Dist. 17
by St. Bonaventure
Source text: Public Domain Mark 1.0. English translation/apparatus/encoding: CC BY-NC 4.0, Wroot Press.
https://bonaventure.wrootpress.com/browse/1/d/17/q/bon-sent-I-d17-littera
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### DISTINCTION XVII.

### Part 1.

#### CHAPTER I. *That the Holy Spirit is the charity by which we love God and neighbor.*

Now at last let us approach the assignment of the mission of the Holy Spirit, by which he is invisibly sent into the hearts of the faithful. For the Holy Spirit himself, who is God and the third person in the Trinity, as was shown above, temporally proceeds from the Father and the Son and from himself, that is, is sent and given to the faithful. But what this mission or giving is, and how it comes about, must be considered.

So that this may be more intelligibly taught and more fully grasped, something must be premised that is highly necessary for the matter. It was indeed said above and shown by sacred authorities that the Holy Spirit is the love of the Father and of the Son, by which they love each other and us. To this it must be added that the same Holy Spirit is the love or charity by which we love God and neighbor. When this charity is so present in us that it makes us love God and neighbor, then the Holy Spirit is said to be sent or given to us; and one who loves the very love by which he loves his neighbor, in that very act loves God, since that love itself is God, that is, the Holy Spirit.

Lest, however, in so great a matter we should seem to introduce anything of our own, let us corroborate what has been said by sacred authorities. On this Augustine, in the eighth book *On the Trinity*, says: «Whoever loves his neighbor, the consequence is that he should especially love love itself. But God is love. The consequence therefore is that he should especially love God». Likewise in the same book: «*God is love*, as the Apostle John says. Why then do we go and run into the heights of the heavens and the depths of the earth, seeking him who is with us, if we are willing to be with him»? «Let no one say: I do not know what to love. Let him love his brother and let him love that same love. For he knows the love by which he loves better than the brother whom he loves. Behold, you can already have God better known to you than your brother — clearly better known, because more present, because more inward, because more certain.

Embrace love as God and by love embrace God. This is the love that joins all the good Angels and all God's servants together in the bond of holiness. Therefore the more sound we are from the swelling of pride, the fuller we are with love: and of what but God is he full who is full of love»? With these words Augustine sufficiently shows that love itself, by which we love God or neighbor, is God. But still more clearly in the same book he adds, saying: «Let us attend to how greatly the Apostle John commends fraternal love. *Whoever loves*, he says, *his brother abides in the light, and there is no scandal in him*. It is plain that he places the perfection of righteousness in love of one's brother. For in whomever there is no scandal, he is altogether perfect. And yet he seems to have been silent about love of God — which he would never do, except because in fraternal love itself he wishes God to be understood. For most plainly in the same Epistle he says, a little later: *Beloved, let us love one another, since love is from God: and everyone who loves is born of God and has known God. He who does not love has not known God, since God is love*. This linkage declares plainly enough that this same fraternal love — for fraternal love is that by which we love one another — is preached on so great an authority, namely John's, to be not only from God but also itself God. When therefore by love we love a brother, by God we love a brother; nor can it be otherwise than that we should love that very love most of all by which we love a brother, since God is love». Likewise: «*He who does not love his brother is not in love; and he who is not in love is not in God, since God is love*». Behold, most plainly he says that fraternal love is God.

#### CHAPTER II. *That fraternal love is God — neither the Father nor the Son, but only the Holy Spirit.*

But although fraternal love is God, it is neither the Father nor the Son, but only the Holy Spirit, who in the Trinity is properly called love or charity. Whence Augustine in the fifteenth book *On the Trinity*: «If among God's gifts there is nothing greater than charity, and there is no gift of God greater than the Holy Spirit, what is more consequent than that he himself should be the charity which is called both God and from God»? «For so John says: *Love is from God*; and a little later: *God is love*. Where he makes plain that the love which he said was from God is what he called God. God therefore from God is love». Likewise in the same book: «*John, wishing to speak more openly about this matter, says: In this we know that we abide in him and he in us, because he has given us of his Spirit*. The Holy Spirit therefore, of whom he gave to us, makes us abide in God and him in us; and this love does. He himself therefore is God love. He himself, then, is signified where it is read: *God is love*». From these things it is clear that the Holy Spirit is charity.

#### CHAPTER III. *That the saying* God is charity *is not said by way of cause, in the way that* Thou art my patience and my hope *is.*

But lest perhaps someone say that *God is charity* is said by way of expressing a cause, namely that charity is from God and is not himself God — as it is said: *God is our patience and our hope*, not because he himself is these things, but because they are from God — Augustine meets this, showing that this is not said by way of cause, as those expressions are, in the fifteenth book *On the Trinity*, saying thus: «We are not going to say that charity is on this account called God — namely, that this charity is one substance worthy of God's name — but only that it is a gift of God, in the way that it is said to God: *Thou art my patience*. For this was certainly not said because the substance of God is our patience, but because it is from him to us. Whence elsewhere: *From him is my patience*. The very turn of Scripture's speech easily refutes this sense. For *Thou art my patience* is of the same kind as *O Lord, my hope*, and *My God, my mercy*, and many similar expressions. But it is not said: O Lord, my charity, or: thou art my charity, or: my God, my charity; but it is said in this way: *God is charity*, just as it is said: *God is spirit*. Whoever does not discern this, let him not seek the explanation from us, but understanding from the Lord; for we cannot say anything more plainly. *God therefore is charity*». From what has been said it is clear that the Holy Spirit is the charity by which we love God and neighbor; whence it is easier for us to show in what way the Holy Spirit is sent or given to us.

#### CHAPTER IV. *In what way the Holy Spirit is sent or given to us.*

He is then said to be sent or given to us when he is so in us that he makes us love God and neighbor — through which we abide in God and God in us. Whence Augustine, suggesting this manner of mission, in the fifteenth book *On the Trinity*, says: «God the Holy Spirit, who proceeds from God, when he is given to a man, kindles him to love God and neighbor — and he himself is love. For man has nothing from which he might love God, except from God». Behold how the Holy Spirit is given or sent to us, according as he is called gift or thing-given. This gift Augustine commends, explaining more openly how it is given, in the same book: «*The love of God*, he says, *is poured forth in our hearts*, as the Apostle says, *through the Holy Spirit who has been given to us*. There is nothing more excellent than this gift of God. It alone is what divides the children of the kingdom from the children of perdition. Other gifts also are given through the Spirit, but without charity they profit nothing. Therefore unless the Holy Spirit be imparted to someone in such a way as to make him a lover of God and of neighbor, he is not transferred *from the left* to the right. Nor is the Holy Spirit properly called gift except on account of love — the man who lacks which, *though he speak with all tongues, and have prophecy and all knowledge and all faith, and distribute all his substance, and deliver up his body so that it burns, profits him nothing*. How great a good then is that without which such great goods lead no one to eternal life? Love itself, however, or charity — for both are the name of one thing — leads to the kingdom. Therefore the love which *is from God and is God* is properly the Holy Spirit, through whom God-charity is poured forth in our hearts, by which the whole Trinity dwells in us. And so most rightly the Holy Spirit, since he is God, is also called the gift of God. And what is this gift properly to be understood as, except charity, which leads to God, and without which any other gift of God does not lead to God»? Behold, here it is opened up — what was said above — namely that charity is the Holy Spirit and the more excellent gift, and how this gift, that is, the Holy Spirit, is given to us: namely, when he is so imparted to someone, that is, when he so has being in someone, that he makes him a lover of God and of neighbor. When he does this, then he is said to be given or sent to someone, and then that person is properly said to have the Holy Spirit.

#### CHAPTER V. *Whether the Holy Spirit is increased in a person, or is more or less had or given, and whether he is given to one who has and to one who does not have.*

Here the question is asked: if charity is the Holy Spirit, since charity itself is increased and diminished in a person and is held more and less at different times, whether it must be granted that the Holy Spirit is increased or diminished in a person and is held more or less. For if in a person he is increased and is given and held more or less, he seems to be mutable; but God is altogether immutable. Therefore it seems that either the Holy Spirit is not charity, or charity is not increased or diminished in a person. Likewise: charity is given to one who does not have it, that he may have, and to one who has, that he may have more fully. If, then, the Holy Spirit is charity, he is given both to one who does not have, that he may have, and to one who has, that he may have more fully. But how is he given to one who does not have, since he, as God, is everywhere and whole in all creatures? And how is he more fully given or had without change in himself?

Thus we reply, saying that the Holy Spirit, that is, charity, is utterly immutable and is neither increased nor diminished in himself, nor does he in himself receive more or less, but rather is increased and diminished in a person, or rather *to* a person, and is more or less given or had — just as God is said to be magnified and exalted in us who in himself is neither magnified nor exalted. Whence the Prophet: *Man shall come to a deep heart, and God shall be exalted*. Upon which place an authority says: «God grows great not in himself, but in the heart of man». So therefore the Holy Spirit is given to a person, and once given is given still further — that is, increased — and is held more and less, and yet remains immutable.

And although he is everywhere and whole in every creature, there are nonetheless many who do not have him. For not all those in whom he is have the Holy Spirit; otherwise even irrational creatures would have the Holy Spirit, which the piety of the faith does not admit.

In order, however, that what we have said may become more certain, let us confirm it by authority. That the Holy Spirit is more and less perceived, and is increased in a person, and is given to one who does not have, and to one who has so that he may be had more, Augustine shows on John, saying: «Without the Holy Spirit it is settled that we cannot love Christ and keep his commandments — and that we can do and accomplish this so much the less, by how much we perceive him less, and so much the more, by how much we perceive him more. Therefore not only to one who does not have him, but also to one who has him, is he not promised in vain: to one who does not have, that he may be had; to one who has, that he may be had more. For if he were not held less by one and more by another, the holy Elisha would not have said to the holy Elijah: *Let the spirit which is in thee be doubled in me*. *To Christ*, however, who is *the Son of God*, *the Spirit was not given by measure*. Nor indeed is the *Mediator of God and men, the man Christ*, without the grace of the Holy Spirit; for the fact that he is the only-begotten Son equal to the Father is not of grace but of nature, while the fact that man was assumed into the unity of the person of the Only-begotten is of grace, not of nature. To others, however, he is given by measure, and once given is added to, until for each one a measure proper to his perfection is made full». Behold, you have it expressed that the Holy Spirit is given or received more and less, and once given to a person is increased, and is given both to one who has and to one who does not have, since the Holy Spirit is charity, which is given to one who does not have and is increased and grows in one who has. Indeed, to speak more truly and more properly, it is the man who advances in it and at times falls back; and then *it* is said to advance or fall back, although it neither advances nor falls back in itself, since it is God. Whence Augustine in the ninth homily on the Epistle of John says: «Let each one prove how much charity has advanced in him, or rather, how much he has advanced in charity. For if charity is God, it neither advances nor falls back. So therefore charity is said to advance in you because you advance in it». Behold, this is how it is to be understood when the Holy Spirit is said to be increased in us — namely, because we advance in him; and so for other expressions of this kind.

#### CHAPTER VI. *That some say that the charity of God and of neighbor is not the Holy Spirit.*

It was said above that the Holy Spirit is the charity of the Father and of the Son, by which they love each other and us, and that he himself is the same charity which is poured forth in our hearts unto loving God and neighbor. The first of these all Catholics concede — namely, that the Holy Spirit is the charity of the Father and of the Son; but that he is the same charity by which we love God and neighbor is denied by very many. For they say: if the Holy Spirit is the charity of the Father and of the Son and ours, then it is the same charity by which God loves us and by which we love him. But the authorities of the Saints seem to deny this. For Augustine, in the book *On the Spirit and the Letter*, says: «Whence is love, except from the same source whence faith itself comes — that is, from the Holy Spirit? For it would not be in us unless it were poured forth in our hearts through the Spirit. *But the love of God is said to be poured forth in our hearts*, not by which he loves us, but by which he makes us his lovers. Just as God's righteousness is so called by which we are made righteous by his gift, and the Lord's salvation by which he saves us, and the faith of Christ by which he makes us faithful». By these words there seems to be shown a distinction between the charity by which God loves us and that by which we love. And just as our righteousness is called God's, not because he himself is righteous by it, but because by it he makes us righteous — and likewise faith and salvation — so the charity of God which is in us seems to be so called not because he loves by it but because he makes us love by it. On this also the same Augustine in the fifteenth book *On the Trinity* says: «When John had recalled the love of God, not by which we love him, but by which he himself loved us, and sent his Son as our liberator on behalf of our sins». Behold, here also he seems plainly to divide the love by which we love God from that by which he himself loves us. If therefore — they say — the Holy Spirit is the love both by which God loves and by which we love, there are two loves, indeed two diverse things, which is absurd and far from the truth. Therefore he is not the love by which we love, but only that by which God loves us.

To these we reply, determining the words of the cited authorities in this way: *the love of God is said to be poured forth in our hearts*, not by which he himself loves us, but by which he makes us love, and so on. By these words there is no division shown nor diverse charity shown — that by which God loves us, distinct from that by which we love — but rather, since it is one and the same charity and is called God's charity, it is shown to be called God's charity in Scripture for diverse causes and reasons. For it is called God's charity either because God loves us by it, or because by it he makes us his lovers.

When therefore the Apostle says that *the charity of God is poured forth in our hearts*, it is not called the charity of God by which he loves us, but the charity by which he makes us love — that is, it is not there called God's charity because God loves us by it, but because by it he makes us his lovers. And that on that ground it can be called the charity of God, namely because by it he makes us love, he shows from a similar genre of speech: just as it is said God's righteousness, by which he makes us righteous, and the Lord's salvation, by which he saves us, and the faith of Christ, by which he makes us faithful.

Likewise we explain the other authority, where he says that the love of God is recalled, not by which we loved him, but by which he himself loved us — as if he were saying: he recalls God's love, not according as we love God by it, but according as he himself loves us by it.

But there is something else, they say, that presses more heavily. For Augustine said above that love is from the Holy Spirit, from whom faith also is. As therefore faith is not the Holy Spirit from whom it is, so neither is charity. For how is charity the Holy Spirit if it is from him? For if it is from him and is himself, then the Holy Spirit is from himself. To which we say: the Holy Spirit indeed is not from himself, but he is given to us by himself, as has been said above. For the Holy Spirit gives himself to us. And in this sense it is said that charity is from him in us — and yet that charity is the Holy Spirit. Faith, however, is from the Holy Spirit and is not the Holy Spirit, since it is only a gift or thing-given, not the God who gives.

They also bring forward other arguments to show the same — namely, that charity is not the Holy Spirit, since charity is an affection of the mind and a movement of the soul, but the Holy Spirit is not an affection of the soul or a movement of the mind, since the Holy Spirit is immutable and uncreated: therefore he is not charity.

That charity is an affection of the soul and a movement of the mind they confirm by authorities. For Augustine in the third book *On Christian Doctrine* says: «I call charity the movement of the soul toward enjoying God for his own sake, and oneself and one's neighbor on account of God». The same in the book *On the Customs of the Catholic Church*, treating that word of the Apostle: *Neither death nor life shall be able to separate us from the charity of God*: «The charity of God, he says, is here called a virtue, which is the most upright affection of our soul that joins us to God, by which we love him». Behold, by these words it is expressed that charity is an affection and movement of the soul, and accordingly does not seem to be the Holy Spirit.

To this we say that this is so said in the way that it is said: God is our hope and our patience, because he makes us hope and endure. Just so, charity is said to be a movement or affection of the soul, because by it the soul is moved and affected toward loving God. Nor should you marvel if charity, since it is the Holy Spirit, is said to be a movement of the mind — since even in the book of Wisdom it is said of the Spirit of Wisdom, *which reaches from end to end*, that he is *a movable, certain, undefiled act*. This is not said because Wisdom is something movable or some sort of act, but because by his own immobility he reaches all things — not by local motion, but in such a way that he is everywhere always and is nowhere held in confinement. So therefore charity is said to be a movement of the soul — not because it is itself a movement or affection or virtue of the soul, but because by it, as if it were a virtue, the mind is affected and moved. But if charity is the Holy Spirit, who *works in each one as he wills* — since by him a man's mind is affected and moved to believing or to hoping and the like, just as to loving — why is charity not also called a movement or affection of the mind toward believing or hoping, just as toward loving? To which it can be said with reason: because charity, that is, the Holy Spirit, works the other acts and movements of the virtues through the mediation of the virtues whose acts they are — namely the act of faith (that is, to believe by the mediation of faith) and the act of hope (that is, to hope by the mediation of hope). For through faith and hope he works the said acts. But the act of loving he works by himself alone, without the mediation of any virtue — that is, to love. Therefore he works this act otherwise than the other acts of the virtues. And for this reason Scripture speaks differently about this and the others, attributing this one specially to charity. Charity, then, is truly the Holy Spirit. Whence Augustine, treating the aforementioned word of the Apostle, in the same book says that charity is a good than which nothing is better, and by this he signifies that charity itself is God, saying: «If no thing separates us from his charity, what can be not only better but also more certain than this good»? Behold, he says that nothing is better than charity. Therefore charity is the Holy Spirit, who is God and the gift of God or the thing-given, who divides his gifts to the individual faithful, while he himself is not divided but is given undivided to each. Whence Augustine, where John says that *the Spirit is not given to Christ by measure*, says: «But to others he is divided — not the Spirit himself, but his gifts».

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