Prima Secundae
181. Summa I-II Q75 aa.1–3: Does sin have a cause? Inward causes (reason, will, sense desire) and outward causes
Class of 2014-10-17
https://berquistcourse.com/course/theology/11-prima-secundae/181-summa-i-ii-q75-aa-1-3-does-sin-have-a-cause-inward-causes/

[0:00] In the Name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. Amen. God, our enlightenment, guardian angels, strengthen the lights of our minds, order, illuminate our images, and arouse us to consider more correctly. Saint Thomas Aquinas, angelic doctor, Pray for us. and help us to understand all that you have written. Father, Son, Holy Spirit. Amen.

[0:28] So, if you thank God for freely choosing you to be, you have to thank Him for that before you thank Him for creating your immortal soul.

[0:42] What do you have to thank Him for before is freely choosing you to be? What do you have to thank Him for? Before freely choosing you to be.

[1:03] I suppose that's one point to start. I was thinking that you have to thank Him for freely choosing this universe to be right, because God could have created infinity of different universes, huh? So,

[1:27] unless He had chosen this universe to be right, there wouldn't be any place in the universe He chose for you, right? And of course, you have to thank Him for the common good even before the private good, right? Huh? So you're thanking God for choosing a universe of which you could be a part.

[1:47] You know. And I suppose this universe could be without me, you know. That's a likely guess. Not always the universe, is in Him, but so are you. But if He had made another universe, I could not even been a part of it, right? Huh? So it's one thing for Him to have chosen a universe that I could be a part of, and then more so, you know, then second, He chose me freely to be in this universe, right?

[2:19] The fact, that, He created you with an immortal soul means that your soul is going to be a permanent part of the universe, huh? Because it's immortal, huh?

[2:30] So the soul of the dog or a cat is not eternal. That nice dog who greets me there, you know, That, brown dog out there.

[2:46] So we're up to question what 75. And let's just look back for a second at question 71, the premium. Just so we'll recall how thorough Thomas is, right?

[3:07] In the proemium to question seventy one, which is the premium to a whole bunch of these questions here. Consequently, we're not to consider about vices and what sins, and about these six things occur to be considered. The first is about the vices and sins in themselves, right? Secundum se. Secondly, about the distinction of these. Third, about the comparison of them to each other.

[3:42] Fourth, about the subject of sin, right? And now the fifth part we're about to begin. About the what cause of sin, huh? And that will be followed by the further articles on the effect of it, right?

[4:00] So Thomas again is looking before and after here when he looks for the cause and the effect, huh? But in the first four ones, he's more looking at the thing itself, right, huh? Okay,

[4:17] we're up to the causes. Now this is divided into two parts, right? First, we're going to consider about the causes in a very general way here, and then in what special, right? And we'll see what the special consideration is. We can understand what the special will be better after we know the general. About the first four things are asked.

[4:45] First of all, whether sin has a cause. That's how fundamental Thomas is, huh? Is there is there a problem about whether sin has a cause?

[5:04] The criminal says, "I just blacked out," you know. That's always a good thing I've heard this so many times; it used to be a common thing, you know, kind of excuse, you know.

[5:18] Somebody asked him if he'd been out of trouble. He said, "Well, except for my psychotic episode, But I never remember the many." Yeah, I guess there was this famous bank robber, you know, and he got caught a number of times, and finally the judge says, "Well, why do you rob these banks, you know? That's what the money is." Simple answer, You don't see how I blacked out, you know?

[5:41] That's where the money is. And if it does have a cause, whether it has a what interior cause in the second article, right? Cause within us, and then third, whether it has a cause outside of us, right? So we have an abundance of causes inside and outside of you, huh? And then, interesting question: whether sin can be the cause of sin.

[6:12] So, to the first one goes for thus: it seems that sin has no cause, for sin has the, yeah, character of something bad, right? Huh? Has the nature of something bad, the definition of something bad, right? This has been said, but the famous Dionysius says the bad does not have a cause. Therefore, sin does not have a cause. What seems to settle pretty much, right? What more could you ask for?

[6:47] A nice, syllogism, I guess, they call that. Moreover, a cause is that to which of necessity something other follows. But that which is from necessity does not seem to be a sin, in that every sin is something what voluntary. Therefore, sin has no cause.

[7:17] I'm pretty impressed with these arguments. However, if sin has a cause, either it has for a cause something good or something bad. huh? An either or argument now, right? But not something good, because the good does not make except the good. For a good tree cannot bring forth bad what fruit, as someone of great authority said in Matthew seven, chapter eighteen. I mean, verse eighteen.

[7:55] Likewise, neither can what the bad be a cause of sin, because the bad of what punishment follows what to sin. But the bad of guilt is the same thing as sin.

[8:14] Therefore, sin has what does not have a cause. That was a strange argument. That last one, isn't it? But against this is that everything that comes to be has a cause. Because, as is said in Job chapter 5, verse 6, nothing is on the earth except what comes to be. It comes to be without a cause, right? There's a reason for everything. But sin comes to be, for is something said, or done, or desired against the law of God.

[9:25] That's kind of a definition, I guess, of sin, right? Comes from Augustine. It says in my footnote here. Therefore, this sin has a what? Cause. So, what? This time is going to sort this out, huh? But you know, that's that part of the article we left you for the day to think about, right? And then tomorrow we'll drop in the second part, right? I remember When Charles de Koninck, you know, came down and gave a public talk there at the College of Saint Thomas, and Duffy, there was a friend of my brother Richard and my cousin Donald, you know, he said, you know, I gave enough to think about for a whole week.

[10:17] He said, you know, the one talk. He says, if I could get a, you know, talk like that, you know, once a week, you know, that would give me enough to occupy my mind for the rest of the week. I used to sometimes go around with it with a phrase or Monsignor Dionne or some key thing in this lecture, you know, for thinking about day and day out, you know, for several days, you know, and there's something about that, right?

[10:41] And we tend to rush through things, huh? I remember when some philosopher—I won't mention who—but some philosopher I knew, you know, was taking one of these speed reading courses. I just laughed. I could hardly help but laugh. at my guy's face. So one thing, a philosopher doesn't need is a speed reading course to read philosophy texts. You've got to slow down. Why is doing slow, right? They stumble to run fast.

[11:07] I mean, it's just ridiculous. I mean, you're working in government. You got to go through these crazy documents. I mean, you know, nobody even reads the bills anymore. That they, that they, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Nobody reads those things. But

[11:26] so Thomas begins. He says sin is a what? Disordered act, right? What did Dionysius say that sin is something against what reason, right? And how is reason defined by? order? Yeah, by order, right? So a disordered act is one that is opposed to what reason, right?

[11:55] So there's two things involved there in the idea of sin. Then that it's an act and it's what disordered, right? Now on the side of therefore of act, it can have a cause per se, right? Just as any other what act, right? But on the other side of the disorder,

[12:22] it can have a cause in the way in which a what negation or a privation or a lack, to use English word, is able to have a cause, right?

[12:39] So this is key in understanding what what the bad is in general, right? The bad is is a lack of something one is able to have and should have, right? Then.

[12:54] Now of some negation, a twofold cause can be assigned. I didn't know that. That's something to think about, right? First, the defect of the cause itself—that is, the negation of the what—cause itself—is a cause of the negation secundum se ipsum, according to itself. For to the absence, you might say, of the cause follows the absence of the effect, just as the cause of the obscurity, the darkness, is the absence of the what—sun.

[13:40] They didn't have light bulbs in those days. In another way, the cause of some something affirmative, right, to which there follows a what—negation, right—is the accidental cause, the per accidens cause, of the negation that falls upon it. Just as what fire, in causing heat from its chief what intention, consequently causes the privation of what. So you see the difference between those two ways. In the one way, something lacking, right, in the cause, is a cause of something lacking the fact.

[14:37] Okay, that's more secundum se, he says, right. In another way, something affirmative that the cause is producing has as a consequence the privation of something what else, okay.

[15:02] Of which the first, he says, of these two ways, you know, when I edit these texts, and I would have a skip a little space there, right? Okay. Because you see the distinction to be understood here, right? And he's pointed out a distinction, right? And he's what exemplified it, huh? Okay.

[15:31] Of which the first of these two can suffice for a simple what negation, right? Okay. But since the disorder of sin and every evil is not a simple negation, okay. Now, if you go back to the categories, and Aristotle first distinguished the four kinds of what opposites, right? And one is simply negation, right? One is privation or lack, and one is contrariety, right? And then you have.

[16:06] Kind of distinct from those three, relative opposition, right? Okay. It's extremely important that text of Aristotle, huh? You know, it extends all the way to what the distinction of the what Trinity, right? Huh? You know, relative distinction, huh? That's what one of the axioms I remember from theology was: in God, everything is one, except where there's the opposition of relation. Yeah. That's right there. Yeah. Yeah.

[16:39] What's the difference between a negation, a simple negation, and a lack, right? Huh? See. Well, if this glass here doesn't see, right? Is that a privation? It's lacking something it should have. No, it's just a mere negation, right? It does not see, right? Huh? But if somebody is what blind, huh? Some man or even a dog is blind. Well, then what? A lack. Yeah. Because he's able to, and he's disposed against the.

[17:15] Yeah. Organ of sight. So it's a non-being of something you should have and don't have, right? Huh? Something that by nature you should have, right? Able to have. Of course, Aristotle in the fifth book of Wisdom would distinguish for his senses of privation or lack, right? But in the full sense, it's a non-being of something you're able to have and should have, right?

[17:49] Now he says because of that, huh? It is necessary that such a disorder, right? Huh? I skipped what I said in English to you. But it's a privation of that which something is not debet habere and debit ought to have, right? Huh? It is necessary that such a disorder have an agent cause, what per accidens huh? For what something is naturally apt to be in, what is naturally apt to be in something and ought to be never is absent except on account of some cause, what impeding this, right?

[18:34] And according to this, it is customary to say that the evil, which consists in its own privation, right, has a deficient cause or an agent, what per accidens, huh? Now, every cause per accidens is reduced to a cause what per se, huh? That's generally true. The per accidens is somehow reduced to the per se, right? So I may what. A wise grandfather, right? That's being per accidens, right?

[19:08] Huh? Okay. But the way I became wise and the way I became a grandfather are totally unrelated, right? Huh? And wisdom and grandfather don't come together, although they tried to say so today in church. There was special mass, you know, for the grandfathers, right, of the children who were in the the parish school, right? Huh? And Bishop McManus was there to say the mass, right? Huh? So the bishop was saying along with the pastor, the Monsignor, rose, you know, and so nice, nice mass.

[19:42] But they're talking about the wisdom of the grandfathers, right? They accumulate all this wisdom from their age, and he was quoting Pope Francis, I guess, huh? Until youth and wisdom meet, we're going to have trouble, right? You know. we're gonna. We need these two good things. Youth is good, right? And wisdom is good, but the two have gotta meet to come together, right? So the grandfathers meet with the grandchildren.

[20:13] I was reading a comment from George Bush when he was asked about why he, why he I don't know, if he smoked dope or drank or something Mm-hmm. He said, "Well, when I was young and foolish, I was young and foolish."

[20:38] Since, over every Prachidansk cause is reduced to a per, accidens but every per accidens cause is reduced to a cause per se. Since, therefore, sin on the part of disorder has an agent cause per accidens, and on the side of the act it has an agent cause that is what per se. It follows that the disorder of the sin follows from the what cause of the act.

[21:08] Thus, therefore, the will, lacking the direction of the rule of reason and of the divine law, aiming at some changeable right good, it causes the act of sin per se. But the disorder of sin per accidens, and apart from what intentions, right?

[21:43] But the defect of order in the act comes from the defect of what direction in the what the will. This is the way they solve the argument from what Dionysius, right. Because when Dionysius says evil does not have a cause, what does he mean? Per se as such, right? See, because no one acts aiming at the bad as such, right? Okay. To the first, therefore, he says it should be said that sin not only signifies the what lack of good, which is a disorder, but it signifies an act under such a what such a lack, which has an notion of something bad, which in what way it has a cause per accidens has been what said in the body of the what article, right?

[22:49] Put that in your pipe and smoke it for a while, right? didn't have to be a corncob pipe, but. My father used to smoke a corncob pipe sometimes, you know. But I think especially when they were trying to sell wagons to the farmers, right? He'd put that corn pipe in his house you know so they kind of associated with MacArthur that corncob pipe, you know, and so

[23:21] on. Here, picture my son and myself before with a picture of MacArthur in the background there at West Point, you know. But I don't know where it is. I have to find it one of these days. I know. Bring it in, you know. But after I ran across this and here, I said, "Dale, don't anybody want to see my my patriotism, you know, and so on." Standing at attention there in front of the Washington's grave there.

[23:47] Washington Irving, you know, that was his last work on his biography of of Washington. Yeah, yeah. And it's a very, very good, very good biography. But he was a little boy, I think, he was in the arms of his nurse, right? And she went to a bookshop there in New York. That's where the first presidency was, and Washington came in. And she said to Washington, "Here's a little one named after you, sir."

[24:14] And so he put his head on his hand, you know. So of course Irving wouldn't remember that, but he but he told it on how Washington put his hand upon him and so on. He had this great respect for Washington, you know, but kind of a personal touch, if I can say it, you know, with the man, huh?

[24:36] Two seconds should be said, huh? If that definition of cause universally ought to be what verified, huh? Is necessary that it be understood about a cause that is both sufficient, right, to produce the effect, right, and that is not impeded, right? Okay. So Thomas often qualifies that definition of the aspect of a cause, huh? That something follows what necessarily, right? Because some things follow necessarily if they are a sufficient cause of the thing being, and no one impedes it, right?

[25:23] But you have to bring that out because otherwise the definition would would fail in some cases, right? For it can happen that something is a sufficient cause of another, right? And nevertheless, not from necessity does the effect follow, on account of some impediment, right, coming upon it, huh? Otherwise, it would happen that all things happen from necessity, as is clear in the sixth book of the Metaphysics, as Aristotle points out.

[25:58] Thus, therefore, although sin does have a cause, it however does not follow that it is what necessary, because the effect is able to be what impeded. Right.

[26:14] To the third, it should be said, huh? That as has been said, the will, without the addition of the rule of reason or the divine law, right, is the cause of what sin, huh?

[26:34] Now, this, which is to not what apply the rule of reason or the divine law, in itself does not have the notion of something bad, right? Nor of punishment, nor of what guilt. Before is applied to what act, right? You can't always be thinking about these things, right?

[26:59] Hence, according to this, huh? The cause of the what first sin is not something bad, huh? But something good with the absence of some other what good. So when the will proceeds to act, right, without having waited for the what ordering of reason, right, or without you know paying attention to divine law, then it becomes the cause actually of what sin, right? Okay.

[27:43] That's kind of a subtle thing, right? The will proceeding to act without waiting, huh? The due consideration of reason, huh? Don't confuse me with the facts he said.

[28:09] Sometimes I know I mentioned before St Alphonsus talks about. in some cases, anyways, the willful inadvertence. I don't want to think about that. Yeah. you see that sometimes in conversation with people too. you know Turn away from it Yeah

[28:27] they don't want to think about that. Okay, for the. Sin as a inward cause, right? I usually translate interior, inward, huh? To the second, one goes forward. Thus, it seems that sin does not have a cause within.

[28:54] For that which is within a thing is always what present to it. If, therefore, sin had an inward cause, always man would sin. Oh my God, that's terrible. Since the cause being what, Since the cause of being laid down, then the effect is laid down, right?

[29:22] Moreover, the same is not a cause of itself. It's a good principle, right? But the inward motions of a man are what sin, right? We talked before about what sin was, right? It's inward motion, right? Therefore, they're not a cause of sin, right?

[29:51] In the sense you say that sin is more the inward motion of the man, right? Okay. But that is a cause of itself. Moreover, whatever is within a man is either natural or voluntary. But that which is natural cannot be a cause of sin, because sin is against nature, as Damascene said, as Shakespeare says too, right?

[30:25] Whatever is voluntary, if it be disordered, is already a what sin. Therefore, something inward cannot be a cause of the first sin. It's amazing, Amazing these arguments

[30:47] Imagine I could torture somebody with these, huh? Enough getting out of prison until you can resolve this problem, right? Because you're in prison because you sinned, and you better find out what the cause of sin is, right?

[31:15] Probably have more suicides on your case than people. I used to hear the story that the Voltaire is supposed to look, at, the objections, you know, and that's all he bothered with, you know, and then he threw them up against his Catholic acquaintance, and they couldn't answer them, you know, yeah, for the fun of it. I wouldn't put it beyond him. Right there.

[31:47] But against this is what Augustine says that the will is the cause of sin. Huh? That's a nice concise sentence. Voluntas es causa peccati. Brevity is the soul of wit. Wisdom in that brief statement.

[32:08] I answer it should be said that it has been said that the per se cause of sin, right, must be taken on the side of the act itself.

[32:24] Now, of a human act, one can take both a what? Internal cause. Yeah. And one that's what? Immediate. And one that is immediate. Huh?

[32:41] Now, the immediate causes of human acts are reason and will, according as man is free in his what? Judgment. Huh? It's kind of funny that liberum arbitrium, you know, Thomas takes it up you know, and the Prima Pars is there, you know, is liberum arbitrium more in reason or in the will? Thomas says more in the will, right? And but yet you say arbitrium, right? Huh? Judgment seems to name an act of reason, right?

[33:16] And so the way you name this thing is kind of strange, right? And Thomas will try to explain how this is this is the freedom of the will, right? Kind of depends upon the reason's ability to judge and to go to opposites and so on, right? But it's kind of funny the way you name it, right? And people always have a problem how you translate liberum arbitrium because if you translate it word by word.

[33:40] It's free judgment, right? Huh? It seems like you want to talk about free will here, you know. But you kind of seem the source of it, huh? In reason, huh?

[33:53] I mean, Aristotle says that we, you know, that everybody who does wrong, you know, is mistaken. He saw that, right? Now, the remote cause is the grasping of the sensitive what part, and also the sense appetite, sense desire. Okay.

[34:25] For just as the will is moved from the judgment of reason, right, to something that is according to reason. So also it is moved, I guess, by the grasping of what? Excuse me, not it, but the sense appetite, sense desire, is also what? Inclined. Something from the apprehension of senses, right? So the apple was attracted to the senses there of, Eve, huh?

[35:09] Which inclination sometimes draws the will and reason? I assume you have experience of that, huh? Thus, a twofold interior cause of sin can be assigned: one which is proximate, right, on the side of reason and the what, will; another which is remote, on the side of the imagination, right, or of sense desire, right.

[35:47] And because, as has been said above, the cause of sin is some good apparent, right, huh? That is moving, right, with a defect of the proper motive, which is the rule of reason or of the divine law, right?

[36:10] Therefore, the mover that is the apparent good pertains to the grasping of the senses and the sense desire, right, the appetite of it. But this absence of the right rule pertains to what? Reason, which is naturally apt to consider a rule of this sort, huh?

[36:36] But the perfection of the voluntary act of sin pertains to the what? Will. In that the act itself of the will, presupposing the what, lack of the order of reason and so on, right, is itself already a what? Sin, huh?

[37:00] So he's saying there's inward cause, but it's both what? Remote and immediate, right? But the immediate one being reason and will, right? But reason beginning and the will completing, right? And then the other one is kind of influencing it, right?

[37:25] Now, what do you say to the first one here about what's always in the mind We're always sinning. It seems we are. To the first therefore it should be said. That that which is within as a natural power is always what within right inest.

[37:48] But that which is within as an interior act now is distinguished from a interior power ability, such as a interior act either of a desiring power or a grasping power right. That's the way he names those two right. The desiring power, I guess that's what he translates appetitive right. It's better than saying appetite.

[38:13] Or he always uses the word apprehensive the grasping power right for the knowing power. That's intrinsic, but it's non semper inest. It's not always within right. People aren't always thinking or always willing. Now, the power of the will itself is a cause of what sin In ability. in potency, right? In ability, right?

[38:51] But it's reduced to an act through the what preceding motions of the sensitive part first, and of reason what consequently. Now, from this that something is proposed as desirable according to the senses, and since desires inclined in that, right? Reason sometimes interdum cessat ceases from the consideration of the suitable what rule, and thus the will produces the act of what sin.

[39:33] Because therefore the preceding motions are not always an act. Neither is sin always an act. That was a close call. To second, it should be said that not all interior motions are of the substance of sin, which consists chiefly in the act of the what.

[40:03] But some precede and some follow the sin itself. What's the one in Cymbeline there where Posthumus, you know, he's deceived by Iachimo right? You know, the way that I thought it was deceived by Yago, right? Iago and Iachimo the Italian villains, right? His wife has been unfaithful, right? So it's a beautiful scene there where where he denounces womankind, you might say, because you know he doesn't trust any woman now, you know, because she had seemed to be you know the paragon of virtue and so on, and he's attributing every what evil man to human race to woman, right?

[40:55] And this is Aristotle says people like to generalize that thing, you know, whatever they suffer from. And but you know sometimes we speak of man as having what reason and woman as being what will, right? Now, so I always think about that when you you see this here, right? Because now he's saying the will is what is

[41:22] consistent principaliter, right? In actu voluntatis, right? See, so it's the will that is what. Yeah, it's that reason that is principally what sin consists in, right? Huh? So it consists more in woman than in than man. See. No, but it's kind of interesting that sense that we think of man as being more tied up with reason, right? And and woman more tied up with love, you know.

[41:53] And you know how how look, look, Berri, right? People of this sort. And Saint Francis of Assisi, they'll take the woman saints, you know, kind of want to talk about love, right? Because they kind of more clearly illustrate this, huh? And when the child gets bumped, you know, he runs to his mother more than to his father, right? Because because her loving, you know, sympathy and so on, huh?

[42:19] So, two beat, you know, therefore what affectionate will to the woman, right? And affectionate reason to the man. I have a passage somewhere I found if I can find again, but interesting passage where John Paul II, you know, talked about this, huh? Touched upon, right? And how we men are apt to to use our reason more than women, you know. But I mean, you know, he was pretty careful what he said, you know.

[42:46] But but he yeah, I mean he actually said this. Pope Francis has talked about it too in different ways. He said to recognize that the church we call her mother. And she said that's the feminine side of things that we need. He's saying we need to emphasize that. Yeah, yeah. But then something he said about what does that mean? You want women in bigger positions of responsibility?

[43:13] He says just says that's to make them into men. He says that's not what we want. That's not what I'm talking about. Yeah. He made that say. I am surprised it didn't make more press. But they talk about women being, you know, having positions of power in the church. He says every pastor is his housekeeper. She controls everything.

[43:44] Okay. To the third, it should be said that that which is a cause of sin, in the sense of a power producing an act, is something what natural, right? Huh? And the motion of the sense part, from which there follows what sin, is sometimes what natural, right? Huh? Just as when, on account of the desire for food, someone what sins, huh?

[44:16] But a sin is made what unnatural from this that there fails the rule, the natural rule, right? Huh? Which man, according to his nature, ought to what attend? So when Shakespeare says, "What is a man?" right, he's talking the nature of man, right. And if you're not following that, what is a man if his chief good and mark of his time be but to steep and feed?

[44:42] Well, then you're not acting like a man, really, huh? Pursuing goods in the way that's natural for man to pursue them. To The third one proceeds thus: It seems that sin does not have an outside cause,

[45:12] for sin is a voluntary act, but voluntary things are of those which are in our power, right, in us, and thus they do not have a what, exterior cause.

[45:28] Therefore, sin does not have an exterior cause. Moreover, as nature is a beginning within, when Aristotle defined nature as a beginning and cause of motion and rest in that which it is, right? First, as such, and not by accident.

[45:55] But so also is the will. But sin in natural things—no, see the word "sin" is used there for natural things. So, if the baby is born without an arm or a leg, that's a sin of nature, right? But that's in the broadness of the Latin word there, right? quod It never happens except from some what interior cause. Has monstrous parts, right? Defective babies and so on. Births comes about from the corruption of some interior what principle.

[46:36] Therefore, neither in morals can there be a sin except from an interior cause. Therefore, it does not have an exterior. Therefore, sin does not have an exterior cause.

[46:51] Moreover, the cause multiplied, the effect is multiplied. But the more and the greater are the exterior. exterior things inducing to sin, the less is that someone what, plainly, and is imputed to him as to sin, right? Therefore, nothing exterior is the cause of sin, right? So he's kind of saying they can diminish all kind of the responsibility for sin, but not

[47:23] Greek word for cause. I guess there's got the sense of responsible, right? You're responsible for this. That means you're the cause of this, right?

[47:35] It's your your negligence, right? But against this is what is said in the Book of Numbers in the Old Testament, there, chapter thirty-one, are that these not those who deceive the sons of Israel and make us what, here go astray. In the Lord, over the sin of Phogor, whatever that was. Therefore, something outside can be a cause making us to sin.

[48:21] Now, notice the way Thomas proceeds here in the reply, nice threefold reply here. I answer: It should be said that, as has been said above, the inward cause of sin is both the will, as what, as perfecting, completing the act of sin, and reason, as regards the lack of the suitable rule, and the sense desire as inclining. Right. Well, there's three. Three. No more, no less.

[49:00] Thus, therefore, something outside tripliciter, is able to be a cause of sin. Huh? Well, you know that would move me to enthusiasm, right? Huh?

[49:18] You know, when when Thomas is commenting on the premium of Aristotle to the De Anima, and Thomas says the premium has three parts. This is kind of you know this text is kind of you know bumped into our heads a lot by professors, you know. So every time we're writing a thesis or papers like that, you've got to have a premium with. These three parts, you know.

[49:46] So. So this is nice, though. Okay. Now, so it's going to have to move one of these three things, right? The will, however, as has been said above, cannot be moved inwardly, right? Except by what God, who cannot be the what cause of sin, as will be shown later on. But that'll be taken up, you know. I guess in the cause of sin in particular. It's God, a, cause of sin, huh?

[50:30] Whence it remains that nothing outside is able to be a cause of sin, except in so far as it moves reason, right? As a man or a demon persuading sin, right? Or as moving, right, the sense desire, just as exterior sensible things move sense desire, right? The woman or the bottle or something, you know.

[51:06] I asked my friend Jim, "I said, which is better, a woman or a bottle?" And he says, "A bottle, he said." Doesn't talk. One one one afternoon, Jim and I were visiting used bookshops, right? And so we go to used bookshop, and then we go to a tavern, have a beer or something, and then go to another used bookshop, and then you know, finally said to Jim, "We run out of bookshops."

[51:29] He says, "We don't run out of taverns yet." They go good together, you know, one to the other, back again. But neither exterior persuasion in things to be done, right? Huh? Of necessity moves what? Reason, huh?

[52:02] This happens in politics, right? Can't convince these people. Nor also does things outwardly proposed of necessity move sense desire, right? Huh? So one doesn't always go for the candy or whatever it is that's out there. Unless perhaps, huh? One in some way disposed, right? Huh? Okay.

[52:29] And nevertheless, also the sense desire does not of necessity move reason and the what will, right? Whence something outward is able to be a cause moving one to sin, right? But not sufficiently what inducing or leading us into what sin.

[52:53] But the cause sufficiently completing sin is the will alone, right? Yeah, so it's possible I get found the some in part of it, you know. I you know he says there's none no sin except to her, you know. But but you could pile to the will, right? You know, it's. Okay.

[53:21] That's important. I guess for helping clarify whatever discussion goes on about addiction and so on. Well, certainly this disposition can be established to make them weak and so on. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

[53:38] I think you have to understand that. Okay. The first objection was saying what the voluntary is in our power, right? Huh? Thomas admits that, right? To the first, therefore, it should be said that from this that the exterior or outward movers to sin. Do not sufficiently right induce, and from necessity right, it follows that there still remains in us to sin, and what, not to sin?

[54:13] The second should be said that through this, that there is laid down an inward cause of sin, does not exclude the exterior right, because that which is outside, for that which is outside is a cause of sin.

[54:33] Yeah, causes sin, except by means. of something interior. Yeah. Okay. So the candy doesn't make me eat to excess or something like that, right? But even so, in insofar as it moves the sense desire, right? But the will has to consent to stuffing myself. Okay.

[54:58] Um. To the third should be said that the exterior causes inclining to sin being multiplied, the acts of sin are multiplied, right? Because many from these causes, in many ways, are inclined to the acts of sin. That's a good description of mankind, right? plures ex illis causis et pluribus modis, many from those causes, and in many ways, I guess, are inclined. To the acts of sin, right? But nevertheless, the ratio of guilt, right?

[55:38] is lessened, right? Which consists in this that something is voluntary, within our power, right? So what about David and Bathsheba, right? He's moved by something exterior, right? But he was eventually forgiven, right? But he went pretty far, you know, having having his husband killed, you know. Thomas, you know, says that

[56:22] the Psalms are attributed to David, right? Or they've come from him, so that we don't lose hope, right? Our own sinfulness, right? It's kind of interesting, you know. You know, it's not Moses who composes the Psalms, but it's it's this David who's, you know, considered, you know, some very serious, very sins, right?

[56:52] Because there's a connection between hope, I guess, and and the divine attribute of mercy, it seems to me, right? And I believe God is because it is not because of his mercy. but I believe God, because of his truthfulness, right? But if I hope in God, it's primarily because of his what mercy, right?

[57:13] But his his justice and that sort of things more instills fear in me, right? Which is necessary, right? That's been kind of beautiful in the Psalms there. Thomas says, you know, that mercy without justice becomes what? Tyrannical or something. Excuse me. Would you say mercy without justice becomes? Mercy without justice becomes kind of weak. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And justice without mercy has another harm, right? You need kind of a balance between the two, right?

[57:49] I actually take that and kind of you know generalize it and say you know that you need a balance of hope and fear, right? And you could apply it to other kinds of hope and fear, but I just apply it sometimes to the philosopher, right? The philosopher despairs of finding the truth, as you might have these objections and so on. If that's all you hear, that's going to ruin you as a philosopher, right?

[58:13] If you despair of finding the truth, you'll give up the pursuit, right? But if you don't have the fear of making a mistake, right, and say you know you know I know all the answers and so on, and I can answer any question, then you become what? Have to make mistakes, right? So you need a balance of hope and fear. And the beautiful example given there is the one of Socrates in

[58:45] Phaedo, yeah, yeah, yeah. Because in the Phaedo they get into discussion, you know, of the immortality of the soul, which is a thing difficult to know, right? Is the soul immortal or not? And Socrates makes a joke there, right? About you know they say we're always discussing irrelevant things, you know, you know, things that are not apropos. And soon the day I'm going to die, you know, it might seem that this is not an irrelevant thing to be considering or to be thinking about.

[59:11] And so Socrates, you know, begins by defending the immortality of the soul. And it seems pretty good what he's said, the arguments he gives, and everybody seems to be more or less convinced. But there's a couple tougher guys there, you know. He said, he says, Socrates says, you guys, you know, still thinking about this, or you got to something else you're talking about, you know? So what we've been thinking about, you said, Socrates, and you know, I get an objection, and Summa is object, you know, and they give their objections, right?

[59:49] All of a sudden they fall into kind of a what despair, right? Because the arguments of Socrates seem so good, and now they don't seem to be good at all. And Socrates, the guy who's narrating this last day, Socrates, right? You know, he talks about the kind of you know that discouragement they had and if not despair. And the guy's hearing about it, yeah, but Socrates, you know, he said I never admired Socrates more than this time.

[1:00:18] Socrates a beautiful way of leading them out of this, right? And kind of restoring a little bit their their hope, you know. And then he he resolves the arguments, right? And the one of the guys' arguments are easier to handle than the other guy, and so he takes up the easier ones first, right? And they're really getting confidence just a minute now, you know, you know the the other the other guys got harder to answer, right?

[1:00:41] So he's always kind of what crushing them, you know. Like my friend Warren Murray said about Monsignor Dionne, you know, his principal passion is fear, right?

[1:00:54] And and you know if you come up with some new newfangled idea, you thought of, you know, his first impression, you know, is, you know, no, and but it forces you, you know, to to justify it, you know, and and to be more careful, right? So but I I remember what what Kasurik, my teacher, who studied under Dionne too, he he mentioned you know this one story where he was in class, you know, and seeing Dionne had solved some problems, what it was, and Kasurik, you know, came to speak.

[1:01:29] To Dionne in his office after class, right? And he was much different in the office than he had been in the classroom, you know. And Kasurik just kind of wondered about. it. He says, "why were you like that in class?" Oh, he says, "It's a business of the teacher to encourage the student." He says to think, you know. But then he had a guy that was, you know, pushing things, showing the difficulties, you know.

[1:01:52] So I mean, a teacher like that, or like Socrates, right? He can see where his his students are, right? And sometimes they need what encouraging, and sometimes they need to be discouraging, right? So, you know, you know, that's just a divine providence, you know. One thing I think thank God for is for Kasurik and De Koninck and Dion, right? Now, but if I'd gotten Dion first, I would have probably been afraid to think, you know.

[1:02:18] And Kasurik was always encouraging me, "Dwayne, you know, go on and read this, and you know." He kept me, you know, thought that into my mind to some extent, you know, and I was interested in something. And you know, occasionally he'd say, "Dwayne, you know, read very carefully."

[1:02:35] Dwayne would say, and so next time I got a taxi, he directed me to, you know, he'd make sure I was really knowing it, right? And then De Koninck was much more careful, right, than more than than Isuric was, right? And then Dion, you have more fear of Dion, you know. So you kind of move up, you know. But I got him the right order, right? I mean, I think it would have been, it would have been.

[1:02:57] If you had Dion first, it would have been a little bit. What are you doing? You know, he was yet yet yet come with him. Just his intensity, you know, huh? He'd see something, you know, huh?

[1:03:13] That I'd think about for a week or something, you know, something thing he said, you know. What are you doing? Do you see? You know, he sort of said it.

[1:03:26] But it's interesting to see even the mechanics of great great humility in front of Dionne, you know, and you know respect for him. I I I rented a place, you know, I stayed right across from De Koninck's house, you know. And sometimes I see Dionne coming up there to talk to Dionne, you know. so, and Dionne stopped in front of De Koninck's house, and we walked back and forth, just thinking out something like that, you know.

[1:03:50] I realized I just say a little walk on right on it when engaging in conversation, you know. But sometimes Deconic would ask Dion to make a logical analysis of some little text, you know, Dion. So. So we're up to Article Four now, is it? Yeah. Yeah. Okay.