Summa de Ecclesia

To the second argument of the adversaries, which is reckoned among them an Achilles, answer is given in two ways. First, by denying the assumption if it is taken universally, namely that it is a common conception of the mind that the whole is greater than its part. For we say that this is true of the integral whole, but not of the potential whole, whence the Master of the Sentences in book 1, dist. 3, comparing the parts of an image with one another and one with all the others, said etc.: They are equal not only singly to singly, but also singly to all. Against which St Thomas, at the end of the aforesaid third distinction, arguing there to prove that one power of the soul is not equal to all the others, uses this argument: Every whole is greater than its part. To this he himself in answer says thus, that this is true of the totality of dimensive or numerical quantity, which are of the same account, and not of the totality of virtual quantity: for it can happen that one power extends to as many objects as several others. And in like manner the lord Peter of Tarentaise, who was Innocent V, answered the same argument in the place above, saying thus that what is said, that every whole is greater than its part, is true of the integral whole, but not of the potential whole. And so according to this, conceding of the integral whole that every whole is greater than its part, the argument of the adversaries does nothing for the point: since we do not speak of the majority of dimensive or numerical quantity, according to which there is no doubt that any congregation is greater than its prelate or ruler, but we speak of the majority of virtual or potential quantity, according to which it stands that one power endowed with power is greater than all the other inferiors which are called to a share of solicitude only in part. Whence if that argument of the adversaries were valid, it would in like manner militate against Christ as against the Pope, arguing thus as the adversaries argue: It is a common conception of the mind that the whole is greater than its part, but Christ is a part of the Church, therefore the Church is greater than Christ. That Christ is truly called a part of the Church is clear.

Both from that which we adduced above in the preceding chapter from the Apostle, 1 Cor. 12, where he is called a member of the body of Christ, which is the Church. And from what Bernard says in a certain sermon on the body of Christ, who says thus: For the whole Church is the body of Christ, namely the head together with the members. But there are found in this body as it were three parts of which the whole body consists: one part is the head itself. For the head is both head and part of the body, etc. And yet, these things notwithstanding, the conclusion is false and heretical, namely that the Church is greater than Christ. Whence what one of the adversaries says in a certain tract of his, as we touched in the argument, that the Church is greater or nobler than Christ, insofar as He is man and insofar as He is comprehended among the members of the Church, is erroneous and heretical, since it is manifestly against holy Scripture. For it is said in Eph. 1 that God has put all things under his feet, namely of Christ, where the Gloss says as if to say: not only does he preside over men in dignity, but they are also under him. And there follows below in the Gloss to the point: under his feet, that is, under his humanity which is signified by the feet. There follows in the Apostle: And he has made him head above the whole Church, which is his body, the Gloss: above the whole Church which is in heaven and which is on earth. Likewise it is against the Scripture of the same Apostle saying in Eph. 5: Christ is the head of the Church, he himself the Saviour of his body. There follows: the Church is subject to Christ. Besides, how can a faithful mind conceive that the Saviour is not superior to the saved, the bridegroom to the bride, the husband to the wife, and the head to the whole body. But what the aforesaid adversary says, that some doctors have said this, is false, unless there have been some heretics. But there are found some doctors who, in the 4th book of the Sentences, dist. 13, on that word which the Master adduces, what better than the body and blood of Christ, ask whether the true body of Christ is better than the mystical body of Christ. And in answer they say, Master William of Auxerre, Master

Albert and St Thomas, that the mystical body of Christ, if it is taken together with its head, is better than the true body of Christ. If however the true body of Christ is taken without the divinity with which it is one, otherwise not, since God and all creatures are not anything better than God alone. But if the mystical body of Christ is taken without Christ the head, thus the true body of Christ is nobler: this St Thomas expressly, and the same is the opinion of the others. Let learned men mark how contrary the teaching of these doctors is to the teaching of the adversaries. Moreover what the adversary adduces as an argument to colour the aforesaid error is altogether foolish. Both because it supposes that the humanity of Christ, which is united in the same supposit to the divinity and to which the Spirit is not given by measure, does not include the assistance of the Holy Spirit as the Church does. Which seems altogether foreign not only to the Catholic faith, but to the sound judgment of any learned man. For since the influx of grace into the body of the Church proceeds from the head, more inward is the assistance of the Holy Spirit, who is the fount of all gifts, to Christ the head, who is the holy of holies, than to the body which is flowed into, since it receives holiness from him. But what the adversary says in the end, that it is manifest that whatever short of God can be thought of cannot in excellence and dignity be compared to the Church, is most false and heretical in our judgment: since the humanity of Christ, which is short of God, is in nobility and perfection nobler and worthier than the Church militant itself, of whom Ps. 44 says that he is fair in form above the sons of men. Secondly, the angelic or heavenly hierarchy is short of God, and nevertheless more excellent and worthier than the ecclesiastical hierarchy. Likewise the blessed Virgin, who is read of as exalted above the choirs of angels, is more excellent and worthier than the whole remaining Church. Whence that word of Apoc. 12 is expounded of her by the saints: A woman clothed with the sun, and the moon, that is the Church, under her feet; since she surpasses the whole Church, and so in the point at issue.

Secondly, answer is given to the argument by denying the minor, namely that the Pope is a part of the Church if he is referred to the account of power: since in the account of power the Pope is rather to be called the whole Church virtually, since in him alone is the totality and plenitude of the whole ecclesiastical power, according to the sayings of Pope Leo, blessed Gregory, Julius, and blessed Bernard commemorated above, just as in the head alone of the natural body is the plenitude of sense, on account of which, as blessed Ambrose says in the Hexameron, the whole man is said to be in the head. But that the totality of the power of the Church is in the Pope we easily show both from the order of the papal power and from the condition and nature of the potential whole. For order among powers has this, as Boethius says, that whatever of power-virtue is in the inferiors is in the superior. Whence in the supreme power the quantity of all the other inferior powers is included, and so since the papal power is supreme, in it are contained virtually all the other powers of the Church, and so in the account of power it has not the account of a part, but rather of the whole. Whence blessed Dionysius in the sixth chapter of the Ecclesiastical Hierarchy says: But the disposition itself of the hierarchic order is placed in all the holy totalities. Secondly, this same is shown from the nature of the potential whole: for the power of the Church is not to be deemed or judged as if it were some whole integrated out of particular powers, as many of the adversaries perversely understand, but after the likeness of the potential whole. Of which kind the nature, as St Thomas says in the fourth distinction, twenty-fourth, question 1, is such that according to its complete account it is in one, but in others there is a certain participation of it. And he puts the example in the sacrament of orders, that the whole plenitude of this sacrament is in one, namely the priesthood, but in the others there is a certain participation of orders. And he says this to be signified in that the Lord says to Moses in Num. 11: I will take of thy spirit and give to them, that they may bear with thee the burden of the people, thus St Thomas. He puts the second example in the following answer concerning the kingdom, that in a kingdom, although the whole plenitude of power resides with the king, yet the powers of the ministers, which are certain participations of the royal power, are not excluded; but in an aristocracy the plenitude of power resides with no one, but with all, thus St Thomas. It is clear therefore that, speaking of the majority of quantity of virtue, just as the head in the natural body is greater than the whole remaining body, though not by majority of dimensive or numerical quantity, so the Pope is greater by majority of power than the whole remaining body of the Church, as the shepherd is greater in authority than his whole flock.

It remains now to answer to ch. legimus, dist. 93, where Jerome says that if authority is sought etc.¹ To which in answer we say that this saying of Jerome, although the adversaries often and most of all adduce it for themselves, yet in nothing favours them nor prejudices the truth laid down: for Jerome does not speak there of the authority of the power or jurisdiction of the world in respect of the Roman Church or apostolic see, but speaks of the authority of custom, which is said to be of so much the greater authority the more general it is or by the more it is observed. Just as Augustine speaks of the canonical Scriptures, as is had in ch. in canonicis, dist. 29, according to which rule there is no doubt that the custom of the world is greater than the custom of the city, which neither does the apostolic see keep nor has it commanded to be observed. But that Jerome does not speak of the authority of the world in respect of the apostolic see, but of the authority of the custom of the world in respect of the city, is clear from many things. First, from the very intention of the speaker. For Jerome speaks against the custom which reigned in the city of Rome, by which certain deacons were set over presbyters. From which custom some deacons throughout the world took occasion of preferring themselves to their presbyters, although the contrary custom was throughout the world, of which Jerome writing to Bishop Euandrus says thus, as is clear from the text of the alleged chapter: Why dost thou bring forward to me the custom of one city, why dost thou vindicate the small number, from which pride has sprung, into laws of the Church? Everything rare is the more desired. Pennyroyal among the Indians is more precious than pepper, fewness makes deacons honourable, but the crowd makes presbyters contemptible, thus Jerome. Secondly, this same is gathered from the Gloss on the chapter, which says thus: the general custom is greater and therefore more to be followed, as here. Thirdly, the same can be gathered from the chapter Haec est fides, 24, question 1, which is Jerome's own. But to the Gloss adduced we say that that Gloss speaks by way of arguing, whence it refers itself to what it says in question 9, third, nemo. But of this Gloss and the like, in the third book, where with God's help the authority of councils is to be spoken of, it will be said more fully.