Dist. 33, 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/3/d/33/q/bon-sent-III-d33-a1-q1
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### Article, Single. *On the cardinal virtues in general.*
### Question I. *Whether it is fitting to posit cardinal virtues besides the theological ones.*

Concerning the first point one proceeds thus and it is asked, whether it is fitting to posit cardinal virtues besides the theological ones. And that it is so, seems [to be the case].

1. In Wisdom 8 it is said, in commendation of wisdom, that *she teaches sobriety and prudence and justice and virtue, than which nothing is more useful to men in life;* but by those four are understood the four cardinal virtues: therefore they are most useful and fitting for us.

2. Likewise, the privations of these virtues, or the vices opposed to them, lead to death, as gluttony, lust, and avarice; but just as the privations are pernicious, so the positings [of them] are useful and fitting: therefore it seems that there is great necessity of having the cardinal virtues.

3. Likewise, no one can reach the kingdom of heaven except by the fulfillment of the commandments of God; but there are certain commandments to whose fulfillment the cardinal virtues dispose, namely the commandments of the second table: therefore it seems that they are greatly necessary for us to obtain salvation.

4. Likewise, just as one loses life through a sin against God, so also one can lose it through a sin against the neighbor: therefore just as it is necessary to have virtues ordering [us] to God, so it is necessary to have virtues ordering [us] to the neighbor and to oneself: but the virtues ordering to God are the theological ones, those ordering to oneself and to the neighbor are the cardinal ones: therefore the cardinal virtues are necessary.

**On the contrary:** 1. Romans 13: *He who loves the neighbor has fulfilled the Law;* but he who fulfills the Law has all that is necessary for him unto salvation: therefore he who has charity does not need another virtue ordering [him] to the neighbor: therefore, the theological virtues being had, it seems that the cardinal ones are superfluous.

2. Likewise, the virtues are principally necessary for ordering the affections of the soul, as Augustine says in the book *On the Spirit and the Soul*; but the principle of all the affections is love, as is said in book fourteen *On the City of God*: since therefore charity sufficiently orders love, it seems

that he who has the rectitude of charity does not need the rectitude of any other virtue.

3. Likewise, the virtues are for reforming the powers of the soul; but the powers of the soul are reformed through grace and the three theological virtues, in which is attended the image of reformation through grace: therefore it seems that, these being had, there is no necessity or utility of a cardinal virtue.

4. Likewise, the virtues are for directing in actions and passions; but through faith the intellect is sufficiently directed, and through charity the affect is directed: therefore, the theological virtues being had, it seems that the cardinal ones are superfluous.

### CONCLUSION.

> Besides the habits of the theological virtues, the habits of the cardinal virtues are to be posited.

**I respond:** It must be said that the general necessity of virtue is for rectifying the powers of the soul against crookedness and for invigorating [them] against difficulty. For virtue makes a power upright and vigorous. And since it happens that man is ordered to God, it happens nonetheless that man is ordered to the neighbor and to himself; and in these same [orderings] he can be made crooked and impeded or held back: hence it is that he needs not only habits invigorating and rectifying him, insofar as he tends directly to God — of which kind are the habits of the theological virtues — but he also needs habits regulating and rectifying him, insofar as he is ordered to himself and to the neighbor. And such are the habits of the cardinal virtues. Hence, just as besides the precepts of the first table, which order [us] directly to God, it was fitting to posit the precepts of the second table, which order [us] to the neighbor; so also it must be understood in the habits. And therefore, besides the habits of the theological virtues, it is necessary unto salvation to posit the habits of the cardinal virtues; as the reasons adduced for the first part show, which are to be granted, since they conclude truly.

1. To that which is objected first to the contrary, that *he who loves the neighbor has fulfilled the Law;* it must be said that this is not said for this reason, that to fulfill the Law belongs to love alone by reason of itself, but it is because [love] has other habits annexed [to it], which, moved in a certain way at the command of love and charity itself, direct and dispose to the observing of the works of the commandments — as one observes the commandment of not committing fornication *elicitively* through chastity, but *imperatively* through charity. And the Apostle attributes this to love and charity because it is the mother, form, and end of all the virtues, as was touched on above and will be better explained below in its place.

2. To that which is objected, that every affection has its origin from love; it must be said that, although every affection has its origin from love as from the principal affection of the soul itself, love nonetheless is not the *whole* cause of the other affections; therefore neither does the rule of love itself in itself suffice for the rectification of the soul, unless there be in it virtues regulating and directing the other affects. And therefore that reasoning can be dissolved, because it proceeds from an insufficient [ground].

3. To that which is objected, that the virtues are for reforming the powers; it must be said that it is true; but the *face* of the powers of the soul is twofold according to the twofold portion and its twofold conversion, namely toward the lower and toward the higher, toward the created good and toward the uncreated good, and toward the end and toward that which is unto the end. Therefore, when he says that the soul is sufficiently formed and reformed through the theological virtues; it must be said that this is true by comparison to the higher; but from this it does not follow that the cardinal virtues are superfluous, because they inform and reform the soul itself by comparison to the created and to that which is ordered unto the end. And *if you object* that the theological virtues order not only to the end, but also in those things which are unto the end, as is clear in charity; it must be said that this is not principally, but *consequentially.*

4. To that which is objected, that the virtues are for directing the acts of the powers; it must be said that the powers of the soul have certain acts ordered to the *contemplative* life, certain ones to the *active* life; and it is necessary to order both acts, because each mode of living is necessary for this, that one may be able to merit beatitude. Since therefore he says that faith and charity direct the acts of the powers of the soul; it must be said that, although this can be granted in the acts which pertain to the *contemplative* life, it is nonetheless not true in things to be done or in the acts which pertain to the *active* life; and therefore it does not follow that the cardinal virtues are superfluous.