Tractatus de Gratia Divina Actuali

Likewise, every grace is efficacious, if that is called efficacious, as it is rightly called, which can effect something. But because not every grace obtains its effect, therefore, having regard to the term or effect, which is present or absent, grace is divided into sufficient and efficacious: so that that grace is called efficacious which is effective, or is joined with its effect, while that is called sufficient which, although it gives an antecedent and complete power of acting, is nevertheless not joined with its effect. The affirmation of this real division aims at this, that it be established that not only those graces are given by God to fallen men which are joined with their effect, but that others also are conferred by God which give the same antecedent and complete power for acting, yet are destitute of their effect on account of man's free choice, and therefore that the grace of God can be resisted. This indeed is the doctrine which the Catholic Church asserts against heretics.

I. Every power is sufficient for that for which it is ordered, or in other words, for that which it can do; for in this is placed the sufficiency of a power, for sufficiency is spoken of with respect to some determinate effect, and then a power is said to be sufficient when it can do that, or when it has the power of doing it. Moreover, every power compared with that for which it is ordered and which it is said to be able to do, is a power which does not require another force to be added to itself in order to be able to do it; otherwise it would be false that it itself could do it, but it would at most be the power of another lesser effect. Now indeed every grace confers the power of acting salutarily; not any grace whatever gives the power of any act whatever, but individual graces give power for certain and determinate acts. This power, which is the reason why the act exists, is a power antecedent to the very exercise of the faculty. Therefore, with respect to those acts for which grace confers the power, the same grace is sufficient; every grace, therefore, is sufficient for that for which it is given. Since, therefore, sufficiency is placed in the power, and this is prior to the act or operation and therefore exists even when the act does not exist; hence the sufficiency of grace remains the same, whether the act for which it is given exists or not.

II. Among the approved Latin writers the term efficacious has the signification of power; namely, it signifies that which can effect, whether it actually effects or not: for actual exercise is not required in order that the appellation of efficacious may truly be ascribed to anyone. If, therefore, the term efficacious is taken in this sense, which no one can reject, then every grace is truly efficacious, just as it is also truly sufficient, since it can perform the act for which it is given.

II. Why, then, is grace distinguished into sufficient and efficacious? Making abstraction of every special system, which does not pertain to the faith, and employing the interpretation which must be admitted in every system and which suffices for the faith, this distinction is drawn from the extrinsic term, i.e. the effect, which can be and not be and in reality is now present, now absent. That grace, therefore, which obtains its effect, which in reality produces the good act of the will, is wont to be called efficacious grace (it would be better said: effective), so that by the term efficacious there is signified not only the power of effecting but actual efficacy. Moreover, the term efficacious having been contracted to that special signification, the grace which is not joined with a good act is not called efficacious, but retains the appellation of sufficient, the truth of which appellation is discharged by power alone. In order that this proper signification, by which the positing of the act is excluded, may be more determined, grace is also wont to be called purely sufficient. Thus by this distinction there is signified not a difference of nature, but of fact.

For by reason of nature both have the efficacy of power; for both are sufficient, but as regards the fact, the connection with a free salutary act, which the one has, is lacking to the other, and therefore it remains in the state of pure sufficiency.

IV. Moreover, in order that this distinction may be true in the logical order, it suffices that grace can be conceived joined with its effect and can be conceived separated from its effect. But in order that it may be true also in the real or historical order, it is necessary that some grace, in itself sufficient and efficacious in first act, be also efficacious in second act, and that some grace, in itself sufficient and efficacious in first act, not be efficacious in second act. This, moreover, is what is affirmed by those who affirm that this distinction of grace into sufficient and efficacious is real.

For it is asked whether every grace which is conferred by God on fallen men is efficacious, i.e. joined with a good act. The Calvinists and Jansenists affirm it, and therefore deny that purely sufficient graces exist. Jansenius De Gratia Christi. L. III.Cf. Stephanum Dechamps L. I. Disp. 8. The Catholics deny it, who accordingly contend that purely sufficient graces are also given. The question is of the greatest importance. For if no graces are given except efficacious ones, then whenever the effect is absent, grace too must be said to have been lacking, as Jansenius teaches, De Grat. Christi. L. II. c. 25, and therefore whenever a man sins, he lacked the grace by which he could act salutarily. Hence the first proposition of Jansenius: «Some precepts of God are impossible for just men willing and striving, according to the present powers which they have; there is also lacking to them the grace by which they might become possible.» And because the grace remaining purely sufficient is that to which the will resists; hence, with that sufficient grace denied, there follows also the other proposition of Jansenius: «To interior grace in the state of fallen nature there is never resistance»; for efficacious grace, i.e. that joined with its effect, is not resisted.

V. It must therefore be proved that purely sufficient graces are also given, i.e. that not all graces which God confers obtain their effect, but are separated from the good act. And because this separation is not to be traced back to the nature of grace, which, being sufficient, is of itself fitted for producing the effect, it can be traced back only to the free choice of the will. In the preceding theses we denied the necessity of the attainment of the good act and accordingly affirmed the possibility of its failure; here, moreover, we also assert the fact, affirming that graces which are purely sufficient are really given, graces, namely, which give the antecedent and complete power of acting, yet lack their effect, or are separated from the good act for which they are given.

Grace, therefore, that is purely sufficient is grace which gives power for the act and complete power, so that on the part of the agent principle nothing further is required; otherwise it would not be sufficient. It is the grace by which the will is prepared by the Lord, by which God touches the hearts of the faithful with paternal inspirations that they may do something good; it is that grace which, according to Augustine, gives the will and makes us act (Cf. Th. XLIV. p. 1ª.). It is nevertheless at the same time such that it is not joined with its effect, and therefore it is called purely sufficient, or simply sufficient. Its existence is to be proved.

VI. It is proved 1) by the authority of the Scriptures. From the Scriptures we are taught that the precepts of the law of God oblige all men, at least those who know them, both the just and sinners; likewise from the Scriptures we are taught that the observance of the law, which God requires at least of the just (to say the least), is a salutary observance, which, namely, can lead the just to eternal life: but it is evident from the same Scriptures that salutary observance of the law cannot take place without the grace of God. Now indeed from these things it follows, therefore all men, at least the just, can observe the law of God salutarily; therefore they have the necessary grace which confers this power; therefore when they do not observe it and sin, they were able to observe it salutarily; therefore when they sin, they had the grace by which they were able, if they had willed, to observe it; moreover, many of the just do in reality sin: therefore they had the grace not to sin: but that grace was without its effect; therefore purely sufficient graces are really given.

And in very truth sinners are reproached by God, and are reproached for this, that although God had abundantly bestowed on them all the means for living well, they nevertheless willed to sin. Isaiah V, 3. seqq. Now therefore, inhabitants of Jerusalem and men of Judah, judge between me and my vineyard. What is there that I ought to have done more to my vineyard and did not do to it? Or that I expected it to bring forth grapes, and it brought forth wild grapes? The vineyard in the prophets is frequently the chosen people (cf. Isaias III, 14. XXVII, 2. Matt. XX, 1. seqq. XXI, 33. seqq. Luc. XX, 9.). But those are dreaming who want the vineyard, of which there is speech here, to be Adam; for what do the things that immediately follow intend? And now I will show you what I will do to my vineyard; I will take away its hedge, etc.? Does not God himself interpret the allegory in v. 7, for the vineyard of the Lord of hosts is the house of Israel...? The discourse is therefore in this place about fallen men. Now indeed God testifies both that he conferred on those men all the defenses or helps for doing judgment and justice, and that they were unwilling to act well; and this is the reason of the reproach, that they did not do it when God had furnished to them all things which would be necessary and opportune, as far as in him was: but this reproach would be empty and unjust, if those men had lacked the grace conferring the power; therefore.

Again, in this testimony note that, the helps having been bestowed, God is said to expect their good use; and therefore we are taught that the will is left under grace with an indifferent power, and that in it itself, and in no way in a defect of grace, is the reason why the act does not exist; the will therefore was able, if it had willed: grace therefore was present, which lacked its term through the fault of man.

Likewise God complains that the riches of his grace are despised by sinners, and of that grace which leads sinners to penance (Rom. II, 4); but it could not be said that sinners despise those graces which they have not received, and the grace which leads to penance confers the complete power of repenting: therefore.

Likewise God reproves sinners, comparing them with those who, furnished with the same helps, would have acted well. Matth. XI, 21: therefore the only cause why good operation was lacking in the former was their will; therefore the sinners had the complete power of acting well: therefore.

Likewise men are reproached because they resist the Holy Spirit (Act. VII, 51); grace to which resistance is made is therefore given in fact: not every grace, therefore, is efficacious.

VII. It is proved 2) by the authority of the Councils. Arausic. II. can. 25. «This also we believe according to the catholic faith, that, grace having been received through baptism, all the baptized, with Christ helping and cooperating, can and ought to fulfill those things which pertain to salvation, if they will to labor faithfully.» All the baptized, therefore, have grace to act well: but frequently many of them act badly; grace therefore in them was separated from its effect, because they were unwilling to labor faithfully.

Concilium Trident. Sess. VI. cap. 11. «No one ought to use that rash voice, prohibited by the Fathers under anathema, that the precepts of God are impossible of observance for a justified man; for God does not command impossibilities, but by commanding he admonishes both to do what you can and to ask for what you cannot, and he helps that you may be able... for those who are sons of God love Christ; but those who love him, as he himself testifies, keep his words: which indeed they are able to accomplish with divine help... For God does not forsake those once justified by his grace, unless he is first forsaken by them.» When, therefore, the just man sins and forsakes God, he was able to keep the precepts of God, and he was able by divine help; otherwise God would have forsaken him first: this help, therefore, lacked its effect; therefore.

Ibid. cap. 13. As regards perseverance it says: «All ought to place and repose the firmest hope in the help of God; for God, unless they themselves fail his grace, just as he began the good work, so he will perfect it, working the will and the accomplishment.» Therefore he who does not persevere, he himself failed the grace of God; grace did not fail him; some grace of God, therefore, was void in itself, or separated from the good act. Therefore. Cf. Cann. 18.22.

VIII. It is proved by the authority of the Apostolic See. Among the Baian propositions this is the 54ª. «This definitive sentence: that God commanded nothing impossible to man, is falsely attributed to Augustine, since it is Pelagius's.» Add also the two propositions of Jansenius recited above and the 13th of Quesnellus: «When God wills to save a soul and touches it with the interior hand of his grace, no human will resists him» and the 6th among those condemned by Alexander VIII. 7 Decemb. 1690: «Sufficient grace is for our state not so much useful as pernicious, so that accordingly we may justly ask: free us, O Lord, from sufficient grace.» by the authority of the Apostolic See.

IX. It is proved 4) by the authority of the Fathers; for this doctrine of the Faith, contained in the Scriptures, authentically proposed by the Councils and the Roman Pontiffs, was always handed down by the Fathers. Irenaeus adv. haer. L. IV. c. 37.1.: «Those who do not work good will receive the just judgment of God, because they have not worked good, when they could» by the authority of the Fathers. to do it.» Hieronym. epist. 140a. 5.: «From the beginning of his condition man uses God as his helper, and since it is of his grace that he was created, of his mercy that he subsists and lives, he can do no good work without him, who so granted free will that he did not deny his grace in all things.» Ambrosius in Luc. L. VI. c. antepen.: «The Lord Jesus distributes the foods, and he indeed wills to give to all, he denies to no one, for he is the dispenser of all... what will you answer him, or how will you excuse yourself? You cannot say that he did not give food, who gives to all. And you cannot say that he did not will you to do good, before whom he placed good and evil, so that your good might not be from necessity, but voluntary.» Chrysost. hom. VII. in Ioann.: «Grace is poured out upon all; it does not except or disdain the Jew, the Greek, the barbarian, the Scythian, the free man, the slave, the man, the woman, the old man, the young man; it is the same for all, it shows itself easy to all, it calls all with equal honor: but those who neglect to enjoy its gift, let them impute this their blindness to themselves; for since it is given to all, lies open to all, and is forbidden by no one: certain lost and worthless men refuse to enter through their own malice alone.»

X. It is proved 5) specially by the authority of Augustine. The heads of the doctrine of the most holy Father in this matter are these: α) The grace of God is received in vain by sinners. De peccat. mer. et remiss. L. I. c. 39.: «He (the baptized person) has concupiscence, with which he may fight and, God helping, overcome it; if he has not received his grace in vain, if he has not willed to be a reprobate.» Whence in Psalm. CXXIV. c. 1.: «Their heart (of those who prosper in this world) grows cold against God and becomes hard against the rain of his grace, lest it bear fruit.» β) He who sins despises the grace of God, and this contempt is imputed to him as fault. L. III. De Lib. arbit. c. 19: «Since God is everywhere present, who in many ways through the creature serving him as Lord calls the unwilling, teaches the believer, consoles the hoping, exhorts the loving, helps the striving, hears the praying; it is not imputed to you as fault that you are unwillingly ignorant, but that you neglect to seek what you are ignorant of; nor that you do not gather your wounded members, but that you despise him willing to heal. These are your own sins.» And De Spir. et lit. c.

33. »Unbelievers indeed act against the will of God, when they do not believe his Gospel;... destined to experience in punishments the power of him whose mercy in gifts they have despised.«

γ) God does not forsake unless he is forsaken. De Nat. et grat. c. 26: «God, when... he justifies the impious,... and has led him to perfect life and justice, does not forsake him, if he is not forsaken, so that one may live piously and justly. For just as the eye of the body, even most fully healthy, cannot see unless aided by the brightness of light; so also man, even most perfectly justified, unless he is divinely aided by the eternal light of justice (the discourse is therefore about actual grace, which is conferred on the justified, and this God does not forsake unless he is forsaken), cannot live rightly. God therefore heals not only that he may blot out what we have sinned, but that he may also provide that we do not sin.»

δ) That men are not helped by the grace of God, the cause is in themselves, not in God. De pecc. merit. et remiss. L. II. c. 17.: «That what lay hidden may become known and what did not delight may become sweet, is of the grace of God, which helps the wills of men: that they are not helped by it, the cause likewise is in themselves, not in God.» On these words of Augustine Fulgentius says this to Monimum, L. I. c. 28: «In these sayings of St. Augustine attend, I ask, my dearest, first that men are not helped by God is said to have the cause in themselves, not in God.»

ε) To persevere is in the power of the just man who does not persevere. De Corrept. et grat. c. 7. »It can be said: man, in that which you had heard and held, you would persevere in it, if you willed.«

ζ) To call and to persuade is God's; to consent, however, or to dissent from the calling is of the human will. De Spir. et lit. c. 34. has these words: «By the persuasions of visions God acts that we may will... in these ways, therefore, when God acts with the rational soul that it may believe him (for it cannot believe anything by free will, if there is no persuasion or calling to which it may believe), certainly God works in man even the very will to believe: but to consent to the calling of God, or to dissent from it, is of one's own will. Which not only does not weaken what was said, for what have you that you have not received? but even confirms it. For the soul cannot receive and have the gifts, about which it hears this, except by consenting; and by this, what it has and what it receives is God's; but to receive and to have is certainly of the receiver and the holder.» Where you see that to receive the gifts of God is to consent to God calling through his grace, and that the gift which is received is the very good act.

η) God condemns no one by an unjust judgment, although hidden: for an evil will preceded, which merited the punishment. Augustine, answering those who objected that some are blinded and hardened by God, says: «I answer that even this their will has merited. For thus God blinds, thus hardens, by forsaking, not by helping (i.e., efficacious help having been denied): which he can do by a hidden judgment, by an unjust one he cannot.» Tract. LIII. in Ioan. n. 6. This is the reason why the judgment of God in forsaking certain sinners is just, because namely their will merited it: if it merited it, it was able, therefore, to act well although it did not act; but certainly it could not have done so destitute of the grace of God, according to Augustine: therefore.

θ) The calling of God which the consent of man does not follow is to be distinguished from the calling which the consent of man follows, which calling is productive of the good will, which calling Augustine calls by the special name of mercy. Therefore a twofold grace is to be distinguished, namely the congruous and the less congruous, to which the consent of the free will is lacking. Likewise a twofold persuasion is to be distinguished: the one, by which someone is so persuaded that he is won over; the other, by which he is persuaded in such a way that he is nevertheless not won over. Certainly in De Spir. et lit. c. 34. Augustine says: «Now if anyone should press us to scrutinize that depth, why to one it is so persuaded that he is won over, but to another not so, two things alone occur for the present, which it pleases me to answer: O the depth of the riches, and is there iniquity with God?» But in book I. ad Simplic. q. II. n. 13: «It is true, therefore: many are called, few are chosen. For those are chosen who are congruously called (al. who corresponded to the calling): but those who did not correspond nor were attuned to the calling are not chosen, because they did not follow, although called. Likewise it is true: it is not of the one willing nor of the one running, but of God showing mercy; because even if he calls many, he nevertheless has mercy on those whom he so calls, in the way in which it is fitting for them to be called that they may follow. But it is false if anyone says: therefore it is not of God showing mercy, but of man willing and running; because God has mercy on no one in vain: but on whom he has mercy, he so calls him as he knows to be congruous for him that he may not reject the one calling.» Augustine therefore distinguishes calling and mercy, simple suasion and persuasion: God persuades all, which cannot be done without actual grace,

God calls all: but he persuades, or has mercy on, those whom he congruously calls, who are also the chosen. But those who are called and yet are not chosen are not chosen for this reason, because they have not followed the calling. Congruous calling, therefore, supposes and includes the free consent of the will following the calling; when this consent is lacking, the calling is not congruous. Besides the grace, therefore, by which God actually has mercy on the elect, there is also the grace which many do not follow, from which it comes about that God does not actually have mercy on them, which is the less congruous grace. Consider that all these heads of doctrine are drawn from the books which Augustine wrote either when the Pelagian heresy was already known, or after God revealed to him what was to be held in the question of the beginning of faith, which happened to him when he wrote the books to Simplicianum (De Praed. SS. c. 4.).

XL. Jansenius, lest he should fight against the very evidence, concedes some grace besides the efficacious, a grace to which the will resists, namely one not doing that to which it is moved by it. But this grace is not a grace sufficient for deliberately willing and doing that which it inspires, but is only a gentle breath, as it were, of a thin breeze, obtaining a certain most tenuous complacency of the will, by which it draws the will after itself most swiftly and, as it were, stealthily (De Gratia Christi I. II, c. 27.). But it is most absurdly said that the will resists grace, when the will both does all that to which grace draws it and does not do that to which grace does not impel it. For who resists him, to whom he yields only as much as he is drawn by him, and whom he does not follow only in that in which he is not drawn? Moreover, this grace, sufficient for stealthily obtaining a most tenuous complacency, insufficient for deliberate will and action, draws the will to that, not to this: and it always obtains that; never, therefore, is the grace of God resisted, according to the doctrine of Jansenius.