Dist. 34, Art. 1, Q. 1
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/34/q/bon-sent-II-d34-a1-q1
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### ARTICLE I.
### *On the original principle of evil.*

### QUESTION I.
### *Whether evil is from the good as from its origin.*

Concerning the first point one proceeds thus and it is asked, whether evil is from the good as from its origin. And that it is, it seems:

1. First, by the authority of Augustine, *On Free Choice*, where he says thus: *Evil is, the unchangeable good having been spurned, to cleave to changeable things, which we do by the free choice of the will.* If therefore free choice is good, since sin is from free choice,

sin or evil is from the good.

2. Likewise, this same thing seems [to follow] by *example*. Suppose that there were nothing but the free will; it is agreed that it would love itself and could love itself immoderately and viciously; but such love is not without malice: therefore then sin would come about, and not except from the good: therefore etc.

3. Likewise, by *reason*. Evil is blameworthy in itself and renders its agent blameworthy; but nothing is to be blamed in its action, unless it can in some way do well, or unless it has a natural aptitude for this; but everything of this kind is good: therefore nothing can do evil but the good.

4. Likewise, no one is said to do evil, except because he does what he ought not, or because he does not do what he ought: therefore all evil is undue to its agent, and its opposite is fitting and due; but everything to which evil is undue and the opposite of evil fitting is good: therefore everything from which evil comes about must necessarily be good.

5. Likewise, if evil is from something, either that thing is good or evil. If good, I have what was proposed. If evil, either it is from another or from itself. If from another, there will likewise be the same to ask about that: therefore if there is not to go to infinity, a stop must be made in some evil which is from itself. But on the contrary: everything that is from itself needs nothing else in order to be; and everything of this kind is self-sufficient; and everything that is self-sufficient altogether has perfection and beatitude both in itself and from itself; and everything of this kind is perfectly good: therefore it is impossible that anything be evil and not be from another. It remains therefore, since there is a stop and not a going to infinity, that evil is from the good.

6. Likewise, if evil is from something, either that from which the evil of guilt comes has the use of reason, or not. If it does not have the use of reason: therefore it can in no way be blamed, nor ought it to be; for this is plain both according to the natural law, and according to the civil law, and also according to the divine law: it has therefore necessarily the use of reason. But reason and its use is a great and noble good: it is necessary therefore that evil be from the good, if it is from anything.

**On the contrary:** 1. Matthew, seventh [chapter]: *A good tree cannot make bad fruits, nor a bad tree make good fruits.* From this authority it is necessarily argued that the good cannot be the cause of evil: therefore if evil is from anything, it is necessary that it be from evil. — Likewise, more expressly in the Gloss: « Nothing is intermediate, but that the cause of the good is good, and [the cause] of the evil evil »: therefore evil is not from the good.

2. Likewise, this seems [to follow] by the maxim of the dialecticians, which is: « *That whose cause is good, is itself good* »: if therefore the cause of evil is good, the evil itself is good: if therefore this is false, it is manifestly clear etc.

3. Likewise, this seems [to follow] by a sufficiently probable proposition: « *Of contraries the causes are contrary* »: if therefore the cause of the good is good, and in no way does evil cause the good, therefore it seems that in no way does the good cause evil, nor that evil is from the good.

4. Likewise, this same thing seems [to follow] by a necessary and proven proposition: « *For whatever is the cause of a cause, is the cause of the thing caused* »: if therefore all good is caused by the highest good, [and] if evil is from some good, evil is from the highest good; therefore the highest good makes evil. But nothing is perfectly good which makes evil: if therefore evil is from the highest good, the highest good is not the highest; and this is impossible: therefore etc.

5. Likewise, either a first evil is to be posited, or not. If not, there is a going to infinity in evils: if therefore this is impossible, because it is necessary to make a stop in the order of causes, it is necessary therefore to posit a first evil. But the first good is not from another, but rather is the cause of all goods, by the very fact that it is first: therefore by parity of reasoning, if a first evil is to be posited, it seems that it is not from another, but is the cause of all. It remains therefore that evil is not from the good.

### Conclusion.

> Evil has its origin from the good.

**I respond:** For the understanding of the foregoing it is to be noted that concerning this there was and even now is the heresy of the most impious Manichaeus. For he erred in this, that he posited that the first cause of evil is evil, not good; whence he posited that, since a human can do well and can also sin, there are in one human two souls, one of which is from God the good and always desires goods, the other indeed from a god [who is] evil and always desires evils. And hence it is that in us there is a continual struggle; and all the evils which we do arise from an evil principle, just as goods from the good. — This most wicked heresy Augustine very effectively refutes in the book *On the Two Souls*, first by the very guilt of sin, secondly by its opposite, namely penitence.

— « For sin, as he says in the same place, is the will of retaining or pursuing what justice forbids and from which one is free to abstain ». « The will is a motion of the mind, with no one compelling, toward not losing something, or toward acquiring [it] ». These two definitions he sets forth, and afterward from them, as from things manifest, he himself destroys the aforesaid error; rather he shows how the error destroys itself, while it posits that the evil soul cannot do well, and yet is the principle of sin through its own origin and nature. For it posits that in sinning it does not sin, and therefore he adds in the same place: « Whoever concedes that these two definitions of will and of sin are true, condemns the whole heresy of the Manichaeans without hesitation by the briefest and fewest, but plainly most invincible, little arguments ».

— Finally, at the end of the book, he refutes [it] by the opposite of sin, namely by penitence itself, arguing thus: it is plain that to repent of guilt is good and just; it is plain also that it is possible for a human — for the Manichaeans themselves urge this — it is certain also that it is for him to repent who did the evil: therefore the very same thing which was the principle of evil can be the principle of good. It remains therefore, since the principle of good is good, that if the same is the principle of evil which can be the principle of good, evil is from the good. This is the deduction of Augustine, although it is not the [exact] sequence of his words.

Therefore on account of these deductions and similar ones, which have been adduced in objecting, the aforesaid heresy is to be rejected far off, because it is not only against the faith, but also against the right judgment of reason. It must be said therefore, as sound faith says, and the Master in the text manifests by the authorities of the Saints, that evil has its origin from the good.

But for the clarification of the objections it must be understood that the evil *of guilt*, of which the discourse here is, which indeed consists about the rational creature, can consist and be considered about it in three ways: either as to the *exterior effect*, or as to the *interior*, or as to the *habit*. For evil or sin is called sometimes an *exterior act*, sometimes an *interior habit*, sometimes an *interior act*. Whence the *act* of stealing is evil, and the *will* of stealing in act is evil, and the *aptitude* or habitual affection toward stealing is evil. Therefore insofar as evil is called an *exterior work*, thus it is not first either in the genus of *being* or in the genus of *evil*, since the exterior act is caused by the interior act, and the malice of the exterior act by the malice of the interior will. — But insofar as evil is called an *evil habit*, likewise it is not first either in the genus of *being* or in the genus of *evil*. For an evil habit is caused by an evil act: for because we do evils, we are evil. — But insofar as evil is called an *evil interior act*, thus it can be first in the genus of *evil*, but not in the genus of *being*. In the genus of *evil* it can be first, as is plain in the first disordering of the will of Lucifer, before which no malice had preceded; nor yet can it be a principle in the genus of being. For every act proceeds from a potency, and that is posterior, as the effect is posterior to the cause. And since that potency is good and of the genus of goods, it is plain that evil has its origin from the good. — And the reasons showing this are to be granted.

1. To that indeed which is objected from the authority of the Lord in Matthew, and from the Gloss, it must be said that both the text and the Gloss are understood of evil, insofar as it is considered about the exterior act; and this indeed is manifest from the text which follows.

2. To that which is objected from that maxim: *That whose cause is good* etc.: it must be said that that maxim is to be understood *per se* or in itself, namely if it causes insofar as it is *good*, and is good insofar as it *causes*. This is not true in the case at hand, because, even if it be conceded that the good is the principle of evil, yet it is not conceded that it is the principle of evil insofar as it is good. But in what manner it ought to be called its origin or principle, will appear in the following problem.

3. To that which is objected, that of contraries the causes are contrary; it must be said that that proposition has truth insofar as it is understood of contraries, of which each is some nature, and in causes acting naturally and which are determined to one effect; otherwise it is manifestly false. For the same God, even according to the Manichaeans, made hot and cold; and the same rational potency, according to the Philosopher, is the cause of opposites. And therefore it has no place in evils, because evil does not state any nature, insofar as it is evil, and because it is from the will, insofar as it is free, which is not determined to one of the contraries.

4. To that which is objected, that whatever is the cause of a cause etc.: it must be said that against that proposition there offends the sophistical *fallacy of accident*, just as also against that one by which it is said: « When one thing is predicated of another, of whatever the subject [is predicated] the predicate also [is predicated] ». For each proposition is to be understood of a predicate and effect which so belongs to one that it is not foreign to the other. But it is not thus in the case at hand. For although the good is the cause of evil, this is not according to that which it has from the highest good, but by reason of the defectibility which it has from nothing.

To that which is asked last, whether a first evil is to be posited, the answer is plain. For I say that an evil is to be posited before which there is no other evil; but from this it does not follow that it is a first *being*, but rather it is therein consequent. For it is argued with the superlative, which has in itself the force of distribution, from that which is in the lesser to that which is in the greater. Whence just as it does not follow: there is a *first man*, therefore there is a *first being*; so neither in the case at hand. But it is not so with the good, because the good and being are convertible. Because therefore a first evil is to be posited in the genus of *evil*, therefore there is no proceeding to infinity; but because it is not first in the genus of *being*, therefore it does not have being from itself, but from elsewhere; and so from the good.