ARTICLE V

In the Fifth Article We Ask: ARE HUMAN ACTS RULED BY PROVIDENCE?

Difficulties:

It seems that they are not, for

1. As Damascene says: "What is in us is the work not of providence but of our own free choice." What is in us means our human actions. Consequently, these do not fall under God's providence.

2. Of the things coming under God's providence, the more noble a thing is, the more elaborately is it provided for. Now, man is more noble than those creatures that lack sensation and, never departing from their course, rarely, if ever, deviate from the right order. Men's actions, however, frequently deviate from the right order. Hence, they are not ruled by providence.

3. The evil of sin is very hateful to God. But no one who is provident permits what is most displeasing to him to happen for the sake of something else, because this would mean that the absence of the latter would be even more displeasing to him. Consequently, since God permits the evil of sin to occur in human acts, it seems that they are not ruled by His providence.

4. What is abandoned does not fall under the rule of providence. But, as we read in Ecclesiasticus (15:14): "God left man in the hand of his own counsel." Human acts, therefore, are not ruled by providence.

5. In Ecclesiastes (9:11) we read: "I saw that . . . the race is not to the swift, nor the battle to the strong . . . but time and chance in all." Since the author is speaking about human acts, it seems that men's actions are subject to the whims of chance and are not ruled by providence.

6. By the rule of providence, different allotments are made to different things. But in human affairs the same things happen to the good and to the evil; for, as we read in Ecclesiastes (9:2): "All things equally happen to the just and to the wicked, to the good and to the evil." Consequently, human affairs are not ruled by providence.

To the Contrary:

1'. In the Gospel according to Matthew (10:30) is written: "The very hairs of your head are all numbered." Even the least of human acts, therefore, is directed by God's providence.

2'. To punish, reward, and issue commands are acts of providence, because it is through acts of this kind that every provider governs his subjects. Now, God does all these things in connection with human acts. Consequently, all human acts are ruled by His providence.

REPLY:

As pointed out previously, the closer a being is to the first principle, the higher is its place in the order of providence. Now, among all things, spiritual substances stand closest to the first principle; this is why they are said to be stamped with God's image. Consequently, by God's providence they are not only provided for, but they are provident themselves. This is why these substances can exercise a choice in their actions while other creatures cannot. The latter are provided for, but they themselves are not provident.

Now, since providence is concerned with directing to an end, it must take place with the end as its norm; and since the first provider is Himself the end of His providence, He has the norm of providence within Himself. Consequently, it is impossible that any of the failures in those things for which He provides should be due to Him; the failures in these things can be due only to the objects of His providence. Now, creatures to whom His providence has been communicated are not the ends of their own providence. They are directed to another end, namely, God. Hence, it is necessary that they draw the rectitude of their own providence from God's norm. Consequently, in the providence exercised by creatures failures may take place that are due, not only to the objects of their providence, but also to the providers themselves.

However, the more faithful a creature is to the norm of the first provider, the firmer will be the rectitude of his own providence. Consequently, it is because creatures of this sort can fail in their actions and are the cause of their actions, that their failures are culpable--something which is not true of the failures of other creatures. Moreover, because these spiritual creatures are incorruptible even as individuals, they are provided for on their own account as individuals. Hence, defects that take place in them are destined to a reward or punishment which will belong to these individuals themselves--and not to them only as they are ordered to other things.

Now, man is numbered among these creatures, because his form--that is, his soul--is a spiritual being, the root of all his human acts, and that by which even his body has a relation to immortality. Consequently, human acts come under divine providence according as men themselves have providence over their own acts; and the defects in these acts are ordained according to what belongs to these men themselves, not only according to what belongs to others. For example, when a man sins, God orders the sin to the sinner's good, so that after his fall, upon rising again, he may be a more humble person; or it is ordered at least to a good which is brought about in him by divine justice when he is punished for his sin. The defects happening in sensible creatures, however, are directed only to what belongs to others; for example, the corruption of some particular fire is directed to the generation of some particular air. Consequently, to designate this special manner of providence which God exercises over human acts, Wisdom (12:18) says: "Thou with great favour disposest of us."

Answers to Difficulties:

1. The statement of Damascene does not mean that the things in us (that is, in our power to choose) are entirely outside of God's providence, but it means rather that our choice is not determined to one course of action by divine providence, as are the actions of those beings which do not possess freedom.

2. Natural things lacking sensation are provided for by God alone. Consequently, no failure here is possible on the part of the one who provides, but only on the part of the objects of His providence. But human acts can be defective because of human providence. For this reason, we find more failures and deordinations in human acts than we do in the acts of natural things. Yet, the fact that man has providence over his own acts is part of his nobility. Consequently, the number of his failures does not keep man from holding a higher place under God's providence.

3. God loves a thing more if it is a greater good. Consequently, He wills the presence of a greater good more than He wills the absence of a lesser evil (for even the absence of an evil is a certain good). So, in order that certain greater goods may be had, He permits certain persons to fall even into the evils of sin, which, taken as a class, are most hateful, even though one of them may be more hateful to Him than another. Consequently, to cure a man of one sin, God sometimes permits him to fall into another.

4. "God leaves man in the hand of his own counsel" in the sense that He gives him providence over his own acts. Man's providence over his acts, however, does not exclude God's providence over them, just as the active power of creatures does not exclude the active power of God.

5. Even though many of our human acts are the result of chance if we consider only lower causes, still, if we consider the providence which God has over all things, there is nothing that results from chance. Indeed, the very fact that so many things happen in human affairs when, if we consider merely lower causes, just the opposite should happen, proves that human actions are governed by God's providence. Hence, the powerful frequently fall, for this shows that one is victorious because of God's providence and not because of any human power. The same can be said of other cases.

6. Even though it may seem to us that all things happen equally to the good and to the evil since we are ignorant of the reasons for God's providence in allotting these things, there is no doubt that in all these good and evil things happening to the good or to the evil there is operative a well worked out plan by which God's providence directs all things. It is because we do not know His reasons that we think many things happen without order or plan. We are like a man who enters a carpenter shop and thinks that there is a useless multiplication of tools because he does not know how each one is used; but one who knows the trade will see that this number of tools exists for a very good reason.