E. Response to the Objections

49. [To the first objection] - As to the first objection [n.46] one can allow that if an angel were created with purely natural powers and did not have moral virtues in his will, these virtues could be generated therein from right choices done many times - not indeed about passions in the sensitive appetite existing in the angel (which neither were present in him nor will be nor could be), but only about the sort of passions shown to him in universal terms by the intellect. And by positing this intellectual showing, and by commanding what thus in the passions should be chosen by one who can have them, a will consonant with such command can possess, from many choices, a right moral habit.

50. And there is a proof of this:

First because every will that does not necessarily lack the perfection which befits the will has belonging to it every perfection of the will; but to will the good about what is doable not only for oneself but also for another (and this not only in its order to the divine good but also insofar as it is a certain proper good) is a perfection of the will; and the will of an angel is not necessarily imperfect. Therefore a habit can belong to this will whereby it wills for me the good of temperance insofar as temperance is a good fitting for me. This habit cannot be called charity because (as was just said) this habit is not only a good for loving God but a good under the proper idea of the goodness of temperance; nor is this habit other than temperance, because the formal idea of a habit does not vary according to ‘for me’ and ‘for you’. Therefore just as by the habit of temperance I formally choose this good for myself, so by a habit of the same idea anyone else wills this good for me. And so in an angel there will be a temperance whereby he wills this good for me.

51. In this way too can, as a consequence, the idea of moral virtues be posited to exist in God, just as charity is allowed to exist in him without its being an accident in him [Lombard, Sent. III d.32 ch.2 n.1].

52. And so from this reasoning about angels that was brought against the proposed solution [n.46] an argument can be taken in favor of that solution. For the will of an angel can will me the good that is the proper habit of temperance insofar as this proper habit is ‘this sort of good’; therefore, an angel can will it for me from the habit of temperance (as was argued [n.50]), and so there will be temperance in him - and not in the sensitive part, so in the other part [sc. the will].

53. But if the objection is made that this is against the Philosopher, who in Ethics 10.8.178b8-18 [n.14] denies moral virtues of the gods, my reply is that the Philosopher is perhaps thus denying of them all accidental habits, if, as some say, he posited that the gods were good naturally.

54. Alternatively, if one is not pleased to posit moral virtues in the gods, one can deny the consequence of the reason that is brought against the proposed solution [n.46], and that in one or other of the following ways:

Either because virtue does not concern just any good but the difficult good. Now this sort of good, which is posited to be the sort of object of the will, is only difficult for someone who has a sensitive appetite that is of a nature to be carried to the opposite of this good, at least as to some circumstance of this good. And from the fact that the sensitive appetite is so inclined, the will in him who has sensitive appetite is of a nature to be thus delighted along with it. And therefore is it difficult for the will to tend to the good that has its due circumstances. So as to an angel, who does not have a sensitive appetite - his will is not of a nature to delight along with any such habit or appetite, and therefore it tends without difficulty to the moral good, that is the good which is rightly circumstanced.

55. Or in another way one can say that volition is twofold. One is simple and is a certain taking pleasure in the object; the other is effective, namely that by which the one willing pursues the willed thing so as to have it in himself, unless he is impeded. Only the second is properly speaking choice, the way the Philosopher speaks of it in Ethics 3.4.1111b20-23, “will is of impossibles, choice is not,” for no one chooses the impossible, that is, effectively wills it with a will by which he pursues it, although someone could with simple taking of pleasure want impossible things (in which way perhaps the first angel sinned, or could have sinned, by willing the impossible, namely equality with God [cf. Ord. II d.6 n.11]).

56. One can say, therefore, that in those who have sensitive appetite the will can be the principle of many choices with respect to the moral good, and choice is the above effective volition, which alone is of a nature to generate a habit; and although it is prior to every habit in the sensitive appetite, it is yet of a nature to be a principle of commanding such appetite. In an angel, however, there can be simple volition but not of a nature to command.

57. [To the second objection] - As to the second objection [n.47], although one can say that not every perfection of a nobler perfectible thing need be itself nobler, yet, if there is indeed in a nobler thing some perfection less noble than a perfection in a less noble thing, the supreme perfection of a nobler thing must surpass the supreme perfection of a less noble thing; now moral virtue is not the supreme perfection of the will, nor is prudence the supreme perfection of the intellect, but charity is of the will and faith of the intellect; and charity seems to exceed faith.

58. This response, however, does not seem sufficient, because the nobler power seems to have a nobler act with respect to the same object when each is acting according to the utmost of itself, because then there is no excess on the part of the object (for it is the same in both cases), but only on the part of the powers, and to that extent the nobler exceeds. Therefore, when there is an act of the practical intellect and of the will about the moral good, which is the same object, then if both powers are acting perfectly (the intellect in dictating and the will in choosing) right choice will be simply nobler than right dictating; and consequently the habit generated by choices will be simply more perfect than the habit generated by nobler acts - which I concede.

59. And as to the Philosopher when he prefers prudence [n.47] I reply: prudence is in some way the rule of the other virtues, to the extent that it or its act precedes in generation the habit and the act of moral virtue; and in this priority moral acts and habits conform to prudence as to what is prior, and not the other way around. This priority seems in the Philosopher to prove the idea and thereby the dignity of [prudence as] the rule and measure - but not simply.

60. [To the third objection] - As to the third [n.48], it is agreed that there can be virtue and habit in a part of the body, as is plain in the case of the hand of the writer and the painter; for my unexercised hand is unsuited to that ability, or in its facility for playing the lyre; but an exercised hand is suited, and this comes only from the facility inhering in the hand. This suitability is posited and conceded to be a certain virtue, because it is a certain suitability suiting something for the work of moral virtue. The same is also further conceded of irrational things, as of a horse, which is suited for certain acts to which it has become accustomed. But such suitability is not found in merely inanimate things; for a stone is not thrown upwards more easily by custom.