. Since, therefore, effects future conditionally are neither in fact actually existing, nor are truly and absolutely future, but would only be if the condition were placed; for that reason they do not require any decree actually formed, but only one to be placed and formed, if such a condition were placed.

On the contrary. First, this reply militates directly against Saint Augustine, who, as we have already said many times, asserts that God foreknows conditionally future things, and that dependently on his decree: therefore just as he in fact foreknows those things as conditionally future, so also he in fact decreed and pre-defined them; otherwise he would not in fact and actually know and cognize them, but would only have cognized and known them if his divine Science or divine decree depended on a condition to be placed, nor would it have been prior to the very condition to be placed.

— Then, that decree which is to be placed if the condition be placed is either actually known by God, or not: they cannot assert that it is not actually known; for they affirm that conditionally future things are known dependently on that decree to be placed conditionally. But if it is known, either it is known as actually existing, or as future. If the first, I have what I intended: if the second, it follows that some decrees of God are future, which we earlier proved to be false against Suarez.

— Then, if some decree conditionally future were given, it would follow that the divine will must be changed, and depend on something extrinsic: since the decree will be formed, if such a condition of a thing conditionally future be present; but it will not be formed, if such a condition be absent: but it implies a contradiction that the divine will be mutable, and depend on something extrinsic: therefore it equally implies a contradiction that the divine decree about conditionals be future.

— Finally, if what the adversaries reply were true, namely that the cause is to be proportioned to the effect, in the way that has been said, it would follow that the decrees about absolutely future things are not even in act in God; and so not only conditionally, but also absolutely future things would not presuppose an exercised decree actually formed, but only one to be formed. But the consequent is false: therefore also the antecedent. The consequence of the major is evident: for absolute futures are not in act from eternity, but will only truly exist in some difference of time: therefore if it be true that to the effect which will be, only the cause which will be should be assigned, not the cause which in fact is; it clearly follows that even that which is absolutely future should not presuppose a decree actually formed, but only a decree to be formed in the future; and since the advocates of middle knowledge do not deem this true, neither ought they to think that to the effect, which would be if such a condition were placed, a decree should also be assigned, not one which is in act, but one which would be if such a condition were placed.

Proof 2. Middle knowledge is useless for those ends for which it is affirmed to be necessary by its advocates: therefore it is not to be admitted. The antecedent is proved: the necessity and utility of middle knowledge, if there were any, is chiefly for reconciling human liberty with predestination and efficacious grace, and also for directing God in his absolute decrees, or for founding a certain and infallible knowledge of absolute futures: but it is useless for both: therefore, etc. The major is evident from the opinion of the adversaries, who judge that unless God through middle knowledge explored all the affections of the created will, and saw what man, placed in these or those occasions and circumstances, would will from innate liberty, he could not certainly and infallibly determine anything concerning the salvation and conversion of men, and would expose himself to the danger of not fulfilling what he efficaciously intends. They judge likewise that the certainty of predestination cannot be reconciled with our liberty otherwise than through that science by which God foresees the future consent antecedently to the decree; so that if the divine decree and the grace proceeding from it preceded the consent and determination of our will by priority of nature, it would infer an antecedent necessity, and so would violate liberty.

The minor is therefore proved. First indeed, because God in forming his absolute decrees concerning the salvation of men is sufficiently directed through the knowledge of simple intelligence: therefore he does not need middle knowledge as director and explorer of the human will. The antecedent is evident: for God through the knowledge of simple intelligence comprehends his essence and omnipotence, and sees in the treasures of his mercy those infinite means and most efficacious helps, by which he can strongly and sweetly prevent and allure the human will, so that it consents, and when and where he wills: For who would so impiously rave, says Saint Augustine in the Enchiridio, cap. 98, as to say that God cannot convert to good the evil wills of men, which he wills, when he wills, where he wills?

This Augustine himself explains more fully, and no less elegantly, in Homily 23 of the fifty,

You were not an adulterer, he says, in that past life of yours full of ignorance, not yet illumined, not yet discerning good and evil, not yet believing in him who ruled you in your ignorance: this your God says to you: I was ruling you for myself, I was keeping you for myself: that you would not commit adultery, a tempter was wanting; that the tempter should be wanting, I brought it about. Place and time were wanting, and that this should be wanting, I brought it about. A tempter was present, place was not wanting, time was not wanting: that you would not consent, I brought it about. Acknowledge, therefore, his grace, to whom you owe that you did not commit it, etc.

With which words Saint Augustine openly teaches that time, place, and other circumstances are decreed by God through his infinite providence: therefore there is no need for him to explore through middle knowledge the opportune circumstances of time and place, and likewise the affections of the human will.

Especially since, as Saint Prosper sang in the poem De ingratis, cap. 5,

But truly the Omnipotent saves man with grace, Grace itself completes its own work, to which the time of acting Is always present, whatever it wills to be done; no delay is made to it By morals, nor is it held in suspense by any causes: Nor does it execute, by the care and office of a minister, what it alone can do, And commit to servants the role of acting.

It is confirmed. God through the knowledge of simple intelligence knows all possible things: therefore likewise through it he knows the fitting mode of alluring the human will, and of reconciling it with his decrees: therefore middle knowledge is not necessary for this. The consequence is evident: for if this mode is made known through the knowledge of simple intelligence, no other science is necessary for detecting it. The antecedent is also certain: for that mode, whatever is conceivable, is first possible before it is future; and accordingly it would first be seen through the knowledge of simple intelligence, which is concerned with all possible things.

The second part of the minor is also proved. namely that middle knowledge is useless for reconciling human liberty with predestination and efficacious grace: both because, first, the holy Fathers expressly affirm that this reconciliation is most difficult: whence Saint Augustine, Epist. 105. ad Sixtum: Why this one believes and that one does not believe, and when both hear the same, if a miracle is wrought in their sight, both see the same; it is the depth of the riches of the wisdom and knowledge of God, whose judgments are unsearchable. And below: Why he would deliver this one rather than that one, or not deliver him, let him search who can, into so great a depth of his judgments: but let him beware of the precipice. And in lib. De Praedestinatione Sanctorum, cap. 9: Why he would deliver this one rather than that one, his judgments are unsearchable and his ways past finding out: for better it is that here too we hear and say: O man, who are you, that you answer back to God! than that we dare to say as though we knew what he willed to be hidden. And in lib. 4 Contra Iulianum, cap. 8: This question, where the free choice of the will and the grace of God are disputed, (and the same concerning predestination), is so difficult to discern, that when free choice is defended, the grace of God seems to be denied: but when the grace of God is asserted, free choice is thought to be taken away.

From which it is evident that Saint Augustine differs greatly from the more recent theologians, who judge that the reconciliation of efficacious grace with created liberty is easy.

Secondly: so far is that mode of reconciliation through middle knowledge from seeming easy, that it is not without reason rejected by many theologians as impossible. For that on which this reconciliation through middle knowledge is founded is that the created choice is seen by God to determine itself to the free act before God concurs to that act; so much so that the will of concurring on the part of God presupposes the conditional prescience of the concurrence of the created choice itself; and yet between the concurrence of the divine and human will there is no distinction, no order of priority except by priority of reason.

But who can understand that a distinction of reason, which is simpliciter nothing, is the foundation of reconciling efficacious grace with created liberty? How will God, who after the manner of men does not conceive as distinct those things which ex natura rei are indistinct, unveil the mystery of such concord? Or perhaps we search out the true reason of such concord, which God cannot grasp?

IT IS IMPUGNED, THIRD, FROM THE INCONVENIENCES AND ABSURDITIES ARISING FROM IT.

First indeed, because it seems to detract from divine omnipotence: for, middle knowledge being supposed about some conditional, v. g., about the conversion of Peter as future if he be placed in these or those circumstances and conditions, either the divine will can, those circumstances standing, will that Peter not be converted, or it cannot will that. If the first, that science will not be infallible, because the objective truth of this future conditional will be evacuated by the repugnant divine volition. If the second, then divine omnipotence is judged weak, and the liberty of the divine will will be weaker than the liberty of the created will; for the created will under those occasions and circumstances is foreseen to determine itself to one part with the possibility and liberty of determining itself to the other, which would not belong to the divine liberty and will itself:

Is it really so, then, says Saint Fulgentius in lib. De Incarnatione et Gratia, cap. 29, that the order of things is permitted to be believed and thought, that God, who is the Creator of man, is able to make man, but not to change him? And that he who needs no one's help to make man operate, nevertheless cannot in man's will what he wills, until he has found in man the willing itself? May God drive this madness away from his faithful, and take it away from the unbelievers.

Secondly, from middle knowledge follows the error of the Semipelagians, who asserted that predestination to grace is made from the prevision of merits: for that predestination is made from foreseen natural merits, if in a sign of reason antecedent to the divine decree, by which men are chosen and predestined to grace, God foresees their future merits: but, middle knowledge being admitted, God foresees those future merits in a sign antecedent to the decree of predestination to grace: therefore from middle knowledge it follows that predestination to grace is made from foreseen natural merits. The major is evident: for God in that prior sign of reason, if before he determines to confer grace on a man he sees his future merits, cannot but be moved by the sight of them to confer grace on the man. The minor, however, is proved: for in whatever sign of reason something is true, it is foreseen by God; and consequently if in that prior sign the natural merits of Peter are objectively true, they are foreseen by God: and so from those foreseen merits God will be moved to confer grace on the man, which involves the manifest error of the Semipelagians.

Thirdly, from that middle knowledge it would follow that man discerns himself by purely natural powers: for on the hypothesis that God foresees Peter and Paul, the former indeed about to consent to grace, if it be given to him in such a circumstance; the latter, however, not about to consent: either Peter will determine himself to consent from the sole powers of free choice, or such determination is to be caused by exciting grace, or by co-acting and co-efficient grace: but this determination cannot, in the opinion of the adversaries, be said to be made by grace, whether exciting or co-efficient: therefore they must admit that that determination is made by the sole powers of free choice.

The minor is proved. For in the first place such a determination of the will cannot be foreseen by God as to be caused by morally exciting grace, because the advocates of middle knowledge judge that such grace is subject to free choice and is determined by it and applied to acting; and consequently they cannot think that that determination is made by exciting grace, but by free choice. The same minor is evident as to the second part: for operating and co-efficient grace, or the simultaneous concurrence of the supernatural order, is in itself, they say, indifferent, and is offered to the will in an indifferent mode, and is determined by it to the species of the act: but an indifferent concurrence determinable by the human will cannot cause its determination; rather it is determined by it: therefore the determination of the will to consent to grace cannot be foreseen by God through middle knowledge as caused by co-efficient grace.

And consequently, if God sees Peter, antecedently to the decree, about to determine himself, he sees that determination as future from the sole powers of free choice, which savors of the heresy of the Semipelagians, indeed even of the Pelagians.

The impugners of middle knowledge bring forward several other contradictions: namely. 1. That it takes away from God the notion of First Cause, because it supposes the creature to determine itself first, and independently of the decree. 2. That it takes away from God the notion of the first free being, because the first free being must be the first determining and the first choosing; for to choose and to determine is the proper act of liberty; and middle knowledge takes away from God the notion of the first chooser and first determiner, because it supposes the election and determination of the human will to be conditionally future before every election, or before every actual and exercised decree. 3. That middle knowledge obstructs the supreme dominion of God over the wills of men, since the advocates of middle knowledge affirm that the wills of men determine themselves and apply themselves to acting antecedently to the divine decree, by which God is deemed to determine them. 4. That it attributes to God a mode of concurring with free causes that is blind and ignorant, vague and indeterminate, because it supposes a concurrence indifferent and without intention and volition of any particular act and effect, with only the general intention of doing what the creature wills, whether good or evil: but this is to concur in a blind and ignorant mode, and to act confusedly and at uncertainty; in nearly the way in which someone would wish to shoot and discharge an arrow in darkness, doubtful where it tends or what it strikes, unless by subsequent light: for just as the vision that follows does not prevent that discharge of the arrow from having been made in a certain blind and ignorant mode, so the cognition and exploration of middle knowledge does not prevent that the mode of acting and concurring with free causes, blind and ignorant, vague and indeterminate, be attributed to God.

OBJECTIONS FROM SACRED SCRIPTURE ARE PROPOSED AND SOLVED.

They object 1. The advocates of middle knowledge bring forward various texts of Sacred Scripture by which they strive to confirm their opinion. In the first place, indeed, they bring forward that reproach of Christ, Matthaei 11.: Woe to you, Bethsaida, woe to you, Corozaim, etc., from which they argue thus: God knows certainly and infallibly the conversion of the Tyrians and Sidonians as future, on the condition that Christ the Lord had preached among them: but he did not know it in some decree: therefore he knew it antecedently to such a decree, and consequently through middle knowledge. The major is evident from the first Question of the present Section, in which we determined that God has certain and infallible cognition of future conditionals. They prove the minor: Christ not only foretold, but also reproaches the unbelief of the Jews in comparison with the Gentiles, who, if they had seen the miracles which the Jews had seen, would have done penance: but that reproach, at least as comparative, would not be just, if the penance of the Gentiles had been known as future conditionally in the divine decree: therefore it was not so known. The minor is proved: in order that a comparative reproach seem just, there must be equality between the extremes of that comparison; for the servant to whom the master of the family had given two talents would not have been justly reproached for not having gained ten, as he who had received five: but, a conditional decree about the penance of the Gentiles being supposed, and the same decree being denied to the Jews, the equality between them would not be preserved, and the Jews could justly answer: Therefore, having seen the miracles of Christ, we did not do penance, as the Tyrians and Sidonians would have done; because you did not have that decree toward us about future penance, as you had it toward the Gentiles: therefore if such prevision of future penance is made in the decree, it follows that the reproach of Christ is not just; and since that consequent is false, that also from which it follows is false.

I answer 1. That Saint Augustine overthrows middle knowledge by this very principle of the Tyrians and Sidonians: for when in Capitul. 9. of the book Bono Perseverantiae he had related the response which he had made to one of the six questions of the Pagans, namely that Christ came at such a time because he foreknew that men would not believe in him if he had come earlier, which is the opinion of the advocates of middle knowledge, he adds:

These things, certainly, we cannot say about Tyre and Sidon: and in them we recognize that these divine judgments belong to those causes of predestination, without prejudging which hidden causes I said that I then answered these things. For it is easy for us to accuse the unbelief of the Jews, coming from free will, who, when such great miracles were done among them, refused to believe, which the Lord also, reproaching, argued and said: woe to you, Corozaim;

with which words Saint Augustine says two things: first indeed, that that penance of the Tyrians, future conditionally, is not to be refunded into the congruity of their calling, and accordingly that it is foreseen only from a conditional decree. Second, that the Jews are deservedly accused because they had sufficient help for doing penance, which nevertheless they were unwilling to do from their will: therefore the opinion of Saint Augustine stands far apart from the advocates of middle knowledge.

I answer 2. That the same argument can be turned back against the defenders of middle knowledge themselves: for although they admit with us that the Jews and Tyrians were equal in grace considered according to physical entity; they do not, however, deny that they were unequal in grace viewed according to its moral being and inasmuch as it is alluring of the will in this or that mode. For either they judge that that moral allurement is made conformably to the temperament and disposition, as Vasquez teaches; or in that congruity of time and in those occasions, in which the Gentiles were foreseen through middle knowledge about to consent: but to the Jews, indeed, the same grace was exhibited, but not according to the same moral efficacy, or not having regard to that inclination and those circumstances. Since, therefore, the Jews did not have that equal grace according to moral being, they could complain just as justly, as they would complain about a conditional decree of future penance not being placed toward them.

I answer 3. By denying the minor; and to all its proofs I say that for that just reproach of the Jews it suffices that they were bound to be converted, and that for this they had sufficient help. For that someone be justly reproached before another, it suffices that the obligation of both be the same, which nevertheless one transgresses and the other fulfills: but this obligation is founded on being able to accomplish something, not on the act itself and the application of the potency. Whence, since a conditional decree does not confer the ability, but presupposes it, and applies the potency conditionally to the act, hence it is that it does not take away the equality of obligation, nor obstruct a just reproach, even a comparative one. Whence, although a conditional decree may have been placed about the penance of the Tyrians, future conditionally upon seeing the miracles of Christ, which was not placed toward the Jews: nevertheless the Jews are justly reproached, because they had sufficient help for their conversion.

The adversaries press. Saint Augustine, in lib. De Bono Pers., cap. 10, treating the question why God did not will those signs to be done among the Tyrians and Sidonians, by the sight of which they would believe in God, says:

A certain not ignoble Catholic Disputator explained this passage of the Gospel in this way, as to say that the Lord had foreknown that the Tyrians and Sidonians would afterwards depart from the faith, when they had believed through the miracles done among them, and that it was rather out of mercy that he did not do those things to them: because they would become liable to a graver punishment, if they had left the faith which they had held, than if they had never held it at any time.

Since in fact St. Augustine approved that opinion, it follows that he approved middle knowledge of conditionally future things before any decree. For it is not likely that God decreed to predetermine them to the act of faith, and to the apostasy which He foresaw would follow, on the hypothesis that, having seen those signs, they would believe in Him.

It is confirmed 1. These two things openly conflict: that God absolutely decreed that those signs should not be performed before them, lest believing and afterwards falling away from the faith they should be punished more severely; and that God decreed to determine them to the act of faith.

It is confirmed 2. Since that supposition, namely of performing those signs before them, depended on the will of God alone, it would be said foolishly that God decreed to determine the Tyrians and Sidonians to the act of faith, if those signs were performed before them: for this would be to say nothing other than that God had decreed to give them faith, if He had decreed to work miracles before them.

I answer 1. That St. Augustine did not simpliciter approve the opinion of that Doctor, for he adds: But if that opinion is true: from which he draws an argument to confirm what he had taught against the Semipelagians, namely that man is not saved, nor damned, on account of the good or evil works which God foresaw he would do, if he had lived longer; but only on account of those works which he will truly do in his life.

I answer 2. That God, in the conditional decree by which He had determined to move the Tyrians and Sidonians to faith and to the doing of penance, on the hypothesis that those signs had been performed among them, certainly knew their future conversion: for just as the knowledge of things absolutely future presupposes in God an absolute decree, by which He decrees His concurrence with the created will for its acts; so likewise the knowledge of things conditionally future presupposes in Him a conditional decree, by which He determined that they would be future if the condition were fulfilled, for nothing can be future unless God willing and determining it.

To the first confirmation. I answer that there is no conflict between these two: namely, that God by an absolute decree determined that those signs should not be performed before them, lest believing and afterwards falling away from the faith they should be punished more severely; and that by a conditional decree He determined to move and determine them to the act of faith if those signs had been performed among them: for those two decrees are not opposed to one another, because one is absolute, but the other conditional.

To the second confirmation. I say that nothing against us is gathered from this, for just as it is rightly inferred that God would have decreed to rule and administer another world if He had truly determined to create it; so likewise it is rightly said that God decreed to give faith to the Tyrians and Sidonians, if He had decreed that those signs should be performed before them.

They press again. from the same St. Augustine in the same place cap. 14, where, weighing the same text of Sacred Scripture, he affirms that the Tyrians and Sidonians would have done a great penance of humility, if those signs of divine powers had been performed among them. But this certainty of doing penance he does not trace back to the divine decree, but to the inclination and disposition of the will of the Tyrians and Sidonians, about whom he had spoken in c. 9, for thus he says: from which it appears that some have naturally, in their very talent, the divine gift of understanding, by which they are moved to faith, if they either hear words fitting to their minds, or behold signs. He was speaking, however, of the Tyrians and Sidonians of whom he infers: therefore the eyes of the Tyrians were not so blinded, nor was the heart of the Tyrians so hardened, because they would have believed if they (the Tyrians) had seen signs such as they themselves (the Jews) saw.

I deny. That St. Augustine traces this certain knowledge about doing penance back to anything other than the divine decree; for straightway opening his meaning, he indicates that that foreknowledge presupposes some decree of the divine will; for he adds: For they hear and do, to whom it is given: but they do not do, whether they hear or do not hear, those to whom it is not given. And again: but because it was not given to them to believe, even that by which they might believe was denied them. With which words St. Augustine traces the penance of the Tyrians back to the decree of the will of God, by which He distributes His grace to whom He wills, and when He wills. Nor indeed could he reduce that certainty of doing penance to the natural disposition itself and the gift of understanding, by which they would be moved to faith, if signs had been performed before them. For St. Augustine speaks only of external signs, which do not suffice for faith, but besides these an interiorly moving grace is required: otherwise St. Augustine would have agreed with the Pelagians, who asserted that no other grace is necessary for faith than the preaching of the Gospel.

They object again. several other texts of Sacred Scripture, by which they strive to prove that God knows many conditionally future things through middle knowledge and antecedently to any decree. They bring forward the first testimony from that passage of Genesis 11 concerning those first men who said: Come, let us make for ourselves a city and a tower whose top may reach to heaven, and let us make a name for ourselves: concerning whom God says in the same place: They have begun to do this, nor will they desist from their designs, until they complete them in deed. By which words God predicts that that building would be completed, unless those men had been called away from it by the confusion of tongues. They bring forward the second from cap. 34 of Exodus and 3. Regum cap. 11, where the Jews are forbidden to take as wives the daughters of the Gentiles, For most certainly, he says, they will turn away your hearts, that you may follow their gods; where that word, most certainly, signifies a prediction of the event proceeding from a certain and infallible knowledge. They bring forward the third from 4. Regum cap. 2, where when Elias had said to Eliseus that he should ask whatever he wished, before he was taken away from him: and Eliseus had said: I beseech thee that thy double spirit be made in me, Elias answered: thou hast asked a hard thing: nevertheless if thou shalt see me when I am taken from thee, it shall be unto thee as thou hast asked: but if thou shalt not see me, it shall not be. In which place a double conditional event is revealed, namely the infusion of a double spirit with the condition appended, if he should see Elias, and the denial of the infusion if he should not see him. They bring forward the fourth from John 5, where Christ says:

I have come in the name of my Father, and you have not received me: if another shall come in his own name, him you will receive, and there is one who accuses you, Moses, in whom you trust: for if you believed Moses, you would perhaps believe me also; for he wrote of me.

With which words a double conditionally future event is predicted. The fifth is taken from the first Epistle to the Corinthians cap. 2: For if they had known (says St. Paul of the crucifiers of Christ) they would never have crucified the Lord of glory; where a conditional future is manifestly enunciated, on the hypothesis that Pilate and the princes of the Jews had known Christ to be the Lord of glory. I pass over other similar texts of Sacred Scripture, which the supporters of middle knowledge heap up in abundance: for those will easily be resolved from the explanation of the foregoing.

Therefore I answer to the first. That God truly foresaw that the wills of those men were in fact determined to completing the city and the tower, unless they had been hindered from it by the division of tongues: but He knew this in the conditional decree, by which He had determined to permit the consummation of that city according to the disposition of the will of those men, unless for a reasonable cause He had called them away from that work. For many times in Sacred Scripture effects are revealed as future according to the disposition and determination of causes, which nevertheless in reality were not fulfilled, because God hindered them from coming to pass. Thus the subversion of Ninive was to follow within forty days, as Jonas had predicted in cap. 3, namely according to the demerits of that city, unless God on account of their penance had revoked the sentence of punishing them.

To the second. I say that that word most certainly signifies not infallible certainty, but only moral certainty, which sometimes fails: whence, with the danger of idolatry set aside, God permitted the Jews to take foreign wives, as is clear in the case of Ruth, whom Booz took as wife.

To the third. I answer that in the decree, by which God determined that a double spirit should be made in Eliseus, on the hypothesis that he would see Elias when he was to be taken away from him, God certainly knew that double conditional event: whence not through middle knowledge antecedently to the decree, but in the decree itself He knew both of those conditionals.

To the fourth. I say that that proposition: If another shall come in his own name, him you will receive, is not about a purely conditional future, which was never to have being: but about an absolute future, for that prediction concerns the coming of Antichrist, who will come in his own name and will seduce many.

To the other conditional proposition of the same text. namely if you believed Moses, etc., I say that that conditional future was known to Christ, not through middle knowledge, but through the knowledge of simple intelligence, on account of the necessary connection which those two propositions have: if they did not believe Christ, neither did they believe Moses; for Moses bore testimony concerning Christ. As by way of comparison, this conditional: if Peter runs, he will be moved, is known through the knowledge of simple intelligence, on account of its necessary connection with the condition, even if that condition is never in fact to be posited anywhere.

To the last. I say that God willed for just causes to hide the mystery of the Incarnation from the Devil and his ministers, namely lest the redemption of men should be impeded through the death of Christ. Whence they crucified Christ through ignorance, as St. Peter testifies, Acts 3: And now, brethren, I know that you did it through ignorance. But all these things happened only from a decree of the divine will, at least permitting, and so that conditional was known in that decree.

OBJECTIONS FROM THE HOLY FATHERS ARE BROUGHT FORWARD AND RESOLVED.

They object 1. various passages of St. Augustine, by which they contend that he acknowledged and approved middle knowledge of conditionally future things existing in God before every free decree of His will. But since several testimonies of that holy Doctor have already been resolved by us, I bring forward only that which is found in De Bono Perseverantiae c. 9, where St. Augustine says: Certainly God, foreknowing that they would fall, could take them out of this life before that happened. And in lib. De corrept. et grat. cap. 8.

Let them answer, he says, if they can, why God, when they lived faithfully and piously, did not then snatch them from the perils of this life, lest malice should change their understanding, or lest guile should deceive their soul? Did He not have this in His power, or did He not know their future evils? Surely none of these things is said except most perversely and most insanely.

I answer to the first. There St. Augustine is not dealing with conditionals, which are not future; but with the foreknowledge of sins, which in reality were future and which God by a just judgment did not will to impede, namely by snatching the man away at an immature age, before they were committed.

To the other passage. I answer that the truth of those conditionally future contingents is founded in the conditional decree of God, by which God determined to permit them, on the hypothesis that that condition should be present; whence through free knowledge, which follows the decree of the divine will, God knows conditionally future things of this kind, not however through middle knowledge, which precedes the decree.

They object 2. Other holy Fathers: first indeed St. Gregory of Nyssa, in the Oratione de iis qui praemature arripiuntur, where he says thus: It is likely that God, who knew what is future just as what is past, should hinder the progress of the life of the infant toward perfection; lest that which by prescient power must be punished as evil in him who would have so lived be brought to completion. Likewise St. Cyril, praised above, quaest. 1. n. 5, where, proving a certain saying of Porphyry, he says that God, knowing the future, often prevents it, snatching some adolescents from life beforehand, but leaving others. Moreover St. Chrysostom, Homil. 65 on Matthew, where, treating of the vocation of the holy Paul and Matthew, he teaches that God called them then when He knew they would consent. And St. Bernard, Sermon 54 on the Canticles, where he says: God sometimes withdraws grace, not on account of the pride which already is, but of that which would be future unless grace were withdrawn: therefore God sees future pride unless grace were withdrawn: but He does not see that in the decree, because God does not decree the futurition of pride: therefore He sees it before any decree, and so sees it through middle knowledge.

I answer to Sts. Gregory and Cyril. That they are to be explained in that way in which St. Augustine, in lib. De Praedestinatione Sanctorum cap. 14, explains that passage of Wisdom 4: He was taken away lest malice, etc. where he says:

That was said according to the perils of this life, not according to the foreknowledge of God, who foreknew this which was to be, not that which was not to be: that is, that He was about to bestow on him an immature death, that he might be withdrawn from temptation: not that he would sin, who was not going to remain in temptation.

Or it must be said that God foreknew the sins of those young men as future on the hypothesis, in the conditional decree, by which He determined to permit them if they lived longer, and to concur to the entity of the sin; but since by an absolute will He decreed to impede sins of this kind, He snatched them away at an immature age. For the actual decree of God to impede the sin which is foreknown as future on the hypothesis does not conflict, but rather greatly accords, with the conditional decree by which He determined to permit those sins, unless they had been impeded by an immature death.

To St. Chrysostom. I say that he is to be understood in this way, that God called those Apostles when He foreknew that He would operate in them through grace and bring it about that they would obey willingly and from the heart: which response is conformable to the doctrine of St. Augustine, cap. 18 of De Bono Perseverantiae, where he hands down this rule: when among some preachers of the word of God the name of foreknowledge is found and the vocation of the Elect is being treated, by the name of Foreknowledge predestination must be understood, that is, foreknowledge founded in the decree and in predestination.

To St. Bernard. I say that God, by withdrawing grace, foreknows the pride through the knowledge of simple intelligence, by which He sees all possible things; and also through the knowledge of vision, insofar as a decree about providing concurrence to the physical and material act of that pride has preceded.

OBJECTIONS TAKEN FROM REASON ARE PROPOSED AND RESOLVED.

They object 1. God knows the truth of this conditional future: If I give Peter efficacious grace, he will be converted: but He cannot know that truth except through middle knowledge: therefore it must be admitted in God. The major is clear from what has been said. They prove the minor thus: this truth, since it is free and contingent, cannot be known by God through the knowledge of simple intelligence, which is concerned only with natural and necessary things: and since it is about a conditional future, it is not attained through the knowledge of vision, which is borne only toward things absolutely future: therefore that truth is known only through middle knowledge.

I deny the minor. For that truth is known through the knowledge of simple intelligence, because although the extremes are free and contingent, nevertheless the signification, which is expressed in it, is infallible and necessary, and accordingly belongs to the natural knowledge of God. For it can happen that a conditional proposition is necessary by force of the consequence and inference, although it is inferred from something free and contingent, indeed from something false and impossible. For this is necessary: If Peter speaks, he moves his tongue, and yet each extreme taken in itself, that is, the speech of Peter and the movement of the tongue, is free and contingent: similarly this is necessary: If a man is a horse, he is capable of neighing, and yet both are false and impossible, namely that a man is a horse and capable of neighing. Whence since in this conditional, If I give Peter efficacious grace, he will be converted, the goodness of the inference and consequence is expressed, which is necessary, as being deduced from this altogether necessary principle, whatever God efficaciously wills will infallibly come to pass, therefore the truth of that consequence is known through the knowledge of simple intelligence.

They object 2. Conditionally future things, with the divine decree set aside, have truth or falsity: therefore before the decree they are known by God: but they are not known through the knowledge of simple intelligence, because they are contingent and conditional, and accordingly cannot be attained by that knowledge, which is concerned only with necessary things: nor through the knowledge of vision, because this follows only upon the decree: therefore they are known through middle knowledge. Proof of the antecedent. The congruity of a vocation does not depend on the decree of God; for a vocation is congruous for this reason, not because it is chosen by God, but on the contrary it is therefore chosen by God because it is congruous: therefore before the free election God knows the congruity of the vocation, and consequently He also knows the future conversion which will arise from such a vocation.

Some answer with Didacus Alvarez. by denying the major: then because, as Aristotle teaches, lib. 1. De Interpret. c. 8., propositions about a future contingent, in themselves, do not have determinate truth or falsity, because the contingent, insofar as it is contingent, is altogether indifferently disposed to either alternative: therefore before the decree of the divine will determining to one or the other part of the contradiction, nothing is determinately future in created things; and so it can be said that before that decree things do not have determinate truth or falsity. Then because it can be said that when propositions are in contingent matter, it is not always necessary that one be determinately true and the other determinately false: but it suffices that if one is true, the other is false; so that it is contradictory that both be false at once, or both true at once. Then finally, because although for any instant of time it is necessary that of two propositions about a future contingent one be determinately true and the other false: nevertheless it is not required that for any sign of reason one be conceived as determinately true and the other false. Whence before the decree neither of those propositions is to be called determinately true or false, but indifferent to either. For if God in the second sign of reason decrees that, the antecedent being posited in being, the consequent should likewise be posited, the affirmative conditional proposition about a future contingent will be true, and the opposite will be false: but if He decrees that, the antecedent being posited in being, the consequent should not follow, the negative conditional proposition about a future contingent will be true and the affirmative will be false.

But since these solutions suffer difficulty, therefore I deny the minor: for God knows that congruity of the vocation through the knowledge of simple intelligence and sees it through the knowledge of vision, where He has formed the efficacious decree of converting the man through that congruous vocation, which He employs for that end for which God chooses it.

They object 3. It is heretical to assert that God knows conditionally future things in His decree: therefore He knows them antecedently to His decree, and so through middle knowledge. Proof of the antecedent. From the doctrine of Calvin, lib. 3. Institutionum cap. 23. § 7: I confess, indeed, a horrible decree: nevertheless no one can deny that God foreknew what end man would have, before He created him: and that He foreknew it because He had ordained it by His decree. Calvin therefore judges that God foreknows future things in His decree, and so that the divine decree precedes His foreknowledge.

I answer. by denying the antecedent: and to its proof, I say that Calvin was not condemned for this, that he asserted the divine decree to precede the divine knowledge of things absolutely or conditionally future: but only because from the antecedent decree he inferred that all things happen necessarily, and that nothing comes to pass contingently: and consequently that there is no freedom of men; for Calvin says, lib. 2. instit. c. 3. § 5: The will is drawn by necessity into evil, although liberty, being renounced, offends those who do not know how to distinguish between necessity and coercion, etc. From which it is clear that Calvin thought the divine decree overthrows our liberty, and leaves in our will no indifference to opposite acts, but only spontaneity and immunity from coercion.

They object 4. God certainly knows future sins under a condition: but He does not know them in the decree: therefore He knows them antecedently to it, and accordingly through middle knowledge. Proof of the minor. If God had a decree about future sins absolutely or conditionally, He would be their cause, and the malice of the sin itself would be attributed to Him; for malice is attributed to the sinning man for no other reason than because he freely determines himself and of himself decrees the sinful act. Then, if sin were decreed by God, it would already not be sin; for sin is sin insofar as it is contrary to the divine will; but if it were decreed by Him, it would not be contrary, but indeed conformable to the divine will: therefore it would not be sin.

I deny the minor. and to the first proof I say: God would be the cause of sin as to the physical entity of the act, I concede: as to the deformity and lack of moral rectitude, I deny: for the malice of sin is not therefore properly attributed to the sinning man, because he decrees and concurs to the sinful act considered entitatively, but because he operates as a moral agent, and disformly to the rules of morals, and withdraws himself from the rectitude of the divine concurrence and of the divine motion. But God does not so concur, nor decree, because He does not operate as a moral agent and with dependence on the rules of morals, but as the First cause and as the universal Provider, furnishing to all second causes the means necessary for acting.

To the second proof. I say: If sin were conformable to the divine will it would already not be sin, under that aspect under which it would be conformable to it, I concede: under another, I deny: but it would be conformable to the divine will according to the physical entity of the act, by which it is decreed by God, and as such it would not be sin: but it would not be conformable according to the morality and deformity of the act itself, which is neither decreed by God, nor produced, indeed is prohibited: but only by the created will freely deflecting from the rectitude which ought to be in such an act. But how the morality, or lack of rectitude, of the sinful act is distinguished from the entity of the same act, will be resolved in the following Disputation.