Tertia Pars
11. Relations of Reason, the Divine Power, and the Grace of Union (ST III, Q.2, aa.10–11)
Class of 2008-10-23
https://berquistcourse.com/course/theology/13-tertia-pars/011-relations-of-reason-the-divine-power-and-the-grace-of-union/

[0:00] The Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit, Amen. 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 and help us to understand all that you've written. Father and Son,

[0:24] Holy Spirit, Amen. Now, like we were saying there, the guardian angel corrects you, you know, makes you think twice, right? Well, my guardian angel pulled me up and said, "Brookus, you are not saying exactly the right things here to these guys." Okay. Um.

[0:43] One kind of relation of reason, huh, that Aristotle talks about, is a strange case where one relation is real, right, on the one side, and then on the other side it's not real, but it's said because of the relation of the first one too, I know. And the example Aristotle gives is taken from knowing, where he says the knower always has knowledge of something, and the knower is really by his knowledge related to the thing he knows.

[1:22] So knowledge is knowledge of the known, right? But then he says the known is related by relation of what reason, huh? Okay. Now the reason for that is that knowledge is based upon immateriality,

[1:44] and sometimes they define knowing as receiving the form of another as other, while keeping the form you have, and that immaterial being is only in the knower, and it's not in the chair out there that is known. So there's nothing in the chair whereby it's really related to me, but there is something in me whereby related to the chair because I possess in this immaterial way the chair, right?

[2:14] Okay. Well, if I kick you, right? Huh? There's a relation between I think we're on both sides, huh? Um, and the kicker of you and you're being kicked by me, right? But we share in a certain motion, a certain activity, right? Okay. Well, now the great Avicenna and Thomas himself both refer to this is not the same way with love and the loved as it was with knowing and the knower, right?

[2:48] I think I was giving an example of that, right? And the reason for that, they both go back to the sixth book of wisdom. Where Aristotle says that truth and falsity are chiefly in the mind, although they're measured by the thing out there, but the good is chiefly in what? Things, right? Okay. So you got to be careful then to say that that's a relation of reason of the thing love to the what lover, right?

[3:19] Because it's not two kinds of what. Being right, huh? But the good is really in what things? Why truth is primarily the mind. That's a little a little thing there, which you got to. Your guardian angel pulls you up sometimes.

[3:38] Just a little aside here, but going back to Trinity, I ran across a very interesting text of Thomas, where he's taking up this question of whether the power to generate the son that the Father has. And the power to create are they the same power? Okay. Now, this is a question from my question disputata de potentia, right? So the power to generate the son, right?

[4:19] God the Father has the power to generate the son. Then you also have this power of God, the power to create. Now they the same power. What would you say, Bob? Yeah.

[4:46] Because the power to generate involves the power of God, as it's in the Father, right? Okay. But the power to create is common to all. Yeah. Okay. But basically, they're really the same powers. What Thomas is going to defend. What I found very interesting was this objection and the way Thomas replies to it, because he sees a likeness of these two to something in us. Okay. Now the objection is saying that the Father naturally gives birth to the son.

[5:25] So that up here you have nature, but as far as creating, God chooses to create us, huh? So it's will and choice, huh? Down here. The

[5:42] objection says, "Well, nature and will and choice are not the same thing. " And you know Aristotle, the ninth book of Wisdom. In speaking of this difference, he says that nature is determined to one. That's part of the reason why it's one son. Why the will is open to what opposites? Okay. So when I go to the restaurant, I sit down and give me the menu. I can choose to have chicken or not to have chicken, right?

[6:14] Or to have chicken or to have steak or something else, right? And why the nature is determined to one? Even Shakespeare, you know, the famous scene in Coriolanus, nature not being able to be more than one thing, right? So these seem to be opposites, right? And so these two powers can't be the same thing, right? Well, Thomas begins his answer by saying, "Well, but in God, nature and will are the same thing, right?

[6:42] " But then he goes on to a a very interesting distinction, and then a likeness to something in us. And he says, "Well, really, you shouldn't really say that this power to create is the will, right? " But you can say the will uses the power to create, right? Okay. Well, up here we always deny this, right? That the the Father didn't choose to produce the son; he naturally produces the son, right?

[7:16] And then Thomas says nothing prevents the same power, right, coming to something naturally, and then being moved by the will to something. And you know he takes as his example for this that be more known to us.

[7:39] He takes our reason, right? Okay. Now take two things that I think by my reason. I think that a whole is more than a part,

[7:59] and I naturally think that. Everybody naturally comes to think that a whole is more than a part. So my reason, you could say, is naturally led to think that a whole is more than a part. Now let's take something else. I think. I think that God became man. Do I naturally think that? No. Every man naturally thinks that a whole is more than a part. If he says he doesn't think that,

[8:36] we'd say, "Well, you you say that, but you really do think it. " He says, "No, no, I really I really think that you know the whole is not more than a part. " He says, well, we'll give you a part of your cell right today. We'll give you part of the car you bought. We'll give you part of the meal you ordered, right? " And he'll scream and rave and rant, and you'll see that he really knows that the whole is more than the part, right?

[8:58] So I naturally think the whole is more than the parts. Every man does, right? But now, why do I think that God became man? Do I think that naturally? No. But actually, my reason is moved by my will. My will under the influence of grace, undoubtedly, right? So you see the likeness, huh? Some things reason is moved to naturally, like to think that the whole is more than the part, and some things our reason does, right, like thinking that God became man, where it's moved by the what will.

[9:47] Okay. Now there are other things besides the will involved, but basically we know that those two are found in the case of what reason, right? And so that's like this one power, right, huh? It gives rise to the sun naturally, right? It gives rise to us creatures, as moved by the divine will, choosing you to be. I didn't know, why he chose you to be, or me, but he he chose us to be, right?

[10:19] That's why he chose some parents for us. All the way back, right? You know, we we should thank him for choosing a universe, right? Of which, however humble a part we could be, right? And choosing to have a church of which we could be a part, and so on. I think that's an interesting comparison, right? Okay.

[10:46] And then there's some things that the reason comes to by reasoning, right? From those things that actually knows. How did I come to think the Pythagorean theorem, right? Well, originally by will, right? But eventually I reasoned out from things I naturally knew, right? And sometimes you reason from these things. What's that

[11:11] kind of interesting? Interesting thing that Thomas has there. It's in the second question. there's two questions which taking up this potentia generandi, this power to generate that the Father has.

[11:29] Okay, we're up to the eleventh article here in this difficult question two. Excuse me, tenth, yeah, ten. Okay. To the tenth, then one proceeds thus. It seems that the union of the incarnation was not through what grace.

[11:52] For grace is a certain what accident, as has been said in the second part. Now, incidentally, how does Thomas distinguish between grace and the three theological virtues? Grace is a quality of the soul. Yeah. But it is a habit.

[12:22] Yeah. So, so when you study the soul and its powers, right? The soul is in the genus of substance. It's form, the genus of substance, and the soul naturally gives rise to, among other things, reason and what will, right? These powers, right? But the reason, the will are not the same thing as the soul, but they're natural powers of the soul. And Thomas will speak of sanctifying grace.

[13:01] As being in the soul, right, and making the soul kind of godlike, huh, or like Saint Peter says, kind of a partaking of the divine nature. And then from this grace, there flows into reason, right, faith, in the will, hope, and love or charity, right. Okay. So just as naturally, you could say, reason will arise in the soul, right. So likewise, the soul perfected by what, grace, right, gives rise to these virtues, theological virtues, in reason and in the what, the will.

[13:49] Incidentally, another little kind of interesting thing there. Remember that symmetry about the mass, the musical parts of the mass that I spoke of before, and we said that the symmetry was

[14:05] A B C B A, right. These five parts of the mass that are sung in at least the Roman rite, huh? You have the Kyrie, right, and the Agnus Dei, which are really prayers, huh, asking for God's mercy, right. And then you have the Gloria and the Sanctus and Benedictus, which are more praise of God, right, huh? And then you have the Credo, right, huh? So I was making a little kind of comparison there that, in a way, there's a reflection here of the theological virtues, huh?

[14:49] Because the Credo obviously corresponds to faith, right? And the prayers asking for God's mercy, these two here, correspond to what hope. And to some extent, you could put the praise with what love, right? And this comes out very clearly in that in the words of Saint Augustine, right, that I quoted many times, but that Paul VI in his address to the Saint Cecilia Society on the Feast of Saint Cecilia, quotes Augustine quite at length about the connection between music and love, right.

[15:30] But the phrases of Amare in laudibus, laudare in amore, right? To love in praises and to praise in love, right? So I'll rest my case there, right? That there's a connection between the praise and what love, huh? Well, then I was I was reading this address by Benedict the Sixteenth. And I think it's the one who's talking to the Benedictines, so the one gets a little more, you know, friendly with them, and talking about importance of singing these things, right?

[16:07] But he's noticing something here about the glory of the Sanctus that they both come from the what, angels, huh? Because the angels say glory to God in highest, and then in Isaiah, right, the seraphim and so on, sanctus, sanctus, sanctus, and then he quotes one of the Psalms, you know, I was singing in the presence of the angels and so on, right, huh? Well, it's kind of appropriate that the angels would come in here because they have the virtue of what, love, but they don't have faith and hope because they see God as he is.

[16:44] So it's kind of appropriate that the angels should be involved in the one that he says tied up with love, right? Okay. So grace is something. It's not the substance of the soul; it's something added. If we call it an accident, right? But it's fundamental, sanctifying grace, and from that there arises these virtues, huh? In the reason and in the the will.

[17:14] So grace is a certain accident, as is had in the second part. But the union of the human nature to the divine is not made through any accident, huh? I'll get you down to Nestorius or somebody, right? Okay. Therefore, it seems that the union, the incarnation, was not made by what, grace? That's the only very good argument. And then the second objection here is what I was saying, right?

[17:43] The subject of grace is the what, soul, right? But as is said in Colossians two, in Christ dwelt the what, fullness of divinity, even bodily, right? Well,

[18:02] think about that when you say Corpus Christi, right? Therefore, it seems that that union was not made by what, grace, huh? Moreover, every saint is united to God by grace. If, therefore, the union of incarnation was made by grace, it would seem that Christ is not, in another way, said to be God, than other holy men, right?

[18:35] But against this is what Augustine says in the book on the predestination of the saints. By that grace, right, from the beginning of what, faith of each man, huh? Each Christian, it comes about by which grace that man from the beginning was made what. Christ, huh?

[19:03] But that man was made Christ, the union of divine nature. Therefore, that union was made through grace. Well, of course, Thompson's going to see some distinction in the meaning of what? The word grace, huh?

[19:22] Grace is one of those words that you can't quite translate except by the word grace. You want to keep the different meanings in there, huh? I answer. It should be said that as has been said in the second part, grace is said in two ways.

[19:46] In one way, the very will of God giving gratis, right? Something, huh? And then, in another way, the gratuitous. what gift of God, right? Okay. I know, since some of these, you know, texts they want to translate grace by favor, right? Huh? Well, it kind of has something of the first meaning, right? Here that he gives of grace, but not in the second meaning, right? Okay. I mean, God's favor.

[20:20] Well, he approves of me somehow, you know. I don't think he does. I mean, but let's say for the sake of argument here, sake of illustration, you say he approves of me, but that's something in him, right? You know, not in me, right? Why does God have the second sense of grace, which is something in us? Huh? Okay.

[20:45] Now, human nature, huh, needs, indiget, huh, the gratuitous will of God, right? Huh. That's not owed to us, right? In order that we might be elevated to God, right? Since this is above the faculty, the power of his foot. nature, huh? But now human nature is elevated to God in two ways. Did you know that? In one way, by operation, by activity, by which the saints know and what love God.

[21:27] So knowing God and loving God are what activities, operations, right? Okay, and one is raised up to God by knowing Him in some way, and especially by loving Him. Huh? That's the old catechism answer, right? Who made me? God made me. Why to know and love Him, serve Him, right? In this world, happy in the next. But now there is another way that one is raised up to God.

[21:54] Another way through what being? Yeah, as a personality. Which mode or way is singular or unique to Christ? Huh. In which human nature was assumed to this, huh? That become what the nature of the person of the Son of God.

[22:21] Now it is manifest that for the perfection of operation, it's required that the power be perfected through a habit, huh? So the virtue of faith and the virtue of hope and the virtue of charity are habits, huh? Firm dispositions, huh?

[22:42] But the nature has being in its what suppositum, huh? In the underlying substance, does not come about by some what habit. It's immediate thing, right?

[22:59] So now he's going to answer the question. Keeping in mind these two senses of grace, right? Thus, therefore, it should be said that if by grace is meant the will of God doing something not out of justice but gratuitously, gratis,

[23:20] or having somebody as what acceptable to Him, then the union of the incarnation was made by grace, just as union of saints to God is through what knowledge and love. But if by grace one means the gratuitous gift of God,

[23:43] thus that human nature be united to the divine Person could be what said to be a certain grace, huh? In so far as by no preceding merits was this what done, made,

[24:01] but not by this that there is some what gratuit some habitual grace, right? By means of which such a union came about, huh? Okay. Because what what he said before that it's united in immediate way to the what Person of the what Son now the human nature is.

[24:30] So what Thomas is is saying is what it's not by an habitual grace that the human nature is united to the Son of God, right? It's immediate thing. It might be called grace in some other sense that he what that human nature doesn't merit that union, right?

[24:58] Because it's united to Him before He does anything to merit. He can merit on the cross and so on. And now he comes back to the first objection, right?

[25:15] To the first, therefore, it should be said that the grace which is an accident is a certain likeness of the divine nature partaken in by man. And I think that text he always quote from what Saint Peter, right?

[25:36] Consors in the Latin, right? Divine nature, but to the incarnation, human nature is not said to partake of some likeness of the divine nature.

[25:55] Which is not to say that Christ doesn't have grace; he doesn't have that too, right? But that's not what you are talking about when you talk about the what incarnation.

[26:06] But is said to be joined to the divine nature in the very person of the Son, hypostatic union. And greater is such a thing, right? Than its likeness Partaken of.

[26:29] Now, in, the second objection: Thomas is agreeing that grace is what habitual grace, right? Is in the soul, right? He says habitual grace is only in the what soul. But the grace that is the gratuitous gift of God, which is to be united to the divine person, as you know the sense of the word grace, right? Pertains to the whole human nature, right? Which is composed from the body, from the soul, and the what body.

[27:05] And in this way, the fullness of divinity is said to dwell in Christ, even what bodily. It's kind of interesting that prayer that the Immaculata sanctifica me corpus me corpus, you know, in some ways you know it's very, but it's because the plenitudo divinitatis dwells bodily, right? Why? Because even the body, right, is united, right? Because the divine nature is united not only to the soul but also to the what body, right?

[27:44] When they talk about the Eucharist, they say that the by words of the consecration, huh? They say this is my body. Then the body of Christ is there, but his blood and his soul and even his divinity are there by being joined, huh? And so, and he says, "This is my, you know, cup of my blood, " and so on. Then, by the words of the consecration, the blood is there, right?

[28:14] Because the blood is joined to the body, and the body and blood to the soul and these divinity, all the rest is there, right?

[28:33] But this is tied up with the idea that it's being corporally, right, bodily. One thing that's kind of interesting about the Eucharist: the Eucharist is the end and the culmination of all the sacraments. They're all ordered to the Eucharist. And the sacraments all get their efficacy from Christ's death on the cross.

[29:10] And sometimes, you know, they'll they'll point to the baptism, Eucharist, those two sacraments in particular, and see something in the the blood and the water that comes from Christ's side as referring to these two sacraments, right? And you know, it seems that in those two sacraments, especially the Eucharist, there's a greater symbolism of the what, passion, death, right? So Saint Paul would say, you know, you were buried with Christ in baptism.

[29:40] I suppose it's more explicit in the old times that you went down the stairs in the water, then came up, right? There's a more explicit representation of that, right? But that doesn't mean our baptisms aren't legal, right? We do it now, but. You priest, you know, correct me if I'm in incorrect here, but it seems to me that you know if the priest were to consecrate the body, right, consecrate the bread here, and then stop and not consecrate the blood, right, the

[30:19] bread would have been turned into the body of Christ, right? Okay, but this would be a great irregularity, right? And and the priest would not be allowed to consecrate one without consecrating the other, right? And part of the reason for that, even though it's enough for us, you know, as laymen, let's say, to receive just let's say the the host, right? But that the separate consecration of the body and the blood, right, represents the separation of the body and the blood on the what cross.

[30:55] So in that sense, it's more most essential to the Eucharist that you represent in a sensible way, right, the death of Christ on the cross. And you know that's the source of all the sacraments, right? It's most explicitly represented in the greatest of all the sacraments, and the one to which all the other ones are what ordered, huh? I was saying to a priest one time, I said, "No, why do you have these two consecrations?"

[31:31] I don't know where they, you know, they said they would have thought that somewhere along the line, you know, they would realize that that

[31:39] this is to represent the separation. At least he didn't say what consecration. So that's the explanation he gives there in that first paragraph of Christ the fullness of divinity dwelling what bodily in Christ, right?

[32:14] By this habitual grace in the saints is in their soul, right? Although it can also say that it is said to dwell in Christ bodily, that is not in a shadowy way, huh? Umbraliter, huh? Not shadowy, It's like an adverb almost there. As he dwelt in the sacraments of the Old Testament, huh? About which it is then joined afterwards that they are the shadows of the future things.

[32:44] The body, however, is what Christ against. Insofar as body is divided against what shadow, right? Some say that the divinity is said to have dwelt in Christ

[33:03] bodily in three ways, just as the body has three dimensions. In one way, through essence, presence, and power, as in other creatures. Another way, through grace, making one what acceptable to God, as in the saints. But in a third way, through a personal union, right, which is proper to Him, right.

[33:31] Whence he says is clear the answer to the third objection, right? Because the union of incarnation is not made only through the habitual grace. He doesn't deny the habitual grace of Christ as other saints united to God, but in this unique way, right? According to what subsistence, or according to the very persona. Sounds like that part of the Sacred Heart refers to the Sacred Heart of Jesus substantially united to the Word of God.

[34:05] Yeah. Yeah. Okay, now this next one here is about whether it was merited, I guess, huh? Okay, we can go on to eleven. Yeah. To the eleventh, one proceeds thus: It seems that the union Incarnation was made, fouling upon some merits, huh? Is that the way you translate it? subsecuta.

[34:39] Okay. Yeah. Because upon that is Psalm thirty-two, huh? May your mercy, O Lord, be upon us as we have hoped in you, right? I know it's going back again to this side here about the two prayers there, right? Um, and I tied them over hope, right? The Agnus Dei and the Kyrie Eleison. I know it's connection here between what mercy and hope here, right?

[35:16] Because hope seems to have as its object in part, at least, the the mercy of God, right? You know, the faith has more God as its object, as he's the first truth, and charity is God as its object, in so far as he is the supreme good. But hope is looking upon God as a difficult good, right? That can be gotten to only through the help of God through his mercy, huh?

[35:51] So hard to put to get out this human way of thinking about God, you know. Something, you know. I like to ask the question, though: If God had created nothing, would He have been selfish? You know. What did the the the average person think? you know. huh

[36:11] They probably think he would have been selfish, James. Then it wouldn't have been a Trinity. Yeah. I had someone say to me once on the other side of the coin that, well, if God created us just to praise Him, then He's selfish. Yeah, yeah. So He's selfish and makes us to be selfish. Yeah, I heard people say it's a big ego trip or something. Yeah, it was a long one.

[36:35] Yeah. And um, Cardinal Schönborn a couple years ago read an article on evolution question in the New York Times, and he got all these all these letters from scientists, and this one scientist went off. He says, "I really find it hard to believe about some guy up there with a white beard that we're supposed to." And this cardinal wrote back, and he said something like, "You know, I I I wish he would, you know, say something like, I wish he."

[37:16] Speak as intelligently about theology as you do about this childlike image. He was also being kind about saying that. You can't be serious. So may your mercy be upon us, Lord, as we have hoped in you.

[37:40] And here is insinuated, the gloss says, right, and the desire of the prophet about the incarnation and the merit of its what fulfillment, right? Therefore, the incarnation comes under merit.

[38:05] Moreover, whoever merits something merits that without which that cannot be had. But the ancient fathers, the Old Testament, merited eternal life, right? To which they were not able to arrive at or get to, except through the incarnation.

[38:31] For Gregory says Gregory the Great in the book on morals that those who before the coming of Christ right came into this world, however much they had the virtue of justice,

[38:48] in no way could they what when they were let out of their bodies be immediately received into the what bosom of the celestial fatherhood, because there had not yet come the one who would what gather the souls of just to the perpetual seat. Therefore, it seems that they merited the what incarnation because that was the necessary means of getting there.

[39:19] More about the Blessed Virgin now. Here we're getting serious. More about the Blessed Virgin is sung that she merited to bear the what the Lord of all, which was made through the incarnation. Therefore, the incarnation came under the merit.

[39:41] I don't know. Pretty good these objections, huh? Now, against this is what Augustine says in the book on the predestination of the saints. Quisquis in

[40:02] capite nostra, whoever right in our head right would find what preceding merits of that singular and unique what generation right? He and us, his members. seeks what

[40:24] merits preceding this what multiplied regeneration, but no merits precede our regeneration, according to that of Titus chapter. This is the Titus chapter three verse five. Not from the works of justice which we make, but according to His mercy, He saves us through the washing of regeneration. Therefore, neither was that generation of Christ did some merits precede the generation of what Christ.

[41:07] The answer, it should be said, that as regards Christ Himself, is manifest from the foregoing, that no merits of His could precede what that union, right? Because he couldn't do anything until he had that nature, right? He couldn't do anything as a human. For we do not lay down that before he was a what pure man, just a man, and after by the merits of a good life he obtained to be the Son of God, as Photinus said, right?

[41:42] Other heretics, but we lay down that from the beginning of his conception that man was truly right the Son of God, right? As not having any other hypostasis than that of the Son of God, according to that of Luke chapter one verse thirty-five. Who is born of you, the saint will be born of you, this holy one will be called the what Son of God, right? And therefore, all operation, all doing of that man was subsequent to the what union.

[42:24] Whence no doing of his could what be the merit of the union? It's not like the old mythology there, you know, the great war, you know, it gets summed up and rakes the gods, right, for his great deeds, you know.

[42:44] What about other men? No, could other men merit that? Right, but neither could the doings of any other man, right, be meritorious of that union and then kind of the technical term ex condigno, right? Huh? Okay, might be a certain appropriate as you you might say, right? But not condigno worthy of it, right? Okay.

[43:16] First, huh? Because the meritorious doings of man are properly ordered to beatitude, which is the what reward of virtue, and which consists in the full enjoyment of God.

[43:41] But the union of the incarnation, since it was in the personal being, right, it goes beyond, transcends the union of the blessed mind to God, which is through his act of what enjoying God, huh? And thus it cannot come under what merit, huh? You see what I was he saying there, right? It goes back even to philosophy there, where human happiness, right, is the reward of what virtuous activity. Right, and Thomas sometimes says, you know, virtue is the road to happiness, and you can say vice is the road to to misery, right?

[44:24] And you can pick up the daily newspaper, which I know the gentlemen don't do anymore, but there's always somebody miserable there in some situation, and the road he got there was some vice, right?

[44:36] But is the union of our mind with God in the vision, is that as great a union as that of the incarnation? No. Um. So if this union of our mind with God is what we, in a sense, merit by our virtuous activity, right? We're meriting something less than the incarnation, huh? Yeah. Notice how the other side of that thing is too. You know, remember, I think we're studying the reasons for the incarnation, and you know, in the Summa Contra Gentiles, my favorite book, the first reason Thomas gives for the incarnation is that man would have hope of the vision as possible, right?

[45:28] Because if this greater union has taken place, right, then the what lesser one would be possible. If human nature could be raised to what this personal union with God, right, then it could be raised to this union whereby we would see God as He is, right? And in a sense, it's a little bit like the old rule in dialectic, right? If what is seems

[46:00] less possible is possible, right, then the what more apt to be done would be so, right? Yeah. That's the first reason he gives. That's a very good reason, right? It's very interesting in terms of what we saw before. Secondly, because grace cannot fall under what merit, right? Because it's the beginning of merit.

[46:33] You see, now in the prayers of Thomas, there you know he's asking for grace that you would give him grace, and then and then reward that grace that you're giving me.

[46:44] Whence, much less does the incarnation come under merit, right? Because it's the beginning of grace, right? According to that of John chapter one verse seventeen, grace and truth was made through what Jesus Christ. That's interesting, right? You're saying grace precedes merit, right? And the incarnation precedes even grace, right? Yeah.

[47:11] And Thomas is dividing the the Bible, right? You quote that passage there, the whole thing, and says, "For the law was given by Moses, but grace and truth came through what, Jesus Christ." And then he divides the Old Testament the basis of the law, the law of the Father and the law of the King, the New Testament and the basis of grace, the origin of grace, the nature of grace, and the effect of grace, huh?

[47:37] Which is almost in the Second Vatican Council, by the way, because they give the the what Gospels first, which is the origin of grace, and then the epistles of St. Paul, which is the nature of grace, and then they put the what, acts the apostles with the canonical epistles and the Apocalypse, which is the chief effect of grace, you might say, the Church as a whole, right?

[48:01] The origin of the Church and the growth of the Church and the final state of the Church, right? That's a beautiful argument, isn't it?

[48:15] Grace precedes merit, and the if grace comes through Jesus Christ, then that's twice the rule, right? So don't put the cart before the horse. There's this joke about the cart. Now you put the cart before the horse. Actually, Descartes does.

[48:46] Third, because the incarnation of Christ was reforming, remaking the whole of human nature, right? Okay. And therefore, it does not come under the merit of some individual man, right? Because the good of some mere man, right, pure man, purely man, cannot be the cause of the good of the whole of nature, right? So he's saying in those two arguments that, and these are technical words he uses, also ex condigno, right?

[49:23] Huh? But there's a suitability ex congruo, right? Some what holy fathers merited what the incarnation, right? Huh? By desiring it and what asking for it, yeah. For it is suitable that God hears those who what obey Him, right?

[49:50] And that's the way he answers the first what objection, right? Just taken from the text there about the fathers, right? Huh? Um. Now to the second, right? Second argument is saying, well, if you merit one thing, you merit the means to it, right? To the second, it should be said that this is false: that under merit falls all that without which reward cannot what be.

[50:24] For some things there are which are not only required for the reward, but also they are what preexist; they are presupposed to what merit, as the divine goodness, right, and his grace being his favor, right, and even the nature of man. And likewise, the mystery of incarnation is the beginning of merit, because of the fullness of Christ we have all received, as is said in John one sixteen.

[50:58] That's kind of going back to the body, the article there, right? The arguments that he's giving. To the third, it should be said that the Blessed Virgin is said to have merited to carry the Lord Jesus Christ, not because she what merited for God to become flesh, but because she merited from the grace given to her, right, that grade of purity and sanctity that she could suitably be the what mother of God.

[51:36] Let's go take a little break before going to the.