1. Whether some Supernatural Habit needs to be Posited that gives Grace to a Nature Capable of being Beatified

126. [A supernatural habit bestowing grace is present within] - As to the first article [n.125] one can say that from no act which we experience, whether from the substance of the act, or from the intensity of the act, or from the pleasure or ease in doing it, or from the goodness or the moral rectitude of the act, can we conclude that some such supernatural habit is present; because from none of them can anyone possessed of charity know with certitude that he exists in charity, namely from the fact that an act with such and such intensity is experienced to exist within him, or to be in him with pleasure and ease, or to be consonant with right reason.

127. Now the reason that one cannot conclude from the act or from any condition of the act that such a habit exists within is that either the act is able of its own power alone to have all the aforesaid features, when there is concurrence of right reason (as is the case when one holds the fourth way set down in the preceding solution [n.46]), or, if some habit would, because of any of the aforesaid conditions [n.126], be concurrent with the act, it could be some acquired habit; for acquired friendship could give just as much intensity to the act (as second cause, along with the power as first cause [n.40]), could also bestow just as much pleasure and ease, could even be a habit just as consonant with right reason, because an elicited act would have no clearly apparent condition from which the conclusion would necessarily follow that it was elicited according to a supernatural habit.

128. But if you say ‘the will is moved suddenly to acting intensely, easily, pleasurably, and this in a way consonant with supernatural reason (that is, consonant with the dictate of faith), but the will cannot suddenly acquire a habit of ordered friendship consonant with the faith, therefore it has some non-acquired habit whereby it is inclined suddenly to act’, - I reply: the will can be moved to natural acts with suddenness enough, and these natural acts are totally subject to its power, because - as Augustine says Retractions I ch.22 n.4 - “nothing is as much in the power of the will as the will itself”; therefore the proposed conclusion cannot be drawn from this suddenness.

129. I say, therefore, that over and above all the aforesaid conditions, namely the intensity of the act, pleasure and ease in acting, rectitude or goodness and conformity with right reason (right either according to the dictate of prudence or according to the dictate of faith), over and above - I say - all these, there is one condition in the act that is a matter of belief, namely that the act is acceptable to God; not indeed merely with the common acceptance by which God accepts every creature (which is even the way he wills the act that is substrate to a sin, otherwise the act would not have its existence from him), but with a special acceptance, which is in the divine will an ordering toward eternal life of this sort of act as of something condignly deserving of the reward. And in this way we have belief that our nature is capable of beatification, is just, is habitually accepted, -that is, that when it is not actually operating, yet still the divine will is ordering it to eternal life as being worthy of so great a good, in accord with the disposition that it possesses habitually in itself. And it is because of this habitual acceptance of a nature capable of beatification even when it is not operating, and because of the actual acceptance of an act elicited by such a nature, that one must posit a single supernatural habit whereby he who formally possesses it is accepted by God and whereby his elicited act is accepted as meritorious. So the nature or the act does not seem to be accepted without some habit informing them, because - in accordance with what has been argued [nn.116-117, 122] - God does not seem to have a will different in nature about an object that has in no way been made different [nn.116-117]; nor would even an act ‘as it is acceptable to God’ seem to be in the power of an agent unless that by which he formally acted were his form [n.122].

130. [Doubt 1] - But there is a doubt about how this habit may be the reason for accepting the nature and the act.

131. The reason indeed for accepting the nature seems to be just a sort of comeliness of nature, pleasing to the divine will, such that, whether the habit is posited as active or non-active, from the mere fact that it is such a form, beautifying and adorning the soul, it can be a reason of acceptance and a reason for accepting the nature.

132. But for the acceptance of an act more is required than that the agent have this spiritual comeliness, otherwise he who has such a habit could not have any act that was indifferent, nor could commit venial sin, which is discordant [II d.41 q. un nn.3-4]. - The proof of the consequence is that neither of these things [indifferent acts and venial sin] takes away the comeliness from the actor, and so each of them would be accepted, if an act were to be accepted merely from the comeliness of the actor.

133. One must therefore say that the habit, besides the fact that it is a spiritual comeliness, also inclines toward definite acts, and this either non-actively, according to the fourth way posited in the preceding solution [n.46], or (which seems more to be the case) actively, according to the third way [n.32].

134. The proof is as follows:

First, because otherwise it would seem that, without the habit, one could have a very intense act of loving God, and this both as a wayfarer and in the fatherland, and thus also have beatitude; for in the instant of nature in which an act is elicited by an active principle, if the will alone were the active principle, it would ‘insofar as active’ be a principle that was just as perfect without the habit as with it, and the power alone could, with equal effort, perform the act (as is plain [n.70]); therefore a most perfect act of loving God could be had without such a habit.

135. A second proof to the same effect is that otherwise what Augustine says [Pseudo-Augustine Hypognosticon III ch.1 n.20] about free choice would not seem to be true, namely that ‘grace is related to free choice as a rider to a horse’, because the rider actively directs and moves the horse, in some way or other. - Nor even would that remark seem to be true which he is says in a letter to Boniface [Augustine, Epist. 186 ad Paulinum ch.3 n.10]: ‘With the will accompanying,’ he says, ‘not going ahead; a foot follower, not a lord’. Now the will would not be a foot follower to grace if grace itself had no causality.Note by Scotus: “There is a position [from St. Thomas Aquinas and Godfrey of Fontaines] that for a meritorious act the will along with charity is not sufficient but a special influence is required, - not the influence of a permanent form but of a motion, just as an instrument has motion from the principal agent over and above its own form. The first reason: a natural form is given to something so that it might act, because such action is proportioned to it; grace is not given to us so that we might act but so that we might be acted on (Romans 8.14: “as many as are led by the Spirit of God, they are the sons of God”), and this because such action is not proportioned. - A confirmation comes from John 4.14: “the water that I shall give him shall be in him a well of water springing up” etc. An example: grace is like a weight, not like art; a weight is not an operative principle, and grace is like the spherical shape given to a mass of lead. Another example: grace is compared to the active generative power of a mother; a mother has this force (because she has a human soul), but in a diminished way and not as capable of acting unless it be moved by the active force of the father. Second reason: grace now does not perfectly heal nature. The point is taken from Augustine On Nature and Grace I ch.26 n.29, where he says in general: ‘as the healthy eye cannot see without light, so neither can even the just soul live rightly without the spiritual light’. - A confirmation comes from Romans 7.25 about ‘the law of sin’, and 8.26 ‘we know not what we should pray for as we ought’ and ‘the Spirit makes intercession’. Third reason: an act is considered as it is from free choice, as it is from free choice informed by grace, third - in addition to this - as it is from free choice moved by the Holy Spirit. In the first way it is not even worthy of a reward; in the second way it is worthy (just as is also a baptized child) but not with condign worth (John 4.14: ‘a well springing up’ whose water does not rise above its beginning); in the third way then it does have condign worth.” ²⁴

136. [Doubt 2] - But then there is a further doubt about this habit when compared with the operating power - namely which of them should be called the first cause and which the second.

137. For it seems from what has been said [n.135] that grace is the first cause.

138. But it seems the opposite is the case:

First, because the power uses the habit and not conversely.

139. Second, because the action would not be free if grace were the first cause; for the will would be moved naturally, because grace would move it naturally, - and just as the will would not be moved freely, so neither would it act freely, since it would not act save because it was moved.

140. Third, because the will - once it has grace - would not seem able ever to sin, because the second cause always follows the inclination of the first cause, nor seem able to be moved to the opposite of that to which the first cause inclines it.

141. Similarly, fourth, the will is more without limit as to acts than the habit is; being without limit as to several effects seems to belong to the superior cause [cf. nn.33-39].

142. Here it can be said that in a meritorious act (about which the discussion now is [nn.129-135]) I am considering two things, namely: that which precedes the idea of its being meritorious, and in this rank are included the substance of the act and its intensity and its moral rectitude; over and above this I consider also the very idea of its being meritorious, which is that it is accepted by the divine will in order to a reward, or that it is acceptable or worthy of being accepted.

143. This second thing would be truer if the act had complete merit through something that is in him who merits; to accept is not in him but is a divine action; but divine action does not seem to be per se required for merit. - There is also proof for this in that there seems to be a merit [sc. in him who merits] with respect to this sort of ‘being accepted’, for some act is worthy to be accepted and another not; therefore before it is understood to have been accepted, there is something in the act whereby it is worthy to be accepted; therefore there is then in it the idea of merit, at least with respect to acceptance.

144. On the contrary: the idea of merit is not completely had unless the idea of being worthy or worthily ordainable to a reward is had (which reward is beatitude), and this ‘worthily’ accords with commutative or retributive justice; but no act has this order merely from what acts from within (for then God could not fail to reward beatitude to him who has so acted without unjustly depriving him of it, - this is false); therefore such order according to justice is from the divine will alone gratuitously ordering it, and thus the idea of merit will be complete from the divine will ordering this act to a reward.

145. And as to what is said about the second thing that ‘divine action is not of the idea of merit’ [n.143], - I reply: the relation to divine action in the action of him who merits belongs to the idea of merit, because there is no relation of the one who merits without divine action.

146. If you say that ‘then it is not in the power of the one who merits to merit, just as neither is the divine action in his power’, and similarly ‘the meriting would belong more principally to God than to me, because what is more principal in the merit comes from divine action’, - to the first point: the act which is merit is in my power, on the supposition of the general influence, if I have grace and the use of free choice; but the completion of the idea of merit is not in my power save dispositively, although disposivitely in such a way that the completion for my acting always follows from the divine disposition, just as animation always follows on the organizing done by the natural cause. The same thing makes clear the response to the second point, because although what is more principal in merit - that is, what is last and completive - is from God, yet it does not follow that ‘therefore God merits’, because merit is an act of a free power, and an act elicited according to the gift of grace, accepted by God as being rewardable with beatitude - and therefore to merit is to act thus; God does not act thus.

147. On the contrary: at least what is more principal in merit is from God. - I reply that if by ‘more principal’ is meant what does the ultimate completing, let it be conceded; if is meant the first reality or the more perfect reality, let it be denied, because an act is something absolute and prior in nature to ‘the passive acceptance’, and is more a being than it is.

148. To that which was adduced second for the second thing, which was ‘the act merits to be accepted’ [n.143] - I reply: there is in it the idea of merit ‘in a certain respect’, because the ordaining of the act to beatitude is not to it as to a reward that has to be justly rendered for such an act, - and let it be conceded that the passive divine acceptance is not included in the idea of merit ‘in a certain respect’, just as it is not required in the idea of merit by congruity, in the way that someone contrite merits to be justified.

149. And what has just been said [nn.144-148] must be understood of the divine eternal acceptance by which God, foreseeing from eternity this act being elicited from such principles, willed it to be ordered to a reward, and by the act of his will ordering it to a reward, willed it to be a merit; which act, considered in itself without such divine acceptance, would not, in strict justice, have been worthy of such a reward from the intrinsic goodness that it would have from its own principles; the fact is plain because a reward is always a greater good than the merit, and strict justice does not render a greater good for a lesser one. Therefore it is well said that God always rewards beyond condign worth, indeed universally beyond the worth of the act which is the merit, - because that the merit is condign merit is something beyond its nature and its intrinsic goodness, and comes from gratuitous divine acceptance; and perhaps further it is beyond that other merit which an act needing to be accepted would have by common law, whenever God rewards it from pure generosity.

150. In addition, just as in a meritorious act there are the two aforesaid things (namely the substance of the act along with rectitude, and the idea of merit [n.142]), likewise the habit of grace is a certain quality, - and the proof is that besides the relation which it has to right reason insofar as it is a morally good habit, it has a special relation to the divine will accepting it or accepting the subject that has it.

151. This habit according to its substance actively inclines to act, and this it does actively as a partial cause (when one holds the third way in the preceding solution [n.32]), and in this causality the habit is second cause and the power first cause, as was said in the preceding solution about the habit in general and about the power, when positing the habit as ‘active’ [n.40]; and this is proved by the reasons already adduced [nn.138-141].

152. But when one takes the act according to its idea of being meritorious, one can say that this condition belongs principally to the act from the habit and less principally from the will; for the act is more accepted as worthy of reward because it is elicited by charity than because it is freely elicited by the will, although both are necessarily required. An example of this can be posited about the cutting up of a body by means of a knife; the cutting, to be sure, is itself absolutely more from the moving power of the cutter than from the knife, and therefore a stronger moving power cuts more quickly; but yet insofar as this cutting is compared to sight under the idea of being acceptable - as pleasing to someone - it is attributed more to the knife, because the smoothness of the cut parts, which pleases sight, comes more from the sharpness of the instrument than from the efficacy of the virtue that principally does the cutting. Likewise, a sound is more from the percussion of the sounding body than from the orderedness of the percussion, and yet, as acceptable to hearing, it is more from the orderedness of the percussion than from the efficacy of the percussive power; nay the percussive virtue could be more efficacious and less acceptable, - nay altogether not acceptable to hearing, because the sound is not harmonious. Another example: if the father is the principal cause with respect to the son and the mother is less principal, yet she can be a more principal cause of the son insofar as he is loved or lovable by someone, such that the son is more loved because he is the mother’s as his bearer than because he is the father’s as his begetter.

153. So it is possible for God to have ordained to accept some act as worthy of reward - or as acceptable or to be accepted - because some habit inclines to that act as the partial active principal of it, and which because of this is more principally accepted or more principally acceptable than because it is from the remaining partial cause.

154. In this way [nn.152-153], then, can the remark of Augustine be expounded that ‘charity is like a rider to a horse’ [n.135], and also the remark that ‘the will in respect of grace follows on foot behind and does not go ahead’; this is indeed true with respect to the act insofar as it is meritorious, but not insofar as it is the act ‘in its substance’.

155. And the first example [about rider and horse] would be altogether similar if the horse were free and the rider were directing the horse by way of nature to a definite end. The horse’s course would be more pleasing, and that to some ordained will, from the fact that it was according to the natural inclination of the rider himself to a definite end than from the fact that the horse was by its own motive force running quickly. Then too the horse could of its own liberty throw off the rider, or move itself to something else at a tangent to the rider’s direction to the end; and in the first case indeed the horse would become altogether non-acceptable, because it would not have the rider on account of which it would be accepted by such a will, - in the second case, although such a horse would be acceptable, yet its course would not be accepted, because it would not be according to the direction of the rider. - This is how it is in the proposed case. The will is as it were a free horse, and grace as it were the rider by way of nature, inclining it to an object in a determinate way; a course of the will in accordance with this sort of inclination would be pleasing, - a different course would not be pleasing, as when there is venial sin or an indifferent act; but when the rider is thrown off, which is done by mortal sin, the will itself becomes altogether displeasing.

156. In this way too the will is a foot follower, because it does not of itself as determinately incline to the term (on account of which inclination the act is accepted) as grace inclines, and the will participates that inclination from grace, because the inclination belongs more to grace by its essence than to the will; and in this respect is the will itself a second cause, not because in causing ‘something intrinsic to the act’ it is second cause, but it is so in being that because of which the act is accepted, because it states a respect of the act to what is extrinsic; certainly it is possible enough for some relation to what is external to belong less principally to an effect because of a more principal cause of the effect than because of a less principal cause of it, as is plain in the examples set down above [n.152].Tr. As that the directing of the horse to an end by the rider, which is a relation to something extrinsic to the horse caused by a more principal cause (for the rider is such a more principal cause), is less principally a property of the horse than the running of the horse (for the running belongs more to the horse than the direction of the running), which running is caused by the less principal cause that is the horse itself. ²⁵

157. But this habit, just like any other moral habit also, has to incline itself determinately to the object - or to the end - by virtue of the object which in some way it participates; for just as an intellectual habit has the object in some way in itself as present to it under the idea of intelligible object, so a moral habit has the object in some way in itself under the idea of lovable good, - and thus, just as the former by virtue of the object has in some way to act in the presence of the object, so the latter by virtue of the object it in some way contains has to incline toward the object; from this it is clear how the habit inclines more determinately to the object than the power does, because it more determinately includes the object.

158. And in accord with this [n.157] one could also say that the partial causality which is attributed to the habit [nn151, 40, 32] comes to it from the part of the cause by which the object is said to be active with respect to the action and not from the part of the cause by which the power is said to be active, because a habit has its force more from the object which it determinately includes than from the power itself.

159. And if it is then argued, as was argued in the aforesaid solution, that ‘the habit determines and inclines the power, therefore it is a prior cause’ [n.34], - look for the response there [n.85].