C. When or for What Period there was Need for a Sacrament to be Instituted

246. The answer to the third article is plain from the first [nn.225-226, 237-238]. For medicine is necessary for any state where there is sickness; and for any state of life (especially after the fall) it is fitting for man to be led to invisible things through some sensible sign. But in every state of life after the fall there is sickness in nature; so for the whole of that state it was fitting for some sacrament to be instituted.

247. But as to particulars, about whether several sacraments are fitting for the time of the same law, and which and how many, will be touched on below [nn.254-257]. Here a general question alone is asked about the time when, as about other conditions pertaining to the institution.

248. Hence it is plain that for the state of the fatherland no sacrament is fitting, because then man does not need sensible things to know intelligible things belonging to his salvation, nor does he then need to be exercised in seeking what belongs to salvation, because he has perfectly obtained salvation.

249. Also for the state of innocence it was not fitting for a sacrament to be instituted as it was after the fall, because although then man was not able to learn from sensible things [Ord. I d.3 nn.186-187], yet no sensible thing was then necessary for leading him to salvation so that it could, by removal of some impediment to salvation, be properly called a cure.

250. But whether marriage, which certainly existed in the state of innocence, was then a sacrament will be discussed later [d.26 n.11-12].