Dist. 35, Art. 2, Q. 2
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/35/q/bon-sent-II-d35-a2-q2
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### QUESTION II.
### *Whether mode, species, and order are corrupted by sin equally.*

Secondly it is asked, whether these three are corrupted equally by every sin. And that they are, it seems:

*Fundamenta.*

1. First, by Augustine in the book *On the Nature of the Good*: « Where these are great, the good is great; where small, [it is] small »: therefore according to these three is reckoned the intensity and diminution in every good: therefore if the same good cannot be greater and lesser than itself, it is necessary that, when these three are deprived, they be deprived equally.

2. Likewise, these three are a vestige of the supreme Trinity, where there is perfect equality and consubstantiality: therefore just as these three are consubstantial, so that one cannot exist without the other, so also they are equal: therefore as much as is diminished from one, it is necessary that as much be diminished from the rest.

3. Likewise, for these three to be deprived is nothing other than for the good to be deprived, as was shown before; but in the same [thing] and according to the same there is no *more* and *less* to be found: therefore if by the same evil these three are deprived, it is necessary that they be deprived equally.

4. Likewise, the more the will receives from God, the more it is like God, and the more it is like God, the more it tends toward God: therefore it is necessary that, as much as it has of mode, it have as much of species and order; and if this, it is necessary that those three goods be deprived equally by evil.

**On the contrary:**

*To the opposite.*

1. It seems that evil principally deprives [it] of *order*, since the malice in a work is principally reckoned according to the disorder of the intention: therefore if order consists principally in this, it seems that evil has [the power] to deprive [it] of order more than of mode or species.

2. Likewise, mode, species, and order correspond to those three, namely to unity, truth, and goodness; but evil principally and more takes away from goodness than it takes away from unity and truth: therefore if these three correspond to those three, it seems that these three are not taken away equally.

3. Likewise, to those three in which the character of the vestige is reckoned, namely mode, species, and order, there correspond those three in which the character of the image is reckoned, namely memory, understanding, and will. But sin, when it deforms the image, does not deform all the powers equally, but rather principally and more deforms the will: therefore by parity of reasoning, it does not corrupt mode, species, and order equally, but principally takes away *order* more than mode or species.

4. Likewise, sin, speaking essentially and properly, is a deformity; but every deformity principally signifies a privation of *form* or of *beauty*, therefore of species: therefore guilt does not deprive [it of] these three equally, but principally deprives [it] of *species*.

5. Likewise, evil can in some manner be well ordered, as Augustine says in the *Enchiridion*; but it can in no way have *species*, since it is a privation: therefore it seems that in evil there is rather made a privation of *species* than of order: therefore the privation of those three is not made equally.

6. Likewise, no privation is made in something relative except through a privation previously made in something absolute; « for in *the relative* there is properly and per se neither motion nor change »: therefore if *order* signifies a relation to another, corruption cannot be made in *order* except through a corruption made in *species*; it seems therefore that the corruption made by evil does not regard those three equally.

### Conclusion.

> Mode, species, and order are corrupted equally by every sin.

**I respond:** It must be said that since these three, namely mode, species, and order, insofar as they are deprived through the evil of guilt, are conditions of the same good will, not only inseparable from one another, but also equal, they are deprived equally by every evil of guilt. *(Conclusion.)* — For every evil of guilt disorders insofar as it makes [one] unlike God, and insofar as it makes [one] unlike God, to that extent it removes [one] far from God, *(Reason.)* so that, just as grace equally renders the soul ordered and beautiful and powerful toward a good [that is] as great or greater; and just as in glory there is likewise an equalization of the endowments: so also in guilt the privation of these three is made equally. And therefore, just as it is said that « the vision in glory is the whole reward », on account of the connection and equality in the glorious endowments; so also, as Augustine says in the book *Of the Eighty-three Questions*, that « the whole name of evil is found from the privation of species », not because by evil species alone is deprived, or principally, but because in the privation of species is understood the privation of the others. — The reasons therefore which are adduced for the first part are to be granted.

*Solution of the opposing [arguments].*

1. To that therefore which is objected, that malice consists principally in the intention; it must be said

that it is true; but as for what he himself objects, that order is reckoned according to the intention; it must be said that this is understood according to a certain *appropriation*. For mode, species, and order consist about the *intention itself*, from which both the intention is good and the action is good which proceeds from the intention.

2. But to that which is objected, that to mode, species, and order there correspond unity, truth, and goodness; it must be said that it is true, insofar as in those three the *general character of the vestige* is considered; *(To be noted.)* but insofar as the *corruption of the evil of guilt* is reckoned in them, which consists about the will, these three are to be considered in the good, according as it is good, as appeared in the preceding problem. And therefore they are deprived equally by evil, since [evil] is opposed directly to them.

3. To that which is objected, that evil does not deform all the powers of the image equally; it must be said that it is not similar; because those powers are diverse and ordered to diverse acts, in such a way that some of those acts regard guilt and justice according to more and less. But it is not so in the case at hand; for these three differ only by comparison, and since they have the same foundation, it is necessary that, as much as one is diminished, the other also be diminished.

4. To that which is objected, that the evil of guilt is a deformity; it must be said that it is not only a *deformity* opposed to beauty, but is also a *crookedness* opposed to rectitude. Therefore it does not follow that it deprives [it] of species more than of order; for it is not called a *deformity* through the privation of beauty alone, but in this is also understood the privation of the others; nevertheless it is more denominated from the privation of species and form on account of this, that species is the character of knowing.

5. To that which is objected, that evil is capable of being ordered; it must be said that order is twofold. *(Twofold order.)* For there is an order *prior to the thing's being made*, which is from the intention of the maker. And there is an order *after the thing's being made*, which indeed is reckoned according to the justice of the one requiting. The first order is that which is deprived by evil through evil; and this order evil cannot have, just as neither [can it have] species. But the second order is not deprived through evil, but rather evil is capable of being ordered in punishments according to that order.

6. To that which is objected, that no privation is made in the relative except through something absolute; it must be said that both *species* and *order*, as taken here, are each relative; therefore one is not deprived through the other any more than conversely. Nevertheless these three are taken away through a change made about something absolute; for then they are deprived, when the free will sins by moving itself inordinately.

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