Dist. 15, Part 1, Art. 1, Q. 6
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/4/d/15/q/bon-sent-IV-d15-p1-a1-q6
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### Question VI. *Whether good works done apart from charity avail toward a more tolerable punishment.*

Sixth and last it is asked, whether good works avail toward a more tolerable punishment apart from charity. And that they do seems to be the case.

1. Augustine says of such works in the *Enchiridion*, that "they avail to this, that the damnation may be more tolerable."

2. Likewise, it seems so *by reason*: for it was proved above that something is merited by such a work; therefore, granted that a man dies immediately after it; then, since it is not unrewarded and is not rewarded in the bestowal of a good, it is therefore rewarded at least in the diminution of an evil.

3. Likewise, "to turn aside from evil always avoids punishment, although it does not always attain the palm"; but it is better to do good: therefore it will all the more strongly avoid punishment.

4. Likewise, sin is aggravated by its consequent outcome and is more gravely punished, as is plain in the sin of idleness: therefore the sin which renders a man more idle toward the good is more gravely punished; therefore that after which good works are done is punished less, and so on.

**On the contrary:**
1. Augustine in the *Enchiridion* says that, *In the matter of bread*, the suffrages of the Church do not profit the damned; but those are more powerful, since they are from charity, than works done apart from charity: therefore those latter profit much less.

2. Likewise, if they merit a remission of punishment, it is either by intensity or by duration. Not by duration, because the punishment is infinite. If by intensity—but in this respect it is finite: therefore good works can be so multiplied that there would be no punishment.

3. Likewise, to so great a fault so great a punishment is owed; but good works done apart from charity neither change nor diminish the fault: therefore neither the punishment.

It is asked therefore toward what such good works avail.

> **Conclusion.** Works done apart from charity avail toward many things, and even toward a more tolerable punishment, but only as a consequence.

**I respond:** It must be said that such good works done apart from charity, when they are done with a good intention, avail toward many things: toward the multiplication of temporal goods, Isaiah one: *If you are willing and will hearken to me, you shall eat the good things of the land.* Toward the diminution of temporal punishment, Third Kings twenty-one: *Have you not seen Ahab humbled before me? Therefore I will not bring* etc. Toward the obtaining of grace, just as Rahab, Joshua six, found grace because of the works which she did for the messengers. Toward habituation to a good life, Lamentations three: *It is good for a man, when he has borne the yoke* etc. Toward resistance to sin, because sin draws by its own weight toward another, Ecclesiasticus three: *Water quenches a flaming fire, and alms resists sins.* Toward a more tolerable eternal punishment, as Augustine says, that it avails "that the damnation may be more tolerable."

But this is understood in diverse ways by diverse persons. For some say that it makes the punishment more tolerable not by changing the punishment, but by strengthening the subject. — But it is not fitting to say this, that some power is given to the damned on account of those works which makes him bear it more mildly: because it would be given either forever or for a time; and each is unacceptable. For that power is either natural or gratuitous, neither of which is easy to assign intelligibly.

Some say that they avail toward a remission of the punishment of the worm, because they will not have as much remorse of conscience as if they had done no good works. — But this does not hold, because the remorse of conscience will be according to the quantity of the fault, as also the fire is: therefore if it does not avail against the fire, neither against the worm.

Therefore it must be said in a third way, that they avail toward a more tolerable damnation as a consequence, because they prevent the fault committed from being aggravated, and they also draw a man back from the frequency of sin and from the intensity of lust and contempt; for he does not sin out of so great a lust who sometimes does good works, as one who forgets God. And against the worm: because he will be tormented less and will have less remorse than if he had not done those works—not concerning the fault which he committed, but concerning the evils which he would have committed, and the goods which he would have omitted, had he not done those good works. — And so it is to be understood of him who dies immediately; and of him who rather dies than denies Christ; and of like cases.

These things seen, the answer to each side is plain. For the reasons for the first side proceed from the punishment which he could incur, if he were to neglect those works. But the reasons for the opposite proceed from the punishment which is owed to the fault already committed. And thus the whole matter concerning this is plain.

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