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PART III - ON THE CORRUPTION OF SIN

CHAPTER 1 - ON THE ORIGIN OF EVIL IN GENERAL^cxxiii

HAVING briefly clarified certain matters relating to the Trinity of God and the creation of the world, we shall now, with equal brevity, touch upon the corruption caused by sin. What we must hold is summarized thus: sin is not some positive essence, but a defect, a corruptive tendency; that is, a force which contaminates mode, species, and order¹⁰⁰ in the created will.^cxxiv Hence the corruptive power of sin, while opposed to good as such, yet has no being except in a good, and no origin except from a good; which good is the will's capacity for free choice. And this capacity is not entirely evil,¹⁰¹ for it may tend toward good; nor entirely good, for it may fall into evil.

2. This should be understood as follows. Since the first Principle exists of Himself, and not by another, He must necessarily exist for His own sake: He must be the supreme Good, absolutely free of defect. A first and absolute evil does not and could not exist, for the notion of first Principle implies supreme plenitude, and the notion of supreme evil, utter deficiency. Since the first Principle, the supreme and complete Being, cannot fail either in existence or in operation, He is neither absolute evil, nor any degree of evil, nor can He in any manner be the cause of evil.

Because the first Principle is almighty, He is able to draw something good into being out of non-being, even without any pre-existing elements. This is precisely what He did when He formed the creature to whom He granted being, life, intelligence, and will. This creature, proceeding from the supreme Good and innerly conformed to the triple cause,^cxxv fittingly has in its substance and will a mode, species, and order: following which mode, species, and order implanted in its nature, it was meant to act by the power of God, in accordance with God, and for God as an end.

3.  But man, made out of nothingness, and imperfect as he was by nature, had the capacity of acting for ends other than God; of acting for himself instead of for God, and thus not properly by the power of God, nor according to God, nor for God as an end. That precisely is sin: the vitiation of mode, species, and order. As sin is a defect, it has a cause which is not EF-ficient, but DE-ficient, being the defection of the created will.^cxxvi

4.  Sin can only be the corruption of a good; and only a corruptible being is subject to corruption; therefore, sin can be found only in some corruptible good. Now, free will, by falling away from the true Good, corrupts its own mode, species, and order; hence, sin as such proceeds from the will as from its source, and resides in the will as in its proper subject: which occurs whenever the will, through fallibility, mutability, and indifference, spurns the indefectible and immutable Good and cleaves to the mutable.^cxxvii

5. We understand, then, that "sin is not a desire for evil, but a forsaking of good,"^cxxviii which thereby destroys mode, species, and order in the disposition of the will; and thus we understand that "sin is so directly dependent upon the will that without will, there is no sin."^cxxix

Before these truths, the impious Manichean teaching^cxxx that there exists a supreme evil, the first principle of all evil, manifestly collapses. For it is also clear from what fountain evil flows, and in what subject it resides.

CHAPTER 2 - ON THE TEMPTATION OF OUR FIRST PARENTS

1.  If we are to understand how the corruptive power of sin entered the world, we must consider the fall of our first parents, the transmission of original sin, and the origin or root of actual sin. As to the fall of our first parents, there are three points to consider: the diabolical temptation, the act of sin itself, and the consequent penalty.

2.  Concerning the temptation, the following must be held. God established man in the bliss of paradise, having made two sexes, the male and the female. Then the devil, envious of man, assumed the form of a serpent and addressed the woman, first asking: "Did God say: 'You shall not eat. . . '?";¹⁰² then asserting: "You shall not die"; then promising: "You will be like God, knowing good and evil" By this temptation, he sought to bring about the fall of the weaker woman, so that through her he might then overthrow the stronger sex. This, God permitted him to do.

3.This should be understood as follows. The first Principle, as He is utterly powerful in the act of creating, is also utterly just in the act of governing. Therefore, "He so governs the things He has made as to let them move by their own inner powers."^cxxxi Now, since man was made in order to win the prize of eternal peace by fighting on to final victory, God, while knowing that man would yield to temptation, could not but let him be tempted by whosoever had the wit, the might, the will to tempt. Now, Satan, wise and just at first, but rendered sly and envious after falling through his act of pride, had the WILL to tempt because he hated; and in his craftiness, he KNEW HOW to tempt. He therefore challenged man with all the MIGHT God would let him use. But by God's will, the tempter had to take a serpent's form, not only that his cunning might be seen, but also that, by such a sign, all Adam's sons might learn how shrewd a tempter Satan is.¹⁰³

4.   The temptation concerned a precept of discipline-again, this was by God's permission. Whether the devil was finally to win or to lose, all human beings were thus to learn the merit of obedience and the evil of rebellion. But it was by the devil's own cunning that he approached the woman first. It is easier to overcome the weak. A clever enemy always attacks a stronghold at its weakest point.

5.   The devil was extremely clever also in the manner in which he tempted, for he went about it by probing, prodding, and enticing: probing by his question, prodding by his assertions, and enticing by his promise. First, by asking about the purpose of the command, he awakened doubt in the rational power; when doubt was felt "lest we die,¹⁰⁴" he gave reassurance, inducing contempt in the irascible power; finally, he uttered his promise, provoking the concupiscible power to desire.¹⁰⁵ By this triple approach, he wrested consent from the free will, a faculty of both intellect and will, and embracing also the rational, irascible, and concupiscible powers^cxxxii indicated above. Accordingly, the devil enticed the woman by proposing a triple object: knowledge, appealing to the rational power; godlike eminence, appealing to the irascible; and the sweet fruit of the tree, appealing to the concupiscible.¹⁰⁶ Thus, he tempted everything that could be tempted in the woman,^cxxxiii and by every means that could lead her into acquiescence, that is, by the triple worldly lure, the lust of the flesh, and the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life;¹⁰⁷ for all temptation stems from one of these three: the world, the flesh, or the devil.

CHAPTER 3 - ON THE SIN OF OUR FIRST PARENTS

1.  Concerning the sin of our first parents, the following must be held. The woman, yielding to the temptation of the devil, wished to possess knowledge and a godlike state; she desired also to taste the sweetness of the forbidden fruit. So, in the end, she broke the divine command. Not content with this, she offered the fruit of the forbidden tree to the man, involving him as well. And he, not willing to jeopardize his own delight, did not reprove her, but yielded to her wicked persuasion. Tasting the proffered fruit, he also broke the command.

2.  This should be understood as follows. As stated above,¹⁰⁸ the first Principle gave the human creature a twofold perception and a twofold desire as regards the two books and the two kinds of good. But possessing freedom of will, this creature could turn either way. Now, the woman, hearing in the external way the serpent's suggestion, failed to read the internal book that was open and quite legible to the right judgment of reason. She kept her mind on the external book instead, and began to be concerned with the external good. Because her mind was not upon the infallible truth, her desire soon began to lean toward the perishable good. And so she set her heart upon what the devil promised, and agreed to do what he proposed. In her craving for superior knowledge, she rose to pride, which drew her into gluttony, which in turn finally cast her down through disobedience. The first act was a thought, the second a feeling, and the third a deed. Temptation began at the bottom and attained the top: it began with hearing, passed through desire, and attained consent. Conversely, disorder began at the top¹⁰⁹ and went down to the bottom, consummating the one sin that was to be for human nature the beginning of all sin and the origin of evil.

3.  The woman, led astray, beguiled the man. He, too, turned to the external book and to perishable good. In his excessive love for the woman's company and the solace of her presence, he shrank from reproving her lest he endanger his own happiness. Because he did not rebuke where he should have rebuked, the woman's sin was imputed to him. When, out of concern for his own delight, he failed to reject the woman's offering, he committed an act of selfish love that cast him out of the friendship of God, and made him fall into greed and disobedience.

4.  Both the man and the woman disobeyed the command, but for different reasons. The woman was deceived, the man was not.¹¹⁰ Yet in both man and woman there occurred a disruption of order in all their powers, from the highest to the lowest: first in their intellect, then in their senses, and finally in their actions. Both fell into disobedience and succumbed to greed because both had risen in pride. In the woman, it was out of avidity and desire for what she had not; in man, out of excessive love and concern for what he had. The woman believed that if she ate, she would be exalted; Adam, relying on his own greatness and God's love, did not expect a heavy punishment: never yet had he experienced the rigor of God's severity.^cxxxiv

By their inordinate attempt to rise above what they were, both fell wretchedly below what they were: from the state of innocence to that of guilt and misery.

CHAPTER 4 - ON THE PUNISHMENT OF OUR FIRST PARENTS

1. As to the punishment of our first parents, this is what we must believe. Immediately after they had sinned, the man and woman sensed their punishment already beginning in the rebellion and shame of their flesh, for to hide their nakedness, they ... made themselves coverings¹¹¹. Next, God sentenced the man to the punishment of work and hardship, of hunger and need, of death and return to dust, as Scripture says: "Cursed be the ground because of you,"¹¹² etc. ... Upon the woman fell a punishment twice as heavy, for she was afflicted with the penalties of much distress during pregnancy and cruel pain at childbirth, and of subjection to her husband in their life together.

Heavy was the punishment for the sin committed so lightly, the sin of eating the forbidden fruit.

2.  This should be understood as follows. The first Principle, who governs all things with perfect foresight and presides over all with perfect justice, tolerates no disorder of any kind in the universe. Because the disorder of sin is properly set aright by punishment, when our first parents fell, the shame of sin was immediately followed by the corrective of justice. Thus, what had become disordered through the forsaking of natural order became subject at once to judicial order: for this twofold ordering enfolds all things so strictly that whatever falls away from the first immediately sinks back into the second.^cxxxv

3.  Now, both our first parents disobeyed their Master, through spiritual pride and physical gluttony. By a just judgment of God, their own servants then refused to obey them, particularly the organs intended for the generative function. Since this revolt resulted, not from their created nature but from their freely willed sin, they blushed for shame and covered themselves up.

4.  Again, because the man had spurned the supreme Delight to seek pleasure in his body, by a just judgment of God he was afflicted with hard work and with the defect of hunger and thirst.

5.  Finally, because he had abandoned his soul's true Good for the sake of material satisfaction, by a just judgment of God his soul was condemned to be separated against its will from his body through the body's death and return to dust. In the order of nature, God had given to man a body which should obey the soul, procreate without lust, grow without defect, and remain free from the corruption of death. Now, because man had sinned, God, conforming to the order of justice, took away all the body's gifts and scourged it with the opposite evils. Thus sin would not remain unpunished and uncompensated - a thing which divine Providence could never tolerate.

6.  And because it was in the woman that sin first began, her punishment was twice as heavy: for having risen in her pride, she incurred subjection; for having looked upon and craved the sweet fruit of the tree, she incurred suffering; for having shaken off the yoke of obedience, she incurred the burden of multiplied distress.

Hence, it is clear how the rigorous order of divine Providence inflicted many pains upon the man, and twice as many upon the woman, lest "the shame of sin remain un-

redressed by the corrective of justice."^cxxxvi

CHAPTER 5 - ON THE CORRUPTION EFFECTED BY ORIGINAL SIN

1.  Having spoken of the fall of our first parents, we shall now speak of the transmission of original sin. We shall examine how the corruption comes about, how it is transmitted, and how it is cured.

2.  This is how mankind is corrupted by original sin. Everyone generated from the union of the sexes is, by the very nature of this birth, a child of wrath;¹¹³ for he is deprived of the righteousness of original justice,^cxxxvii in the absence of which our souls incur a fourfold penalty: weakness, ignorance, malice, and concupiscence. These, inflicted because of original sin,^cxxxviii are matched in the body by all kinds of pain, imperfection, labor, disease, and affliction. More penalties come later: death and the return to dust, privation of the beatific vision and loss of the heavenly glory, not only for adults, but also for infants who die without baptism. Of all human beings, however, these little ones suffer "the lightest penalty."^cxxxix They are deprived of the beatific vision, but are not chastised in their senses.

3. This should be understood as follows. The first Principle acts by His own power, by His own law, and for Himself as an end. He must then be utterly good and righteous, and hence utterly kind and just. That is why all the ways of the Lord are mercy and truth,¹¹⁴ meaning justice. If God had CREATED man wretched from the very beginning, that would have been neither kind nor just, for He would have imposed great miseries upon His handiwork in the absence of sin. Nor would divine Providence have GOVERNED us with kindness and justice had it afflicted us or permitted us to be afflicted with these same miseries in the absence of sin. Now, it is absolutely certain that the first Principle is utterly righteous and merciful both in creating and governing. It follows, then, by necessity that in the beginning He CREATED mankind free from any sin or misery; and it also follows that, in GOVERNING mankind, He cannot permit any misery to exist in us except as a punishment of sin. But it is also absolutely certain that we are burdened from the time of our birth with the penalty of countless miseries: hence it is just as certain that, by natural birth, we are all children of wrath, deprived of the righteousness of original justice. That privation is called original sin.^cxl

4.  Because all sin implies movement away from the changeless Good and toward a perishable good; and movement away from the changeless Good means forsaking supreme power, truth, and goodness; and movement toward a perishable good means loving that good excessively: therefore, by losing original justice, man incurred weakness, ignorance, malice, and concupiscence.

5.  Again, by forsaking the changeless Good in favor of a perishable good, man becomes unworthy of both. Hence, by losing original justice, man in his earthly life loses peace of the body, and is made to suffer in many ways from decay and death; and at the end of his life is deprived of the vision of eternal light, losing the beatific glory in both his body and his soul.

6.  Finally, because the absence of this justice in the newly born is not caused by a personal act of their will nor by any actual pleasure, original sin does not demand after this life that they suffer the punishment of the senses in hell; for divine justice, always tempered with superabundant mercy, punishes not more but less than would be just. This we must hold to be Augustine's actual opinion, although, in his detestation of the Pelagian belief in some form of happiness after death for unbaptized infants¹¹⁵ he made use of words that might seem to have a different ring.^cxli In his effort to bring the Pelagians back to moderation, he himself went somewhat to extremes.

CHAPTER 6 - ON THE TRANSMISSION OF ORIGINAL SIN

1.  This is how original sin is transmitted. The soul itself is not handed down, but original sin did pass from the soul of Adam into the souls of his descendants through the flesh born of concupiscence. As Adam's flesh had been tainted by his sinful soul, becoming prone to lust, so the flesh seeded with lust and carrying in itself a virulent infection, taints and vitiates the soul. This infection in the soul is not only a punishment, but also a sin. Hence the spiritual element corrupts the physical, and corrupted physical nature in turn corrupts the spiritual,^cxlii while leaving in all things the justice of God unimpaired; for although God infuses a soul^cxliii as He creates it, and, through this infusion, attaches it to infected flesh, He yet can never be blamed for the soul's infection.

2.  This should be understood as follows. Because the first Principle made man in His image to be an expression of Himself, He created the bodily element of man in such a way that all men would stem from the first man as from a single radical principle; and He created the spiritual element in such a way that, because it was an express similitude as much in nature and duration as in intelligence and love, all rational spirits would stem from Him, God, as from a first and immediate Principle. And because the soul, being superior, is closer than the body to the first Principle, therefore the Creator so formed man that the spirit was pre-eminent over the body, and the body was subordinate to the created spirit as long as that spirit should obey the uncreated Spirit. But were the soul, on the other hand, to disobey God, by God's just judgment the body would revolt against it: and that is what happened when Adam sinned.

3.  If Adam had stood firm, his body would have remained obedient to his soul, and he would have handed down that obedient body to his descendants. In such a body, God would have infused a soul which, being united to flesh both immortal and obedient, would have been established in righteousness and exempt from all penalty. But Adam did sin; his flesh did reject the authority of his soul. Hence the body which he must transmit, and into which God, by His own primordial decree, must infuse a soul, was such that this soul, united to this rebellious flesh, was weakened in that order of natural justice wherewith it should have ruled the lower impulses. As soul and body are one being, the soul must, then, lead the body, or be dragged along by it. Because it cannot lead rebellious flesh, it must be led, incurring the disease of concupiscence. Thus it suffers both the loss of due justice and the sickness of disordered passion. In the opinion of both Augustine and Anselm, the twofold movement - the turning AWAY, and the turning TOWARD- is precisely what constitutes original sin.^cxliv

4.  As explained above,¹¹⁶ the manner of creation of human nature, its intended method of propagation, and the punishment provided in the event of sin are all perfectly conformed to the order of Providence. Creation, indeed, conforms to the order of wisdom, propagation to the order of nature, and punishment to the order of justice. Hence, the transmission of original sin to posterity is clearly not inconsistent with divine justice.

5. Now, original sin could not be transmitted to the soul unless the punishment for rebellion were already present in the flesh, and there would be no punishment if there had not first been sin. Again, sin came from a will not well-ordered but disordered; hence, from the will, not of God, but of man. Therefore, the transmission of original sin is due to the first man's sin, and not to God; to an offense actually committed, and not to nature as originally created. Rightly, then, does Augustine say; "It is not generation, but lust, that transmits original sin to posterity."^cxlv117

CHAPTER 7 - ON THE CURE OF ORIGINAL SIN

1.  Finally, the cure of original sin takes place in this way. It is cured as regards guilt, but the temporal punishment remains, as appears in baptized infants; it is cured as regards eternal punishment, but the actual inclination of concupiscence remains; it is cured in the parent, but even so, transmitted to offspring by the very one who was healed in baptism. Its stain is blotted out, but its consequences remain, to be fought against as long as life lasts; for in no human being, assuredly, has concupiscence ever been extinguished by ordinary grace. We say this because in the case of the Blessed Virgin, concupiscence was extinguished by extraordinary grace when she conceived the Son of God.^cxlvi

2.  This should be understood as follows. As infection is caused in all men by that created principle which is responsible for propagation, that is, the flesh or inferior element, so healing is brought about by the uncreated Principle who is responsible for the infusion of the soul, that is, the higher element or the spirit. As regards the soul, men are unrelated in that one soul is not born of another, but all come directly from God. Healing grace, then, poured into the soul by God, applies to each one considered as a single, individual person, and not as a principle of physical propagation. Consequently, while original sin is a disease infecting both elements, the personal and the physical - the personal through the will and the physical through the flesh - the stain of original sin is blotted out in the soul, while on the other hand the infection and its consequences remain in the flesh. Now, man is a principle of propagation, not in his spirit which is healed, but in his flesh, which remains infected; not as spiritual, but as carnal. Hence, while he himself, a baptized person, is cleansed from original sin, he still hands it down to his offspring.

3.  Again, since the guilt deserving eternal damnation concerns the deformity of the person or spiritual principle, while the deed concerns the physical propensity or the flesh, therefore original sin passes away through baptism in regard to guilt, but it remains in regard to the act itself.^cxlvii

4.  Finally, because temporal affliction denotes a condition which affects the flesh: as the flesh always remains subject to some form of infection, so also it must always remain liable to penalty. Hence, as grace does not remove the penalty and corruption from the flesh, so also the consequences of original sin - concupiscence and bodily weakness-may coexist with healing grace. Concupiscence may gradually decrease, but its roots remain. No wayfarer, then, is completely rid of it, except the most Blessed Virgin, who was relieved by a special favor. Because the Virgin conceived Him who is Expiation of all sin, she received a privilege that radically freed her from concupiscence, so that her conception of the Son of God would be all-pure and perfect.

"It was wholly right that the Virgin should shine with a purity greater than any other that could be thought of under God. For it was to her that the Father determined to give His only Son - born of His heart, equal to Him, and dear to Him as His own Self - to be the one and self-same Son of both the Father and the Virgin; the Son Himself chose to make her His true Mother; and the Holy Spirit willed, and made it be, that the Son from whom He Himself proceeds should be conceived by her and born of her."^cxlviii

CHAPTER 8 - ON THE ORIGIN OF ACTUAL SIN

1. Having spoken of the transmission of original sin, we shall now consider the origin of actual sin. What must be known concerning this may be summarized as follows. Actual sin is born of the free will of the individual by a process of suggestion, [anticipated] satisfaction, consent, and action. As James says in his first chapter: Everyone is tempted by being drawn away and enticed by his own passion. Then when passion has conceived, it brings forth sin; but when sin has matured, it begets death¹¹⁸. If suggestion and satisfaction remain short of actual consent, the sin is venial; but if they are followed by consent and an action forbidden by divine law is committed, a mortal sin is consummated.

There are intermediate cases. If full consent occurs, but without execution, or if an action is intended but prevented by some extrinsic cause, the will is judged as if the deed had been accomplished: it is no less guilty than if it had been caught in the very act. Again, the will may choose, not the act itself, but the subjective satisfaction: in which case the woman eats, but not the man.¹¹⁹ Here the sin, although not fully consummated, is still mortal, because, though the woman alone eats, the whole man deserves condemnation. The clearest examples are the sins of the flesh.

2.  This should be understood as follows. Because sin indicates that the will withdraws from the first Principle in some matter in which it should have chosen to be acted upon by Him, in accord with His will, and for Him as an end, every sin is a disorder in the mind, or rather in the will, the source of both virtue and vice.^cxlix And so, actual sin is an actual disorder of the will. When the disorder is so serious that it DESTROYS the order of justice, it is called mortal sin, for by its very nature it extinguishes life, separating as it does the soul from God by whom the just spirit is vivified. When the disorder is slight and does not destroy but merely DISTURBS the order of justice, it is called venial, or readily pardonable, for it does not result in total loss of grace or in God's enmity. Now, the order of justice demands that the eternal Good be preferred to the temporal, the good of virtue to that of utility, the will of God to one's own, and right reason to sensuality. Since the law of God prescribes rightful order and forbids disorder, when the temporal is preferred to the eternal, the advantageous to the virtuous, one's own will to the will of God, and sensual appetite to right reason, a mortal sin results. As Ambrose writes, a mortal sin is "a transgression of the divine law, and an act of disobedience to the heavenly commands."^cl Sin consists in either omitting what divine law prescribes, or committing what it forbids. There are, therefore, two ways of sinning: by omission and by commission.

3.  When a temporal good is loved too much, without being actually chosen over the eternal; when the advantageous is not actually chosen over the right; when self-will is loved too much but not actually preferred to the will of God; when the flesh is full of desires but not actually preferred to the judgment of right reason: the sin is not mortal but venial, because all this, while outside of the law, is not directly against it.^cli In fact, sensual pleasure is never actually preferred to right reason unless reason itself agrees: short of consent, there is no mortal sin.

4. If, however, the senses are unduly aroused, this disorder, unwilled as it may be, disposes man to sin. It is sinful to some extent, for it upsets somewhat the order of justice.

In the state of innocence, the senses were moved by reason alone. If man had stood firm, there could have been no venial sin. But now the senses wrestle with reason, whether we like it or not, and inevitably we do commit some venial sins through the reactions of impulse. It would be possible to keep any one of them under control, but not all of them together, for they are not only sins but also penalties of sin. That is why they are properly called venial, for that is precisely why they are pardonable.^clii

5.  But since reason is not necessarily overcome by such impulses, if, realizing the pleasure, it does acquiesce in the act, then there is full consent and thus a consummated sin; for then it extends to the masculine principle, the higher part of the mind, upon which full consent depends.

6.  Now, consent applies not only to acting but also to enjoying, in which case the inferior part of the mind obeys the call of the senses. If in sensual delight reason succumbs to sensuality, then the feminine principle is bowing to the serpent. Right order and justice are subverted, whereby a mortal sin is committed, although it is of lesser gravity; and it is imputable not only to the woman but also to the man, who should have restrained her and prevented her from obeying the serpent.

Clearly, then, every personal sin is in a way a copy of the first and original sin, as the eminent doctor Augustine explains in the twelfth chapter of his book "On the Trinity."^cliii

CHAPTER 9 - ON THE ORIGIN AND DIVISION OF CAPITAL SINS

1. Next, we shall investigate the origin of the different kinds of sin: capital, penal, and final or irremissible; in other words, the initial, the intermediate, and the ultimate.

Concerning the origin of capital sin,^cliv this is a summary of what must be held. Actual sin has one source, two roots, three incentives, and seven heads: the capital sins. The one source is pride, of which it is written: pride is the beginning of all sin.¹²⁰ The two roots are fear that unduly restrains, and love that unduly inflames. The three incentives are the three worldly temptations: the lust of the flesh, and the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life¹²¹. Finally, the seven heads are: pride,¹²² envy, anger, sloth, covetousness, gluttony, and lust. Among these, the first five are sins of the spirit, the last two, sins of the flesh.

2. This should be understood as follows. Mortal sin is an actual withdrawal from the first Principle. There is no withdrawing from the first Principle except through contempt, either for Himself or for His commands. Now, contempt for the first Principle is an act of pride. Clearly, then, all mortal sin or offense has its ONE SOURCE in pride.

3.  Man never contemns the first Principle or His commands in themselves, but only because he desires to have, or is afraid of losing, something other than God. Hence, sin has TWO ROOTS: fear and love. These are fundamental to all evil, but they are not equally primordial.

4.  Fear is born of love, for no man is afraid of losing something unless he loves it.^clv Fear, then, thrives on the same food as love. Disordered love occurs only in relation to perishable good. Since perishable good is threefold - the interior good of personal superiority, the exterior good of wealth, and the inferior good of sensual satisfaction - there are THREE FUNDAMENTAL INCENTIVES, as indicated above; from these, when the soul seeks them inordinately, stem all actual sins.

5.  Because this may come about in seven ways, there are SEVEN HEADS or capital sins which give rise to all the vices.

Our will may be disordered because it either seeks what it should not seek, or rejects what it should not reject. First, it may seek what it should not seek: what appears good now, but is either a temporal good [inordinately sought] or a false one. It may be interior, such as personal superiority, the goal of PRIDE; exterior, such as wealth, the goal of COVETOUSNESS; inferior, such as the pleasure of eating that satisfies the sense of taste and is intended for the preservation of the individual, which appeals to GLUTTONY; or the pleasure of carnal intercourse that satisfies the sense of touch and is intended for the preservation of the species, which appeals to LUST. But our will may be disordered also by rejecting what it should not reject, and this in three ways corresponding to the manners of rejection: perversion of the rational faculty by ENVY; perversion of the irascible appetite by ANGER; and perversion of the concupiscible appetite by SLOTH.¹²³

Since there are four main objects of desire, and three powers prompting the will to rejection, there are in all seven capital sins.

6. Now, the perception of a desirable object is associated with pleasure, and that of a loathsome object, with pain. Thus, the first four of these sins have pleasure attached to them, and the last three, unhappiness and pain. Yet all seven are called capital sins because they are the chief disorders, and each in its own way is the cause of many others. Some of these sins, while they imply rejection, also imply a certain delectation. Envy aims at the exclusive, thus full possession of personal goods;¹²⁴ anger, at their unopposed, thus peaceful, possession; sloth, at their effortless, thus easy, possession. And since men do not obtain such results readily, these sins bring with them a great host of vices in the pursuit of the objects of love and in the flight from the objects of loathing. It is in reference to such vices that sins are called capital, for they are as headwaters from which flow countless other sins.

CHAPTER 10 - ON THE ORIGIN AND NATURE OF PENAL SIN^clvi

1. Concerning penal sin, the following must be held. While the evil of guilt and the evil of penalty are distinct species of evil, there are some sins that are both sins and penalties of sin. Narrowly considered, these are the sins that imply pain and sorrow, such as envy, sloth, and the like; more broadly considered, they are the sins that imply either the depraving of nature or something shameful, such

as those by which the sinner is given . . . up to a reprobate sense;¹²⁵ and in a general view, they are those that "occur between the first act of unfaithfulness and the final punishment of hell. These are called both sins and penalties of sin,"^clvii for, as Gregory says, "crimes are punished with further crimes."^clviii

While the selfsame thing may be both a sin and a penalty of sin, we must hold that every penalty in so far as it is a penalty is rightful and comes from God, but that no sin as such is ever rightful, nor does it come from God: it comes from free will alone. Penalty which is mere penalty is inflicted by God, but penalty which is sin, or a propensity to sin, is contracted or committed by man.

2. This should be understood as follows. Since evil is a withdrawal from the first Principle, it is damaging to created good; nor can it damage good without robbing it of something. And, since good consists in mode, species, and order,¹²⁶ every evil is therefore harmful to mode, species, and order.^clix Now, there are two kinds of order: that of nature and that of justice. The order of nature pertains to the natural good, the order of justice to the moral. We find natural good in any created essence, but moral good in the will alone. The order of nature, therefore, exists in any created essence, but the order of justice, only in free will. Because the will is "an instrument that moves itself,"^clx while nature is not, it follows that the order of justice is not merely established but self-establishing, while the order of nature is merely established. And because evil may be a privation either in the order of justice or in the order of nature, there are two forms of evil: the evil of guilt and the evil of penalty.

3.  Again, because the order of justice is an order of the will, it follows that "the evil of guilt is an effect of the will, while the evil of penalty is not."^clxi

4.  Finally, because the order of justice that exists in the will is a self-establishing order, it follows that "the evil of guilt, which is a privation of righteousness, is an evil we cause, while the evil of penalty is an evil we suffer."^clxii

Now, since there cannot be any receiving of an effect without antecedent action, nor any performing of an action without consequent effect,^clxiii there can exist no penalty without an antecedent guilt that deserved it, nor can there exist any guilt without a consequent penalty.

5.  Whatever we do is our own doing, but what we suffer may be caused either by ourselves or by another agent either superior or inferior to us. While sin is always our own doing, not all of our penalties are self-inflicted: some may be so, while others are imposed upon us, and others, again, inherited.

6.  It is just that a man suffer what he must for doing what he should not do. Every penalty, in so far as it is a penalty, is just and comes from divine Providence, because it is fitted to the sin and effective in restoring the order disturbed by sin.

7.  The suffering of a penalty consists in the loss either of a natural good only, or of both a natural and a moral good. That is why some penalties are penalties only, while others are both penalties and sins: for the moral good of righteousness is not lost except through unrighteousness, that is, sin. Thus, penalties of the first kind, both as punishments and in the fact of loss, do come from God acting, not as Creator, but as Avenger. Penalties of the second kind, in as much as they are also sins, do not come from God; but in as much as they vindicate order, they do. When these penalties derive from actual sin, they are our own doing; when they derive from original sin, they are inherited.

8.  If evil is considered in a limited sense, as a privation of natural good, an effect outside the will, something we merely suffer, then it is not the same as the evil of guilt, although the two go hand in hand. If evil is considered broadly, as a privation in the order either of nature or of the will, whether caused by ourselves or by another, then the two coincide within the same subject, but not in reference to the same object nor from the same viewpoint. For the very thing that is guilt in itself is also a penalty in reference to an earlier sin; and what is a sin when viewed as something done, is also a penalty when viewed as something suffered.

Thus it is clear in what way, to what extent, and why something can be called both a sin and a penalty of sin.

CHAPTER 11 - ON THE ORIGIN OF FINAL SIN, OR SIN AGAINST THE HOLY SPIRIT

1. Concerning final, or irremissible, sin - that against the Holy Spirit - the following must be held. Generally speaking, every sin is an offense against the triune God. By appropriation, however, some sins are said to be against the Father, others against the Son, and others, finally, against the Holy Spirit. Sin against the Holy Spirit is called irremissible either in this world or in the world to come;¹²⁷ not because it could not be remitted in this world, but because its guilt is seldom, if ever, remitted here, and its penalty is hardly, if at all, remitted hereafter.^clxiv Of this sin there are six different kinds: envy of another's spiritual welfare, rejection of known truth, despair, presumption, obstinacy of mind, and final impenitence.

2.  This should be understood as follows. Sin being a withdrawal from the first Principle, trine and one, every sin distorts the likeness of the Trinity and damages the soul itself in its three powers: the irascible, the rational, and the concupiscible; and every sin proceeds from free will, which bears within itself the sign of the Trinity: being a power, it bears the mark of the Father; being rational, the mark of the Son; being free, the mark of the Holy Spirit.

3.  In every sinful act, all three concur, but there is always one whose defection brings about the perversion of the others. Now, defection of power is impotence; defection of reason, ignorance; defection of intent, malice. Some sins, then, are due to impotence, others to ignorance, and others again to malice; wherefore, power being attributed to the Father, wisdom to the Son, and will to the Holy Spirit,^clxv some sins are said to be against the Father, others against the Son, and yet others against the Holy Spirit. Because there is nothing greater in the will than the will itself,^clxvi and sin originates in it, no sin is as wholly and exclusively voluntary as that which arises from corruption of the will.

Only two things can preclude the will's free exercise: constraint and ignorance; the first by a failure in power, the second by a failure in knowledge.^clxvii When, therefore, the will has the power to resist, but solely out of its own corruption, chooses to do something recognized as wrong, it is committing what is known as a sin of sheer malice. Such a sin arises from an absolute defection of the free will, and is opposed directly to the grace of the Holy Spirit. Because it derives exclusively from free will, it has not even the color of an excuse, and the man who is answerable for it may count on little or no relief from the ensuing penalty. On the contrary, because a sin such as this directly flouts the very grace of the Holy Spirit by which penalties of sin are remitted, it is called irremissible. It is not beyond all remission, but from its nature it is directly opposed to the very medicine and remedy whereby sins are remitted.

4. The remission of sins is brought about by God through penitential grace within the communion of the Church. Irremissible sins are distinguished accordingly as they directly oppose one of these three; for in truth they directly oppose penitential grace either in itself, or in relation to God by whom it is given, or in relation to the Church in whose communion it is obtained.

Now, the communion of the Church consists in two things, faith and love, that is, grace and truth¹²⁸. Thus there are two possible sins against it: envy of another's spiritual welfare, and rejection of a known truth.

Again, in matters of justification, all the ways of the Lord are mercy and truth¹²⁹. Thus there are two possible sins against God the Giver of grace: despair, which impugns mercy, and presumption, which impugns justice.^clxviii

Finally, penitential grace lifts man out of past sins, and guards him against future sins. Thus there are two possible sins against penitential grace, in itself or in its purpose: obstinacy of mind, which is opposed to the first, and final impenitence, which is opposed to the second. If by "final impenitence" we understand the intention never to repent, it is in this sense that it is one of the sins against the Holy Spirit. If we understand it to mean the continuation of sin until the very end, it is a consequence of all mortal sins that have not been remitted in the present life, but more specially, of every kind of sin against the Holy Spirit.

5. Every sin, therefore, is born of pride, and tends to its full maturity and end in final impenitence. Whoever reaches this point falls headlong into hell, since no one guilty of mortal sin is able to free himself without the intervening grace of the Mediator Christ.¹³⁰ Therefore did the throng of those expecting salvation yearn for the incarnation of our Mediator and Lord; to whom be all honor and glory forever and ever. Amen.

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