Tractatus de Gratia Divina Actuali

I. Now it must be declared more distinctly what this twofold grace of illumination and inspiration is. The opinion which we now propose here is not exclusive. We establish only that actual grace certainly comprises vital acts of the intellect and of the will: the exclusive question, however, will be treated a little later in Thesis XVI. The argument of this Thesis, clear and demonstrative, comes down to this. The notion of actual grace, namely what precisely it is, cannot be gathered except from those monuments from which alone we are infallibly taught the existence of the same and its offices: the Theologian, therefore, must strive to form in his own mind the notion of actual grace from those monuments. Wherefore if it is certainly established that the dignity of actual grace is claimed for some determinate thing, that thing will without doubt be to be numbered among the actual graces. But whether the Scriptures are consulted or the Councils or the Fathers, and those who have discoursed on grace most frequently and most abundantly both thetically and polemically, it is evident that actual grace is set forth as consisting in vital acts of the intellect and of the will. The assumption is proved. It is enough to compare what we have adduced in the two preceding theses. For it is manifest that the grace by which we are aided is called thought, opinion, operation of the truth, persuasion, speaking in thought, revelation, calling, illumination, illumination of the born eyes, inspiration and infusion of charity, charity, desire, longing, pleasure, sweetness, delight, delectation, most frequently a good will (i.e., volition).

But 1) Cognition, knowledge, charity, desire, delight and the like are formally vital acts both of the intellect and of the will, nor can they be conceived apart from those. 2) Illumination, revelation, opening of the truth, speaking are themselves also vital acts, both because the preceding appellations are used as synonyms of these, and because illumination of the intellect, revelation to it of some truth, speaking to it, cannot formally be obtained except through some act of thought excited in it. Hence inspiration of love, infusion of knowledge and the like signify the very vital acts of knowledge and love insofar as they are excited in us by God. Therefore all the appellations by which grace is represented in all Christian monuments are such that they formally exhibit some vital act either of the intellect or of the will: wherefore at least this must be concluded: therefore some vital acts are to be numbered in the census of actual graces.

II. And in truth the confused concept of actual grace received by all comes down to this, that actual grace is a certain divine motion of our faculties; but the motion existing in the intellect and in the will, insofar as it is received in them, must consist in some act of the same faculties; for motion is the act of the movable, just as mechanical motion is the act of the body; but the act of a vital faculty, which is moved insofar as it is vital, namely insofar as it is cognitive or volitive, cannot be anything but vital; therefore the divine motion existing in our faculties comes down to some vital act. Therefore that which exists in us when God moves us and which is called actual grace is at least some vital act.