Dist. 49, Part 1, Art. 1, Q. 4
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/49/q/bon-sent-IV-d49-p1-a1-q4
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### Question IV. *According to what beatitude is present in the soul.*

Fourthly it is asked, according to what beatitude is present — whether it is in the soul first according to *substance*, or according to *power*. And that it is according to *substance*, it seems:

1. Because beatitude is life; whence Augustine holds that to be blessed is to live in God and by God; but the soul naturally lives prior to the powers: therefore it is first vivified by God.

2. Likewise, beatitude in the soul is one, but the powers are many; but when the first subject is multiplied, the perfection must necessarily be multiplied: therefore etc.

3. Likewise, God is most inward to the soul itself: therefore, since beatitude is in the soul through an influence from God, that influence proceeds from what is inmost; but the substance of a created thing is more interior than its power: therefore beatitude is first infused into the substance.

**On the contrary:** 1. Beatitude is present in the soul according to the fact that "it is capable of God and can be a partaker"; but it is capable according to the image, and the image is according to the mind, and the mind is the eye and a power of the soul: therefore beatitude is present in the soul first according to *power*.

2. Likewise, beatitude is present in the soul according to a special mode of the union of God and the soul; but the special mode is only through perfect knowledge and love, and this is through the powers: therefore etc.

3. Likewise, beatitude is a second habit and a second perfection; but every second habit and second perfection is present according to some power of receiving, which differs from the substance: therefore beatitude is not present in the soul through the substance immediately.

4. Likewise, if it is present immediately and first through the substance, then, with the powers abstracted, the soul could be understood as glorious: therefore, with it abstracted that it neither sees nor loves God, it will be glorious; which is foolish to say and against the Saints.

### Conclusion

> *Beatitude is in the soul first according to power, and indeed one in many powers.*

**I respond:** It must be said that the opinion of certain men is that, as with grace, so with glory: that just as *grace* and *virtue* differ, so also do *beatitude* and *dowry*. And just as *grace* regards the substance of the soul, and therefore is one, whereas *virtue* regards *power*, and therefore they are many: so also *glory*, which regards the *substance* of the soul, is therefore one; but the *dowries* regard the *powers*, and therefore they are many. And the natural example is in the human soul perfecting the body, which, insofar as it is *vivifying*, regards the *complexion*, which is one in the whole body; insofar as it is *mover*, it regards *diverse organs*. — But I believe that here there is rather an *appropriation* than a *property* and truth. For the body is never disposed to life, whatever complexion it may have, unless it also has *organization*; whence neither the influence of life nor motion is from the soul into the body, unless the *disposition of organization* naturally pre-exists. Likewise I believe concerning *grace* and *glory*, that the soul is not capable of grace nor of glory except *through the mind*. Whence I believe that both *grace* and *glory* are first in the *power*. — But *for something to be in a power* is twofold: either according to the disposition and fitting of that power to its *proper act*, since it is in this way that powers are distinguished; and what is in a power in this way *is multiplied* and is in the power according to the *account of the power*. But something is in a power according to its conformation to *some one thing* and its union to that; and what is in a power in this way is not multiplied in the powers, but rather is said to be *in a power* according as it has the account of *substance*; and thus are *grace* and *glory*, each of which is a deiformity and conformity to God. And because the soul itself is conformed and reformed to one and the same thing, therefore grace and glory are one in many powers, just as one soul is in many organs, and one health in many members. And this was disputed more clearly in the second book, in the twenty-sixth distinction, concerning grace.

**To the arguments:**

*To 1.* To that which is objected, that the soul is vivified prior to the powers, it must be said that this is true of the life which is *first act*; but not of the life which is *second act*.

*To 2.* To the other the answer is already clear: because glory is not in the powers according to that in which they *are distinguished*, but according as they *are united* in the account of the image, through which they are capable of one deiformity.

*To 3.* To that which is objected, that God is most inward to the soul, therefore [the influence] proceeds from what is inmost, it must be said that this influence does proceed from what is inmost; but it does not proceed according as He is the *inmost thing conserving in the being of nature*, but according as He is the *object consummating in the being of glory*; and therefore along this path He is more inward and immediate to the power than to the essence. Whence it does not follow that, if the divine essence is inmost, then any influence of His whatever [is so].