De natura et gratia libri III, cum Apologia contra Catharinum

With these notions of justification and faith explained, we undertake to demolish the machine of the Lutherans by this series of propositions. First¹ is set down against their foundation, which we explained in the fifth and sixth propositions. The catholic faith, necessary to the Christian family, as being that by which we are reckoned Christians, is not that special [faith] by which anyone undoubtedly believes and determines for himself that his sins are remitted on account of CHRIST, and that he is in the grace of God: but rather that divine persuasion and assent which we owe and render to God, concerning all things in general which have been revealed by him to the Church through CHRIST, and through his Prophets, Evangelists and Apostles: among which the divine promises themselves are numbered. We enunciate two things here. The first is that there are by no means two, but one faith entirely, by which we believe all things revealed, whether they be histories, or promises, or precepts or counsels. For it is the power of the same habit to believe that Abraham begot Isaac, and that in him the redeemer was promised to us: that CHRIST took flesh, and that he promised salvation to believers and the baptized. And it is the act of the same faith to believe that those promises, and whatever others are in sacred page, were made by God, which pertains to history: and to believe with certainty that they are most true and most firm, which properly pertains to the faith of promises, whence hope is raised in us. The second is that the assent of promises, pertaining to the catholic faith, is not that special [assent] by which anyone believes concerning himself that he either now receives or already has grace, but that [assent] in general by which we firmly believe that JESUS CHRIST is the universal redeemer, the one mediator of God and men: and therefore that unless by his merit, no fault is forgiven to anyone: but whatever sins have been remitted from the fall of Adam until now, and will be remitted, are remitted by the power of his blood. And therefore that to no one except through him is access to the eternal inheritance opened. But that this benefit is bestowed on this one in this way, or on that one, because anyone can resist the divine inspiration, is a human conjecture: which must be discussed in the chapter specially devoted to this matter. This conclusion is demonstrated especially from the apostolic definition of faith itself.² For faith is the substance of things to be hoped for, the argument of things not seen. That is, the habit, or force and power of the mind, by which, although obscurely, yet certainly and firmly we assent to those things which we hope to see openly. In this definition the firmness of assent is first designated: whose cause is called substance: that is, the beginning of things to be hoped for, which has its strength and firmament from the obedience of liberty. For of things which are neither seen nor demonstrated by reasoning, we would never have so firm an assent, unless, bringing the intellect into captivity, we reduce it to the obedience of CHRIST. It is designated besides that the subject of faith is the intellective power, but the nature of its object is to be obedient to all things, and to embrace all things whatsoever have been revealed from heaven by God: whether they be deeds, or commands, or warnings, or his promises. For all these send us into the hope of future things. Wherefore in the same creed both kinds of articles are joined: namely both those which are historical, as that CHRIST was born and crucified: and besides those which are established concerning the communion of saints and the remission of sins, as comprehended under the same object of faith. And the argument is confirmed. The reason³ for Christians to believe is the supreme and infallible truth of God: but this same truth shines through all revealed things, whether it pertains to history or to promises. Therefore the faith of all things is the same. Of which one and the same tiny particle is [the faith] concerning the promises: which we believe not only truly to have been made, but to be most firm, as far as is on God's part, unless we resist. But that that special fictitious faith⁴ asserted by them in the sixth proposition does not pertain to the catholic faith, this is surely most easy to persuade. For the catholic faith depends solely on the divine assertion or promise: but that anyone is apt and fit to receive the promised benefit depends also on human assent and cooperation, therefore the faith of this is not catholic. What we say is such. The catholic faith, which if anyone did not firmly hold he would be a heretic, is entirely this, that God is most present to us and most ready, unless it stands by us [i.e., unless we obstruct], to work salvation in us: and to bestow it on each one who assents. But that anyone should believe that he himself now obtains salvation adds besides the assent that he has presented himself to God, and has not opposed any obstacle to his moving finger. Since (as was established in the previous book) God draws no one by compulsion, but freely. And therefore since this certainty requires human effort, it cannot equal the certainty of catholic faith. They are therefore connected and inseparable errors, that our justification depends on the sole divine promise without our works, and that anyone can become certain through faith that he is in grace. And therefore no one can maintain both at once: namely, that it depends in any way on our free will, and that anyone can become certain, unless God specially reveals it.

There also comes⁵ this argument, that the catholic faith is one, which obliges the whole family of CHRIST. If therefore it were a catholic faith that I am in grace, all would surely be bound to believe the same as I. In addition. He who is uncertain and doubtful concerning the catholic faith⁶ is judged a heretic: but he who doubts what manner of man he is before God has no reason to be held a heretic, since he fears nothing concerning the promises of God, but with the most just Job fears his own works, without which⁷ we are certain that we are by no means capable of his benefits which pertain to the grace of justification. For our lawgiver CHRIST⁸ makes no one certain, nor commands anyone to believe that he is or is becoming just, but only this, that he who⁹ believes and is baptized shall be saved. And that indeed unless he has opposed a depraved will: for unless you do penance, he says elsewhere, you shall all¹⁰ perish together. Nor does he preach that the kingdom¹¹ of heaven is at hand except to those who do penance. Which the adversaries themselves profess. But nowhere has he commanded anyone to determine concerning himself with the certainty of catholic faith that he has been lawfully baptized, or has done penance. Surely I do not see how those who acknowledge that grace is conferred on no one before he repents can resist [the conclusion] that a man is not certain of his salvation through faith. They say: Because penance is not the cause, yet it is required: but concerning whether it is legitimate, we have by no means a revelation of faith. But concerning this dispute of certainty there is a whole chapter below in book 3. Now however we establish only this, that that distinction of faith into historical and justifying is nugatory.¹² Therefore the definition of Calvin¹³ which he assigns to faith in his book On the Institution of the Christian Religion is incongruous. Namely, that it is a firm and certain knowledge of the divine benevolence towards us, which is revealed to our minds and sealed in our hearts by the truth of the gratuitous promise in CHRIST. For if it is referred to the promises in general, it is only a tiny portion of the catholic faith: but if to that special certainty of his, which each one has concerning himself, it is outside the limits of the same orthodox faith.

The second¹⁴ proposition. Faith, hope and charity are virtues distinguished not only in thought, but in reality, and also by their object and subject. This we establish against their seventh proposition. For note well, reader: lest they should abandon the word which they had once begun to spread abroad (namely, that we are justified by faith alone), by what contrivances they have attempted to retain it. First, because they saw that the catholic faith does not suffice for justice, they began to call it historical faith, fashioning [the notion] that the faith which justifies is only that which we have toward God promising the remission of sins through CHRIST. And up to this point, although cutting the branch of faith from the just tree, they were nevertheless erring within the bounds of faith. But because they understood that that also was not enough, having now transgressed the line of true faith, they devised that special [faith] which we were just now refuting. But because they were driven also from this position (namely, convicted that anyone can believe with certainty that he is in grace, yet be deceived by that vain credulity), they thought to weave¹⁵ into the nature of faith both hope and charity: nay, even works. As if all these were reckoned under the name of faith. And to this pertains what we were just now reporting from Calvin¹⁶: namely, that faith is sealed both in minds, that is, in intellects, and in hearts, that is, in wills. But hear Philip¹⁷ in the Apology of the Augsburg Confession. For these words are found in article 5 of the same confession: All terrified minds should know that they ought to believe that remission of sins is certainly given to them on account of CHRIST, not on account of their merits or dignity. All these certainly obtain remission of sins. And when in this way we console ourselves with the promise or the Gospel, and raise ourselves by faith, at the same time the Holy Spirit is given to us. Philip repeats these same words in the Apology. But very near the back of the same little page he says that the faith which justifies is not only a knowledge of history, but is to assent to the promise of God. He adds: And lest anyone suspect that it is only a matter of knowledge, we will add further: it is to will and to accept the offered promise of remission of sins and justification. And Bucer renews the same words in his recent Concordances.¹⁸ Weigh the manifest contradiction. First he says that that special faith, by which we certainly believe that it is given, and so on, suffices for salvation and justifies us. And immediately he adds that to will and to accept the promise is included in the nature of faith. Such are their apologies. If faith suffices, how is an act of the will required, which belongs to another power? Yet I see another greater absurdity¹⁹ in this stuffed definition of faith. The question was: By what do we receive the benefit of justification promised to us by God? And they answer: By faith alone. But when we press to inquire what this faith is like²⁰, they answer that it is not only to assent to the promise of God promising us gratuitously the remission of sins, but also to will and to accept the offered promise. Therefore it is just as if they said that we receive the benefit of justification by the fact that we will it, and at length accept it. Finally, we receive justifying grace because we receive the promise. Who would not perceive that we are wrapped by them in a blind veil of words, and rolled about as in a whirlwind, while they define the same thing to us by the same thing? Would they not have said more clearly that we receive that benefit by the act by which, through the special help of God, we believe that God is and is a rewarder, together with the act of hope by which we are raised through the same help, and the act of charity by which we repent of our errors, with the sacrament added, either of baptism if we are converted from unbelief, or of penance if, having relapsed, we come to our senses? But they answer: We embrace all those acts under the name of faith. Against this answer, therefore, we have opposed the second proposition. For who could endure this theology, that in the definition of faith the acts of hope and charity are glued together? For the substance of faith has its legitimate nature in the persuasion and assent of the intellect, whose proper object is the true, which has been revealed by God. But the other habits pertain to the will. For the object of hope and charity is not the nature of the true, but of the good, which is the object of the will: just as the intellect['s object] is the true. For we are raised formally not by faith, as they think, but by hope toward that divine good, although faith leads us there by directing us. We are raised, I say, by desiring and appetizing: but charity is the love of the same good, benevolence and friendship. Wherefore in the fatherland, when faith is driven out by vision, hope will at the same time cease: but charity, from the very beholding of God, will so far from depart that it will be wondrously perfected. The expectation of the creature, says Paul, awaits the revelation of the sons²¹ of God: but hope which is seen is not hope: for what a man sees, why does he hope for it? And elsewhere: Charity never falls away: whether prophecies²² shall be made void: or tongues shall cease. From which he concludes that faith, hope and charity are not only three things, but that the greatest and most excellent of them is charity. Not only because faith and hope are temporary, but charity is perpetual, but because it is the form of all the other virtues: which being absent, nothing is esteemed at the price of virtue. For this cause, where Paul speaks precisely of the nature of faith: He who approaches God, he says, must believe that he is, and that he is a rewarder. Behold the whole substance of faith. But where he speaks of faith with its companions, which is required together for justice: Neither circumcision, he says, is of any avail, nor uncircumcision, but faith, which works through charity. Whence on Psalm 31 Augustine:²³ What one believes is of faith, but what one works is of charity. Moreover, unless these men had so hostilely banished all philosophy from their schools, they would never have so confusedly mingled the natures of the virtues, but would have given each its own. For as the essences and definitions of justice, temperance and the other virtues are various, so also are those of faith, hope and charity. But to one who looks back at the model of these men's mind which we set out in chapter 5, it will be easy to weigh the inconstancy and contradiction of these men.²⁴

For when they say that we are justified by faith alone, they bring their master's reason, that the sole word of CHRIST's promise is that which works our salvation: but the word is apprehended by faith alone; therefore we are justified by that alone. Where they manifestly take faith for the sole assent of the intellect, as it is distinguished against every other virtue and work. Wherefore they say that that faith is not only the foundation, but the whole apprehension of salvation and grace, which grace, they say, charity follows. But afterwards, either forgetful of themselves, or certainly convicted that that faith does not suffice, they sew hope and charity and penance onto the nature of faith. Who would not detect their whirlings? And yet by these things another of their cavils is exposed, who turn themselves to every side so that their word 'by faith alone' may obscure something. For because they felt that they were already cast down from this position, namely that the nature of faith embraces the other virtues, they say that at least they are connected. But this connection, if you recall, good reader, they do not understand in such a way that those virtues precede grace, as we have been taught by the Fathers according to the evangelical truth, but that faith alone receives justifying grace, drawing charity with it. For the words are those of Melanchthon²⁵ cited above: By faith alone, not through love, we obtain remission of sins: although love follows faith. Except that now Bucer²⁶ in his Reconciliation seems to wish to persuade that even if all were required for obtaining grace, faith, hope and charity are nevertheless three virtues, but connected among themselves: so that neither charity is without faith, nor faith is present without charity. Nor does he use any other witness than one example, which he took from his master in On the Babylonian Captivity, and thinks irrefragable. Let us think, he says, of a man of sound mind and reputation who is gravely ill, and who, fearing death, is visited by one who calls him to some prepared and splendid banquet, and who is such that the miserable man undoubtedly gives him faith; can such a starving man, he says, not immediately conceive from that faith a confidence in the food he desires: and can he not hasten quickly to that banquet, and at the same time love and honour that host with his whole heart, and desire to gratify him in whatever way he can? Humbly, he says, propose to the mind of someone suffering from a dangerous disease and expecting the end, that a physician is present who promises certain health: thus, he says, he who has faith in the Gospel cannot but certainly hope for the offered health, and fulfil all its commands, and finally turn himself to him with his whole breast. For who, he says, does not experience in himself that he cannot but love and honour him whom he does not doubt promises him great goods, and will most certainly perform them: and also eagerly follow his counsels and precepts, whom he does not doubt gives him true and salutary counsel and commands? But first of all this example of Bucer is doubtful.²⁷ Nay rather it fights more against them than against us. For even if we grant that the said virtues are connected because of the example of the sick man, who if he so believed would immediately do all that the physician ordered: from this it is not gathered that faith alone is the cause of salvation, but that faith begets confidence, and confidence obedience: which would be the nearest cause.

Yet neither do we certainly grant that: but we set down a third proposition against this example.²⁸ Faith, hope and charity are so far from being distinguished only in thought that they are separated in reality, so that faith, nay even hope, can exist without charity. And since this is the place from which they think we are most sharply and strongly attacked, we shall insist here somewhat more fully against them. We do not now dispute whether faith or hope without charity are true virtues. Since, as we said in book 1, chapter 21, no office in the absence of charity is absolutely worthy of the name of virtue. And besides, since faith is the foundation of charity, charity cannot be infused without faith. But that solitary faith can exist without charity is proved. The nature and essence of faith²⁹ is not only other than the nature of charity, but prior by its nature, and not depending on it: because it consists entirely, as has been said, in the intellect, whose operation precedes the operation of the will: therefore nothing prevents it from being able to be begotten prior to charity, and to survive when charity departs. But because they do not value arguments of this sort so highly, in order that I may at the same time dilute Bucer's argumentation, I argue by another reason.³⁰ Faith, grant it, stirs the will to appetite for the good which it shows, yet it brings no force upon it, but the will always remains free, as is its nature: therefore however much we give faith to God inviting us to the heavenly banquet, threatening us with eternal punishments, and promising us rest from our labours, it is nevertheless free for man to prefer present sensual goods to those. Not that it is not the nature of faith to call us from earthly things to eternal things, but that these present things, obvious to the senses, move us to themselves more vehemently. Especially since men promise themselves after a fall repentance and divine favour, by which they may be restored to the friendship of God. Wherefore there is no contradiction that someone may have a certain and constant faith, so that for its confession he would submit his neck to the sword, and nevertheless persist in some sin. Nay, even in human affairs the contrary of Bucer's example is not always [true].³¹ For there can be found a sick man at the point of death, even most desirous of life: to whom however if a physician offered health on this condition, that he permit his mouth or leg to be cauterized, or a part to be cut out by which the stone could be extracted, or that he endure some such terrible thing: truly he would rather reject life. As is read of Marius, who, when one leg was bound, and he was ordered to extend the other, said: Health is not worth so much pain. Nor in these terrifying cures only, but in lighter affections we find men who, though most certain that they are procuring death for themselves by their pleasures, are none the more restrained. So plainly experience teaches us concerning faith: namely that although Christian men have a firm faith in the divine goodness, and in future goods and evils: yet, either because the door of piety and religion seems narrow to them, and the path rough and uphill, or because they are entangled in the snares of this world and involved in desires, they cannot so extricate themselves as to follow what they judge best. Where the very splendour of the divinity pours over those happy heavenly ones, seeing God as he is, there can be no hesitation or delay in loving.³² For that sight of the fountain of all goods cannot but carry the blessed into love, and so deified bind them wholly to God by a certain spontaneous necessity of friendship: where there is no place for sloth, no sickness of mind: in short, nothing which can retard that perpetual filial reverence. Yet this knowledge of ours through a mirror in an enigma is not so efficacious: and therefore not always fruitful of good works. Otherwise it would not only not allow anyone to fall from the grace of God, but would also keep all Christians intent on the best and highest offices, and bound by the Pauline knot: which neither death, nor life, nor things present, nor things to come could separate from the love of God.³³ But we are not all rapt even to the third heaven. They send us to that passage of the Gospel where the twelve disciples, asked whether they also wished to go away,³⁴ answered: Lord, to whom shall we go: because you have the words of eternal life. And from this they bid us understand in what way he who believes cannot but love. But we do not deny that faith very often engenders charity: for this is its nature: but we defend this, that it cannot always, wherever it is, do as much, when the affections of the flesh resist. Let us send them in turn to another passage, where that young man who had kept the commandments from his youth (otherwise the Gospel would not say³⁵ that CHRIST looked upon him and loved him) and therefore came with living faith to ask CHRIST³⁶ what he should do to possess eternal life. He, I say, undoubtedly believed the Redeemer that if he sold and distributed his goods and followed him, he would be perfect: and yet the great love of riches, in which he had fixed his mind, prevailed over faith. Whence it is not so plainly conjectured that his faith was not great, as that that love of wealth and of the flowing abundance of goods was greatest in him. For indeed the same faith, where it had not met such great difficulty, could immediately have torn the young man from the world. Nor is it necessary to say that he lost the grace of God on account of that tepidity of faith. Since it was not a commandment but a counsel: if he wished to be perfect. As will be said in book 3.

Therefore, that all these things may shine more fully, the qualities, degrees and habits of faith which befall it, while its substance is preserved, are various and diverse.³⁷ For sometimes it is sound and firm, sometimes weak and feeble. For Paul says: Receive the weak in faith.³⁸ And: Rebuke them sharply, that they may be sound in the faith.³⁹ Again CHRIST our Saviour reproaches the little faith of Peter when he trembles, and praises the great faith of the Centurion and the Canaanite woman. Finally James calls that faith dead which is deserted by charity: and Paul calls that living which works through charity. For just as the motion of the body is an indication of animal life, so also the offices which are done according to God are the witnesses of spiritual life. But as not every remission and languor of faith extinguishes the light of divine grace, so neither is death itself to be judged such as to consume and expunge the substance and nature of the same faith and its habit. Nay, a dead faith can be stronger than a living one, although then it is not better: nay, it may not be a virtue at all.⁴⁰ Peter, although he did not have that degree of confirmed faith so as to walk steadily on the waters, is not forthwith to be judged to have sinned mortally. Which we also said in like manner of the young man just mentioned. Nay, there are tepid men, not very strong in faith: yet they persevere in grace, because they are not exposed to great dangers of falling. There are on the contrary much stronger men, who nevertheless, when a great occasion suddenly presents itself, are precipitated by the impulse of passion. According to the word of that comic poet: However, it is easy to act wickedly on a sudden. As one who, seeing his dearest son slain or his bed violated, would rush upon the murderer or the adulterer. In David⁴¹ there is an example: surely when, kindled with most ardent love for the beautiful Bathsheba, he committed adultery with her, did he lose faith? By no means. Nay, he had an outstanding faith. For he did not doubt that he had sinned against God, as he afterwards tearfully confessed. But he could not sustain the great conflict of the flesh: he could have, I say, through the grace of God, if he had fought strenuously, but nevertheless he was conquered. Indeed we do not deny that, if you look only at the nature of faith, the greater it was, the greater charity was engendered. For, as Ambrose says in the book On the Calling of the Gentiles, faith is called the mother of good will and just action. And on Ezekiel, Homily 22, Gregory says: We love in this life only as much as we believe: and as much as we love, so much do we presume of hope. But there are carnal and secular impediments by which faith is hampered: to overcome which other virtues besides faith are necessary.

Finally our assertion is confirmed by the irrefragable testimony of Paul:⁴² For if I have, he says, all faith, so as to remove mountains, but have not charity, I am nothing. Therefore not only faith, but the greatest faith can exist without charity. This is the passage at which, seeing it most manifestly convinces the matter, they strive exceedingly to delude, by inventing I know not what faith of miracles, besides justifying faith. For just as, seeing that assent to sacred Scripture can be had without charity, they say that it is not that by which we are justified, but is historical faith: so hearing from Paul that all faith can be found without the companionship of charity, they devise another faith of miracles. Surely if it were permitted so to cavil at the Scriptures, and to tear and mock the nature and qualities of faith in individual passages by this new usurpation, all reason of explaining [them] would perish. First,⁴³ what kind of naming is 'faith of miracles'? If he had said 'grace of miracles', as grace of healings, or gift of miracles, like the gift of tongues, the word could be understood of some grace freely given. But when Paul says nothing other than 'all faith', what other faith can be understood than the catholic faith, to which as to the foundation of the evangelical law this privilege of miracles belongs? Otherwise it could also be called hope or charity of miracles. Likewise Paul's word⁴⁴ is entirely an allusion to that of the Redeemer: If you have faith as⁴⁵ a grain of mustard seed, you shall say to this mountain, pass from here to there, and it shall pass. Where the discourse is manifestly concerning the catholic faith. Since indeed, when reproaching the unbelief of the apostles, who for that reason had not cast out the demons, he added that word. For indeed, as we said a little before, it is most constant and most received that CHRIST neither usurped the power of miracles nor imparted it to his disciples except to confirm faith, which could not be persuaded by natural reasons. Which we showed above by the word of CHRIST, sending the apostles to disseminate the word: where he says,⁴⁶ And these signs shall follow those who believe, etc. Nay, from the very beginning of old the divine custom of revealed faith was to confirm it by portents and miracles. For so he promised to Abraham⁴⁷ that from an old man and a barren Sarah he would propagate offspring beyond the sand of the sea. And to the inviolate virgin,⁴⁸ in order that the angel might establish faith in the mystery, he mentions the pregnancy of an old woman as another miracle. Therefore to that same faith for the sake of testifying which miracles were to be wrought, the same power and authority was conferred: if only it were so fruitful as to beget a certain confidence of obtaining. And this is what the Apostle says, 'all faith', that is, faith in that supreme degree which is necessary for removing mountains: although now, where there is no such necessity of asserting faith by miracles, this power does not display itself so frequently. But what need is there to summon other witnesses? Is not the Apostle most explicit as to what faith he speaks?⁴⁹ For when he concludes at the end of that chapter that faith, hope and charity are three, and charity greater than the others, can anyone deny that he is speaking of the three theological virtues: and therefore of the catholic faith, which is the first of them. In the whole chapter, therefore, he speaks of the same [faith], which he so compares with charity that in whatever degree it is solitary, it does not suffice for the friendship of God. But laborious charity, which is patient and kind, supplies to all the other virtues their divine being. And for this reason he attributes to it that it believes all things and hopes all things. And besides, because through charity both faith and hope increase. To the same point pertains that saying of CHRIST: Not everyone who says to me, Lord, Lord, shall enter into the kingdom of heaven: but he who does the will of my Father. For many will say in that day: Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied in your name, and the rest:⁵⁰ who nevertheless will not enter into the kingdom of heaven. For to say Lord, Lord pertains to the catholic faith, by which we know that God is the true Lord. Nor do we know it as the demons do: for they do not say Lord, because they do not believe from obedience. But to say Lord is the proper faith of a Christian: not only acquired, but that by which, bringing the intellect into captivity, we offer assent to the divine majesty, having professed his law. Which can nevertheless exist without charity. And therefore our Redeemer adds: Everyone therefore who hears these my words and does them shall be likened to a wise man: but he who hears and does not do [them] shall be likened to a foolish man. Where to hear is the same as to believe and receive the faith. Whence in Luke⁵¹ that servant who knew the will of his lord and did not do according to his will shall be beaten with many stripes. For undoubtedly to know the will is to have faith. To this also pertains the parable⁵² of those invited to the great supper: who surely doubting nothing about the banquet excused themselves, putting forward secular business. But here there are two or three objections of theirs to which it is necessary to respond. First,⁵³ since faith is a gift of God, as charity is, why is it not equally expunged with charity by any mortal crime? The answer is at hand. Because charity is the inseparable companion of grace. For grace is that by which we are loved by God, and charity is that by which we love him. And as is had in the Gospel:⁵⁴ He who loves me shall be loved by my Father. Wherefore by whatever contrariety mortal sin is opposed to grace, it is also opposed to charity. But faith and hope and the other moral virtues have their own distinct natures, which of themselves do not say either friendship or the grace of God. Wherefore just as charity departing through the sin of theft does not take with it the habit of chastity, so neither the habit of hope or faith: but all remain unformed, and therefore unworthy of the simple name of virtues. But heresy or apostasy, which stands opposed over against faith, excludes its infused habit. For a heretic in one article, although he has acquired faith in the others, does not however believe them on account of the formal nature of catholic faith: namely, as they have been revealed and proposed by CHRIST through the holy Church. But when the nature of faith fails, faith itself is also abolished.

The other doubt is of greater weight among them.⁵⁵ namely, that dead faith is not faith. For the name 'dead' implies this, since a dead man is not a man. And besides they argue that this kind of faith differs in no way from the faith of demons. For in one context James says⁵⁶ that faith if it does not have works is dead in itself: and that he who believes in this way does nothing more excellent than the demons, who believe and tremble. But he will dissolve both of these without difficulty who has carefully weighed the words of James. For he does not compare faith to charity as a man to a soul: but as a body to a soul. He does not say, I say, 'as a man', but 'as the body without the spirit is dead, so faith without works is dead'. For both man and body live by the soul: but man as by a form which is a part of himself, the body however as by that which comes to it from outside. And therefore because God, who is to us as the soul of spiritual life, dwells in us through charity (for God is charity),⁵⁷ and he who remains in charity remains in God, and God in him: when charity is expunged, both man remains spiritually dead, and his faith dead. Yet, as the body without the soul retains its entire essence as a body, so faith without charity has its own nature, substance and property of faith, which is to assent to the sayings of God. Nor does it forthwith follow that that dead faith differs in nothing from the faith of demons. For the nature of faith consists not only in certainty,⁵⁸ which perhaps the demons can have greater, nay clearer, than we, but in this, that it is received through obedience and the submission of the will (as we hinted in its very definition). But the demons believe not willingly but unwillingly: and hence it is that our faith by its own nature allures us to the love of God, while theirs instils nothing but fear and trembling of him. But the holy Synod of Trent has already defined each of these things in detail. Surely what it explained after canon 7, that those three theological virtues are distinguished by their own proper natures, and therefore separable from one another, and in chapter 12 it censured under anathema that faith is not that special confidence: and in canon 28, that faith which remains without charity is true faith, although dead, which suffices to make a man a Christian. The Synod, I say, of Trent,⁵⁹ which has now been transferred to Bologna (may God turn it to the good of his Church, and may it be happy and auspicious for her).