Scotus Academicus, Tomus primus: De Deo in se subsistente

Note 1. The dispute among the holy Fathers about the resolution of the present Question was always famous, even from the very first beginning of the nascent Church. For some, from Apocalypse 20 itself: Blessed is the Saint, who has part in the first resurrection: in these the second death has no power, but they will be priests of God and of Christ, and will reign with him a thousand years, and when the thousand years are finished, Satan will be loosed from his prison, etc., affirmed that after the universal resurrection Christ the Lord would reign with the Saints in the holy city of Jerusalem. Whence they were called Chiliasts, or Millenarians, from these thousand years of empire. St. Jerome, in the book De Viris illustribus, makes the author of this opinion a man celebrated for piety and doctrine, named Papias; Papias, he says, a hearer of John, Bishop of Hierapolis, is said to have published the Jewish παραδόσεις of the thousand years, whom Irenaeus followed (who in lib. 5. cap. 38. affirms that he drew this opinion from Papias), and Apollinaris, and the rest, who say that after the resurrection the Lord will reign in the flesh with the Saints. Tertullian also, in lib. De spe Fidelium, and Victorinus of Pictavium, and Lactantius are led by this opinion: the same holds with respect to cap. 65. of Isaiah: whence in lib. 1. In Ieremiam he does not dare to condemn this opinion, Which, he says, although we do not follow it, nevertheless we cannot condemn it, because many of the ecclesiastical men, and martyrs said these things: and let each one abound in his own sense, and let all the judgments of the Lord be reserved: but so that it may become more clearly known what, and of what sort, was the opinion and view of the Millenarians, or Chiliasts.

Note 2. The Chiliasts, or Millenarians, held various opinions, as may be seen in Lactantius, lib. 7. Divinarum institutionum, where he discloses his own, and the other Millenarians', opinion in these words:

He will come, he says,the Son of the most high and greatest God, and judge the living and the dead: and when he has destroyed injustice, and has made the greatest judgment, and has restored to life the just who were from the beginning, he will dwell among men for a thousand years, and will rule them with a most just empire. Then those who will be alive in their bodies will not die; but through those same thousand years they will beget an infinite multitude, and their offspring will be holy, and dear to God. But those who will be raised from the dead will rule over the living, and will be judges: but the Nations will not be utterly extinguished: but some will be left for the victory of God, that they may be triumphed over by the just, and be subjected to perpetual servitude. At the same time, the Prince of the demons, who is the contriver of all evils, will also be bound with chains, and will be in custody a thousand years of the heavenly empire, in which justice will reign in the world, lest he contrive anything evil against the people of God. After whose coming the just will be gathered from all the earth, and, once the judgment is completed, a holy City will be established in the middle of the earth, in which God himself the Creator will dwell with the just who rule. And when he had said that that time would be the golden age sung by the poets, and had elegantly proved it, he adds: Men will therefore live a most tranquil, and most abundant life, and will reign together with God: and the kings of the nations will come from the ends of the earth with gifts, and offerings, to adore, and honor the great king, whose name is renowned, and venerable to all nations which will be under the heaven, and to the kings who will rule on the earth. But when the thousand years of the kingdom have made their end, the prince of the demons will again be loosed, and, sent out of custody, will go forth, and will stir up all the nations, which will then be under the dominion of the just, to bring war upon the holy City. After a little: But when the thousand years have been completed, the world will be renewed by God, and the Heaven will be folded up, and the earth will be changed, and God will transform men into the likeness of Angels: and they will be white as snow, and will always move in the sight of the Almighty, and will sacrifice to their Lord, and will serve him in eternity. At the same time will take place that second, and full resurrection of all, in which the unjust will be raised to everlasting torments: these are they who worshipped idols made by hand: who either did not know, or denied, the Lord of the world as their parent: but also their Lord will be seized together with his ministers, and will be condemned to punishment: together with whom all the crowd of the impious, for their crimes, in the sight of the Angels, and of the just, will be burned with perpetual fire in eternity. This is the doctrine of the holy Prophets, which we Christians follow: this is Christian wisdom.

But how far Lactantius, together with the other Millenarians, strayed from Christian truth will be proved below.

Note 3. This celebrated dispute of the Millenarians, often agitated by the Fathers and Doctors of the Church, especially around the year 1331., when John XXII. was administering the Christian world and the pontifical dignity, was renewed again more vehemently, and more ardently in the Pontifical Curia, with certain most learned theologians asserting that the souls of the Saints, after their separation from their bodies and their reception into heaven, immediately behold God face to face; with others, however, denying that this deifying vision is to be granted to the blessed minds before the universal judgment: but when Pope John observed that the arguments of the denying side had not been so diligently examined; since he himself was most devoted to the study of the sacred Letters, he began with the greatest solicitude to gather from everywhere arguments for strengthening that denying side, and to weave together various testimonies from the holy Fathers, and to set them forth publicly as a private Doctor, and to repeat them often, so that the prelates and Doctors might discuss those arguments more diligently. This gave occasion to the malevolent followers of the Bavarian schism to tear apart on every side with calumnies the faith and doctrine of the Pontiff, as if he had defined, and pronounced ex Cathedra, that the divine essence is not seen by the Blessed before the judgment. Whence soon those schismatics with wicked zeal appealed to a general Council, so that John might be deprived of the Pontifical dignity, and be condemned as a heretic: for these things they objected to him, as may be seen in the manuscript of the Vatican library, n. 1009.:

Lord John, in the year of our Lord one thousand three hundred thirty-one, on the feast of All Saints, in the sermon which he publicly made, which begins: Remember the works of the Fathers, which they did in their generations, etc.; and in another sermon, which he publicly made the same year on the third Sunday of Advent, which begins: Rejoice in the Lord always, etc.; and in another sermon, which he publicly made in the year of our Lord one thousand three hundred thirty-two, on the vigil of the Epiphany, which begins: Arise, take the child and his mother, dogmatized that the Saints in Heaven do not see, nor will see until the day of the general judgment, and the future resurrection of the bodies, the face of God or the divine essence: but only see, and will see until the future universal judgment, the humanity of Christ.

But how falsely the enemies of the Pontiff defined these things to have been said by John will be clear below.

Single conclusion. — The souls of the departed, who live in sanctifying grace in this life, and have nothing to purge, immediately enjoy the intuitive vision of God. This was defined in the Florentine Council, sess. ultima, in the decree of Union, in these words:

We define that the souls of those who, after receiving baptism, incurred no stain of sin at all: those souls also, which after contracting the stain of sin have been purged, either in their bodies, or divested of those same bodies, are received into Heaven with no delay, and behold God himself, Three and One.

The same is established from the Council of Trent, sess. 5. On Original Sin. Likewise sess. 25. On the invocation of Saints presupposes this as certain and determined in these words: But those who deny that the Saints, enjoying eternal happiness in Heaven, are to be invoked, etc., are altogether to be condemned, as the Church already long ago condemned them, and now also condemns them.

It is proved first from various places of Scripture: first indeed Luke 23., where Christ the Lord says to the thief dying with him, and begging the participation of his kingdom: Today you will be with me in Paradise: by which name of Paradise the Scripture of the New Testament often uses to signify the beatific vision, or the place destined for the blessed minds seeing God intuitively. Add that in this place, by the name of Paradise, the Earthly Paradise cannot be designated, as some, even among the holy Fathers, interpreted, especially Justin in question 15.: both because that earthly Paradise can confer nothing of delights upon souls loosed from the body, since it was created and destined only for receiving and refreshing bodies: and because by those words Today you will be with me in Paradise, Christ the Lord promises his companionship to the thief: but that adorable Savior did not dwell in the earthly Paradise: therefore neither

the Thief dwelt in it. Neither is the bosom of Abraham to be understood by the name of Paradise, because it is the common, and usual expression of the Scriptures, that the holy minds, which were received into the bosom of Abraham, are rather said to descend into Hell, than to proceed into Paradise. Whence Christ himself, having descended into the very bosom of Abraham, in order to free Abraham himself together with the other faithful souls, is said to have descended into Hell. Finally, by the name of Paradise there is not only signified the empyrean Heaven, destined for the beatific vision; since Christ was to ascend into Heaven itself only after forty days, who nevertheless, dying, promises to the thief the entrance into Paradise on that very same day. It remains, therefore, that by the name of Paradise the beatific vision was promised to the thief, and that his soul, as departing in sanctifying grace, was granted it immediately after its separation from the body. Durandus, Bishop of Meaux, proved this same truth by several other texts of Scripture, in the little book which, consulted by John XXII about the resolution of the present question, he sent to him; and he urges this especially from the fact that Christ is said to have descended into Hell:

Christ, he says, did not descend into Hell according to the body, because it lay in the sepulchre the whole triduum, until the resurrection; nor according to the Divinity, because according to it he is everywhere; therefore he descended according to the soul. But the soul of Christ did not penetrate into Hell, except to free the souls of the holy Fathers, and of the others, which were in Limbo, according to that of Zachariah 9.: But you, in the blood of your testament, have led out your prisoners from the pit: therefore the soul of Christ descended into Hell, to rescue the holy souls dwelling there. But in Hell there is only a double punishment, namely of sense and of loss: but in the Limbo of the Saints there was no punishment of sense, but only the punishment of loss, which is the want of the divine vision, from which no one can be freed, and delivered except through the divine vision itself; because a privation is not removed, except by the opposite act: therefore if the descent of the soul of Christ into the Limbo of Hell was for the liberation of the holy souls, which were shut up in it, it is necessary that he freed them from the want of the divine vision, which could not be done except by the beatific vision itself being communicated to them.

Whence he rightly infers, that he who denies that the souls of the Saints of the Old Testament, which were in Limbo, see God with the beatific vision, denies the article of faith of the descent of Christ into Hell. He confirms it with the example of Lazarus, whose soul, carried into the bosom of Abraham by the Angels, enjoyed the greatest consolation before Christ freed him together with the other holy souls: what therefore did the descent of the soul of Christ into Hell confer upon him? Either it granted the divine vision and fruition itself; or only a greater joy and consolation than he had before. If the first, the intent is had; if the second, truly Christ did not free those souls, for to give great or small consolation is not to free from bonds, nor to lead out of prison, as the prophecy of Zachariah bore: it remains therefore, that he led those holy souls to the beatific vision of God. — He confirms the same moreover by several other arguments, but especially by the general authority and rite of the Church, which says of the Apostles: He gave them everlasting glory: but this glory is not the glory of the body that will come through the resurrection, but the glory of the soul, which consists in the clear vision of God: the Church brings forward the same of the holy Martyrs, of whom it sings: They possess a blessed life. Durandus subjoins other things of this kind: From which it is clear, he says, that the general rite of the Church, which in such matters has the greatest authority, confesses, praising God, that the saints after death, and before the resurrection, are glorified as to the soul.

The same truth is proved from the holy Fathers; the principal of whom expressly affirm that the holy souls are given the beatific vision. Thus Gregory of Nyssa, in the funeral Oration on Pulcheria, the little daughter, as I think, of the Emperor Theodosius:

Therefore, he says, if the girl has departed from you, yet she has run back to the Lord: she closed her eye to you, she opened it to the everlasting light of things: she has slipped away from the table, but she has been joined to the Angelic one. Hence she is a little plant torn away, and has been planted among the things of Paradise. She has been transferred from Kingdom to kingdom. She has put off the purple garment: but she has put on the vesture of the heavenly kingdom; and you forthwith grieve, that the beauty of that body is no longer seen; for you do not behold the true beauty of that soul, which is now hidden in the festive assembly of the heavenly beings — how beautiful is that eye which received God!

— Likewise Gregory Nazianzen, in Oration 10., which he wrote on his brother Caesarius: He says that his soul not only penetrated into heaven, and awaits the dances of the Angels and the splendor of the blessed men, or rather dances and exults together with them; but also that it stands by the great King, and is filled with the light shining forth from there: which he then says is the reward of the labors, and of the good works, and the end of our sacred Mystagogy. Which he also indicates more clearly at the end of the eleventh Oration; where, making a speech about the beatitude of Gorgonia his sister and enumerating its several heads, he says: It is permitted to contemplate the purer and more perfect illumination of the supreme truth, which no longer pours itself into the mind joined, and dissipated through the senses: but offers itself wholly to the whole mind to be contemplated and held, and shines upon our souls with the whole light of the Divinity. — Likewise Chrysostom, Homil. 71. on the holy Philogonius, relating his beatitude, says: Having left these feasts, he was translated to the celebrated assembly of the Angels: in which celebration, and in the midst of the assembly, the King himself is present, whom all see, as much as they can grasp, both present, and illuminating with the splendor of his Majesty all who are with him; by which he asserts that the souls of the Saints not only possess the companionship of God, but also behold him himself, which is the head of perfect happiness. — Likewise from the Latins St. Augustine, who although he seems doubtful in this matter, nevertheless in lib. 20. De Civit. Dei, cap. 9. says: Although not yet with their bodies, nevertheless already their souls reign with him, while those thousand years run their course. Likewise in cap. 21. Meditationum, addressing the saints, he says: I ask you by him himself, who chose you, who made you such, of whose beauty you are already satiated: of whose immortality you are already made immortal: in whose most blessed vision you always rejoice. — Saint Cyprian expressly signifies that the heavenly glory is not deferred until the outcome of the last judgment; but is presented immediately from death, for he closes the exhortation to martyrdom thus:

How great is the dignity, and how great the security, to go forth from here joyful, to go forth amid pressures, and straits glorious: to close in a moment the eyes with which men and the world were seen; and to open the same immediately, that God and Christ may be seen! With how great swiftness does one migrate so happily? You are suddenly withdrawn from the lands, so that you may be placed in the heavenly kingdoms.

In which he embraces two heads of beatitude, namely the heavenly habitation, and the intuitive vision of God. — Likewise St. Gregory, lib. 4. of the Dialogues cap. 29., answering the question of Peter the Disciple asking whether, before the resurrection of the bodies, the souls are received into Heaven, says: That the souls of the just, as soon as they go out of the enclosures of this flesh, are snatched into the heavenly dwellings, according to that: Wherever the body shall be, there also the eagles will be gathered: because without doubt, where the Redeemer is in body, there also the souls of the saints are gathered. And in cap. 28. he says:

That the souls of the saints are in heaven, you have believed on the testimony of the sacred eloquence; it is fitting that you believe to be true in all things, that the souls of the wicked are in hell: because from the retribution of eternal justice, from which the just already glory, it is necessary that in all things the unjust be tormented: for just as beatitude glorifies the elect, so it must be believed, that the eternal fire burns the reprobate.

By which St. Gregory openly affirms, that the blessed souls enjoy the clear vision of God. Whence this same truth is proved by reason: God is more ready to reward the good, than to punish the bad: but the bad, departing in mortal sin, are immediately punished with all that punishment with which they will be tormented forever as to the soul: therefore much more the good, departing with sanctifying grace, are to be crowned with all that beatitude with which it is fitting that they rejoice in eternity, especially as to the soul. Then God himself commands in Leviticus 19.: The work of the hireling shall not abide with you until the morning: therefore he himself must rise up in the precept which he commanded, and confer the reward, which he promised to his workers once the time of the work is finished. But this promised reward is the intuitive vision of God: therefore he must render it to the holy souls immediately after their exit from the body. It is confirmed from that of James first: Blessed is the man who suffers temptation: because when he has been proved, he will receive the crown of life. But the whole proving of man is in this mortal life: therefore, once it is completed, it is fitting that the proved men receive the crown of life, which will be nothing other than the clear and intuitive vision of God.

You will say 1. That oracle of Apocalypse cap. 20., which gave the Millenarians occasion of erring, and has until now redoubled the greatest difficulty for the Catholic Interpreters; for when St. John had asserted that he had seen an Angel descending from Heaven, having the key of the abyss, and a great chain in his hand, who seized the ancient serpent, who is the Devil and Satan, and bound him for a thousand years: and cast him into the abyss, and closed, and sealed over him, that he might no longer seduce the nations, until the thousand years are consummated: and after these things he must be loosed for a little time, he adds in verse 4. that he likewise saw the souls of those beheaded for the testimony of Jesus, and for the word of God, and who did not adore the beast, nor his image, nor received his character on their foreheads, or in their hands, and they lived and reigned with Christ a thousand years. He adds indeed in verses 5. and 6.: The rest of the dead did not live, until the thousand years are consummated. This is the first resurrection. Blessed, and Holy, is he who has part in the first resurrection: in these the second death has no power: but they will be Priests of God, and of Christ, and will reign with him a thousand years. The Millenarians interpret these Prophetic words in such a way, that they want this prediction not to be fulfilled before the persecution of Antichrist has raged. So that, when he is dead, the Church of Christ is to be given the greatest peace and happiness, and Christ himself is to descend with the heavenly Jerusalem to the earth, and in it to reign peacefully with the just rising from the tomb for a thousand years. Meanwhile, while the millennium itself runs, Satan will be bound, lest by his cunning, and the storms of his temptations, he disturb the tranquility of the Church. But when those thousand years are completed, then finally those things will follow, which we wrote in the first Note from Lactantius. From which the Millenarians openly infer, that the Saints are not to be given perpetual beatitude nor the intuitive vision of God before the final judgment. — But this interpretation of the Millenarians labors with a threefold error.

First indeed, because it supposes a double future resurrection of the Saints; one a thousand years before the universal Judgment, so that they may lead a blessed and tranquil life on earth with Christ; another after the general conflagration of the world, by which all the dead, both the good and the reprobate, must be raised, so that they may be presented to the supreme Judge to be judged. But it is constant that Scripture makes mention of only one final resurrection. Thus Job 19.: On the last day I shall rise from the earth, etc. and Paul, 1. to Corinth. 15. says that we will rise in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet. Which John also indicates not obscurely in the praised chapter of the Apocalypse v. 13. where he says: The sea gave up the dead, which were in it: and death and hell gave up their dead, which were in them, and judgment was made of each one according to their works. It is false, therefore, that a true resurrection of the bodies will take place before the world has been purified by the universal conflagration.

Secondly, it supposes that the souls of the Saints, after having received their bodies in the resurrection, will enjoy carnal delights; which directly militates against that Oracle of Christ Matth. 22.: In the resurrection they will neither marry, nor be given in marriage: but they will be like the Angels of God. Thirdly finally, this opinion falsely supposes, that by the first resurrection the holy John understands the bodies raised from the tombs, when nevertheless he speaks there only of the mystical and allegorical resurrection of souls, as openly appears from these words: I saw, he says, the souls of those beheaded for the testimony of Jesus, and of those who did not adore the beast, and they lived, and reigned with Christ a thousand years. They lived, I say, and reigned, understand: in spirit, of those beheaded; and therefore the holy John speaks there not of the corporeal, but of the spiritual resurrection, by which the souls of the Saints, putting off this mortal life, obtain the immortal one. Far, therefore, from the genuine understanding of St. John does the interpretation of the Millenarians wander.

The whole hinge of the present difficulty, therefore, turns on making it appear; first, what is that binding of Satan for a thousand years, and what freedom finally granted to him of raging against the just; second, from what point the reckoning of those thousand years is to begin, in which the just are foretold to reign with Christ; thirdly finally, what are the first and second resurrection: to which, that satisfaction may be given — I answer, omitting the various opinions of the sacred Interpreters, that that binding of Satan was made around the death of Christ the Lord, at which time, namely, the Demons were to be cast out and expelled from this world, and thrust down into Hell, Christ saying in John 12.: Now is the judgment of the world, now the Prince of the world will be cast out: whence Paul, to the Colossians 2., shows Christ the Lord hastening to the punishment of death, as the triumphant over the Demons, in these words: Despoiling the principalities, and powers: he led them away confidently, triumphing over them openly in himself. Hence St. Ambrose, lib. 10. in Lucam, said that Christ the Lord ascended the cross as a triumphal chariot: He ascended, he says, his chariot as a triumphant one, and not a tree fortified with trunks sought from the mortal enemy: but on the triumphal gibbet he hung the spoils captured from the world: for from the death of Christ the Lord all the power of the Demons over men was emptied. Whence Saint Augustine, lib. 20. De Civitate Dei, cap. 8.: The binding of the Devil was made not only from the time the Church began to be dilated into the nations, but is also made now, and will be made until the end of the age: because for each one of the faithful that strong one is then bound, when he is snatched from him as a vessel. To which fits that response of the Devil given to Saint Anthony, reported by St. Athanasius in the life of Saint Anthony himself: Why are you troublesome to me, men? Let them impute it to themselves, if they fall: for I can do nothing, unless they of their own accord subject themselves to me.

As a dragon, he has been hooked by the hook of the cross by the Lord, and bound with a halter as a beast of burden, and like a fugitive slave, bound with ring and armlet, his lips pierced, he is permitted to devour none of the faithful at all. Now the miserable one, mocked by Christ as a sparrow for sport, laid beneath the heel of the Christians, groans, he who applauded all the seas hidden from himself: he who promised that the orb of the earth was held in his hand, behold he is conquered by us. Behold, he cannot prevent me, disputing against him.

Wherefore aptly St. Augustine makes the devil like a bound dog, which can bark, but cannot bite, unless one who wills, and joins himself to him through consent and will. — Although, however, speech is there made of the binding of Satan alone, that is, of the Prince of the Demons, nevertheless the whole army of the Tartarean region was also bound and ensnared through the cross: so that neither the Prince himself, nor his deadly phalanx may in any way prevail against the Catholic Church; by hindering, namely, the public worship of God and the exercise of Religion: for what would it profit for this matter that only the Prince of the Demons be held in custody, if free access lay open to the other nefarious Spirits for vexing men, who of course could both consult their Prince, although ensnared, and rage at his command and counsel? Add that Satan is said to be held bound by the Angel; but the Angel would not seem able to hold a Demon fixed to some place, without the Angel himself likewise not departing from that same place. But it would be an excessive simplicity to persuade oneself, that the Angel will so remain in hell for a thousand years, as to retain there the bound Demon.

It is better, therefore, to say, that by this binding of Satan is understood the power of all the Demons emptied from the death of Christ, and the dissemination of the Church throughout the world, until the persecution of Antichrist himself; at which time, namely, Satan will be loosed from his prison, and will go forth, and will seduce the nations, says St. John in verse 7. — But that all these things may be more easily perceived, and may fit the text more evidently, it must be observed that a double binding of the Demon can be distinguished: one by which men were loosed from his power, when, namely, they were redeemed through the death of Christ, as Christ had foretold in Mark 3.: No one can enter the house of the strong man and plunder his goods, unless he first binds the strong man; the other, moreover, so that the Wife of the Lamb, namely the Catholic Church, may peacefully enjoy the happiness of her sacred marriage, and not be vexed by the infestations and savageries of the Demon. But this latter binding of the Demon was not put into execution, until the Roman Church triumphed over pagan Rome, the idolatry being thence utterly exterminated, and the faith of Christ being disseminated, and propagated throughout the whole world. Wherefore it must be asserted, that although Christ constrained the demon in his death, so as to take away the prey from him, by loosing men from those bonds; nevertheless he left him for some time as free, and loosed, so that he might rage through the nefarious Emperors against the Christians, namely until the conversion of Constantine, who introduced the public exercise of Christianity, the cult of the idols being extinguished, and all persecution being banished. — As to the thousand years, however, during which the demon is to be bound, lest he vex with his infestations the peaceful delights of the Church, spouse of Christ the Lord, and during which likewise the just are to reign with Christ, I judge to be signified all that time which flowed from the idolatry driven out of the Roman world, and the waves of the persecutions calmed, to the savagery of Antichrist rising against the faithful, by which almost all the peace, and all the tranquility of the Church will fall to the ground.

To this conjecture St. Augustine seems to give his assent, in book 20. De Civitate, cap. 7.:

The thousand years, he says, can, as far as it occurs to me, be understood in two ways: either because this matter is transacted in the last thousand years, that is, in the sixth millennium of years as in the sixth day, whose later spaces are now being unrolled, with the Sabbath to follow thereafter, which has no evening, namely the rest of the Saints which has no end: so that by the complete number of this millennium there might be signified the very fullness of time; for the millenary number renders the solid square of the denary number: for ten multiplied ten times make a hundred: which now is not a square figure, but a full one. But in order that it may rise in height and become solid, again a hundred is multiplied ten times, and a thousand is made.

— By these words St. Augustine not only indicates that by the thousand years expressed by St. John there is designated the entire interval of time from the death of Christ to the last day of the universal Judgment: but he also freely favors that opinion by which many of the more weighty Authors think that that interval of time from the passion of Christ to the end of the world is contained in two thousand years. Which opinion indeed can be confirmed by several conjectures and reasons. For first, the world ought to last as many thousands of years as it was created in days; but it was founded in six days: therefore it will endure for six thousands of years, and so, since four thousand have already flowed by before Christ suffered, it follows that only two thousand remain from His passion to the end of the world. They prove the major from this, that the seventh day, namely the Sabbath, on which God rested from all the work which He had made, signifies the day of the blessed rest of the Saints in the eternal Sabbatism after the general resurrection, namely the seventh millennium of eternity: therefore in equal proportion, the six days preceding the Sabbath designate the six thousands of years by which the duration and the motion and the labor of the world must precede that Sabbath of eternal beatitude; because Ps. 89.: A thousand years are before the eyes of God as yesterday's day. These words St. Jerome thus weighs: I think that from this place a thousand years are wont to be called one day; so that, namely, because the world was fabricated in six days, it is believed to subsist for only six thousands of years, and afterwards there comes the septenary and the octonary number, in which the true Sabbatism is exercised.

— The second conjecture is drawn from this, that St. John himself in this chapter six times names the thousand years, as if intimating that the world will last for six thousands of years. For in verse 2. he says: He bound him for a thousand years: in verse 3.: Until the thousand years are consummated; verse 4.: They reigned with Christ a thousand years; verse 5.: Until the thousand years are consummated; verse 6.: They shall reign with him a thousand years; verse 7.: When the thousand years shall have been consummated. For why does he six times repeat and inculcate the thousand years, unless to intimate that after six thousands of years there will be the consummation of the world and of all things? — Thirdly, in the world there have been three successive laws and states, namely the Law of Nature, the Law of Moses, the Law of Christ: but the time of the Law of Nature, which was from Adam up to Abraham, who received and instituted circumcision as the token of the Mosaic Law, lasted almost two thousand years; again the time of the Mosaic Law lasted likewise two thousand years, for precisely so many are from Abraham up to the Nativity of Christ. Therefore likewise the third Law and State of the World, namely the Law of Grace and of Christ, will also last two thousand years, so that the states of the world may be fulfilled in six thousands of years.

The same thing St. Gaudentius Brixianus expressly asserts, in tractate 10.:

We await, he says, that truly holy day of the seventh thousandth year, which will come after those six days, namely the six thousands of years of the world, which being completed, there will be rest for true holiness and for those faithfully believing in the resurrection of Christ. For there will be no fight there against the Devil, who then will certainly be held bound, fastened by his punishments.

In like manner many of the holy Fathers teach this, whom the praised Cornelius recounts and cites at length: with whom the Talmudists agree, lib. 4. tractate 4. which is inscribed Sanhedrim, that is, judgment. The world will be for six thousands of years, they say, and again it will be destroyed. Two thousand were of emptiness, that is, of the Law of Nature: two thousand of the Mosaic Law: two thousand of the days of the Messiah. — Therefore by the thousand years in which the demon is to be bound, in which likewise the souls, as well of the Martyrs beheaded for the name of Christ as of the Confessors and of the just who at the time of the persecution of Antichrist will not receive the character of the beast, nor adore its image, must reign with Christ and live a blessed and immortal life, there is rightly signified all that time from the death of Christ to the last judgment. — As for the first and the second death of the just, I say that it can be taken in two ways: first indeed mystically, as Alcazar explained it, saying that the souls of the beheaded Martyrs rise in the first resurrection, not in their own bodies, but in the infidels, who by their example and martyrdom have been converted to the faith of Christ, or confirmed in it. So that, he says, the same happens as with a grain of wheat, whose wonderful force and faculty is this, that when it has died and been buried, it nevertheless afterwards rises gloriously, and for one dead grain a hundred arise, in each of which that first grain, which had died, is said to revive, according to that oracle of Christ the Lord, John 12.: Unless a grain of wheat falling into the earth shall have died, it remains alone: but if it shall have died, it brings forth much fruit. With these words St. Paul affirms that the resurrection is adumbrated, in the first Epistle to the Corinthians 15. Hence therefore it has been touched upon that the blood of the martyrs was the seed of the Christians, says Tertullian, and so the spirit, religion, and holiness of the Martyrs rises again in the faith of those who are converted to Christ, and consequently to the glory and splendor of the Roman Church, until namely those blessed Martyrs obtain the second resurrection in their honored bodies. In like manner he explains what St. John subjoins, that the rest of the dead did not live, that is, the reprobate already dead were not celebrated and illustrious in the world, but their memory perished with a sound. — Or, more fittingly to the literal sense, I say that St. John opposes the Pious to the Impious, and the Elect to the Reprobate, in this namely, that the Pious and the Elect live in the first resurrection, that is, are blessed as to the soul, and reign with Christ, until the thousand years are consummated, that is, to the end of the world, so that then they pass to the second resurrection, and are blessed and glorious in soul and body: but the Impious and the Reprobate, when they die, pass into the first death, that is, fall into the punishment of hell; so that, the thousand years being consummated, rising on the day of judgment they pass into the second death, that is, the punishment of soul and body. — From which it is clear that St. John in no way favors the opinion of the Millenarians.

You will press. St. John expressly asserts in cap. 6. of the Apocalypse, that the souls of the Martyrs are not to be granted the beatific vision before the number of the Martyrs, who must be killed by Antichrist, is completed: therefore he judges that the souls of the Just do not see God before the day of Judgment.

The antecedent is proved. From verse 9., where John relates that when the Lamb had opened the fourth seal:

I saw, he says, under the altar the souls of those who were slain for the word of God, and for the testimony which they held. And they cried with a loud voice, saying: How long, O Lord, holy and true, dost thou not judge and avenge our blood on those who dwell on the earth? And there were given to each of them white stoles, and it was said to them that they should rest yet a little time, until their fellow servants and their brothers, who are to be killed even as they, are completed;

namely by Antichrist, whose time of cruelty will be brief, in which the number of the Martyrs and of the Elect, who are to reign with Christ forever, will be completed: therefore from this it is clear that the souls of those Martyrs who have already been killed are not yet granted beatitude.

I deny the antecedent. For it is established from St. John himself in the following chapter, verse 9., that the souls of the Martyrs are before the throne of God, and serve him day and night; and so it is likewise established that they enjoy the sight and vision of God. Then, those very souls of the Martyrs, whose vows to be fulfilled are deferred, are nevertheless granted white stoles, which are the symbols of the blessed vision and fruition of God, according to the promise of Christ in 3. of the Apocalypse, verse 5.: He who shall overcome thus, shall be clothed in white garments, and I will not blot out his name from the book of life. It is clear therefore that the souls granted white stoles enjoy the vision of God; for this beatitude is promised to the one who overcomes under the name of the stole, or white garment.

I answer 2. That the sense of the aforementioned text is not that which the Millenarians usurp: for St. John there speaks symbolically and by synecdoche, by which the part is put for the whole; namely the soul for the man, say for the Martyr: in that similar way in which Genesis 46. speaks of 70. souls, that is, men, going out from the thigh of Jacob. The souls of the Martyrs therefore cry out, either by themselves or by their bodies: they cry out, I say, by their bodies under the altar, because namely the martyrs were wont to be buried under the altar. First, so that they themselves might be honored in so sacred a place, as St. Ambrose indicates in Epist. 54., in which he admonishes Marcellina, his sister, that he has deposited the relics of Saints Gervasius and Protasius under the altar; Let the triumphal victims, he says, succeed into the place where Christ is the host: but he is above the altar, who suffered for all: these are under the altar, who have been redeemed by his passion. This place I had predestined for myself: for it is worthy that the Priest rest there where he has been wont to offer: but I yield the right-hand portion to the sacred victims: this place was owed to the Martyrs. Secondly, because, says St. Augustine, in sermon 11.:

Fittingly, and as it were for a certain fellowship, burial has been appointed for the Martyrs there, where the death of the Lord is daily celebrated. Not undeservedly, I say, is a tomb set up for those slain in a certain fellowship, where the members of the Lord's slaying are placed; so that those whom the cause of one passion had bound with Christ, the Religion of one place might also join together.

Thirdly and finally, the relics of the Martyrs under the altar are joined with the prayers. Wherefore the Priest, about to approach the altar, prays and says: We pray thee, O Lord, by the merits of thy Saints whose relics are here: and in the consecration of the altar the Pontiff says: You who have received seats at the Altar of God, intercede for us. By which it is established that the souls of the slain crying out under the altar are here taken for the bodies of the Martyrs and the sacred relics deposited under the altar, and imploring vengeance on their slaughterers, and demanding their rest and beatitude, just as the blood of Abel cried for vengeance, Genesis 1. Or if you should say that St. John is to be understood of the souls themselves: I shall reply that by the altar, under which the souls cry out, there is here understood the secret and heavenly sanctuary: namely the place of the happiness and glory of the Martyrs in Heaven, in which the souls of the Martyrs, translated after death, as it were rest, breathing forth a continual incense of praise to God. So that just as in the Temple of Solomon there was a double altar; namely the altar of Holocausts, which was in the court; and the altar of Incense, which was in the Sanctuary: so likewise there are as it were two altars under which the souls of the Martyrs cry out; namely the altars of holocausts, in which their bodies lie as slain victims; and the altar of incense, that is, the blessed seat in which the soul itself breathes forth to God the pleasing odor of praise and prayer. Which appears more clearly in Apocal. cap. 8. verse 3., where the Angel offers to God on the altar of incense the incense of the souls, that is, their prayers and praises. Therefore St. John wishes to indicate nothing else than that the souls of the Martyrs implore the glorification of their own bodies. To whom, however, it is answered, that they should sustain a little time, namely until the last day of judgment, on which the number of the Martyrs will be fulfilled, and at the same time they will be granted eternal beatitude also as to the body.

They press. Beatitude is the end of all our desires; and he who enjoys it has nothing further to desire, since it itself is a state made perfect by the aggregation of all goods: but from what has been conceded, the souls of the Just still long for and implore the raising up of their own bodies, and vengeance on their enemies: and so they do not yet obtain beatitude.

I answer. That beatitude is taken in two ways: first indeed, generally and integrally, for the aggregation complete on all sides of all goods. Secondly, essentially, for the most noble operation of the more excellent part of the rational creature, such as is the beatific vision. In the former way, nothing indeed remains to be desired by the Blessed one: but in the latter, he can still long for some good compossible with himself. The former beatitude will be granted only after the final Judgment, when namely the body together with the soul will be granted beatitude. The latter, however, is in fact granted to the blessed souls, which although they have nothing further to desire for themselves, yet have something to long for for their bodies, namely the resurrection.

They insist. Matth. 20. The father of the family commanded the steward to render to his workers their wage when evening had come: but by the particle evening, the final Judgment and the last day is understood: therefore from this it is clear that the wage is not to be conferred on the Blessed except after the final Judgment.

I answer first. That this particle, evening, in that parable of the workers in the vineyard, signifies precisely nothing; but is only added for the ornament and elegance of the narration; for many words are written in this parable which do not aim at the scope designated in it, as we said in the preceding Question, and therefore no force is to be made of that particle.

I answer secondly. That if anything can be inferred from this particle, only this can be gathered, that the wage of the just is to be conferred on their bodies after their resurrection, which will not happen before the final Judgment, and so the wage promised to them will be conferred only in the evening. It is otherwise, however, with the souls, which, if they have nothing to atone for, as soon as they are loosed from their bodies, are granted the blessed vision of God.

They press. From the same parable the denarius is promised and given only to him who labored in the vineyard of the Lord: but not the soul alone, nor the body alone, but the whole man labored in the vineyard of Christ: therefore only the whole man is to be granted the blessed wage; and so the soul cannot be beatified alone.

They confirm. The reward is owed per se to him to whom it belongs per se to merit such a reward; otherwise it would not be a condign and just retribution: but the soul does not merit per se, otherwise the separated soul could merit; nor can the body merit without the soul: therefore only the whole man, inasmuch as he consists of soul and body together, merits the reward, and so only the whole man can be granted the reward.

I distinguish the major. He who labored either denominatively or appellatively, or effectively, that is, as the principle of motion and labor, I concede: he who labored only denominatively and appellatively, I deny.

To the minor. Only the whole man labored appellatively and denominatively; because namely the whole man is called laboring and working, I concede the minor: he labored effectively or principiatively alone, I deny the minor.

The whole man indeed receives the denomination of the one laboring; but the soul and the body precisely are the effective principles of the labor and of the merit; the soul indeed is the principle which, but the body is the principle by which: and therefore since the soul, loosed from the body, is capable of the reward and the wage, and it has been the principal cause of the labor and of the merit; it also ought to be granted the wage and the reward immediately after its loosing from the body. And so the whole man will indeed be denominated blessed only after the resurrection; but his soul can before that be called and be made blessed, because namely it is immortal and capable of beatitude, even separated from the body.

Add. That the argument can also be turned back against the Millenarians, who confessed that the souls of the reprobate are immediately after death adjudged to eternal torments: to him the eternal punishment is to be attributed who was the author of the crime and of the sin: but not the body alone, nor the soul alone, but the whole man was the author of the crimes and of the demerit, and so not the soul, but the whole man is to be tormented: but the reprobate will not be the whole man before the resurrection: therefore if the consequence of the Millenarians about the blessed is true, that they are not to be rewarded before the souls have been united to their bodies in the resurrection, it will likewise be true about the souls of the reprobate, that they are not to be tormented before the resurrection. Which, however, they themselves think false.

They object. Finally, they also summon many of the holy Fathers in support of their opinion. First indeed St. Irenaeus, lib. 5. adversus haereses cap. 5., where he affirms that the souls of the just are immediately after death deposited in the Terrestrial Paradise, in which the first man had been created:

Wherefore, he says, the Presbyters, who are the disciples of the Apostles, say that those who have been translated have been translated thither. For Paradise has been prepared for just men, and for those having the Spirit: into which Paul the Apostle also, being carried away, heard unutterable words, as far as concerns us in the present: and that those who have been translated remain there until the consummation, awaiting incorruption.

Again, St. Chrysostom, hom. 39. in primam ad Corinthios, says that souls without the flesh will not enjoy those admirable goods of beatitude. Again, Theophylactus expressly asserts that the souls of the Saints are received into the Terrestrial Paradise, into which likewise the thief converted to Christ was admitted:

For just as, he says, those who have been condemned do not move about in the Palace at all, but are kept shut up in prisons appointed to their punishments, while those who are honored both enter the Palace and dwell in it for a time; afterwards, when the time for distributing the royal gifts arrives, they are bestowed upon them: so the Saints, although they do not yet grasp all that is perfect, are meanwhile nevertheless kept in those splendid and sweetly fragrant and royal, to say it in one word, Tabernacles, although they have not yet perfectly received the royal gifts: thus, therefore, that thief was in Paradise, and has not yet attained perfection, so that he should not be made perfect without us.

Finally, again, St. Bernard, sermon 3. de Sanctis, where he says there are three states: the first in the body as in a Tabernacle; the second, outside the body as in the courts of the house of God; the third, finally, in the house of God with the body taken up again; into which house of God, he says, the souls of the Saints will enter neither without us, nor without the flesh. I pass over the other holy Fathers thinking the same.

I answer. Indeed, several of the holy Fathers went over to that opinion, because the matter had not yet been discussed and determined by the Church, as it now is; wherefore it was free for each one to think as he wished: nevertheless it is an established truth that far more numerous are those who asserted that the souls of the just are received into Heaven immediately after their separation from the body, and are endowed with the blessed vision of God.

You will ask 2. What is to be thought of Pope John XXII., namely whether he really patronized the opinion of the Millenarians, and defined anything in its favor by Apostolic authority?

I answer. That he did not. And this is proved first: if there are any indications by which one may be allowed to conjecture and be persuaded that he patronized the aforesaid opinion, they are chiefly either because he published a little book filled with the authorities of Sacred Scripture and the holy Fathers, by which he seemed to prove that souls are not to be endowed with the intuitive vision of God before the Judgment: or because in his sermons and disputations he brought forward many things in assertion of this opinion: or finally because he reproached Philip, King of the French, for that, inflamed with the ardor of faith, he had forbidden, even under threat of death, that such an opinion be spoken or asserted by any of his subjects: but from none of these heads can it be gathered that John patronized this opinion, or that he defined anything in its defense by Apostolic authority. Therefore, etc. The minor, in which the whole difficulty lies, is proved first indeed from the Epistle to King Philip, given at Avignon on the 14th kalends of December, in the 18th year of his Pontificate, in which he testifies that he never said or wrote anything of his own that favored that opinion, but only collected those authorities of Sacred Scripture and the holy Fathers which seemed to patronize it; not that he defended that opinion from the heart, but so that, with the question weighed on both sides, the truth might appear more clearly and evidently: whence in the aforesaid Epistle he addresses the Most Christian King in these words:

Because, most beloved Son, we know what you intend in these and other things, that the truth may be brought to light, we ask your Royal benevolence that you cause to be announced through a faithful messenger or faithful messengers to the Masters in Theology and the Bachelors reading and residing at Paris, that, notwithstanding such threats having been made, anyone may be able to say, dispute, and preach what shall seem to him to be disputed and also preached according to Evangelical and Apostolic doctrine, until something else be ordered or even declared by the Apostolic See: for thus will the truth of the aforesaid question be able to be reached more readily.

The same thing is evident from the Epistle written by him to Peter Rogerius of Malo-Monte, Archbishop of Rouen, in which he commands and orders that the little book composed by himself, in which he had collected nothing of his own, but only the sayings of Sacred Scripture and the holy Fathers which seemed to favor the negative opinion, he should take care to have translated into the French idiom, and give it to Joan, Queen of France, to read, as well as to King Philip, so that it might be clear that he himself had defined nothing by Apostolic authority, nor written these things from his own opinion. Which he again did on the 2nd Ides of May of the year 1332., when he sent his aforesaid writing to Brother Gualterus of Divio, a Minorite, confessor of the aforesaid Queen, that he might read it, explain it, and suggest to the aforesaid Queen those authorities of the holy Fathers which he had gathered in favor of the negative opinion.

It is confirmed. Moreover, from the Epistle of the same John to the aforesaid King Philip, to repel the calumny branded upon him: the occasion of which indeed had been given by Gerard Otho, Minister General of our Order: for when he had been delegated by the Pope as Apostolic Nuncio, together with Brother Arnaldus of St. Michael of the Order of Preachers, Apostolic Penitentiary, to pacify Edward, King of England, and David, King of Scotland, who were attacking each other in hostile fashion, and when these Legates had arrived at Paris, the Procurator of the King of Scotland signified to them that they would proceed further in vain, for the reason that the King of Scotland had gone elsewhere outside the Kingdom, and had committed his role or power to no one for making peace with the English: wherefore they intimated these things to the Pope, from whom they received the reply, that they should return to him if they wished: but to Gerard he gives the power to set out on legations into any other parts for making peace. That Gerard, from the pulpit, brought forward some things in favor of that opinion which was being spread abroad under the name of Pope John. Thence the rumor spread that he had therefore been sent to Paris by Pope John, to disseminate that opinion. Whence it came about that there was a cry against him and the Pope from all, both Prelates and Masters of Theology, as against an assertor of heresy: and at length, when a complaint about this matter had been brought to King Philip, it was forbidden by him by public edict that anyone disseminate and defend that opinion. Then King Philip, together with Robert, King of Sicily, humanely warned the Pope that henceforth he should keep silent about the aforesaid opinion, reprobated by all learned men: and he intimated that it was murmured by many that he had sent Gerard to Paris to spread and defend this opinion, which calumny, that the Pope might wipe it away, he answers in the Royal Letters as regards this part thus:

We have further seen contained in the same Royal Letters that it was said by many that we had sent our beloved son Gerard Otho, General Minister of the Friars Minor, to Paris to teach and preach that souls separated from the body and purged from sins will not see the divine Essence until after the resurrection of bodies. To which we say and assert before God, that it never entered our heart nor went out from our mouth.

But this truth is especially established and confirmed by Benedict XII., the Successor of John, who, to cleanse and restore the shaken reputation of his predecessor, issued this public Diploma: which, because it is a most efficacious argument for establishing the present truth, it has pleased us to write out in full:

Benedict, etc. For an everlasting memorial of the matter. As the corruption of human nature brings it about that the saying of one man is easily followed by the multitude, and that lesser men frequently strive to interpret the sayings of their greater in the worse sense; so the order of right reason, to which the testimony of the holy Fathers lends its support, brings it about that truth always prevails over falsehood and an interpretation of this kind. Indeed, whereas it has now for some time been called into doubt by some whether souls separated from bodies and purged from sins and the punishments of sins see the divine Essence before the resumption of bodies, namely with that vision which the Apostle calls the vision face to face; and whereas on this matter, both in sermons and in other collations and conversations, many things had been said, recited, written, and preached by John XXII. of happy memory, our predecessor, and by many others in his presence; the same predecessor, wishing to meet the words and tongues of the malicious, on the third day of the month of January in the year from the Nativity of the Lord 1333., second indiction, said, asserted, and protested before the Cardinals of the Holy Roman Church, of whose number we then were, and many Prelates, and Masters in sacred Theology, and other persons and public notaries personally constituted before him in the Apostolic Consistory, under this form: Lest anyone be able to interpret sinisterly that we have thought or do think anything that runs counter to Sacred Scripture or the Orthodox Faith, we say and expressly protest, etc.; that whatever we said, alleged, or proposed in our sermons and collations on the question or matter of the vision of souls, namely whether the soul purged from sins and the punishments of sins sees the divine Essence with that vision which the Apostle calls the vision face to face, or whatever else about this matter; not intending to determine or decide or believe anything which would be in any way opposed to Sacred Scripture or contrary to the Orthodox Faith, but to hold and believe that only which can and could agree with Sacred Scripture and the Catholic Faith: and if perhaps in the aforesaid sermons or collations we said some things which were or seemed in any way opposed to Sacred Scripture or the Orthodox Faith, we say and assert that they were brought forth by us beyond our intention, and we expressly revoke them, not intending to adhere to them, nor to defend them at present, nor even in the future.

Benedict then sets out how the aforesaid John, enduring his final illness and near to death, in the presence of many Cardinals and several Prelates and public notaries present and specially summoned for this, caused a certain Letter to be read in his name, and likewise declared that he had believed and did believe; and he made the confession, revocation, and submission which were dealt with in that Letter, in these words:

Lest those things which, concerning the purged souls separated from bodies, whether they see the divine Essence, namely with that vision which the Apostle calls the vision face to face, before the resumption of bodies, have been frequently said, both by Us and by several others in our presence, by reciting and alleging Sacred Scripture, and the originals and sayings of the Saints, or by otherwise reasoning, should be able to be understood and said otherwise than they were said and understood by Us, and to be hammered into the ears of the faithful; behold that we declare our intention, which together with the holy Catholic Church we have and have held as certain, in the tenor of the presents, as follows. For we confess and believe that purged souls separated from bodies are in heaven, in the Kingdom of the Heavens, and Paradise, and are gathered with Christ in the company of the Angels, and see God and the divine Essence face to face clearly, in as much as the state and condition of the separated soul allows. If, however, other things, or otherwise, have been said, preached, or written by Us concerning matter of this kind, in whatever way we said, preached, or wrote them, by reciting the sayings of Sacred Scripture and the Saints, and by conferring and not determining, nor even holding, and thus and not otherwise, we will those things to have been said, preached, or written, etc.

That this profession of Faith on the beatific vision of souls was issued by John, even his Adversaries themselves agree, as may be seen in Raynaldus, tom. 15. ad annum Christi 1331. n. 38. That John however wrote not from the heart, but only for the sake of inquiring into and manifesting the truth, and said more in favor of the negative side, is further confirmed by the same Benedict XII., who in the little book which he published on the blessed vision against John's opinion, has among other things the following:

Although, however, my aforesaid Predecessor brought forward reasons and authorities in sermons and in writings only for that side of the aforesaid questions which I do not hold and have not held, and not for the side which I hold: nevertheless he frequently said publicly, both in sermons and in the Consistory, before a great multitude of people, that the things which he said about those matters he said only by way of conferring: and because for that side, in favor of which he brought forward reasons and authorities, little or nothing had been brought forward in the Sermons by others; therefore, so that the truth might appear more clearly from such a conferring, he brought forward the said proofs in favor of that side which until then seemed undefended. Which he declared toward the end of his life, and moreover commanded Letters to be made on this matter sealed with his bull, declaring that he had faithfully believed and did believe that the souls of the Saints, purged from sins and the punishments of sins, before the general resurrection and judgment, saw the essence of God face to face, according as their state allowed. Which I say, lest anyone think that he asserted and held the contrary of that which, now that I, although unworthy, have been assumed to the Apostolate after him, has been determined by me with the Council of Cardinals.

The heretics object: Peter of Ailly, then Master of the College of Navarre, afterwards Bishop of Cambrai, then Cardinal, who, writing against John Montesono, a Dominican, who had appealed from the sentence published against him by the sacred Faculty of Paris to the Supreme Pontiff, says thus in the tract published in the name of the Faculty against him, art. 1. concl. 6.: Likewise the aforesaid Faculty could lawfully do this against the Supreme Pontiff, therefore a fortiori against his subject and inferior (namely, to reprove his errors doctrinally). The assumption was evident in the time of John XXII.; because, as Master Nicolaus de Lyra reports in his tract on the beatific vision, almost forty Masters of the said Faculty concordantly determined the contrary of that which the Pope publicly asserted; and the said Master did the like, and similarly Master Guillelmus Okam wrote publicly against him, as is evident in his Dialogue: all which things in this regard were reputed to have been done lawfully, as appeared in the time of Benedict the Twelfth, his Successor. These things from a manuscript codex of the College of Navarre.

They confirm it. From the fact that Philip of Valois, King of France, then, since he felt himself fortified by the definition of the Parisian Theologians, wrote threatening Letters to John XXII., in which these words are found, that he should revoke himself, or he would have him burned, that is, that he should revoke his error, otherwise he would take care to have him consumed with fire; as Peter of Ailly, now Bishop of Cambrai, noted in a certain oration which is preserved in manuscript in the Library of St. Victor, and begins thus: The peace of God, which surpasses all understanding. Whence he adds: The Pontiff obeyed the King, revoked his error, and subjected himself to the Church, his mother and Lady.

I answer. Indeed, Aventinus, Plessaeus-Mornaeus, and other similar men assert this: but how wrongly, and how mendaciously they have devised this very thing, clearly appears from that supreme observance of Philip, the Most Christian Prince, toward John XXII., as well as from the splendid testimony of the sacred Faculty of Paris concerning the innocence of John himself, as appears from the deliberation of the same Faculty made on the second day of January, in the year of the Lord 1333., the tenor of which follows:

To the most Serene Prince, and Lord, the Lord Philip, illustrious King of the French, his devoted Chaplains by the same mercy. Peter, Patriarch of Jerusalem, Peter, Archbishop of Rouen, Guil. Bernardi, Chancellor of Paris, Ioann. de Blangiaco, Archdeacon of Vexin in the Church of Rouen, Nicolaus de Lyra of the Order of Minors, Ioannes de Menthono of the Order of St. Benedict, Matth. de Archis, Peter de Palma, Provincial Prior of the Friars of the Order of Preachers in France, Ioannes de Caricampo of the Cistercian Order, Peter de Casa, General Prior of the Friars of Blessed Mary of Mount Carmel, Simon de Meueriis, Guillelmus de Castro Reginaldi of the Order of Preachers, Germanus Celati, Galinus de Giaco of the Order of Preachers, Guillelmus de Brena Minor, Guillelmus Caleot of the Order of Preachers, Olivarius Saladini, Gerardus de Pergamo of the Order of Hermits of St. Augustine, Peter de Verberia of the Order of the Valley of Scholars, Nicolaus de Alexandria of the Order of Hermits of St. Augustine, Peter Herse of the Order of Carmelites, Nicolaus Boneti of the Order of Friars Minor, and Durandus de Aureliaco of the Order of Preachers, Masters of sacred Theology, with their most humble recommendation, so to pass through the governance of the temporal Kingdom as to arrive at the summit of the everlasting Kingdom. It pleased your Royal Majesty to convoke us on the 4th Sunday of the Advent of the Lord in your Manor in the wood of Vincennes to its presence, and to require of us that we be willing to take a bodily oath, that on the things asked of us concerning the state of the souls of the Saints divested of their bodies, we would faithfully and without any veil of palliation whatsoever say the truth which we felt, there being present at your Royal Highnessthe excellent Princes the Lords Philip by the grace of God King of Navarre, John your firstborn of Normandy, Louis, Duke of Bourbon, Charles your brother, Duke of Alencon, Guy, Count of Blois, and the reverend Fathers Guillelmus the Occitan, Archbishop, Guillelmus of Paris, Andreas of Arras, Guillelmus of Cominges, Peter of Rodez, Roger of Limoges, Bernard of Le Puy, John of Nevers, Bishops, Guillelmus elect of Evreux, Peter of Cluny, Guy of St. Denis, Peter of St. Germain of the Meadows, Hugh of Corbie, Abbots, and a copious multitude of others, as well of Clerics as of Barons, and Knights, your Counselors, Religious and Secular. Moreover, the aforesaid oath having been taken by us, two questions were proposed to us: the First, Whether the souls of the Saints existing in Heaven see the divine Essence face to face, before the resumption of bodies, and before the general Judgment. The Second, Whether the vision which they now have of the divine Essence will be made void on the day of the last Judgment, another succeeding. And because, most Serene Prince, we are bound to revere You as our most dear Lord, Founder and Guardian of the Parisian studium, and of our Faculty of Theology there, and as an excellent King, and to obey your commands; attending especially to that which we heard from your mouth there, that you sought nothing in this matter which could touch the most holy Father and our Lord John, by divine providence of God Supreme Pontiff of the sacrosanct Roman and universal Church, whose devoted servants and sons we are; nay rather, as his most devoted son, you were zealous for his honor in these and other things; and noting that we have heard by the report of many worthy of faith, that whatever his Holiness said in this matter, he brought forth not by asserting or opining, but only by reciting; and considering that, according to the doctrine of the Prince of the Apostles, we ought to be ready to render an account to everyone asking us of the faith and hope which is in us, we answer singly what we felt on the things asked, and we all agree in this opinion: that from the time of the death of Our Lord Jesus Christ, through which the price of the redemption of the human race was paid, all the souls of the holy Fathers, whom the same our Savior, descending into Hell, led out of Limbo, and the souls of the other faithful which have gone out of their bodies, having nothing purgable, or which are already purged in Purgatory, have been taken up to the naked and clear, beatific, intuitive, and immediate vision of the divine essence, and of the most blessed Trinity, the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit, which the Apostle, 1. ad Corinth. 13. cap., names the vision face to face, and perfectly enjoy the Deity itself, and already seeing what they believed, holding what they hoped, are blessed not in hope, but in reality: and that the said vision, which they now have, will by no means be made void, another succeeding, when bodies have been taken up again; but the same vision itself, since it is their life and nature, will remain in them perpetually. And because, renowned Prince! afterwards on the day of St. John the Evangelist you caused us to be gathered at Paris, and there we were required in your name, that we should put into writing, with our seals appended there, that which we had said on the said 4th Sunday of Advent in your presence; although we had begged that your Royal Highness deignto be content with those things which we had already said; or that, just as each one would answer singly, so it would be put into writing singly: nevertheless, not wishing to oppose your commands, we have judged that the present letters, under the apposition of our seals, should be granted to the Royal Excellence in testimony of the foregoing. And we, Guillelmus le Petit, Henricus de Somons, Provincial Minister of the Order of Friars Minor in France, Aegidius de Pestico, Ioannes of St. Denis of the Order of St. Benedict, Guillelmus Herees, Penitentiary of Paris, and Robertus de Bardis, Doctors of Theology in the same faculty, who were not present at the said Convention made in the wood of Vincennes, hindered by legitimate causes, afterwards in other Congregations required in your name, answer similarly in all things on the aforesaid questions with the aforesaid Fathers and Masters, and we believe and feel the same which they said in the aforesaid matter; in testimony of which thing we have judged that our seals, together with their seals, should be appended to the present letters. Given at Paris at St. Mathurin's, in our General Congregation of the Masters in Theology, Regent and Non-Regent, on the second day of January in the year of the Lord 1333.

From this public instrument, (whose original is preserved in the Archives of the sacred Faculty of Paris, from which I have transcribed these things) it appears more than sufficiently what was the reverence, both of the Most Christian King and of the sacred Faculty, toward the Supreme Pontiff, the Parent of all the faithful; and how the aforesaid John XXII., not by asserting, nor by opining, but only by reciting, wrote that the holy souls, for whom nothing remains to be expiated, are to be deprived of the clear vision of God until the day of Judgment.

It is also evident how wrongly our Nicolaus de Lyra is numbered among the condemners and impugners of John; since indeed he subscribed to the opinion of the aforesaid Faculty of Paris, and together with the other Masters asserted that the aforesaid John wrote the aforesaid opinion not assertively, but only recitatively.

Finally, it is evident with how little certainty Bzovius wrote, ad annum 1331., that Pope John, in building up that opinion, adhered to the opinion of the Friars Minor: for that the Franciscans earlier taught, held, or fostered it, or that John inclined to their opinion in this matter, is a mere fiction: since indeed no serious Historian attributes the origin of this opinion to the Minorites: nay rather, several Writers record that Pope John was the first author of this controversy: to which moreover this is an argument, that no Franciscan will be found who has left anything in writing in favor of this opinion.

That Guillel. Astiensis, Inquisitor at Avignon in the Pontifical court, cast into prison Thomas Valentein, an Englishman of the Order of Preachers, preaching the contrary opinion before the Pope; he did not therefore do this because he himself thought with John, but because the Preacher, less religiously and more rashly than was fitting, censured the Pope himself not obscurely (with Bzovius himself here and elsewhere as witness), imprecating divine malediction upon the assertors of that opinion: especially since at that time John defended nothing tenaciously, nor asserted anything constantly in this question. And so it was the irreverence of the Preacher, not the preaching of truth, that was the cause for which he was consigned to prison.

It is also evident how shamelessly Calvin lies, lib. 4. Institutionum, cap. 7, paragrapho 28., when he asserted that John XXII. thought that souls are mortal until the last day of judgment, and that he was therefore placed in the Catalogue of Heretics. What more shameless thing can be invented? Or what is more alien from John's opinion? Nevertheless Calvin heaps up this lie, when he calls Gerson (whom he unskillfully feigns to have been a contemporary of John, when he had not yet been born) as witness to the immortality of the soul denied by John. For Gerson did not even think that; but only from the beatitude attained by the thief immediately after death, he argues that the doctrine of John was false, which he falsely attributed to him, namely that the souls of the Saints would behold the Divinity only after the judgment. But of Gerson more fully below.

Finally, it is evident how much certain inept conjecturers rave, who will have it that John was snatched from life by divine intervention, lest he go astray in deciding this controversy. For what miracle does death have in a man of ninety, especially when it is preceded by a four-day illness? And what danger was there, since he was to be guided by the Holy Spirit in issuing the decree of faith concerning a question agitated and weighed on both sides?

They object 2. Adrian VI and Gerson, asserting that John XXII. was truly condemned by the sacred Faculty of Paris, as well as by King Philip: for thus Gerson addresses the Most Christian King in the Sermon on Easter: Wherefore moreover the falsity of the doctrine of Pope John XXII. appears, which was condemned with the sound of trumpets, or horns, before King Philip your uncle by the Parisian Theologians, concerning the beatific vision: and he believed rather the Parisian Theologians than the Curia: therefore truly John XXII. was condemned by the sacred Faculty of Paris.

I deny the consequence. For Adrian does not speak assertively, but from the common opinion, by which it was disseminated through the deceit of heretics: for he says It is reported of John XXII. etc. As for Gerson, however, I say that the aforesaid sermon does not seem to be a genuine, but a spurious offspring of his, as several, and those the gravest, considerations make credible. First, because Gerson was not ignorant of the aforesaid decree of the sacred Faculty justifying John XXII. Second, because the style of the aforesaid sermon is so lowly and barbarous, that it cannot be ascribed to any wise Gerson. But I bring forward one or another of the many: for while he wishes to restrict certain questions regarding the Resurrection, he says: curiosity, desiring to know, wanted to ask many other questions: then again toward the end: It was my intention rather to enter the matter; but the other orations of Gerson, especially those which he delivered before Kings, are of a nobler genius and of a more polished style. Third, that Peter Schotus affirms that some things were inserted into the works of Gerson by the fraud of the enemies of the Church; for instance, concerning images and indulgences, so that they might be able to stain the reputation of so great a man, and patronize their own errors; why should not the aforesaid sermon equally have been ascribed to him, especially since it scarcely smells of Gerson's genius?