Treatise on Grace

• 109,1: Can we know truth without grace? St. Thomas invokes his general metaphysical thesis that no nature, be it corporeal or spiritual, can perform its characteristic actions unless it is moved by God. Thus every action by a created agent depends on God as the source of the form by which it acts and as the first mover cooperating with its act. In the case of our cognition of truth, the intellect has its natural form, the intelligible light or the light of natural reason, from God; and it can also by a special gift have the light of grace, which is added to its nature. However, this light of grace is not in principle required for the cognition of every truth; rather, it is required only in the case of the mysteries of the faith, which exceed our natural cognition. 

• 109,2: Can we will and do good without grace? In the state of integral nature (Adam before the fall with respect just to the principles intrinsic to human nature) man needed God's help as first mover to will and do good, but man "was able, through his own natural principles, to will and do the good proportioned to his nature, which is the good of acquired virtue, though not the good exceeding his nature, which is the good of infused virtue." However, in the state of fallen nature man needs grace even in order to achieve the full good of acquired virtue, since he must be healed; in addition, he needs grace in order to achieve the good of infused virtue.

• 109,3: Can we love God above all things without grace? In the state of integral nature man was able to love God above all things, since this is connatural to man and to all other intelligent creatures as well. Grace is needed to elevate this love to supernatural beatitude, which is a sharing in the very life and happiness of the persons of the Trinity.) But in the state of fallen nature we need healing grace even in order to attain the good that is connatural to us -- that is, the good that is in principle attainable by our natural powers  --  and so in this state we need grace in order to love God above all things.

• 109,4: Can we fulfill the precepts of the natural law without grace? Once again, as far as the substance of the works is concerned, in the state of integral nature man was able to fulfill the precepts of the law without grace, but in the state of fallen nature he needs healing grace in order to do this. However, as far as the mode of acting is concerned, in neither state can we fulfill the precepts out of (supernatural) charity without grace. Notice that this immediately raises the question of whether we can avoid sin without grace -- see art. 8 below.

• 109,5: Can we merit eternal life without grace? Unsurprisingly, St. Thomas holds that the acquisition of eternal life exceeds our natural powers. (It would be good to go back to the Treatise on Beatitude and ask why exactly this is so. The answer is that grace is necessary for us to know God in his essence and to act out of charity as participants in the divine life. Any other form of knowledge or love of God falls short of satisfying the formal definition of happiness as the fulfillment of all our ordinate desires.)

• 109,6: Can we prepare ourselves for grace without the external help of grace? This question forces us to distinguish the sort of preparation that presupposes habitual (or sanctifying) grace, which heals us and serves as the principle of meritorious works, i.e., the works of the infused virtues, and the sort of preparation which precedes the reception of the gift of habitual grace. The latter sort of preparation does not presuppose a further habitual grace, but it does presuppose "some gratuitous divine assistance by which God moves the soul from within or inspires us with respect to some proposed good." This demands divine assistance because in our postlapsarian state we are not "naturally" turned toward God as our special end who is desired as our own proper good. God normally accomplishes this conversio little by little (as with, say, Augustine) but sometimes does it instantaneously and miraculously (as in the case of St. Paul).  In either case, the sort of grace in question is often called actual -- as opposed to habitual -- grace, since it is ordered toward an act which disposes us to habitual grace.

• 109,7: Can we recover from sin without the assistance of grace? To recover from a sin is not merely to stop the act of sinning, but to have restored what is lost through sinning. As we saw before, the loss associated with sinning has three elements:

• (i) the stain or blemish or tarnish of sin (macula peccati), i.e., the loss and privation of the beauty of grace. This beauty of the soul cannot be restored unless God once again illumines the soul, and hence this restoration requires habitual grace.

• (ii) the corruption of the good of nature (corruptio boni naturae), i.e., our nature is disordered by a will that is not subject to God. The good of nature can be restored only if the will is subjected once again to God, but this cannot occur without God's drawing the will to himself in a special movement.

• (iii) being deserving of punishment (reatus poenae), i.e., the meriting of eternal damnation. This punishment can be remitted only by God, against whom every sinful offense is committed.

• 109,8: Are we able not to sin without grace? In the state of integral nature man -- even without habitual grace -- was able not to sin. (This assumes the preternatural gifts of 'natural' justice or righteousness, etc.) But in the state of fallen nature we need habitual grace in order to avoid mortal sin altogether -- and this because in such a state man's reason is not subjected to God and hence either habitually or impulsively goes off after commutable goods as his chief end, even though one is able in any given case to impede acting in accordance with such a habit or impulse. Even with grace, we are unable to avoid all venial sin -- and this because habitual grace does not in this life restore the subjection of the passions to reason and the law of God. (Note: Is there a problem with freedom here? How can we be free not to commit any particular sin and yet be unable to avoid sin altogether? Imperfect analogies: free throws; memorizing Aristotle's Metaphysics. Further question: what does it take to act out of character or with premeditation? Also see ad 1: Is St. Thomas implying that in some cases the sin is imputed to us even though in the circumstances we are unable to avoid it -- in the same way, say, that sins are imputed to someone who is drunk?)

• 109,9: Is one in the state of grace able to do good and avoid sin without any further assistance of grace? The answer is that such a one does not need another type of habitual grace, but nonetheless does need actual grace, i.e., grace directed toward a particular good operation. This is because habitual grace does not completely remove our lack of self-knowledge, our ignorance of particular circumstances, or the movements of sensuality. We can think of actual grace as that by which we are conserved by God in the goodness bestowed on us through habitual grace.  (This is connected to the gifts of the Holy Spirit, through which we are given cognitive illumination and strengthening of the will with respect to particular acts of the infused virtues.)

• 109,10: Does one who is in the state of grace need the assistance of grace to persevere? If by perseverance we mean not a habit by which we stand firm against difficulties or the resolve to persevere in the good until the end of our lives, but our actual continuation in good until the end of our lives, then for this we need actual grace to direct us and protect us against temptation, but we do not need any further habitual grace.

Question 110: On the essence of grace

• 110,1-2: Grace (or favor) (gratia) can mean either (i) the love which a benefactor has for someone (as in "to be in his good graces") or (ii) a gift which the benefactor gives to someone gratuitously (as in "he did me a favor") or (iii) the gratitude that one shows to a benefactor (as in "grace before meals"). The second is the sense we have in mind, though it is important to note that God's grace, unlike man's grace, is what makes us lovable in the first place. It is through God's grace that rational creatures are drawn in a special way, beyond our nature, to a participation in the divine good. Ontologically, as something existing in a rational creature, habitual grace is a quality of the soul, whereas actual grace is a motion or movement in the soul. Habitual grace is the supernatural analogue of the natural inclinations and desires for naturally attainable good which God instills into every creature. By habitual grace we are disposed for intimate friendship with God.  It is this grace that makes us by "adoption" what the God-man is by nature.  That is, it is the source of our divine filiation.

• 110,3-4: Habitual grace is not identical with the infused virtues but is instead a principle from which the infused virtues emanate, analogously to the way in which the natural powers of the soul emanate from its essence (see ST 1's treatment of the powers of the soul). So grace affects, in the first instance, the essence of the soul and so has the essence of the soul as its immediate subject:

• "Just as the natural light of reason is something over and above the acquired virtues, which are called virtues insofar as they are ordered to the natural light itself, so too the very light of grace, which is a participation in the divine nature, is something over and above the infused virtues, which are derived from that light and are ordered to it ... Just as the acquired virtues perfect man for living in a way congruent with the natural light of reason, so the infused virtues perfect man for living in a way congruent with the light of grace."

• "Since grace is prior to virtue, it has a subject prior to the powers of the soul. Thus, it exists in the essence of the soul. For just as by means of his intellective power man participates in the divine knowledge through the virtue of faith, and just as by means of the power of the will he participates in the divine love through the virtue of charity, so too by means of the nature of the soul he participates, according to a certain likeness, in the divine nature through a kind of regeneration or re-creation."

Question 111: On the divisions of grace

• 111,1-5: Gratia gratum faciens heals and sanctifies the person who receives it, whereas gratia gratis data is given to one person not for his own sanctification but for the sake of the community.

• Gratia gratum faciens includes habitual grace and actual grace, each of which can be thought of as either operating grace or cooperating grace, according to whether we are thinking just of God's action (operating grace) or of our action as well (cooperating grace): (i) habitual operating grace is gratia gratum faciens insofar as it is a habit by which God alone heals or justifies the soul and makes it gratum; (ii) habitual cooperating grace is gratia gratum faciens insofar as it is a habit serving as a principle of the meritorious works that proceed from creaturely free choice as well as from God; (iii) actual operating grace is gratia gratum faciens insofar as it involves our will being moved interiorly by God to the good; (iv) actual cooperating grace is gratia gratum faciens insofar as it involves our will freely commanding the appropriate exterior act as aided by God.

• Gratia gratum faciens is also divided into prevenient grace and subsequent grace relative to the five effects of grace (see question 113 below):

• (1) the healing of the soul
• (2) the soul's willing the good
• (3) the soul's efficaciously doing the good that it wills
• (4) the soul's persevering in the good
• (5) the soul's attaining glory (supernatural beatitude)

So, e.g., grace insofar as it is a cause of  (2) is prevenient to grace insofar as it is a cause of  (3) and subsequent to grace insofar as it is caused by (1), etc.

• Gratia gratis data is divided, ala 1 Cor 12, into nine different categories, three having to do with understanding the faith (faith, wisdom, and knowledge), four with confirming the faith (miracles of healing, miracles of power, prophecy, discernment of spirits) and two with proclaiming the faith (gift of tongues, interpretation of tongues). Note that this sort of grace is not as fundamental as gratia gratum faciens, since it is ordered toward the latter and does not of itself sanctify the one who has it.  Rather, it is given to one person for the sake of facilitating the sanctification of others.

Question 112: On the cause of grace

• 112,1: God is the principal cause of grace, though he uses creatures (both rational and irrational) as instrumental causes of grace through their example, friendship, conversation, preaching, teaching, etc.

• 112,2: Habitual grace demands a predisposition for grace on our part, but this preparation for grace is itself a moving of the will by God. God usually accomplishes this little by little, but in some cases quickly.

• 112,3: Here St. Thomas takes up the interesting question of whether God necessarily grants habitual grace to one who is preparing himself for grace and doing all that he can to receive grace. There is no necessary connection between the acts of free choice by which one prepares himself and the consequent attainment of grace, since grace is not caused by such acts of free choice. On the other hand, God's action in effecting such free acts of will infallibly accomplishes the end toward which it is ordered. So St. Thomas's point is that any necessary connection here is due to God's lovingly and graciously setting things up that way and not due to a natural connection between our acts of free choice and the attainment (or intensification) of grace. The important thing here is that the preparatory acts of free choice are as much God's effects as they are our effects.

• 112,4: To the extent that one person can participate more than another in habitual grace, one person can have "more grace" than another.  (Perhaps it is better to say that one person can participate to a greater degree than another in the divine life that God offers us.)  This difference is traced back principally to God, "who dispenses the gifts of grace in different ways in order that the beauty and perfection of the Church might emerge from different grades."

• 112,5: St. Thomas denies that, outside of a special revelation, anyone can know with certitude that he is in the state of grace. However, one can have a well-grounded opinion that he is in the state of grace insofar as he perceives that he delights in God and disdains worldly things and insofar as he is not aware of any mortal sin in himself.

Question 113: On the first effect of grace: the justification of the impious

• 113,1: Is the justification of the impious a remission of sin? Justification or righteousness, on the part of the one justified or made righteous, implies a movement toward a state of justice. Justice in the relevant sense connotes "a certain rectitude in a man's interior disposition, viz., insofar as the highest part is subject to God and the lower powers of the soul are subject to the highest, i.e., reason." When justification is taken as ordered toward justice in this sense, it does not imply a previous state of impiousness or a remission of sin. Hence, Adam is said to have been justified by original justice. However, in our case justification implies a movement toward justice from a state of impiousness (associated with fallen human nature). Thus it consists in a transformation from a state of injustice to a state of justice through the remission of sin.

• 113,2: Does the remission of sin and guilt require an infusion of grace? An offense is remitted only if the one offended is at peace with the offender (and not just if the one offended does not hate the offender or does not impute the sin to him -- ala certain Reformed notions of justification). Thus sin is remitted only if God is at peace with us. This peace consists in the love by which God loves us; still, even though this love is eternal on God's part, it is possible for us to fall out of this love and to regain it. But what we lose when we fall out of love with God is precisely the grace by which we become worthy of eternal life and which gives us the ontological status of children of God. So the remission of sin requires an infusion of grace.

• 113,3-5: Does the justification of the impious require a movement of free choice? God moves us to justice in the manner proper to our nature, and in one who has the use of free choice (see 113, 3, ad 1 for infants, the mentally retarded, and the insane), this involves an act of free choice by which the gift of grace is accepted and which is simultaneous with, though naturally posterior to, the infusion of grace. The relevant act of free choice is twofold: viz., a free conversion to God through faith and a free renunciation of sin.

• 113,6-8: Here St. Thomas gives us a logical ordering of the effects which occur simultaneously in time in the justification of the impious:

• (1) the infusion of grace  --  motion of the mover (God)
• (2) the movement of free choice to God through faith  --  motion of the moved toward the terminus ad quem
• (3) the movement of free choice against sin  --  motion of the thing moved away from the terminus a quo
• (4) the remission of guilt (sin)  --  the attainment of the terminus ad quem

So the very same action is an infusion of grace, a movement of free choice, and a remission of sin, since it has distinct, though subordinated, objects while remaining the same act in substance. This action is instantaneous (a. 7).

• 113,9-10: Creation is God's greatest work as far as the mode of acting is concerned, since it involves something's coming to be from nothing. But as far as the magnitude of the work or effect is concerned, the justification of the impious is God's greatest work, since it terminates "in the eternal good of divine participation." Justification is a miracle in some senses of 'miracle' but not others. In the sense that a miracle requires an infinite divine power, it is a miracle. But in the sense in which the form induced is beyond the natural potentiality of the recipient, it is not a miracle, since "the soul has a natural capacity for grace." (He means here an obediential potency, i.e., a natural ability to receive grace -- though not a natural ability to effect grace.)  Finally, justification sometimes occurs suddenly and hence miraculously, as in the case of St. Paul, whereas most of the time God works gradually through a first incomplete' motion and brings it to completion only over an extended interval of time.

Question 114: On the second effect of grace: merit

• 114,1: Merit or reward is that which is given to someone in compensation for some work or deed. To give someone a reward is an act of justice. But justice simpliciter has to do with the relations among equals (see ST 2-2), whereas God and man are wholly unequal. So any relation of justice between them is justice secundum quid and any notion of merit man deserves from God is likewise merit secundum quid. More specifically, the idea of merit in this context presupposes a wholly gratuitous act on God's part by which he freely promises to reward us for our supernatural acts and also gives us the means to perform such acts. So God is not in debt to anyone simpliciter but only because of his previous promise and institution of merit.

• 114,2: We need grace as a principle of merit in order to merit eternal life, since no created nature is a sufficient principle for meriting the gift of eternal beatitude. This claim presupposes that there is an intrinsic, rather than merely extrinsic, connection between the internal state of our souls and our desire for or capacity to enjoy the beatific vision of the Holy Trinity.  We simply cannot make ourselves into beings who either (a) desire the beatific vision as a specification of our natural desire for happiness or (b) attain and enjoy the beatific vision.  This is God's doing.  However, in the state of corrupted nature, man needs not only to be elevated but also to be healed, and this, too, demands the grace which constitutes the justification of the impious.

• 114,3: Merit can be considered in two ways: as condign, i.e., as in some sense due according to justice, and as congruous, i.e., as appropriate according to mercy, though not due. (For instance, it is appropriate that God should reward the excellence of human virtue, but not a matter of justice.) Insofar as our meritorious acts are considered with regard to the substance of the acts and as proceeding from our free choice as a principle, they earn congruous merit. Insofar as they proceed from a supernatural principle -- viz., from the grace of the Holy Spirit and the love for God on the part of one who is an adopted child of God -- they earn eternal life as condign merit.

• 114,4: Human acts merit for two reasons: (1) principally, insofar as they are divinely ordered to the merited good; (2) secondarily, insofar as they are voluntary. On both counts, charity is central. First of all, the good toward which such acts are ordered, viz., the supernatural participation in the life of God and the enjoyment of God, is an act of charity toward which all other virtuous acts are ordered, making us fit for the beatific vision as an intrinsic end. Second, the more our actions are motivated by love, the more voluntary they are. So, once again, charity is the highest motive for the acts of any virtue.

• 114,5-6: We cannot merit first or initial grace for ourselves, either ex condigno or ex congruo. As far as meriting for others is concerned, only Christ himself (via his human nature) can merit first grace for others ex condigno. However, if we are in the state of grace, we can merit first grace for another ex congruo, though, of course, there may be an impediment in the one for whom we desire grace.

• 114,7: No one can merit reparation for himself after a fall out of the state of grace -- either ex condigno or ex congruo, the latter because in this case there is an impediment in both the one who asks for grace and in the one for whom he asks it. Here we are "reduced to" pleading for God's absolute mercy.

• 114,8-9: One in the state of grace can indeed merit ex condigno an increase in grace, since this is part of the reward of grace, which has eternal beatitude as its ultimate end and the whole progression towards eternal beatitude as an intermediary end. (Note, though, that the increase is over time and depends on the future disposition of the recipient.) However, no one can merit his own final perseverance in grace up to the end of the present life, since this depends solely on God's graciousness. (This bears closer scrutiny.)

114,10: Only spiritual goods -- and not temporal goods as such -- fall under merit. Temporal goods can, however, fall under merit per accidens, viz., insofar as they are ordered to the works of virtue and hence to spiritual goods. "For God gives temporal goods to the just -- and temporal evils as well  --  to the extent that this aids them in attaining eternal life."