Scotus Academicus, Tomus nonus: De Sacramentis in genere

Once the essence of the Sacraments has been explained and their number asserted, their origin, firmness, and effect must now be investigated, in which their dignity and excellence shine forth in a most marvelous manner. For what can be considered more illustrious, nobler and more splendid for their commendation, than that God alone is asserted to be the author and institutor of these aids to our salvation, and that the most excellent power of any creature whatsoever cannot contribute anything to their institution and ordination? What could be judged more worthy of human wonder than that such signs, however meager in appearance, should possess such great power that they not only cleanse a man hideously disfigured by sins, but also suffuse him with the light and beauty of sanctifying grace from heaven; and, what is still more astonishing, consecrate him as a son of God, and establish him as an heir and sharer? Hence Tertullian rightly said, in book On Baptism, chapter 1:

There is nothing that so hardens the minds of men as the simplicity of divine works, which is apparent in the act, and the magnificence that is promised in the effect. Thus faith too is deemed incredible because, with such simplicity, without pomp, without any new apparatus, and finally without expense, a man is lowered into water and immersed amid a few words, then rises no cleaner, or no cleaner at all; the attainment of eternity is deemed incredible, etc.

Thus three things are to be determined here: first, whether it belongs to God alone to institute the Sacraments; second, what their efficacy is with respect to producing grace; third, which Sacraments produce a character.

Note 1. Concerning the institution of the Sacraments, two powers can be distinguished: one indeed of authority, the other of ministry. The power of authority is called that which is independent of any other and, by its own virtue, chooses certain signs and confers upon them the power and efficacy of producing grace. The power of ministry, however, is that delegated virtue from the principal cause for either the confection or the administration of the Sacraments. Moreover, the power of ministry is established as twofold: one indeed principal of excellence, the other common. The principal power of excellence is that which belongs to someone with a singular prerogative above the other causes that can concur either in the designation or in the confection of the Sacraments. The power of ministry, commonly so called, is that which belongs to any minister insofar as he is merely a minister of the Sacraments, that is, an administrator and dispenser. Hence a twofold difficulty arises: first, whether God alone can confer upon some creature the power of authority to institute Sacraments, for example upon Christ's humanity; or whether the Lord Christ, insofar as he is man, possessed from his own virtue the principal power of excellence.

Note 2. From the Doctor in distinction 1, question 3, number 1: that it is one thing to institute a practical sign for producing grace, and another to render that sign certain and efficacious for producing the same grace.

For it is possible, says the Doctor, for someone at times who is not truthful to use that sign: for it has its signification from institution; but that it be certain it has only from the determination of some cause operating upon that sign in order to cause the thing signified; for example, if some legislator should institute in his polity the touching of hands, or something of the sort, as a sign of peace, although from this imposition that sign has the property of practically signifying peace, nevertheless, if another who is not truthful can use this sign, that sign is not certain from the legislator's imposition, but remains equivocal: at one time true, namely when it has the thing signified accompanying it, at another false; for the false person uses this sign, or thing signified, just as he would use a speculative sign, or thing signified, saying, “I grant you my affection,” while having something else, namely the opposite, in his heart.

These are the Doctor's words, by which he indicates that two things must be distinguished in the institution of the Sacraments: first, the designation of a sensible sign for signifying and conferring grace; second, the virtue and efficacy of that sign, by reason of which it is said to signify and confer grace certainly and infallibly, insofar as it is in itself. The first, however, is related only incompletely and imperfectly to the institution of a Sacrament, since it belongs to its very nature not merely to be a sign of sanctifying grace, but to be a certain and efficacious sign of it; and this it cannot obtain except from him who has the physical power of producing grace and attaching that production to this sign.

Note 3. Sacraments can be considered instituted by God in two ways, namely either immediately by himself, or mediately through some Angel or man. Immediately, for example, if God designated some sensible sign, at whose application he would certainly and infallibly produce and confer grace. This can indeed happen in two ways: either immediately by God as God, or by God insofar as he is God-man, that is, insofar as the divine person who immediately instituted those Sacraments subsists in assumed humanity. This again can be conceived in two ways: first, so that the whole designation of the Sacramental sign, and the power attached to it of producing grace, is referred back to the divine person, while only its manifestation would take place through the assumed humanity; or so that the assumed humanity itself has received from the divine person the communicated power of instituting signs of this sort effectively, as though it were proper to it, so that it is considered the principal cause of this institution. Likewise, God can be conceived as instituting Sacraments mediately in two ways: namely either incompletely, if he were to grant some creature the faculty of designating and assuming some sensible sign, at whose presence and placement he himself would certainly and infallibly produce grace; or completely, if he were also to grant the creature to whom he grants the faculty of instituting a sign the power and efficacy of producing grace.

With these preliminaries, three things remain to be established: first, that God alone has the power of authority and the principal power of instituting Sacraments properly so called, so proper and peculiar to himself that he cannot delegate it to any creature; second, that the Lord Christ, insofar as he is man, is not the principal and physical cause, but the moral cause, of the institution of the Sacraments; third, that he instituted all the Sacraments immediately insofar as he is God.

First conclusion. — GOD ALONE CAN COMPLETELY AND PROPERLY INSTITUTE SACRAMENTS. This is the Doctor's position in the passage praised above, number 5, where he says:

As regards signification, it would be possible for a Sacrament to be instituted by some creature, because just as a man could impose a speculative sign of God's effect, as is clear from this proposition, “God causes grace in the soul,” so he could impose a sign that would practically signify God acting invisibly; but he could not give that sign what would make it regularly certain: for he cannot give certainty to any practical sign unless it is in his power to be able to cause the thing signified by that sign; but God alone can determine himself to cause an effect proper to himself: therefore God alone can give certainty to the practical sign of his effect. Thus it is clear that a Sacrament can be instituted by God alone, as regards a certain sign.

And below, number 6, there:

if this certain sign belongs to the nature of a Sacrament, as seems to follow from that expression, efficacious, it follows that, according to its properly speaking nature, it can be instituted by God alone. But if it belongs to its nature, etc.

By these words the Doctor teaches quite openly that God alone can institute a Sacrament, since he alone has the power to produce grace infallibly upon the application and placement of some sign, although he could entrust to a pure creature the designation of some practical sign, at whose presence he himself would confer sanctifying grace. This designation, however, as we said, would be merely an imperfect Sacrament on the part of the one designating it; for whoever determined such a sign would not have from himself the power to make that sign efficacious and practical, but this would necessarily have to be supplied by God, and consequently God alone can institute Sacraments authoritatively. — The argument can indeed be formed as follows: only he can institute Sacraments authoritatively who can confer virtue upon a Sacrament and produce through it the effect signified; but God alone can confer virtue upon a Sacrament and produce its effect, namely sanctifying grace and remission of sin; therefore, etc. The major is evident. The minor is proved by all those texts of Scripture in which God is asserted to be the sole author of sanctifying grace and justification. Thus Job 14: “Who can make clean what was conceived from unclean seed? Is it not you, who alone are?” And Psalm 83: “The Lord will give grace and glory,” etc.

You will say 1: The Sacraments of the law of nature were signs to be assumed at will by faithful men as a protestation of their faith; but the Sacraments of the written law, like the Mosaic law itself, had been delivered through Angels: therefore Sacraments can be instituted by creatures. — I answer the first, that from this it follows only that the determination of Sacramental signs was from the human will, not that the institution of the Sacraments depended upon it: for God willed and immediately by himself instituted that, in the time of the law of nature, men should assume sensible signs for their sanctification, at whose placement he himself would produce grace, but not that men should attribute to those signs the power of producing grace. To the second I say that the law and the Sacraments of the Mosaic law are said to have been delivered through Angels, not because they established that law or instituted those Sacraments by their own authority, but only because they were their promulgators.

You will say 2: Whoever can produce the effect of a Sacrament can also institute a Sacrament; but the Ministers of the Church can produce the effects of the Sacraments: therefore, etc.

The major is evident from what was said. The minor is proved as follows: the effect of the Sacraments is that man is cleansed from sins, enlightened, and perfected through grace; but cleansing, enlightening, and perfecting belong to the Ministers of the Church, as Saint Dionysius teaches in book On the Ecclesiastical Hierarchy, chapter 5: therefore, etc. — I deny the minor, and I distinguish its proof: cleansing, enlightening, and perfecting per se and immediately is the effect of the Sacraments, I concede; merely mediately, I deny. Likewise, with the minor distinguished, the consequence must be denied: for the cleansing attributed to the Ministers of the Church is not immediate; they are said to cleanse for this reason, that they cast out unclean spirits from the assembly of the faithful and dispose them to receive the Sacraments through catechisms and sacred admonitions. Likewise they enlighten God's people, not by enlightening the souls of individuals per se or infusing grace, but by preaching the things of God and administering the Sacraments.

You will say 3: From Saint Augustine, Tractate 6 on John, about the middle: John's Baptism was the baptism of a man; but John's Baptism was a true Sacrament: therefore man can institute a true Sacrament. The major is Saint Augustine's own; for he says:

It is one thing, he says, to baptize through ministry, another through power; for a baptism is such as he is in whose power it is given, not such as he is through whose ministry it is given. Such was John's baptism, such as John was: nevertheless, the baptism of a just man, but one who received from God such grace that he was worthy to go before the Judge; but such was the Lord's baptism as the Lord was, etc.

— I answer by denying the minor: for John's Baptism did not have the power of conferring sanctifying grace or remitting sins, as we shall prove when treating of Baptism.

You will say finally: A creature can designate some sign at whose presence God would infallibly produce grace; but this suffices for the nature of a Sacrament: therefore a creature can institute a Sacrament.

The major is proved by the authority of Saint Augustine in the passage praised above, where he says:

Now our Lord Jesus Christ could, if he wished to give some servant of his the power to give his baptism as though it were that servant's, and to transfer from himself the power of baptizing, and establish it in some servant of his, and give baptism, transferred to the servant, as much power as the baptism given by the Lord himself would have, etc.

— I answer the minor with the Doctor in the passage praised above, number 6: if these things suffice for the nature of a Sacrament, then indeed a pure creature could, by God's commission, institute Sacraments; and in this way the Doctor's position could be reconciled with the opinion of the Angelic and Seraphic Doctors, who assert that God can entrust a creature the virtue and faculty of instituting Sacraments, if this institution is taken precisely only as the designation of sensible form and matter, and as abstracting from certainty and efficacy with respect to the effect. This is indeed clear, because some thus hold that the remedy of the law of nature was instituted so that it would be in anyone's power to assume any thing as a protestation of faith. Thus Christ instituted the Sacraments by the power of excellence, as man; and just as the power of instituting the rites and solemnities of the Sacraments was given to the Church, so the power of designating the matter and form could have been entrusted to it. Yet certainty and efficacy would not follow from this for the instituted sign, but from God's decree by which he determined to concur infallibly in producing the signified effect. Therefore signs instituted in this way would indeed have their designation from a pure creature, but their effect from God; and thus the creature would be the author of the institution of the sign, while God would be the author of the signified effect. — Nor did Saint Augustine certainly intend anything else by the words cited in the objection, as is clear from what follows; for he says:

He did not want the hope of those to be in him who were being baptized, from whom they recognized themselves as baptized. Therefore he wanted the servant to place hope in the servant. For this reason the Apostle cried out when he saw people, in their worship, placing hope in himself: “Was Paul crucified for you, or were you baptized in the name of Paul?” Therefore he baptized as a minister, not as power itself. But the Lord baptized as power.

From these words it is clear that Saint Augustine did not want that primary and absolute power of sanctifying inwardly through the Sacraments to have been communicable to a servant. Indeed, if such power were granted, nothing absurd at all would follow if someone placed his hope in him. Thus he wanted only the Sacramental power of confecting and administering in the proper name of the one conferring, for example, I baptize you in the name of Claudius, or I confer my baptism upon you, to be able indeed to be conferred upon a servant, but not to be suitable, lest the servant, deceived by the very words, should place his hope in the baptizer rather than in God, the principal cause.

Second conclusion. — THE LORD CHRIST, INSOFAR AS HE IS MAN, WAS ONLY THE MORAL AND MERITORIOUS CAUSE OF THE INSTITUTION OF THE SACRAMENTS.

Proof: The Lord Christ had some causality concerning the institution of the Sacraments; but he did not have physical causality; therefore, moral causality.

The major is clear because, as will be proved in the following conclusion, he himself instituted all the Sacraments. The minor is proved: physical causality is either principal or instrumental; but he had neither. Not principal, indeed: first, because God alone is the principal cause of justification, as is gathered from these texts of Scripture, Job 14: “Who can make clean what was conceived from unclean seed? Is it not you, who alone are?” Isaiah 43 and Hosea 13: “There is no savior besides you.” Nor is it resolved by saying that those texts merely imply that God is the first cause of justification; for although God is the first cause of heating, it would nevertheless be absurd to say, “Who can make heat? Is it not you, who alone are?” when fire likewise concurs in forming heat. Second, because if Christ's humanity were the principal cause of the grace produced through the Sacraments, this would be either from its innate virtue or from a virtue divinely infused.

Not the first: since his humanity is of the same species and natural order as the others, whereas grace is of the supernatural order and exceeds the powers of every nature. Nor the second: for it would have this either from habitual grace or from the hypostatic union. Not the first; otherwise every just person could have such firmness, since he has Christ's grace, graciously similar in species. Nor does the greater intensity of Christ's grace stand in the way, because it does not change the nature and power of causing; for a more intense form has only this, that it can produce a more intense effect, which a less intense form would not produce because of greater resistance in the subject, and this has no place in the present case. Nor the second, because through that union the nature is not substantially changed and consequently receives no physical power that it would not have from itself; rather, by reason of the union God merely assists it, and through that divine assistance and union it comes about that the humanity is the moral, meritorious, and impetratory cause of a grace that another just person could not impetrate and obtain by reason of his works and his grace. This moral causality ought not to change Christ's humanity physically; it suffices that God, through an extrinsic relation, makes it worthy to obtain what it requests, just as royal dignity does not physically change the nature of a queen, who obtains something from the law by reason of such dignity that would not be granted to another, for example Esther. Thus Christ was heard because of his reverence, says the Apostle; but for him to be a secondary and physical efficient cause by reason of the hypostatic union, something real and physical would have to flow into it from the union itself; otherwise, remaining physically unchanged, he would obtain no physical activity from the union.

You will say 1: That is the principal cause to which the effect must be assimilated per se; but our justification consists in this, that it assimilates us to Christ's humanity, according to Romans 8: “He predestined us to be conformed to the image” (that is, to the humanity) “of his Son.” Therefore, etc. — I deny the major; for God can use the grace of one just person as an instrument for producing grace in another just person; and then the effect would be similar to that moral cause, and that cause would not be principal.

You will say 2: Whatever is the universal principle of our justification is its principal cause; but Christ is such a principle, for from his fullness we have all received. — I deny the major; and to the minor I say that Christ is called the universal cause of justification in the sense that, as man, he merited every grace which, as God, he produces.

You will insist: From this several absurdities follow: first, it follows that Christ does not differ from the other ministers, who are also instrumental causes; second, if he were only a moral instrument, he would not first have to be just and pleasing to God—for an instrument ought not to have the form that it produces in another—with the result that even a Priest, although he is in mortal sin, confers grace and absolves from sins, because he is merely an instrument; third, it would follow that our grace is more perfect than Christ's grace and justification, for the effect is always nobler than the instrument by which it is produced. — I deny all these consequences.

The first, indeed, because although they do not differ through instrumental virtue, he nevertheless differs because by true merit of condignity he impetrates grace from God; the others, however, produce grace through no merit of their own, but through the virtue of the Sacrament. The second likewise, because grace and holiness are truly prerequired in Christ for him to impetrate truly; otherwise, if he ministered merely as a Priest those things through whose conferral grace is infallibly conferred. The third, finally, because this is true of physical instruments, not of moral and impetratory ones: since the Most High does not approve the gifts of the wicked, nor hear sinners, it follows that whoever is to receive what he asks from God must be just and pleasing to him.

You will say 3: Christ is just by essence, for he has holiness from what is his own, not through participation; but what is such by essence is the principal cause of other things that are such through participation. — I distinguish the major: insofar as the God-man has holiness from himself, not begged from another, I concede; as though his humanity had justice from itself and not borrowed from the divinity, I deny. Likewise the major must be distinguished: things that are such by their own nature, I concede; things that are so only from another, I deny. Christ's humanity, however, is not holy by its own nature, but through internal habitual grace and through the external assistance of God flowing from the union; these do not change it physically and consequently do not confer any physical efficacy upon it.

Nor is it a physical instrumental cause: first, because, as was said, the humanity has no physical activity toward grace; second, because, as will be said more fully below, no creature can have natural efficacy toward grace and things that are of the supernatural order. — It remains therefore to infer that Christ is only a moral and meritorious cause. Meritorious, I say, since, as the Doctor says in distinction 2 of book 4, question 1, number 7, he is the meritorious cause of the Sacraments who, through signs instituted by himself, merited the efficacy of producing grace; but Christ, as man, merited this. Proof: God, offended by men, had decreed not to pardon such an offense, nor to grant any help for expiating it, unless divine honor were first repaired and satisfaction had been made to divine justice by the offering of someone who gave God as much honor as human sin had taken away; but Christ did this, offering himself to redeem us from all iniquity; indeed, so that where sin abounded, grace might abound more, so that redemption might be plentiful with him: therefore, etc. — It is confirmed, for all the efficacy of the Sacraments comes from Christ's Passion: therefore it is their meritorious cause. The antecedent is proved: the Sacraments have their efficacy from him from whom they have it that grace is regularly and infallibly produced upon their conferral; but they have this meritoriously from Christ's Passion. The major is evident, since the efficacy of the Sacraments is nothing else. The minor is proved: all grace to be conferred upon men is conferred solely in view of and through the virtue of Christ's merits. Hence Saint John: Grace and truth through Jesus Christ, and again: From whose fullness we have all received: therefore especially by reason of Christ's completed merits; but Christ's merits were not complete except through his death and Passion, which was not only the fitting terminus of his passibility, but also the seal and completion of his merit. Although the name Jesus was imposed upon him at the Circumcision and foretold by the Angel before he was born, nevertheless it was in his Passion alone that he attained the perfect power of that name, according to the Apostle: Christ humbled himself, becoming obedient unto death, even the death of the cross; for which reason, etc. Since, therefore, he attained the name of Savior perfectly only through death, it must be inferred that from his death the means of our salvation, such as the Sacraments, derived their power and origin. The same is indicated by all those sacred passages in which Christ is said to have washed us from our sins in his Blood and to have redeemed us not with corruptible gold or silver, but with most precious Blood, etc.

You will say 1: An effect in act comes only from a cause in act, according to Aristotle, Metaphysics 5, chapter 2; but Christ's Passion is not in act: therefore it cannot confer the efficacy that the Sacraments actually possess. — The Doctor distinguishes the major: an efficient and physical cause, I concede; a moral and meritorious cause, I deny; for we have actually conferred many benefits because of past services, whose memory alone endures.

You will say 2: The Sacraments would have that efficacy from Christ's Passion either as past or as future. Not the first, otherwise Baptism and the Eucharist would not have that efficacy, since they were instituted before the Passion. Nor the second, otherwise the Sacraments of the Old Law could have had equal efficacy. Therefore, etc. — The Doctor answers that they had it from the Passion exhibited not indeed in an external act, but in an interior one, by which Christ from the moment of his Conception adjudged himself to the cross and death, according to: In the head of the book it is written, etc. And: I have a baptism with which I must be baptized, and how constrained I am until it is completed! I answer 2 that if they had been administered while Christ was alive, they would have had less efficacy, both because they would not have opened heaven to those receiving them, and because, if from the whole of Christ's life one offering for our redemption was contracted and integrated, from which our Sacraments drew their efficacy, it is most certain that it was not so fruitful from the incomplete offering as it was from the offering completed through the Passion.

You say 3: If the Sacraments had that efficacy from Christ’s Passion, chiefly either as from a meritorious cause or as from a principal cause. Not in the second way, because nothing can be the principal and efficient cause of the Sacraments unless it can be the cause of the effect signified through the Sacraments; but only God can be the efficient and principal cause of grace. Nor in the first way either, because grace has no meritorious cause: for if it were from merits, it would no longer be grace, as Paul argues in Romans 9. Hence St. Augustine speaks mystically, and by a certain likeness between the things that flowed from Christ’s side and the Sacraments. For blood is likened to the species of wine in the Eucharist, and the water that flowed forth is likened to baptismal water; hence St. Augustine says that these two Sacraments flowed from Christ’s side.

Third conclusion. — ALL THE SACRAMENTS OF THE NEW LAW WERE INSTITUTED IMMEDIATELY BY THE LORD CHRIST. This seems to be a matter of faith determined in the Council of Trent, Session 7, Canon 1, in these words: If anyone should say that the Sacraments of the New Law were not all instituted by Christ, let him be anathema. Although the particle “immediately” is not explicitly present there, it is nevertheless plainly gathered that the Canon must be understood of immediate institution. First, because otherwise the Council would not have issued this Canon if it concerned only mediate institution; for everyone readily admits that, since it is certain that the Church prescribes nothing, especially in matters concerning the confection and administration of the Sacraments, except through the authority delegated to it by the Lord Christ. Second, because this Canon was added especially against the Lutherans, who contended that only the Sacraments of Baptism and the Eucharist were instituted by the Lord Christ, and consequently affirmed that the others were indeed sacred rites ordered by the Church, but denied that they were Sacraments properly so called. Third, because in Session 21, chapter 2, the Holy Synod declares that this power has perpetually been in the Church, so that in the dispensation of the Sacraments, with their substance preserved, it might establish or change those things that it judged more expedient for the benefit of those receiving them or for the veneration of the Sacraments themselves, according to the variety of things, times, and places. But this exception, “with their substance preserved,” would be added in vain if they had been instituted not by Christ but by the Church; for if the Church had instituted them, it could also change their substance, since the same power belongs both to establish the laws of an earthly commonwealth and to approve them. Fourth and finally, if there were difficulty concerning the immediate institution of some Sacrament by the Lord Christ, it would especially concern Extreme Unction, which some contend was instituted by Saint James from chapter 5 of his Canonical Epistle. But the Council of Trent, Session 14, Canon 1, On the Sacrament of Extreme Unction, decreed: If anyone should say that Extreme Unction is not truly and properly a Sacrament instituted by our Lord Christ and promulgated by Blessed James, but only a rite received from the Fathers or a human invention, let him be anathema.

This truth is likewise gathered from Sacred Scripture; for Saint Paul says in 1 Corinthians 4: “Let a man regard us as Ministers of Christ and stewards of the mysteries of God,” that is, of the Sacraments; but if the Apostles had instituted some Sacraments, they would not be merely dispensers, but also authors and institutors of God's mysteries: therefore, etc. Further, in Acts 1 the Lord Christ is said after the Resurrection to have appeared to the disciples for forty days, conversing and speaking with them about the kingdom of God, that is, about the Church to be built and administered; but the Sacraments pertain above all to the building and administration of the Church. Hence Saint Leo writes splendidly in Sermon 1, On the Ascension of the Lord:

Those days that flowed between the Lord's Resurrection and Ascen> sion did not pass in an idle course, but great Sacraments were contained in them, great mysteries were revealed. This same point the Subtle Doctor clearly confirms in distinction 2 of book 4, question 1, number 1, where he says:

All the Sacraments were instituted by Christ, or by God, for the time of this Law. I briefly show this here, because each will appear more fully in its proper place. Of Baptism it is clear that it was instituted by Christ while he was living, because the disciples baptized, as is clear in John 3, and it was commanded that it be preached publicly, Matthew, last chapter: “Go, teach all nations, baptizing them,” etc. — Of the Eucharist its widespread preaching is clear in John 6, but its institution was at the Supper, Matthew 26. — Of Confirmation its institution is clear in John 20: “Receive the Holy Spirit,” etc., or on the day of Pentecost, Acts 2. — Of Penance it is said that it was instituted in James 5: “Confess to one another,” etc. But this does not seem probable from the progress of the text, because it immediately follows: “Pray for one another,” etc. For it is manifest that by what follows he did not intend to institute or promulgate any Sacrament; nor did James have the authority to institute any Sacrament, as will be touched upon below in the argument to be given for this conclusion. It is better, therefore, to say that it was instituted in John 20: “Receive the Holy Spirit: whose sins you forgive,” etc., and promised in Matthew 16: “I will give you the keys of the kingdom of heaven. Whatever you bind,” etc. For this power was not principally that of forgiving sins, which is proper to God, but of judging concerning the remission of sin, with a judgment approved by God; and to judge in this way is, in the forum of Penance, to loose or bind. — Of Extreme Unction it is said in James 5: “Is anyone among you sick?” etc. But although he promulgated the Sacrament there, it is better to say that it was instituted by Christ. For we read in Mark 6 that the Apostles anointed many sick people with oil, and they were healed; but it is clear that they did this only in the virtue of Christ, who had instituted that efficacious anointing. — Of Matrimony it appears in Matthew 19: “Have you not read” (Christ says) “that he made them male and female?” namely, God, and said, namely, through the mouth of Adam: “For this reason a man will leave,” etc.; where Christ approves and ratifies what God, in the state of innocence, published through Adam's mouth. — Of Order, Matthew 26: “Do this in remembrance of me.” And John 20: “Whose sins you forgive,” etc. For these two things pertain to the Priestly Order, namely, power with respect to the true Body of Christ and power with respect to Christ's mystical body, as will be said in the treatment of Order. — That all these were instituted by God alone is clear from what was touched upon generally concerning the institution of a Sacrament. No one is competent to institute a practical sign except either with respect to some act of his own or with respect to someone subject to him as regards that act; but a Sacrament is a practical sign properly with respect to God's effect, and God cannot be subject to another in an act proper to himself: therefore, etc. These are the Doctor's words.

The Holy Fathers teach the same truth, especially Saint Dionysius, who says in Ecclesiastical Hierarchy, chapter 1: The Apostles received the forms of the Sacraments; they did not invent them; but they could not have received them from elsewhere than from Christ: therefore, etc. — Likewise Saint Ambrose says in book 4, On the Sacraments, chapter 4: Who is the author of the Sacraments, except the Lord Jesus! And

Saint Augustine, book On True Religion, chapter 17: Where, he says, will be the time of grace, where the very wisdom of God, having assumed man, through whom we were created for freedom, established certain most salutary Sacraments, etc. This is also urged by three arguments, or fittingnesses. For it was fitting that all the Sacraments, which are efficacious means for attaining salvation, should derive their origin from him who is truly the Mediator of God and men, lest men place their hope in anyone other than the Mediator himself. Second, lest division and schism arise in the Church because of different Sacraments instituted by different persons: for if a contention had arisen among the faithful because those who had been baptized by the Apostles considered themselves preferable to those who had received Baptism merely from the disciples, as the Apostle observes in 1 Corinthians 1, rebuking them for saying, I indeed am of Paul, but I am of Apollos, and I of Cephas, although all had been baptized in Christ's baptism, how much more would they have been divided from one another if they had received different baptisms from different persons? Finally, since it belongs to the head of a commonwealth to enact fundamental laws, and laws that have force throughout the commonwealth, such as sacramental laws, by the very fact that there were several institutors of the Sacraments, there would also be several heads in the Church, which would certainly be absurd and dangerous.

You will say 1: Addressing the disciples in John 20, the Lord Christ says: As the Father sent me, so I send you. But he was sent by the Father in such a way that he had the power of instituting Sacraments: therefore he delegated the same power to the Apostles. — I distinguish the major: as regards something, namely the office of reconciling men and extending the remission of sins, I concede, because, as Saint Paul said, “We act as ambassadors for Christ”; as regards the complete fullness of authority, I deny. Otherwise it would follow that, just as the Lord Christ could remit sins without any intervention of the Sacraments, so the Apostles too could remit sins in that way.

You will say 2: Whoever the author of the Sermon at the Supper is, in Saint Cyprian, treating of the washing of feet, says: “He himself, the supreme Priest, is the institutor and author of his Sacrament. In the others, men had the Holy Spirit as teacher; and just as the dignity of the Holy Spirit and Christ is equal, so authority and power are equal in their institutions. What the Apostles handed down at the dictation of the Holy Spirit is no less ratified than what the Lord himself handed down and commanded to be done in his memory.” Therefore he judges that the Lord Christ instituted only the Eucharist immediately. — I answer first, denying the consequence: Christ is called the institutor and author of the Eucharist above the other Sacraments because he celebrated it first; he not only instituted it, but also exhibited and received it; the other Sacraments were not so. For the Apostles conferred and received these, already instituted by Christ. I answer second: that author understands by Christ's Sacrament not only the Eucharist, but also the other Sacraments; and by “in the others” he understands the ceremonial rites, which were instituted not immediately by Christ but by the Church, as Bellarmine, Gravina, and others explain. I add that the authority cited above does not favor the heretics, since they teach that not only the Eucharist but also Baptism was instituted immediately by Christ.

You will say 3: From Saint Augustine, Letter 115: Christ sustained us with his easy yoke and light burden; hence with very few Sacraments, easiest in observance, most excellent in signification, he bound together the society of the new people, such as Baptism, communion of his Body and Blood, and whatever is commended in the canonical Scriptures. But those things that we preserve not written but handed down, which are observed throughout the whole world, are to be understood as commended and established either by the Apostles themselves or by plenary Councils, whose authority in the Church is most salutary, and are to be retained as established. Therefore Christ instituted immediately only those Sacraments that are commended in Scripture; the others were instituted by the Apostles. — I deny the consequence, for all the Sacraments are commended in Scripture, at least implicitly. Second, Christ immediately handed on to the Apostles, and they to their Successors, many things concerning the matter and forms of the Sacraments that they did not wish to write down, lest they be cheapened among the unlearned and profane. For, from Saint Augustine, Letter 57: “You know in what sacrifice it is said: Let us give thanks to the Lord our God.” From Ecclesiastical Hierarchy 3: See that you do not number the Holy of Holies, but rather revere it; and do not hand on less perfect things, but communicate them only to those who are sacred. And chapter 7: It is sacrilegious to interpret the consecrated invocations by themselves and to bring into public their secret meaning and the rites through which God secretly works in them. Therefore the things that Saint Augustine says are preserved as established by the Apostles or Councils are ecclesiastical ceremonies, for example that the Lord's Passion, Resurrection, Ascension into heaven, and the coming of the Holy Spirit from heaven be celebrated with an annual solemnity, and whatever else the universal Church observes.

You will insist: The same Saint Augustine, book 3 of On Christian Doctrine, chapter 19, says:

After the manifest sign of our freedom shone forth in Christ's Resurrection, we are not burdened even with those signs whose operation we now understand as a heavy burden, but, in place of many, the Lord himself and Apostolic discipline handed on to us a few signs, easy in faith, most august in understanding, and most chaste in observance.

Therefore, in his view, not only Christ but also the Apostles handed on and instituted Sacraments. — I distinguish the major: “the Lord himself and Apostolic discipline handed on,” namely the Lord by instituting, but Apostolic discipline by commending and dispensing what Christ instituted, I concede; as though Christ himself instituted only certain Sacraments, while Apostolic discipline instituted the rest, I deny. And likewise, with the minor distinguished, I deny the consequence.

You will say 4: There are many Catholic Doctors who expressly assert that some Sacraments were instituted either by the Apostles or in Councils. For Hugh of Saint Victor, book 2 of On the Sacraments, part 1, chapter 5, says in express terms: The Sacrament of Extreme Unction of the sick is read as having been instituted by the Apostles; for the Apostle James, writing in his Epistle, says: Is anyone among you sick? etc. Saint Bonaventure likewise holds this concerning the Sacrament of Confession, in distinction 17 of book 4, article 1, question 3:

Confession, he says, was suggested by the Lord and instituted by the Apostles, promulgated by Saint James, Bishop of Jerusalem, in his Epistle, chapter 5, where he says: Confess your sins to one another.

He proves this assertion as follows:

Because, he says, confession is a purely human work; hence the virtue of the Sacrament was not given to Confession itself, but to Absolution; therefore the institution was rightly reserved to pure men.

From what has been said, four reasons can be drawn why the Lo> rd did not immediately and expressly institute Confession: first, because it was not necessary; second, because he taught that in this it ought to be voluntary; third, because it is the Sacrament of those who relapse; fourth, because in itself it is a human work. Hence I believe that he did not institute it per se, although he is said to have instituted it; this is to be understood as suggesting it and giving authority.

Moreover, our Alensis says in the question On the Sacrament of Confirmation, member 1:

Some say that this Sacrament was instituted and conferred by the Lord, for example when he placed his hands upon children, Matthew 19. But since in that imposition of hands nothing is expressed concerning the form of the words or the matter through which this Sacrament would be exercised, it is clear that it was not instituted by the Lord. Others say that this Sacrament was instituted, conferred, and administered by the Apostles; this is not true, and it is clear from the fact that the Apostles confirmed by the mere imposition of hands, without anointing and without the form of words used by the Church. For this reason it must be said, without prejudice, that the Lord neither instituted this Sacrament as a Sacrament, nor dispensed it, nor did the Apostles. It must therefore be understood that after the Lord's Ascension it was fitting that the Apostles be confirmed and that the Holy Spirit be given to them for strength; hence the Holy Spirit had not yet been given, because Jesus had not yet been glorified. I say, not in fullness or for strength; but he was given on the day of Pentecost. Hence the Apostles were confirmed immediately by the Holy Spirit without a mystery and Sacrament, and they themselves afterward confirmed without a Sacrament. Why this? It is clear within. But after the Apostles, who were the foundations of the Church, who had been appointed by the Lord and confirmed by the Holy Spirit, had failed, this Sacrament was instituted by the impulse of the Holy Spirit in the Council of Meaux, as regards the form of words and the elemental matter, and the Holy Spirit also conferred upon it the power of sanctifying.

Saint Bonaventure teaches the same in distinction 7 of book 4. — I answer first, that those authors understood by the name “institution of the Sacraments” their promulgation and administration. But what some, together with Alensis, judged concerning Confirmation, namely that it was instituted in the Council of Meaux celebrated in the year 844, can be confirmed by no reason, since not even a single word of institution or promulgation is found in the Canons of that Council. If we look at the Acts of the Council as they are reported in volume 3 of the Councils of Gaul, there are only Canons concerning Chrism, namely 4 and 16. In the first it is forbidden that anyone receive any gift on account of the sacred chrism; in the second, that anyone presume to make sacred chrism except on Holy Thursday of Holy Week. But if we attend to the chapter That Bishops, cited by Gratian from the Council of Meaux in On Consecration, distinction 5, it is merely prescribed that Bishops, fasting, should give the Holy Spirit through the imposition of hands. No mention is made of institution. I answer second, as Saint Augustine once answered the Donatists when they objected with Saint Cyprian's authority concerning the invalidity of Baptism conferred by heretics, book 2 against Cresconius, chapter 30: I do not accept, he says, what Blessed Cyprian thought concerning the baptism of heretics and schismatics, because the Church for which Blessed Cyprian shed his blood does not accept it.

Note 1. Both ancient and more recent heretics have fallen into various errors concerning the efficacy of the Sacraments and the power of producing [their effects]. For St. Augustine reports, in book 16 of On Heresies, that the Manichaeans denied the Sacraments the power of justifying: baptism, he says, in which they assert that they bring no salvation at all to anyone, nor do they think that any of those whom they deceive has been baptized. The Paulicians too, according to Epiphanius, book 2 of the Panarion, chapter 21, taught that Baptism benefited the soul in no way, although it brought some benefit to the body: they sometimes wish, he says, their children to be washed by the Presbyters of the Church with salutary baptism: for they think that water and Baptism benefit the body; yet they do not think that it reaches the purification of the soul, nor that it brings any other benefit. Likewise the Massalians, or Messalians, according to St. John of Damascus, near the end of book On One Hundred Heresies, said that the amendment of the soul was brought about by prayers alone; and that Baptism did not perfect a man, nor did the divine Sacraments cleanse the stains of the spirit, but that only the prayers poured forth by man contributed to this. Hence the Euchites, that is, “prayers,” were so called, because, according to Theodoret, book 1 of Heretical Fables, chapter 11, they attributed the perfection of salvation to prayers alone: for they said that Baptism removed sins only like a razor, but not the roots of sins, which, they asserted, were uprooted completely by prayer alone; and that the evil demon assigned to each person from the beginning was entirely expelled from the soul. They were also called Enthusiasts, because they admitted into themselves the power of some demon, which they called the presence of the Holy Spirit. Finally, the Armenians, distinguishing between the remission of sins and grace, taught that sins were remitted through the Sacraments, but denied that grace, or anything else justifying, was conferred through them, as Guido the Carmelite asserts in book On Heresies, chapter 16. — As for the more recent heretics, their opinion concerning the efficacy of the Sacraments was not one and the same, but multiple: for the Sacramentarians and Anabaptists deny them every production of grace. As for Luther and Calvin, if you look to their words, they sometimes seem to agree with us and sometimes to disagree; yet in reality they differ from us altogether, for they assert no other causality in the Sacraments than that of sealing or recalling, not that of truly producing grace; so that they do indeed wish faith to be aroused and nourished through the Sacraments, by which man grasps the divine promises and, by the benefit of this apprehension, is justified through faith. Hence Melanchthon, in the Apology of the Augsburg Confession, concerning articles 4 and 13, boldly declares:

We condemn the entire body of Scholastic Doctors who teach that the Sacraments confer grace, by the work worked, upon those who place no obstacle, without a good movement on the part of the user. This opinion has simply been judged to be that we are justified by ceremonies without a good movement of the heart, that is, without faith; and yet this impious and pernicious opinion is taught with great authority throughout the papal realm.

To refute these errors and vindicate Catholic Doctrine from this impious accusation and calumny of the heretics, three points must here be established: first, that the Sacraments produce sanctifying grace by the work worked; second, how they produce it, whether through physical activity or only through moral activity; third, what kind of grace they produce and confer. To make these points clearer,

Note 2. When it is said that grace is produced ex opere operato, nothing else is signified than that it is produced by the power of the external work elicited: for a human work can be distinguished as twofold, namely external and internal. The external work, however, is situated as it were passively, because it is commanded by the internal work, and obtains from it its value and merit. Hence theologians took occasion to distinguish a twofold mode of operating, namely ex opere operantis and ex opere operato. Someone is then said to act ex opere operantis when he produces an effect by the force and efficacy of an interior work, for example when someone obtains sanctifying grace by the power of contrition or of another disposition. He is said to act ex opere operato, however, when he performs some external act by whose power grace is produced, even if there were no efficacious disposition in the recipient for receiving grace, provided that there is no obstacle on his part. Thus, to confer grace ex opere operato is to confer it by reason of the external work, or the conferral of the Sacrament, and not by reason of the interior act of the recipient or minister; or, which is the same, to confer it not by reason of merit, but beyond the merit of the recipient, and solely by reason of the external work received. This does not mean that we wish the Sacraments to confer grace on adults without any disposition of theirs, as Melanchthon and Calvin wrongly charge us, book 4 of the Institutes, chapter 11, where he pretends that the meaning of this controversy is: Whether the Sacraments confer grace without faith, or a good movement of the heart, or the disposition of the recipient. For the Council of Trent openly teaches the contrary, Session 6, where it teaches that faith, repentance, devotion, etc. are required beforehand in adults for receiving sacramental grace. — Nor is there reason for Calvin, in the same place, section 11, to mock these words ex opere operato and call them monsters of words and new inventions: for, if Horace is witness, in The Art of Poetry,

Many words will be reborn that have already fallen, and will fall, those now in honor, if usage so wills;

and Cicero writing in the Tusculans: Usage has invented many words, and made obsolete those it invented: certainly usage has prescribed this term for more than a hundred years. For we find it used by Innocent III in book 3 of On the Mystery of the Mass, chapter 5, where he writes: Therefore the wickedness of the Priest does not impede the office of the Sacrament, just as the weakness of the physician does not corrupt the power of the medicine: although, therefore, the operating work may be unclean in some respect, nevertheless the work operated is always clean. Nor is it unusual or unheard-of to coin new words and, against the rules of Grammar, change a deponent verb into the passive; for we have the foundation of this practice in the Epistle to the Hebrews, chapter 3, in these words: God is said to approve such sacrifices, where the deponent verb promeretur is taken passively. Thus, in a similar case, St. Augustine in Psalm 138 preferred to say ossum ossi rather than os ossis, so that it might be more easily understood by the people: For it is better, he says, that grammarians should reproach us than that the people should not understand.

Note 3. A productive cause of something can be distinguished as twofold: one physical, the other moral. A physical cause is one that by a real action reaches the entity and production of the thing itself. A moral cause, however, does not reach the effect through its action, but either by applying active things to passive things, as a physician is called the cause of health; or by inducing an agent to act through prayers, counsels, commands, prohibitions, a proposed reward, and the like. Again, either cause is twofold, namely principal and instrumental. A principal physical cause is one that reaches the effect through itself and independently of the influx of another cause, although it admits another into cooperation in producing the effect. A principal moral cause is called that which moves more principally and efficaciously toward the production of the effect: for example, a prince who orders the prefect of the treasury to give someone a hundred gold pieces is called the principal cause of such a gift. An instrumental physical cause is one that does not operate through the power of a form existing in it, but only through the motion by which it is moved by the principal agent. An instrumental moral cause is an instrument that the principal cause uses to produce the effect; for example, a letter written by the king's hand to the prefect of the treasury ordering him to give a hundred gold pieces is an instrumental moral cause of such a donation, because it is the instrument the prince uses for such an effect; the principal moral cause, however, is the prince's will. The question is how the Sacraments produce grace: whether, that is, through the mode of a physical or moral cause, principal or instrumental. Since the Sacraments are diverse, and some are more excellent than others, it must also be established whether they produce greater or equal grace in subjects equally disposed.

First Conclusion. — THE SACRAMENTS OF THE NEW LAW PRODUCE GRACE BY THE WORK WORKED, OR BY THE FORCE OF THEIR INSTRUMENTAL CAUSALITY. This has been determined as a matter of faith in the Councils: first in the Council of Nicaea, rendered into Latin by Alphonsus Pisano, where book 3 of the Constitution on Holy Baptism reads as follows:

Our Baptism, he says, is not to be considered with bodily eyes, but with the eyes of the mind: you see water; consider the power of God hidden in the waters. The one who is baptized descends guilty of sins and rises freed from this servitude and sin, made a son of God and heir of his grace.

The Florentine Council likewise expressly teaches this in the Decree of Eugene, where it is decreed that there are seven Sacraments of the New Law, which differ greatly from the Sacraments of the old law; for those did not contain grace, but only signified that it was to be given through the Passion; whereas these, our Sacraments, both contain grace and confer it on those who worthily receive them. — But most clearly of all the Council of Trent, Session 7, Canon 6, On the Sacraments: If anyone says that the Sacraments of the New Law do not contain the grace which they signify, or that they do not confer that grace on those who place no obstacle, as though they were merely external signs of grace and justification received through faith, and certain marks of Christian perfection by which the faithful are distinguished from unbelievers among men: let him be anathema. And Canon 8: If anyone says that grace is not always given through these Sacraments, and to all, so far as concerns God’s part, even if they receive them rightly, but only sometimes and to some: let him be anathema. And Canon 9: *If anyone says that through the Sacraments of the New Law grace is not conferred ex opere operato, but that faith alone in the divine promise is sufficient for conferring grace: let him be anathema. The same is gathered from the Constantinopolitan and Nicene Creed, where it is defined: We confess one Baptism for the remission of sins.

This truth is proved first from all those texts of Scripture in which grace is declared to be conferred, or to have been conferred, through the Sacraments. First, this is clear concerning Baptism. For it is written in John 3: Unless someone is reborn of water and the Holy Spirit, and so forth. In these words regeneration and spiritual birth are attributed to the Holy Spirit as principal cause, but to water as instrumental cause. For water is joined with the Holy Spirit as the cause of this regeneration, which is especially signified by the conjunction “and”; for, as grammarians know, it indicates some causality.

Calvin responds, book 4 of the Institutes, chapter 16, no. 27, that by water the Holy Spirit is signified:

I therefore simply take water and Spirit for the Spirit who is water. Nor is this a new expression, for it entirely agrees with that found in Matthew, chapter 3: the one who follows me is the one who baptizes in the Holy Spirit and fire. Therefore, just as to baptize with the Holy Spirit and fire is to confer the Holy Spirit, who in regeneration has the function and nature of fire, so to be reborn of water and the Spirit is nothing other than to receive that power of the Spirit which does in the soul what water does in the body.

— But Hunnius the Lutheran, book On Baptism, chapter 10, rightly calls this interpretation of Calvin a thoroughly reckless act and a twisted gloss of the devil, since it directly conflicts with other texts of Scripture in which remission of sins and the justification of a person are attributed to Baptism itself. Thus in Acts 2: Let each of you be baptized in the name of Christ for the remission of sins: where the preposition “for” with the accusative case denotes for what end, and toward what effect, this washing is performed; and it further denotes Baptism as antecedent to justification, and consequently it is not merely its seal and connotative sign, as Calvin wishes. — Hence Ananias said to Paul in Acts 22: Be baptized; wash away your sins in his name. Then St. Paul himself, explaining the instrumental efficacy of Baptism in Ephesians 5, says: Christ loved the Church and gave himself for her, cleansing her with the washing of water in the word of life. And in Titus 3: He saved us through the washing of regeneration. In these passages cleansing and salvation are assigned as effects of the washing with water. — The same is clear concerning the Eucharist. For it is written in John 6: Unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood, you will not have life in yourselves. But if the Eucharist were only a sign of grace and did not confer it, this expression would be no less absurd and ridiculous than if someone said: unless someone drinks from ivy, signifying wine for sale, he will not satisfy his thirst. Likewise in 1 Corinthians 10 the Apostle intends the faithful to be one in the unity of charity: because we, though many, are one bread and one body, all who partake of the one bread. But if participation in one bread is the constitutive reason for the unity of the body, it is manifest that this unity is the effect of such participation; and therefore charity, through which that bond is made, is attributed to the Sacrament of Christ's Body as the effect of its cause. — The same is clear concerning the other Sacraments.

We read the same concerning Penance: Whose sins you forgive, they are forgiven him. Concerning Orders, in 2 Timothy: Stir up the grace which is in you through the laying on of my hands. Concerning Extreme Unction, in James 5: The prayer of faith will save the sick person, and if he is in sins, they will be forgiven him. Concerning Matrimony, although the testimony is not so evident and clear, it is nevertheless gathered from Ephesians 5, where it is called a great Sacrament, so that it may be signified that its efficacy is the same as that of the other Sacraments.

The same truth can likewise be proved by various arguments drawn from the teaching of the holy Fathers. First, from their assertion that the nature and magnitude of the Sacraments' operation, by which it surpasses the natural weakness of the intellect, can be found and understood only through faith. “It is marvelous,” says Tertullian, book On Baptism, chapter 2, “that death is washed away in the washing; but it is all the more to be believed if, because it is marvelous, it is not believed. For what do they say divine works are, unless they are beyond all wonder? You yourselves also wonder, but because we believe.” Likewise St. Chrysostom, Homily 24 on John 1: Those things we see and touch every day, he says, need faith; how much more those hidden and spiritual things? Hence that well-known exclamation of St. Augustine, Tractate 80 on John: What a great power of water, that it touches the body and washes the heart! But unless baptismal water contributed to the production of grace, and a person were moved by faith merely toward its presence, there would be nothing marvelous in it and nothing worthy of exclamation. Therefore, and so forth.

Secondly, the same is persuaded by various likenesses which the holy Fathers use to explain the regeneration that takes place through the water of Baptism. For St. Chrysostom, Homily 25 on John, likens it to the maternal womb: What the womb is, he says, for the embryo, that the water of faith is: for in water it is begotten and formed. In the same place he compares Baptism to the waters which, at the beginning of the world, God commanded to produce creeping things: For first, he says, it was said: Let the waters bring forth the creeping creature having life: but from the time Christ entered the channel of the Jordan, the waters produce no longer creeping things that are living souls, but rational and spiritual souls. But St. Leo, Sermon 5.4 On the Nativity of the Lord, compares Baptism to the womb of the Blessed Virgin:

For every person being reborn, he says, the water of Baptism is like a virginal womb, the same Spirit filling the font who filled the Virgin, so that the sacred Conception, which had removed sin there, may here remove it through mystical washing.

Hence some of the holy Fathers also say that, just as the Holy Spirit came upon the Virgin so that she might conceive Christ the Son of God, so mystically he came upon the waters of Baptism so that he might confer on them the power of producing adopted children of God. The spirit, says Tertullian, book On Baptism, chapter 10, came down from heaven immediately and floated over the waters, sanctifying them from himself; and thus sanctified, they absorb the power of sanctifying. St. Jerome teaches the same in the Dialogue against the Luciferians, not far from the beginning: First, he says, the water itself is washed by the Spirit, so that it may be able to wash others spiritually. And St. Cyril of Alexandria: Just as water heated by the powers implanted in fire burns no otherwise than fire itself, so water, which is sprinkled on the body of the baptized by the operation of the Holy Spirit, is transformed for divine virtue and power. Certainly all these and other similar expressions would be empty and void if the Sacrament of Baptism contributed in no way to producing grace.

Third, the same truth is plainly established by the fact that Baptism conferred on infants remits original sin, confers sanctifying grace on them, and, if they depart this life before attaining the use of reason, brings them to the kingdom of heaven, as St. Augustine teaches everywhere against the Pelagians. But these marvelous effects cannot be attributed to the efficacy of the infants' faith; and therefore they are attributed solely to the power of the Sacraments.

The Lutherans and Calvinists respond that, at the time when infants are baptized, the use of reason is divinely granted to them. — But this response is more worthy of ridicule than refutation: for who would believe that God works this miracle, when neither Scripture nor the holy Fathers mention it in any way?

Finally, the same truth appears from the splendid praises with which the holy Fathers commend the efficacy of Baptism. Thus St. Ambrose, book On Initiation, chapter 4: In that element of the world, he says, he was buried, dead to sin, and raised again to eternal life. Theodoret, in the Epitome of the Divine Decrees, chapter “On Baptism”:

The gift of Baptism gives not only remission of past sins, but also implants hope of promised goods, makes us participants in the Lord’s death and resurrection, grants participation in the gift of the Holy Spirit, and makes us children of God, heirs, and co-heirs of Christ; for it does not, as the insane Messalians think, merely imitate a razor by removing sins.

The Heretics respond that the holy Fathers speak of the efficacy of the Sacraments through the arousal of faith. — On the contrary, first, many of them write that the Sacraments of the Gospel flowed from Christ’s pierced side, and that Christ wished to be baptized so that, by the touch of his most pure flesh, he might give the waters the power of cleansing, as Ambrose says, book 2 on Luke. But if it influenced only by arousing faith, and not by eliciting grace, as a sermon or a picture does by representing the mysteries of faith, they would not rightly be said to have flowed from Christ’s side; just as neither a sermon nor a picture is said to have flowed from it. Nor would Christ be said to have given any power to the water by the touch of his flesh more than to sacred sermons. The Sacraments of the Gospel would also have nothing more than the Mosaic [Sacraments] in conferring grace, because the Mosaic [Sacraments] also aroused faith. But the Fathers distinguish our Sacraments from the ancient ones in that ours produce grace, which the ancient ones merely signified. The reason is that, according to the heretics, faith is truly a cause of salvation and grace; but in Scripture the Sacraments of the New Law are called a cause of grace in the same way as faith. For faith is described in Luke 7: Your faith has saved you. John 5: He who believes him who sent me has eternal life. Acts 15: Purifying their hearts by faith. Romans 4: We reckon that a man is justified by faith. Romans 9: Therefore, being justified by faith. Of the Sacraments of Baptism and the Eucharist the same things are said in the same words: 1 Peter 3: Baptism saves you. John: He who eats my flesh has eternal life. Titus 3: He saved us through the bath of regeneration. John 3: Unless someone is born again of water, etc.

The Heretics object with various texts of Scripture by which they try to prove that man is not justified through received Sacraments, but through the faith and devotion of the recipient. First, because Habakkuk 2, Romans 1, and Hebrews 10 say: The just man lives by faith; but he does not live by the Sacraments; therefore the Sacraments cannot be said to justify. — I distinguish the major: the just man lives by faith, that is, through faith he awaits and expects the eternal life promised to him by God, and is not shaken, or, even if he sees it delayed, remains so because of the faith he has, I concede. Hence Habakkuk says: If he delays, wait for him, because coming he will come, and he will not delay. Behold, he who is unbelieving, his soul will not be right within him; but the just man will live by his faith. The Apostle likewise says in Hebrews 10: You have need of patience, so that, doing the will of God, we may receive the promise: for yet a little while, and he who is to come will come, and will not delay; but my just man lives by faith. That is: faith alone contributes to justice and life, and the Sacraments contribute nothing of themselves to it. — I deny: for it is false that faith produces sanctifying grace and contributes by itself alone to justification, as we said in the Disputation on Faith.

They object 7. Those who teach that the Sacraments produce grace not only distract people from Christ's merits, but as it were bind divine power to the Sacraments; for they make people resort to a bodily thing as the cause and source of their justification, as though God could not justify them except dependently on those external signs. But the consequence is absurd; therefore so is the antecedent. — I deny the major: rather, through these helps they advance people toward God and Christ, since they admit that the Sacraments have power only from Christ's merits and that the effect signified through them is produced efficiently by God alone, but morally by those Sacraments. Thus, just as those healed by Christ through touching his garment, such as the woman with the issue of blood, or through the mud placed on them by his divine hands, such as the man born blind, did not place their hope in those material things but rather in Christ the Lord himself, from whom, as from a fountain, this healing power flowed, so we do not place our hope in the Sacraments themselves but in God's efficiency and Christ's merits. This would not involve absurdity; otherwise God should not have healed the Israelites from the serpents' bite through looking at the bronze serpent, or cleansed Naaman the Syrian through the waters of the Jordan; nor should the Son of God have assumed flesh, lest people adhere more to a bodily thing than to God. Nor is God, justifying through the Sacraments, bound to the Sacraments themselves; rather the Sacraments are bound to God, because God can justify without the Sacraments, whereas the Sacraments cannot without God. Add that the heretics themselves want an adult to whom Christ's blood is applied not to be justified except through faith, yet they do not want God bound to faith or to Christ's blood; therefore the same must be said of the Sacraments.

They object 3. In the passage of 1 Peter where eight souls are said to have been saved through water: Which also, he says, now saves you by a like figure, Baptism—not the putting away of the filth of the flesh, but the appeal of a good conscience to God through the resurrection of Jesus Christ: but this appeal of conscience is nothing other than an exercise of faith in Christ’s Resurrection, which has the power of sanctifying; therefore salvation must be attributed not to the water of Baptism, but to the virtue of a good conscience and faith. — I distinguish the major: a good conscience’s appeal saves us insofar as it is a disposition and preparation for receiving the effect of Baptism fruitfully, I concede; as the sole productive cause of grace and salvation, I deny. To the minor I say that the appeal of conscience itself is nothing other than the interior cleansing of the mind, which is called the appeal of a good conscience to God through the Resurrection of Jesus Christ, namely by reason of its effect. For this appeal is the effect of the washing of the soul: the cleansing of the soul’s stains makes it possible for our conscience to be questioned and tested by God as sincere and good, and also to ask God and answer him, because it firmly believes in Christ’s Resurrection, so that we may walk in newness of life. For, as the Apostle says in Romans 4.¹ Christ rose for our justification.

They object 4. That passage of Luke 5: Who can forgive sins except God alone? Therefore man cannot contribute anything through the Sacraments toward the remission of sins. They confirm this from St. Jerome on the fourth chapter of Isaiah, where he says: Man provides the water, but God the Holy Spirit, by whom the stains are washed from the soul and sins are cleansed: therefore man contributes nothing at all to the bestowal of grace through the administration of the Sacraments. — I distinguish the antecedent: God alone remits sins as the principal cause, I concede: for Isaiah says, chapter 43: I am he who blots out iniquities: as ministerial and instrumental cause, I deny. Thus, for example, the Lord Christ restored sight to the man born blind as principal cause; nevertheless the water of Siloam, with which the blind man made use at Christ’s command, contributed to that restoration of sight as instrumental cause. Hence St. Augustine, book 3 of the Questions on Leviticus, question 81: And Moses, he says, sanctified, and the Lord: but Moses by visible Sacraments through his mystery, whereas the Lord by invisible grace through the Holy Spirit.

They object 1. They cite various authorities of St. Augustine, by which he seems to signify that men contribute to justification through the administration of the Sacraments in no other way than by praying and entreating. Thus he teaches especially in tractate 6 on John: He saw, he says, Simon Magus saw that the Holy Spirit was given through the laying on of hands, not because they themselves gave him, but because he was given while they were praying: he teaches the same lib. 15. De Trinitate, chapter 17: How great is God, who gives God: for none of his disciples gave the Holy Spirit; they were praying that he might come upon those on whom they laid hands, they themselves did not give him: and the Church also preserves this practice in its prelates: but if the Apostles did not confer the Holy Spirit through the laying on of hands, neither did they bestow grace; for, the Apostle says, The charity of God has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit, who has been given to us. — I respond: St. Augustine means nothing other than that the Apostles did not give the Holy Spirit as a divine Person; nor did they bestow grace as principal cause, I concede; as the gift of the Holy Spirit, I deny. And so the consequence must be denied. For St. Augustine’s meaning is no different: there he proves Christ to be God from the fact that he gave the Holy Spirit on Pentecost; for he says: How is he not God, who gives the Holy Spirit? Indeed, how great is God, who gives God? None of his disciples gave the Holy Spirit, because properly he can be given only by him from whom he proceeds; but he does not proceed from the disciples, and consequently could not be personally given by them. Nevertheless, as ministers of Christ they gave the gift of the Holy Spirit himself; for we read in Acts 8 that the Holy Spirit was given through the laying on of hands.

They object 2. They cite other authorities of the same holy Doctor by which they try to prove that the Sacraments act only according to the faith and disposition of the recipient. Thus, Sermon 3 On the Words of the Lord: Baptism, which is once administered, cleanses through faith. And in the book Questions on the Old and New Testament, question 50, where he thinks Baptism consists in a bodily manner, he says: he is not spiritual and will not be able to obtain the heavenly gift, who believes that he is changed by water itself, not through faith; for water touches him, but he is cleansed by the Spirit working, so that faith may be in him. But if man is changed through faith, not through water, salvation must be attributed to faith, not to the Sacrament. — I respond to the first: Baptism cleanses through faith as a prior disposition, I concede; as the efficient cause of cleansing, which Baptism arouses and from which it has the power of cleansing, I deny. For St. Augustine explains that passage of Luke 11: Now you Pharisees cleanse what is outside the cup and the dish. But what is within you is full of plunder and iniquity. Hence Christ rebukes the Pharisees, who washed themselves with water every day before lunch as though that washing could be cleansing of the heart, and he warns the disciples not to think that justice consists in cleansing the body; for Baptism cleanses adults through faith as a subsequent disposition. Faith, however, is within, not outside, according to Acts 15: Cleansing their hearts by faith. But the Pharisees washed what is outside, while within they were stained by very many vices. To the second I respond first that this work is in no way St. Augustine’s, as Erasmus proves by several arguments in his censure of this book; nor is this treatise mentioned either in St. Augustine’s books of the Retractions or in the catalogue of Possidius. Among other things, this author conflicts with St. Augustine’s doctrine: for he teaches that by the Spirit of the Lord, which was borne over the waters at the world’s origin, the Holy Spirit is not understood, but the spirit of matter placed over all substances. Likewise, that Melchizedek was not a man, but was the Holy Spirit. And in question 69, which is brought against us, he explains these words of the Lord, John 3: The Spirit blows where it wills, etc., of the wind, not of the Holy Spirit. All of these things are wholly opposed to St. Augustine and to the truth.

Nor is it valid to say with some that the Sacrament produces grace for an undetermined time, or at a determined time before the Sacrament is completed; or with others that grace is produced at the same instant at which the Sacrament is completed. For every real and physical cause is presupposed, at least by priority of nature, to its effect; therefore it cannot produce before it exists. Moreover, while the form is completed and finished, only the final syllable remains in being, and that is not the Sacrament.

Objection 6. If the Sacraments of the New Law truly concurred in producing grace, they would have a different efficacy and power from the Sacraments of the Old Law: but Saint Augustine teaches the contrary: therefore, etc. The major is clear from what has been said. Calvin proves the minor, book 1 of the Institutes, chapter 11, no. 26, from Saint Augustine, Homily 26 on John, where the holy Doctor says:

The sacraments of the Jews were different in their signs, equal in the thing signified: different in visible species, equal in spiritual power. And in Homily 45: In different signs, the same faith; in different signs, just as in different words: for words change their sounds with the times, and words are certainly nothing other than signs. The Fathers drank the same spiritual drink, not the same bodily drink. See, therefore: while the faith remained, the signs changed. There the rock was Christ; for us, Christ is what is placed on the altar. And they drank flowing water from the rock as a great sacrament; what we drink, the faithful know. If you attend to the visible appearance, it is something else; if to the intelligible signification, they drank the same spiritual drink. In Psalm 78, book 19 Against Faustus, chapter 13: The food and drink of those people was the same as ours in mystery; but the same in signification, not in species: for the very same Christ was figured for them in the rock and manifested for us in the flesh. Although we also concede that in this respect there is some difference. For both testify that God's benevolence in Christ and the graces of the Holy Spirit are offered to us by the Father; but ours do so more illustriously and clearly. In both there is the presentation of Christ; but in these it is fuller and more abundant, namely according to what we discussed above concerning the distinction between the Old and New Testaments. And this is what Augustine himself intended (whom, as the best of all antiquity and the most trustworthy witness, we cite so often) when he teaches that, after Christ was revealed, the Sacraments were instituted fewer in number, more exalted in signification, and superior in power. Thus Calvin.

I answer first, that Calvin has falsely and corruptly produced the first authority; for nowhere did Saint Augustine say that the Sacraments of the Old and New Law are equal in spiritual power, but that they signify the same thing by spiritual power. For he says: Those sacraments are different in their signs, but equal in the thing signified. Hear the Apostle: For I do not want you to be ignorant, brothers, that all our fathers were under the cloud.... and all ate the same spiritual food: certainly the same spiritual food; for the bodily food was different, because they had one and we another; but the spiritual food was the same as ours. And he adds: All drank the same spiritual drink; they had one and we another, but visibly different, while signifying the same thing by spiritual power. From this it is clear that Saint Augustine means nothing other than that the Sacraments of the Old and New Law agree in power—not indeed in producing grace, but in signifying it—with this distinction, that those signified only speculatively the grace that was to come, while these signify it as present and practically.

I answer second, that the Sacraments of the New Law have two offices: one, to instruct; the other, to heal. They instruct when they signify grace; they heal when they confer it. In the first office they are protestative signs of faith; in the second, operative signs of salvation, as Saint Chrysostom observes, Homily 82 on Matthew: Through this most sacred table, he says, he both saves and attracts. In the former office they agree with the Sacraments of the Old Law, which commended and taught the same faith, and differ from them only in this: the Sacraments of the Old Law regarded and signified the future object of faith, while the Sacraments of the New Law represent the past, namely Christ's Incarnation, life, death, and his other mysteries. In the latter office, however, the Sacraments of the New Law differ entirely from those of the Old Law: for although the latter signified the same grace, they neither contained nor conferred it; they were needy and empty, Saint Paul says, and if they possessed any fullness, they were filled only with shadows and figures; for everything happened to them in figure. Saint Augustine did not distinctly note this distinction in the places cited above for two reasons: first, because he was in Africa, where the heresy of the Manichaeans was spreading, and they condemned the Old Law; hence it was more fitting to express the harmony of the Sacraments of the Old and New Law than to proclaim their difference; second, because the Treatises on John and the expositions of the Psalms are homilies and discourses to the people, among whom were catechumens and many unbelievers, to whom it was not permitted to reveal the mysteries of the Church. Hence Saint Augustine also frequently says in those sermons: as the faithful know.

Objection 7. Those who teach that the Sacraments produce grace not only draw people away from Christ's merits, but also, as it were, bind divine power to the Sacraments; for they make people resort to a bodily thing as the cause and source of their justification, as though God could not justify them except dependently upon those outward signs. But the consequent is absurd: therefore, so is the antecedent. — I deny the major: rather, through these aids they advance people toward God and Christ; for they acknowledge that the Sacraments have power only from Christ's merits, and that the effect signified through them is efficiently produced by God alone, but morally by those Sacraments. Thus, just as those who were healed by Christ through touching his garment, like the woman with the flow of blood, or through mud placed by his divine hands, like the man born blind, did not place their hope in such material things but rather in the Lord Christ himself, from whom, as from a fountain, this healing power flowed, so we do not place our hope in the Sacraments themselves, but place it in God's efficiency and Christ's merits. This certainly involves no absurdity; otherwise God should not have healed the Israelites from the serpent's bite through looking at the bronze serpent, nor cleansed Naaman the Syrian through the waters of the Jordan; nor should the Son of God have assumed flesh, lest people cling more to a bodily thing than to God. Nor is God, when justifying through the Sacraments, bound to the Sacraments themselves; rather, the Sacraments are bound to God, because God can justify without the Sacraments, whereas the Sacraments cannot without God. Add that the heretics themselves want an adult to whom Christ's blood is applied to be justified only through faith, yet they do not want God bound to faith or to Christ's blood: therefore the same must be said of the Sacraments.

The last objection is: A bodily creature cannot produce a spiritual and supernatural thing: but a Sacrament is a bodily creature, while grace is a supernatural thing: therefore, etc. — I answer, distinguishing the major: it cannot produce it as a principal cause, I concede; as an instrumental cause, I distinguish: physically, I concede; morally, I deny. Then, having conceded the minor, I likewise distinguish the consequent. Whether they produce grace physically or morally, it is sufficient to stop the mouths of the adversaries speaking wickedly.

I answer that these points have no force: first, because it is certain that through these prayers the water does not receive the power of sanctifying, since any other unblessed water would suffice for Baptism; moreover, that power would have to belong not to the water alone but also to the words, since the Sacrament is constituted from matter and form. Second, because those words can be understood only of moral efficacy, which water or oil does not have from its nature, but from divine ordinance. Just as a king can accomplish through royal authority many things which he could not accomplish according to his natural and physical powers, while that royal authority nevertheless establishes nothing physical in him, so the Sacraments can do many things by divine ordinance and through moral efficacy which they could not accomplish according to natural power, as the Catechism says.

To the first question, therefore, I say that since the necessity of things ordered to an end is taken from the end, and according to all who speak about the Sacraments the end of a Sacrament is grace, or some invisible effect of God disposing a person toward salvation, and since this end can sufficiently be obtained in the way it is obtained through a Sacrament without saying that the Sacrament has any properly so-called action, either with respect to grace, which it cannot reach because grace is created, or with respect to the prior supernatural disposition, because that too would be created, it follows that such an action should not be posited, since neither are these additional things necessary nor can they manifestly be posited.

Saint Bonaventure in the same place, article 1, question 1, Alensis, part 3, question 5, member 3, article 5, Aureolus, question 1, article 4, Durandus, question 1, and Vazquez, distinction 132, chapter 5, incline to the same opinion. The Doctor proves it because the necessity of something is inferred from the end; but the end of the institution of the Sacraments is sanctifying grace, or some invisible supernatural effect; and this effect can be obtained through the Sacrament without that physical influx: therefore, etc. The Doctor's argument is indeed most effective, based on the presupposed refutation of the affirmative opinion, which we shall present below.

The Conclusion is therefore proved. First, by the authority of the holy Fathers, who deny true physical efficiency to the Sacraments of the New Law. Thus Saint Cyprian, Sermon On the Baptism of Christ: Remission, he says, whether it is given through baptism or through other Sacraments, belongs properly to the Holy Spirit, and the privilege of this efficiency remains with him alone: the solemnity of the words, the invocation of the sacred name, and the signs of institution entrusted to the priestly ministries of the Apostles visibly celebrate the Sacrament; but the Holy Spirit forms and effects the reality of the Sacrament. — Basil agrees, book On the Holy Spirit, chapter 15, where he says: The Lord who dispenses the rite established the covenant of baptism for us: the water fulfilling the image of death, while the pledge of life proceeds beforehand through the Spirit. Therefore he thinks baptism is a covenant or sign of a covenant, upon which God has established that he himself immediately infuses grace. Ambrose also agrees, book 7 On the Sacraments, chapter 5: One thing is the element, another the consecration; one thing the work, another its operation; the water is the work, the operation is that of the Holy Spirit. Finally Saint Augustine, Letter 23: It, he says, exhibits outwardly the sacrament of grace, while the Spirit inwardly works the benefit of grace: dissolving the bond of guilt, reconciling the good of nature, regenerating the human being in the one Christ. From these passages it appears how the holy Fathers deny physical, but not moral, efficiency to the Sacraments; for elsewhere they affirm that the Sacraments produce grace. Therefore, to reconcile them with one another, moral causality must be established and physical causality denied. In ordinary speech we both attribute and deny an effect to one and the same cause; for example, when the craftsmanship of a palace is praised, the prince is said not to have built it, but the craftsman; but if its magnificence is praised, then the prince, not the craftsman. Likewise, when the Fathers explain in the Sacraments what power physically produces grace, they attribute it to God alone; but when they explain what the Sacraments can do by reason of their institution and Christ's merits, they teach that they cause grace.

Second, it is proved by reason. The causal efficacy of the other Sacraments is the same as that of Baptism: if Baptism does not have true physical causality and efficacy with respect to producing grace, then neither do the other Sacraments. The minor is established: a more perfect power of causing grace and justification does not belong to Baptism than to the humanity of the Lord Christ; but the humanity of the Lord Christ had only moral and meritorious efficacy with respect to producing grace; therefore physical causality, which is more perfect, does not belong to Baptism. The major is clear: Baptism and the other Sacraments borrow all their efficacy from Christ's meritorious works, which are present in them and applied through them, as Saint Augustine teaches in the Enchiridion, chapter 52, and Origen and Anselm, from Saint Paul's saying to the Romans 6: Whoever has been baptized in Christ has been baptized into his death. The minor is proved from the Council of Trent, Session 6, chapter 7, where, speaking of the causes of justification, it says:

The causes of this justification are: the final cause, indeed, the glory of God and of Christ, and eternal life; the efficient cause, the merciful God, who freely washes and sanctifies, sealing and anointing with the Holy Spirit of promise; the meritorious cause, his most beloved only-begotten Son, our Lord Jesus Christ, who, when we were enemies, by his most holy Passion on the wood of the cross merited justification for us and made satisfaction for us to the Father; the instrumental cause, the Sacrament of Baptism, which is the Sacrament of faith, etc.

By these words the Council attributes two kinds of causality to Christ, namely final and meritorious causality; but the causality of an efficient cause, insofar as it is distinguished from the instrumental and meritorious, it attributes to God alone, and without any qualification. By this manner of speaking it denotes physical efficiency, which is efficiency without qualification; therefore the Council's meaning is that such efficiency belongs neither to the Sacrament nor to Christ. The consequence is proved because the Council declares that Christ's merit must be referred chiefly to his Passion, through which he paid the due satisfaction to God the Father for us; but this merit cannot have true physical efficiency, since operation follows being, and consequently what does not really and physically exist cannot physically and really influence the production of anything; but the Passion of the Lord Christ and his merits exist neither in themselves nor in any effect of theirs really, but only in divine acceptance; therefore they cannot have physical efficiency. Add that the Council attributes causality to Christ's Passion only insofar as it had the character of satisfaction and merit; but in this respect it had no other kind of causality than moral. This is proved because Christ's Passion influences those justified no differently as something offered than as something to be offered: for Christ was the Redeemer and head of all, both those who preceded and those who followed, according to Paul's saying: All drank from the spiritual rock following them, and the rock was Christ. But Christ's Passion did not have the character of a physically influencing cause with respect to those who preceded his Incarnation, since it did not yet exist; therefore neither does it now act physically.

Third, the preceding argument is confirmed. What physically concurs in the production of something must really exist while the thing is produced and must have some activity by which it can physically act and produce; but the Sacraments neither really exist while grace is produced nor have any physical activity by which they can concur in its production; therefore, etc. The major is clear as to the first member: what does not really exist cannot produce anything more really than a possible or dead man can in fact and in act speak or walk; for to operate follows being, and consequently what is not actual and real cannot act actually and really. It is likewise clear as to the second member: for if it has any activity in first act with respect to something, it can never produce that thing more than blackness can whiten, etc. The minor is therefore proved as to its first part. A Sacrament, for example Baptism, does not really exist—neither in its entirety, nor according to any part of itself, nor according to anything produced by it—while grace is being produced. I prove it: a Sacrament does not operate and cannot produce grace unless it is perfect and complete both according to the matter and according to the form. For if, for example, in baptizing someone, through malice, ignorance, or the death of the person baptized, someone were to say only, I baptize you in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Spirit, but did not add the final word, holy, there would be no Baptism and consequently it would produce no grace, because the Sacrament would be imperfect, as everyone admits. If someone denied this, he could be convicted by the fact that, if omission of one word of the form did not invalidate the Sacrament, neither would omission of two invalidate it, nor three, and so on; for the penultimate word is no less of the essence and integrity than the final one. Thus, by omitting the words Holy Spirit, Baptism would nevertheless be valid, which the Councils proscribe as heretical. Therefore Baptism does not produce grace until it is completed by the utterance of the final syllable of the form. But that final syllable of the form is not the Sacrament either: first, because otherwise it alone would suffice to produce grace; second, because grace is produced only in the instant in which the complete utterance of the necessary words is formally completed, and in which it is true to say: now that form is no longer complete, though immediately before it was. Therefore, in the instant in which grace is produced, the Sacrament is not real either in its entirety or according to any part of itself. Nor does it remain according to anything produced by it through which it could produce grace, because the same difficulty that was raised concerning the production of grace would recur; besides, no other effect to be produced is assigned, apart from the Sacraments that do not imprint a character, except sanctifying grace and certain aids of grace.

The Lutherans and Calvinists reply that, for the time during which infants are baptized, the use of reason is divinely granted to them. — But this reply is more worthy of laughter than refutation: for who would believe that God performs this miracle, when neither Scripture nor the holy Fathers mention it in any way?

Nor is it valid to reply likewise that, through obediential power, God elevates that last part of the Sacrament, whether through some supernatural quality, as the intellect is elevated by the light of glory to see God and the will by charity to love, or through an extraordinary concurrence by which a creature, by reason of obediential power, is elevated in activity to produce the effect. I say that the reply is not valid: first, because that part, thus elevated and physically causing, is not the Sacrament of Baptism, since to produce grace through the Sacrament of Baptism the utterance of the other words and the outward washing are required, and they do not then exist in act; second, because if they exist, they do so only morally. Therefore, if the earlier words can morally move God to elevate that syllable so that grace may be physically produced, why will the complete words not sufficiently move God to produce grace?

You will reply that the real existence of the whole cause is not required for it to act physically, but that it is enough for one part to remain after the other parts have passed away, and for that part to produce the effect in place of the whole; for example, alteration, although successive, concurs as a whole in the production of heat, although only one part of it exists while heat is produced. — On the contrary, it is impossible for something to be said to produce anything physically according to a part that does not exist, unless that part, while it existed, produced something conducive to the production of the effect; otherwise it would be a cause and not a cause. Nor can one part produce by the power of the other parts unless the earlier parts produced something which, through the last part, could be carried out, though that last part by itself could not carry it out. Nor does the example of alteration press the point: either heat is produced in the instant after the motion, and then it is not said to be produced by alteration except insofar as alteration removes obstacles and prepares the subject; or it is produced through successive alteration, and then each part of the motion produces each part of the heat. Hence that example contributes nothing to the matter.

For the earlier words do not produce a part of grace, both because they do not have the character of a Sacrament and because, if the others were not uttered, a person would nevertheless be said to be justified—which is impossible and all deny it. Nor do they remove an impediment or prepare the soul, because the soul of itself is sufficiently disposed to receive grace, and there can be no other impediment than the person's obstinate will in sin, which can be changed not by the earlier words of the form, but by exciting and cooperating grace: therefore, etc.

Objection 1. All the authorities of the Councils and the holy Fathers praised in the first Conclusion, in which true causality with respect to grace is attributed to the Sacraments of the New Law. — Vasquez replies, that this causality is preserved more suitably and better by moral causality than by physical causality: first, because it is easier to understand and involves fewer difficulties requiring solution; second, because in this same way the Fathers, the Councils, and Scripture testify that Christ's death, blood, and Passion cleanse and sanctify us, etc., just as they assert this of the Sacraments; yet it is certain that Christ's death does not sanctify us physically, but only morally and meritoriously; finally, because the Fathers speak in the same way of the efficacy of a Sacrament when it has long been completed and when it is being administered, as in the case proposed concerning baptismal grace. For Saint Augustine, book 3 On Baptism, chapter 3: Then, he says, the same Baptism begins to be effective for the remission of sins, when they have come to the peace of the Church—not so that sins already remitted may not be retained, nor so that that baptism might be rejected as foreign or another, nor so that another might be given, but so that it might be that very same baptism, etc.

Objection 1. 1. The prayers of the Church in the blessing of baptismal water, among which are found these and similar words: Bless these simple waters with your mouth, so that, beyond the natural cleansing for which they can be used to treat bodies, they may also be effective for purifying minds. And when the candle is immersed, these words are said: Let the power of the Holy Spirit descend into this fullness of the font. And while breathing upon the water: May he make the whole substance of this water fruitful with the effect of regeneration. — 2. The prayers which the Bishop uses on Holy Thursday at the Lord's Supper in consecrating oil: We humbly ask your mercy that, by bestowing spiritual grace upon this ointment, you pour into it the fullness of sanctification. — 3. The words of the Catechism of the Council of Trent, part 2, chapter 1, no. 27, where, explaining the manner in which grace is produced, it says:

But how such a great and admirable thing is effected through the Sacrament, so that, as Saint Augustine's celebrated saying has it, water touches the body and washes the heart—this indeed cannot be grasped by human reason or understanding. For it must be established that no sensible thing is endowed by its nature with such power that it can penetrate into the soul; but by the light of faith we know that the power of almighty God is present in the Sacraments, by which they effect what natural things cannot accomplish by their own power.

I answer that these things prove nothing: first, because it is certain that through these prayers the water does not receive the power of sanctifying, since any other unblessed water would suffice for Baptism; moreover, that power would have to belong not only to the water but also to the words, since the Sacrament is constituted from matter and form. Second, because by these words only moral efficacy can be understood: water or oil does not have it from its own nature, but from divine ordinance. Just as a king can accomplish many things through royal authority which he could not execute according to natural and physical powers, while royal authority itself establishes nothing physical in him, so the Sacraments can accomplish many things by divine ordinance and through moral efficacy which they could not accomplish according to natural power, as the Catechism says.

You will object: The Catechism says that this manner of operating is admirable and ineffable. And Saint Cyril, book 1 on Saint John, chapter 11, speaking of Christ's Flesh, after saying that he used not only signs and wonders as God, but also employed his flesh as a kind of co-worker in all things, so that he might show in reality that his flesh too, because it is united to him, is life-giving, says in chapter 21, treating of the efficacy of that same flesh in the Eucharist: We cannot understand with the mind or express with the tongue how this happens; but we receive it in silence and with firm faith. But if he had thought that this happened through moral efficacy, he would not say that it was ineffable. For what is easier to conceive than that moral efficacy? — I answer, that moral efficacy is indeed far easier to conceive than physical efficacy; nevertheless it is very admirable that, upon the application of such signs even by the most unworthy person, God infallibly produces grace.

You will object 1: Saint Ambrose, book 4 On the Sacraments, chapter 1, compares the words of consecration and transubstantiation with the words of creation; but the latter had physical efficacy: therefore so do the former. — I distinguish the antecedent: he compares them with respect to the truth of the effect on the part of the speaker, I concede; with respect to the efficacy of the utterance and of the words, I deny. Saint Ambrose intends only that, just as God was able to create all things from nothing by a word, so much more could he change created things by a word. Whether those words meanwhile have physical efficacy or moral efficacy is immaterial, provided that the effect follows.

You will object 2: It would follow from this that the Sacraments have no greater efficacy than the words of sorcerers for producing marvels through the aid of demons. — I deny: because the Sacraments have infallible efficacy, incapable of being impeded by any cause, with respect to producing grace in a disposed subject. The case is otherwise with sorcery, etc.

Third conclusion. — THE SACRAMENTS CONFER EQUAL GRACE ON SUBJECTS EQUALLY DISPOSED, AND UNEQUAL GRACE ON THOSE UNEQUALLY PREPARED. Thus the Council of Trent expressly teaches, Session 6, chapter 7, where it attributes the inequality of grace not only to God's will but also to the differing disposition of those who receive it, in these words: We are truly called righteous and are [righteous], receiving righteousness in ourselves, each his own, according to the measure that the Holy Spirit apportions to each as he wills, and according to each one's proper disposition and cooperation. It should be noted, however, that by the words as he wills the Council does not intend that the Holy Spirit sometimes confer unequal grace on two persons disposed in the same way: otherwise it would add and according to each one's proper disposition in vain. Rather, it understands the measure on God's part to be his will, by which he apportions gifts to each universally as he wills, whether in the Sacraments or outside the Sacraments.

The Sacraments of the Jews were different in signs, equal in the thing signified: different in visible species, equal in spiritual power. And in Homily 45: In different signs there was the same faith; in different signs, just as in different words, because words change their sounds through the ages, and words are certainly nothing other than signs. The Fathers drank the same spiritual drink, not the same bodily drink. See, therefore: while faith remained, the signs changed. There the rock was Christ; for us Christ is what is placed on the altar. And they drank, as a great Sacrament, water flowing from the rock; what we drink the faithful know. If you attend to visible appearance, it is different; if to intelligible signification, they drank the same spiritual drink. In Psalm 78, book 19 of Against Faustus, chapter 13: Their food and drink were the same in mystery as ours, but the same in signification, not in species, because the very same Christ was figured for them in the rock and manifested for us in the flesh. Although we also concede that there is some difference in part. Both testify that the Father's benevolence in Christ and the graces of the Holy Spirit are offered to us, but ours more illustriously and splendidly. In both there is the presentation of Christ, but in these it is fuller and more abundant, according to the distinction between the Old and New Testament discussed above. This is what Augustine himself intended when he taught that, once Christ was revealed, the Sacraments were instituted fewer in number, more august in signification, and more excellent in power. Thus Calvin.

Manna, which in Exodus 16 was gathered by each person without distinction of sex or age according to the measure of a gomor; the seed which in the Gospel is sown equally; the denarius which in Matthew 20 is distributed equally by the master of the household through his steward. To these he adds: the Holy Spirit is not given by measure, but is poured out whole upon believers. For if the day rises equally for all, and if the sun spreads over all an equal and identical light, how much more does Christ, the true sun and day, bestow in his Church the light of eternal life with equal equality?

Nor should you say that from this it follows that Saint Cyprian wants grace always to be communicated equally through the Sacraments, notwithstanding the different disposition of those who receive them. For I answer that there he is speaking only of the Sacrament of Baptism considered in itself, whether it is conferred by washing or by sprinkling, and he contends that both are valid and confer equal grace insofar as the Sacrament is considered according to its efficacy, but not with respect to the subject. A Sacrament can be considered in three ways. First, by comparison with another different in species, for example by comparing Baptism with the Eucharist, etc.; and since one is more excellent than another, as the Council of Trent decrees, Session 7, Canon 3: If anyone says that these seven Sacraments are so equal in power that in no respect is one more worthy than another, let him be anathema; it is certain that the more excellent one likewise produces more excellent grace. Second, it can be considered in itself alone and according to that proper effect for which it was determinate instituted by Christ. Third, by its relation to the subject to which it is applied. In the first way, one Sacrament produces more excellent grace than another, notwithstanding equal disposition. In the second way, it has the power to confer its own grace in this and that determinate degree, and not in a greater or lesser one. For example, when Baptism is conferred on infants, since it finds in them no positive disposition but only mere non-repugnance, which is equal in all, it also has in all of them an equal degree, because it has nothing else except what Christ willed to correspond to the Sacrament's work performed, without relation to the disposition of the subject. In the third way, it produces grace equally or unequally according to the different disposition of those who receive it, and this by the work performed: first, according to Christ's ordinance, which is made known to us through the Council of Trent praised above; second, according to the analogy that the Sacraments have with natural causes, which produce an equal or unequal effect according to the varying disposition of the subject; finally, according to the fitting and gentle providence and ordinance by which greater grace should be conferred on one better disposed, so that the hope of that greater fruit may stir us to receive the Sacraments with greater disposition and reverence. In this way all the objections from the authorities of the Fathers are to be solved. — That Saint Cyprian intended this is clear from the examples he uses. Although the sun's light is the same, it nevertheless becomes greater or lesser by reason of the greater or lesser transparency of the subject. Although manna was the same, it nevertheless had different sweetnesses according to the different disposition and desire of those eating it. Indeed, when expressly pressing the example of the seed, he says:

In the Gospel the Lord's seed is sown equally; but according to the depth of the soil, one part is absorbed, while another is counted as abounding in manifold plenty and in the fruit of thirtyfold or sixtyfold yield.

Nevertheless, the Subtle Doctor does not contradict this assertion, as some falsely attribute to him, claiming that he teaches that in fact greater grace is given by virtue of the Sacrament to the predestined than to the reprobate, and indeed that among the predestined more abundant grace is conferred through Baptism on the one predestined to greater glory. On the contrary, he plainly teaches the opposite, although he holds this to be possible. To make this clear, I transcribe his words from book 1, distinction 4, question 1, no. 3, where he says:

I answer that, since God is the principal cause, Christ's Passion the meritorious cause, and the person receiving Baptism also concurs in its effect, namely grace, equality or inequality could be considered on the part of any of these. As regards God determining himself to cooperate with this sign through the signified effect and instituting it as a certain sign, there can in some way be a difference and in some way not. For he has regularly determined to confer some grace with this sign, so that he gives no one less; thus it can be said to be conferred by virtue of Baptism, by virtue of the truth of this sign. As that universal determination is uniform as regards this degree, so the effect is equal.

Here we have our conclusion in precise terms. — Again: because God predestined different Elect to different degrees of glory, and did so before determining this sign, greater grace may reasonably be conferred according to the ordinance toward greater glory. God can therefore arrange, in determining the truth or certainty of this sign, that one recipient receive precisely the grace required for the sign's certainty and another receive more, whom he predestined to greater glory. But that further degree would not be conferred by virtue of Baptism, but from a special divine benevolence. Hence it can be said that, on the part of the principal cause, the effect regularly is simply equal when given by virtue of Baptism, because it is presupposed that by the common law the first grace is not given greater without some difference outside the principal cause.

What could be clearer? He asserts the possibility of inequality on the part of the principal cause but denies the effect under the common law. — He speaks in the same way in no. 1 of inequality on the part of the meritorious cause, saying:

Concerning the second, it can be said that the meritorious cause can work more efficaciously toward grace in one person than another, either because it is offered more specially for one than another as regards the intention of the offerer, or because it was offered in effect for one but for another only in divine foreknowledge. In the first way Christ is held commonly to know all things, because God knows by the knowledge of vision and consequently knows all the Elect and to what degree of glory they were chosen. He could therefore offer his Passion more fully for one predestined to greater glory, especially when he offered himself for the human race, so that divine predestination might be fulfilled in them. In the second way Christ's Passion cooperates more efficaciously for us, who are in the Evangelical Law, than for the Fathers under the Mosaic Law, because an obedience rendered for a greater good to be rewarded is more acceptable than a foreseen benefit. In this second way there is inequality in those receiving grace through Circumcision and Baptism, because the meritorious cause is unequally applied to them, and perhaps also in those baptized before and after the Passion. But if in the first way, namely because of a special obligation in Christ's will, there is inequality of grace in some now baptized, this is doubtful as a matter of fact; but its possibility has been shown.” Thus far the Doctor. Therefore no one should readily believe authors who cite the Doctor for some opinion without reading and weighing the text, lest what is said in Ecclesiasticus 19:1 prove true of him: He who is quick to believe is light of heart, and shall be diminished.

Question 1. Whether, besides sanctifying grace or its increase, the Sacraments confer any helps distinct from the infused virtues and gifts of the Holy Spirit?

I answer that this appears more probable, as theologians commonly teach: otherwise several distinct Sacraments would have been instituted in vain, since grace could be increased by frequent repetition of the same Sacrament, for example by Holy Communion; it is likely that more habitual grace is conferred by frequent Eucharist than by receiving the other Sacraments. Moreover, the holy Fathers teach that Matrimony and Orders were instituted so that their grace might enable ecclesiastical duties to be rightly fulfilled, the burdens of marriage to be borne with equanimity, mutual love and fidelity to be preserved, and children to be piously educated. They likewise teach that Confirmation was instituted to confer grace by which we may steadfastly profess the faith against all who attack it, even with loss of goods and danger to life. The same must be said of the other Sacraments. Since Baptism was instituted for spiritual generation and restoration of the life of grace, it is likely to confer special helps by which this new life is perfected and preserved. Penance confers a special help for detesting sins more efficaciously and making satisfaction for those committed. The Eucharist, instituted as spiritual nourishment, confers helps by which we are preserved from spiritual death, namely mortal sin. The same is clear of Extreme Unction, ordered to wiping away the remnants of sins and conferring strength in that crisis of life; it may rightly be believed to confer special helps for such effects. — Finally, things with different effects are distinct. But the effects of grace that makes pleasing and of sacramental grace are different: the former bestows some likeness to the divine nature, according to 2 Peter 1, That through these you may become partakers of the divine nature; the latter confers a remedy against the defects of sin. Such effects are undoubtedly different. The same is clear of sacramental grace in relation to virtues and gifts. Sacramental grace is related to the grace of the virtues and gifts as that grace is related to sanctifying grace generally. Sanctifying grace may be considered first generally, insofar as it makes a person pleasing to God and a partaker of the divine nature; second, as the grace of virtues and gifts adds helps by which a person is perfected and invigorated to elicit acts conformable to them, especially to believe, hope, and love God above all; and third, as sacramental grace perfects a person for the special effects of the Sacraments just designated. That sacramental grace truly adds something to the grace of the virtues and gifts, and also to habitual grace, is clear: otherwise the Sacraments would be conferred in vain on those possessing habitual grace and the virtues and gifts of the Holy Spirit, especially since that grace could be increased more easily by exercising the virtues and gifts than by the Sacraments.

You will say: Sacramental grace is ordered only to removing the soul's defects arising from sins. But the grace of the virtues and gifts suffices for this, since all sins are excluded by those virtues, because every sin is opposed to some virtue. Therefore, and so forth. — I distinguish the minor: it suffices generally, I concede; specifically, I deny. Habitual grace of the virtues and gifts removes the soul's general defect and the general wound of its powers, the privation of virtue and grace; but it does not remove particular defects, whose removal is the purpose of sacramental grace.

Question 2. What is that sacramental grace?

Paludanus replies that it is a special habit really distinct from habitual grace, the virtues, and the gifts of the Holy Spirit, which he calls regenerative in Baptism, strengthening in Confirmation, and nourishing in the Eucharist. The same is to be said of the other Sacraments. But there is no need to admit such a habit: the acts to which sacramental grace helps are either common and ordinary acts elicited by deliberate will, or extraordinary acts exercised by the special motion of the Holy Spirit alone and not by one's own deliberation, as sometimes happens in holier persons. Habitual grace with the supernatural virtues suffices for the former; the gifts of the Holy Spirit suffice for the latter, making us readily mobile to follow the impulse of the divine Spirit.

Others think otherwise; but, setting their opinions aside, I think it should be said that sacramental grace adds to habitual grace and the virtues and gifts of the Holy Spirit actual helps, such as a pious and holy thought or sudden movements of the will divinely implanted by God, for attaining the end of the Sacraments. The recipient has a right to these helps. For although every habitual grace requires helps, or prevenient graces, for resisting temptations and acting well—for God, says the Council of Trent, Session 6, chapter 11, does not abandon those once justified by his actual grace unless they first abandon him—the reason had been given:

By this, he says, the just ought to feel themselves all the more bound to walk in the way of justice, since, freed from sin and made servants and friends of God, they can advance by living soberly, justly, and piously through Jesus Christ, who loves those who love him, enriching them with special favors and helps by which, if they wish, they can more easily keep God's commandments. For this is consonant with the laws of friendship: that a friend should act according to the will of a friend.

Although every habitual grace claims the special helps necessary for its preservation, this especially suits sacramental grace, which fittingly calls for certain helps by which what Christ the Lord specially intended through the Sacrament may be obtained. It is like what happens among human beings: when a subject has earned his prince's friendship by his services in some place, he is especially worthy to be rewarded there; for example, after compelling a city on the enemy's side to surrender, he is worthy to be appointed its governor.

You will say. The same habit of grace does not suffice for specifically different acts. But the acts in the Sacraments are specifically different: Matrimony is ordered to preserving conjugal fidelity, Christian education of children, and bearing family burdens. Therefore another habit must contribute to eliciting these acts; but that other habit can be nothing but sacramental grace. Therefore sacramental grace is not an actual but a habitual help.

I deny the major. Sanctifying grace conferred in the state of innocence and under the Old Testament does not seem specifically different from that conferred on just persons under the Evangelical Law; nevertheless it produces specifically different effects. The grace of the state of innocence restrained the unbridled motions of the sensory part, subjecting the body to the soul and the senses to reason; sanctifying grace of the New Testament does not produce that effect. It is likewise much more efficacious than the grace of the Old Testament, since it opens to human beings the heaven previously closed.

You will ask further: Who have a right to those sacramental helps?

I answer, it seems more probable that only those claim this right for themselves who obtain sanctifying grace in receiving a Sacrament and preserve the grace obtained. Hence the person who does not receive God's grace together with the Sacrament of Matrimony does not acquire a right to the special aids that help holy spouses in educating children and bearing the other burdens of Matrimony; and the same applies in the other Sacraments. This is proved because the author of the sermon at the supper, in Saint Cyprian, chapter On the Washing of the Feet, says: God gives again through penance, so that the Sacraments that had been injured may again be useful to them; but if penance were not present, they could in no way afterward experience the effect. Hence the person who, after receiving the Sacrament of Confirmation, loses grace through mortal sin and returns again to God through penance undoubtedly receives more grace than one who, without having received Confirmation, approaches the Sacrament of Penance with an equal disposition. For the former is prepared with a more ready spirit to undergo every torment for defending the faith than one who, without having received the Sacrament of Confirmation, approached Penance in a similar way. But this strength of spirit is not conferred precisely through the Sacrament of Penance, because it confers grace according to the measure of the recipient's disposition. Therefore it must proceed from the power of the Confirmation received, whose grace comes to life again through penance insofar as penance removes the impediment, namely sin.

You will say: An actual help of grace does not require the state of sanctifying grace, since God sometimes grants it even to the most depraved, as is clear from St. Paul, Magdalene, and other sinners who, when the light of grace shone upon them, turned to good fruit. Therefore habitual sanctifying grace is not necessary for receiving helps through the Sacraments. — I distinguish the antecedent: if actual grace is given from sheer liberality and mercy, as it was given to St. Paul and other illustrious penitents, I concede; if it is given from some right or debt, as the helps due through the conferral of the Sacraments are given, I deny.

You will insist. Sacramental grace has no greater connection with sanctifying grace than the divinely infused virtues. But these can exist without sanctifying grace: faith and hope can exist in sinners in whom grace that makes pleasing does not reside. —

I distinguish the major: it has no greater connection than the virtues which flow from sanctifying grace itself, I concede; than the virtues required as dispositions for grace, I deny. And, with the minor distinguished in the same way, I deny the consequence. I admit that sacramental grace has no greater connection with sanctifying grace than charity, which flows from it and is really identical with it. But the case is otherwise with the virtues which do not flow from it, but rather are preliminary dispositions toward it, such as faith and hope.

NOTE 1. According to the Doctor in 4. dist. 26, q. 3, n. 7, by the name of character here is signified some sign by which those marked with such a sign are mutually assimilated and distinguished from other people: for χάραξ in Greek is called in Latin a form, figure, or image, a mark, or some sign distinguishing some from others. Hence in Heb. 1 the Son of God is called in Greek χαρακτὴρ τῆς ὑποστάσεως αὐτοῦ, that is, the figure and image of the substance of the Father himself; and in Apoc. 13 some are said to have the character of the beast, or a figure on their foreheads and hands, signifying that they belong to the beast's household. That figure by which cattle are marked with a branding iron, so that they bear the mark of their master and can be distinguished from the cattle of another master, is commonly called a character. In this way too, says the Doctor, we call the characters or figures with which letters are written characters; for which reason certain figures drawn in incantations are also usually called characters. Thus, by the name character theologians properly signify a certain spiritual sign impressed by God upon one receiving a non-repeatable Sacrament.

NOTE 2. From the same source, two principal properties and two effects of this character are distinguished: one physical, the other moral. The physical property is that the subject possessing the character is assimilated to another that possesses a similar form, and is distinguished from another not so marked. The moral property is that it is a commemorative sign of the Sacrament received, conformative to Christ, whose Sacrament is received, and obliging the recipient to observe the law and faith, whose initiation it is; finally, that through this sign the recipient of the Sacrament is deputed to some office, just as in former times people were enrolled in military service by some distinctive mark. From this the Doctor concludes that the character is distinguished from another effect of the Sacrament, namely grace, and also from the infused virtues, faith, hope, and charity; “because,” he says, “such virtues are not always imprinted on the recipient of a non-repeatable Sacrament, as on the recipient of Orders or Confirmation: but the character is always imprinted. This is also clear from another condition commonly attributed to the character, namely, that it is indelible: but these virtues are erasable, as is evident in one who sins mortally, in whom these virtues do not remain.”

NOTE 3. More recent heretics try to call into doubt that such a character is impressed upon recipients through the Sacraments of the New Law. Thus John Wycliffe, book 1 of The Trialogue, chapter 15, says: Some multiply characters from the Sacraments in Orders; but I find neither their foundation nor their fruit in Sacred Scripture or in reason. Luther too, in the book On the Babylonian Captivity, chapter On Orders, mocks the character in this way: They have fabricated, he says, characters which they attributed to this Sacrament of theirs, to be impressed upon those ordained: whence, then, do such ideas arise, by what authority, by what reasoning are they established? Calvin likewise, in the Institutes, Canon 1 of Session 7 of the Council of Trent: What, he says, they chatter about the indelible character comes from the same workshop; for it was wholly unknown among the ancients, and is more akin to magical incantations than to the sound doctrine of the Gospel; therefore it will be rejected with the same ease with which it was devised.

With these premises established, four principal points must be determined in this Question: first, that a character is truly impressed through only certain Sacraments; second, that it is neither some relation of reason, as Durandus held, nor merely real, as some wrongly pretend the Subtle Doctor asserted, but a certain spiritual quality; third, whether that character is immediately subjected in the substance of the soul or in one of its faculties; fourth, finally, whether it is altogether indelible and irremovable.

First conclusion. — THE THREE SACRAMENTS OF THE NEW LAW, NAMELY BAPTISM, CONFIRMATION, AND ORDERS, IMPRESS A SPIRITUAL CHARACTER. This is of faith, determined in the Councils, especially at Florence in the Decree of Eugene, where we read: Among these Sacraments of the New Law there are three, Baptism, Confirmation, and Orders, which impress upon the soul a character, that is, a spiritual sign distinguishing it from the rest, an indelible sign; hence they are not repeated in the same person. The remaining four do not impress a character and admit repetition. The Council of Trent defines the same in Session 7, Canon 1, in these words: If anyone says that in the three Sacraments, namely Baptism, Confirmation, and Orders, a character is not impressed upon the soul, that is, a certain spiritual and indelible sign, so that they cannot be repeated, let him be anathema. Innocent III also clearly expressed this same truth, received by perpetual tradition from the beginning of the Church, as reported in the chapter Maiores, On Baptism. When it was asked there whether the character of the Sacrament is impressed in Baptism upon sleepers and the insane, so that once awakened from sleep or illness they should not be baptized again, he replied: “There are those who say that Baptism and Orders are conferred not only upon sleepers and the insane, but also upon the unwilling and resisting, though not as to the thing, yet as to the character. Others distinguish, not absurdly, that he who is violently drawn by terrors and punishments, lest he incur harm, receives the Sacrament of Baptism, as one who approaches Baptism in faith receives the character of Christianity impressed upon him. But he who wholly resists and never consents receives neither the thing nor the character of the Sacrament. Sleepers and the insane, however, if before they fell into insanity or sleep they persisted in refusal, do not receive the character of the Sacrament even if they were immersed in this condition; but otherwise if they had previously been catechumens and had intended to be baptized. The sacramental operation therefore impresses the character when it finds no obstacle of a contrary will resisting it.” By these words Innocent presupposes that the doctrine concerning the sacramental character is established in the Church and received from the Fathers, as the Subtle Doctor excellently notes in the cited question 3, n. 11. There he observes that although it could perhaps be said that the words of this authority consequently use the name character to signify Baptism, nevertheless, he says, in the later words, where it says that the sacramental operation impresses a character, it seems expressly to speak of the character as something impressed upon the soul itself, as we are speaking here.

There are also testimonies of Scripture supporting this truth. First of all, that passage of 2 Cor. 1 may be brought forward: The God who anointed us, who also sealed us and gave the pledge of the Spirit in our hearts. In these words the Apostle distinguishes three effects of Confirmation. The first is grace, by which we are anointed and strengthened like oil; the second is the character, by which we are consecrated to God and sealed as with the sign of Christ for divine worship and some office; the third is the Holy Spirit, who bears witness to us of a good conscience and is in us like a pledge of future glory. I nevertheless confess that from this and similar Scriptural authority the impression of such a sacramental character cannot be concluded clearly and explicitly. Someone could reply, by explaining such Scriptural texts, that they concern sanctifying grace, just as the Council of Trent, Session 6, chapter 7, calls it the Spirit of the promise, saying: The merciful God, the efficacious cause of justification, who freely washes and sanctifies, sealing and anointing with the promised Holy Spirit, who is the pledge of our inheritance. Chrysostom, Oecumenius, and others understand the Apostle's passage in 2 Cor. 1 in this sense. Although not everyone receives it in the reception of the Sacrament, nevertheless the Sacrament itself, insofar as it is from itself, is ordered to confer it; and that is sufficient.

Many authorities of the holy Fathers are also brought forward as intimating the same truth. First, Cyril of Jerusalem, in the preface to his Catecheses, says: Great indeed is the proposed Baptism: liberation from captivity, remission of sins, death of sin, regeneration of the soul, a garment of brightness, a holy and indelible seal. But Baptism is not indelible by reason of sanctifying grace, for this is lost through any mortal sin; therefore it is called such by reason of the seal remaining in the baptized person, and nothing else can it be except the character. Likewise Saint Basil, Homily 13, says: Do you wish the devil to see the seal upon you, so that he may fight for you or rescue you from enemies? How, you will say, am I God's, when I do not show God's sign? Or do you not know how the destroyer passed over the marked houses in Egypt, but slew the firstborn in those not marked? An unsealed treasure is easily exposed to thieves; a thing without a mark is immediately vulnerable to ambushes. Saint Gregory Nazianzen likewise, Oration 1, Baptism, says: Baptism is a seal, because it is preservation and a signification of lordship; for it signifies whose possession we are. And later: What is sealed beforehand is not easily attacked by ambushes; what is not sealed is easily seized by thieves. Saint Chrysostom, Homily 2 on the Epistle to the Ephesians, says: The Israelites were sealed, but with the mark of circumcision, like cattle; we, as sons, for the day of redemption. Hence in Homily 11 he says: He made us a royal flock. Other holy Fathers say the same, such as Jerome on Eph. 1: God impresses upon the soul the seal of the Holy Spirit. And Saint Ambrose, book On the Holy Spirit, chapter 6: We are sealed with the Spirit, so that we may retain his brightness, image, and grace, which is the spiritual seal. But Saint Augustine most excellently supports this truth in many places, especially book 6 of On Baptism, chapter 1, writing:

A sheep that was wandering outside fled from the pastors of the Church, and had received outside from deceitful predators the Lord's character, suitable for the salvation of Christian unity; it is corrected from error and healed from its wound, yet the Lord's character in it is recognized rather than rejected.

But that Lord's character is either God's grace itself, or the Sacrament itself, or some indelible seal impressed upon the soul. But it is not grace itself, for this is not impressed upon wolves, that is, wicked people remaining in their wickedness, nor is it recognized in a sheep wandering outside among heretics. Nor is it the Sacrament itself, because the character mentioned by Saint Augustine is impressed upon wolves; but an external Sacrament cannot be said to be impressed, since it is a passing action. Therefore it is necessary that he speak of a character impressed upon the soul.

It should nevertheless be noted, as the Doctor observes, n. 11, that this authority can be understood of Baptism itself, but not of Baptism's effect. Hence I confess that neither this authority nor the others mentioned above by us would suffice to establish this sacramental character unless the Church's definition intervened. Hence the Doctor there excellently concludes: Therefore, solely on the authority of the Church, insofar as the matter presently requires, it must be held that a character is impressed. Thus Suarez excellently, Disputation 11, section 1, after reviewing various testimonies of the holy Fathers for the impression of the sacramental character, adds: “Since, however, all these testimonies do not seem compelling, therefore Scotus, d. 6, q. 1, says that Baptism itself, for example, can tacitly be explained as being the character, and therefore concludes that solely by the authority of the Church are we compelled to posit a character. But although it is true that the Church's authority has the principal role in this matter, nevertheless, that being presupposed, we understand the Saints' intention to have been to speak of the character in the same signification; and without doubt many things said by the Saints will be better understood in the aforesaid way.” In these words he excellently touched upon the Doctor's aim and the meaning explained by us.

Nevertheless, the Doctor offers three congruences for asserting such a character, n. 1, where he writes: “First, it is fitting that some disposition be posited for a perfect form; but grace is a supernatural and perfect form; therefore it is fitting that there be some preceding supernatural disposition toward it; such is the character. Second, it is fitting that God did not institute vain Sacraments, at least for the New Law, which is perfect; therefore it is fitting that no one truly receive his Sacraments without their having some effect. But they do not always have grace, as in the case of a pretender; therefore they have some other effect. Third, it is fitting that one received into Christ's household be distinguished from one not received by something intrinsic to him. Although Christ could distinguish without such an intrinsic thing, nevertheless it is more perfect both in itself and in comparison with the whole Church, militant and triumphant, if this occurs through some remaining intrinsic form than if it does not. The distinguishing mark of one who receives the Sacrament by which one enters Christ's household, as opposed to one who has not received it, is placed in the recipient as something remaining: this is the character.” He adds that the third of these congruences is more reasonable, because it is also particular to Baptism; while the other two have this probability, that if a character is posited, it will be posited in the way touched upon by those congruences. Hence he concludes: Thus let the conclusion briefly be held, on account of the Church's authority brought forward above; and the two congruences, one concerning reception into Christ's household and the other concerning a disposition to be conferred, are probable.

From this it is evident that the Subtle Doctor does not call into doubt the truth and existence of the sacramental character, as some wrongly impute to him, but only that this truth cannot be proved by express and evident statements of Sacred Scripture or of the holy Fathers, nor demonstrated by any efficacious reasoning, but merely that it is established by the authority of the Church, whose tradition and definition are supported both by Scripture and by the utterances of the holy Fathers.

The Author of the sermon on the Supper preserved by Saint Cyprian supplies another congruence for this truth. For, treating of the washing of the feet, he openly signifies that Baptism, Confirmation, and Orders cannot be repeated because they impress a character. Ecclesiastical rules forbid Baptism to be repeated, namely in Apostolic Canons 16 and 18: and once people have been sanctified, no later hand presumes to approach to consecrate another. No one renews sacred Orders once given; nor does he anoint again those anointed with the sacred oil, but preserves them; no one by the imposition of hands or by ministry diminishes the priesthood, because it would be an insult to the Holy Spirit if it could be taken away, though he sanctifies.

The Heretics reply 1. Baptism is not repeated because it is entry into the Church. — Against this: it would follow that when someone has departed from the Church through apostasy, on approaching it again he ought to be baptized again; this conflicts with the doctrine of the Fathers mentioned above and with the ancient doctrine of the Councils.

They reply 2. It is not repeated for this reason, because it is a spiritual regeneration cleansing the soul from original sin. — Against this: when someone is baptized while the effect of mortal sin is present, he is neither spiritually regenerated nor freed from original sin; nevertheless, when he later repents of this, he is not baptized again. Further, spiritual regeneration also occurs through contrition aroused by the preaching of the Gospel, as is said in Apoc. 1 and 1 Cor.: Through the Gospel I begot you. Nevertheless those thus begotten are baptized. Finally, a person is regenerated as many times as he recovers the spiritual life he has lost; yet he is not baptized that many times.

They reply 3. In proving the existence of the character, a vicious circle is made: for we say that the three Sacraments impress a character because they cannot be repeated, and they cannot be repeated because they impress a character. But this reasoning is invalid, as is clear from Aristotle, book of the Prior Analytics; therefore, and so on.

I deny the major. For a vicious circle occurs when it is made in the same genus of cause; here it is otherwise. The impression of the character is the cause why the Sacrament is not repeated, and non-repetition is the effect of that character. Just as the rational is not proved posteriorly through the risible, while the risible is demonstrated a priori through the rational, so too the character is rightly inferred through the negation of repetition, and repetition through the impression of the character.

You will say 1: No sufficient reason appears why the sacramental character should be admitted; therefore it is asserted in vain. Proof of the antecedent: it would either be admitted as a disposition toward grace, which cannot be affirmed, because a Sacrament received in desire confers grace independently of the character; moreover, as the Doctor says, n. 16, since grace is conferred in every Sacrament, an impression of some character would be required in every one as a preceding disposition for such grace to be conferred, which is false. Or it would be admitted in order to distinguish the baptized from the unbaptized; but this also seems useless: with respect to God, who without any sign whatever knows people and what sort they are; with respect to the blessed and angels, who see and discern the baptized from the unbaptized most clearly in the divine essence; with respect to us, because, since that sign is spiritual, it cannot be perceived by us through the senses; with respect to demons and the damned, since, because this sign is of the supernatural order, it follows that it cannot be known by an intellect operating solely through the powers of nature; and finally with respect to the offices and ministries to which those receiving such Sacraments are deputed, since that deputation can be made by an extrinsic denomination alone, just as judges are deputed to render justice to each person.

I answer, the character can be regarded as conferred upon people through the Sacraments for all the assigned ends. For God claims for himself by a special right the person marked with a character; the blessed take wayfarers into special custody and associate them with the fellowship of faith and the Sacraments, and although the character is not in itself sensible, nevertheless through its cause, or through the Sacrament once conferred, it distinguishes one who has received such a Sacrament from one who has not. “The blessed also,” says the Doctor, n. 1, “and the damned can recognize a person marked with a character whom they would not recognize in that way if he were not marked by such a character; for the character subsists in blessedness for greater glory, and in damnation for greater confusion.” Finally, just as those deputed to different offices in the household of some Prince are accustomed to be marked with certain signs by which their duties are known, so people who through Baptism are received into Christ's household, through Confirmation are designated as soldiers for professing the faith, and through Orders are given some power concerning Christ's true and mystical body. It was fitting, I say, that they be designated for these same offices by a special sacramental character.

You will say 2: The holy Fathers understand by the name character and the mystical sign or seal of Christ nothing other than the Sacrament of Baptism itself; therefore the sacramental character is not some effect of the Sacrament. —

I distinguish the antecedent: They understand nothing else than the Sacrament of Baptism, which is a seal causally and efficiently, as regeneration of the soul, death and remission of sin, and order: formally and in itself, I deny it. For that seal is said to be imprinted or impressed upon believers and carried by them, yet always remaining; but the outward sign employed is not of this kind, but rather the effect of Baptism. For Cyril says, The Holy Spirit seals souls in Baptism. From Ambrose, book 1, On the Holy Spirit: We are sealed in the body, yet in truth we are sealed in the heart, so that the Holy Spirit may imprint in us the likeness of the heavenly image, so that we may know that this is more the seal of our heart than of our body. Therefore that seal in the heart is something internal and distinct from the Sacrament.

You will insist. The character of which we speak is an internal spiritual seal indelibly impressed upon the soul; but the character of which the holy Fathers speak, especially Saint Augustine, is not of this kind, and is nothing other than the invocation of the most holy Trinity, as is clear from his sermon on the proceedings against Emeritus, Bishop of the Donatists at Caesarea: Therefore, he says, when I come to my brother and correct my erring brother, I attend to faith in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. This is the character of my Emperor, who commands his soldiers, or rather commands them together with his soldiers to impress it upon those whom they gathered into his camp, saying: Go, baptize the nations. —

It is confirmed, because Saint Augustine teaches in the same place that if Donatus or Paul had baptized in his own name, he would have impressed his own character. Therefore by the name of the character impressed in Baptism Saint Augustine understands nothing other than the invocation of the most holy Trinity, in whose name and power the Sacrament of Baptism is conferred. The antecedent is clear, for he says there: What is it that I say? A deserter does not bear his own character. Donatus did not baptize in the name of Donatus; for if Donatus, when he made the schism, had baptized in the name of Donatus, he would have impressed the character of a deserter. And again below he says that Paul rightly prohibited those who said, “I am of Paul,” because they had not been baptized in his name and had another character, namely that of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit: What do you wish to be mine, he says, and not rather his whose I am? Recognize and consider your character: were you baptized in the name of Paul?

I answer, by attacking the major and distinguishing the minor: Baptism is an impressing character, I concede; an impressed character, I deny. For, just as the same image of the king and the same character are in the seal and in the wax, but in the seal it is impressing and in the wax it is impressed, so the Sacrament of Baptism, especially its form, is the impressing character; for its spiritual mark is impressed upon the soul, and by that mark it is called the impressed character. Hence Saint Augustine himself, Letter 23, says: The Sacrament of Baptism among heretics is effective for preservation, not for participation in eternal life. By preservation he does not mean sanctifying grace, since this is participation in eternal life; nor Baptism, which has passed away. Therefore it is necessary that he mean the character. Hence in Treatise 1 on the First Epistle of John he says: See: whoever is baptized, if he has charity, and then he says, I have been born from God; but if he does not have it, he has the character imposed. But that character is not the Sacrament itself, since it does not remain; nor grace, since grace is not acquired without charity; therefore, and so on. In confirmation I will say that the meaning of Saint Augustine's words is that if Donatus or Paul had baptized in his own name, the invocation of their names would have presented the appearance of an impressing character, but in reality it would not have been an impressing character, because it would have been the character of a deserter, not of the Emperor, and would consequently have produced one effect. Hence he says that he would delete, cast away, and anathematize it if he found such a character in a person approaching unity. Therefore, just as in monetary matters, when silver or gold is marked with the image of a Prince, the impressing character in the iron seal must be distinguished from the impressed character in the silver or gold, so too in sacramental matters, when a soul is marked with a character in some Sacrament, the impressing character in the invocation of the most holy Trinity must be distinguished from the character impressed in the soul of the recipient of the Sacrament.

You will say 3: Every character is a sign; but no sign can be in the soul, since every sign must be sensible; therefore there can be no character in the soul. —

I distinguish the major: it is a sign analogically and through some likeness, insofar as whatever configures and assimilates something to another, or distinguishes it from another, is called an image, figure, and sign, just as the Son is called the character and figure of the Father's substance, I concede. For the Sacraments bind the faithful to one another, configure them to Christ, and distinguish them from unbelievers. It is a sign properly so called, I distinguish again: by reason of itself and in itself, I deny, for in that way it is something insensible; by reason of the sensible Sacrament which he received, I concede. For we know and can assert that someone is marked with the baptismal character because we know for certain that he was washed with water in the name of the most holy Trinity.

You will ask: Why are there only three Sacraments that impress a character?

The Subtle Doctor answers in 4. dist. 6, q. 10, n. 12, that the number of characters is best gathered and explained from the proportion which the state of the evangelical law bears to political government, according to which certain special degrees of dignity are maintained in a Prince's household that do not belong to everyone. The first is association into the household, which belongs to all the Prince's servants and by which they are distinguished from others; the second is military service, or the soldiers deputed to guard the Prince and protect the kingdom; the third is that of ministers and dispensers, according to their various degrees. Maintaining this proportion, Baptism is that by which someone is received into the household, Confirmation into military service, and Orders into ministry and administration. The other Sacraments can be common to all the others existing in the Christian household. To make this clear and more evident, I gladly append the Doctor's words: “I say that this can be made clear by a similar case in these worldly political communities. No one has a determinate rank in the king's household because he eats or drinks, nor because after an offense his lord is reconciled to him, nor because he multiplies persons in this political community; for these acts can be common to everyone at whatever rank. But someone has one rank when he is received into his lord's household, another when he advances further and is appointed a soldier to defend the commonwealth, another when he is appointed as the highest subordinate to the lord, to appoint others to determinate ranks in his household, such as a general seneschal immediately beneath the lord, to whom universal authority is entrusted to receive some into the lord's household. Therefore, if a name had been imposed signifying a rank in the household or a bailiwick, one would not say that someone had that rank because he ate, or because he returned to grace after an offense; one would say only that he had the rank of one taken from the people into the lord's household, and a further rank of one appointed in the household as a superior to receive some into the dignity of the household, because he approached the table or because he reconciled and appointed inferiors to be appointed. So in the present case, the three Sacraments, namely the Eucharist for spiritual nourishment, Matrimony for bodily procreation, and Penance for annual reconciliation, establish no one in any determinate rank in the Church; indeed they can be common to every member of the Church, at whatever rank. But the first rank of the Church, and the most universal, is to be received into Christ's household, which occurs in Baptism. The second is the special rank of military service for the defense of the Christian faith, which occurs in Confirmation. The third is to be established as father and shepherd for introducing others into the Church and directing and instructing them, which occurs in Orders. And just as in that political community it is not fitting to repeat those three dignities, namely reception into the household, promotion to military service, and elevation to teaching, though nourishment, procreation, and reconciliation can be repeated, so in the present case the three Sacraments ought not to be repeated, while the others are repeated. In the non-repeatable ones a non-repeatable rank is acquired, and it is called a character; in the repeatable ones, it is not.” —

The Tridentine Catechism agrees with this, question On the Sacraments in General, n. 80, where it says: “Now the character has this effect, both that we are made suitable to receive or perform something sacred, and that one person may be recognized from another by some mark. By the character of Baptism we obtain both: we are made fit to receive the other Sacraments, and, besides, the faithful people are distinguished by it from the Gentiles who do not keep the faith. The same can be recognized in the character of Confirmation and of holy Orders. By the one we are armed and equipped as a soldier of Christ for public confession and defense of his name, and against the enemy implanted in us and the spiritual forces of wickedness in the heavens; at the same time we are distinguished from those who have recently been baptized and are like newborn infants. By the other, it both carries the power associated with confecting and administering the Sacraments, and displays the distinction of those endowed with such power from the rest of the faithful.”

Second conclusion. — THE SACRAMENTAL CHARACTER IS NEITHER A RELATION OF REASON NOR A REAL RELATION, BUT A REAL ABSOLUTE FORM. This appears to be the more probable opinion of the Subtle Doctor, whatever some less honorably and wrongly attribute to him. To make this more evident, it is useful to transcribe the Doctor's words in 4. dist. 6, q. 10, n. 18. He says: “To the question it can be said that, just as it cannot be proved that some real form distinct from grace and the virtues is impressed in the reception of Baptism, either by natural reason or by evident reasoning from manifest articles of faith, so it cannot be proved that the character, if posited as a real form, is an absolute real form or a relative one, since either can be maintained: namely, that it is a relative form, as was already shown, or that it is an absolute real form. If it is posited, it cannot be evidently disproved. For certain things can be reasonably granted concerning the character, if it is posited as existing: for example, that it is a spiritual form impressed by God upon anyone receiving a non-repeatable Sacrament; that by divine institution it effectively signifies that grace of the Sacrament and disposes toward it, as was explained in the preceding question, because it is in the same recipient, from the same agent, and is a prior and less perfect form; and because it is indelible, since it has no meritorious cause of corruption. It is also a commemorative sign with respect to reception of the Sacrament, which has passed, and a configurative sign, that is, signifying the soul's obligation to Christ. It is also an assimilative form to another receiving the Sacrament, and distinguishing from another who does not receive it.”

From this it is evident how rashly some, with Vasquez, 3. d. 151, c. 2, object to the Subtle Doctor and accuse him of rashness for saying that the character is a relation of reason. Those who wish him to have asserted that the character is a real relation depart no less, and indeed far less, from his opinion. For if the Doctor is examined thoroughly as a sound evaluator and judge of things, it will appear that he merely taught what could indeed be defended by the opinion affirming that the character is a real relation; yet he judges more probable the opinion which contends that the character itself is an absolute form of the genus of quality. He assigns and defends this opinion, as his own, in the final place, as is his custom. It is also defended by his more celebrated disciples, Bassolius, in this question 3; Mayronius, d. 1, q. 5, art. 10; Rubionensis, q. 2, art. 2; Torillon, q. 3, d. 3, conclusion 1, to say nothing of all the Moderns who, with the most learned commentator Cavello, uphold the same assertion.

Proof: The essence of the character should be established in whatever more conduces to its dignity and efficacy; but this is true of the opinion affirming that it consists in some absolute real form; therefore, and so on.

The major is evident: the effects of the Sacraments should be celebrated with as much commendation as possible, without any contradiction or repugnance. For this greatly contributes to the dignity of the Christian religion and to celebrating God's goodness toward human beings.

The minor is proved: an absolute real form is much more perfect than any relative form, as the philosophers know. Relations have a more slender and tenuous being and are more dependent than absolute accidental forms, since the latter depend only upon the subject in which they inhere, whereas the former depend not only upon a subject but also upon a foundation and a term. —

Furthermore, a relation is not produced in itself, but results from the production of something else, like the likeness between two white walls. But the character is produced primarily in itself, as was said in the preceding conclusion, where it was proved that certain Sacraments produce and impress a character immediately in one who receives validly, though with a pretense, some Sacrament that impresses a character. No other term or effect of that Sacrament can be assigned than the character itself, since in that case sacramental grace is not produced. Therefore the character is some absolute real form. —

Finally, if it were a relation, it would be either a relation of reason or a real relation; but neither can rightly be affirmed. Not the first: both because the Councils and holy Fathers assert that the character is a spiritual sign impressed upon the soul, whereas this cannot be verified of a being of reason, since it is not impressed upon the soul but exists only objectively in the intellect; and because God is the principal author of the sacramental character, but God is not the author of beings of reason—for let us not say that God conceives a thing on the side of reality otherwise than it is. Also, a person is marked by the character and truly distinguished from another who is not marked by such a character; but he cannot be so marked by a being of reason. For how could that relation of reason and extrinsic denomination be a sign by which one is deputed before another to sacred actions and given the ability to perform them, when it places nothing in the person and is not knowable in itself? Finally, the character is indelible, but a being of reason cannot be called indelible, since it exists only through a fiction of the intellect that very easily vanishes. Therefore the character cannot be regarded as a relation of reason.

It is likewise more probable that it is not a real relation, for it would be either intrinsic or extrinsically added. Not the first: this requires a proximate foundation and a really existing term; but the character of Baptism and Orders, for example, impressed upon the Apostles, did not at some time have an actually existing term, as during the three days of Christ's death, when Christ was not present. Nor can anything be assigned as its proximate foundation. If there were such a thing, it would especially be the actual reception of the Sacrament; but this cannot be considered the proximate foundation of the character, because it is impossible for a relation actually to subsist when its proximate foundation no longer subsists. Yet the character subsists, since it is indelible, even after the actual reception of the Sacrament has passed. Therefore that reception cannot be considered the proximate foundation of the character. It must therefore be concluded that the character is an absolute form. —

Nor is it an extrinsically added relation: although in a baptized, ordained, or confirmed person, from the sacramental action by which he was baptized, confirmed, or ordained, there remains an extrinsically added relation of the person to the minister of such Sacraments, this relation cannot be called the character. Otherwise it would follow that a character is also impressed by the action of the other Sacraments, since such a relation arises from that action. This is proved because the relation remaining from the application of Baptism, for example, is nothing other than the denomination “baptized”; but a similar relation, or denomination, “nourished,” “absolved,” “healed,” and “married,” remains from the application of the Eucharist, Penance, Extreme Unction, and Matrimony. Therefore, and so on.

You will ask: To which species of quality does the character belong?

The Doctor answers, in the passage cited above, n. 15, that it can be reduced to the first or second species of quality, namely either to habit or to power. For the Doctor says: I answer therefore that, if the character is posited as an absolute accident, it can be posited in the second species of quality, or also in the first; neither of these can be evidently disproved. He proves this as follows:

If the character could not be reduced to the second species, this would be chiefly because only those things that have the character of a natural power belong to that species; and consequently, since the character is a supernatural quality, it could not belong to it. But this reasoning is invalid, because, says the Doctor, although the Philosopher included under this heading only qualities naturally active, nevertheless a supernatural power, if it is absolute, non-accidental, and spiritual, can well belong to the same intermediate genus as a natural habit. Likewise, if it is reduced to the first species, namely habit, because it is difficult to remove, it cannot be disproved. For if anything prevented the character from being reduced to habit, it would chiefly be because a habit is given for operating easily, whereas the character, since it is supernatural, is given for operating simply; or because the character is a disposition toward grace and therefore is not a habit; or because a habit is determined to one mode of acting, good or evil, since we cannot use habits indifferently: no one can use the habit of virtue badly, and no one can use the habit of vice well. But the character is indifferent to either, namely to acting well or badly: some use the sacramental character well, religiously, and piously, while others use it badly, sacrilegiously, and impiously. But these reasons are invalid. Not the first, because, says the Doctor, n. 16, a supernatural habit, as a supernatural form difficult to remove, can be a principle of acting or resisting corruption, and thus have the character of a supernatural power. Hence, although a natural habit signifies only facility and not power, nevertheless a supernatural habit, insofar as it is an immovable spiritual form, can have the character of a habit; but insofar as it is a principle by which we can elicit a supernatural act, it can be called a power. Nor the second, because, says the Doctor in the same place, one habit can well be a disposition toward another, just as, according to those who distinguish the habit of principles from the habit of conclusions, the habit of principles disposes toward the habit of conclusions. Yet it does not follow that it is a disposition insofar as this is distinguished from habit in the first species of quality; for this disposition is a quality easy to remove, and as such is distinguished from habit insofar as habit is a quality difficult for the subject to lose, such as the character. Nor the third, because, he says in the same place, an act can be indifferent. Just as from frequently repeated acts of acting well a habit inclining one to act well is acquired, and from frequent acts of acting badly a habit inclining one to act badly is acquired, so from frequent acts of acting absolutely a capacity for eliciting an act that is neither good nor bad is acquired. He proves this with the example that someone who frequently considers geometry can acquire great facility for considering a conclusion in that science; yet there is no good or bad habit there, just as there is no good or bad act from which it was generated. The same can occur in a supernatural habit.

Third conclusion. — IT IS PROBABLE THAT THE CHARACTER IS IMMEDIATELY AND FORMALLY IN THE WILL, BUT MEDIATELY AND REALLY IN THE SUBSTANCE OF THE SOUL. This is the Doctor's opinion in 4. d. 6, q. 10, n. 1, where he says: I answer the question, presupposing ... concerning grace, which is the same as charity, and consequently is first in a power, namely in the will; and further, that this disposition toward the form is in the same recipient as the form, while the character, if it is posited as inhering, is suitably posited as a disposition toward sacramental grace: therefore it is fitting to posit the character formally in the will. Thus the Doctor; and in these words he notably says that it is fitting. For the reasons he offers to prove this assertion do not establish absolute necessity, but only a certain greater fittingness. He proves first: It is more fitting that a disposition be established in the same proximate subject in which the form toward which it disposes is received; but the character is at least a moral disposition toward grace, which formally and immediately resides in the will, as was proved in the preceding Treatise; therefore, and so on. The major appears evident from physics: since a disposition must remove obstacles that would hinder the introduction of the form and must prepare the subject for receiving the form, it must be found in the same subject in which the form is to be received. The Doctor presupposes the minor as proved in q. 9, n. 18, where, inquiring about the character and objecting to himself that a disposition can be on the side of the patient or the agent, he answers: “Not on the side of the agent,” he says, “as though it were some intermediate agent between the first agent and the patient. For I do not posit that the character has any active power with respect to causing grace, but while it assists grace as an incisive sign for causing grace, when it marks, once the impediment or inherent obstacle has withdrawn. Therefore it is a disposition on the side of the recipient, because it is the prior form under which the later form is received, not simply necessarily, but necessarily in comparison with the ordinary power of the agent causing both forms.” By this the Doctor signifies that although character and grace have no necessary connection with one another from the nature of things, they nevertheless have one in moral estimation, because the character is ordered toward the conferral of grace both through the Sacrament by which it is impressed and through other Sacraments, especially if we speak of the baptismal character, since through it we are made capable of the other Sacraments. For there would be no reason why the character should be indelible and make the Sacrament non-repeatable unless it were subordinated to grace as a prior form; nor can the configuration of the soul and of the image, which is principally made through grace, properly subsist in the character alone unless it expressed some order toward grace; nor can the obligation following upon such configuration to Christ abstract from the means by which it must be fulfilled, namely actual or habitual grace. Therefore it must have at least a moral connection with the grace toward which it is a disposition. He proves secondly: Every obligation to a moral work belongs to the will; but the baptismal character, for example, induces an obligation of the soul toward Christ, so that it observes the Christian law. This obligation is a moral necessity of acting, and consequently a certain inclination toward the action itself, just as a law, precept, or vow is said to incline toward action insofar as it opposes the freedom to act or not to act and to do this or that. Likewise, the character of Confirmation induces the obligation of military service and confession of faith; the character of Orders is also a principle of acting, for it is an active power. But every moral obligation belongs especially to the will; therefore

The character induces a moral obligation to act, and should therefore be in the will immediately rather than in the substance of the soul itself, which is not operative in itself, or in the intellect, which of itself does not seize upon moral action. Further, the character is a power, or sign of the power, of receiving or drawing forth those things that pertain to divine worship; but it belongs to the virtue of religion, which is in the will, to expend and perform those things that pertain to divine worship. Therefore the sign of such power should also be placed in the will. This is confirmed because the Sacraments belong to religion; therefore that effect which deputes a person to divine worship, such as the character, must also belong to religion. It must therefore be concluded that the character is immediately and formally in the will, but really in the substance of the soul itself, with which the will is really identical. In the same way, grace and charity inhere in the will as forms affecting and perfecting it in relation to operation; but really they inhere in the substance of the soul itself, with which the will is really indistinct.

You will say 1. The character is not ordered toward acting, but only toward perfecting and marking the soul; therefore it ought to inhere in the substance of the soul rather than in some faculty. — I distinguish the antecedent: it is not ordered per se and effectively, I concede; through another and dispositively, namely by reason of operative grace toward which it disposes, or of the ministry and office to whose fulfillment it obliges, I deny.

You will say 2. The substance of the soul is the subject of power, in which the faculties of the soul inhere; but a power cannot be the subject of another power. Yet, as we have said, the character can be reduced to the second species of quality, which is power; therefore it cannot exist in some faculty or power of the soul. — I distinguish the first part of the major: the substance of the soul is the subject of a natural power flowing from it, like a property connatural to it and really identified with it, I concede; of a power that is a supernatural accident really distinct from it, I deny. I likewise distinguish the other part of the same major: a power is not the subject of another power of substantiality and really identified with it, I concede; of an accidental power really distinct from it, I deny. And with the minor thus distinguished, the consequence must be denied; otherwise it would follow that no habit of virtue should be placed in the will itself.

You will say 3. The character is a certain spiritual light; but every light belongs to the intellect; therefore the character does too. The major is established by Saint Dionysius, book On the Ecclesiastical Hierarchy, chapter 2, where he says:

Divine blessedness receives and admits the human being brought to Baptism into its participation or communication, and makes him a participant in its own light, as in a kind of sign, making him intimate with God and a sharer in the gifts of the sacred order, whose sacred token is that of the High Priest, a seal given to the one approaching, and so on.

But this seal is nothing other than the character, which he calls light and illumination; therefore, and so on. — I distinguish the major: the character is a spiritual light ordered toward the proper illumination of the one possessing the character, I deny; toward the illumination of others, so that through the character they know that I am deputed as a member of the household, or soldier, or minister of Christ, I concede. Such a light need not be in the intellect. Thus the characters and insignia of servants enlighten others, or lead them to know that they are servants of such and such a master, yet those marks and characters of servitude need not be in the intellect.

Fourth conclusion. — THE SACRAMENTAL CHARACTER IS INDELIBLE AND IRREMOVABLE. The Doctor proves this truth in d. 6, q. 9, n. 20, where he says:

Although indelibility of the character is spoken of in many ways, and it is not very useful to recount them, I say briefly that no form can be in the soul, other than the soul, which God could not delete by absolute power, just as something later can be removed a priori, since no contradiction can be found in this. But the character, if posited, is indelible in this way and cannot be deleted in this way, because it cannot be deleted by the power of any creature. This is clear because it is a supernatural form. Nor can it be deleted by divine power according to the ordered power, because God has ordained that no supernatural form be deleted except on account of some demerit inhering in the soul; but with respect to the character being deleted, no demeritorious cause can exist, since when it is impressed in the act of mortal sinning, nothing can merit its being taken away.

By this the Doctor clearly signifies that in the ordinary course the sacramental character is indelible. This truth is clearly handed down by the Councils of Florence and Trent, as is clear from their decrees cited in the first conclusion, by which it is signified that the character inheres indelibly in the soul. It is likewise clear from the holy Fathers, who call this seal indissoluble, especially Saint Augustine, book 2 of Against Parmenian, chapter 13, where he says: The Christian Sacraments adhere no less than the mark of bodily military service, which was once impressed upon the flesh ... and the holiness of the Sacraments remains inviolable and undefiled in the good for reward, in the wicked for judgment. A fitting reason also supports it: it was fitting that the character be altogether indelible and could not be annulled by any sin. Indeed, if the power of Orders signified by the character could be lost through some sin, it would follow that people would often be uncertain whether they validly received the Sacraments, since they have no indication whether the priests from whom they receive the Sacraments are in a state of grace or not; and this would truly tend to the great detriment of the faithful.

You will say 1. If some character were indelible, it would be especially the character of Orders; but that can be deleted by sins and wicked crimes; therefore, and so on. The major is clear. The minor is proved: the character of Orders is the power of administering and performing those things that specially pertain to divine worship, the administration of the Sacraments, and the public government of the Christian commonwealth; but that authority is lost through sin, so that whatever is done by wicked ministers is rejected by the Church as invalid and null; therefore, and so on. The minor is proved by many acts and examples, especially those of Photius, Bishop of the See of Constantinople, Maximus the Cynic, bishop of the same city, Proculus, Bishop of Marseille, and Ebbo, Archbishop of Rheims, whose ordinations and ecclesiastical offices were declared entirely invalid and null. First, the invalidity and nullity of the authority of a wicked minister of the Church is clear from the example of Photius, whose ordinations and ecclesiastical offices were rejected and annulled. For when, through the schemes of the eunuch Barda, he had been consecrated Patriarch of Constantinople by Gregory, the excommunicated Bishop of Syracuse, after the legitimate Bishop Ignatius had first been imprisoned and then driven into exile, a Roman synod was convened by Nicholas I, Supreme Pontiff, in which this sentence was passed against Photius: let him be foreign to every honor and name of the priesthood, and deprived of every office of the clergy. The same Pontiff also issued this sentence against him: Those whom Photius, a neophyte and intruder into the See of Constantinople, promoted to any ecclesiastical order, we deprive of every clerical office. Similar statements are found in the same Supreme Pontiff's first letter and in Letter 1 to the Emperor Michael, where he writes that Photius received nothing from Gregory except as much as Gregory had; but he had nothing and gave nothing. Adrian II, Supreme Pontiff, likewise decreed this, as we read in Act 3 of the Eighth Ecumenical Synod, where it says concerning those ordained by Photius: Whatever Photius is thought to have ordained in any rank, we rightly remove from the number and dignity of the bishops, which he usurped and falsely conferred. He adds three reasons: first, that Photius is like Maximus the Cynic, who, as we shall soon say, possessed no episcopal authority; second, that this had been decreed by his predecessor Nicholas; third, that he was ordained by an excommunicated man, who had nothing and gave nothing, except perhaps the condemnation he poured out upon his followers. Hence the following is found in Canon 1 of the Fourth Council of Constantinople:

Cutting out by the roots the love of primacy, as a kind of evil root of scandals arising in the Church, we condemn by a just decree the man who rashly, transgressively, and irregularly, like a great wolf, leapt into Christ's fold, namely Photius, who filled the world with a thousand tumults and disturbances. We proclaim that he was neither previously nor now a bishop, and that those consecrated or promoted by him in any priestly rank do not remain in the rank to which they were advanced. Moreover, we restrain from such patronage those who received from him the customary prayers for promotion to a prelacy; and we decree that the churches which Photius and those consecrated by him are thought to have dedicated, or in which they set up moved altars, be dedicated, enthroned, and established again, with everything done in him and by him for receiving a priestly rank or for condemnation made void.

The Council has spoken. But if Photius is not considered a bishop because he was ordained by an excommunicated Gregory, and if everything done by Photius is invalid because he had intruded into the See of Constantinople and was afterward excommunicated, it follows that the episcopal character and authority cease in a notorious and excommunicated person; therefore, and so on. The same is clear from the example of Maximus the Cynic. After he had been made Bishop of Constantinople by certain Egyptian bishops corrupted with money, through a clandestine election, the First Council of Constantinople pronounced concerning him and his ordinations in Canon 6, in these words:

Concerning Maximus the Cynic philosopher, because of his undisciplined teaching which arose in Constantinople, it was decreed that Maximus neither was nor should be considered a bishop, nor should those ordained by him possess any clerical rank, everything done around him or by him being revoked as invalid. —

Photius, a man exceedingly desirous of glory, was transformed from a layman into a Patriarch in six days: on the first day he was made a monk from a layman, on the second he became a Reader, on the third a Subdeacon, on the fourth a Deacon, on the fifth a Priest, and on the sixth finally a Patriarch. He ascended the throne and announced peace to the people while thinking of nothing worthy of peace. He was consecrated by Gregory of Syracuse, Bishop of Ignatius's rebel and excommunicated enemy, who had been driven from the throne; but he used as ministers Peter, Bishop of Sardinia, called “the wretched,” and Eulalius, Bishop of Apamea. These facts indicate that Photius's episcopal consecration was illicit, not invalid.

Therefore, although those ordained by him could never licitly exercise the duties of the Order received, since they were suspended from its exercise because they had received the Order from one who had imposed hands in another diocese, not his own, without the consent of that place's bishop, nevertheless they were validly ordained and received the character of the Order. That Photius's ordination was valid is clear from the letter of John VIII, Supreme Pontiff, to the emperors Basil and Alexander, in which he approves Photius's restoration to the See of Constantinople after Ignatius's death: Without prejudicing the Apostolic statutes or dissolving the rules of the blessed Fathers, we receive and hold the same Photius, who, after seeking mercy before the synod according to custom, as a brother in the love of charity, as a fellow minister in pontifical office and a fellow shepherd in pastoral teaching, for the peace and benefit of the Church of God, restoring him to the throne against Christ's will— and so on. He proves that this can be done by the examples of the Donatists and Bonosians, who were received into their honors and offices without any reordination. Nor does it matter that John is reproached by many for having been so accommodating toward Photius's restoration, since afterward Photius became the most intense enemy of the Roman Church and the author of the schism and defection of the Greeks from the Latins. No one has ever thought him blameworthy for judging that Photius should be received without reordination. The same must be said of the ordinations he performed. For Pope Formosus, writing to Stylianus, Bishop of Neocaesarea in the province of Euphratesia, says among other things: Dealing mercifully with those ordained by Photius, we have decreed that, after submitting petitions, they confess that they have sinned and ask pardon through penance, promising that they will never do anything of the kind again. By this he approves their reception, with penance indeed, but without a new ordination. The same must be said regarding the example of Maximus the Cynic, since Adrian, in his second letter to Ignatius, writes that Photius's ordination is entirely similar to Maximus's, since both were illicit though valid. Nor does it matter that both are called not bishops. For this is said for the common understanding of the people, not with doctrinal precision, almost as true priests are called wicked and violators of the priesthood by their actions—not because they do not possess the dignity, gravity, authority, state, and perfection of the priesthood when they stain their consciences with shameful crimes, but because they do not observe the laws of the priesthood. In the common way, consuls who do not care for the commonwealth are denied to be consuls, physicians who do not heal others are denied to be physicians, doctors who make no effort to teach others are denied to be doctors, and kings who scorn the duties of a king are denied to be kings. No one will deny that these and similar, even harsher, phrases can be used to attack vices. Concerning the example of Proculus of Marseille, I say that Zosimus calls him not a bishop not because he truly lacked the episcopal character and authority, but because he illicitly and against the Canons aspired to the metropolitan office. That he was truly always a bishop is plainly clear from Saint Jerome, Letter 1 to Rusticus, where he writes: You have there the holy and most learned Bishop Chromatius, who surpasses our little writings with living and present speech and directs your journey by daily discourses, and so on. Moreover, he is found signing together with Saint Ambrose at the Council of Aquileia in 381. Therefore, when Proculus is said not to be a bishop, or those ordained by him are removed from any ecclesiastical rank, or are said to lack the priesthood, all this is to be understood not as deprivation of the character in the one conferring Orders or in those receiving them, but as deprivation of the goods of ranks and offices. The same truth appears thirdly from Proculus of Marseille. When the Council of Turin, held in the year 397, had declared in its first canon that Proculus, Bishop of Marseille, acted as metropolitan over the churches appearing to be situated in the Second Province of Narbonne, Pope Zosimus, about twenty years later, annulled that synodal judgment, as is clear from various letters, especially Letter 6 to the Bishop of Carthage, where he declares invalid the ordinations of two bishops, Universus and Terentius, made by Proculus. In Letter 1 to the Bishop of Arles he condemns Proculus for undertaking such things. When Proculus still did not yield, he wrote Letter 11 to the people of Marseille, in which among other things he says: Since Proculus is no longer a bishop, he performs what belongs to bishops, and, as a generous human benefactor, says he can bestow on others what he could not justly retain as something once given to himself, and so on. But if a condemned bishop ceases to be a bishop, and priests ordained by him lack the priesthood, it follows that his character and authority cease and consequently are not indelible. The fourth example is Ebbo, formerly Archbishop of Rheims. In the year 835, under Pope Gregory IV, at a gathering of bishops held at Thionville, he had resigned the episcopate on account of certain crimes of which he was accused, especially that he had promoted the deposition of Emperor Louis the Pious. Nevertheless, after his deposition, while Louis's son Lothair reigned, he was restored to his see by a synod of provincial bishops and ordained several clerics in that church. Finally, with the support of King Charles, he was removed and deposed by the bishops of Gaul, and Hincmar was substituted for him while he was still alive. When Hincmar after Ebbo's death refused to admit the priests and clerics whom he had ordained, the bishops of Gaul held the Council of Soissons in 853, under Pope Leo, in which they condemned all ordinations made by Ebbo after his deposition and declared them invalid and null, as Flodoard reports in book 3 of the History of Rheims, chapter 11, where he recounts the entire proceedings of this Council. Therefore, all these things establish that the episcopal character and authority are not indelible and irremovable, since they cease through the crimes or deposition of a bishop. I deny the consequence, and concerning the first example I say that the ordinations made by Photius were indeed valid, though not licit, because Photius had been ordained against the Church's Canons. For, as Nicetas says in Baronius under the year 857: Concerning the fourth example I say that everything determined by the Council of Soissons, instigated by Hincmar, against the clerics ordained by Ebbo was condemned and rejected by the Apostolic See, as appears from Letters 16 and 17 of Nicholas, Supreme Pontiff. It is clear from these that when Hincmar acted through repeated embassies before Leo IV to obtain confirmation of this Council and obtained nothing from him, he induced Benedict, Leo's successor, by false accounts to obtain the Council's confirmation surreptitiously, but only conditionally, in this form: “if it is so,” and so on. Pope Nicholas reports there that when Pope Benedict had not fully satisfied Hincmar's wishes in his letter, Hincmar added some things to that letter and removed others at his own discretion. Hence Nicholas, at the end of Letter 16, declares that even if everything alleged against Ebbo were true, nevertheless the clerics ordained by him, if they showed humility and obedience, were to be received with their honors, because Ebbo, whatever he had been, had caused them no obstacle at all. He confirms this by the example of Maximus, who, although a neophyte and improperly ordained, Saint Leo nevertheless did not wish to remove from episcopal dignity. And from the letter of Anastasius II, who, writing to the Emperor Anastasius, says that wicked men, while administering good things, harm only themselves and do not stain the Sacraments of the Church. Finally, from the acts of the Council of Soissons itself and from what was afterward done for those clerics ordained by Ebbo, it is evident that such clerics were only expelled from their ranks and suspended from the administration of their Orders. This is clear, I say, from the Council of Soissons, for it confirms what had previously been done by Hincmar; what that was appears from the petition of those clerics, who say in a petition submitted to that Council: We ask that mercy be shown to us by your fatherhood concerning the administration of the ecclesiastical Orders to which we were once advanced by Lord Ebbo, but from which we have been suspended by your authority. It is equally clear from the acts concerning their restoration. For Nicholas, Supreme Pontiff, commands Hincmar and the other bishops of Gaul nothing else than that such clerics be restored to their ranks. Therefore, when it is said in the same Council, in its fifth session, that whatever Ebbo had done in ecclesiastical ordinations after his condemnation, except holy Baptism, was to be considered canceled and invalid, this must be understood as concerning the honor and rank from which those clerics ordained by Ebbo were considered suspended. The same interpretation must be given to what follows after the sixth session concerning Alduin, who is said to have received the priesthood by a leap from Lupus, Bishop of Châlons, because he had previously received the diaconate from Ebbo. The Council's intention is not that Alduin was not truly a deacon, but that by receiving the character of the diaconate he could not receive the rank and honor of that Order; hence he was treated with respect to the exercise of ministry as though he had truly been promoted by a leap.

You will urge. The Supreme Pontiffs themselves sometimes rejected ordinations made by their predecessors and judged that those ordained by them ought to be ordained again; therefore they did not think that the Sacrament of Orders impressed an indelible character. Proof of the antecedent: first, the example of Pope Stephen IV, who in 769, having convened at Rome a Council of the select bishops of Gaul, Germany, and Italy, declared all ordinations made by his predecessor Constantine invalid. The Council confirmed this invalidation, as is read in its acts, also reported by Anastasius the Librarian, who, speaking of that Roman Council, says:

In that same Council it was promulgated that those bishops who had been ordained from priests or deacons by him should return to their first rank of honor; even if this had pleased all the people of their city, after a new decree of election they were to return, according to custom, with clergy and people to the Apostolic See, so that from Saint Stephen the Pope they might receive consecration by apostolic blessing.

He adds that the same was decreed concerning priests and deacons, and immediately continues: Those bishops, returning at once to their first rank of honor, elected again by clergy and people and proceeding to the Apostolic See with the customary decree, were consecrated by that most holy Pope. Finally he concludes: For it was thus decreed in that same Council, that everything which that Constantine had done in ecclesiastical Sacraments and divine worship should be repeated, except holy Baptism and holy Chrism.

— The second example is Stephen VI. When his predecessor Formosus had ordained several bishops and priests, Stephen, having convened a Council at Rome, not only deposed them all but also ordained them again, as Luitprand reports in book 1, chapter 8, writing: All whom he had ordained, after being deposed from their proper rank, he ordained again. This was because Formosus had previously been excommunicated by John VIII, and because, contrary to the Canons, after abandoning his own wife, that is, the episcopate, he had been made Roman Pontiff from Bishop of Porto. This decree was approved not only by that Council but also by Sergius III. Concerning him the same Luitprand writes: Sergius secretly entered Rome and entered upon the papacy, appointed as a terror to the Roman name, so that they held all Formosus's ordinations invalid. — Finally the same is established by the example of John XII, who likewise convened a Council at Rome in 964 and anathematized the election of Leo, commonly called Leo VIII, as Supreme Pontiff. Concerning those ordained by him, this was decreed in Act 3 of that Council:

Those whom Leo, a neophyte and invader of the Holy Catholic and Roman Church, promoted in any ecclesiastical Order, we recall to their first rank by Apostolic and canonical authority and by synodal decree, because the one who ordained them had nothing for himself and gave them nothing, just as long ago our predecessor, Pope Stephen of blessed memory, pronounced judgment concerning those ordained by a certain Constantine, a neophyte and invader of the Apostolic See, and afterward consecrated some of them, priests or deacons, who were pleasing to him.

Therefore from all this it is clear that the Supreme Pontiffs thought pontifical and episcopal authority could be lost, and consequently that its character was not indelible.

I deny the antecedent, and concerning its first proof I answer with Baronius under the year 769, n. 6, that the bishops said to have been consecrated by Stephen IV should not be considered to have received Orders again. They are called consecrated because they received, according to ancient custom, the pontifical blessing and all the rites customarily observed in reconciling schismatics or heretics. Such reconciliation was necessary for those ordained by Constantine, since he was a pseudo-pontiff who, the brother of the Duke of Tortona of the city of Nethina, relying on his brother's power, invaded the Apostolic See and almost in a moment, observing no intervals, emerged like an actor from the stage as Roman Pontiff. After sitting for a year he ordained many deacons, priests, and bishops. Since they supported his party, they were rightly suspended by the Council and by Stephen, the legitimate Supreme Pontiff, from their offices and ministries until, after a new election, or rather approval, by the people and clergy, they received the Apostolic blessing and were restored to their ranks, honors, and ministries. Nor does it matter that Auxilius, book 2, chapter 1, saying that Stephen IV ordained again those ordained by Constantine, excuses the action only by saying that an example should not be taken from wicked men; both Supreme Pontiffs, Constantine and Stephen V, were wicked men. Constantine was an invader of the Roman See; Stephen, because by his command and approval his followers deprived the captured and fleeing Constantine, who had been left half alive after many blows, of his eyes. Auxilius says that this was not an apostolic but an apostate deed. This does not stand, I say, because it is false that the bloody cruelty against Constantine occurred under Stephen's command. Anastasius the Librarian, who flourished in the same century as Auxilius, attributes Constantine's blinding not to Stephen but to a certain Gratiosus, who, without Stephen's knowledge, surrounded by a band of soldiers, inflicted this cruelty upon Constantine. Hence Anastasius accuses Stephen of no crime, indeed celebrates him with many praises, as well as the bishops who had assembled with him in the Roman Council. If we nevertheless prefer to follow Auxilius's opinion and consider the consecration performed by Stephen a true reordination, I answer that it does not follow that Stephen judged either that the character was not impressed through the Sacrament of Orders or that it was removable, but only that he erred in fact, thinking Constantine was not a valid bishop, just as he was an illegitimate pontiff. Thus he could think all Constantine's pontifical acts altogether invalid. Indeed, he did not even consider everything invalid, for, as the same Anastasius reports, he approved not only the Baptism conferred by Constantine but also the chrismation, namely Confirmation, which is ordinarily conferred only by a true bishop.

I answer secondly with Baronius under the year 897: first, that Stephen can rightly be excluded from the number of the Roman Pontiffs, as can Sergius, since in those most perilous times of the Church they were driven from the Roman See by the faction of the Tusculan Marquises, intruders being expelled by intruders. I would not dare, says Baronius, n. 6, to number Stephen among the Roman Pontiffs unless I had received this as having been done by the Fathers. And rightly so: that Stephen was infamous for so many and such great crimes that he is altogether unworthy of the name and title of Roman Pontiff. Among his grave and horrible deeds, he ordered his predecessor Formosus to be dragged from the tomb and placed, dressed in priestly vestments, upon the chair of the Roman Pontificate; then, after stripping him and cutting off three fingers with which he used to bless the people, he ordered his mutilated body to be thrown into the Tiber, as Luitprand narrates in book 1, chapter 8, in these words:

After Formosus had died and Arnulf had returned to his own country, the one appointed after Formosus's death, namely Bonus, was expelled, and Pope Sergius (so I should have written) was set up by Adalbert. Once set up, as an impious man ignorant of holy doctrine, he ordered Formosus to be dragged from the tomb and placed, dressed in priestly vestments, upon the pontifical chair, and said to him: Since you were Bishop of Porto, why did you usurp the universal Roman See in the spirit of ambition? Having finished this, he ordered him stripped of the consecrated vestments and, after three fingers had been cut off, thrown into the Tiber; and he ordained again all whom he had ordained, after deposing them from their proper rank. You can perceive, most holy Father, how badly you acted, since those who received from Judas, the betrayer of our Lord Jesus Christ, before the proof of salvation or apostolic blessing, were not deprived after that betrayal of the suspension of their own bodies, except those whom shameful crimes had perhaps defiled¹. For the blessing bestowed upon Christ's ministers is not poured out through the one who appears to be a priest. For neither the one who waters is anything nor the one who plants, but God who gives the growth. How great Formosus's authority and religion were we can gather from this: when he was afterward found by fishermen and carried to the Church of blessed Peter, Prince of the Apostles, certain images of the Saints in the shrine saluted him reverently as he lay there. I have often heard this from the most religious men of the city of Rome.

I add, however, that Stephen's act of reordaining those already ordained by Formosus was tyrannical in fact, not an error in faith. For everything done by Stephen VII and Sergius III was carried out only through threats and terrors, with the good protesting and the wicked terrified by their deed. Hence, after Stephen had been removed from this life by an unhappy end—for in the year 900 he was thrust into prison and strangled there by a noose—the three Supreme Pontiffs who succeeded him, namely Romanus, Theodore, and John IX, entirely rescinded his acts, as Luitprand reports concerning Romanus and Auxilius concerning Theodore. John, moreover, after celebrating two Councils, condemned in the first, held in 901, the pseudo-synod convened by Stephen, in these words:

The bishops, priests, and deacons, as well as the subdeacons and the rest of every other order of the Holy Apostolic See, who were canonically consecrated by that revered Pope Formosus and rashly cast down from their own orders and ranks at the pleasure of certain persons, we restore, by the common judgment of the Synod, to their own ranks, and by God's authority we decree that they be established with perpetual force and canonical censure,

etc. In that same year John also held another Synod at Ravenna, which Sigebert mentions in these words: He also, to confirm the Order of Formosus, whom Pope Stephen had deposed, held a synod of 74 bishops at Ravenna in the presence of the Frankish archbishops and the king, and before them the synod which Stephen had held for the condemnation of Formosus was burned. Therefore, with Bellarmine, book 1 of On the Supreme Pontiff, chapter 12, we must conclude

that Stephen and Sergius issued no decree by which they determined that those ordained by a degraded bishop, or specifically by Formosus as degraded, should be ordained again, but only ordered in fact that they be ordained again. This order proceeded not from ignorance or heresy but from hatred of Formosus, and could be carried out only through force and tyranny. Nor does it matter that Stephen's decree was approved by the Roman Council he celebrated in the year of the Lord 897, for all of this was done through tyranny and fear imposed upon the good bishops who were present. Hence all who took part in that pseudo-synod begged pardon for their offense in the Roman Council under John IX. Thus we read in it: The bishops and priests, and the remaining clergy, who took part in that Synod, because, compelled by fear and dread of terror, they confessed that they had attended while asking pardon, we have forgiven them at the request of the holy Synod. — Finally, concerning the third example I answer that nothing else was done in that Roman Council against those ordained by Leo except that they were expelled from the rank to which Leo had raised them and recalled to their former rank. For Sigebert, who appears to have read the synodal acts of this Council, summarized them in his Chronicle as follows:

John, having gathered a Synod, deposed Leo and canceled his acts. It was also established by the public judgment of all that the Synod held by Leo—indeed, it was not to be called a Synod but “the raging brothel of the adulterer” (thus he called Leo, because he had invaded the Roman Church betrothed to another)—and all who had been condemned by Leo's ordination were ordered to present their own proscription in writing, containing these words: My father had nothing for himself; he gave me nothing. Thus they remained deposed in the ranks they had held, not ordained by Leo. But if some were judged worthy to be ordained without a prior consecration being received, the same decree was imposed upon them as upon the one condemned by Constantine the Neophyte.

This is Sigebert. Nor should those words move us: My father had nothing for himself; he gave me nothing, and so on. They are to be understood with respect to honor, rank, and ministry, just as was said concerning those ordained by Constantine the Neophyte, since Sigebert asserts that Constantine's decree had been intimated to them.

You will object 3. There are various Canons of Councils by which ordinations made either by those who do not ordain their subjects, or by those who are excommunicated, suspended, or degraded, are declared invalid. First, Canon 16 of the Council of Nicaea: If anyone should attempt to invade another parish and ordain in his own Church without the consent of the bishop from whom the one called by the rule has departed, let such an ordination be declared invalid. Concerning the ordinations of excommunicated persons, the Council of Quedlinburg, held in 1085 under Pope Gregory VII, says: In that Synod the ordination of Benilo of Mainz, the intruder, and of Siegfried of Augsburg and Norbert of Chur was judged invalid; indeed all ordinations and consecrations of the excommunicated were judged wholly invalid, according to the decrees of the holy Fathers Innocent, Leo I, Pelagius, and his successor Gregory I. The same is decreed concerning the ordinations of simoniacs in the Council of Piacenza under Urban II, where it is established: If anything in holy Orders and ecclesiastical matters appears to have been acquired simoniacally by money given or promised, let it be considered invalid. Therefore the authority once acquired to confer holy

Orders can be lost; and consequently the character is not irremovable. —

I deny the consequence, and concerning the aforesaid Canons I answer that such ordinations are called invalid not with respect to the impression of the character, but with respect to the suspension of the ministry and of the Order received. This is defined in the Council of Trent, Session 6, chapter 5, On Reform, where it is established: Let no bishop be permitted, under pretext of any privilege, to exercise pontificals in another diocese except with the express permission of the local Ordinary, and only over persons subject to that Ordinary. If anything is done otherwise, the bishop is suspended by the law itself from the exercise of pontificals, and those thus ordained from the execution of Orders. That nothing else is intended in the aforesaid Canons, especially the Quedlinburg Canon, is evident, since it brings forward the authority of Innocent, Leo I, Pelagius, and Gregory the Great, whom it is certain approved ordinations performed by neophytes, heretics, and excommunicated persons, as we shall see when treating of the minister of the Sacraments.

You will ask: Does that character also subsist after death, both in the blessed and in the damned?

I answer. This appears certain, since the Councils and holy Fathers absolutely pronounce that this character is indelible. Although it was not their intention to determine whether it subsisted even after death, because no controversy concerning this question was being conducted with the heretics, nevertheless this appears constant from the practice of the Church, which does not customarily baptize, confirm, or ordain again one raised from the dead; yet it permits him to receive and administer the Sacraments as he did while alive and before death. To assert that God reproduces the character in him anew, just as he reproduces life, is to admit a miracle without any necessity or sufficient reason. Therefore it must be inferred that the Church's mind is that the character subsists in him.

This is further supported by a common argument. If the character perished with life, it would do so chiefly either through corruption of the subject, opposition of a contrary, or lack of conservation; but it cannot be erased in any of these three ways. Not through corruption of the subject, since the soul, which is its subject, cannot be corrupted; not through opposition of a contrary, since it has nothing contrary to it; nor through lack of conservation, since God conserves it in the blessed for adornment, and in the damned for punishment and disgrace. For when something is conserved by God, God does not interrupt his conserving influx unless some urgent and efficacious reason advises it; but the character perseveres until death, and no reason appears why it should perish in death or why God should deny it conserving concurrence, since it is spiritual and independent of the body.

You will say: When the end ceases, those things ordered to the end cease, otherwise they would remain in vain. Hence Matrimony will not subsist after generation, because generation, toward which it is ordered, will cease. But the end of the character will also cease in death, namely external worship of God, since there will be no such worship in hell, nor will there be any in heaven; for in heaven nothing will be done in figure or under a veil, but in open and naked truth. —

I answer by distinguishing the major: if the end ceases altogether, I concede; if it ceases only in some respect, I deny. I likewise distinguish the minor: external worship will cease in heaven with respect to its external matter, I concede; with respect to its end, I deny. And likewise I deny the consequence. For two things can be considered in divine worship: the matter of worship, namely certain external works, and the end of worship, namely the honor and glory of God presented to him through those external works. Those external works will indeed cease in heaven, but the end, namely God's honor and glory, will remain; and consequently the character itself will also persevere, in the good for glory and in the wicked for disgrace, just as a military character perseveres in soldiers after victory has been won: in those who conquered for glory, but in those who were conquered for punishment.

You will insist: The damned are unworthy of every supernatural gift, as Saint Dionysius testifies in book On the Divine Names, chapter 4, where he says that demons lack all divine gifts both according to habit and according to operation; but the character is some supernatural gift; therefore it does not remain in the damned.

I answer, that although the damned are unworthy of every supernatural gift that could contribute to their consolation, nevertheless they are not unworthy—in fact, they are supremely worthy—of everything that can contribute to their punishment and suffering. Such, without doubt, are the characters with which they have been divinely marked. For just as in the civil commonwealth it is the greatest dishonor and reproach for a soldier to become a traitor or deserter, for a steward of entrusted goods to become their squanderer and defrauder, and for a son or servant to become degenerate and rebellious against his father or master, so in the ecclesiastical commonwealth it is the greatest dishonor for Christ's faithful person, soldier, and dispenser to be condemned as a rebel, traitor, and squanderer. Therefore those three characters—the sonship acquired through Baptism, the military service obtained through Confirmation, and the dispensation of Christ's goods entrusted through Orders—will remain in the damned as punishment for their rebellion and defection.