Dist. 27
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/2/d/27/q/bon-sent-II-d27-littera
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### DISTINCTION XXVII.

#### Cap. I.

#### *Whether the grace which is called operating is the same as that which is called cooperating.*

Here it must be considered, since it has been said above that by *operating* and *prevenient* grace the will of man is freed and prepared, so that it may will the good, and by *cooperating* and *subsequent* grace is aided, lest it will in vain: whether the grace is one and the same, that is, one freely-given gift, which both operates and cooperates; or whether it is diverse, the one operating, the other cooperating. — To certain men it seems not irrationally that it is one and the same grace, the same gift, the same virtue, which both *operates* and *cooperates*, but on account of its diverse effects it is also called operating and cooperating. For it is called *operating* insofar as it frees and prepares the will of man, so that he may will the good; and *cooperating* insofar as it aids that same will, lest it will in vain, namely that it may do a good work. For grace itself is not idle, but merits to be increased, so that, increased, it may merit also to be perfected.

#### Cap. II.

#### *In what way grace merits to be increased.*

But if it is asked in what way this prevenient grace merits to be increased and perfected, since no merit exists apart from free choice; and what this grace itself is, whether a virtue, or not; and if a virtue, whether an act, or not: so that this may be plainly intimated, it must be premised that there are three kinds of goods.

#### Cap. III.

#### *On the three kinds of goods.*

For some are *great*, some *least*, and some *middling*, as Augustine says in the first book of the Retractations: « The virtues, he says, by which one lives rightly, are great goods. But the appearances of any bodies whatsoever, without which one can live rightly, are least goods. And the powers of the soul, without which one cannot live rightly, are middling goods. Likewise, no one uses the virtues badly; but the other goods, that is, the middling and the least, anyone can use not only well but also badly; and therefore no one uses virtue badly, because the work of virtue is the good use of those things which we can use also not well; but no one by using well uses badly. And not only the great, but also the middling and least goods, the goodness of God bestowed ». — Behold, you have the three kinds of goods distinguished.

#### Cap. IV.

#### *In which goods free choice is found.*

But it is asked, in which goods free choice is contained. On this Augustine in the first book of the Retractations thus says: « In the middling goods indeed is found the free choice of the will, because we can also use it badly; but yet it is such that without it we cannot live rightly. But the good use of it is now a virtue, which is found among the great goods, which no one can use badly. And since goods both great and middling and least are from God, it follows that the good use of free will is also from God, which is a virtue and is numbered among the great goods ». — Attend diligently to what has been said, and gather it into one; for thus will be opened what was asked above. He said indeed that the work of virtue is the good use of those goods which we can also use not well, that is, of the middling goods, in which he placed free choice, whose good use too he said to be a virtue. But if this is so, then it is not the work of virtue, as he said above, because virtue is one thing, the work of it another.

#### Cap. V.

#### *On virtue, what it is, and what its act is.*

Here it must be seen what virtue is, and what its act or work is. — Virtue is, as Augustine says, a good quality of the mind, by which one lives rightly, and which no one uses badly, which God alone works in man. Therefore it is the work of God alone, as Augustine teaches concerning the virtue of justice upon that place of the Psalm: *I have done judgment and justice*, thus saying: « Justice is a great virtue of the soul, which none has made in man save God. Therefore, when the Prophet, in the person of the Church, says: *I have done justice*, he willed not the virtue itself, which man does not make, but the work of it, to be understood ». — Behold, it is here plainly intimated that justice in man is not the work of man, but of God; which is likewise to be understood of the other virtues.

For writing to the Ephesians concerning the grace of faith, the Apostle similarly asserts that faith is not from man, but from God alone, saying: *By grace you are saved through faith, and this not from yourselves; for it is the gift of God*. Which is thus expounded by the Saints: « This, that is, faith, is not by the power of our nature, because it is purely the gift of God ». — Behold, here too it is manifestly handed down that faith is not from the liberty of choice or from the choice of the will, which is consonant with what was said above, where it was said that prevenient or operating grace is the virtue which frees and heals the will of man. Whence Augustine in the book on the Spirit and the Letter says: « We are justified not through free will, but through the grace of Christ; not that this comes about without our will, but our will is shown to be infirm through the law, so that grace may heal the will, and the healed will may fulfill the law ».

#### Cap. VI.

#### *On the grace which frees the will, whether it is a virtue, or not.*

If, then, the grace which heals and frees the will of man is a virtue, whether one or several; since grace itself is not from the choice of the will, but rather heals and prepares it, that it may be good; it follows that virtue is not from free choice, and thus is not a motion or affection of the mind, since every motion or affection of the mind is from free choice, but the good [motion] is from grace and free choice, while the bad is from free choice alone. For as Augustine says in the first book of the Retractations: « Man of his own accord and by free choice was able to fall, but not also to rise again ». The same in the book on the Two Souls: « If souls lack the motion of the mind for doing and not-doing freely, if finally no power of abstaining from their own work is granted them, we cannot hold them guilty of sin ». — Here it is plainly shown that the motion of the mind, whether to good or to evil, is from free choice. Therefore, if grace or virtue is a motion of the mind, it is from free choice. But if it is from free choice even in part, then God alone does not make it without man. Therefore certain men not unlearnedly hand down that virtue is a good quality or form of the mind, which informs the soul; and it itself is not a motion or affection of the soul, but by it free choice is aided, that it may be moved and raised toward the good; and thus from virtue and free choice is born a good motion or affection of the soul, and thence a good work proceeds outwardly. Just as by rain the earth is watered, that it may germinate and bear fruit, yet the rain is not the earth, nor the sprout, nor the fruit, nor is the earth the sprout or fruit, nor the sprout

the fruit; so into the earth, freely given, of our mind, that is, into the choice of the will, is poured the rain of the divine blessing, that is, grace is breathed in — which God alone does, not man with him — by which the will of man is watered, that it may germinate and bear fruit; that is, it is healed and prepared, so that it may will the good, according to which it is called *operating*; and it is aided, that it may do the good, according to which it is called *cooperating*. And that grace is not incongruously named a *virtue*, because it heals and aids the infirm will of man.

#### Cap. VII.

#### *In what way good merits begin from grace, and of which grace this is to be understood.*

When therefore good merits are said to be from grace and to begin; either grace freely-giving is understood, that is, God, or rather grace freely given, which goes before the will of man. For it would be no great thing if these were said to be from God, from whom are all things; but rather his grace freely given is understood, from which good merits begin, which, although they are said to be from grace alone, free choice is not thereby excluded, because no merit is in man which is not through free choice. But in the meriting of good things the principality of cause is attributed to grace; because the principal cause of good merits is grace itself, by which free choice is stirred and healed, and the will of man is aided, that it may be good.

#### Cap. VIII.

#### *That the good will is said to be principally from grace.*

Which good will is itself also the gift of God and the merit of man, nay rather of grace, because it is principally from grace and is grace. Whence Augustine to the priest Sixtus: « What is the merit of man before grace, since grace alone makes our every good merit in us »? For from grace, as has been said, which goes before and heals the choice of man, and from that choice itself, is procreated in the soul of man a good affection or a good motion of the mind; and this is man's first good merit. Just as, for example, from the virtue of faith and the choice of man is generated in the mind a certain good and rewardable motion, namely the very act of believing; so from charity and free choice another certain motion proceeds, namely loving, very good; and so is it to be understood of the other virtues. And these good motions or affections are *merits* and *gifts of God*, by which we merit both their increase and other things, which are consequently bestowed upon us here and in the future.

#### Cap. IX.

#### *By what reckoning faith is said to merit justification.*

When therefore faith is said to merit justification and eternal life, it is taken to be said on this account, that through the act of faith it merits them. Similarly it is taken of charity and justice and the others. For if faith itself, the prevenient virtue, were said to be an act of the mind, which is a merit, then it itself would have its origin from free choice; which, because it is not so, it is *thus* said to be a merit, because its act is a merit, provided however that charity is present, without which neither to believe nor to hope is a merit of life. Whence it appears truly that charity is the Holy Spirit, which informs and sanctifies the qualities of the soul, that by them the soul may be informed and sanctified, without which a quality of the soul is not called a *virtue*, because it has no power to heal the soul.

#### Cap. X.

#### *On the gifts of the virtues, and on the grace which is not, but makes, merit.*

From the gifts of the virtues, therefore, we are good and live justly; and from the grace which is not a merit, but makes [merit], yet not without free choice, proceed our merits, namely good affections and their progress and good works, which God rewards in us, and these very things are the gifts of God. Whence Augustine to the priest Sixtus: « When God crowns our merits, he crowns nothing other than his own gifts. Whence eternal life, which at the end is rendered by God to preceding merits — since even the very merits, to which it is rendered, are not from us, but are made in us through grace — is rightly itself also called grace, because it is given freely. Nor freely on this account, that it is given not to merits, but because those very merits also, to which it is given, were given through grace ». From the foregoing it can now in some measure become known to us how prevenient grace merits to be increased, and other things; and what it itself is, whether a virtue, or something else; and if a virtue, whether it is an act, or not. For it has been shown above, on the part of certain men, that it itself is a virtue, and that virtue is not an act, but its cause, yet not without free choice. Whence, what Augustine said above, that the good use of free choice is a virtue, can be taken thus, that is, [as] the act of virtue; otherwise he would seem to contradict himself, who also said above that the work of virtue is the good use of those things which we can use not well, in which he placed free choice. But if the good use of free choice is the work of virtue, then it is not virtue. Therefore, when he said that its good use is a virtue, by the name of virtue he signified the use of it.

#### Cap. XI.

#### *That the use of virtue and of free choice is the same, but principally of virtue.*

For indeed the same good use is from virtue and from free choice, but principally from virtue. And that good use is to be numbered among the great goods. But that prevenient grace, which is also a virtue, is not the use of free choice, but rather from it is the good use of free choice; which is to us from God, not from us. But the good use of choice is both from God and from us; and therefore it is a good merit. For there God alone operates, here God and man. This merit proceeds from that most pure grace; which the Apostle noted, saying: *By the grace of God I am what I am, and his grace in me has not been void*. Upon which place Augustine thus says: « Rightly does he name grace; for first God gives grace alone, and not save freely, since nothing precedes save evil merits; but afterward through grace good merits begin. And to show free choice also, he adds: *And his grace in me has not been void*. And lest the will itself without the grace of God be thought able to do something good, he subjoins: *Not however I*, alone namely without grace, *but the grace of God with me*, that is, with free choice ». Plainly, when grace has been given, our good merits begin to be, yet through it; because if it is wanting, man falls.

#### Cap. XII.

#### *Some think that the virtues are good uses of free choice, that is, acts of the mind.*

But others say that the virtues are good uses of the lesser powers, yet not all, but only the interior ones, which are in the mind; while the exterior ones, which are carried out through the body, they say are not virtues, but works of the virtues. And therefore what Augustine says, that the work of virtue is the good use of the natural powers, they take of the exterior use; but what he says, that the good use of free choice is a virtue and is numbered among the great goods, they understand of the interior use. And they assert that the virtues are nothing other than good affections or motions of the mind, which God makes in man, not man; because, although those motions are of free choice, yet they cannot be unless God frees and aids him by his grace operating and cooperating; which gratuitous will of God they take [it to be], because it is God who both works in us to will and to do the good.

But that the virtues are *motions of the mind*, they establish by the testimonies of the Saints. For Augustine says upon John: « What is faith? To believe what you do not see ». But to believe is a motion of the mind. The same in the third book on Christian Doctrine: « But charity I call a motion of the soul ». But if charity and faith are motions of the soul, then the virtues are motions of the soul. — To whom others, answering, say that the foregoing words of Augustine are thus to be understood: Faith is to believe what you do not see, that is, faith is the virtue by which is believed what is not seen. Likewise: Charity is a motion of the soul, that is, the grace by which the soul is moved to loving. And that these and the like are thus to be taken, is gathered from these things which Augustine says elsewhere. For in the second book of the Questions on the Gospel he says: « It is faith by which are believed those things which are not seen, which is properly called faith ». Likewise, in the thirteenth book on the Trinity: « The things which are believed are one thing, the faith by which they are believed another ». From which words they thus argue and proceed: to believe is one thing, that by which one believes another. But it has been said before that faith is that by which one believes. Thus therefore to believe is not faith, because to believe is not that by which one believes. They add also: Virtue is the work of God alone, which he alone makes in us. It therefore is not the use or act of free choice; but to believe is an act of free choice: it is therefore not a virtue. — Upon the foregoing and other reasons and testimonies both [parties] rely. The judgment of these things I leave to the examination of the diligent reader, hastening on to other matters.

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