ARTICLE VII

In the Seventh Article We Ask: CAN THERE BE ANY CREATURE WHICH HAS ITS FREE CHOICE NATURALLY CONFIRMED IN GOOD?

Difficulties:

It seems that there can, for

1. A spiritual nature is nobler than a corporeal one. But there is a corporeal nature for which it would be out of keeping to have any disorder in its motion. That is the nature of a heavenly body. With all the more reason, then, can there be a created spiritual nature capable of free choice in whose motions there naturally cannot be any disorder. But this means that it is impeccable or confirmed in good.

2. The answer was given that it belongs to the nobility of a spiritual creature that it be able to merit, but that this would be impossible unless it could sin or not.--On the contrary, the ability to merit is within the competence of a spiritual creature by reason of its having the mastery of its own acts. But if it were not able to do anything but good, it would nonetheless still have the mastery of its own acts; for it could do something good or not do it without falling into evil, or it could at least choose between something good and something better. The ability to sin is therefore not required for meriting.

3. Free choice, by which with the help of grace we merit, is an active power. But it is not of the nature of an active power that it fail. A spiritual creature can therefore have the power to merit even if it is naturally impeccable.

4. Anselm says: "The power of sinning is neither freedom nor a part of freedom." But freedom is the reason why man is capable of meriting. Then, even if the power of sinning is taken away, there will still remain to man the power of meriting.

5. Gregory of Nyssa and Damascene assign as the reason why a creature is changeable in its free choice the fact that it is from nothing. But it is more closely a consequence of being a creature that it can fall into nothingness than that it can do evil. Now there are found creatures which are by nature incorruptible, such as the soul and heavenly bodies. Even more surely, then, can there be found a spiritual creature which is by nature impeccable.

6. What God does in one thing He can do in others. But He grants to spiritual creatures by their very nature to tend so invariably to a certain good, happiness, that they can by no means tend to the contrary. He could in the same way, then, grant to some creature that it should naturally tend to all good so that it could by no means incline to evil.

7. Since God is supremely good, He communicates Himself in the highest degree. He consequently communicates to creatures everything of which creatures are capable. But creatures are capable of the perfection which is confirmation in good or impeccability. This is evident because it is granted to some creatures by grace. Consequently there is also some creature which is naturally impeccable and confirmed in good.

8. Substance is the principle of a power, and a power is the principle of operation. But there is a creature which is naturally invariable in substance. There can therefore be some creature naturally invariable in its operation so as to be naturally impeccable.

9. Attributes of creatures consequent upon their efficient principle belong to them more essentially than those consequent upon their material principle, because the effect takes on a likeness of its efficient cause but stands opposed to its material cause. Opposites are from opposites, as white from black. But confirmation in good comes to some creatures from God, their efficient principle. Much more, then, should confirmation in good be said to be natural to them than the ability to sin, which belongs to them as being made out of nothing.

10. Civic happiness is unvarying. But man can attain to civic happiness by natural means. He can therefore naturally have invariability in good.

11. Whatever is in a being from nature is unvarying. But man naturally tends to good. Hence he does it invariably.

To the Contrary:

1'. Damascene says that the reason why a rational creature can turn to evil in its choice is that it is from nothing. But there cannot be any creature which is not from nothing. Hence there cannot be any creature whose free choice is naturally confirmed in good.

2'. The characteristics of a higher nature cannot belong to a lower nature unless it is changed into the higher. Thus it is impossible for water to be naturally hot unless it is changed into the nature of fire or air. But to have a goodness incapable of failure is the characteristic of the divine nature. It is therefore impossible that this should naturally belong to any other nature unless it is changed into the divine nature. But that, of course, is impossible.

3'. Free choice is not found in any creatures except angels and men. But both man and the angels have sinned. The free choice of no creature, therefore, is naturally confirmed in good.

4'. No rational creature is kept from attaining happiness except by reason of sin. If any rational creature were naturally impeccable, therefore, it could attain to happiness by purely natural means without grace. But that seems to smack of the Pelagian heresy.

REPLY:

There is not and cannot be any creature whose free choice is naturally confirmed in good so that the inability to sin belong to it by its purely natural endowments. The reason is this. A failure in an action is caused by a failure in the principles of the action. Consequently, if there is something in which the principles of action cannot fail in themselves nor be hindered by something extrinsic, its action cannot possibly fail. This is seen in the motions of the heavenly bodies. But it is possible for a failure to occur in the actions of those things in which the principles of acting can fail or be hindered. This is seen in beings subject to generation and corruption, which undergo failure in their active principles by reason of their changeableness and have defective actions as a result. For this reason in the operations of nature something amiss frequently happens, of which the births of monsters are examples. For something amiss, whether it be spoken of in natural or artificial or voluntary matters, is nothing but a defect or disorder in the agent's proper action when something is done otherwise than as it should be, as is explained in the Physics.

A rational nature endowed with free choice, however, is different in its action from every other agent nature. Every other nature is ordained to some particular good, and its actions are determined in regard to that good. But a rational nature is ordained to good without further qualification. Good, taken absolutely, is the object of the will, just as truth, taken absolutely, is the object of the intellect. That is why the will reaches to the universal principle of good itself, to which no other appetite can attain. And for this reason a rational creature does not have determined actions but is in a state of indifference in regard to innumerable actions. Now, since every action proceeds from the agent with a certain similarity to the agent, as hot things heat, any agent which is ordained in its action to some particular good must have the formality of that good naturally and invariably within itself if its action is to be naturally indefectible. If a body, for instance, naturally has an unvarying heat, it heats invariably.

A rational nature, accordingly, which is directed to good, taken absolutely, through many different actions, cannot have actions naturally incapable of going astray from good unless it have in it naturally and invariably the formality of the universal and perfect good.

That can be had, however, only in the divine nature. For God alone is pure act, admitting no admixture of any potentiality, and thus is pure and absolute goodness. But any creature is a particular good, since it has in its very nature the admixture of potentiality, which belongs to it because it is made out of nothing. And hence it is that among rational natures only God has a free choice naturally impeccable and confirmed in good, whereas it is impossible for this natural impeccability to be in a creature because of its being made out of nothing, as Damascene and Gregory of Nyssa say. From this, too, is the particular good in which the nature of evil is founded, as Dionysius says.

Answers to Difficulties:

1. Corporeal creatures are directed to some particular good through definite actions, as has been said.* Consequently, in order that error and sin be naturally absent from their actions, it is sufficient for them to be fixed by their own nature in some particular good. But this is not sufficient in the case of spiritual natures ordained to good taken absolutely, as has been said.*

2. There is no contradiction between being naturally impeccable and having the mastery over one's own actions, since both are verified in God. But there is a contradiction between natural impeccability and the possession of the mastery over one's own actions by a created nature, which is a particular good; for no creature which has determined actions directed to a particular good has the mastery of its own acts.

3. Although it is not of the nature of an active power that it fail, it is of the nature of an active power which does not have within itself the sufficient and unvarying principles of its own action that it be able to fail.

4. Though the ability to sin is not a part of free choice, yet it results from freedom of choice in a created nature.

5. A creature gets an act of existence which is determined, particular, and from another. Consequently, a creature can have a stable and unvarying existence even though there is not found in it the formality of the absolute and perfect good, but by its actions it can be directed to good taken absolutely. Hence there is no parallel.

6. Every rational mind naturally desires happiness in an undetermined and general way, and in this regard it cannot fail. But the motion of the will of a creature is not determined in particular to seek happiness in this or that. And so a person can sin even in seeking happiness if he seeks it where he should not, as one who seeks it in sensuous pleasures. The same is also true in regard to all goods, for nothing is desired except under the aspect of good, as Dionysius says. This is so because the tendency to good is naturally in the mind, but not to this or that good. Hence it can fall into sin in this matter.

7. A creature is capable of impeccability, but not so as to have it naturally. Hence the conclusion does not follow.

8. The principle of a correct operation proceeding from free choice is not merely the substance and the faculty or power, but there is also needed the due application of the will to certain things which are extrinsic, such as the end, and other things of the sort. Consequently, even when there is no defect in the substance of the soul or in the nature of free choice, a failure in its action can follow. From the natural invariability of the substance, then, natural impeccability cannot be concluded.

9. God is the cause of creatures not only in their natural endowments but also in everything additional. It is accordingly not necessary that whatever creatures have from God should be natural to them, but only what God has endowed them with in instituting their nature. But confirmation in good is not something of this sort.

10. Since civic happiness is not happiness without qualification, it does not have invariability without qualification; but it is called unvarying because it is not easily changed. Yet even if civic happiness were simply unvarying, it would not follow on this account that free choice would be naturally confirmed in good. For we are not speaking of something natural in the sense that it can be acquired by the principles of nature, as political virtues can be called natural, but in the sense that it follows from the necessity of the principles of nature.

11. Although man naturally tends to good in general, he does not so tend to a specific good, as has been said. It is for this reason that sin and failure occur.