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425 RELIGIOUS ENCYCLOPEDIA Thomas Aquinas

scholastics, held to creationism, therefore taught that the souls are created by God. Two things according to Thomas constituted man's righteousness in paradise-the j2cstitia originczlis or the harmony of all man's powers before they were blighted by desire, and the possession of the gratis gratum faciens (the continuous indwelling power of good). Both are lost through original sin, which in form is the " loss of original righteousness." The consequence of this loss is the disorder and maiming of man's nature, which shows itself in " ignorance; malice, moral weakness, and especially in concupiscentia, which is the material principle of original sin." The course of thought here is as follows: when the first man transgressed the order of his nature appointed by nature and grace, he, and with him the human race, lost this order. This negative state is the essence of original sin. From it follow an impairment and perversion of human nature in which thenceforth lower aims rule contrary to nature and release the lower element in man. Since sin is contrary to the divine order, it is guilt and subject to punishment. Guilt and punishment correspond to each other; and since the " apostasy from the invariable good which is infinite," fulfilled by man, is unending, it merits everlasting punishment.

But God works even in sinners to draw them to the end by " instructing through the law and aiding by grace." The law is the " precept of the practical reason." As the moral law of nature, it is the participation of the reason in the all-determining " eternal reason." But since man falls short in his appropriation of this law of reason, there is need of a " divine law." And since the law applies to many complicated relations, the Practice dispositiones of the human law must be laid down. The divine law consists of an old and a new. In so far as the old divine law contains the moral law of nature it is universally valid; what there is in it, however, beyond this is valid only for the Jews. The new law is " primarily grace itself " and so a " law given within," " a gift superadded to nature by grace," but not a " written law." In this sense, as sacra: mental grace, the new law justifies. It contains, however, an " ordering " of external and internal conduct, and so regarded is, as a matter of course, identical with both the old law and the law of nature. The consilia (see CON3rLIA EVANGELICA) show how one may attain the end " better and more expediently " by full renunciation of worldly goods. Since man is sinner and creature, he needs grace to reach the final end. The " first cause " alone is able to reclaim him to the " final end." This is true after the fall, although it was needful before. Grace is, on one side, " the free act of God," and, on the other side, the effect of this act, the gratis infusa or gratis treats, a habitus infusus which is instilled into the " essence of the soul," " a certain gift of disposition, something supernatural proceeding from God into man." Grace is a supernatural ethical character created in man by God, which comprises in itself all good, both faith and love. Justification by grace comprises four elements: " the infusion of grace, the influencing of free will toward God through faith, the influencing of free

will respecting sin, and the remission of sins." It is a " transmutation of the human soul," and takes place " instantaneously." A creative act of God enters, which, however, executes itself as a spiritual motive in a psychological form corresponding to the nature of man. Semipelagian tendencies are far removed from Thomas. In that man is created anew he believes and loves, and now sin is forgiven. Then begins good conduct; grace is the " beginning of meritorious works." Thomas conceives of merit in the Augustinian sense: God gives the reward for that toward which he himself gives the power. Man can never of himself deserve the prima gratis, nor meritum de eongruo (by natural ability; cf. R. Seeberg, Lehrbuch der Dogmengeschichte, ii.105 106, Leipsic, 1898). After thus stating the principles of morality, in the seconds secundce Thomas comes to a minute exposition of his ethics according to the scheme of the virtues. The conceptions of faith and love are of much significance in the complete system of Thomas. Man strives toward the highest good with the will or through love. But since the end must first be " apprehended in the intellect," knowledge of the end to be loved must precede love; " because the will can not strive after God in perfect love unless the intellect have true faith toward him." Inasmuch as this truth which is to be known is practical it first incites the will, which then brings the reason to " assent." But since, furthermore, the good in question is transcendent and inaccessible to man by himself, it requires the infusion of a supernatural " capacity " or "disposition" to make man capable of faith as well as love. Accordingly the object of both faith and love is God, involving also the entire complex of truths and commandments which God reveals, in so far as they in fact relate to God and lead to him. Thus faith becomes recognition of the teachings and precepts of the Scriptures and the Church (" the first subjection of man to God is by faith "). The object of faith, however, is by its nature object of love; therefore faith comes to completion only in love (" by love is the act of faith accomplished and formed ").

The way which leads to God is Christ: and Christ is the theme of part iii. It can not be as serted that the incarnation was absolutely neces sary, " since God in his omnipotent

6. The power could have repaired human Summa, nature in many other ways ": but it Part iii.; was the most suitable way both for Christ the purpose of instruction and of satisfaction. The Unio between the Logos and the human nature is a " relation " between the divine and the human nature which comes about by both natures being brought together in the one person of the Logos. An incarnation can be spoken of only in the sense that the human nature began to be in the eternal hypostasis of the divine nature. So Christ is unum since his human nature lacks the hypostasis. The person of the Logos, accordingly, has assumed the impersonal human nature, and in such way that the assumption of the soul became the means for the assumption of the body. This union with the human soul is the gratis unionis which leads to the impartation of the