B. To the Arguments of the Second Question

72. To the arguments of the second question:

I say [to the first, n.12] that the blessed has, not by absolute power but by ordained power, whatever he can rightly will. Or if he has it by absolute power this must be understood in the sense of ‘whatever he can absolutely will rightly’, that is, what God wills him to will; but God does not will that any will wills freely to have a greater glory than he has conferred on it; and so it cannot rightly will a glory other than what it has.

73. And when you say in proof: ‘through a natural will, which is always right’, I say that the natural appetite of any will is for the highest glory such that the will could be naturally perfected by that much glory; however there is not there any natural inclination for the highest glory such that the opposite of that form, that is, non-highest glory, would be in it by force (in the way that a heavy object is naturally inclined to go downwardsa such that the opposite - namely being up, or not being down - cannot be in it save by force). For any soul is naturally inclined to have the highest grace, and yet it can be at rest in a smallest grace, because there is no intrinsic principle in it determining it equally to any determinate degree of grace.

a.a [Interpolation] because that inclination [sc. natural appetite in the will] does not have an intrinsic principle necessitating it toward that for which it is the inclination.

74. But when you say [n.12] that a free will will be right if it accords with natural will, I say not always so but only when it accords with the superior will, namely the divine will (when it wills what God wills it to will); but sometimes God wills the will to will freely, because he wills natural will to exercise its appetite; but sometimes he does not, but he wills free will to be in accord with his own will and not in accord with natural appetite. And for this reason is blessedness rightly desired freely, because God wills natural appetite to desire this and free will to be in accord with him. But God on occasion does not will free will to love immortality, and yet he does will natural appetite to be for the opposite of death - and then he does not will free will to follow it but to follow his own will, which is a higher rule, because God by his own will, which is a higher and the highest law, has prefixed on any created will that it not will more than the divine will has conferred on it and wants it to will.

75. To the next argument [n.13] I say that although Christ’s soul has supreme inclination for the highest grace as far as concerns the foundation of the inclination (so that any other grace less that the highest grace would be in by force), yet it has supreme inclination for the highest grace whereby it can be joined in the highest way to the object; and so, although it could be at rest in any grace whatever (as any other soul also can), yet it would not be at rest in the highest way without the highest grace, nor would it be joined in the highest way to the object (wherein is perfect rest) if it did not have the highest grace.

76. To the next [n. 14] - if the antecedent is conceded (which however seems doubtful and against the authority of Augustine On Free Choice 3 [n.54]), the consequence can be denied.

77. And when the cause is asked for as to why God made the highest grace but not the highest nature [n.14], I reply that the highest created nature, if it existed, would not have influence over all natures, just as now too a higher species in the universe does not necessarily have influence over a lower; but the highest grace has, according to the being of grace, influence over lower things; and so there seems to be a greater necessity to posit something supreme possessing grace than for some nature that is supreme. But if, just as God supplies the influence of a higher nature, if there is one, over a lower one (because God has influence directly over everything), then he could directly supply the influence of the highest grace, because he pours grace onto all.

78. But another reason could be given [sc. to the question posed in n.77], that, in any work of nature whatever, divine power and wisdom are manifested, because they have produced things from nothing; and divine power and wisdom belong to the whole universe, both as to the hierarchy of corporeal natures and as to natural existence. But mercy and justice, which belong to the hierarchy of intellectual natures as to moral existence, are not manifested supremely in every work of grace; on the contrary, it seems that the highest mercy is not manifested unless the highest grace and glory be given without merits.