CHAPTER 120

THREE KINDS OF ACTION, AND THE EVIL OF SIN

We should observe that sometimes action is in the power of the agent. Such are all voluntary actions. By voluntary action I mean an action that has its principle in an agent who is conscious of the various factors constituting his action. Sometimes actions are not voluntary. In this class are violent actions, whose principle is outside the agent; also natural actions, and actions performed in ignorance. These do not proceed from a conscious principle. If a defect occurs in non-voluntary actions that are directed to an end, it is called simply a fault (peccatum). But if such a defect occurs in voluntary actions, it is called not only fault, but sin (culpa). For in this case the voluntary agent, being master of his own action, deservedly draws blame and punishment on himself. If actions are mixed, that is, are partly voluntary and partly involuntary, the sin is diminished in proportion to the admixture of the involuntary element.

             Since natural action follows the nature of a being, a fault in natural activity clearly cannot occur in incorruptible things, for their nature is incapable of change. But the will of an intellectual creature can suffer defect in voluntary action, as was shown above. Consequently freedom from evil in nature is common to all incorruptible things. But freedom, in virtue of natural necessity, from the evil of sin, of which rational nature alone is capable, is found to be an exclusive property of God.