4. How Original Sin is Remitted by Baptism

68. As to the fourth article and the fourth question [nn.49, 24].

It is said that that which is formal in the remission of the sin must in itself destroy what is formal in the sin through the opposite of it - opposite formally or virtually -, and what is formal in the sin is not the debt (as is plain, because justice was due in the state of innocence), but the lack of the justice; this lack then must be destroyed either by the positive proper opposite [nn.47, 53] or by something else which virtually contains the opposite. Now grace, although it does not join to the ultimate end, as far as an accidental end is concerned, as perfectly as original justice does, yet it does join to it more perfectly (as was said in d.29 n.25), and that as to the fact that original sin disjoins from the ultimate end; for grace joins simply to the end - under the idea of end - more eminently than original justice does; and therefore, when grace is given in baptism, the sin is simply remitted more eminently than it would be by its proper positive. And even if the lack of the proper positive remains, yet it is not guilt, because the sin is not the debt; for the debt to have that gift is discharged and changed into a debt to have another gift.