Article 8 — Whether God can force the will

Eighth, it is asked whether God can force the will. (Parallel texts: In II Sent., d. 25, a. 2; ST I.105.4; I.106.2; I.111.2; I-II.9.4,6; SCG III.88-91; Disputed Questions On Evil, q. 3, a. 3; Compendium theologiae, ch. 129.)

Obj. 1: And it seems that he can, for whoever turns something in whatever way he wills forces it. But, as is said in Proverbs 21:1 the heart of the king is in the hand of God; he turns it wherever he wills. Thus, God can force the will.

Obj. 2: Furthermore, commenting on Romans 1:24, therefore, God gave them up, and so on, the Gloss of Augustine says, it is manifest that God works in the hearts of men to incline their wills to whatever they want, whether toward goodness because of his mercy, or toward evil because of their merits. (Glossa ordinaria, at Romans 1:24, 6.27; Peter Lombard, Commentary on Romans, at Rom 1:24 (PL 191:1332A); from Augustine, De gratia et libero arbitrio, ch. 21 (PL 44:909); according to ST I-II.79.1, ad 1.) Thus, God can force the will.

Obj. 3: Furthermore, if the finite acts finitely, the infinite acts infinitely. But some finite creatures draw the will finitely since, as Cicero says, (Cicero, On Invention, bk. 2, ch. 52, n. 157; see Moralium dogma philosophorum, q. 1, n. 4 (PL 171:1009C).) the honorable is what draws us by its own power and what entices us by its dignity. Therefore, God who possesses infinite power in his activity can altogether force the will.

Obj. 4: Furthermore, that is properly said to be forced into something which cannot avoid doing it, whether it wants to or not. But the will cannot help but want that God should desire it to will by his own will of being well-pleased, otherwise God's will would be inefficacious with regard to our will. Therefore, God can force the will.

Obj. 5: Furthermore, in any creature there is perfect obedience toward the Creator. But the will is a creature. Therefore, there is within it a perfect obedience toward the Creator. Thus, God can force it to whatever he wants.

On the contrary (1), being free from force is natural to the will, but what is natural cannot be removed from another, thus, the will cannot be forced by God.

Furthermore (2), God cannot make two opposites be at true at the same time. (Augustine, Contra Faustum, bk. 26, ch. 15 (PL 42:481); cf. Aquinas, In I Sent., d. 42, q. 2, a. 2.) But the voluntary and the violent are opposed, since the violent is a species of the involuntary, as is clear in the Ethics. (Aristotle, Ethics 3.1, 1109b35.) Therefore, God cannot make it such that the will wants something out of force, and so he cannot force the will.

I answer that it must be said that God changes the will by necessity, but he cannot force it. For inasmuch as the will is changed toward something, it is not said to be forced toward it, the reason being that wanting something is to be inclined toward it, however, force or violence is contrary to the inclination of the thing being forced. Therefore, when God changes the will, he does it such that another inclination follows upon the previous inclination so that the first is removed while the second remains. Hence, that to which he inclines the will is not contrary to the already existing inclination, but to the inclination which was there first: thus, it is neither violence nor coercion. For example, within a stone there is an inclination to a downward place by reason of its heaviness, yet with this inclination remaining, there will be violence when the stone is cast upward. However, if God should remove from the stone the inclination of weight and should give to it an inclination of lightness, then being born upward would not be violent for it, and so there can be a change in its motion without violence. It should be understood in this way that God changes the will without forcing it.

However, God can change the will inasmuch as he works within it just as within nature. Hence, just as every natural action is from God, so also every action of the will, inasmuch as it is an action, is not only from the will as from an immediate agent, but also from God as the first agent who impresses upon it vehemently. (Cf. above: q. 5, a. 9.) Hence, just as the will is able to change its action toward another, as is clear from what was said, (Above: a. 6.) all the more can God do this. However, he changes the will in two ways: in one way by only moving it, namely when he moves the will to will something but without impressing any form upon the will; as when he sometimes makes man to will what he did not will before without the application of any habit; but in another way by impressing some form upon the will itself. For just as the will is inclined to will something by the nature which God gave it, as is clear from what was said, (Above: a. 5 et 6.) so also is the soul inclined further to will something by what is super-added, such as by grace or virtue, toward which it had not been inclined before by natural inclination.

Yet this super-added inclination is sometimes perfect, but at other times imperfect. When it is perfect it causes a necessary inclination toward what it determines, just as the will is necessarily inclined by nature to desire the end, as is the case among the blessed, in whom perfect charity inclines sufficiently toward the good, not only with respect to the end, but with respect to what is for the sake of the end. But sometimes the super-added form is not altogether perfect, as in wayfarers; and in that case the will is inclined by the super-added form, though not by necessity.

Reply Obj. 1: And from this the solution to the objections is clear, for the first arguments proved that God can change the will, but the second that he cannot change it, both of which is true, as is clear from what was said.

Nevertheless, it must be known that where it is said in the Gloss that God works in the hearts of men to incline their wills toward evil, it should not be understood, as the Gloss says in the same place, that God imparts wickedness, but that just as he applies grace so that the will of men is inclined toward goodness, so also does he remove it from some of them so that, with it being removed, their will is turned toward evil. (Glossa ordinaria, at Romans 1:24, 6.27; Peter Lombard, Commentary on Romans, at Rom 1:24 (PL 191:1332A); from Augustine, De gratia et libero arbitrio, ch. 21 (PL 44:909).)