De natura et gratia libri III, cum Apologia contra Catharinum

From this point, by a twofold reasoning concerning inherent justice as formed, we descend more prepared into the dispute which the Lutherans bring against us concerning the imputation of the justice of CHRIST, and concerning the imperfection and inchoation of ours.

For the third point in which they dissent from us concerning formal justice is that the justice by which we are formally just is not the justice which is in us: but that which is formally in CHRIST: which indeed is imputed to us as if we ourselves had made it ours. This word is most popular, and when heard on the surface cannot but be plausible. For at first sound it presents nothing else than that our works are not the cause and merits of our own justification, which nothing more orthodox and holy can be said. But nevertheless it is thoroughly necessary to see how these men hide their religion under the name of the imputed justice of CHRIST. This word, always suspect to me, I brought into suspicion before the holy Synod, disclosing how great and of what kind are the things these men fabricate from this their imputed justice. Which afterwards others more skilled than I weighed in a more diligent disputation. But to pass over very many of their words with which they fortify this place everywhere, in the imperial booklet presented at Regensburg,¹ article 5, they thus bring forth their inherent justice, as if it were their last will. Although, they say, he who is justified receives and has justice through CHRIST, even inherent justice, yet the faithful soul does not rely on this, but on the sole justice of CHRIST given to us, without which there is and can be absolutely no justice. And so by faith in CHRIST we are justified, or reputed just: that is, accepted through his merits: not on account of our dignity or works. But on account of inherent justice we are called just because we do the things that are just. Nay, even Pighius² among our own, when he speaks of the formal cause, says that we are justified before God neither by faith nor by our charity, if we speak formally and properly: but by the one justice of God in CHRIST: by the one justice of CHRIST communicated to us. With how much applause Bucer³ received this confession of Pighius, and how exultantly he approves and kisses it. Saying that would that he had said the rest in the same way. And he adds that to be justified in the eyes and judgment of God is nothing else than to be judged just by him with the justice of CHRIST, by which justice of CHRIST our sins and also the imperfection of our renewal are covered: because neither faith nor charity, that is, the whole of our renewal and inherent justice, advances and is perfected in this life to such a degree that, relying on it, we could bear the judgment of God. Thus Bucer. Here therefore the careful reader must meditate accurately, that they think differently from us concerning inherent justice (which they call the beginning of renewal). For they do not admit it in this sense, that through it we are formally accepted by God (for they ascribe this to the sole justice of CHRIST), but that through it we begin to worship and love God by doing the things that are just. Not that in this life we satisfy the law: but in the future: as will be clear in book 3. And therefore in their popular didagma they do not teach justification, or formal justice, other than that which is the non-imputation of sins through the justice which is in CHRIST. But also the reverend and orthodox Canons of Cologne, whom I name for honour's sake as a shield and wall of the faith, in their antididagma,⁴ by which they wisely and catholically came forward against the aforesaid didagma (or whoever published that book in their name), have used that word 'imputation' in a good sense indeed (for what other thought can underlie concerning catholic men?) but perhaps more secure from the adversaries than safe. Where they say that the first head of justification is the remission and washing away of sins through the imputation of the justice of CHRIST. And a little below, they say: We are justified by God by a twofold justice, as it were through formal and essential causes. Of which one and the prior is the consummated justice of CHRIST: not indeed as it is outside us in him, but as and when the same is imputed to us for justice (while nevertheless it is apprehended by faith). But otherwise we are formally justified by inherent justice, which, with the remission of sins, together with the renewal of the Holy Spirit and the diffusion of charity into our hearts, is given, infused and made our own according to the measure of faith of each one. And it is added: Yet we do not principally rely on this inherent justice (because it is imperfect), but by it as by a certain interior experiment we are made certain that remission of sins has been made to us (who feel and experience such a renewal of our spirit in us), and that the consummated justice of CHRIST is imputed to us, and that thus CHRIST dwells in us by faith. Surely in these words something cannot but be desired by which the false sense of the adversaries would be more explicitly contradicted.

And first, to begin from the lesser: namely from the nature and property of a formal cause,⁵ this nature certainly does not at all agree with that justice which is in God or in CHRIST as he is man, in respect of us. For a formal cause, as is most approved and received among philosophers and theologians, is that thing or quality which is in a subject: as the soul is the form of man; light, the form of air; heat, of the hot; and whiteness, of the white. For form is said in relation to matter, to which by inhering it gives being: but the justice by which CHRIST is formally just, like the justice of God (which is his own essence), is not in us: how then can it be the formal cause of our justification? Who would philosophize so as to say that the formal cause of illuminated air is the light which is in the sun, or the form of heated water is the heat not existing in fire? By equal reasoning, therefore, just as air is not bright formally by the light which is in the sun, but by the light received from the sun into itself, it is most constant that neither are we formally just, accepted and pleasing by the justice which is in CHRIST: but by that which he has brought into us. For these are distinct notes of prepositions, by which we distinguish between the efficient and the formal cause. We are indeed just by the justice of CHRIST, as by an efficient cause: but not through it, as through a formal cause. Plato⁶ was one who posited formal causes separated from individuals; and Augustine often used this phrase, as we said a little before, saying that we are good by the goodness which is in God, and wise, etc. But this is nevertheless to be understood from the fact that our goodness and wisdom are a certain participation of that which is in him. And so our charity and our justice are called [his], because our grace and virtues are participations of his goodness. There is an example in animal life. For it is manifest that we live the life of God, for in him we live, move and are.⁷ But if you so understand 'of God' as if the life which is formally in God were that by which we formally live, what is more absurd? 'The life of God' is therefore understood effectively, that is, the life of the soul which he has produced in us. Which although in its own part, which is indivisible, receives no difference, yet from the diverse disposition of matter, some excel others in nature or talent: and some are born better than others. And so it must be thought concerning grace. The justice of CHRIST (as he is man) can also be significantly called an exemplary cause, as we said in chapter 9: because God predestined us to be made conformable to the image of his Son. Besides that it is a meritorious cause, and in its degree efficient: as was explained there: but not a formal cause.

But I would not dispute so much about the manner of speaking⁸ if there were no hidden danger in the matter. For preaching that we are justified by the sole justice of CHRIST, which when it is apprehended by faith is reputed ours, they exclude every respect and nature of the justice which is in us. Hence, what dogmas do you think they produce?⁹ They produce, I say, first, that our sins are so entirely remitted through that justice that no satisfaction of ours through his grace is any longer necessary. Since both the guilt and equally every fault is pardoned to anyone who apprehends that justice by faith. Therefore as it was sufficient in him, so they wish to allow the respect of our disposition to be efficacious in us. By this dug tunnel they have crept to undermine the citadel of confession. And therefore secondly they infer that the first justification is equal grace in all. For all (as they say) are made just by one and the same justice. Hear the blasphemy of the man, Luther's, in the sermon on the Nativity of Mary:¹⁰ If indeed Christians, or things, can bear so much. All we Christians, he says, are equally great as the mother of God, and equally holy as she. And your prayer is as dear to me as hers, if you believe that CHRIST dwells in you equally as in her. Because through the blood of CHRIST we are all equally cleansed from sins. And besides from this they infer their certainty of grace. Because if we are just by the justice of CHRIST, and not dependently on that which is in us, the whole certainty depends on the promise of CHRIST. And therefore whatever we may think about our works, they say that he is impious who doubts that he receives grace: for he doubts concerning the faith of CHRIST promising us salvation, not through our justice. Let anyone consider most carefully how these men build their machine from their imputed justice, and weigh how, whatever they say with their mouth, in reality they deny that we are justified by faith which works through charity, as we have noted again and again in the preceding. Which is especially detected from this their manner of imputed justice. For they say that we are not formally justified by the fact that we are moved by God with the motion of free will toward him, but by that formal justice which is in CHRIST alone apprehended by faith: that is, believed.

In order, therefore, that we may not admit these absurdities, we establish this contrary conclusion.¹¹ Namely, that although we are not justified by the charity by which we first love God (as we confessed above), but by that by which he first loves us, yet we are not formally just through the charity which he himself is, or which is in CHRIST as he is man, but through the grace which he communicates to us by his love, and imparts to us according to the measure of faith, but of that faith which works through charity, by which works he disposes, draws and converts us. For this cause he requires of us faith, hope, charity and penance in our justification, so that according to the measure and quantity of this preparation he may bestow the degree of grace by which we are formally just, and accepted to as great a degree of glory as is that of grace. And although this is best understood by those who acknowledge that grace is an infused habit, yet however obstinately anyone may deny habits, he must nevertheless, unless he wishes to err, confess that according to the measure of his cooperation and disposition, sinners receive from God a different grace of formal justification: that is, are loved with unequal love, and reconciled by God. For in my Father's house there are many mansions:¹² as in the fatherland, so also on the way. And there is a most beautiful allusion of Paul, concerning the stars, of which one differs from another in brightness.¹³¹⁴ For just as all the stars receive splendour from one sun, yet each according to its quality, as each is more or less transparent and solid, so also from the one justice of CHRIST effectively (which in itself is a sun most patent without measure) we receive different measures of grace at that time when we are justified. Which grace, with the other gifts, CHRIST measures out to us according as we expand the bosom of our heart, with him preceding us. For open, he says, your mouth, and I will fill it.¹⁵ Wherefore each one will receive not only in the fatherland according as he has done in the body, according to his works, by which after infused grace he labours at its increase, but also according to those by which he disposed himself with divine help for its first infusion. Although by reason of the sacrament actually exhibited a certain degree is conferred. These things are finally confirmed from that word of the Gospel: He who loves me shall be loved by my Father:¹⁶ for hence it is gathered that as much as one loves, so much shall he be loved: that is, as much as, with God insinuating himself into us through his love, we allow ourselves to be freely moved, so great will be the degree of friendship: according to the opinion of Augustine in On Grace and Free Will, chapter 9, on that word, Of his fullness we have all received.¹⁷ I will subjoin his words. From his fullness therefore we have received according to our measure, as it were our little parts: as God has divided the measure of faith.

It remains therefore that we examine the words by which they think to confute us.¹⁸ They say that our justice is imperfect, and therefore we rely on the justice of CHRIST, through which, imputed to us, we are accepted by God. But if they understand this of our preparatory works, by which they precede grace, neither do we attribute such perfection to them that they are merits of grace, which we have already very often confessed in the preceding. Nevertheless, when they are works of God moving us, they have that perfection that through them he converts and prepares us to receive his grace, according to the fervour of our cooperation. If however this is understood of the works of a man already imbued with grace,¹⁹ we undoubtedly deny that it is imperfect in the sense they think. Nay, whatever is the least degree of the grace of God has a just perfection for constituting us in his friendship, so that it wholly deletes every nature of enmity. We confess therefore that our grace is imperfect in comparison with that which is in CHRIST, first in intensity: as the light of the air is imperfect with respect to the light of the sun. Nay, in this way even the grace of one just man differs from the grace of another.²⁰ And besides there is this difference, that the grace of CHRIST is the grace of the head, by which he was gratuitously [gifted] as the redeemer of the world and the cause of our salvation, but ours is the grace of members, imparted to us from that, which is peculiar to each one. Nevertheless a man through any least degree of grace is so much a friend of God that no other supplement is necessary. Because that same grace is the effect of CHRIST, by which we are properly denominated, and truly are, beloved sons of God, and therefore heirs of the kingdom. Wherefore we do not deny that the justice of CHRIST is imputed to us. But this is altogether nothing else than that grace and gifts are infused into us, by which we are made partakers of him. And although grace were not a distinct quality in us, we would not therefore be formally pleasing and just through that which is in CHRIST, but effectively and meritoriously through it, and formally through this, that we are loved according to different degrees of friendship.

But if anyone objects: God accepted the passion of CHRIST for the redemption and liberation of the whole world from all sins: therefore it is that by which we are formally justified. The consequence is denied; but rather it must be noted that God accepted that justice of CHRIST at that time when he offered it, as most sufficient for the redemption of the whole world. Yet it is then efficacious in each one when he is a member of CHRIST: and its efficacy is to pour grace into the members.²¹ And as in the human body all members partake of the same life, but in a different order and manner (for otherwise the heart, otherwise the eyes or ears, and otherwise the hands or feet), in the same way we (according to Paul) are many one body in CHRIST, but certainly one member is his most sacred mother, others the apostles, and others the princes of the kingdom of heaven, and another each one of us. To which also the similitude of CHRIST's branches in the vine alludes.²² For not all branches receive the same fruit from the same vine. Hence it is that the calumny is most manifest when the Lutherans say²³ that we establish our own justice, ignoring that which is CHRIST's. Nay, we so call it ours, that is, inherent in us, that we nevertheless refer it as received to God the author and redeemer in CHRIST. For he is the one who both draws us to himself through the dispositive works of our free will, and communicates his grace to us. For we cannot think anything, but he is the one who gives us to will, to work and to perfect.²⁴ Whence eternal life, according to Augustine in On Grace and Free Will, chapter 7, is the grace of God, by which even the good works themselves are from God to us, from whom is both faith and love to us: by which we merit glory. We do not therefore deny that our justice relies on the justice of God through that which is in CHRIST. Namely, which he worked on the cross. But nevertheless ours relies on it, not as if both were formal, and that were the supplement of ours: as the adversaries imagine. For these men so speculate about our justice and the justice of CHRIST, as if there were two before a prince, one in a lower place, and the other [higher], and therefore the lower, although it might have some value before him, yet not so much but that it would need the advocacy of the higher, and his merit supplying what it cannot. But the matter is far otherwise between us and CHRIST the mediator. For all our justice relies on his, not because he supplies the defect of that which is in us from him, but because in the genus of efficient cause all ours depends on his in being made and being preserved.²⁵ As the light of the air [depends] on the light of the sun: which being taken away, the light of the air would be none. For so altogether, unless God had justified us through the grace of CHRIST, we would lie in the darkness of sins, and if he deserted us, we would immediately slip back. And therefore David prayed: Be my helper, Lord, do not forsake me.²⁶ Nevertheless, with grace conferred on us, which he preserves, it needs no other supplement, just as the sun does not supplement the light of the air except by preserving it by its presence. But that God supplies our defects must be understood thus.²⁷ Further, if by the name of defects we understand sins, it is the same as to remit and forgive. But if [we understand] our littleness, weakness, nay impossibility to conciliate his friendship, to supply is the same as to help us and bring aid to acquire and retain his grace. But if you call defect the smallness of grace, which from our faint-heartedness and sloth (without fault, however) we do not so cultivate that it may be more abundant and more consummated, this defect God will truly never supply: but where the tree falls, there it will be:²⁸ so that according to the measure of grace there may be the reward of glory, and he who has not paid in this life the debts due for sins by the fruits of penance may indeed be saved: but through fire. But in what way these men imagine that the justice which is in CHRIST supplies the defect of that which he has effected in us is ridiculous to say: for it would be to supply the defect of his own grace. But he will supply it if we diligently use his favour and aid, so that the grace which is in us may not be empty, but by our constant cultivation may grow with the fruits of merits.²⁹ The conclusion is therefore that we are formally just not only by that inherent justice which God imparts to us, but that no further imputation of the justice of CHRIST is needed to supply its imperfection. But the reason (to speak summarily) why formal justice is in us is this: the justice of CHRIST, by which we are made just, is one, and does not vary: but that we should all always be made equally just is most absurd to say: therefore the formal justices in us are unequal, by which we are accepted to various degrees of glory in virtue of that efficient justice of CHRIST. And therefore when Paul censures and reproaches those who establish their own justice, ignorant of that which is CHRIST's, and wherever Scripture admonishes us that we are justified not by our justice but by CHRIST's, we are only admonished that our works preceding his grace are not justice before God, but those which we do from his own grace. For such works are the justice³⁰ of CHRIST as of an efficient cause, but ours as of those receiving and cooperating. As Augustine says expressly in the letter to Paulinus in these words: Ignorant of the justice of God, that is, of that which is given from God, and wishing to establish their own, which is from the law.

But behold the arguments which were objected not only by the adversaries but also by our own men in disputation, from Pighius and other catholics. Who would dare to present his own justice before the tribunal of CHRIST, and not rather that of CHRIST alone?³¹ For we are all sons of Adam, conceived in iniquities, and born children of wrath:³² whose works accordingly (as the prophet says) are all like a menstruous cloth.³³ But he is, as John says, the propitiation for our sins: blotting out³⁴ (as Paul says) the handwriting of the decree that was against us, and fastening it to the cross.³⁵ Therefore unless his justice is imputed to us, ours is not sufficient. For the Apostle says that the sufferings of this time are not worthy to be compared with the future glory which shall be revealed in us.³⁶ Which he understands even of those offices which are done in grace. For he speaks to those to whom the Spirit bears testimony that they are sons of God. And David: Do not enter into judgment with your servant, because no living man shall be justified in your sight.³⁷ Whence Augustine says: Woe to the life of men, however laudable, if it is judged with mercy removed.³⁸ And Job: Truly I know that it is so, that man composed with God shall not be justified.³⁹ And below: If I have anything just, I will not answer: but I will entreat my judge: therefore however great our justice may be, it is not sufficient unless it receives a supplement from that of CHRIST imputed to us. As the Apostle says: Him who knew no sin, God made sin for us, that we might be made the justice of God in him.⁴⁰ From these Pighius concludes⁴¹ that our inherent justice, if strictly examined according to the divine rule, is not perfect, but rather that we are justified by the justice of CHRIST imputed to us. And he adds an example, that just as Jacob, under the disguised garb of his brother, the true firstborn, received his father's blessing,⁴² so we are to receive glory under the alien person of CHRIST. But all these things are twisted into a sinister sense from one equivocation.⁴³ Who would hesitate in any way that the sons of Adam, who from our nature and faculty can bring nothing of dignity into the sight of God, can only set the justice of CHRIST before our faults: by whose right we are both sons and heirs of the kingdom? But when we say 'of CHRIST', this genitive does not designate the subject, so that the sense would be 'the justice which is in CHRIST' (as they hallucinate), but it is the mark of an efficient cause: so that the sense is 'the justice which that [justice] of CHRIST, accepted by God, flows into us'. Which is to say: We are all pleasing and accepted as members of CHRIST according to the cited word of Paul, that we may be made the justice of God in him. To which understanding the example of Jacob under the likeness of Esau is apt. But do we not partake of that justice unequally, and not wholly according to the quantity which it has in CHRIST? But each one (as Paul says) according to his works and as he has done in the body. Otherwise there would not be many mansions in the house of the Father,⁴⁴ nor would star differ from star in brightness.⁴⁵ But the authorities brought to the contrary in book 3, in the disputation concerning satisfaction and the merits of works, are fully expounded. When you have inspected those expositions, you will clearly see that they do not at all contradict what we have said. But if these imputers object to us that the divine Augustine and perhaps others sometimes use this word of the imputation of the justice of CHRIST, let them think themselves answered by the same Augustine in On the Predestination of the Saints, chapter 14, that they used it for what is to be communicated, that is, to be participated in and imparted to us: because there were none then who depraved the sense of this word. But in this age, when these men draw a bad sense from it, either the word 'imputation' must be soundly explained, or wholly removed from the midst. But that Augustine everywhere took it in the sense of St. Thomas and the other scholastics, for what is to be participated in, that is, communicated according to unequal portions, is clear from On the Spirit and the Letter, chapter 9, where expounding that of Paul, The justice of God is manifested, he says: He did not say the justice of man, but of God: not that by which God is just, but that by which he induces man when he justifies the ungodly. And chapter 11, expounding that, The just man lives by faith, he adds: This is the justice of God⁴⁶ which in the old testament was veiled, in the new is revealed: which is therefore called the justice of God because by imparting it he makes [men] just: as salvation is the Lord's, by which he makes [men] saved. And chapter 32 he repeats it more explicitly. And in the exposition of Psalm 30, on that word, In your justice deliver me: For the justice of God, he says, is that which is ours, when it is given to us. And on the same word of Psalm 70: In your justice, he says, not in mine: for when I shall be just, it will be your justice: because I shall be just by the justice given to me by you: and so it will be mine as it is yours: that is, given to me by you. Well therefore and catholically the present Synod of Trent, session 6, chapter 7,⁴⁷ determined that there is one formal cause of our justification: namely, the justice of God: not indeed that by which he himself is just (for that is meritorious and efficient of ours), but that by which he makes us just: because namely, having been given it by him, we are renewed in the spirit of our mind: and we are not only reputed, but truly named and are just. Receiving justice in us, each one his own, according to the measure which the Holy Spirit imparts to each as he wills, and according to each one's own disposition and cooperation. And canon 10 condemns those who say that we are formally justified by the justice of CHRIST: and canon 11 more explicitly those who say that a man is justified by the sole imputation of the justice of CHRIST, with grace and charity excluded, which are poured into our hearts by the Holy Spirit and inhere in us.

Nor can I fail here to remember how these men are driven by their furies against the Church, so that all things should be silent which oppose them. At the very beginning, when the matter of justification was sent into discussion and consultation, some brought forth certain shadows of decrees in commentaries, so that from each one what made for the matter might be picked out. One [decree] they stole three months before the Session was held: and as if it had been a definition of the Council, so from it they seized the occasion of raging against the Synod.⁴⁸ I pass over how impudently, calumniously and ignorantly, from this one passage. They say that we deny that the blood of CHRIST suffices for the whole and eternal justification of man: and therefore that what is diminished in the merit of CHRIST we affirm must be supplied by human works, as by a more precious thing. Who even of the Pelagians would have said this? Surely not even any of the demons would dare to think it. But they make nothing of how they impose on us, so long as they expose us to the reproach and insult of the credulous people. Since we are so far from this blasphemy that we say that works preceding grace are of no value for our being justified freely: but works following have their whole worth from the grace of CHRIST. But as to the present passage, they wonder how we speak contradictions, namely that no one can obtain salvation except in the merit of the passion of CHRIST: and yet we require another inherent justice in us. Whereas it is we who wonder that they do not see that air is not illuminated except by the sun: but yet only through the light which it receives from it. For our justice does not supply the defect of that which is CHRIST's, but is its effect. Nor do we deny the efficacy of his justice: but that it is the formal cause. But why do we continue to respond to their invectives and tragedies? Rather the place where the Church lies is to be lamented by us, and God is to be prayed to: that he may at some time look upon us, even for his own glory.