3. About the Distinction between the Aforesaid Keys

40. About the third article [n.17], some say that these keys are the same as the priest’s character, and then it would be easy to see how they, just as also the characters, are conferred in his ordination on any priest.

41. But against this there is argument as follows:

Those powers are distinct where one of them can be without another; but the power of confecting the body of Christ (or the priest’s character as it is for this purpose) can be without the power that is included in the keys;     therefore etc     . The proof of the minor is that so it was in the case of the Apostles at the Cena, when it was said to them,

“Do this in remembrance of me” [Luke, 22.19, I Corinthians 11.24-25], where power of confecting the Eucharist was given them but, until the resurrection, not the power of the keys when, John 20.23, Christ says “Whose sins you remit etc.”

42. It seems one can argue similarly about any priest now ordained in the Church. For the bishop says first to the ordinands, “Receive the power of confecting or celebrating mass, both for the living and the dead,” giving them the chalice; and, after certain words interposed, he puts his hand on their heads and says, “Receive the Holy Spirit; whosever sins you remit     etc .” Hence it seems that any priest receives the power of confecting first in time before the power of absolving; therefore      it seems that they are a different power. And this proves that the power is not only distinguished from the character, if the character is something single [Ord. IV d.6 nn.279-359], but that they are distinct powers between themselves.

43. Again, the character (as said above [ibid. n.317] can only be a relation; but a relation cannot be the same for several terms; the true and mystical body of Christ, or the consecration of this [sc. the true body in the Eucharist] and the absolution of that [sc. the mystical body in penitence], are distinct terms; therefore that which is the power for consecration, if it be this sort of relation, will not be the same as the power for absolution.

44. I say therefore that they are simply two keys, such that the word of Christ, “I will give you the keys” [Matthew 16.19], is absolutely true.

45. And these keys can, by the absolute power of God, be separated from each other; for just as someone who is now presiding can commit to another cognizance in a cause without authority to pass sentence in it (as if he were to say, ‘I commit to you the authority of examining this case, and you give it back to me so that I may pass sentence’), just as too he could confer authority to sentence without authority of cognizance (as if he were to say, ‘I commit to you to give sentence as you please without any cognizance of the case’, but such commission would not be in order for anyone whose will was twistable) - so could God commit authority to take cognizance without authority to pass sentence; and this commission, if it were simply in order, would also be reasonable. God could also, of his absolute power, commit to someone with a will that was not twistable authority to pass sentence in a case without cognizance of it.

46. But by his ordained power, or his power in fact, both are committed to any ecclesiastical priest, at least to one who is fully ordained - which I say to this extent, that if authority of celebrating is given to him first in time before authority of absolving, he is not a completely ordained priest as to both powers if, after the first has been done, the second were omitted.

47. But whether each power be given precisely together in time I do not assert.

48. But if one of them be given before the other, when is the character impressed, then, on the priest? And how is this double power related to the character?

49. To the first it could be said that, as there are two powers, so there are two characters, and each is impressed in its own sensible sign signifying that invisible mark, as that the first is impressed in the giving of the chalice with the words “Receive the power of celebrating etc.,” and the second in the imposition of hands in the words “Receive the Holy Spirit     etc .”

50. And according to this would be plain what would be said to the second question [n.48], that each power is a certain character but that these two make integral the total order of the priesthood. But there would, according to this, also seem to be two characters corresponding to the two keys, or they would be the two keys.

51. If therefore      one is not pleased to posit so many characters corresponding to one priestly order, it can be said that by a single priestly character, whenever it is impressed, does someone have the power of confecting the body of Christ; and through it is he ascribed to the family of Christ in such an excellent rank, namely in the rank of feeding the people of Christ in the Church.

52. But just as someone promoted in this taking care of great things to an excelling rank in the family of a lord is by this fact disposed to having authority with respect to the other servants, so is he who is constituted by a character in an excellent rank in the family of Christ disposed by congruity to have over the mystical body of Christ power for binding and loosing. And then the priestly character is a disposition to these keys, at least the conferring of one key is not separated from the conferring of the other, because as was said [n.44], just as Christ in that same remark in John 20.23 conferred both keys on the Church, so the bishop in the same sensible sign and word confers both: one as it were excellently and explicitly [sc. the key of power], the other as it were implicitly [sc. the key of knowledge], whose use is antecedent to the use of this first one.

53. And from this is it plain how they can be called one key by unity of Order, because ordered to one ultimate act, namely that of opening; and as to that act one key is subordinate to the other, because more remote from the effect.