Summa summae S. Thomae sive compendium theologiae

[That the first man was constituted in the state of sanctifying grace before he sinned is a doctrine of faith defined at the Council of Trent, sess. V, can. 1, in these words: « If anyone does not confess that the first man, when he had transgressed the commandment of God in paradise, immediately lost the holiness and justice in which he had been constituted...; let him be anathema. » The Council says constituted, and not created, in order to avoid the controversy debated among theologians, which is the question here. For some, at least in the time of St. Thomas¹, indeed acknowledged that the first man had been endowed with sanctifying grace before he sinned, yet contended that he had not received it at his creation. But since, with the common and now far more probable opinion

I say: The first man was created in sanctifying grace².

Proof 1° from Holy Scripture. Eccles., VII, 30: God made man upright. Yet, according to the phrasing of Holy Scripture, the upright are called just; whence Canticle, I, 3: The upright love thee; Psalm, VII, 11: He saveth the upright of heart; Psalm, XXXII, 1: Rejoice in the Lord, O ye just: praise becometh the upright. Therefore.

Proof 2° from the Holy Fathers. Jerome, book I adv. Iovinian., ch. 16, says: « Since we were created good and upright by God, by our own fault we have fallen away to worse things. » Hilary, in Augustine, book II contra Iulian., ch. 8, n. 27: « In Adam's offense we lost the nobility of that first and blessed creation. » Augustine himself, book de Corrept. et Gratia, ch. 11, n. 31: « God therefore did not will that he himself [Adam] should be without His grace, which He left in his free will. » And in the Enchirid., ch. 106, n. 28, speaking of Adam before sin, he attributes justice to him: « Although sin was situated in free will alone, yet free will was not sufficient for retaining justice, unless, by participation in the unchangeable good, divine assistance were provided. » Damascene, book II de Fide orthod., ch. 12: « God created man innocent, upright, virtuous, adorned with every kind of virtue, a second angel, a composite worshiper, spirit and flesh together, spirit by reason of grace. »

Proof 3° from reasons. 1° The same reasoning holds here for man as for the angel; for each is equally ordered to grace³. But the angels were created in grace, as St. Augustine defines, book XII de Civit., ch. 9, n. 2, saying of the angels: « He created them with a good will, that is, with a chaste love, by which they would cling to Him, at once both establishing their nature and bestowing grace. » Therefore man too was created in grace.

2° The happiness in which God created man consisted in this: that reason was subjected to God, and the lower powers and the body to reason; but the first subjection was the cause of the second and the third⁴. But the second and third were not natural, otherwise they would have remained after sin⁵. Therefore neither was the first: and thus it was through the supernatural gift of grace.

3°⁶ — It is repugnant to say that God established man for a supernatural end, and did not immediately confer on him everything necessary for pursuing this end; because, as long as this state lasted, man would at once have had to tend toward such an end and yet would have been unable to attain it: which implies something contradictory and opposed to the wisdom and justice of God. But without sanctifying grace man could not tend toward his supernatural end. Therefore, as soon as He created man, God endowed him with sanctifying grace.

You will say: The Apostle, Ⅰ Cor., XV, 45, opposing Adam to Christ, says: The first Adam was made into a living soul, but the last into a quickening spirit. But the quickening of the spirit is through sanctifying grace. Therefore.

I answer. I deny the consequent. The Apostle there compares Adam with Christ, not as to the soul, but as to the body, in His resurrection, so that the sense is that Adam at his creation received an animal body needing food, like the other animals, but Christ at His resurrection received a spiritual body, that is, one not needing food⁷.

You will ask 1° whether the first man was constituted in justice after the manner of adults, by means of an act of free will, namely, by consent to the acceptance of grace.

I answer more probably in the affirmative. 1° — Because through the conferral of grace a spiritual friendship is contracted between God and man. But friendship implies a mutual agreement of minds. Therefore, while grace is being conferred on one having the use of reason, it is fitting that he consent to that conferral by some act of his own. — I subsume. But Adam was created

with the perfect use of reason. Therefore. 2° Because the manner of receiving grace, by freely consenting to its infusion, is nobler than that manner by which infants receive it. But nothing forbids attributing this nobler manner to the first parent, since it is common to all adults, according to this saying of the Apostle, Ⅰ Cor., XV, 10: The grace of God with me, and the excellence of the divine gift demands that it be accepted by one who enjoys free will, just as it also befits the nobility of human nature that it freely enter into friendship with God.

It cannot be objected that, if man was truly created in sanctifying grace, he could not truly have consented to its infusion, because to be precedes to act. For although the consent of free will was simultaneous in time with the infusion of grace, it can nevertheless be called a disposition toward it, insofar as nature would precede grace in the genus of material cause, but would accompany it, by way of concurrence, in the genus of efficient cause. And this very thing the Angelic Doctor teaches, hic q. 95, a. 1, ad 5. He objects to himself: « For someone to receive grace, consent is required on the part of the recipient... But consent to grace cannot belong except to one already existing. Therefore man did not receive grace in the first instant of his creation. » He answers: « Since the movement of the will is not continuous, nothing prevents the first man from having consented to grace even in the first instant of his creation. »

You will ask 2° whether Adam in the state of innocence possessed all the virtues.

I answer. Adam in the state of innocence possessed all the virtues in some manner⁸; because, as has been said, such was the rectitude of the first state, that reason was subject to God, and the lower powers to reason. But the virtues are nothing other than certain perfections by which reason is ordered to God, and the lower powers are disposed according to the rule of reason. Therefore.

It is confirmed. The first man, as we have said, was created in sanctifying grace. But sanctifying grace is the root

of all the virtues, which flow from it, as properties from an essence. Therefore.

I said in some manner, because not all the virtues were present in the first man in the same way and equally perfectly; for some were present as to habit and act, some as to habit only. The virtues that involve no imperfection, such as charity and justice, were present as to habit and act. Those that imply imperfection, but not one repugnant to the perfection of the first state, such as faith, which concerns things not seen, and hope, which concerns things not yet possessed, were likewise present as to habit and act. But those that imply an imperfection repugnant to the perfection of the first state, such as penance and mercy, were present as to habit only, and not as to act. For sin, which is the concern of penance, and another's misery, which is the concern of mercy, were repugnant to the perfection of the first state. Adam was, however, so disposed that, if he had sinned, he would have grieved, and if he had seen misery in another, he would have repelled it as far as he could; and thus penance and mercy were in him as to habit.

Here it can be inquired what the state of pure nature is; what the integrity of nature is; what the state of original justice is; whether integrity and original justice were so owed to human nature that the state of pure nature would be impossible; whether both for Adam and for the angels, besides habitual grace, actual grace efficacious of itself for perseverance was necessary. These questions will be better and more conveniently resolved in the preliminary dissertation of the treatise on Grace.]