Dist. 4, Part 2, 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/4/d/4/q/bon-sent-IV-d4-p2-a2-q2
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### Question II. *Whether infants in baptism fully receive the reality of the Sacrament.*

Second it is asked, whether infants receive the reality fully, that is, grace with the habits of the virtues. And that they do not, it seems:

1. Augustine, *On the Baptism of Infants*: "Infants, although not yet faith, which consists in the will of believers, nevertheless the Sacrament of faith itself makes them faithful": therefore they do not have the habit of faith.

2. Likewise, by *reason* it seems: because virtue is a habit; but a habit renders a power facile for a work; but this is not in an infant: therefore etc.

3. Likewise, virtue is a perfect habit, because "it is virtue that perfects the one having it"; but perfection of conduct presupposes perfection of nature: therefore since in an infant there is no perfection of nature, neither will there be in him perfection of conduct, and so etc.

4. Likewise, virtue is a habit of the motive power; but the cognitive [power] precedes the motive: therefore since infants are not susceptible of cognitive habits, neither will they be [susceptible] of motive ones.

**On the contrary:**

1. Augustine to Boniface: "The regenerating Spirit is common to the greater ones offering and to the infants offered": therefore it has the same effect in great and small.

2. Likewise, by *reason* it seems, because baptism makes an infant fly away, if he die, just as an adult; but the virtues are the wings for flying into heaven: therefore an infant has the virtues, if he is baptized.

3. Likewise, baptism blots out the original [guilt] in an infant; but the original [guilt] deforms not only the substances, but also the powers in children: therefore if baptism is a perfect remedy, it reforms the powers. But the powers are reformed by the habits of the virtues: therefore baptism gives to infants the habits of the virtues.

4. Likewise, baptism makes an infant worthy and fit for the dowries of glory, which are vision, love, possession: but for vision he is disposed by faith, for love by charity, for possession by hope: therefore an infant has the theological virtues and the others consequently.

### Conclusion.

> To infants in baptism, together with grace, the perfect habits of the virtues are conferred.

**I respond:** Some have said that the virtues are given to infants as regards their *root*, not as regards their *habits*, because grace is given to them blotting out guilt, not as an aptitude of the power; because the powers are bound, whence they are not apt to be made fit; but when the powers are loosed, the grace ramifies into the habits of the virtues. — But this position cannot stand, because then someone having the virtues, if his powers were bound in him through folly or madness, would lose them; which is foolish to say, since they are lost by guilt alone.

Another position is, that they are given to infants as regards the *habit*, but not as regards the *use*. — But then it is asked: what is there called *use*? either the *faculty of using*, or the *act*. If the *faculty*; then he who has the habit has the faculty, and there is no distinguishing. If the *act*; but adults do not always use the virtues, as when they attend to other things, yet they completely have the habits. If *use* is called a certain *practice* added to the number of the virtue, just as patience is said to have been in Job; even so it does not resolve [the matter], because this is not in all good adults.

A third position is, that *habits* are given to them, but according to a *state of imperfection*; whence that habit is as it were midway between a bare power and one perfectly disposed, just as is sight in the eye of a dog before the ninth day. — But this position cannot stand fittingly, because the perfection of infused habits comes from the side of grace; and by that which they have, without addition infants can act well, when they have grown up.

And therefore it must be said that the *perfect habits* of the virtues are given to them, just as also to adults, although they do not operate through them. — On account of which it is to be noted that the powers of the soul are impeded in two ways, lest they go out unduly into their acts: in one way by the *imperfection* and corruption *of the body*; and thus they are impeded in infants and the foolish and those sleeping, and against this the perfection and good disposition of the body is the remedy. In another way they are impeded by an *evil habit*, as by concupiscence or by guilt; and thus they are freed through grace or the virtues. Therefore the virtues render the powers facile by perfecting them, and this by removing guilt; but they do not effect the other freeing. Whence since the infant has both impediments, the one is removed through the virtues, not both; and therefore he is not altogether facile.

But a habit of this expediting kind has a threefold origin: for one is *innate*, one *acquired*, one *infused*. The first begins with nature and has its origin from its principle; and therefore in an imperfect nature it is imperfect, and grows with the growing nature, and is perfected with the perfected nature, as is plain in the natural faculty of judgment. The *second*, namely the acquired, has its origin from free choice, which does not have use until nature is in some way perfected; and therefore it follows perfected nature. The *third* has its origin from God, not from *nature* nor from *free choice*; and because it does not have its origin from free choice, it can be in an infant before the use of free choice; but because it does not have its origin from *nature*, it can be perfect, while nature is imperfect. — Through these things the objections are plain.

**1.** For faith has something infused, something acquired, namely the cognition that underlies it; by reason of the first it is in an infant, not by reason of the second.

**2.** To that which is objected concerning facility, the response is plain, because that habit renders the power facile, but not altogether.

**3.** To that which is objected, that virtue is a perfect habit, etc.; it must be said that one perfection of conduct is *acquired*, and this presupposes perfection of nature; another *infused*, and this does not necessarily presuppose [it]. — Yet it could be said that the natural powers in an infant, in which the virtues are apt to inhere, as far as they are of themselves, are perfect, although they do not go out into act on account of the impediment of the body. Whence at once, when the soul of the infant is loosed from the flesh, it has the operations due to it.

**4.** To that which is objected, that the cognitive habits precede, etc.; it must be said that, although the cognitive habits are according to *acquisition*, nevertheless they are gratuitous through *infusion*. — But, since the cognitive [habits] can be infused, why are they not given? The reason is, because they are for knowing, and they do not have this act before the use of reason. But the *motive* habits are not only for directing, but for making [one] worthy of glory and for purifying from guilt.

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