Scotus Academicus, Tomus decimus: De Baptismo, De Poenitentia, De Extrema Unctione

Since penance, as a virtue, is a certain spiritual quality of the soul, whose being, as exceedingly subtle, can be clearly known only through its relation to the object toward which it tends and the subject in which it resides, its nature must therefore be investigated from both. Moreover, the word penance is derived either from punishment or from penalty. St. Isidore gives the former derivation, bk. VI, Etymologies, last ch.: “Penance,” he says, “is so called, as it were, from punishing, because a person punishes himself by doing penance for what he has wrongly admitted; for those who truly repent do nothing else than ensure that what they have done wrongly is not left unpunished.” St. Augustine agrees with him, writing in ep. 54: “One who truly repents does nothing else than ensure that what he has done wrongly is not left unpunished; for in this way he who does not spare himself will be spared by Him whose lofty and just judgment no contemptuous person escapes.” The latter derivation, namely from penalty, is given by the author of On True and False Penance, ch. 19, where he says: “To repent is to hold to a penalty, so as always to punish oneself by taking vengeance for what one committed in sinning. For penalty properly means an injury that punishes and avenges whatever one has committed. Therefore, he holds to a penalty who always punishes what he grieves to have committed. Penance, then, is vengeance that continually punishes within oneself what one grieves to have committed.” The Doctor subscribes to this latter derivation in In IV Sent., d. 14, q. 1, n. 15, where he says that “penance,” according to the etymology of the word, is the same as “holding to a penalty”; for “to repent,” says the Doctor, is the same as “to hold to a penalty.” Hence μετάνοια, in Latin poenitendo, signifies generally grief over things done or omitted, according to that epigram of Ausonius:

I am the goddess who exacts penalties for deed and misdeed:
Indeed, that one may repent: thus I am called Metanoia.

Nevertheless, the heretics of the present day protest—especially the Lutherans and Calvinists, together with their forerunners. For Luther, in a letter to the vicar of his Order, says that “penance does not signify sorrow or hatred for one’s past life, but love of justice and of instituting a new life.” Calvin agrees with him in bk. III of the Institutes, ch. 3, where he declares that the word “penance” chiefly denotes a conversion from one’s past life and a change of mind. Before them, Lorenzo Valla had written that the word μετάνοια is more correctly rendered in Latin by resipiscentia than by poenitentia. Erasmus too supports this view: whenever he encounters the word μετάνοια in the Greek text of the Bible, he renders it by resipiscentia. Hence, in ch. 3 of St. Matthew, he declares that penance is the same as “holding to a penalty,” and that poenitere is as it were “to hold to a penalty,” that is, to become wise afterward, or to recover one’s senses; for resipiscentia is derived from re and sapientia, and resipiscere from re and sapere. Against all these errors, the following Questions must lay down the rule: the first will explain what penance is; the second, what kind it is; the third, what its object is; and the fourth, in what subject it resides.

NOTE 1. Penance, insofar as it is distinguished from the sacrament, is twofold: habitual, that is, and actual. Habitual penance is a permanent quality in the soul, making it ready and disposed, and cooperating with it in eliciting acts of the virtue of penance. Actual penance, however, is the very act of penance by which the sinner wishes to punish and detest the sin he has committed; this act, generally speaking, is twofold: interior and exterior. Interior penance is that movement of the soul by which the sinner is moved to expiate the sin he has committed. The Doctor there, n. 15, distinguishes four forms of it: first, the will to avenge and punish sin, following the intellect’s prior knowledge, which makes its deformity and malice known to the will; on account of this knowledge the will is moved to will its punishment and execration; second, detestation and hatred of that sin; third, voluntary acceptance of the punishment inflicted on its account; fourth, voluntary endurance and suffering of that same punishment. Exterior penance, in turn, is twofold: namely, external confession of the sin committed, accompanied and followed by embarrassment and shame, which is no slight punishment of the soul for the sin committed; and, second, every laborious bodily act by which the penitent who has confessed is punished and makes satisfaction to God for the crime admitted and committed. Here, however, the chief question concerns those four acts of penance: whether those four acts are truly elicited by the virtue of penance, so that, just as habits are distinguished by their acts, penance may thereby appear to be a true virtue, entirely distinct from the others.

NOTE 2. According to the same Doctor in the same place, penance receives four definitions or descriptions from these four acts. The first is: to do penance is to avenge the sin one has committed. The author of the book On True and False Penance, attributed to St. Augustine, agrees with this description, saying in ch. 8: Penance is a kind of vengeance by which the will punishes itself for what it grieves to have admitted. Hence, in ch. 19: To do penance is to undergo punishment, so as always to punish oneself by avenging what one admitted in sinning. St. Augustine also supports this in Letter 308 to Seleucianus: There is also penance, he says, the work of good and humble faithful people, in which we beat our breasts, saying: Forgive us our debts. Isidore of Seville adds, in bk. 6 of the Etymologies, final chapter, where we read: It is called penance, as it were “penal suffering,” because in doing penance a person himself punishes himself for what he wrongly admitted. The second description is: to do penance is to detest or hate the sin one has committed, or to be displeased with the sin one has committed. This description of penance is very common among the holy Fathers, and the Council of Trent approves it, sess. VI, ch. 6, where, speaking of the dispositions necessary for justification, it says, among other things: Therefore they are moved against their sins by a certain hatred and detestation, that is, by the penance which ought to be undertaken before baptism. And sess. XIV, ch. 6: Contrition, it says, is sorrow of soul and detestation for the sin committed, together with the purpose not to sin again. The third description is: to do penance is to accept gladly the punishment inflicted for the sin committed. Hence the Council of Trent says in the same place, ch. 1: Having cast off their perversity and amended their lives, they detested so great an offense against God with hatred of sin and pious sorrow of soul; by pious sorrow of soul it signifies voluntary acceptance of punishment. The author of On True and False Penance also approves this description, saying in ch. 3: Hence let the sinner always grieve, and rejoice in his grief. Finally, the Doctor formulates the fourth description of penance thus: To do penance is patiently to bear the punishment inflicted on oneself for one’s sin. The Council of Trent approves this description along with the preceding one, sess. XIV, ch. 9, saying: “Finally, it teaches that divine generosity is so great that we can make satisfaction not only by punishments which we willingly undertake to avenge sin, or which the priest imposes at his discretion according to the measure of the offense, but also by temporal scourges inflicted by God and patiently borne by us.” The question, then, is whether penance under this fourfold aspect is a virtue—not a general virtue, but a special one.

NOTE 3. Aristotle says in Ethics II, ch. 6: Virtue is a habit of choice, consisting in a mean relative to us, as the prudent person would determine it. Virtue, generally speaking, is twofold: general and special. General virtue is spoken of in four ways. First, by predication, because it is predicated of all other virtues; in this sense justice, taken commonly, is called a general and common virtue, insofar as it is rectitude of soul dictating how good is to be done and evil avoided. Thus the Lord Christ said to St. John the Baptist, Matthew 3: For thus it is fitting for us to fulfill all righteousness; for there is no virtue to which this account of justice does not apply. Second, a virtue is called general by regulation: thus prudence is called the rule of all virtues, since all virtues must be regulated by prudence; for prudence teaches us to keep the mean and avoid extremes. Third, a virtue is called general by informing other virtues, because it confers worth and dignity on them; thus charity is a general virtue, for it informs the other virtues and makes them worthy and pleasing to God. Fourth, a virtue is called general by the aggregation of all virtues, because all the other virtues seem to cooperate in its act. In this way some call penance, insofar as it detests sin, a general virtue, since there is no virtue that does not execrate its opposing vice.

With these preliminaries, the questions are whether penance is mere regret of soul and renewal of one’s past life, or sorrow of soul and vengeance for sin; second, whether in its fourfold act it attains the dignity of virtue; third, whether it is a special or general virtue. These questions will be resolved in the following three Conclusions.

First conclusion. — PENANCE IS NOT MERE REGRET AND BARE CESSATION FROM SIN; IT ALSO INCLUDES SORROW FOR PAST SIN AND OFFENSE. This is against the heretics, and the Council of Trent clearly teaches it, sess. XIV, ch. 1, where it speaks of contrition as follows: Therefore the holy Synod declares that this contrition contains not only cessation from sin, and a purpose and beginning of a new life, but also hatred of the old life. It proves this truth with these passages from Ezekiel 18: Cast away from yourselves all your transgressions by which you have transgressed, and make for yourselves a new heart and a new spirit. The Council immediately adds: Certainly whoever considers those cries of the saints: “Against you only have I sinned, and done evil before you”; “I have labored in my groaning; every night I wash my bed”; “I will recall all my years in the bitterness of my soul”; and others of this kind, will readily understand that they sprang from a certain intense hatred of their past life and a great detestation of their sins. Hence in Canon 5 it condemns the heretics’ doctrine as follows: If anyone says that the contrition prepared by examination, recollection, and detestation of sins, by which someone recalls his years in the bitterness of his soul, weighing the gravity, number, and foulness of his sins, the loss of eternal blessedness, and the incurring of eternal damnation, together with a purpose of better living, is not true and useful sorrow, and does not prepare for grace, but makes a person a hypocrite and a greater sinner… let him be anathema.

The same truth is proved from all those passages of Scripture in which, whenever penance is mentioned, sorrow and punishment to be undergone are expressed. Thus Job, final chapter: I reproach myself, and do penance in dust and ashes. Ashes and dust signify sorrow of soul and affliction of the flesh. Likewise, Matthew 11: speaking of the penance neglected by the people of Chorazin, the Lord Christ says: If the mighty works done in you had been done in Tyre and Sidon, they would long ago have done penance in sackcloth and ashes. Ashes and sackcloth show displeasure of soul and grief for sins committed, not merely a change of mind and judgment, nor only the beginning and institution of a new life. — Likewise, in Luke 10¹ the Lord Christ praises the penance of the Ninevites. But their penance involved sorrow, tears, and bodily affliction, as we read in Jonah 3, where the Ninevites put on sackcloth and sprinkled their heads with ashes—not only to show their sorrow for the sins of their former life, but also, through penal practices and laborious works, to avenge in some way their offenses and faults against God. This penal and laborious penance was not merely a change of mind, or regret, but presupposed regret. — Finally, in 2 Corinthians 7 the Apostle speaks of the penance the Corinthians conceived over the fornicator’s sin, and refers to his first letter: For you were grieved according to God, he says; for sorrow according to God produces penance for lasting salvation. Therefore godly sorrow makes penance salvific; but sorrow is a kind of grief.

The holy Fathers teach the same. Gregory Nazianzen, in his Oration for the Holy Lights, calls penance a baptism of tears. St. Augustine, in On the Trinity III, ch. 4, calls it the crucifixion of the inner man. Hence, in Fifty Homilies, final homily, ch. 5: It is not enough to change one’s conduct for the better and turn away from evil deeds unless satisfaction is made to God for what has been done: by the sorrow of penance, the groaning of humility, the sacrifice of a contrite heart, and alms cooperating with these. Most clearly of all, St. Isidore teaches this in bk. 6 of the Etymologies, ch. 19, where he says: Penance is so called because a person grieves in doing penance for what he wrongly admitted. For those who truly repent do nothing else than refuse to let what they did wrongly go unpunished; in this way he does not spare himself, and no contemptuous person will escape the profound and just judgment of Him who does not spare.

Theological reasoning also supports the conclusion. For the name penance signifies the complete correction and amendment of one’s past life, which signifies three things: first, knowledge of the error, which causes sorrow; second, displeasure with one’s former life, or inward grief over what was done or omitted; third, voluntary chastisement, which is the effect and completion of that inward grief, or displeasure with one’s former life. Penance is named chiefly from this effect of voluntary punishment or vengeance for our sins, from the old and obsolete verb poenio, which is the same as punio; hence poenitet is said as if it meant poenam tenet (“he holds fast to punishment”).

YOU WILL OBJECT 1: Tertullian, Against Marcion II, ch. 24, asks what the word penance means and answers: It is understood as nothing other than a simple change of a former judgment, which can be admitted without reproach—even in a human being, much less in God, whose every judgment is free of fault. Therefore penance in itself does not imply sorrow and punishment. — I distinguish the consequence: if the word penance is taken generally, insofar as sacred Scripture attributes it both to God and to a human being, I grant; if it is taken as proper to a human being and as serving to obtain remission of sins, I deny. Tertullian there is speaking of penance insofar as it is attributed to God, who is often said in Scripture to repent. Just before, he had said: It remains now to learn what the repentance of God is. But divine penance is very different from human penance; or, as Tertullian says there: This definition establishes another character for divine repentance in every respect: it is not to be judged to arise from imprudence, fickleness, or condemnation of any good or evil deed, as human repentance is. By these words he distinguishes divine from human penance on three grounds: first, the latter is based on fickleness or instability of mind; second, it includes condemnation of a deed omitted or committed; third, it signifies sorrow and vengeance for a deed committed, as well as satisfaction to be offered to God.

YOU WILL PRESS: Tertullian says there that the word penance means only a change of mind: for even in its Greek sound, he says, the word penance is formed not from confession of an offense but from a change of mind. Therefore, etc. — I ANSWER: That is true if one considers only the name’s etymology, or its derivation from Greek. For poenitio is said from μετὰ, meaning “trans.” or “post.”, and νοῦς, which means “mind” or “thought”; thus μετάνοια means a subsequent judgment or second thought, a change of judgment. But it is otherwise if one considers the word’s frequent use in Scripture and among sacred authors, where the word signifies human penance: in this use it implies not merely a change of judgment but also sorrow of soul. Although sacred Scripture sometimes uses penance to mean only a change of mind: thus the effective graces by which God certainly leads the elect to eternal life are called in Romans 11: the gift of God without repentance, because once God has destined them somewhere, he does not change his plan.

YOU WILL OBJECT 2: Lactantius, Institutes II, ch. 24, says that μετανοεῖν is best rendered in Latin by resipiscentia (“returning to one’s senses”). Therefore penance means nothing other than a change and recall of the mind. — I DENY the consequence. For Lactantius says there: A person comes to his senses and, as it were, recalls his mind from madness when he regrets his error, chastises himself for his folly, and strengthens his mind to live more rightly; then he takes care not to fall again into the same snares. Therefore, according to Lactantius, penance signifies not only recognition of error and amendment of one’s former life, but also sorrow of soul, chastisement and punishment for folly—that is, sin—and a purpose to set one’s life in better order.

YOU WILL OBJECT 3: Among the best authors, the verb poenitet sometimes means the same as “it wearies,” “it shames,” “it displeases,” and so on. Thus Cicero, in On Old Age: If he had lived to his hundredth year, he would have regretted his old age. And in The Dream of Scipio: The earth itself seemed small to me, this earth of our empire, of which we touch, as it were, a mere point; I would have regretted it. Pliny, bk. 1, ch. 17, speaking of the religious Essenes among the Jews, says: An everlasting people, among whom no one is born; so fertile are they in regret for the lives of others. Therefore this word does not always mean punitive sorrow for sin. — I DENY the consequence. All these expressions are metaphorical: in things that weary, shame, or offend us, there seems to be a certain punishment, distress, and displeasure. Hence whatever wearies, shames, or displeases is also considered in some sense to cause grief.

Second conclusion. — PENANCE, ACCORDING TO ITS FOURFOLD MEANING AND DESCRIPTION, CAN BE AN ACT OF VIRTUE. So teaches the Subtle Doctor, d. 14, q. 2, and

He proves the first part, n. 2, where he says: “The first meaning of penance is that it is vengeance for a sin committed by the person who committed it. But this vengeance can be an act of virtue and conform to right reason. For, he says, according to right reason every legislator avenges a transgression of the law. Hence at the end of bk. 10 of the Ethics, after his teaching about vices and virtues, the Philosopher immediately introduces positive law as the avenger of vices and the rewarder of virtues. But if a legislator avenges according to right reason, his minister executes the vengeance according to right reason, because the rectitude of an act of service universally derives from its conformity to the agent whom it serves. Therefore, according to right reason, someone may, as a minister of the legislator, avenge a sin committed against the law, and do so upon the person entrusted to him for this vengeance, since otherwise he would not be serving. But everyone is entrusted with being a minister of God, who bears his law, to avenge upon himself the sins he has committed. To do penance, in its first sense, means to avenge oneself in this way; for tenere, when no dative is added to express to whom something is held, means that it is held by the person himself, as common usage shows. Therefore, although God punishes the sinner, he is not said to do penance, since he inflicts punishment not on himself but on another; but when someone inflicts it on himself, he is said to do penance, that is, to hold fast to punishment by applying it to himself.” So says the Doctor. Lest he seem to assert that vengeance for sin always proceeds from the habit of virtue, he immediately adds: “I do not say that doing penance in the first sense is always an act of virtue, that is, elicited by virtue. It is called an act of virtue because it is naturally apt to be elicited by virtue or to generate virtue, since it conforms to right reason; and moral goodness consists in being generated by virtue or generating virtue.” Since all this is evident from the terms themselves, there is no need to dwell on it further.

He proves the same concerning the other three meanings of penance, nn. 21 and 12: “As for the second meaning of the word “to do penance,” he says, namely, detesting a sin committed or being displeased with what was committed, I say that this can be an act of virtue. It is proved as before, because it can be an elective act in accord with right reason. For just as right reason dictates that we take pleasure in an honorable good, so it dictates that we be displeased by a dishonorable evil. — From this the second conclusion is clear, namely, whose act it can be: not of any one special virtue, but of any appetitive virtue. For every virtue that inclines us to take pleasure in an honorable good also inclines us to detest and be displeased by the opposing dishonorable evil. Thus chastity inclines us to displeasure at something disordered against chastity, humility at a disordered act of pride, and so on. Yet every virtue inclining us to such displeasure is an appetitive virtue, since nothing is a principle of hating, just as nothing is a principle of loving, except an appetitive virtue. Hence it is clear that it is wrong to posit detestation of sin as an act of the virtue of penance, if we speak of penance in the first sense, as a species of justice; for this act is much more general than the proper act elicited by the virtue of penance as justice. — As for the third meaning, gladly accepting the punishment inflicted for a sin committed, I say that this act too can be virtuous, because it accords with right reason. Second, it can belong to many virtues, each of which is appetitive, since whatever can be a principle for accepting one object can be a principle for accepting another in relation to it; different objects can be accepted through different virtues, in relation to which the punishment inflicted for sin can be accepted. If God is loved through charity, punishment can be accepted through charity insofar as it restores one to God’s friendship. If God is desired through the virtue of hope as a good for me, punishment can be accepted through hope as ordering one to the reward one can attain. If the loss of eternal life is avoided through the virtue of fear, punishment can be accepted through that virtue as excluding that loss. If someone loves purity and innocence for himself through an honorable friendship with himself, he can through that friendship accept punishment, which dissolves the debt that was incurred. — As for the fourth meaning, patiently bearing the punishment inflicted, it is clear that this can be an act of virtue, and of a special virtue, namely patience.” So says the Doctor. By all this he openly admits that, according to the fourfold meaning set out above in the second Note, penance can receive the character and name of an actual virtue, whether commanded or elicited by a virtue, or ordered and directed toward one. But only its primary meaning belongs specifically to the virtue of penance; for the other three acts, which sometimes occur in perfect penance, complete in every respect, can be elicited by other virtues, as will appear from what is said in the third Conclusion. — That penance, taken generally, insofar as it tends to detest and destroy sin as an offense against God, is a virtue, is proved first as follows: there is no divine precept except concerning a virtuous and praiseworthy act; but there is a divine precept to do penance. Matthew 4 says that when Christ began to preach, he said: Do penance, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand. And Mark 1: Repent, and believe the Gospel. Therefore penance is a virtue. Moreover, no act is praiseworthy and meritorious unless it is an act of virtue; but doing penance is praiseworthy and meritorious; therefore, etc. Finally, Aristotle says in Ethics II, ch. 6: Virtue is a habit that makes its possessor good and makes his work good. Penance makes its possessor good; indeed, it often makes him better and holier than he was before his fall. For St. Paul says in Romans 5: Where sin abounded, grace abounded all the more. Hence Peter Damian, Sermon 56: God is accustomed to honor penitents more than the innocent. For, as St. Gregory says in Moralia XI, ch. 19: Anyone who recognizes that he has done evil is brought back to the rule of discernment and thereby advances higher in justice, in the very place where he seemed for a time to have fallen from justice. St. Ambrose aptly confirms this in his sermon On the Chair of St. Peter, where he says, among other things: Peter became more faithful after he wept over having lost the faith; and so he found greater grace than he had lost. St. Maximus agrees beautifully: Peter, he says, makes progress through his trials, rejoices in his failings, grows through his dangers. For Peter received the flock as a good shepherd so that he who had previously been weak for himself might become a support for all. It is therefore clear that penance is highly praiseworthy and makes its possessor good; consequently, it has the dignity and character of virtue.

YOU WILL OBJECT 1: Virtue is a disposition of the perfected toward the best; but an act of penance does not have this character, since the primary act of doing penance is only a wish, or conditional will, by which the sinner would wish, if it were possible, not to have committed the sin. He cannot will this absolutely, since it is impossible. Therefore, etc. — I DENY the minor. For although doing penance is a mere wish insofar as it is directed toward a past and completed sin, if the sin is considered as presently remaining in its turning toward creatures and turning away from God, and as the stain on the soul resulting from an offense against God, then it is an absolute act: the will turns away from the creature it had loved with excessive and disordered love and returns to God, so as, to the extent of its power, to restore the honor it took from him and, to the extent that it glorified itself in delights, to undergo torment and mourning. In this respect the penitent has not a mere wish but an absolute will.

YOU WILL BE PRESSED BY ARISTOTLE, Ethics I: Nothing virtuous is foolish or stupid; but willing that a sin had not been committed, whether by an absolute or a conditional will, is foolish, stupid, and inept, since it is entirely impossible for what is past not to have been past. Therefore, etc. — I DISTINGUISH the minor: willing that what is past had not happened is inept, let it pass; willing to reject an evil committed and to wish it had not happened is inept, I deny. Penance does not reach toward the past as though the penitent thought it possible for an act actually committed not to have been committed. Rather, he rejects it as wrongly done; for the penitent’s sorrow, displeasure, and rejection of a past deed intend to remove its consequence, namely, offense against God and the debt of punishment. This is not inept, but most prudent.

YOU WILL OBJECT 2: Every virtue is desirable for its own sake, or for its own proper end; but penance is desired not for its own sake, but to expiate the evil of guilt. Therefore, it should not be considered a virtue. — I DENY the minor. Penance is desired for its own sake, that is, for its own proper end, which is to erase the evil of guilt and make satisfaction to God who has been offended. It is not desired for the sake of a some other end, distinct from its own proper end.

YOU WILL PRESS: What tends toward evil insofar as it is evil cannot be desired for its own sake, that is, for its own goodness and perfection; but penance tends toward sin, which is evil in itself. Therefore, etc. — I DISTINGUISH the major: what tends toward evil by an act of pursuit, I grant; by an act of aversion and flight, I deny. The minor must likewise be distinguished, and the consequence denied. For medicine tends toward illness, yet it is desirable—conditionally before illness, but absolutely after illness—because medicine tends toward illness not to cause or preserve it, but to destroy it. Penance likewise tends toward sin not to commit it, but to turn away from it. Hence the penitent wills sin, not to be done, but to be destroyed.

YOU WILL OBJECT 3: Every virtue must have a good for its object; but penance does not have a good for its object, since it concerns sin. Therefore, it should not be called a virtue. — The Seraphic Doctor DENIES the major, d. 11, art. 1, q. 1, ad 3; the contrary, he says, is evident in temperance, mercy, and fortitude, which concern what is evil. Alternatively, I distinguish the major: virtue must have a good object when pursuing, I grant; when turning away, I deny. For pursuing evil and fleeing good are indeed evil, whereas pursuing good and turning away from evil are right and good. For this reason punitive authority is good, although it is directed toward an evil to be punished. For there is no authority except from God, says St. Paul in Romans 13. He adds: If you do evil, be afraid; for he does not bear the sword without cause: he is God’s minister, an avenger for wrath against the one who does evil. Since the virtue of penance turns away from and destroys evil, it thereby receives the dignity of virtue. Add that penance has two acts, says the Seraphic Doctor: to flee and detest evil, and to amend the sinner and reform him into a better condition and life; this is good in itself, and through this act penance tends toward good.

YOU WILL OBJECT 4: Every act of virtue brings some pleasure; but penance does not bring pleasure, but sorrow. Therefore, it is not a virtue. — I DISTINGUISH the major: virtue brings pleasure by reason of its act, I grant; by reason of its object, I deny. Fortitude, because of its particular object—for example, dangers to be endured or confronted in war—brings distress, since that object causes sadness and pain; nevertheless, the act itself delights the courageous person, who approaches dangers with ready eagerness of spirit. Similarly, although doing penance has a sad and distressing object in itself, it nevertheless delights because of the eagerness and readiness with which the will exercises its acts through repeated practice and voluntarily determines itself to detest sin. — To make this clearer, we should observe with the Doctor, in the place cited above, n. 4, that five acts concur in perfect penance, in order: our Pitigianus explains them well at d. 14, q. 2, art. 2. First is an imperative willing, commanding and joining together the causes of sorrow; second are the causes themselves that produce sorrow; third is sorrow itself; fourth is approval and willing, or acceptance, of that sorrow; fifth, from that willing follows joy in the sorrow, according to St. Augustine’s saying: Let the sinner grieve over sin and rejoice in grief. For example, Peter committed the sin of fornication. In doing penance he follows this order: first, he has an imperative willing by which he commands the causes of sorrow, of which there are two: the apprehension of the fornication and the refusal or hatred of that fornication. I say, then, that the imperative willing by which the will commands the intellect to consider and apprehend that fornication, and commands itself to detest it, is the first act. The second is the apprehension of that fornication and refusal, or hatred, of it. The third is the sorrow caused by apprehending the fornication and refusing it. The fourth is a willing by which the will wills to have that sorrow. The fifth is the joy that follows upon this willing to have sorrow; then St. Augustine’s saying is verified: Let the sinner grieve over sin, etc. Moreover, the Doctor assigns this order or distinction among the five: the first is related as the principal but remote cause of sorrow; the second as its proximate and immediate cause; the third as its effect; the fourth as an effect following from that act. Thus the first is distinguished from the second as a principal and remote cause from a secondary and proximate one; the second from the third as cause from effect, or action from passion; the third from the fourth as object from the action that passes over it; and the first from the fifth as object from the appetitive passion for that object.

Third conclusion. — PENANCE IS A SPECIAL VIRTUE, NOT A GENERAL ONE. This is the Doctor’s teaching in the place cited above, n. 1, where he says: Doing penance is an act of a special virtue. It is proved: that act is naturally apt to have a special object and ordered special circumstances. The object is sin that can be avenged; the circumstances are those appropriate to an act rightly directed toward such an object. He means that a virtue is special when its formal object is not common to the other virtues. But the object of penance, namely, sin that can be avenged, does not belong to the other virtues, since no other virtue concerns sin as something to be avenged and expiated by due satisfaction. Therefore, penance is a special virtue.

It is confirmed: wherever there is a special difficulty in tending toward an object, not found in the other virtues, there must be a special virtue. But in the offense against God, insofar as it can be avenged and expiated through satisfaction and compensation for injuries, there is a special difficulty not found in the objects of the other virtues: namely, that the person who sinned should grieve over the offense, and that the person who has experienced the will to sin should wish to make satisfaction for it and undergo punishment. Therefore, penance is a special virtue.

The Doctor confirms this again from the circumstances: a virtue is special when it tends toward its object differently from every other virtue. But penance concerns sin differently from the other virtues, since no virtue other than penance concerns sin as something to be avenged and expiated by due satisfaction. Therefore, etc.

YOU WILL OBJECT 1: A virtue that extends to the objects of all the other virtues is not special; but penance concerns the objects of the other virtues. Therefore, it is not a special virtue but a general one. The major is established. The minor is proved: penance concerns every sin, since it undertakes its punishment and destruction; but sin in its whole range is included among the objects of the other virtues, since every virtue stands as a mean between two vicious extremes and intends to flee and destroy them. Therefore, penance is not a special virtue. — I DISTINGUISH the major: if it extends to the objects of the other virtues under the same motive by which those virtues concern them, I grant; under a distinct motive, by which no other virtue attains them, I deny. And I similarly distinguish the minor and deny the consequence. For the Seraphic Doctor says, d. 11, art. 1, q. 2, in the body: “Although penance concerns evil in general, it nevertheless concerns it under its proper aspect and has a special act, which requires a virtue not merely to command it but to elicit it. Thus zealous anger, which detests every sin in one’s neighbor, is a special virtue because it regards sin as deserving punishment; and obedience is a special virtue because it regards what is to be done under the aspect of a command. Likewise, penance is a special virtue because it regards sin as a personal evil committed by oneself against God, by which a person is deserving of punishment.” Hence, answering the third objection, he says: “To the objection about the object, one should say that, although it is not restricted to a particular sin, it nevertheless considers sin under a special and proper aspect: namely, insofar as it was committed by oneself and is an offense against God, to whom one wishes to be reconciled and for whom one wishes to make amends. It is therefore a special virtue, because a virtue is called special or general not by reason of its object, which is material, but according as it has the character of a motive.”

YOU WILL OBJECT 2: What is contrary to all sins is not a special virtue. For just as virtue has a determinate good from which it receives its specification, so it has a determinate evil to which it is opposed. But penance is contrary to all sins. For whatever expels something from a subject and cannot coexist with it is contrary to it; penance, however, strives to expel all sins from the soul. Therefore, it is not a special virtue. — I ANSWER first that the major can be denied if taken universally, since charity is contrary to every mortal sin and is no less a special virtue for that reason. I answer second by distinguishing the major: what is contrary to something and expels it formally, I grant; effectively, I deny. As to the minor, I say that every virtue formally expels the vice opposed to it, as cold expels heat and whiteness blackness, because vicious and virtuous habits are formally opposed concerning the same object. Penance, however, expels all sins only effectively, insofar as it works toward the destruction of sin, as far as sin can be remitted with the divine grace that assists it. Therefore, it does not follow that penance is not a special virtue.

YOU WILL PRESS: Every virtue tends not only formally but also effectively toward the destruction of the vice and sin opposed to it. Therefore, no special virtue of penance is needed for this. — I DISTINGUISH the antecedent: it tends toward the destruction of the vice opposed to it according to the aspect under which it is specially opposed to that virtue—for example, faith tends toward the destruction of unbelief insofar as it is unbelief—I grant; it tends toward that destruction insofar as no special virtue is opposed to it alongside the virtue itself, namely, insofar as it is an offense against God to be avenged and repaired by due satisfaction, I deny. Therefore, to destroy sin under the aspect of an offense against God, a special virtue is needed, namely, penance.

YOU WILL PRESS: There is even less need for a special virtue tending toward the destruction of evil insofar as it offends God than for one tending toward the pursuit of good insofar as it honors God. But no special virtue is needed for the latter, since every virtue is referred to God’s honor and glory, or else it would be fruitless and vain. Therefore, etc. — I DENY the minor, since the virtue of Religion is specially ordered to this: to tend toward good insofar as it honors God; it has this as its particular object and special end. For although the other virtues must be referred to that end if they are to be true virtues, they are not referred to it as their proximate end and immediate object. Therefore, by analogy, a special virtue is needed to tend toward sin’s being avenged insofar as it is an offense against God.

Fourth conclusion. — PENANCE IS A SPECIAL VIRTUE ONLY ACCORDING TO ITS PRIMARY MEANING, NOT ACCORDING TO THE OTHER THREE. This is likewise the Doctor’s teaching in the same place, n. 11, where he grants that detestation of sin can be an act of virtue: Because, he says, it can be an elective act in accord with right reason; for just as right reason dictates that we take pleasure in an honorable good, so it dictates that we be displeased by a dishonorable evil. Yet there he denies that this detestation is an act of a special virtue distinct from the others, because it can be an act of any appetitive virtue: “Every virtue,” he says, “that inclines one to take pleasure in an honorable good also inclines one to detest and be displeased by the opposing dishonorable evil. Thus chastity inclines one to displeasure at something disordered against chastity, humility at a disordered act of pride, and so on. Yet every virtue inclining one to such displeasure is an operative virtue, since nothing is a principle of hating, just as nothing is a principle of loving, except an appetitive virtue. From this it is clear that it is wrong to posit detestation of sin as an act of the virtue of penance, when speaking of penance as a virtue in the first sense, as a species of justice, because this act is much more general than the proper act of the virtue of penance as justice, elicited by that virtue.” The Doctor does not deny that detestation of any sin can be an act commanded by the virtue of penance; he means only that it is not an act elicited by it. — At the same place, n. 12, he teaches the same about the third meaning of penance, insofar as it is voluntary acceptance of punishment inflicted for a sin committed: “I say that this act too can be an act of virtue, because it accords with right reason. Second, it can belong to many virtues, each of which is appetitive; for whatever can be a principle of accepting some object can be a principle of accepting another object in relation to it. Different objects can be accepted through different virtues, in relation to which the punishment inflicted for sin can be accepted. If God is loved through charity, punishment can be accepted through charity insofar as it restores one to God’s friendship. If God is desired through the virtue of hope as a good for me, punishment can be accepted through hope as ordering one to that attainable reward. If the loss of eternal life is avoided through the virtue of fear, punishment can be accepted through that virtue as excluding that loss. If someone loves purity and innocence for himself through an honorable friendship with himself, he can accept through that friendship punishment which dissolves the debt incurred.” — (As for the fourth act, the Doctor teaches in the same place that it is not a special act of the virtue of penance, but of patience, since patience is to bear punishment inflicted steadfastly and patiently tolerate every adversity.) From this it follows that penance has the character of a special virtue insofar as it inclines one to avenge sin, but not insofar as it is detestation of sin, or unwillingness to have sinned, as the Thomists maintain. For that detestation of sin can be elicited by any virtue to which sin, in general or in a particular kind, is opposed; for it belongs to the same virtue to pursue good and flee from, detest, and be displeased by evil. And the virtue by which one is displeased by something is also the virtue by which one grieves over it insofar as it is present and applied; hence whichever virtue detests sin also detests the vice opposed to it.

THE THOMISTS REPLY that this is indeed true if detestation occurs insofar as sin is opposed to the dictate of right reason and the particular honesty intended by each virtue. But it is otherwise if sin to be expiated and detested is considered insofar as it is an offense against God; in this respect, they say, it is a special act of the virtue of penance, which does not belong to another virtue. — Against this: it belongs not only to penance to grieve over sin insofar as it is an offense against God and to execrate it, but also to charity. For it belongs to the same virtue to pursue a good and turn away from and execrate what is opposed to it; but every sin, under the aspect of an offense, is opposed to God, who is the object of charity. Therefore, charity must execrate sin under this aspect. The minor is proved: charity grieves over sin insofar as it is contrary to its object, or ultimate end, and to God toward whom it tends. But sin is precisely contrary to God under the aspect of offense; for it is an offense insofar as it removes God’s friendship with humanity, turns one away from the ultimate end, and turns one toward a creature. These two things are most opposed to charity, which tends toward God under the motive of friendship and conversion. Therefore, charity execrates sin for no other reason than that it is an offense against God. Consequently, this detestation pertains to the virtue of penance only insofar as it is at least remotely commanded by penance; and so an act of command proper to penance must be presupposed to that act.

YOU WILL OBJECT 1: The holy Fathers and Councils usually express penance only by sorrow and detestation for sins, and assert that this detestation is the final and perfect disposition for justification, both within the sacrament and outside it. Thus the Council of Trent, sess. XIV, ch. 6, defines contrition by sorrow and detestation: Contrition, it says, is sorrow of soul and detestation for the sin committed. Hence, in sess. VI, ch. 6, when assigning the manner of preparation for justification, it mentions not vengeance for sin but detestation alone: They are moved, it says, against their sins by a certain hatred and detestation, that is, by the penance which ought to be undertaken before baptism. Therefore, etc. — I answer that the Fathers and Councils speak this way because sorrow and detestation for sin are included as a primary effect in the will to avenge it. If this will is effective for the remission of sins, it must inflict punishment and consequently command sorrow. Since, according to the etymology of its name, to do penance means the same as to undergo punishment, and since punishment is undergone when sorrow is elicited and detestation formed, penance is therefore considered complete only when it has its term or effect and obtains the character of justice, which restores God’s right through vengeance. It is under this aspect that the holy Fathers and Councils consider penance when they call it sorrow of soul and detestation for sin committed.

As to the Council of Trent’s latter authority, I say that it treats of detestation of sin arising not from the motive of penance but from charity, as is clear from the preceding words: They begin to love him (God) as the source of all justice and are therefore moved against their sins by a certain hatred and detestation. By these words it signifies that the motive and cause of that hatred and detestation is love of God; consequently, it is not an act elicited by the virtue of penance, but one commanded by it.

YOU WILL OBJECT 2: Willing to avenge sin and detesting it are one and the same act: for whoever detests sin, insofar as it is in him, wills it to be absent and consequently wills to avenge it. Therefore, if the act of vengeance is an act of the virtue of penance, the act of detestation will be so as well. — I DENY the antecedent. For the act of vengeance is an act of pursuit, since it is a willing of punishment to be inflicted in retribution for sin; the act of detestation, however, is an act of flight, since it is an unwillingness for sin. Therefore, just as love of some honorable thing and hatred of the opposing disgraceful thing are not in reality one and the same act but several acts, at least formally distinct, even if perhaps elicited by the same virtue, so willing to avenge and detest sin are not one and the same act—especially when they can proceed from different virtues, as happens here. Detestation of sin can proceed solely from the motive of charity, hope, or another virtue opposed to that sin; for this reason it cannot be an act of vengeance, since that requires the motive of justice.

YOU WILL PRESS: At least, detestation of sin virtually contains the will to avenge sin; consequently, at least virtually they are one and the same act. — I answer that the discussion concerns the act considered formally, insofar as it proceeds from a special virtue, and therefore the objection is irrelevant. Further, if detestation of sin includes the will to avenge only virtually, it follows that those two acts are formally distinct, just as every act is formally distinct from the cause in which it is virtually contained.

From these points, therefore, it follows that penance is not a general virtue either by way of predication, as though it were a general condition and transcendent predicate extending to all virtues, as the Altissiodorensian, Major, and certain other theologians maintain, or by the aggregation of all virtues, as our own Alensis seems to suggest. He indeed admits that penance is a special virtue insofar as it is an act by which the penitent punishes himself in compensation for his offense; but he considers it general with respect to the act of hating and detesting all sins, since each virtue contributes to the act of hating all sins, at least by commanding it. For hatred of the object contrary to a virtue—that is, sin—arises from love of that virtue’s object. Hence Alensis thinks penance can be called a general virtue by concomitance and aggregation of all virtues. The contrary, however, is evident not only from what we have said but also from this reasoning: if the virtue of penance were general by the concomitance and aggregation of the other virtues, it would follow that the penitent could not detest all sins through a single act elicited by the virtue of penance. Since each virtue has its own limited and distinct object and cannot tend toward the object of another virtue, it would follow that detesting sins against all virtues would require an act of every virtue. Thus the sinner could not be justified through penance in a single instant, since he could not be justified unless he detested all sins; but he could not detest all sins without exercising acts of every virtue, which he cannot exercise in an instant. This is absurd; therefore the conclusion from which it follows is absurd as well.

Three things above all must be determined in this Question: first, whether penance is an acquired or infused virtue, theological or moral; second, on the supposition that it is moral, to which of the four cardinal virtues it is reduced; third, granted that it must be reduced to some species of justice, whether it is comprised under commutative or distributive justice. These matters may be made known more easily and clearly as follows.

NOTE 1. Virtues, considered generally in relation to God, are of three kinds. Some have God as their object and proximate end, so that it belongs to the nature of these virtues to refer their acts to God; such are the theological virtues, whose object is God himself, either to be believed, hoped for, or loved. Others have God neither as their object nor as their proximate end, as fortitude, whose object is death or something similar, while its proximate end, at least intrinsically, is not God but something else: for example, when someone exposes himself to death for his country, so that, once the enemy has been driven off, people may live in peace. For the material object of this act of fortitude is death; its formal object, or intrinsic end, is peace, or a peaceful and tranquil life. Hence, if such an act is referred to God, this reference will be only to an extrinsic end, and will take place through the virtue not of fortitude but of charity or religion. Others, finally, although they do not have God as their object, nevertheless have him as their end to whom, that is, the proximate end toward which all their acts are directed. Such are religion and penance, whose acts are immediately ordered to God. They are therefore close to the theological virtues, and are for the most part commanded by them.

NOTE 2. According to the Doctor, d. 14, q. 3, n. 5: “A virtue is not judged moral for the reason that it is known and elicited solely from prior natural cognition, rather than from revelation or faith. For, he says, according to the Philosopher a moral virtue is so called because it is generated by custom or habit. But through any kind of knowledge, whether acquired by the light of nature or by faith, the appetite can be inclined accordingly, and by frequent action can generate in itself a habit inclining it in this way. This will be an elective habit, because it is appetitive, and is according to right reason, though not natural reason but another kind of reason. In this way poverty, humility, chastity, and the like are moral virtues, because they are generated according to perfect and right reason, though not purely natural reason, through custom—that is, through frequently choosing in this way.” Hence he concludes: “Therefore, once this rule known from the Gospel, ‘Do penance,’ Matthew 3, is presupposed, the will can, by frequently eliciting an act conformed to this rule, generate in itself a habit inclining it to similar acts; and this will truly be a virtue, because it accords with right reason, indeed with the most perfectly right reason, and yet it will be moral, because generated by habit and custom.” Thus the Doctor. By these words he indicates that although, in order to be a Christian virtue, penance must be elicited for the sake of God who has been offended, on the supposition of a divine precept known through revelation, it will nonetheless be a moral virtue, generated and acquired through repeated acts. Hence, for a virtue to be infused and supernatural, it is not enough that it presuppose knowledge received from revelation; in addition, its acquisition must wholly exceed human powers, so that it cannot be obtained except by God’s giving and infusing it.

NOTE 3. All moral virtues are reduced to the four cardinal virtues, which are called cardinal because the others turn upon them as a door turns on its hinges. They are justice, fortitude, temperance, and prudence. It is clear that penance is not reduced to prudence, fortitude, or temperance, since those virtues are concerned only with moderating and regulating the passions of the sensitive appetite, whereas penance concerns all sins, both spiritual and bodily. Hence the only difficulty remaining to be weighed is the reduction of penance to justice. Since the formal character of justice consists in the obligation and duty of rendering what is owed according to right reason, it extends to various species of virtue: for twenty-two virtues are counted, both immediate and mediate, of which justice is predicated as of its species. These are latria, piety, dulia, hyperdulia, legal justice, equity, benevolence, affability, beneficence, truthfulness, friendship, liberality, penance, reverence, observance, mercy, vindication, gratitude, and punitive, restitutive, distributive, and commutative justice. The sufficiency and proper enumeration of all these are gathered from the four principal debts a person may have: either in relation to the cause on which one depends as an effect; or in relation to one’s own condition and nature; or with respect to a second and added perfection; or with respect to voluntary action. Since the present discussion is especially about the ordering of a person in respect of an obligation that arises through voluntary action, it should be understood that this voluntary action presupposes a deed, or does not. If it presupposes a deed, that deed is either good or bad for the person. If good, the person is obliged to make recompense according to his ability, which he does through the virtue of gratitude. If bad, he is bound by office to correct it, toward which punitive justice inclines him; and in particular, if the wrongdoer has injured his neighbor, he is bound to make satisfaction, toward which restitutive justice inclines him. If, however, the voluntary action presupposes no deed but is on equal terms, then a twofold obligation may arise: either to equality according to geometric proportion, which is exercised by distributive justice, or to equality according to arithmetic proportion, which is exercised by commutative justice.

First conclusion. — PENANCE IS A MORAL VIRTUE, NOT A THEOLOGICAL ONE; ACQUIRED, NOT INFUSED. This is the Doctor’s position with respect to both parts, the first of which

He explains in In IV Sent., d. 14, q. 2, n. 9, where he says: “From this there could be a doubt about the relation of this virtue to charity: for since penance, through its act, commands an act of charity, it seems to be superior to charity. But the contrary is clear, because the per se object of charity is God under the most noble objective character, whereas the proper object of this virtue is a punishable wrong, or the guilty person against whom punishment is to be inflicted.” Hence he concludes that “penance is not only not a theological virtue, but is not even simply the most noble virtue among those concerned with a created object.” Accordingly, at n. 20 he says: “Finally, I say that it is not a theological virtue, but is concerned with a created object.”

This truth is therefore proved by an argument of the Doctor, drawn from In III Sent., d. 26, q. 1, n. 15, where he says: Three conditions are held to belong to a theological virtue: first, it regards God as its object; second, it has as its rule the first rule of human acts, not an acquired rule; third, it is infused immediately by God as efficient cause. But none of these conditions applies to penance. Not the first, since penance is directed immediately not toward God but toward sin, to be avenged and punished. For, as we shall say presently, it is punitive or vindictive justice, whose formal object is the correspondence of punishment to guilt, and whose material object is punishment and guilt themselves.

YOU WILL SAY: In avenging sin, the penitent intends to make satisfaction to God for the injury inflicted; therefore penance is directed toward God as its object. — I deny the inference, for he does not intend to make satisfaction to God as though the satisfaction or punishment itself were the proximate end and ultimate motive he proposes to himself. He intends it only because making satisfaction to God and punishing sin are good. Thus the one making satisfaction, and consequently punishing himself, has as the formal object to which he is directed, not God, whom he does not love by that act, but the will by which he desires to make satisfaction to God, and this is certainly something created. Accordingly, just as obedience, although it wills to obey God, and religion, although it wills to worship God, are not for that reason theological virtues, because they are not immediately concerned with God but obedience with the thing commanded and religion with divine worship, which are created beings; so penance, although it intends to make satisfaction to God, should not on this account be judged a theological virtue, because it is not immediately concerned with God but with sin to be avenged.

YOU WILL PRESS: Penance intends to appease God; but that appeasement is something uncreated, for it is an act of the divine will accepting our acts of service and pardoning our offenses; therefore, and so on. — I distinguish the minor premise: that appeasement is something uncreated on God’s part and in its completed state, I grant, because pardoning sins belongs to God alone; on the penitent’s part and in its becoming, I deny. For the penitent is not immediately concerned with that appeasement and remission, but only with works suited to appease God, which he wills to offer in order to obtain that remission of sins. The offering of these works is in itself good and honorable, even if no pardon of sins were to follow from it. Hence the primary act of penance is to will to punish sin and to offer works of satisfaction by which God may be appeased.

The second condition of a theological virtue is likewise absent from penance, since it is not regulated by the first rule of human acts, namely, either God under some essential or attributive character, or the divine will known through revelation, but by the dictate of reason, which declares that punishment must be proportioned to sin and satisfaction to the gravity of the offense.

It has still less of the third condition, namely, that it be infused by God as efficient cause. For, as the Doctor says in the aforementioned d. 14, q. 2, n. 20: From many acts of justly avenging the guilty person in oneself, a habit can be acquired that remains along with mortal sin; it could be acquired before mortal sin is blotted out, were it not perhaps that God justifies before sufficient acts for the generation of penance can be had. This position is proved as follows. Infused virtues are admitted only so that they may incline the recipient to acts necessary for salvation: thus the habit of faith inclines one to believe, of hope to hope, and of charity to love God as one ought. But the habit of penance, if considered in itself, could not incline its recipient to an act of repenting necessary for salvation; therefore it would be pointless. The major premise is established. The minor is proved: an act of penance is said to be necessary for salvation insofar as it disposes the soul to the infusion of the virtues at the moment of justification. But the act that is the dispositive cause of a subject’s reception of an infused habit cannot be produced by that infused habit itself; therefore, and so on. The major premise is taught by the Council of Trent, sess. VI, chs. 9 and 7, where penance is listed among the dispositions required beforehand in an adult for receiving justification. And in sess. XIV, ch. 4, it says of attrition conceived from fear of hell and punishments, if it excludes the will to sin and is accompanied by hope of pardon, that it does not make a person a hypocrite and greater sinner, but is truly a gift of God and an impulse of the Holy Spirit, not yet indeed indwelling, but only moving, by which the penitent, helped, prepares the way for himself to righteousness. The minor is proved: every form to be introduced follows the disposition for it; therefore an act of a penitent necessary for salvation cannot be elicited by an infused habit of penance, for which it is a disposition, especially according to the Thomists, who admit moral virtues infused in themselves and maintain that they are infused only at justification.

YOU WILL SAY 1: Natural and acquired penance does not suffice for the blotting out of guilt; therefore infused penance is required for this. The antecedent is proved from the Council of Trent, sess. III, can. 3: If anyone says that a person can believe, hope, love, or repent as he ought, without the prevenient inspiration of the Holy Spirit and his help, so that the grace of justification may be conferred on him, let him be anathema. Therefore, just as believing, hoping, and loving are supernatural acts in their substance, so too repenting, in order to be a proper disposition for the remission of sins, must be supernatural. — I distinguish the antecedent: natural penance does not suffice both in substance and in manner, I grant; natural in substance and supernatural in manner, I deny. Therefore the act of penance that is preparation for justification is indeed supernatural in manner, because it is elicited only by the benefit of grace and the help of the Holy Spirit. In this respect acts of the moral virtues, insofar as they are meritorious, are called supernatural—not in substance but in manner, since they cannot be pleasing and acceptable to God in the order of salvation without the benefit of grace. The Council intended nothing else: there it defines only, against the Pelagians and Semi-Pelagians, that a person cannot be justified by the powers of nature alone, without God’s special help. Hence one cannot infer from it that penance is supernatural in substance, but only in manner, which is certainly necessary for fruitful penance.

YOU WILL INSIST: Acquired habits naturally incline one to produce acts like those from which they were generated. Therefore, if a natural habit is generated from acts of penance that contribute to salvation, it will follow that this habit inclines one to produce acts sufficient for salvation, and consequently that we can repent by the powers of nature alone, which is Pelagian. — I distinguish the antecedent: they incline one to produce like acts in substance, I grant; in manner, I deny. For just as a divine precept may be kept with respect to the substance of the act, even though it is not observed with respect to the end intended by God who commands it—for example, if someone fasts during Lent while in a state of mortal sin, he fulfills the precept with respect to the substance of the act, but not with respect to the end intended by God who commands and intends that the act be meritorious—so an acquired habit of penance can indeed incline the will to an act of repentance with respect to the being and substance of the act, namely, to wish one had not sinned; yet it does not incline it with respect to the end intended by the one commanding, namely, God’s intention that this act of repentance be the final disposition for grace.

Second conclusion. — PENANCE IS REDUCED TO JUSTICE. This is the Doctor’s position, In IV Sent., d. 14, q. 2, n. 5, where he proves that willing to punish sin is not an act of the friendship by which a person is reconciled with God, because it is not an act of an appetitive virtue that orders one to oneself, but to another. “There follows,” he says, “another conclusion: repenting is not an act of an appetitive virtue that orders one to oneself, such as temperance and fortitude; therefore it is an act of a virtue that orders one to another, such as justice. This argument holds on the supposition of that famous division of the appetitive virtues, according to which they are reduced entirely to two classes. The antecedent is proved, because a person can exercise this act of avenging in the same way, according to right reason, upon another as upon himself. Even if he exercises it upon himself, he does so upon himself only as upon another, because he exercises it upon himself only insofar as the Legislator commits to him the task of avenging this accused person. But it is accidental that the person to whom this is committed as a minister of the Judge is the accused person himself, since he would exercise it according to the right reason of a minister upon the accused in the same way if the accused were an entirely different person. Therefore this virtue, whose nature consists in this act, is contained under justice, insofar as justice is generally defined as every virtue that orders one to another.” By these words the Doctor makes clear that this act, which is avenging sin, may be elicited by someone with respect to another just as with respect to himself; and when someone avenges his own sin, he deals with himself as though he were acting toward another. Consequently, this act does not belong to a virtue that orders one to oneself, but to another. But if you object that willing to avenge sin is not an act directed toward another but of a person toward himself, the Doctor replies in the same place that “it is no obstacle that, in his act, he is ordered to himself, because he is ordered to himself only as to another, that is, as the minister of the Judge against the accused who has acted against the law, over whom authority has been entrusted to him by the Judge.” That is, when someone punishes himself for sin, he acts as God’s minister. Hence, although he is at once accused and judge, in order to chastise himself he is, as it were, virtually distinguished from himself insofar as he is accused.

YOU WILL SAY 1: Penance is reduced to charity; therefore it is not referred to justice. The antecedent is proved: penance is reduced to the virtue from which its proper act, contrition, is elicited. But contrition is elicited by charity: for sorrow over sins on account of God, loved above all, is an act of contrition, since it belongs to the same virtue to rejoice in a friend’s good and to grieve and be sorrowful over his evils. Therefore the act of contrition proceeds from charity. — I DENY the antecedent; and in answer to its proof I say that contrition can be considered in two ways: namely, insofar as it is sorrow for sin through simple displeasure at sin, or insofar as it is sorrow for sin with the intention of avenging it and making satisfaction to God who has been offended. In the former way it belongs to charity, but not in the latter.

YOU WILL INSIST: It belongs to the same virtue to hate and intend the destruction of that which is opposed to the object pursued by that virtue. But charity intends God as the supreme good, to which sin is opposed; therefore to grieve over sin with the intention of destroying it belongs to charity. — I distinguish the major premise: under the aspect in which that evil is opposed to the good intended by the virtue itself, I grant; under another aspect, I deny. To the minor premise I say that charity grieves over sin with the intention of destroying it under the aspect in which sin is opposed to the divine good intended by charity. But to grieve over sin with the intention of avenging and punishing it is not an act of charity but of penance, as has already been demonstrated.

YOU WILL SAY 2: Justice consists in a mean, since it is a moral virtue; but penance does not consist in a mean, since it tends toward excess, according to Jeremiah 6: “Make for yourself the mourning of an only child, a bitter lamentation.” Therefore it is not reduced to justice. — I answer first, to the major premise, that a virtue is not said to consist in a mean because it must necessarily stand between two vices, one deviating from the dictate of right reason by excess, the other by defect. For virginity, which is the most noble virtue, not only moderates but altogether excludes venereal pleasure, and so it does not concern pleasurable passions by moderating excess or defect, but by wholly excluding pleasure. Therefore virtue in general is said to consist in a mean insofar as it is measured by the dictate of right reason. I answer second, by explaining the minor premise: for the mean of justice is equality, which exists between those among whom justice is found, as Aristotle says in bk. V of the Ethics. But in certain cases perfect equality cannot be established because of the excellence of one party, for example, between father and son, or between God and man. Therefore one who falls short in such cases ought to do whatever he can, so as to accomplish to the best of his ability what contributes to equality. Thus penance ought to be intensified as much as possible, so that the penitent may, to the best of his ability, restore the divine right. Accordingly, no matter how much someone repents, his penance will not be vicious on the part of justice. Hence, however much someone detests his sins for God’s sake, he does not sin; indeed, the greater his detestation and avenging of sin, the more perfect his penance. I answer third, with Pitiganis, that virtue in general can consist in a mean in either of four ways: “First, both on the part of the object and on the part of the circumstances, as temperance, against which one may sin by excess or defect, and likewise against certain circumstances, by eating too much or too little, or when and where one ought not. Second, some virtues have superabundance on the part of the object, but are at the mean on the part of the circumstance. For the Philosopher says in bk. IV of the Ethics, ch. 4, that the magnanimous person is extreme in greatness, yet is at the mean in doing what is fitting; such are magnanimity and fortitude. This is because magnanimity concerns the greatest things, and fortitude has the utmost terrors as its object; and because if a magnanimous person deemed himself worthy of more than he ought, he would be vain, whereas if of less, he would be pusillanimous; and if a brave person exposed himself to death for empty glory, he would be rash, and so on. Third, there are virtues that are in a state of deficiency on the part of the circumstance, such as virginity, which rejects all venereal pleasure and thus takes an extreme with respect to matter; but it holds the mean with respect to circumstances, because it observes this for the time when it is expedient to observe it—that is, for a time when abstaining from carnal union is neither commanded nor counseled by God—and also observes it for the proper purpose, namely, so that the mind may be more freely devoted to spiritual things. Fourth, some virtues have superabundance and not defect, such as magnanimity and fortitude; conversely, some have more superabundance, such as latria; and some have more defect, such as temperance.” These points having been established, it may be said that penance consists in a mean by way of defect and excess: for example, if someone detests a small sin more than a great one, or grieves more over a sin because of the loss of some temporal good than of a spiritual one. Thus Pitiganis.

Third conclusion. — PENANCE IS NOT STRICTLY SPEAKING COMMUTATIVE OR DISTRIBUTIVE JUSTICE, BUT VINDICTIVE JUSTICE. This is the Doctor’s position, In IV Sent., d. 14, q. 2, n. 8, where, speaking of the act of penance, he says: This act, then, is an act of punitive justice, which is distinguished from commutative justice and also from friendship.

The first two parts of the conclusion are proved together, namely, that penance is neither commutative nor distributive justice. For virtues that have different formal objects are distinct from one another; but penance, commutative justice, and distributive justice regard different formal objects. For commutative justice regards equality of thing to thing, that is, a strict debt to be repaid in equality; distributive justice regards equality of rewards or punishments in proportion to praiseworthy acts and faults. But penance cannot restore to equality the divine right injured by sin, because an offense committed against God cannot be sufficiently expiated by any human satisfaction unless God intervenes and freely pardons the offense out of clemency and mercy. Therefore penance is reduced to neither species of justice. — This is confirmed, especially with respect to distributive justice, because it is the justice of a superior toward an inferior: for it belongs to a superior to distribute common goods and punishments to inferiors, to each in proportion to his merit or demerit. Penance, however, belongs rather to an inferior, namely, a creature in relation to God. Furthermore, distributive justice assigns punishments or goods to one person in relation to another, whom it also punishes or rewards; but penance does not punish one penitent in relation to another, but in relation to the guilt committed against God. Therefore, and so on.

Finally, the third part is proved, namely, that penance is vindictive justice. First, by an authority drawn from the book On True and False Penance, cited above by us, which defines penance as follows: It is the vengeance of one who grieves, always punishing in himself what he grieves to have committed. If it is vengeance, then it is vindictive. — Moreover, the sacrament of penance is a tribunal of justice, but of no justice other than vindictive justice; therefore, and so on. The Council of Trent simultaneously confirms the major and minor premises, sess. XIV, ch. 2, where, speaking of the baptized, it says: For it willed that if these should later defile themselves with some crime, they should not be cleansed by a repetition of baptism, since this is in no way permitted in the Catholic Church, but should be brought as guilty persons before this tribunal (of penance).... They obtain full and complete remission of sins, which we can in no way attain through the sacrament of penance without our great weeping and labors, since divine justice (vindictive justice) demands this. And in ch. 5 it indicates that a sinner may publicly confess his sins in order to avenge them: However, it says, although Christ did not forbid anyone to confess his sins publicly for the avenging of his crimes and his humiliation, both for the example of others and for the edification of the Church, which has been offended, and so on. And in ch. 8, On Works of Satisfaction, it establishes: Let them (the priests) keep before their eyes that the satisfaction they impose is not only for the preservation of new life and as a remedy for weakness, but also for the avenging and chastisement of past sins. — This is confirmed: God, by vindictive justice, ordains that sin be remitted through punishment and penitential acts in the sacrament of penance; therefore, when exercising penitential acts, the sinner ought to have this same end and motive. The inference is clear, because a minister, in proceeding rightly to inflict punishment, must act according to the end of the law and the lawgiver, since this is the end of ministerial power, which is intended by the principal delegating cause. But in carrying out punishment upon himself through the virtue of penance, the sinner acts as a minister of God the Judge. For, as Tertullian says in On Penance, this virtue in pronouncing judgment upon the sinner performs the office of God’s indignation. Therefore, just as God prescribes punishment from the motive of vindictive justice, so the penitent ought to prescribe punishment for himself from the same motive.

St. Augustine teaches this admirably when he advises in bk. 50 of the Homilies, hom. 50: Let a person set up the tribunal of his mind against himself, if he fears what ought not to be presented before the tribunal of Christ, where each will receive what he has done in the body, whether good or evil. Let him place himself before his own face; and, once judgment has been established in his heart, let accusatory thought be present, conscience as witness, fear as executioner. From there the blood of the confessing soul indeed flows in tears. Finally, let such a sentence be pronounced by the mind itself that a person judges himself unworthy to share in the Body and Blood of the Lord. Let one who fears being separated from the kingdom of heaven by the final sentence of the supreme Judge be separated for a time, through ecclesiastical discipline, from the sacrament of the heavenly homeland. Let the image of the future judgment turn before his eyes, so that when others approach the altar of God, while he does not, he may consider how greatly he must tremble at that punishment by which, while others receive eternal life, he himself with others will be cast into eternal death.

YOU WILL SAY 1: Penance is not reduced to commutative justice; but according to the Doctor, In IV Sent., d. 19, q. 1, n. 26, punitive justice is the same as commutative justice, for he says: I say, then, that just as in other exchanges commutative justice allows a certain latitude, since in exchanges it does not regard an indivisible point but the mean of right reason, so punitive justice, which is the commutation of punishment for guilt, does not necessarily regard an indivisible degree of punishment corresponding to this guilt; rather, there is some latitude, below which the punishment is insufficient, and beyond which a greater punishment ought not to be imposed. He says something similar in In IV Sent., d. 16, q. 1, n. 4: For the present purpose, commutative justice properly regards punishment and reward, so that rewards are rendered, as it were, in exchange for merits, and punishments for sins. — I answer that in those places the Doctor does not take commutative justice strictly, as that which regards the mean to be observed in things and in exchanges properly so called. In this sense it is distinguished from punitive justice: the latter preserves a certain equality in punishments in relation to the debt of faults, whereas the former does so in exchanges of things. Hence he also pointedly adds “as it were, in exchange,” by which he indicates that punishment is not an act of commutative justice taken strictly, but in a somewhat broader sense, insofar as it preserves equality of quantity and regards arithmetic proportion like commutative justice strictly so called. It does not preserve geometric proportion, as distributive justice does; hence it is reduced to commutative rather than distributive justice, although properly it is neither, but only resembles them in a certain proportion and likeness.

YOU WILL SAY 2: Vindictive justice exists only in a Judge or superior who inflicts punishment, not in a subject and accused person; therefore a sinner who punishes himself through penance does not do so by vindictive justice. — I DISTINGUISH the antecedent: it exists in a superior principally and with authority, I grant; ministerially and executively, I deny. For it exists in a subject and inferior in this latter way.

YOU WILL PRESS: To carry out and inflict punishment is not, properly speaking, to do penance; therefore penance is not vindictive justice even executively. The antecedent is proved: someone could will to take on punishment for his sins without having a purpose of not sinning again or sorrow for past sins, which penance certainly requires. — I deny the antecedent, and in answer to its proof I say that such an undertaking of punishment would not be true vengeance for past sins, at least in this life, because it would not be according to the laws of vindictive and punitive justice prescribed by God, which first of all require sorrow and a purpose of amendment. Hence, just as someone does not truly worship God, even if he has the will to worship, if he does not join an interior act of religion to external worship, so neither does someone truly repent or avenge sin if he does not employ the means ordered to that end.

YOU WILL SAY 3: The punishment that the penitent inflicts must be voluntary in the person who undergoes it, since it is an act of a virtue existing in his will; but the punishment inflicted by vindictive justice is involuntary with respect to the one who suffers it; therefore penance is not vindictive justice. — THE DOCTOR REPLIES, In IV Sent., d. 11, q. 1, n. 13, that punishment is involuntary when compared with the will that follows the desire for what is advantageous. Yet, he says, it can be voluntary by an antecedent will, namely, through the voluntary application of causes from which it follows. It can also be voluntary by a just will that accepts it, and this by a consequent will following the desire for justice, because in this way it accepts whatever is ordered to something justly willed for its own sake; but this sorrow can be ordered to something justly willed for its own sake. He had said beforehand, at n. 11, that what is simply involuntary is that against which the will simply remonstrates; and conversely, by opposition, the voluntary can be understood in three ways: first, that against which the will does not altogether remonstrate, but patiently endures; second, what it voluntarily accepts; third, what it voluntarily causes; and this in two ways, namely, either as a proximate partial cause that does not intend the effect joined to it, or as a principal remote cause that does intend the effect; thus there are four members. He adds the reason for this distinction: For, he says, in the first two ways sorrow is only the object of volition; in the third it is only an effect, and not an object; but in the fourth it is both object and effect, unless something impedes it.

NOTE 1. Since a habitual virtue becomes known only through acts, and acts through their objects, the being and nature of the virtue of penance can be declared and made manifest no better than through knowledge of its object. Its object, however, is twofold: one is material, the other formal, so named by analogy with the matter and form that physically constitute some whole. For just as matter is of itself indifferent to various forms, and consequently to the constitution of various composites, but through form is determined to a certain composite, so a thing about which virtues are occupied, since of itself it is indifferent to various reasons for love or hatred, and consequently to the constitution of various virtues, is called the material object; whereas the very motive reason for love or hatred, by which that thing is determined to constitute a certain virtue, is called the formal object. Thus, for example, money to be given to a needy person can be called the material object, because it is indifferent to the virtue of almsgiving, of liberality, and of restitutive justice; but the giving of that money to relieve the needy person’s misery out of compassion determines the very bestowal of the money to the virtue of almsgiving, just as giving it in order to restore what was taken determines that money to the virtue of restitutive justice.

NOTE 2. The material object of a virtue is again twofold, namely, remote and proximate. I call the proximate object that about which the virtue is occupied first: thus an internal or external act of divine worship, taken as a sign of God’s supreme excellence and of our reverence and subjection toward him, can be called the proximate object of the virtue of Religion. Likewise, the proximate material object of Penance, insofar as it is vindicative justice, can be called everything taken to constitute equality between guilt and punishment, namely, the punishment itself corresponding to the guilt. (This, indeed, is nothing other than an internal or external act taken for vindication; for punishment is that about which the primary effect of Penance is concerned, that is, what Penance immediately intends, since it intends to inflict punishment for a sin committed.) But I call the remote object that between which and the internal act elicited by the virtue of Penance something intervenes: thus between sin, or evil insofar as it is subject to vindication, and the internal act of Penance, namely, the will to vindicate, there intervenes vengeance. Hence it follows that evil insofar as it is subject to vindication is the remote object.

NOTE 3. Evil subject to vindication is nothing other than that which merits punishment in vengeance and which God wills to be punished. It follows that every sin, not only mortal but also venial, is included under the aspect of evil subject to vindication. For although venial sin does not gravely offend God, and therefore does not merit a grave punishment or penalty, nevertheless it is certain that it merits some punishment: punishment is correlated with guilt; therefore, where the guilt is light, the punishment and penalty must at least be light. This punishment is owed for the sin so long as it remains under the aspect of sin and offense against God, and consequently until it is washed away through Penance: “For, says the Doctor, In IV Sent., d. 14, q. 1, n. 7, after the act of sin, when the offense, stain, and debt have ceased, nothing remains except this relation of reason, namely, an ordering to punishment, which, as it is something unfitting to the soul itself, is called its stain, just as the opposite is called beauty; but insofar as it is an obligation formally to that punishment, it is called debt; and insofar as it is an act of the divine will, in which this whole reality consists, by which act it is ordered to such punishment, it is called offense. For in God to be offended or angry is nothing other than to will to avenge with this punishment; and although God is said figuratively to be angry or offended, yet, taking this account of being angry to mean willing to avenge, with the passion accompanying this willing excluded, God is formally angry or offended, because he formally wills to avenge a sin committed against his law.” Hence, he adds in n. 8 that what was said to remain in the sinner after the act can be erased, and sometimes is erased, in accord with that of the Creed, the remission of sins. And in n. 9: “I say that it is not remitted without punishment, or an equivalent in divine acceptance, because by every sin God is offended, as Scripture sufficiently proclaims; but his offense or anger, as was said, is his willing to avenge, or to exact something sufficient to appease him. Therefore, given any sin whatsoever, God wills to avenge himself upon the sinner; but to will to avenge is to will to punish. Therefore, after a sin has been committed, some punishment or equivalent in divine acceptance is required for its removal. So says the Doctor.” By these words he signifies that habitual sin, too, is included under the object of the virtue of Penance.

These points being established, three things remain to be determined: first, what is the proximate object toward which Penance tends; second, what is its remote material object; third, what is its formal object.

First conclusion. — THE PROXIMATE OBJECT OF THE VIRTUE OF PENANCE IS ANY ACT OF THE PENITENT, WHETHER INTERNAL OR EXTERNAL, THAT IS ELICITED AND TAKEN UP TO AVENGE SIN.

The truth of this assertion is evident from the second Note. For just as the proximate material object of commutative justice is everything taken to constitute equality between what is given and what is received, while the objects of distributive justice are rewards or common goods distributed according to each person’s merit, so, by the same reasoning, the proximate material object of Penance, insofar as it is vindicative justice, will be what is taken up in vengeance for an offense committed. This, however, is nothing other than a punitive internal or external act taken up to avenge; therefore both these acts can be considered the primary object of Penance.

Furthermore, that is the primary material object of the virtue of Penance which it intends first. But Penance primarily intends a punishment to be inflicted in vengeance for a crime; for Penance primarily intends that from which it obtains its formal character and denomination. But it obtains both from the punishment taken up in vengeance: for Penance is named from the enduring of punishment, and its formal character, insofar as it is a special virtue, consists chiefly in the character of vengeance. Therefore, it derives its formal character from that punishment taken up in vengeance.

YOU WILL SAY: Punishment is an effect of penance; therefore it cannot be considered its primary object. — I DENY the consequence: for in the moral virtues the same external acts that are done by a virtue, and are effects of the internal acts of the will elicited by the virtue—I mean those very same acts—are, insofar as they are prior in the order of intention, the object or matter of other virtues, as is clear from the example of distributive and commutative justice. Why, then, could not punishment taken up in vengeance, which is as it were an effect of Penance itself, be considered its primary object?

YOU WILL PRESS: The primary object has the character of an end, at least an immediate one; but end and effect cannot be one and the same. Therefore, since the acts by which punishment is taken up in vengeance for sin have the character of an effect of Penance, they cannot be considered its primary object. — I DENY the minor premise. For it is a familiar teaching among philosophers that end and effect can coincide in the same thing under different respects. Health, for example, can be both an effect and an end of walking; and divine worship—that is, an internal or external act taken as a sign of God’s supreme excellence and of our subjection—is an effect of the virtue of Religion and also its proximate end, which that virtue intends, or the object which it intends proximately. Why, then, could not the same punishment that the penitent inflicts upon himself be both an effect and a proximate end, or the object which Penance intends proximately?

Second conclusion. — THE REMOTE MATERIAL OBJECT OF THE VIRTUE OF PENANCE IS EVERY SIN, BOTH ACTUAL AND HABITUAL, COMMITTED BY THE PENITENT.

It is proved: that is the remote material object of the virtue of Penance which it intends through some means. But Penance is directed toward sin by means of punishment taken up in vengeance; therefore one’s own sin, committed by the penitent, is considered the remote object of Penance. It could nevertheless be called the proximate object insofar as it is reached by the elicited act of Penance itself. For, as our Bosco very aptly observes, disp. 6, sect. 1, conc. 7, Penance, by the force of the same affection and effect that proceeds proximately from it, in the same movement by which it is concerned with some act, also reaches the sin. For the virtue of penance does not consist in that bare operation, that is, in the will to avenge, signified by the expression I will avenge, but through it passes to the sin itself, so that this will, I will avenge the sin, in fact applies the punishment owed for the sin. — I said that every sin, both actual and habitual, is the object of the virtue of Penance. For although sometimes a vicious habit remains even in the justified, nevertheless, as Lugo teaches, disp. 3, n. 15, this habit, as it persists, can be matter for Penance with respect to an act of retractation: for I can will that the sin had not been, so that God might not have been offended, just as after a wound or disease has been cured I can grieve over the cause that brought on the disease or wound. Moreover, I can will to avenge that sin and to make satisfaction for it, if its remission is doubtful or conditional, on the supposition that it has not been remitted. This is much truer, indeed, of habitual sin once remitted. For, as the Doctor teaches admirably, In IV Sent., d. 14, q. 1: “What remains in the sinner after the act can be erased, and sometimes is erased, in accord with that of the Creed: I believe in the remission of sins. God remits sins and sometimes remits them; this is proved as follows: sometimes a predestined person falls into mortal sin. This is clear in the cases of David, Peter, and Paul, and almost countless others. But he cannot be beatified, which is what he is principally ordained to by predestination, unless the sin is erased, taking ‘sin’ in the manner just described. For no one is beatified while remaining bound to pay a punishment, either to be paid simultaneously with glory—which is impossible, since, at the very least according to the divine disposition, that glory and any punishment whatsoever are incompatible—or to be paid after glorification, which is likewise impossible, since God ordains that glory to be final in everyone, so that no punishment will follow. Therefore, before glorification, this obligation to undergo punishment at some time must be remitted or erased. Second, I say that it is not remitted without punishment, or an equivalent in divine acceptance, because by every sin God is offended, as Scripture sufficiently proclaims; but his offense or anger, as was said, is his willing to avenge or to exact something sufficient to appease him. Therefore, given any sin whatsoever, God wills to avenge himself upon the sinner; but to will to avenge is to will to punish. Therefore, after a sin has been committed, some punishment or equivalent in divine acceptance is required for its removal.” Thus the Doctor. By these words he signifies that not only the debt of guilt remaining after a sinful action, but also a vicious habit, is subject to vengeance, or can be ordered to punishment, and consequently is the material object of the virtue of Penance.

YOU WILL SAY: A special virtue must have a special object; but Penance is a special virtue; therefore it must have a determinate object. Yet every sin is not the determinate object of some one virtue, but of all of them, since all the virtues, taken generally, contend against all sins, for each has some determinate vice to which it is opposed. — I DISTINGUISH the consequent: it must have a determinate formal object, I grant; a material one, I deny. Although Penance tends toward all sins, which are separately and distributively opposed by the other virtues, nevertheless penance tends toward sins in some special respect in which the other virtues do not reach them, namely, under the aspect of being subject to vengeance and punishment, as will appear from the following Conclusion.

Third conclusion. — THE FORMAL AND SPECIFYING OBJECT OF THE VIRTUE OF PENANCE IS SIN AS SUBJECT TO VENGEANCE. This is the Doctor’s teaching, In IV Sent., d. 14, q. 2, n. 1, where he says: “To repent is a special act” of virtue. It is proved, because that act is naturally apt to have a special object and special ordered circumstances: an object, namely, sin subject to vengeance; and circumstances that befit the act as rightly tending toward such an object, namely, its end, manner, and the like. And further on, in n. 9, he shows that Penance is less perfect than an act of charity, “because, he says, the object of charity in itself is God” under the noblest objective aspect; but the proper object of this virtue is evil subject to vengeance, or the guilty person upon whom vengeance is to be taken.

The Conclusion is proved as follows: the sin toward which Penance tends must be reached under a special aspect under which it is not reached by the other virtues; but that aspect is none other than liability to vengeance, or the obligation to punish sin; therefore, and so forth. The major premise is established. The minor premise is proved: if there were some aspect under which Penance tended toward sin, it would most likely be its malice insofar as it is to be detested and abhorred. But this aspect is not peculiar to Penance, since all the virtues, at least those tending toward God, also tend toward detestation of sin. For charity abhors sin insofar as it is an evil opposed to God’s infinite goodness, which charity considers; for every sin is an evil against God, at least extrinsically, because it displeases God and is opposed to his glory. But since it belongs to the same virtue to detest the evil opposed to the object whose pursuit belongs to that virtue, charity for this reason detests every sin. Likewise, since every sin deprives us of supernatural beatitude and subjects us to eternal punishments inflicted by God as avenger, detestation of sin from such a motive pertains not to Penance but to hope. Sin can also be considered insofar as it militates against God’s honor, reverence, and worship; and in this respect its detestation pertains to the virtue of Religion. The same must be said of the other virtues that tend toward God. Consequently, the reason for detestation cannot be proper to the virtue of Penance alone; and therefore sin as detestable is not the formal and specifying object of that virtue.

Furthermore: sin as subject to vengeance must be reached by some virtue; but it cannot be reached by any virtue other than Penance; therefore, as such, it is the specifying object of Penance. The major premise is established: for, as St. Augustine says, Confessions, bk. 1, “You have ordained, Lord, and so it is, that every sinner be a punishment to himself.” And with good reason. For, as the Doctor said above, since by every sin God is offended and is therefore moved toward the sinner by an impulse of vengeance, and since willing to avenge is the same as willing to punish, it follows that a sinful person cannot be reconciled to God or appease him without first avenging and punishing sin in himself. The minor premise is also established: for no virtue tends toward sin insofar as it is to be punished in order to make satisfaction to God, except Penance alone; therefore, and so forth.

YOU WILL SAY: The divine right, injured by the offense and to be repaired by satisfaction and a certain compensation, is the formal object of Penance; therefore, that object is not sin as subject to vengeance and punishment. — I answer, denying the antecedent: divine right considered in this way can indeed be called the end of Penance, but not its object. For Penance tends toward vengeance for sin so that, insofar as lies within the sinner, with God’s help, he may make satisfaction to God and repair the injury inflicted upon him. Thus the restoration of that divine right and the reparation of the offense are the end moving the penitent to avenge sin. Hence that divine right, insofar as it is to be compensated, has rather the character of an end than of an object with respect to the virtue of Penance.

NOTE 1. Habit in general is divided into the intellectual and the appetitive. An intellectual habit is one received subjectively in the intellect; and it is twofold: one is acquired through one’s own repeated acts; the other is infused by God, through God’s special generosity. The infused is again twofold: either as to substance, namely, one that cannot be acquired at all by any human effort, but comes from God’s sole generosity, such as the theological virtues; or as to mode, namely, one that could be acquired through one’s own effort and generated by repeated acts, but not with such ease or in so short a time; such are habits of knowledge, or of the moral virtues, sometimes granted by God to human beings. The acquired is likewise twofold, namely, speculative and practical. Speculative is that which inclines one to the bare contemplation of an object and undertakes nothing concerning it that pertains to regulating the will. This too is twofold: either real, such as metaphysics, mathematics, and physics; or rational, such as grammar, rhetoric, and logic. Practical is that which concerns things to be done, such as prudence, or things to be made, such as both mechanical and liberal arts. An appetitive habit is one that resides subjectively in the appetitive faculty. It too is twofold: acquired and infused¹. The acquired is again twofold: directed to oneself, such as fortitude and temperance, or directed to another, such as justice. The infused is likewise twofold: directed to oneself, such as hope, and directed to another, such as charity. The question, then, is to which order of habits Penance of this kind should be assigned.

NOTE 2. In general, any virtue habit has a twofold subject, namely, immediate and mediate. The first is the faculty in which that habit immediately resides and which it makes ready and prepared to elicit its acts. Some distinguish three such subjects: intellect, will, and sensitive appetite. For prudence is located in the intellect, justice in the will, and temperance and fortitude, according to St. Thomas, in the sensitive appetite. But the Subtle Doctor objects, arguing that it is received also in the will. The second consists of the persons, or supposits, in which those virtues reside. The question, therefore, is what the immediate and mediate subject of the virtue of Penance is, that is, in which faculty and in which persons it resides.

NOTE 3. An appetitive virtue is a habit that inclines the will to will and avoid something. In general, two kinds are assigned according to the twofold ordering intended by that habit. For one orders its subject toward itself, namely, to will rightly those things that concern the subject in which it resides, such as temperance and fortitude; for these virtues order a person concerning things that are fitting for that person. Another orders one toward another, namely, to render and hand over to that other what is his own, such as justice, which inclines its possessor to will for another what is his own. Hence some virtues make a person upright in himself, without any ordering toward another, such as temperance, whose effect is the moderation of the passions of the concupiscible appetite in relation to oneself; while others make a person upright in relation to another, such as justice, whose office is to govern a person so that he render to another what is his own.

These points having been observed, two matters remain to be determined: what the immediate as well as the mediate subject of the virtue of Penance is.

First conclusion. — THE VIRTUE OF PENANCE RESIDES IMMEDIATELY IN THE WILL, INSOFAR AS IT IS ORDERED TOWARD ANOTHER. So says the Doctor, d. 14, q. 2, n. 5, where he says: To repent is not an act of any intellectual virtue, because it is an act of appetite as appetite, which commands the intellect to consider and the will to detest… Moreover, this commanding belongs only to appetite, or to the will; for no sensitive power can command the intellect and the will and unite them in their acts; nor can the intellect command itself and the will: only the will commands itself and the intellect. That is, Penance is willing to avenge sin. But this willing belongs to the will alone, because commanding the intellect to consider and the will to detest the gravity of the offense belongs to the will alone. It does not belong to a sensitive power, since no sensitive faculty can command the intellect or the will; for sensitive appetite is subject to the rational appetite, in accordance with Genesis: Your desire shall be subject to you, and you shall rule over it. Nor does it belong to the intellect, because the intellect cannot command itself or the will. Therefore, that command, or willing to avenge sin, pertains to the will alone.

The Doctor confirms this, because the will alone can command itself, and also the intellect, as St. Augustine teaches in bk. XI of De Trinitate, ch. 3, where he writes that the will joins the parent to its offspring: that is, it joins the intellect, according to the intelligible species, with actual cognition, which is its offspring. Hence the parent of cognition is fecund memory, namely, the intellect made fruitful by an object or intelligible species; the offspring, however, is the act of understanding, or understanding itself. Thus the will joins the parent to its offspring when it commands the intellect to produce an act of understanding together with the object. Likewise, the will commands itself, since nothing is more within the will’s power than the will itself, that is, its act. Therefore, since commanding pertains to the will, it follows that imperative willing, or the will to avenge sin, which is the very act of the virtue of Penance, pertains to the will and not to the intellect.

Second, the Doctor proves in the same place that an intellectual virtue is ordered to cognition of the true insofar as it is true. For an intellectual virtue judges that something is true or is not true, whether in speculative or practical matters, and dictates that this is to be considered or not considered, done or not done. But Penance, or willing to avenge sin, is not an act by which something is thus dictated as to be done or avoided, considered or not considered; rather, it commands that sin be punished. Therefore, willing to avenge is not an act of the intellect or of the sensitive appetite, but of the will; and consequently the virtue of Penance resides in the will alone.

The Doctor proves the second part in the same place, namely, that willing to avenge a sin one has committed is an act of an appetitive virtue ordered toward another, of the kind that justice is, “because,” he says, “someone can exercise this act of avenging in another in the same way according to right reason as in himself. For even if he exercises it in himself, he exercises it in himself only as in another, because he avenges in himself only insofar as the Lawgiver entrusts him with avenging this accused person. It is accidental that the person entrusted to act as the judge’s minister is this accused person, since in the same way he acts according to the right reason of a minister toward the accused if that person were entirely distinct in person. Therefore this virtue, whose nature this act is², is contained under justice, insofar as justice is said generally of every virtue ordering toward another, or as it were toward another. Nor is it an obstacle that in this act he is ordered toward himself, because he is ordered toward himself only as toward another: that is, as the Judge’s minister toward the accused against the law, in which the Judge has entrusted authority to him.” So says the Doctor. By these words he signifies that when a penitent avenges a sin he has committed, he acts toward himself as though he were a distinct person: for when he prescribes and inflicts a penalty upon himself, he represents³ the person of the Judge; but when he suffers that penalty, he represents the accused, to whom the Judge prescribes a penalty to be paid.

YOU WILL SAY 1: Penance is a judgment by which the intellect dictates that a penalty must be undergone for sin, so that insofar as the sinner glorified himself in delights, he ought to undergo just so much torment and grief. But this judgment is an act of the intellect, not of the will. Therefore Penance resides in the intellect rather than in the will. — I distinguish the major premise: it is such⁴ a judgment presuppositively, I grant; formally and entitatively, I deny. Indeed, I admit that to exercise true Penance it is required beforehand that the intellect know the malice and gravity of sin, insofar as it dictates a penalty to be paid in proportion; for Deuteronomy 25 says: According to the measure of the sin shall the measure of the blows be. But the formal character of Penance does not consist in this dictation. Beyond it, the will must command vengeance for sin through sorrow of spirit, contrition of heart, and mortification of the body; and this command is precisely where the formal character of Penance chiefly consists.

YOU WILL SAY 2: Penance is ordered to wash away every sin. But it cannot wash away and expel sin unless it is in the subject in which sin resides; for it cannot expel sin except insofar as it is contrary to it. A virtue habit and a vice, like other contraries, are not considered opposed and incompatible except with respect to the same subject in which they can inhere. Therefore, for Penance to expel sin, it must be in the same subject in which sin resides. But sin is in every faculty, since one sins through the operation of any faculty. Therefore Penance must reside in every faculty. — I distinguish the major premise: it must wash away and expel sin formally, I deny; effectively, I grant. I likewise distinguish the minor premise: it cannot wash away sin formally unless it is in the subject in which sin resides, I grant; it cannot wash it away effectively and imperatively, I deny. Hence the inference must be denied. For since the formal character of Penance consists in willing to avenge sin, and this willing, by reason of the will’s dominion over the other faculties of soul and body, extends to them all and directs its command toward them, it is therefore not necessary that it exist formally in those faculties. It is enough that it reside in the will, which is the ruler and regulator of the other faculties. Add that sin does not exist formally in any faculty other than the will; for every sin is sin precisely insofar as it is free.

Second conclusion. — PENANCE COULD EXIST IN THE STATE OF INNOCENCE, AND IN ANGELS AND THE BLESSED, AT LEAST ACCORDING TO SOME ASPECT OF ITS RATIONALE; BUT PROPERLY AND FORMALLY IT EXISTS IN SINNING PENITENTS AFTER THE FALL. This is the Doctor’s position with respect to all its parts.

He explains the first part in d. 11, q. 2, n. 19, where, speaking of the angels and our first parents in the state of innocence, after saying, “To the third argument one may reply in two ways. First, since virtue is a supplement in us for natural defect (whence some do not posit moral virtues in angels), and since they would not then have been in a nature such as ours now, they would not then have needed all the virtues that we need now. This is especially so of virtues that have not the good as their object but evil, such as Penance; for in that state there would not have been that evil, just as perhaps there would not then have been Patience, since there would have been no matter for patience,” he adds another view: “Alternatively, one may say that Penance is a habit inclining one readily to avenge the accused in oneself, and that ‘in oneself’ is material, since the formal rationale of the virtue would be the same if one were entrusted to avenge another accused person. But the blessed and the innocent can have a habit of readily avenging another accused person; therefore they can have it with respect to themselves as well, if guilt were present. And so it may be granted that this virtue remains in the state of innocence and in beatitude.” Here, as is plainly evident, the Doctor presents both views as probable. Likewise, in d. 3, q. 1, he discusses problematically whether true moral virtues are found in angels. “To the first,” he says, n. 16, “one may grant that if an angel were created in pure natural powers, not having moral virtues in the will, they could be generated in him from many right choices—not with respect to passions inhering in the sensitive appetite, nor even those that were, are, or could be present, but only with respect to such passions shown universally by the intellect. Once this presentation is posited, and the intellect has dictated what would be chosen if it were possible for them to have those passions, his will, consonant with such a dictate, could acquire a right moral habit from many choices.” So says the Doctor, clearly indicating that Penance, like the other moral virtues, can concern an object not only that exists, existed, will exist, or can exist, but also an object proper to those virtues considered universally. Hence Penance, insofar as it inclines the will to avenge sin universally, abstracting from whether it was committed by one’s own person or another’s, could have existed not only in angels but also in Adam in the state of innocence. I add that Penance could truly and properly have been found in the state of innocence. For since Adam could sin venially in that state, as the Doctor teaches in In II Sent., d. 21, q. 1, n. 73, it is clear that Adam could repent of that venial sin and take vengeance for it, as the Doctor indicates plainly enough in the same place. In replying to the second opposing argument, which concerned excluding punishment from that happy state and consequently excluding every venial sin as well, he says: A punishment other than death may correspond to a venial sin, for example, some displeasure or something of that kind. Or one may say that no punishment properly corresponds to it, but one who commits a venial sin is indebted to a more fervent act of the will than before, whose fervor would consume the venial sin. Nor would it have been incompatible with Adam’s innocence to have the punishment due for a venial sin in addition to death.

YOU WILL SAY: Sacred Scripture, the Holy Fathers, and the Councils, whenever they speak of Penance, always understand by it vengeance for one’s own sin, or detestation and sorrow for sin committed together with a purpose of not sinning again. Therefore the virtue of Penance cannot exist in those in whom there is no sin; and consequently it could not have existed in angels or in Adam in the state of innocence. — I answer: that is indeed true, because they speak of Penance insofar as it is in fact a necessary disposition for the remission of sins, and not as some moral virtue inclining the will to bring about equality between punishment and guilt, in the sense in which the Doctor uses it in his second reply. In this sense Penance could also have existed in the will of the Blessed Virgin, indeed of Christ our Lord, concerning sin shown universally by the intellect. Once this presentation is posited together with the intellect’s dictate concerning what would be chosen, on the hypothesis that that sin were possible, a will also consonant with such a dictate could have repeatedly chosen vengeance for sin. From these many choices it could acquire a right moral habit of the virtue of Penance, by which the will would be inclined to bring about equality between punishment and guilt, on the supposition that the guilt itself were admitted. Hence, although the will of Christ and of the Blessed Virgin was impeccable, and consequently they could not have an absolute act of avenging sin in themselves, they could nevertheless have had a conditional act, saying: If I had sinned, I would avenge sin in myself. Since those acts, insofar as they are elicited absolutely by us, are true and perfect acts of Penance, and a perfect habit of Penance is generated in us from such acts, by similar reasoning a perfect habit could have been generated in Christ and in the Blessed Virgin from that conditional willing, since no reason for a difference is apparent.

I nevertheless admit that Penance, insofar as it signifies sorrow of spirit and detestation of sin committed, together with a purpose of not sinning again, as the Council of Trent describes it, sess. XIV, ch. 4, dividing it into contrition made perfect by charity and imperfect contrition, which is called attrition, can exist only in the will of a sinful human being. For only such a person can perform the precise act of this Penance, namely, willing to avenge a sin he has committed, with sorrow and laborious satisfaction, as well as a purpose of not sinning again. Consequently, the subject of attribution, or mediate subject, of the virtue of Penance, insofar as theologians commonly use the term, is only a sinful human being in the state of this life.