Scotus Academicus, Tomus quintus: De Creaturarum Corporalium et de Homine

Notandum 1. The exterior cause of sin can be distinguished into a twofold one, namely direct and indirect. The direct is that by which there concurs immediately to sin together with the will of the sinner. The indirect is that which merely allures, persuades, and instigates to sin. Exterior causes can be indirect: extrinsic objects, insofar as they allure to sin; the devil, and man, insofar as they persuade and instigate to sin, by proposing objects, persuading with reasons, commanding, threatening, altering the interior phantasm. But no created thing can be the direct exterior cause of sin; because no creature can concur immediately with the very will of the sinner to the act of sin, except God alone, and therefore concerning Him alone is the present Question moved.

Notandum 2. That God is the cause of sin can be understood in various ways: namely, either insofar as He Himself is the cause of the sinning will; or insofar as He does not impede sin, although He could impede it; or insofar as He Himself would be the total productive cause of sin; or insofar as He would concur immediately with His positive concurrence to the entity and formality of sin; or finally insofar as He Himself would impel the created will to sin, either by His preventing and determining decree; or by concurring to the sinful act in the same manner in which He concurs to good and meritorious acts, by reason of which concurrence He is called the maker and cause of our good works. — But it is certain that God is the cause and maker of the created sinning will, which assuredly, if He did not produce it, sin would not come to be: and accordingly by this reason He could be accounted the maker of sin. It is likewise certain that, by His nod and command over creatures, He could impede all sins, if He so decreed and willed: namely, either by annihilating the will prepared for sin, or by not concurring with the intellect to the cognition and proposition of the object alluring to sin; or by denying His very concurrence to the will, lest it break out into act; or finally by bestowing grace so abundant and efficacious that the will would not only be recalled from the sinful act, but would even tend into the opposite good act. It is certain also that God has never been said by any man to be the total cause of sin; otherwise the created will would be guilty of no sin; since the sinful act would have to be imputed to God alone, in that very manner in which the infusion of grace is attributed not to the created will receiving the grace, but to God alone as its bestower. Likewise, no one doubts that God does not concur directly and immediately to the very formality of the sinful act: especially in the opinion of those who hold with us that the formal reason of sin consists in the simple and bare privation of rectitude: and almost all Theologians confess, against Durandus, that God concurs with a positive concurrence to the physical entity of the sinful act: which opinion Albertus Magnus in 2. dist. 35. art. 1. holds to be so certain that he asserts the opposite was proscribed in his time as heretical; This, he says, namely the opinion by which it is denied that evil acts, insofar as they are acts and entities, are from God as from the first moving and concurring cause, which had prevailed among many of the ancients, has almost withdrawn from the court, and is held heretical by many of the moderns. — Hence especially the present difficulty is moved, whether God can be called the author of sin, insofar as by some special concurrence or impulse He induces the created will to sin.

Notandum 3. Various heretics, and above all the Cerdonians, Marcionites, Priscillianists, and Albigenses, fell into this blasphemous opinion, that with sacrilegious mouth, together with the Manichaeans, they posited two supreme Principles of all things: one indeed good, which was the maker of virtues and good works: the other evil, from whom all evils, both of fault and of punishment, flowed forth. But the heretics of our own time appear so much the worse than these, in that with greater impiety they refer all sins not to an evil god, as those ancient Heresiarchs, but to the good, true, and only God. The author of this execrable assertion was a certain Florinus, by the testimony of S. Irenaeus cited by Bellarmine, lib. 2. De statu peccati, c. 1.; and this diabolical doctrine, long since buried in hell, was recalled by Calvin, the renovator of all heresies. For although he does not openly put forward that God is the author of sin, yet he expressly teaches the thing; for he asserts that all the sins of men come to pass not only with God permitting, but also willing, commanding, instigating, and predeficient from eternity. Hence in lib. 1. Institutionum, cap. 18., mocking the common distinction of Theologians between doing and permitting, he says,

It seems absurd that a man should be blinded by the willing and commanding God, who soon after is to pay the penalties for his own deeds: and so by tergiversation they flee to the mere permission, and not also the will, of God that this be done.

And num. 2. he says: The will of God is so the cause of all things, and His providence the moderator in all the counsels and works of men, that He exercises it not only with His own in the elect, but also compels the reprobate into obedience. And lib. 2. cap. 1. num. 3. he distinctly affirms that God destines Satan, the minister of His wrath, and the counsels of the impious, to the executing of His judgments, whereby it comes to pass both to excite the will and to firm the endeavors. And lib. 3. cap. 23. num. 8. he says: Man therefore falls by the providence of God so ordering. And num. 9. he adds, That the necessity of sinning is inflicted by the ordination of God. Against which blasphemy let there be

The single Conclusion. — GOD IS IN NO WISE TO BE CALLED THE AUTHOR AND CAUSE OF SIN.

This Conclusion is of faith, and Catholics prove it against the Heretics

First, by various oracles of Sacred Scripture, in which it is openly said that God does not will, but hates sins, nor commands them, but forbids them, nor impels men to the perpetration of them, but repels them: thus Psalm 5. Not thou, O God, who dost cherish iniquity. Ezekiel 18. Is it my will that is the death of the impious? Habakkuk 1. Thine eyes are pure, so as not to behold evil, and thou canst not look upon iniquity. But how could He be said not to will iniquity, not to look upon evil, if He willed it, decreed it, commanded it, ordered its execution? Wisdom 11. Thou hatest none of the things which thou hast made. And 11. The impious man and his impiety are an abomination to God. But in what way would impiety be hateful, if He so greatly procured that it be put in execution? Or in what way would God not be said to hate those, and to have willed their death, whom from Himself, independently of their wills, He had by His eternal, predeterminative decree destined to sins, for which He had prepared various modes and means, whereby He would impel men? Moreover Ecclesiasticus 15. He commanded no man to do wickedly. Jeremiah 19. They have built the high places of Baalim, which I commanded not: neither did I speak, nor did they come up into my heart. Where, that he may show how alien it is from the will of God to will sins, the Prophet not only says that God does not command them, but that He does not even know them. For God says of Himself that He is ignorant of them, as S. Jerome says on this passage, because He accounts them great things for His knowledge to esteem, according to that of Luke 12. I know you not, depart from me, ye workers of iniquity. But if God accounts sins unworthy of His knowledge, by what reason could He will them of Himself? James 1. Let no man, when he is tempted, say that he is tempted of God; for God is not a tempter of evils: but He Himself tempteth no man. Ecclesiasticus 15. Say not: He hath entangled me. But what greater entanglement than to predestine men to sins, to which He would impel and necessitate them? — But that all sins whatsoever come to pass not with God impelling, nor decreeing, but only permitting, is most clearly defined, first indeed in the Council of Orange, cap. 23., where the Fathers decree,

We do not believe that some are predestinated to evil by the divine will; and if there be anyone who so believes, with every detestation we pronounce anathema against him.

And most clearly in the Council of Trent, Sess. 6. Canon 6. If anyone shall say that it is not in the power of man to make his ways evil, but that the evil works, as well as the good, God worketh; not permissively only, but properly and of Himself, so that His own work it is, no less the betrayal of Judas than the calling of Paul: let him be anathema.

But lest the heretics thrust upon us the assertion that this doctrine of the Council of Trent, whereby the divine permission is distinguished from the will, is a recent dogma of the Schoolmen, it is pleasing to confirm this very distinction by the Oracles of the SS. Fathers. First of all, therefore, Tertullian against Hermogenes,

Now therefore, he says, evil is from Him who is the author of evil; if not the author, because not the effecter, certainly the permittor, because the dominator.

Chrysostom, Homil. 8. on the second Epistle to Timothy, in the 2. part of the Moralia. Know this only, he says, that God provideth all things, that we are made of free will, that He worketh some things indeed, but permitteth others, that He willeth nothing evil to be done: that not all things are done from His will alone, but from ours also; all evils from ours only: all goods from our will and His assistance. Augustine, lib. 13. De Trinitate, cap. 12. But that mode, he says, whereby man was delivered into the power of the devil, ought not to be understood as if God had done this, or commanded it to be done; but only permitted it. Fulgentius, lib. 8. ad Monimum, cap. 13. Any sin, he says, could be from the predestination of God, if any of men could justly sin; but none of men sins justly, although God justly permits him to sin. Damascene, lib. 2. De Fide, cap. 29. Therefore the first preceding will, and acceptance, is said to exist from Himself: but the second following will, and permission, to exist on account of us. And a little after: Evils, he says, He neither wills antecedently, nor consequently wills; yet He leaves the free choice open to them.

This truth very many Theologians prove in the usual way with many reasons, several of which the Doctor rejects and impugns as invalid and insufficient in 1. dist. 37. qu. 1. and 2., and adds that this truth is sufficiently proved by the following reason: Whenever two partial causes concur to some effect that is deficient, that defect can be from one of those causes, without its proceeding from the other. Thus, for example, since, as very many hold, the cognition of the intellect concurs with the will to the eliciting of a volition physically, there can be a defect in the very volition on the part of the will, without its being attributed to the intellect. For indeed even with the intellect rightly persuading, the will at its own choice can either suspend the acts, or command the intellect to turn itself to the opposite object:

So therefore, says the Doctor, qu. 2. num. 17, by parity, if two wills concur to the willing of a created volition, namely the created and the divine will: there can be a defect in the very willing from the defect of the other cause, and this, because that cause could give rectitude to the act, which it is bound to give, and yet does not give it: the other, indeed, although it is not bound to give it, nevertheless as far as in itself lies, would give it, if the created will cooperated. For universally whatever God gives antecedently, He would give consequently as far as in itself lies, unless there were an impediment: but in giving a free will, He gave antecedently the right works, which are in the power of the will, and therefore as far as His part is concerned, He gives rectitude to every act of the will, and He would give it consequently to the will, if the will rightly elicited whatever act from its own part. Therefore the defect in the effect of two causes is not on account of the defect of the superior cause, but of the inferior; not because the superior cause causes rectitude in the effect, and the inferior obliquity: but because the superior cause as far as in itself lies would cause it, if the inferior cause caused according to its own causality, and therefore rectitude is not caused for this reason, because the second, as far as pertains to itself, does not cause.

By which the Doctor expressly explains that although God concurs positively to the physical entity of the sinful act, nevertheless the defect and privation of rectitude of that act ought not to be ascribed to Him, but to the created will, because He does not concur to the act as a determinative particular cause, but as born to concur through the created will.

This proof is confirmed, and at the same time the preceding reason is strengthened: That anyone be truly and properly accounted to sin, three things are required in his act: First, that his action be repugnant to the law, because sin is nothing else than the transgression of the law, and it is beyond controversy that the action is not evil which is repugnant to no law: but by law we understand not only the written law, but also that inscribed naturally and eternal. The second is, that the action be done by a free cause. For this reason brute animals, children, fools, and those asleep do not sin, although they do those things which seem to be shameful, and conflict with the rule of right reason, as parrots which utter blasphemy. The third, that he who does the shameful action do it not only freely, but as a particular cause; for the universal cause, since it is indifferent to this action and to that, cannot be said to be that from which the action is specially, but only from the particular, from which it proceeds, although the universal concurs. Therefore since the deformity which is seen in sin follows upon the particular action, it cannot be referred to the universal cause, but properly to the particular. And certainly when monsters arise, no one says that the cause ought to be referred to Heaven, or to the sun; but only to the proximate cause: for the universal cause no more infuses the effect into this one than into that one; but only the particular. Therefore just as the sin of nature is attributed to the proximate cause — for by Heaven it did not stand, but that perfect man should be produced, but the impediment existed in the proximate cause — so although God concurs with man to any action whatsoever, as the universal cause, always holding Himself in the same manner as immutable and unchangeable, it can easily be understood how He is the cause of the action, and yet is not the cause of the sin. For He is truly the cause of the action, because He truly concurs to its entity; nevertheless He is not to be called the cause of the sin, because He concurs to that action only with a universal concurrence, which does not determine the created will to that evil action, but rather is determined by it.

Answer. the created will cannot be accounted determinative of the divine will to the sinful act: for it would determine either by its entity, or by its activity and its concurrence: but neither can be affirmed. Not indeed the first: for if the created will determined the divine will to the physical and material entity of the sinful act by its entity, the consequence would be that a good act could nowhere be made. For indeed the very entity of the will, of itself tending to the sinful act, would always determine to the same concurrence of the divine will. The second also cannot be said; for the created will cannot be accounted to determine the divine by its activity and its concurrence, unless the concurrence of that created will be accounted prior to the concurrence of the divine will; but this no Theologian nor Philosopher will admit: otherwise God would not be the first cause: wherefore the created will is by no means accounted determinative of the divine will to the sinful act, and accordingly the preceding reason of the Subtle Doctor appears void. — But truly I answer, that nothing is inferred thence against the truth of the aforesaid reason, nor is its force broken; for the created will is said to determine the divine will to the entity of the evil act only to this extent, not that it truly determines it, as indifferent to that act, by an exigency and influx proceeding from its entity or activity, whereby it would move it: for this implies a contradiction: but God is said to be determined by the created will to concur to the eliciting of the entity of the evil act for this reason, because indeed in those circumstances in which the evil act is elicited, He foresees that the created will, if it could act without any divine concurrence, and were of itself the total cause of its own act, would elicit that sinful act. Whence, since He Himself is the universal cause, upon whom it lies to supply every actual concurrence to causes prepared for acting, hence it comes to pass that He supplies that concurrence to the created will for eliciting the evil act, as often as He sees it will be of itself determined to that act, such circumstances being posited; and consequently that determination is rather to be referred back to the created than to the divine will.

It is proved 2. To this extent could God be called the cause of sin, insofar as He either necessitated the will physically or morally to the eliciting of the sinful act: or induced it to the same by praises and precepts: or finally because He counseled that act: but neither of these can be affirmed. Not indeed the first; both because if He thus necessitated the created will to the sinful act, that act would no longer be accounted free, and therefore not morally evil either; and because He does not thus necessitate to the good act: but it is absurd that God, infinitely good, should more necessitate to evil than to good; and finally because sin supremely displeases God: therefore He induces to it neither physically nor morally; for it seems absurd from the very terms that supreme goodness should determine morally or physically to that which supremely displeases it, and which it forbids to be done. The second and third also cannot be said. For it is certain from Scripture and the Oracles of the SS. Fathers praised above, that God forbids and dissuades sin, even under the gravest penalties: therefore He neither commands nor counsels it, otherwise He would command and not command, persuade and not persuade. Next, if God commanded or persuaded sin, it would be good, and would not be sin; which is repugnant: because without doubt, he who does what God commands or forbids, does well; nor can any safer rule of acting well be shown, than that the thing to be done be commanded or counseled by God: just as no better rule of doing evil can be shown, than that the action to be done be forbidden, or dissuaded by God. Finally, third: if God induced man to sin, He would do this either willing or unwilling: not unwilling, because He does nothing against His will, but worketh all things according to the counsel of His own will; nor yet willing: Because, as the Royal Prophet says, not thou, O God, willing iniquity: therefore by no reason does He induce man to sin. It is confirmed; if God were the author or cause of sin, it would follow that He would will man to will that which He would not will him to will. He would indeed will it, if He ordained him to sin, and induced him to sin. But He would not will it, because He forbids sin to be done: therefore He would at once will the same thing and not will it; which implies a contradiction. Finally, if God induced the created will to sin, it would follow that it was at once just and unjust. Just indeed, because, as S. Anselm says, lib. De libero arbitrio, cap. 8., just is the will of man by which he wills that which God wills him to will; unjust on the contrary, by which he wills that which God does not will him to will: but that the will be at once just and unjust with respect to the same thing implies a contradiction: therefore it is equally repugnant that God induce the created will to sin.

The Heretics object 1. with various texts of Scripture, by which certain sins are attributed to God as to a cause, and thus argue: he is truly to be accounted the author and cause of sin, not only physical but also moral, who decrees, commands, orders, and counsels sin to be done: but God performs all these things: therefore he is truly to be accounted the author of sin. This major stands from what has been said: they prove the minor: first indeed that God decrees sin, appears from Genesis 15., where Joseph says to his brethren, by whom he had been treacherously sold: Not by your counsel, but by the will of God, was I sent hither. And cap. 49., addressing the same, he says: Will you fear? can we resist the will of God? by which words he signifies that the crime of his brethren was to be excused; because that selling had been decreed and ordained by God. The same they confirm from Acts 2., where S. Peter, addressing the Jews who had crucified Christ, says He was delivered by the determinate counsel and foreknowledge of God: and again cap. 4.¹ They were gathered together in this city against thy holy child Jesus, whom thou hast anointed, Herod, and Pontius Pilate, with the Gentiles, and the peoples of Israel, to do what thy hand and thy counsel decreed to be done. But that God sometimes commands sin, is urged from 2. Kings, cap. 16., where David says of Semei cursing him: The Lord commanded him to curse David: but that cursing, which he there calls most wicked, was without doubt a sin; and accordingly God commands sin. Moreover in 3. Kings, in the last chapter, we read that when the Lord inquired: Who shall deceive Achab? the devil offered himself, and said: I shall deceive… and I shall be a lying spirit in the mouth of all his Prophets: to whom the Lord said, Thou shalt deceive, and shalt prevail: go forth, and do so. Finally, that God orders and counsels sin, Sacred Scripture itself indicates, especially from Psalm 104. He converted their heart, that they should hate his people. And Psalm 118. Incline my heart unto thy testimonies, and not to covetousness. Moreover God is said to blind men, harden, deceive, deliver up to a reprobate sense. Thus Exodus 7. The Lord hardened the heart of Pharaoh. Isaiah 63. Why hast thou made us to err from thy ways? Thou hast hardened our heart, that we should not fear thee. John 12. Therefore they could not believe, because Isaias said again; He hath blinded their eyes, and hardened their heart: therefore God is truly to be accounted the maker of sin. — I deny the minor: and to its first proof I say, that in these and similar works of God two things are especially to be considered: namely, the end which God intends, and the means by which He commits the intended end to execution. Thus in the selling of Joseph, and the death of Christ, the proximate end was the exaltation of Joseph, and the redemption of the human race: but the means were the very selling of Joseph, and the crucifixion of Christ. The first God intends per se, and predefined by His eternal decree independently of the will of men; because indeed that is per se good: the second, however, was only permitted on account of the foreknowledge of the future sin: for the wicked future will having been foreseen, both of the brethren of Joseph selling him, and of the Jews crucifying Christ, God decreed to permit both this and that sinful action for the greater glory of Christ Himself and of Joseph: which indeed S. Leo excellently declares, Serm. 16. De Passione Domini, where, having said: Is the iniquity of the persecutors of Christ arisen from the counsel of God? He answers:

This plainly is not to be thought of the supreme justice, because that is very diverse, and very contrary, which was foreknown in the malice of the Jews, and which was disposed in the Passion of Christ. Thence came not the will of killing, whence came the dying; nor did the atrocity of the crime and the patience of the Redeemer arise from one spirit: for the Lord did not commit the impious hands of the raging unto Himself, but admitted them: nor by foreknowing > what was to be done doth He compel it to be done, although He had taken flesh for this end, that it should be done.

To the second I say, that this is the manner of Scripture, that it sometimes signifies that God does and commands that which He merely permits and allows, as appears from the law of divorce given to the Jews, Deuteronomy 24.; for that law, which Christ calls a simple permission, Matthew 19. Because Moses, he says, by reason of the hardness of your heart permitted you to put away your wives: the same he calls a precept, Mark 10. For Christ, addressing the Pharisees, says: What did Moses command you? And when they said: Moses permitted a bill of divorce: Christ answering said: By reason of the hardness of your heart he wrote you this precept: from which it appears that the same dismissal of a wife is called both a permission and a precept. But God is therefore sometimes said to command the same, because in the permission of evil God always intends some good: for, as Augustine says in the Enchiridion, cap. 100: the good would not permit evils to be done, unless the Omnipotent were able even from evil to do good: making good use of evils also, as supremely good, for the damnation of those whom He has justly predestinated to punishment: and for the salvation of those whom He has benignly predestinated to glory. Hence S. Basil says in the Homily in which he shows that God is not the author of sins: As a physician uses poison to kill a beast, which he himself did not make, so God uses the malice of man, of which nevertheless He Himself is not the author. Whence S. Augustine on Psalm 61. Think not that the evil are in this world in vain, and that God does nothing good by them: for every evil man lives either for this, that he may be corrected, or for this, that the good may be exercised by him. From these things all those texts are easily solved, in which God is said to order sin: for He orders it only to this extent, that He permits those things to be done, and deduces from them some good. To the last I say, that God indeed sometimes hardens men, not positively, as if He turned the mind away from good, and induced it into evil by some depraved quality infused: but only privatively, namely by withdrawing the congruous assistance, which being removed, the mind is not instructed divinely to see aright, nor is the heart allured to live honestly. Which indeed S. Augustine openly teaches, Epist. 105. ad Sixtum, in these words: God doth not turn aside by imparting malice: but by not bestowing mercy. And in tractate 53. on John: Thus, he says, doth God exercise, thus doth He harden by forsaking, not by adjuring, which He can do by hidden judgment, nay, cannot. In this manner also God is said to deceive, and to deliver up to a reprobate sense: namely, by forsaking man for a just cause, and despoiling him of a more abundant and special aid of grace.

The Heretics object 2. S. Augustine, who in various places seems to teach that God induces to sin. Thus lib. De correptione et gratia, cap. 14., where he openly testifies that Christ chose Judas to the shedding of His blood. When, he says, we hear: Have not I chosen you twelve, and one of you is a devil? those we must understand to be chosen through mercy, that one through judgment. Those therefore He chose to obtain His kingdom, that one to shed His blood. And lib. De gratia, et libero arbitrio, cap. 20., he teaches that the wills of men are so in the power of God, that He makes them to incline whithersoever He will, whenever He will, either to benefits to be bestowed on certain ones, or to certain punishments to be inflicted: and he understands by punishments there, the sins themselves, for thus he subjoins: We are not ignorant that certain sins are even punishments > for punishments of sins, as are the vials of wrath, which the Apostle says perfected unto perdition: as is the hardening of Pharaoh, whose heart is also said to be blinded in it by the power of God. And speaking there of Semei cursing David by the mandate of God: His will, he says, He inclined to evil proper in this sin, by His own just and hidden judgment. And cap. 21. he concludes at length thus: Sufficiently, I judge, is it manifested that God worketh in the hearts of men to incline their wills whithersoever He will, either to goods on account of His mercy, or to evils on account of their merits.

I answer to the first, that the mind of S. Augustine is that Judas was chosen to the shedding of the blood of Christ, not antecedently, but consequently: because indeed the perverse will of the latter, foreseen from eternity as determined to the betrayal of Christ, God nevertheless willed for the work of redemption to be accomplished. This ordination of the evil will of Judas to the completing of the redemption is called by Augustine an election; not that it is an ordination of that will to sin, but that it is a destination of the same will, already depraved and about to sin, to the work of redemption to be consummated. Which indeed S. Augustine signified in the words immediately preceding, saying:

For from that election is He, who knoweth well how to use even evils, that through his damnable work, that work for the sake of which He Himself had come, the venerable work, might be fulfilled.

By which words he does not say that He chose the will of Judas to the accomplishing of the work of redemption, but that He, having foreseen it would sin, used it for the consummating of the work of redemption. The other authorities I say, S. Augustine wills only this, not that God makes the evil wills of men evil, and inclines them to sin, but only that He orders those evil by their own fault unto good, as is clear from his words.

The Heretics object 3. God is the per se cause of the entity of the sinful act: therefore He is also the cause of sin. The Doctor proves the antecedent in 2. d. 37. q. 1. n. 1. Both because, he says, the sinful act is some being, and not from itself: therefore from another, and thus from God: And because to give alms, to preach Christ, to work miracles, to beget a son, are works of the same reason in natural being, whether they be done well morally or ill: therefore they have a cause of the same reason as to their natural being: but God is the cause of those acts when they are morally good: therefore also when they are morally evil. The consequence is also evident: for to this extent the created will is accounted the cause of the sinful act as it is sin, because it is the cause of all the positive entity of that sinful act: therefore since God is also the cause of that entity, He will likewise be the cause of the formality of sin. — I deny the consequence; but the reason of the disparity, why God, although He concurs to the entity of the sinful act just as the created will does, is nevertheless not accounted the cause of sin as the latter is, various authors bring forward variously, as may be seen in Pontrius in the Comment. on the aforesaid question of the Subtle Doctor; Veraerius disp. 21. Sect. 2. Martinonius disp. 22. Sect. 8: but omitting the opinions of others, I answer that the genuine reason of this diversity is to be sought from this, that God does not concur to the very sinful act materially, or formally with a determining physical concurrence, and as a particular cause, but only with a general concurrence, which He ought to bestow as the universal cause, determined by the created will to the eliciting of that very sinful act: and because moreover God does not concur to that act morally, namely by persuading and commanding it, but rather deters from it by prohibition, commination, illuminations, and pious motions to the opposite. Nor does He will that sinful act with an antecedent will, but rather wills it not to be; nor did He implant natural powers for that end, and make nature possessed of reason and free will in order that it might sin; but that it might live according to the prescription of right reason. Whence, since He exhibits His concurrence, He intends its good use: and therefore while He concurs physically and immediately to the evil act, He performs this beyond His first intention, and to accommodate Himself to the liberty of the creature, permitting it to work according to the condition of its nature, and to exercise the natural dominion over its own acts, without which its acts could be neither morally good nor morally evil: wherefore He exhibits that concurrence as if against His will. Wherefore Isaiah 43., to the sinner He thus upbraids: But thou hast made me to serve with thy sins, thou hast wearied me with thine iniquities. The Doctor adds, dist. 37. qu. 2. n. 20., that not

on this account is sin imputed to the created will, because it itself by acting causes the defect; but because it itself is bound to act rightly, inasmuch as the effect is under its own power, and does not act rightly; but not thus is the divine will bound; and from this it cannot sin of itself; nor can it itself first fail by not causing with respect to the rectitude owed in the act, such that it then becomes owed, when it is not from the defect of the created will.

That is, therefore the malice of sin is not to be ascribed to God, but to the created will, because the created will, since it is subject to the law, and ought to conform itself to it in the acts elicited, is also bound to attribute to its own act rectitude or conformity with the law: but God, since He is subject to no law, ought not to attribute that rectitude to the act to which He concurs; nevertheless He would attribute it if man willed, because of Himself He would will to make all the works of men right, if men themselves also willed this, and did not resist His divine will.

You will urge: God concurs only as the universal cause to the good act: nor is He any less accounted the cause of that good act morally: therefore by parity of reason, He will be accounted the cause of the evil action morally; since He concurs to it with a general concurrence. — I deny the parity, for God is held to concur far otherwise to morally good actions than to evil actions; for good actions, if they be supernatural, are done by God through a special assistance, and have from Him that they are supernatural. But if they be good only morally, they are indeed from God through the general assistance; nevertheless two things are attributed to Him on their account: first indeed because they are intended by Him; namely to this end He created us, and endowed us with free will and supplies the general assistance, that we might use these things rightly for conducting life according to the dictamen of right reason; although He permits that we do otherwise, even if it should please us: secondly because God persuades, commands, praises good actions, and exhorts and invites to them: but by a similar reason an evil action cannot be attributed to God, because He neither intends it, nor commands it; nay rather He disapproves, forbids, deters from it, and turns away from it.

You will press: That which is the cause of the cause is also the cause of the caused: but God is the cause of the entity of the action, from which the deformity of sin arises: therefore He is also the cause of that deformity itself. — I distinguish the major: that which is the cause of the cause in the physical genus, is also the cause of the caused in the same genus, I concede: that which is the cause of the cause in the physical genus, is also the cause of the caused, or of the effect, or as it were the effect, in the moral genus, I deny. And thus the minor being distinguished, the consequence must be denied: for God concurs only to the physical entity of the action, but not to its deformity, which is a certain moral thing; not indeed positive, but privative; nor is it an effect, but rather a defect: whence, as we warned above, it has not an efficient cause, but a deficient one. Other similar instances we have already solved, both in the Disputation on divine providence; and likewise in the treatise on Causes, as may be seen in our Academica Philosophia.

The Heretics object 4. It often happens that one sin is the punishment of another sin, as S. Augustine expressly proves, lib. 5. contra Iulianum, cap. 3. and 4: but God is the author of every punishment inflicted upon creatures; therefore He is also to be accounted the author of sin, which is the punishment of another. — I answer first, that sin can be considered in a twofold manner; namely, either insofar as it proceeds from the will, and is a certain action; or insofar as it is received in the will itself, and is called a passion. In the former manner it is not a punishment, but a fault; for punishment signifies not action, but passion. But in the latter manner it can be called a punishment, not indeed properly: for every punishment properly so called is simply involuntary; but sin is voluntary; yet it is called a punishment in a broader manner, and improperly, insofar as it deprives of the due rectitude, and likewise of the aids and divine charisms to be conceded by God to the soul, if sin were not in it. The Doctor answers secondly, d. 3. qu. 2. n. 25., distinguishing the minor: every positive punishment is from God effectively, he concedes: every privative punishment, he denies: for from Him these do not proceed except permissively, and with Him denying the more abundant aids:

For punishment, says the Doctor, is spoken of in two ways: in one way insofar as it is the privation of a good convenient to an intellectual nature, such as is the privation of the vision and fruition of God: and this is pure privation. In another way something positive, and yet disconvenient to such a nature, can be called punishment: as excessive heat is something positive disconvenient to flesh. All punishments spoken of in the second way can be posited by God, because they are something positive, and of these must be understood that which is in the first Retract. cap. 25. and 26.; for he says: In the good works of God, those punitive works are good, although they are evil for those punished, because they are disconvenient to them. But punishments of the first way are not from God as efficient, because they are not effectible; nor from Him as first deficient, but only on account of the demerit of the will in the act of sin, not compelling the will now to have that good to which He would have wrought, as far as in itself lies. Such a punishment therefore is from God not inflicting, or effecting, nor first deficient, but deserting, that is, leaving the nature by which it fails in its own defect, and in all the defects consequent upon that defect, wherein are included many privations of perfections convenient to such a nature: thus therefore the punishment, which is sin, is not from God as efficient, or first deficient; but only from God deserting the will on account of the first demerit, which, deserted by God, falls into the second demerit.