Prima Secundae
150. Aquinas on the Causes of Virtue: Nature, Habit and Infused Virtues (Prima Secundae Q. 63, aa. 1–3)
Class of 2014-01-16
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[0:00] Name of the Father, the Son, Holy Spirit. Amen. Thank you, God. Thank you, Guardian Angels. Thank you, Thomas Aquinas. Deo gratias God, our enlightenment. Guardian Angels, strengthen the lights of our minds, order and illumine our images, and arouse us to consider more correctly. Saint Thomas Aquinas, angelic doctor. Pray for us. Help us to understand what you've written.

[0:32] So, should you ask your guardian angel to take your prayer up to heaven, or what? That's a good idea, huh? Yeah, to fuel his own on the way, and so on. Yeah. Beef it up a little bit. Correct you. What he really means is.

[0:57] Okay, so we're up to question sixty-three here in the Prima Secundae, on the cause of virtues. Question sixty-three. And Thomas gives a little prelude here, which he tells me he intends to do right. Then we're not to consider about the cause of virtues. So Thomas is looking before, right, in the crowning sense here, before the cause before the effect. And about this, four things are asked. First, whether virtue is in us by nature.

[1:38] Secondly, whether some virtue is caused in us from the being accustomed or the repetition of works, huh, Deeds. Third, whether some moral virtues are in us by what infusion, right? They're poured into us, right?

[2:01] And fourth, whether the second and third are the same, right, in species. Whether the virtue which is acquired from the repetition, shall we say, of of works, is of the same species, huh, with the infused virtue.

[2:22] So let's look at the first article. To the first, then one proceeds thus: It seems that virtue is in us by nature. This is interesting. The Thomas will have this first article. For as Damascene says in the third book, that the virtues are what natural. Can he say this right? And they are equally inside what all, right? And Anthony, now that's the guy that's going to be tomorrow.

[2:56] Right, different Anthony. The reference down here is from Athanasius' Life of St. Anthony, so that's the bishop, the abbot, and so on. Beyond tomorrow, and Anthony says in his sermon to the monks, right?

[3:15] If you change, if the will what changes nature, it is perverse. It's a very strong thing, right? What does Shakespeare say? Stumbling on abuse. Yeah, revolts from true birth, right? Yeah, which is the word for nature. Stumbling on abuse, huh? This is what the great Anthony said, huh? Si naturam voluntas mutaverit. huh. The will changes nature. It's a perversity, right? If the condition of nature is served, it is a what virtue.

[3:49] Virtue. There's a big element of truth in this, right? That virtue is going to be in accord with what With nature. nature, right? But nature doesn't give us. He'll point out the full perfection of virtue, right, the complete thing. And in Matthew four, upon those words of Christ that he went around teaching and so on, the gloss says he taught what natural natural justice huh To which chastity, justice, humility, which man has what naturally, huh?

[4:23] Moreover, second objection: the good of virtue is to be in accordance with reason. As Dionysius says, Aristotle says, and so on. But that which is according to reason is natural to man, since reason is the nature of man. Reason, more than anything else, is man, as Aristotle says in the tenth book of the Nicomachean Ethics.

[4:51] Therefore, virtue is in man by what nature? Now, the first two arguments are arguing from nature in one sense, and then the third one would be another sense. Moreover, that is said to be natural to us, which is in us from birth, huh? But some virtues are in some people, right, from birth, right, as is said in the Book of Job, chapter thirty-one, huh? From infancy, right, there grew with me what mercy, huh?

[5:31] And from the what womb, huh, it came forth with me. Therefore, virtue is in man by what nature, right? Now the standard objection is: but that which is in man by nature is common to all men and is not taken away by sin, because even in the demons. The natural goods remain, as Dionysius says, in a chapter of the Divine Names. But virtue is not within all men, right?

[6:06] As you can know from the daily Newspaper, right? And is what taken away by what sin, huh? Therefore, is not in man by what nature, right, huh? Okay. Well, those first three arguments were probable, right? And therefore, they must have some element

[6:29] of truth. Now, Thomas stands back and looks at this thing in a very general way first. I answer: It should be said that about bodily forms, some said that they were entirely from what within, right? As those laying down a what a hiding of forms, right? And this refers to Anaxagoras, right? Everything goes inside, everything, but so small you couldn't see it, right?

[7:05] That's obviously the virtues exist in me, right? They're so small you can't see them. They're there, but you just can't see them. The Aristotle sometimes is is hard on Anaxagoras because he's making what's only in the ability of matter be actually in there, right? But as small as to be invisible. But other times he says he's trying to express the idea of potency, right? Listen to what he's trying to say and what his words actually say.

[7:37] Of course, if you teach, you know, very long, you find students often, you know, they don't see what they really mean, what they're trying to say. They can't really say it. But some take the opposite extreme, right, and say that they're entirely from the what outside, right? Just as those laying down that bodily forms are from some separated cause, like the forms of Plato were spiritual substances or something.

[8:06] Now, usually, when you have two extremes like that, the truth is going to lie somewhere in the middle, right? But some say that they are partly from within, in so far as they pre-exist in matter in ability, huh? And partly from the extrinsic, in so far as they are reduced to act by the what agent, right?

[8:33] So also is it, as he says, about the sciences and the virtues, meaning by virtues here now the moral virtues. For some lay them down to be entirely from within. Thus, that all virtues and sciences naturally pre-exist in the soul. This is what Plato talks about there in the Meno for example, right? In Other places. But through what? Discipline. Yeah, learning and exercise. The impediments of science and virtue are what taken away, right?

[9:07] Huh? Which come to the soul from the weight of the body, huh? Just as when what iron is clarified through what? Polished. Yeah. And this was the opinion of the Platonists, right? That the virtues are in us, right? And then what we call learning is recalling what you you know, right? Huh? Like when someone says what's his name, and I know it, but there's some impediment there to coming to me, right?

[9:41] And then maybe after a while, ah, I remember his name, you know. So I really knew it, but I just couldn't recall it, right?

[9:50] Was an element of truth in saying learning is recalling, huh? Because you have to recall things that which you learn, but you don't recall what you learn. Others say that they are entirely from the outside, that is, from the flowing in of the agent-intellect, which is now not our agent-intellect, but that of the separate substance, right? As Avicenna lays down, right?

[10:18] But the truth lies in between. Others say that, according to a certain aptitude, the sciences and the virtues are in us by nature, but not, however, according to their what perfection, as the philosopher says in the second book of the Ethics, right? And this is more true, he says, Modesty there, right? Very assessed. Now he's going to come to the distinction between the first two objections and the third one, these two senses of nature, right?

[10:54] To the making known of this is necessary to consider that something is said to be natural to some man in one of two ways. In one way, from the nature of the species, the kind of thing he is, man. Another way, from the nature of the what individual, right? This is what Macbeth talks about that distinction, right?

[11:22] Because each thing has its species according to its form, right? It's the form that completes the species, huh? But he is each thing is individuated through what? Matter? According to the matter. The form, however, of man is the rational soul. The matter is his what body, right?

[11:47] Therefore, that which belongs to man according to a rational soul, and a soul that has reason, the understanding soul, as Shakespeare calls it, that is natural to him by reason of his what species, particular kind of thing he is. That, however, which is natural to him according to the determined makeup, you might say, of his body, right?

[12:16] Is natural to him according to the nature of the what individual, right? For what is natural to man on the side of his body, according to the species, we would in some way refer to the soul, because he has this kind of a body because he has this kind of a soul, right? In so far as such a body is proportioned to such a soul, right?

[12:43] Now he says, in both ways, virtue is natural to man according to a certain what commencement, huh? But not according to what completion. According to the nature of the species, in so far as in the reason of man there are naturally certain beginnings. Naturally, known. Both of what, Knowables and of things to be done. So, what does Euclid call them? He calls them axioms, right? Huh? Which which is the Greek word for what?

[13:18] Worthy, right? Worthy of being accepted on their own grounds, like the whole is more than a what? Part. Part. So, if someone says he doesn't know that, we give him part of his meal, right? Or part of his car. Part of his. The whole is no more than the part, right? And he'll scream and rant, and show that he really knows that, right? You think I am some idiot?

[13:42] But yes, you don't know the whole, is more than a part. And some things that we do, right, like can do good and avoid evil, right? Huh? Or do unto others as you had them do unto you, and so on, right?

[13:57] Which are, as a worse, what seed-like things, right, seminalia? And Thomas is fond of that. The word seed, right? Aristotle and the Greeks were fond of that. And these things that are in their natural, these beginnings, which are naturally known, both of things knowable and things to be done, which are seeds of the what intellectual virtues, namely the sciences and of the what moral, moral, okay.

[14:27] And in so far as what in the will there is a certain natural desire of the good, which is in accordance with what reason, right? Huh. But according to the nature of the individual, the makeup of my body individually, right? In so far as from the disposition of the body, some are disposed either better or worse for some virtues, right? Huh. So some men are what by birth more disposed to be brave than other men, right?

[15:02] Huh. Other men to be what. Cowards. What? To be cowards, yeah, yeah, yeah. Some are inclined to be, you know. Timorous. Yeah, and some are inclined to be lascivious, right? Huh. Okay. Or to be to be cowards or something, you know.

[15:26] The little little grandchildren, David, he's kind of a little fresh, you know. You got to watch him, you know, a little bit, you know. But they went to some amusement park there. Where they went to visit daddy and their daddy and and some of the little girls, you know, were kind of afraid of some of these machines and things. He was just all going. He's not bravey, or you know, more bravey than than you know what kind of idiots.

[15:49] He's not rascal, though. You know, when you're out in the summer, there we had the there's a kind of a ledge there, a bit in front of this window, right? And we'd suddenly put things there because you can plug things in computers and so on. He brings the hose around, and so water came. We had to kind of move him by my way. His computer, you know.

[16:09] Oh jeez. And the water went in the bedroom, and it went down to the basement. The water through the floor, and so on. So he's a little, but you know, nobody, nobody else in the family is quite that brave, you know. Yeah, he's a little. It's something with having sense here, you know. So I'll be an engineer. Yeah. Not too socially engaged. You read about Churchill there as a young boy there, you know, and they're playing the game, you know.

[16:37] He jumps off the bridge and under the tree, you know, and he falls down. He almost killed himself, you know. Of course, during the Second World War, whereas they they had to kind of keep him, you know, from exposing himself too much to the enemy, right? I mean, it's coming back one of those conferences. The Germans almost shot him down, you know. So he went out as a air ranger, and so on.

[16:58] Get in there! Get in there! Get down! He realizes being a little bit, you know, you know, forward, you know, we had to out there to the exact thing. You can read Churchill, you know, this term. It was early life, which is very interesting. Things down the war war and so on.

[17:23] Okay. In so far as what the sensitive powers, right, are acts of certain parts of the body, from whose disposition they are either aided, right, or impeded, huh? These powers in their acts, and consequently, right, the what rational powers to which these sensitive powers are servants, you might say, huh? And according to this, one man has a natural aptitude to science, another to courage, another to what temperance, huh?

[18:07] And in these ways, both intellectual virtues and moral, as well as moral virtues, according to a certain what beginning of aptitude, are in us by nature, right? But not the completion, the consummation of these, huh? Consummation, desiderata to be wished for, right?

[18:28] Because nature is determined to one, but the consummation or completion of these virtues is not according to one way of what action, right? But diversely, according to diverse matters in which these virtues operate, and according to diverse circumstances. So you can see that very clearly in the difference between courage and temperance, right? Because the one you've got a more go towards the thing, right? Which is naturally going to kind of you know, you're in danger of losing your life, so you have to be kind of, but somebody has to push you towards it, right?

[19:01] While in the case of food and drink and sex, you have to kind of hold back and. Temper itself, right? So nature being determined in one direction, nature not being able to do more than one thing, as Shakespeare says, right? You can't really have the completion of both fortitude and temperance by what? By nature, right? And that's why you know, when Plato has in Republic education. You know, you have things like athletic, you know, football games and so on.

[19:30] But that's to get what? Courage, right? But then you listen to you know good music and so on in order to get what? Temperance, huh? You see? Or you read a tragedy and you feel pity and all. So it softens you a bit, right? Makes you inclined to temperance. You can't have both of these by nature, right? You're not inclined that way.

[19:56] So there's some truth in the three objections, right? Therefore, it's very brief as you apply to this, as we'll see. Thus, therefore, it is clear that the virtues are in us by nature, according to aptitude and a what beginning, but not, however, according to their perfection or their completion or their consummation, right? Apart from the theological virtues, which are totally from the what outside,

[20:28] and through this is clear the response to the objections. For the first two arguments proceed according as the seeds of virtues are in us by nature, in so far as we are rational creatures. But the third argument or reason proceeds according to what from the natural disposition of the body, which one has from birth, right? For one has an aptitude to having mercy, another to living what Temperately, another to a what A virtue, right?

[21:09] So, I'll be, talking about that in my talk out in California, right? But the connection there between nature and reason and will, a little bit. Okay, so we're going to do that To the second one goes forward. Thus, it seems that virtues are not caused in us from the what?

[21:36] From the repetition, you might say, of doings, right? From being accustomed to doing something. Sometimes people want to take moral virtues from the word "mos," meaning custom, right? Because it's acquired by custom, right, It has something to do with that and then you do it anyway.

[21:56] One, because upon that of Romans fourteen twenty-three, everything that is not from faith is a sin. That's a strong look, according as the gloss of Augustine says, right? Huh?

[22:14] And every life of the faithless is a what sin? Huh? He really gets stone thrown at him today, right? Yeah. And nothing is good without the what? It's good, right? For where is lacking the knowledge of the truth, false is virtue, even in. That's custom. Yeah. I mean, you got to soften a little bit what Augustine says, right? Make a little distinctions there, right?

[22:49] Because I don't think Augustine is denying can have virtue in some way, some kind of human virtue, right? But it's not virtue in the fullest sense, right? But faith cannot be acquired from works, but is caused in us from God, according to that of Ephesians two chapter. Ephesians chapter two verse eight. For by grace we are saved through what? Faith. It's a gift of God. Obviously, gift of God is not acquired through our effort, right?

[23:21] Therefore, no virtue can be acquired in us from the what? Customing of doings, right? Doing things. Moreover, sin, since it is contrary to virtue, is not compatible or with virtue. Sin doesn't. Yeah, it doesn't allow us. Yeah. But God is not able. But man is not able to avoid sin except by the grace of God. Huh? But for the grace of God, why? According to that of Wisdom chapter eight verse twenty-one, I have learned or have known that I am not able to be what caught in it unless otherwise than by God giving it to me.

[24:11] Huh? Therefore, either are there some virtues caused in us from what being accustomed to works, but only by the gift of what God. Now some people thinking about these things, you know, thought that you could kind of forget about the natural virtues, right, acquired by repeated acts. But there is a certain danger that, right, that an infused virtue or a theological virtue can be lost by one act, right?

[24:47] So I can lose charity by going out and murdering my wife or my neighbor or something, right? But a virtue that is acquired by repeated acts, you don't lose it by just one act, right? Grace builds on nature. Yeah, so there is a certain stability in those natural virtues that that doesn't seem to be right away in the even the theological virtues, huh? So you kind of need them to get a certain stability and disposal for the the other virtues, huh?

[25:22] Even the ones you are going to receive from God, huh? So you have them in a more stable way. And they talk about, you know, they used to talk about when I was younger. They talk about the priests' experience with converting the prostitutes in Paris. That was the the thing, you know, and how quickly, how often they would relapse, right? Because you don't have the natural virtue through repeated acts of temperance, you know.

[25:48] Then they have the what theological virtues or the spiritual, the higher virtues, infused virtues, through the being converted by the priests, right? In a kind of unstable way, right? So there is, you know, criticism of those who said you don't need those natural virtues. They're perfect anyway. What are you doing for, right? Well, for sake of stability, you need them and all other things, huh? Nevertheless, grace doesn't void its nature.

[26:25] And the third objection, huh? More of the acts which are in virtue. Fall short. Yeah, for the perfection of virtue. That is, was the acts which are producing the virtue right now. But the effect is not able to be what more perfect than the cause. Therefore, virtue cannot be caused from acts preceding virtue right now. Well, you know, Aristotle raised that question there, right? How does man become courageous by doing courageous things, right?

[26:56] How can you do courageous things without without the virtue? Yeah, yeah, yeah. This is another objection, right now. But I mean, you know, just like developing the muscles, right? Huh? You know, there is one act; it's not what. But trust me, I know. If

[27:19] you repeat the acts, right? You know, the one there, one acts in the virtue of the ones that come before, right? Produces something. Okay.

[27:30] But against this is what Dionysius says in the fourth chapter, the divine names, that the good is more what Virtues are more powerful than the bad, right? But from bad acts are caused the habits of the vices, right? Therefore, much more from good acts able to be caused the habits of what Virtue, huh? You can only know that from experience, Thomas says.

[28:03] That famous sermon, kind of, that Hamlet gives his mother, right, about not going to bed with that evil uncle, you know. Sure. Yeah. Yeah. And then it'll be hard to avoid, but you know, after a while, it gets easier, right? Talking about this bad acts.

[28:23] I answer it should be said about the generation of habits of acts as what above has been said in general, right? But now, especially as regards to virtue, it either considered, as has been said above, that the what of man perfects him towards the good, good, huh? But since the ratio good consists in mode, species, and order, right? This is the famous text of Augustine,

[28:59] as Augustine says in the book on the nature of the good, huh? Or in number, weight, weight and measure, huh? As is said in the book of Wisdom, chapter eleven, huh?

[29:19] There are different ways to explain that, but what is that? What's the distinction between mode, species, and order there, right? Maybe according to different causes. Yeah. Yeah. Or it could be according to before and after there that mode is the things that contribute to the species, right, and that they're well blended, you might say, right? Mode, then the species, the form itself, and then the order that what follows upon afterwards, huh? And then in the good text there from wisdom, what corresponds to mode is what is measure, right?

[30:13] And what corresponds to species is number. That's a famous text of Aristotle there in the in physics there. He says that the species of things, the forms of things, are like what numbers, right? Huh? So if you have a body, that's like one, right? And then you add life, that's two. That's a plant, right? Then you add sensation, and that's a animal. And then you add what reason, and you got a man, right?

[30:48] So when Shakespeare says, "What is a man, right? If his chief good and mark of his time be but to sleep and feed, yeah, see, that's like it's the numbers there, right? Huh? If you take away reason now from man, he's no more than a what? Beast. Yeah. If you take away sensation from the beast, he's no more than a plant. You take away life from the plant, it's no more than a stone, right?

[31:17] So they're like numbers, right? So number corresponds to what species, and pondus or weight corresponds to inclination or order, right? That you have to something, huh? We can't go into explain that text entirely here, but that's a very famous text, one from Augustine. He's quite a guy, that Augustine, you know. Don't know where he got those brains, but he certainly had something by nature there, right? Huh?

[31:42] He didn't have the he didn't have all the teachers about written word or spoken word that Thomas had, you know. Of course, Thomas had Augustine too, huh? Okay.

[32:02] Is necessary that the good of man be considered according to some what rule, right? Huh? Which rule is twofold, as has been said above, to what human reason, right? And the divine law, right? Two things that measure us, right? So my action should be reasonable, right? And also in accordance with divine law, right, which is above reason. And because the divine law is the superior rule, right, therefore it extends to more things, right?

[32:39] That is that whatever is ruled by human reason is ruled also by the divine law, but not the reverse, huh? Okay, so one is more universal. What extends to, huh?

[32:59] I was, you know, taking my excursion after finishing my current reading of the third book of the Summa Contra Gentiles, which, as you know by now, is my favorite book of Thomas. But sometimes I get through one of these books, I'll say now we've got to go on to book four right away. I'll make an excursion, go and read some other things where Thomas talks about things he talks about in book three, right?

[33:25] So I made a nice excursion over to De Malo, question one, right, where he talks about the bad, evil, right? As he does at the beginning of book three, right, consideration of good and bad in the beginning of book three, are always in there. And then after he talks about God as being in the whole universe, then he talks about divine providence, right? So I made a nice excursion into the fifth question of the De Veritate, right, which is about providence, right?

[33:58] And Thomas begins by saying, well, we got to approach our understanding of divine providence through human providence, right? And then he goes to, you know, Cicero of all people, right? Now, where Cicero talks about

[34:21] human prudence having memory and understanding what's present, and then foresight, right? And it's completed kind of by foresight and so on, so on. And he starts to bring out that foresight, you know, it's about the means to some end, right? So he's trying to distinguish between what's kind of presupposed to prudence and what is the matter of prudence itself. And he says what's presupposed to prudence is your natural understanding of what the end of life is, right?

[34:55] And your what? The moral virtues, as Aristotle said, right? Well, the case of God, of course, it's the divine goodness sounds like his prudence, right, to our foresight, huh? I mean, to our moral virtues. Well, anyway, he goes on, and he says later on, though, he says that the divine providence is like the providence of the father, the prudence of the father, or the prudence of the the prince of the king, huh?

[35:26] Now, if you go to the secunda secunde, right, when Thomas goes into the details of of prudence or foresight, now he distinguishes four species of prudence, right? And the first species is the foresight that I have for the good of Duane Berquist. And then there's a second foresight, the foresight I have as the father of a family, right? And they have elected me king or something. There would be what?

[35:58] Political. Yeah, yeah. He also sticks in the foresight of Douglas MacArthur, right? The general, right? King David. Yeah. Which is closest to that of the military? I mean, to the political foresight, right? So MacArthur could kind of go from being the great general he was to the administration of Japan, right? So he had some political foresight too. But he says the foresight of God is like the foresight of the father and of the the king, right?

[36:32] But not that of the individual. Why not? You know. See. I always just take an example. I say, and I sit down the evening, and they say, "Now, what would it be good for me to do? " Well, obviously to read the first or the second or the third or the fourth book of the Summa Contra Gentiles. That's what reason tells me, right? That's my foresight, huh?

[36:56] But as a father, right, maybe I should, you know, read a little fairy tales to my to my children, right? Or do a little bit of the rosary with some nice pictures of the scenes you're meditating on, right? But is it is it good for me to read the the fairy tales? To read the Suma Cargentilas? No, but I am considering the good of the family, right?

[37:21] The good of these children, right? Which is kind of the common good of the family, right? Okay. I am considering the good of Duane Berquist Okay. I said that's kind of interesting. First time I read over it, didn't strike me. Then looked over it a second, and I said, "Oh, now I see what he's talking about, huh? " Because he brings out that prudence is not about the end, but presupposes a knowledge of the end, right, and a love of the end, to the moral virtues and so on.

[37:54] But it's really about the means to the end, right? Okay. Well, God in himself does he need means to an end? Oh, because he's the end himself, right? He's the end. Just direct himself to something. He's there. He's there. Yeah. He's he's he's complete. He's universally perfect, right? So there is nothing. There is no foresight in God that corresponds to my foresight to what is good for doing, purpose to do tonight.

[38:24] Would be reasonable for this son of a gun to do, right? You know. But when you rule as the father, or you rule as the king, or something, right? You are what directing others, right, to the good of to the common good, right? And so God's foresight resembles that of the fathers or the what the kings, right? Kind of interesting, you know, the way Thomas divides the Old Testament on the basis of law.

[38:57] You have the law of the king, right, which is in the Pentateuch and in the prophets who are urging us to follow the Moses law, and then the law of the what, father, right now. Even the way he divides it's kind of interesting, yeah. But it's really kind of beautiful, beautiful text, right? But he approaches it through, you know, human foresight, and then he sees what we, the divine foresight.

[39:20] Of course, the divine foresight is for the common good, the whole universe, right, and not just the common good of my family or the common good of my country or something.

[39:37] But the divine law, of course, is more universal, right? Extends further, right? Now, the virtue of man, ordered to the good, which is what measured according to the rule of human reason, can be caused from what human acts, right? Insofar as these acts proceed from reason, under whose power and rule such a good what consists right now? Be more modest there than Augustine there, right? Augustine's really laying down the law there.

[40:18] Um, but the virtue ordering man to the good, according as it is measured, huh? When Thomas, you know, has explained the word modus there, he does so in terms of the word what measure, right? Quoting Augustine, right now. According as it is measured by what the divine law, and not by human reason, that cannot be caused by what human acts, right now, whose beginning is what reason, huh?

[40:53] But is caused only in us through the divine what operation, huh? And therefore we met this definition before. Remember that. And therefore, defining this kind of virtue, Augustine lays down the definition of virtue, which God in us, without us, works, right? Huh. That's back in question fifty-five, article four. The whole definition is. Look at it again there, right now. Yeah. To the beginning of the article.

[41:44] Yeah. Yeah. Bonae qualitas mentis, huh? A good quality of the mind, by which it does rightly, which no one uses badly, which God in us, without us, works, right? Okay.

[42:04] And about virtues of this sort, the first what argument proceeds, right? Huh. Those horrible quotes of Augustine, right? But no, Augustine's thinking there of what virtue is. What is most perfect form, right? Now, in reply to

[42:39] the second objection, there, right? It says that a virtue divinely infused, especially if it be what considered as perfection, does not what suffer with itself any mortal sin, right? So, by one mortal sin, I can lose infused what virtues, right now.

[43:06] But a virtue humanly acquired can what have compatible with itself some act of a sin, even a what Mortal mortal one, right? Because the use of a habit in us is subject to our what will. This has been said above, huh? But not through one act of sin is the habit of virtue acquired virtue, right? Corrupted, huh?

[43:37] For to a habit is not directly contrary, what an act, but a what habit, right? So you gotta repeatedly be bad, right? Okay. And therefore, although without grace, man is not able to what avoid a mortal sin, such that he never what sins mortally, huh? He's not, however, impeded, but that he can what acquire a habit of virtue to which he abstains from bad works ut in pluribus huh?

[44:16] And especially from those things which are valde, huh? Very much so contrary to reason, right? Okay. So you can see a certain importance of the natural virtues. I mean, the human virtues, as called them, right, is distinguished from the divine virtues, right? Because these divine infused virtues could be lost by one bad act, right? Why the acquired virtue is not destroyed by one bad act, huh? It may be weakened, huh?

[44:42] If you continue, you could eventually wear away, right? But not by just but one, huh? Now it's just you know in there, you know, that was a big point they were making, you know, so many teachers, you know, huh? If you wanted to, you know, say well, forget about those human virtues, you know, you know, you get just the divine ones are important because they fully perfect you, you know, huh?

[45:04] But there's a need for that stability that the human virtues give you, right? Okay. There are some mortal sins which man without grace is in no way able to avoid, right? Which are directly opposed to the what theological virtues, right? Which are in us from the gift of grace. But about these below, you become more what manifest, so wouldn't that?

[45:53] Okay. To the third, it should be said. This is the one now that is saying, how can you get, you know something as stable as a habit from an act which is very unstable, right? To the third, it should be said that, as has been said, of acquired virtues, there preexist in us certain seeds or beginnings, right? Notice I use those two words, seeds or beginnings,

[46:20] according to nature, right? Which beginnings are more noble than the virtues that are what? Acquired by. Yeah, by their power. Just as the understanding of beginnings of speculative things is more noble than the knowledge of the conclusions, so when Thomas talks about the the virtues of looking reason, which are nous in Greek, episteme and sophia, or in Latin they'll say intellectus, scientia, sapientia, or I say natural understanding, right?

[46:58] Reason out understanding and wisdom, right? Natural wisdom is is put first, right? In terms of excellence, right? But then Thomas puts natural understanding before reasoned out understanding. It's. It's the source of that, right?

[47:15] So he's talking here about how these seeds or beginnings that are in us by nature, these seeds or beginnings of what the moral virtues and of the intellectual virtues, right? They're more noble, right?

[47:37] And the natural rightness of reason is more noble, right? Than the rightness appetite, which comes about through the what? Partaking of reason, right? Which rectification pertains to moral virtue. Thus, therefore, human acts, in so far as they proceed from higher beginnings, right? There we go, like last night, huh? Higher beginnings, huh? We're reading Aristotle there, you know, and he's talking about how investigating causes, you should go to the akrotatos cause, right?

[48:16] And akros means higher, right? And the akrotatos is like the superlative of that. Should go to the highest cause, right? As if the cause is above the effects, right? Where he's talking about the what? Altioribus, right? It's like the Greek there. Able to cause what? Human virtues, right? So he doesn't seem to like this time. Here he's saying, just talking about repeated acts, right? Okay. But sometimes when they take the example, you know, of something that gradually by drip, drip, drip, drip, you know, fighting gives way, right?

[48:50] Sometimes that that is emphasized too, right? But here he's emphasizing the fact that the natural beginnings are what are greater, right? Than what is deduced from them, right? So you're not getting the greater from the lesser, but lesser from the greater, right?

[49:12] There's an objection there. I see in the other one. The text there, you know, he's talking about providence. He says, objection says, well, a body can't produce a spirit. therefore a spirit can't produce a body, huh? Well, the body is less than the spirit, right? So that would make no sense for the body to produce a spirit, right? But the spirit is something much greater than a body, right?

[49:32] So maybe a spirit can produce a body, right? Should we take a break now, or should we read our next? I can do this one. Okay. You want to divide the four into three and one? Then I see, no? Right. You want to divide the four into three and one? Then. huh? Rather than two and two. Yes. You read my mind.

[50:09] The third one goes forward thus. It seems that apart from the theological virtues, right, there are not other virtues poured into us or infused into us from what God, right? Huh.

[50:30] I don't hear much about these in sermons. Do you? The infused virtues, moral virtues. You're about faith, hope, and charity sometimes, right? But not much about infused virtues, so.

[50:47] So, to the third one proceeds thus. It seems that apart from the theological virtues, there are not other virtues poured into us by God. For those things which are able to come to be from second causes, right, do not come immediately from God, right. Like the apple, right? Huh? Comes from the apple tree immediately, right? God is remote cause. Except perhaps sometimes miraculously, right? Huh?

[51:18] Because, as Dionysius says, the law of the divine nature is that the last thing should be brought to the middle ones, right? That's the only way of proceeding. But the intellectual virtues and the moral ones are able to be caused in us through our own acts, as has been said in the previous article. Not therefore suitably are caused in us through infusion, right? Huh. That sounds pretty good, huh?

[51:44] So far so good. Who could disagree with that? Moreover, in the works of God, much less is there something superfluous than in the works of what nature. Nature does nothing excess, right? Huh.

[52:05] So why doesn't nature, you know, like the fairy tale, make someone three eyes? Why does nature have just two eyes? Huh. Yeah, you need two eyes, though, right, to have that sense of distance, right? Huh. But you don't need the third eye. Don't need the third leg,

[52:26] huh? It's just sufficient, right? What? Actually, a fourth arm would come in handy. You got the title for the Darwin. Take me along with two arms. Well, see, then, then you can drive and text. I have two brains, though. Well, depends on the drive.

[52:56] But to ordering us to the supernatural good, the theological virtues what suffice, right? Therefore, there are not other what supernatural virtues, which what ought to be in us, ought to be caused in us. Yeah, which are necessary to be caused in us by God. Moreover, nature doesn't do to two what it can do to one, and much less than God. But God inserts in our soul the seeds of the virtues, as said in the gloss in Hebrew one.

[53:33] Therefore, it's not necessary that other virtues in us be caused by infusion, right? Multiplying virtues here without necessity—that's what this is objecting to, right?

[53:47] But against this is what is said in the Book of Wisdom, chapter eight. He teaches sobriety and justice, prudence and what virtue. Well, where did Thomas get this principle? He begins the body of the article with, and it should be said, is necessary for effects to be what proportioned to their causes and beginnings. Where did that come up, Joshua? Where did it come up last night?

[54:27] It's one of the corollaries from the four kinds of causes, or the corollaries of the ways of being causes. Which is it? So you should have the singular cause, the singular cause. Yeah, yeah. So, and this is stating in general what he is saying, right? The cause and effect of that would be what proportional, right? Okay.

[54:51] I see an objection in this De Veritate today where Thomas' objection says that this objection is God's foresight, right, his providence extending down to corruptible things, right? They don't seem to be proportioned to God, corruptible things, because God makes nothing defective, right? And corruption is a defect, right? So how can that be something that's an effect of God, right? Well, it's based on the principle here, right?

[55:23] Okay. That's the third corollary, I think, isn't it? Yeah, third corollary. First corollary from the ways of cause, right? And the first corollary is that causes and act and effects and actor together, right? Second one was the one that what go to the highest cause, right? Under three and one to proportion, but anyway, that's a famous principle that Thomas learned from that pagan Greek Aristotle.

[56:06] But all virtues, both intellectual and moral, which are acquired by our acts, proceed from certain what natural beginnings preexisting in us. But in the place of these natural beginnings, there is conferred upon us by God, right? Theological virtues by which we are ordered to a what? Supernatural matter. Yeah. So why do you need those theological virtues?

[56:39] Yeah, yeah. Because a natural virtue would not be proportioned to what an end that is above nature, right? Then. Okay. Whence is necessary that to these what theological virtues? Yeah, theological virtues proportionally they respond. Other habits divinely caused in us,

[57:11] which thus have themselves to theological virtues, as the moral intellectual virtues have themselves to the what natural beginnings of the virtues. That's a mouthful, right? But it's based upon that one principle that Aristotle had brought out, right? huh? But cause and effects must be what Proportionally, Yeah.

[57:42] Now to the first objection there, right? To the first, therefore, it should be said that some moral virtues, intellectual virtues, can be caused in us from our own what acts. Nevertheless, these are not proportioned to the what Theological virtues, And therefore it's necessary for others proportioned to them to be immediately caused by what God.

[58:22] Now, what about the distinction? Because it was actually the theological virtues doing that, right? Okay. Don't the theological virtues suffice to order us to the supernatural? To the second, should be said that the theological virtues sufficiently what order us to a supernatural end according to a certain what beginning, right? Strange, isn't it? Right. As regards God Himself, immediately, right. But it's necessary that, to other infused virtues, the soul be perfected about what other things, Other things.

[59:02] in order, nevertheless, to what God. So it's other things in God, right, that orders us in a way that is proportioned to the what theological virtues. So it's difficult to see, right, huh? You didn't bring this out until here, right? Before we talked about theological virtues, right? We talked about intellectual moral virtues, right? And here we didn't talk about what's in between. Okay, it's all deducing from the principle where Aristotle gave him, right?

[59:41] That causes and effects must be proportional, right? So there's Dominic bringing the wine over the hills there to the nuns in his convent, right? And abstaining himself from wine. Oh, that's obviously infused virtue, right? Huh?

[1:00:10] Now, the third objection, huh? There are the seeds of these virtues, huh? In us, those are the natural seeds, right? So it says the power of those beginnings, naturally in us, does not extend beyond the proportion of what? Nature. And therefore, in order to a supernatural end, man needs to be perfected through what? Other beginnings added above that, huh? Seems to me this casts light upon the need for purgatory, too, right?

[1:00:52] Take a little break here now.