Summa summae S. Thomae, Tomus III

1°: Faith remains in a sinner who does not commit the sin of unbelief.

It is proved, firstly, from the Apostle, 1 Cor., XIII, 2, where he says: If I should have all faith..., but have not charity, I am nothing. By these words he plainly supposes that charity can be separated from faith while faith remains, and thus that faith can be in a sinner.

Secondly, from Trent, session VI, canon 28, defining thus: « If anyone shall say that when grace is lost through sin faith is always lost with it, or that the faith which remains is not true faith, though it is not living...; let him be anathema. » Hence this conclusion is de fide. To this point tends this proposition condemned by Alexander VIII, the 12th: « When in great sinners all love fails, faith also fails, and even if they seem to believe, it is not divine faith, but human. » Likewise this 52nd of Quesnel: « All other means of salvation are contained in faith, as in its germ and seed; but this faith is not without love and confidence. »

Thirdly, by reason. Not every sin is contrary to faith, nor does it destroy the formal reason of its object: thus one who steals does not for that reason cease to believe that God is the first and infallible truth in speaking. Therefore.

But when the holy Fathers say that there is no faith or any virtue without charity, they speak of living faith and of the virtues in their perfect state of being, as we have already noted.

I say, secondly: In demons and the damned there does not remain infused and supernatural faith ¹.

It is proved. Demons and the damned are stripped of all gratuitous gifts, especially those ordered to beatitude, which they neither hope for nor can hope for. Now faith is a gratuitous gift by its nature ordered to beatitude; for it is, according to the Apostle, Hebr., XI, 1, the substance of things to be hoped for, and according to the Council of Trent, session VI, cap. 8, « the beginning of salvation, the root and foundation of justification. » Therefore.

It is confirmed. For supernatural faith there is required a pious motion of the will, or a good affect of credulity toward the first truth revealing. Now there is in demons and the damned no pious motion of the will, no good will, since it is fixed in evil; and although what they do is sometimes good from its proximate object, yet they always do it from a depraved intention of the end, and thus it is always evil.

You will say: 1° James, II, 19, says: The demons believe, and tremble. Therefore. 2° Demons and damned Christians know in hell the supernatural truths they knew on the way. Now they cannot know these supernatural truths except through faith, which alone among the intellectual virtues is supernatural. Therefore.

I answer to the first. That demons believe with infused faith arising from a pious motion of the will, I deny; that they believe with natural faith, and in a manner coerced, both from the evidence of signs which they penetrate with the keen acumen of a perspicacious mind, and from the miserable experience by which they feel God as their avenger, I concede. Nor does it matter that St. James compares their faith with the faith of sinners, which is true infused faith; for the comparison holds not as to the nature of either faith, but as to the sterility of each, because neither suffices for salvation, since both are without works. The solution is clear from the text.

I answer to the second. I deny the minor. For the faith by which demons and the damned believe and know supernatural truths, although it can be called supernatural on the part of the object, is nonetheless natural on the part of the motive or principle; for it is acquired either from the state of the wayfarer, or from the event of things, or from prophecies fulfilled, or from the punishments they feel: just as, if someone from a merely natural motive, say from the report of parents or of some learned man, were to believe our mysteries, although the object of this faith would be supernatural, the faith itself in itself and on the part of its principle would be natural.

I say, thirdly: Faith does not remain in the blessed ², yet it does remain in the souls in purgatory.

It is proved, first part. 1° From the Apostle, 1 Cor., XIII, 9 and 10, who says: We know in part and we prophesy in part; but when that which is perfect shall come, that which is in part shall be done away. That is, when vision shall have come, faith shall be done away. And 2 Cor., V, 6 and 7: While we are in the body, we are absent from the Lord; for we walk by faith, and not by sight. Whence Aug., book XIV On the Trinity, c. 2, n. 4: « For, he says, there will no longer be faith [in heaven], by which things that are not seen are believed, but sight, by which things that were believed are seen. »

It is proved, 2° ³ The formal object of faith being destroyed, faith does not subsist. Now in the blessed the formal object of faith is destroyed; for the formal object of faith is the first truth not seen, which the blessed see intuitively. Therefore.

Hence the second part stands proved. For the souls in purgatory (the same must be said of the Fathers who were in limbo) do not yet enjoy the beatific vision, and thus the formal object of faith remains in them, namely the first truth not seen. Add that they hope for beatitude; but the foundation of hope is faith, since no one hopes for beatitude unless he believes he can attain it.

I say, fourthly: Faith, whether habitual or actual, does not remain in a heretic who pertinaciously discredits even one single article of faith ^{4 5}. This is common opinion with the Author, against a few.

It is proved, 1° from the Apostle, Gal., V, 4, who says to those who held that observance of the legal rites was necessary for salvation: You are emptied of Christ, that is, of the Spirit of faith, as he explains in the following verse. Trent, session VI, cap. 15: « It must be asserted, he says, not only by unbelief, whereby faith itself also is lost, etc. » Now any heresy, even about one article alone, is unbelief.

It is proved, 2°, by reason ⁶ The formal object ceasing, by which habit and act are specified, the habit and act cease and are destroyed. Now in a heretic who pertinaciously denies even one article of faith, the formal object of faith ceases, both habitual and actual. Therefore. — The minor is proved. The formal object of faith, whether habitual or actual, is the first truth in speaking, as manifested by the Church. Now one who pertinaciously denies one article of faith does not believe the others he holds on account of the first truth as manifested by the Church; otherwise he would believe this one too, which he denies, since it also, like the others, was revealed by the first truth and proposed as such by the Church; but he rejects this one and holds the others by his own judgment and his own choice. Whence Aug., book XVII Contra Faustum, c. 3, addressing the Manichees: « You, he says, believe in the Gospel what you wish, and what you do not wish you do not believe; you believe yourselves rather than the Gospel. »

[Let it be noted, therefore, that although faith, on the part of its object, is an integral whole consisting of parts, inasmuch as it regards the many things revealed by God, nevertheless in the character of a habit and a quality it is one and simple in each believer, since it inclines him to assent to many things under one indivisible motive, namely on account of the first truth in speaking; whence this whole and entire habit perishes in a heretic. But if it happens that a heretic after his heresy believes the articles he still holds with the same ease and firmness as before, this happens because heretics believe with the same firmness and ease not only the articles of faith, but also their errors, so that they sometimes die asserting them. Firmness, therefore, comes from sheer obstinacy of the will, but ease from a habit of faith acquired either, according to some, through acts of previous faith, not as supernatural but as vital acts; or, according to others, through acts of faith natural on the part of their principle, though supernatural on the part of their object; for often a believer, whether from the instruction of parents, or from the teaching of catechists, or from custom, without attending to the revealing first truth, elicits acts which, being natural on the part of their principle, generate an equally natural habit, which remains in heresy. But the habit of supernatural faith is destroyed by the destruction of its formal object. Therefore, when a heretic, by denying one article of faith, denies the first truth, and by this act physically destroys in his intellect the object of faith, in the same way he destroys mediately the habit of faith.]