ARTICLE I

The Question Is about Grace, and in the First Article We Ask: Is GRACE SOMETHING CREATED WHICH IS IN THE SOUL POSITIVELY?

Difficulties:

It seems that it is not, for

1. According to Augustine, "just as the soul is the life of the body, God is the life of the soul." But the soul is the life of the body without any intervening form. Then God is also the life of the soul in the same way. Thus the life which is had through grace is not had through any created form existing in the soul.

2. Ingratiatory grace (gratia gratum faciens), of which we are speaking, seems to be nothing but that according to which a man is in God's good graces. But a man is said to be in God's good graces in so far as he has been favorably received by God; and a person is said to be favorably received by God because of God's acceptance, which is of course in God Himself. It is just as we say that a person is acceptable to a man, not by something which is in the one accepted, but by the acceptance which is in the one accepting. Grace therefore does not imply anything in man but only in God.

3. We come closer to God by the spiritual existence that comes from grace than by natural existence. But God causes natural existence in us without the intervention of any other cause, because He created us immediately. He therefore also causes gratuitous spiritual existence in us without the intervention of anything else; and so the conclusion is the same as before.

4. Grace is a sort of health of the soul. Now health does not seem to imply anything else in the healthy person than balanced humors. Then grace too does not imply any form in the soul, but presupposes that the powers of the soul are balanced in an equality of justice.

5. Grace seems to be nothing but a sort of liberality; for "to give gratuitously" seems to mean the same as "to give liberally." Liberality, however, is not in the recipient but in the giver. Then grace too is in God, who gives us His good things, and not in us.

6. No creature is nobler than the soul of Christ. But grace is nobler, because Christ's soul is ennobled by grace. Grace is therefore not something created in the soul.

7. Grace bears the same relation to the will as truth to the intellect. But according to Anselm the truth, which all intellects understand, is one. Then the grace by which all wills are perfected is also one. But no one created thing can be in many. Consequently grace is not something created.

8. Nothing but a composite is in a genus. Now grace is not a composite but a simple form. It is therefore not in a genus. But everything created is in some genus. Then grace is not something created.

9. If grace is anything in the soul, it seems to be only a habit. "There are three things in the soul," the Philosopher says, "power, habit, and passion." Now grace is not a power, because in that case it would be natural. Nor is it a passion, because then it would be concerned principally with the irrational part of the soul. But it is furthermore not a habit, for a habit is a quality difficult to displace, according to the Philosopher, whereas grace is very easily removed, because this can be done by one act of a mortal sin. Grace is therefore not something in the soul.

10. According to Augustine nothing created intervenes between our soul and God. But grace intervenes between our soul and God, because our soul is united to God through grace. Grace is therefore not something created.

11. Man is nobler and more perfect than the other creatures. But in order to make these latter acceptable to Himself God did not confer upon them anything over and above their natural endowments, since they have been approved by Him as they were, according to the words of Genesis (1:31): "And God saw all the things that He had made, and they were very good." Then neither is anything added to man's natural gifts on the basis of which he is said to be acceptable to God; and so grace is not something positively existing in the soul.

To the Contrary:

1'. Commenting on the words of the Psalm (103:15): "That he may make the face cheerful with oil," the Gloss says: "Grace is a certain splendor of the soul winning holy love." But splendor is something in the soul positively which is created. Then so is grace.

2'. God is said to be in His saints by grace in a special way that distinguishes them from other creatures. Now God is not said to be in anything in a new manner except by reason of some effect. Grace is therefore an effect of God in the soul.

3'. Damascene says that grace is the delight of the soul. But delight is something created in the soul. Then so is grace.

4'. Every action is from some form. But a meritorious action is from grace. Grace is therefore a form in the soul.

REPLY:

The term grace is wont to be taken in two senses: (1) For something which is given gratis, as we are accustomed to say, "I do you this grace or favor." (2) For the favorable reception which one gets from another, as we say, "That fellow is in the king's good graces" because he is favorably received by the king. And these two senses are related, for nothing is gratuitously given unless the recipient is somehow favorably received.

In divine matters we accordingly speak of two kinds of grace. One is called grace gratuitously given or gratuitous grace, as the gift of prophecy and of wisdom and the like. But this is not in question at present, because it is evident that such gifts are something created in the soul. The other is called grace that makes one pleasing to God or ingratiatory grace, and according to it man is said to be acceptable to God. It is of this that we are now speaking. That this grace implies something in God is obvious, for it implies an act of the divine will welcoming that man. But whether along with this it implies something in the man welcomed was doubted by some, since some asserted that this kind of grace was nothing created in the soul, but was only in God.

But this cannot stand. For God's accepting or loving someone (for they are the same thing) is nothing else but His willing him some good. Now God wills the good of nature for all creatures; and on this account He is said to love all things: "For thou lovest all things that are . . ." (Wisdom 11:25), and to approve all: "And God saw all the things that he had made, and they were very good" (Genesis 1:31). But it is not by reason of this sort of acceptance that we are accustomed to say that someone has the grace of God, but inasmuch as God wills him a certain supernatural good, which is eternal life, as is written in Isaias (64:4): "The eye hath not seen, O God, besides thee, what things thou has prepared for them that love thee." Hence it is written in the Epistle to the Romans (6:23): "The grace of God [is] life everlasting."

God does not, however, will this for anyone unworthy. But from his own nature man is not worthy of so great a good, since it is supernatural. Consequently, by the very fact that someone is affirmed to be pleasing to God with reference to this good, it is affirmed that there is in him something by which he is worthy of such a good above his natural endowments. This does not, to be sure, move the divine will to destine the man for that good, but rather the other way about: by the very fact that by His will God destines someone for eternal life, He supplies him with something by which he is worthy of eternal life. This is what is said in the Epistle to the Colossians (1:12): ". . . who hath made us worthy to be partakers of the lot of the saints in light." And the reason for this is that, just as God's knowledge is the cause of things and is not, like ours, caused by them, in the same way the act of His will is productive of good and not, like that of ours, caused by good.

Man is accordingly said to have the grace of God not only from his being loved by God with a view to eternal life but also from his being given some gift (ingratiatory grace) by which he is worthy of eternal life. Otherwise even a person in the state of mortal sin could be said to be in grace if grace meant only divine acceptance, since it can happen that a particular sinner is predestined to have eternal life. Thus ingratiatory grace can be called gratuitous grace, but not conversely, because not every gratuitous grace makes us worthy of eternal life.

Answers to Difficulties:

1. The soul is the formal cause of the life of the body, and for this reason gives life to the body without the intervention of any form. God, however, does not give life to the soul as its formal cause, but as its efficient cause. For this reason a form intervenes, as a painter effectively makes a wall white by means of whiteness, but whiteness makes it white by means of no other form, because it makes it white formally.

2. The very acceptance which is in the divine will with regard to an eternal good produces in the man accepted something from which he is worthy to obtain that good, though this does not occur in human acceptance. Ingratiatory grace is accordingly something created in the soul.

3. God causes natural existence in us by creation without the intervention of any agent cause, but nevertheless with the intervention of a formal cause; for a natural form is the principle of natural existence. Similarly God brings about gratuitous spiritual existence in us without the intervention of any agent, yet with the intervention of a created form, grace.

4. Health is a certain bodily quality caused by balanced humors, for it is listed in the first species of quality. Thus the argument is based upon a false supposition.

5. From the very liberality of God by which He wills us an eternal good it follows that there is in us something given by Him by which we are made worthy of that good.

6. No creature is simply nobler than the soul of Christ; but in a certain respect every accident of His soul is nobler than it inasmuch as the accident is compared to it as its form.--Or it can be said that grace is nobler than the soul of Christ, not as a creature, but in so far as it is a certain likeness of the divine goodness more explicit than the natural likeness which is in Christ's soul.

7. There is one first uncreated truth, from which many truths, likenesses of the first truth, so to speak, are nevertheless caused in created minds, as the Gloss says in comment upon the words of the Psalm (11:2): "Truths are decayed from among the children of men." Similarly there is one uncreated good, of which there are many likenesses in created minds through participation in it by means of grace. Yet it should be noted that grace does not bear the same relation to the will as truth to the intellect. For truth is related to the intellect as its object, but grace to the will as its informing form. Now distinct beings may have the same object, but not the same form.

8. Everything that is in the genus of substance is composite with a real composition, because whatever is in the category of substance is subsistent in its own existence, and its own act of existing must be distinct from the thing itself; otherwise it could not be distinct in existence from the other things with which it agrees in the formal character of its quiddity; for such agreement is required in all things that are directly in a category. Consequently everything that is directly in the category of substance is composed at least of the act of being and the subject of being.

Yet there are some things in the category of substance reductively, such as the principles of a subsistent substance, in which the composition in question is not found; for they do not subsist, and therefore do not have their own act of being. In the same way, because accidents do not subsist, they do not properly have existence, but the subject is of a particular sort as a result of them. For this reason they are properly said to be "of a being" rather than beings. For something to be in some category of accident, then, it does not have to be composite with a real composition, but may have only a conceptual composition from genus and differentia. Such composition is found in grace.

9. Even though grace is lost because of one act of mortal sin, it is still not easily lost, because for one who has grace, which confers an inclination to the contrary, it is not easy to perform that act. Thus even the Philosopher says that it is difficult for a just man to act unjustly.

10. Nothing intervenes between our mind and God either as an efficient cause (because our soul is created and justified immediately by God) or as the beatifying object (because the soul is made blessed by enjoying the possession of God Himself). There can nonetheless be a formal medium by which the soul is made like God.

11. Other creatures, which are irrational, are accepted by God only with regard to natural goods. Consequently, in their case divine acceptance does not add anything above the natural condition by which they are made proportionate to such goods. But man is accepted by God with regard to a supernatural good; and so there is required something added to his natural gifts by which he is proportioned to that good.