Question Two. Whether in the state of innocence only those would have been born who are now the elect.

Scotus, Sent.2 d.20 q.2

1. The second question to ask is whether only those would then have been born who are truly elect.

2. That not so: because many now are born elect from parents who are not elect, therefore      etc.

3. To the contrary is Gregory Moralia 4 at the end.

To the Question

4. I reply by saying that no one now reprobate would have been then produced, and that no one now elect would have not then been produced.

5. I prove the first as follows: God foresaw from eternity all the men capable of being produced, and all the final merits and demerits of each one. Therefore these propositions are incompossible, namely that God foresaw that Judas must act with final badness, that John would abide in innocence, and that he accidentally produced Judas [sc. in the state of innocence].

6. I prove the second thus: God foresaw that the Blessed Virgin had to be acting with final goodness if he produced her, and in fact things are such that he did produce her accidentally.     Therefore then too he would have produced her accidentally, otherwise the state of innocence would have harmed her without her guilt etc     .

7. But would children have grown up as they do now? I say that they would at first have been ignorant, and that they would have increased in knowledge and also in virtue; and so they would at first have been weak and incapable of local motion, and they would have increased in strength of body.

To the Argument

8. To the first objection [n.2] I say that numerical unity of efficient cause is not of necessity required for numerical unity of effect; the fact is plain because, as to the numerically same body that nature produces, God can repair what was not present; and I do not say that those who are now born elect and of reprobate parents would have been born of their same parents as elect, etc.