Article 10 — Whether the free choice of any creature can be obstinate or immutably established in evil

Tenth, it is asked whether the free choice of any creature can be obstinate or immutably established in evil. (Parallel texts: ST I.64.2; In II Sent., d. 7, q. 1, a. 2; Disputed Questions on Evil, q. 16, a. 5.)

Obj. 1: It seems not, for as Augustine says in the City of God, (Augustine, City of God, bk. 11, ch. 17 (PL 41:331).) sin is against nature. But nothing that is against nature is everlasting, according to the Philosopher in the beginning of On Heaven. (Aristotle, De Caelo 1.4, 269b7sqq.) Thus, sin cannot remain within free choice for ever.

Obj. 2: Furthermore, spiritual nature is more powerful than bodily nature, but if some attribute beyond nature should be introduced into a bodily nature, it returns to what is befitting its own nature unless that added attribute be continuously preserved by an agent cause; such as hot water that returns to its natural coldness unless there is something always keeping it hot. Thus, if it should happen that free choice's spiritual nature should fall into sin, it will not always remain subject to sin, but will at some time return to the state of justice, unless there be assigned some cause that always maintains evil in it, which it seems should not be assigned.

Obj. 3: One might object saying that the cause which introduces and preserves sin is both internal and external, the internal being the will itself and the external being the will's object, which entices to sin.

On the contrary, the thing outside the soul is the good, but the good cannot be the cause of sin except incidentally. Thus, the thing existing outside the soul is not the cause of sin except incidentally. However, every incidental cause is reduced to an essential cause. Thus, one must posit an essential cause of sin, which can only be the will. But when the will is inclined toward something, there still remains in it the ability to tend toward its opposite, for that to which it inclines does not remove its own nature from it, by which it is capable of opposites. Thus, neither the will nor anything else can be the cause of making the free choice to cling to sin immutably and necessarily, as it were.

Obj. 4: Furthermore, according to the Philosopher in the Metaphysics, (Aristotle, Metaphysics 5.6, 1015b9.) the necessary is twofold: one which is from itself and another that has its necessity from something else. However, that there be sin in free choice cannot be necessary in the way that something has necessity from itself, for this pertains to God alone, as Avicenna also says; (Cf. Metaph. VIII c. 4 (f. 98vb).) nor again is it necessary as having its necessity from another, for all necessity of this kind is reduced to what is necessary through itself. However, God cannot be the cause of sin, therefore, in no way can it be necessary for free choice to be able to remain in sin; and so no creature's free choice clings immovably to sin. (Cf. supra: q. 1, a. 8, obj. 6.)

Obj. 5: Furthermore, Augustine seems to distinguish a twofold necessity in the City of God, (Augustine, City of God, bk. 5, ch. 10 (PL 41:152).) one of which removes freedom, making something to be not in our power, which is called the necessity of coercion, while there is another which does not remove the freedom that is a natural inclination. However, it is not necessary that there be sin in free choice by this necessity, for it is not something natural but rather against nature; similarly, neither is the first one necessary, for then free choice would be taken away. Therefore, it is not necessary in any way, and so the same conclusion follows as before.

Obj. 6: Furthermore, Anselm says that free choice is the power for preserving the will's rectitude for its own sake. (Cf. Anselm, De lib. arb. cap. 3 (PL 158:494B); ch. 13 (PL 158:505A).) Thus, if there is some free choice that is unable to have rectitude of will, it would lose the account of its own nature, which is impossible.

Obj. 7: Furthermore, free choice does not admit of more or less. However, that free choice which is unable to do good is less than that which is able. Therefore, there is no free choice that is unable do some good.

Obj. 8: Furthermore, natural motion is to natural rest just as voluntary motion is to voluntary rest. But, according to the Philosopher, (Cf. Phys. 5.10 (230 b 10 sqq.).) if there is a natural motion, the rest in which it terminates is natural, and if the motion is voluntary, the rest is voluntary. However, the motion by which a sin is committed is voluntary. Therefore, the rest by which one persists in a committed sin is also voluntary, and so not necessary.

Obj. 9: Furthermore, the intellect is related to the true and the false just as the affection is related to good and evil. However, the intellect never clings to falsehood in such a way that it is unable to be led back to knowledge of the truth. Therefore, the affection never clings to evil such that it is unable to be led back to a love of the good.

Obj. 10: Furthermore, according to Anselm in the book On Free Choice, being able to sin is not freedom nor a part of freedom. (Anselm, De libero arbitrio, ch. 1 (PL 158:490B).) Therefore, it is an essential act of freedom to be capable of goodness. Hence, if some creature's free choice is incapable of goodness, it will be in vain, for anything is in vain if it should be deprived of its own proper act, since each thing exists for the sake of its own activity, as the Philosopher says in On Heaven. (Aristotle, On Heaven 2.4, 286a8.)

Obj. 11: Furthermore, free choice is only capable of good or evil, and so if being able to sin is not freedom nor a part of freedom, it follows that the whole of freedom consists in being capable of doing good. Thus the creature that could not do any good would not have any freedom, and so free choice could not be so established in evil that it be incapable in any way of doing good.

Obj. 12: Furthermore, according to Hugh of St. Victor, the change that is with regard to accidental differences does not change what is essential to the thing, (Cf. Erudit. didascal. VII c. 19 (PL 176, 827 D).) but being able to do good is essential to free choice, as has been proved. Therefore, since sin overtakes free choice incidentally, it cannot be changed by sin in such a way that it be incapable of goodness.

Obj. 13: Furthermore, that which is natural is wounded by sin, though not completely taken away, as is commonly said. (See Peter Lombard, Sentences, bk. 2, d. 25, ch. 7.) But being capable of goodness is natural for free choice. Therefore, it can never be so established in evil by sin that it be incapable of goodness.

Obj. 14: Furthermore, if sin should cause in free choice an obstinacy in evil, it does this by either taking away something from what is natural or else by adding something. But it is not by taking away, for even in demons the natural gifts remain complete, as Dionysius says in On the Divine Names. (Pseudo-Dionysius, On the Divine Names, ch. 4, para. 23 (PG 3:725C).) Similarly, it is not by adding something, for because what is added would be an accident, it would necessarily be received in the mode of the receiver; and so, since free choice is pliable to both, it would not for this reason be rendered immovably fixed in evil. Therefore, in no way can free choice be wholly established in evil.

Obj. 15: Furthermore, Bernard says that it is impossible for the will not to obey itself; (Cf. Bernard, De grat. et lib. arb. cap. 2 (PL 182, 1004 B).) but sin as well as a good act are committed by willing; therefore, it is impossible that free choice be incapable of willing the good, if it should will it. But, that someone be capable of this, if he should will it, is not impossible for someone. Therefore, for whoever possesses free choice of the will, it is not impossible to do good.

Obj. 16: Furthermore, charity is stronger than the cupidity that draws toward sin, for charity loves God's law more than cupidity loves thousands in gold and silver (Glossa interlinearis; Petri Lomb. Commentary on the Psalms, on Ps. 118:72 (PL 191:1079A); from Augustine, Enarrationes in Psalmos, Ps. 118:72 (PL 37:1550); Ps. 118:72.) as the Gloss says on Psalm 118:72 the law of your mouth is better to me, and so on. But demons and even men fell away from charity into sin. Therefore, much more strongly are they able to come back from sin to a desire for the good; and so the same conclusion follows as before.

Obj. 17: Furthermore, goodness and uprightness of the appetite is opposed to obstinacy. However, demons and the damned possess a good and correct appetite, for they desire what is good and best, to exist, to live, and to understand, as Dionysius says; (Pseudo-Dionysius, On the Divine Names, ch. 4, para. 23 (PG 3:725C); cf. above: q. 22, a. 2.) therefore, they do not possess a free choice that is obstinate in evil.

Obj. 18: Furthermore, in the book On Free Choice, (Anselm, De libero arbitrio, ch. 1 (PL 158, 490).) Anselm investigates the same reason for free choice in God, in angels, and in man; but God's free choice cannot be obstinate in evil; therefore, neither in angels nor in man.

On the contrary (1) is the fact that the misery of the damned is opposed to the happiness of the blessed; but it pertains to the happiness of the blessed that they possess free choice so established in goodness that in no way can it be turned toward evil; therefore, it also pertains to the misery of the damned that they be so established in evil as to be in no way capable of goodness.

Furthermore (2), Augustine expressly says this same thing in the book On the Faith to Peter. (Scil. Fulgentius, cap. 3, n. 33 (PL 40, 763).)

Furthermore (3), there is no ready return from sin to goodness except by repentence; but repentence does not take place for an evil angel; thus, it is immovably established in evil.

Proof of the minor: penance does not seem to happen for one who has sinned from malice; (Cf. Isid. Sent. II c. 17 (PL 83, 620 A).) but the angel has sinned from malice: for since it has a Godlike intellect, (Cf. supra: q. 8, a. 8, obj. 7.) when it considers something, it immediately sees all that pertains to that thing; and so it cannot sin except from certain knowledge; therefore repentence does not come upon it.

Furthermore (4), according to Damascene, what is death for a man is a fall for an angel. (John Damascene, On the Orthodox Faith, bk. 2, ch. 4 (PG 94:877C).) But men are incapable of repentence after death; therefore, neither are angels after a fall.

Proof of the minor: Augustine says in the City of God, (Augustine, City of God, bk. 21, ch. 24 (PL 41:737); see also the following chapters.) that since after this life there will be no place for conversion for those who depart without grace, there should not be any prayers for them; and thus it is clear that men are not capable of repentence after death.

I answer that it must be said that Origen was found to have erred regarding this question: (This opinion of Origen's can be found in Augustine, City of God, bk. 21, ch. 17 (PL 41:731).) for he held that after a long course of time the way would be open to return to justice for both demons as well as for men; and he was moved to hold this because of the freedom of choice. Yet such a thought was displeasing for all catholic doctors, as Augustine says in the City of God; (Augustine, City of God, bk. 21, ch. 17 (PL 41:731).) not because they begrudged salvation for demons and damned men, but because for the same reason one would have to say that the justice and glory of blessed angels and men must end at some time, for the glory of the blessed and the misery of the damned are together shown to have been perpetual in Mathew 25:46, and they will go away unto eternal punishment, but the righteous unto eternal life, which Origen seemed to have known. Thus, it must be simply granted that the free choice of the demons themselves is so fixated in evil that it cannot return to willing correctly.

The reason for this must be taken from whence is caused deliverance from sin, in which two things come together: divine grace operating principally, and the human will cooperating with grace: for according to Augustine, he who created you without you will not justify you without you. (Cf. Augustine, Sermon 169, ch. 11 (PL 38:923); according to William of Auxerre, Summa aurea, bk. 3, tract. 2, ch. 2.) Therefore, the cause of obstinacy in evil should be understood to be partly from God and partly from free choice. It is from God not as from one performing or else upholding wickedness, but rather as from one not granting grace; which his justice indeed required: for it is just that the one who did not want to will correctly while he could should be brought to this state of misery that he could not will correctly at all. But on the part of free choice the cause of being able or unable to turn away from sin must be understood with regard to that by which man fell into sin.

But since the desire for the good is naturally within every creature, no one is induced to sin except under some form of the apparent good: for although the fornicator knows that fornication is bad in general, yet when he consents to fornication, he determines that fornication is good for him to do right now. Indeed, there are three things to think upon in this determination, the first of which is the impulse itself of passion, namely of concupiscence or of anger, by which reason's judgment is blocked so that it does not judge in act in the particular what it habitually holds in the universal, but rather it follows passion's inclination so as to consent to that to which the passion tends as being good in itself. The second is the habit's inclination, which being a certain nature of the one possessing it, as the Philosopher say in the book On Memory and Reminiscence, (Aristotle, On Memory and Reminiscence 6, 452a27.) that custom is second nature, and as Tullius say in the Rhetoric, that virtue consents to reason in nature's mode. (De inventione II c. 53 n. 159.) Thus, for the same reason the habits of vice incline like a certain nature to what is agreeable to them.

Hence, it happens that what is agreeable to self-indulgence appears as good to the one possessing a habit of self-indulgence, as though it were something connatural to him. And this is what the Philosopher says in the Ethics, (Aristotle, Ethics 3.7, 1114a32.) that the ends appears to each one according to the mode in which he is.

But the third is reason's false determination with regard to the particular chosen thing, which indeed follows either from one of those previously mentioned, namely from passion's impulse or habit's inclination, or else from ignorance of the universal, as when someone is in this error, that fornication is not a sin.

Therefore, against the first of these free choice has a remedy by which it can turn away from sin: for the one in whom there is an impulse of passion has a correct determination regarding the end, which is as it were a beginning in practical things, as the Philosopher says in the Ethics. (Aristotle, Ethics 6.4, 1140b16.) Hence, just as a man is able, by means of a true determination about the principles, to remove from himself any errors he may have suffered regarding the conclusions, so also inasmuch as he is correctly disposed toward the end, he is able to remove from himself all impulse of passion.

Hence, the Philosopher says in the Ethics (Aristotle, Ethics 7.8, 1150b30.) that the incontinent man who sins because of passion is correctable and able to be healed. Similarly, free choice also has a remedy against the inclination of habit: for no habit corrupts all the soul's powers, and so when one power is corrupted by a habit, since there is still some rectitude in the other powers, the man is led to meditate upon and to perform what is contrary to that habit; just as if someone had their concupiscence corrupted by self-indulgence, he is incited by the irascible appetite itself to seek after something difficult, whose exercise removes the weakness of self-indulgence; as the Philosopher says in the Categories 10 that the depraved man who is led to better activities makes progress in becoming better. (Aristotle, Categories, ch. 10, 13a23.) Free choice also has a remedy against the third thing: for whatever man receives he accepts in a rational way, that is, in the mode of inquiry and combination. Hence, when reason errs in some matter, it can be withdrawn from that error by contrary reasonings; and it is for this reason that man can cease from sinning.

However, there cannot be sin from passion in an angel, for according to the Philosopher in the Ethics 7, (More correctly Phys. 7.6, 248b27 as below q. 26 a. 3) there is only passion in the soul's sensible part, which angels do not have; hence only two things concur in an angel's sin; namely the habitual inclination to sin and the knowing power's false determination of the particular thing that is chosen. But since there is not a multitude of appetitive powers in the angels, as there is in man, when their appetite tends toward somethings it tends to it completely such that there is not in them any inclination inducing them to the contrary. But since they have an intellect and not reason, they receive whatever they determine upon in an intellectual mode; but whatever is received intellectually is received irreversibly, (irreversibiliter: vocabulary of Pseudo-Dionysius, On the Divine Names, ch. 4, para. 8 (PG 3:704D).) as when someone accepts that every whole is greater than its part. (Cf. supra q. 10 a. 12.)

Thus angels cannot let go of a determination that they have once taken up, whether it be true or false. Thus, it is clear from what was said that the cause of the demon's obstinacy in evil depends upon three things, to which are reduced all the reasons assigned by the teachers. (See Alexander of Hales, Summa fratris Alexandri, bk. 2, part 2, n. 75, p. 92.) The first and primary one is divine justice; hence, the cause of their obstinacy is assigned being that since they did not fall by any another, neither should they be lifted up again by any other; or if there should be something else like this that pertains to the fittingness of divine justice. The second is the indivisibility of the appetitive power: hence, some say (as above.) that since an angel is simple, whatever it turns towards it turns to completely; which must not be understood of the essence's simplicity, but of the simplicity that removes the division among the powers of one genus. The third is intellectual knowledge; and this is why some say that angels sinned irremediably because they sinned against their godlike intellect.

Reply Obj. 1: Therefore, to the first it must be said that something is called natural in two ways: in one way it is that whose principle is sufficient to produce what comes from it necessarily, unless something prevents it; as it is natural for dirt that it be moved downward; (exemplum Arist. e. g. De caelo I 4 (269 b 4).) and regarding this the Philosopher understands that nothing against nature is perpetual. In another way something is said to be natural for another thing because it has a natural inclination toward it, even though it is not capable in itself of attaining it necessarily; just as it is natural for a woman to conceive a child, but which she cannot do unless she receives the seed of the man.

However, nothing prevents what is contrary to this natural thing from being permanent, as when any woman remains permanently without offspring. But in this way it is natural for free choice to tend toward the good and it is contrary to nature to sin. Hence, the argument does not follow. Or it should be said that although sin is against nature for the rational mind considered with respect to its creation, yet inasmuch as it now clings to sin, it has become as it were natural for it, as Augustine says in the book On the Perfection of Justice. (Augustine, On the Perfection of Justice, ch. 2 (PL 44: 294).) The Philosopher also says in the Ethics (Aristotle, Ethics 9.4, 1166a20.) that when a man passes from virtue to vice he becomes someone else, inasmuch as he passes, as it were, to another nature.

Reply Obj. 2: To the second it must be said that bodily and spiritual natures are different: for bodily nature is determined to one genus, and thus something else cannot become natural for it unless its nature be wholly corrupted, just as heat cannot become natural for water unless the form of water be corrupted in it; and that is why it returns to its own nature when that which is preventing it has been removed. But spiritual nature has been made to be undetermined and susceptible of all things with regard to its secondary being, as is said in On the Soul, (Aristotle, On the Soul 3.8, 431b21.) that the soul is in some way all things: and by the fact that it clings to something, it becomes one with it, as when the intellect becomes the intelligible in some way by understanding, and the will becomes the desirable thing itself by loving.

And so, although the will's inclination is naturally toward one thing, yet what is contrary to it can become natural by means of love, to the extent that it does not return to its original disposition except by some cause effecting this. In this way sin becomes like something natural for the one who clings to sin; thus, nothing prevents free choice from remaining in sin forever.

Reply Obj. 3: To the third it must be said that the essential cause of sin is the will, and sin is also preserved by it. Although in the beginning it stood in equal relation toward opposites, yet after it subjected itself to sin, sin became almost natural for it; and because of this it remains in sin unchangeably with respect to itself.

Reply Obj. 4: To the fourth it must be said that this necessity for remaining in sin is reduced to God as to a cause in two ways: in one way on the part of his justice, as has been said, namely inasmuch as he does not apply healing grace; in another way inasmuch as he created such a nature that is able to sin, and which has a necessity for remaining in sin after it subject itself to sin from the condition of its own nature.

Reply Obj. 5: To the fifth it must be said that since sin has become natural, as it were, for the rational mind, that necessity will not be one of compulsion, but as it were of natural inclination.

Reply Obj. 6: To the sixth it must be said that, when the power for preserving uprightness of the will is possessed, it is within every thing that has free choice, as Anselm says; (Cf. Anselm, De lib. arb. cap. 3 (PL 158, 494 B), ibid. cap. 13 (505 A).) but demons and the other damned souls cannot preserve it since they do not possess it.

Reply Obj. 7: To the seventh it must be said that inasmuch as free choice is said to be free from compulsion, it does not admit of more or less; but with freedom being considered from sin and misery, (Cf. Bernard of Clairvaux, De grat. et lib. arb. cap. 8 et 9 (PL 182, 1014 et 1016) et Petrus Lomb. Lib, Sent. II d. 25 c. 8.) it is said to be more free in one state than in another.

Reply Obj. 8: To the eighth it must be said that nature's effect is always natural; and thus its motion and action always ends in natural rest. But the will's action and motion is able to end at an effect and at natural rest inasmuch the will and art assist nature; thus, the motion can be voluntary, and the effect or the following rest will be natural and having necessity, as when from a voluntary blow there follows a natural and necessary death.

Reply Obj. 9: To the ninth it must be said that if the angel's intellect should accept any false determination, it cannot let go of it for the reason said above; (Resp.) and so the argument proceeds from a false assumption.

Reply Obj. 10: To the tenth it must be said that although something might be deprived of a proximate end, yet it does not follow that it is wholly in vain, for there still remains an order to the final end; and so even though free choice might be deprived of the good work to which it is naturally ordered, it is nevertheless not in vain because it leaves this to God's glory, who is himself the final end, inasmuch as his justice is declared by this.

Reply Obj. 11: To the eleventh it must be said that sin is not committed by free choice except by the choosing of an apparent good; hence, there remains something of the good in any act of sin, and freedom is preserved in this respect; for when the form of the good is removed, then choosing, which is an act of free choice, would cease.

Reply Obj. 12: To the twelfth it must be said that being capable of the good is not essential to free choice as though pertaining to its primary existence, but rather to what is secondary. However, Hugh is speaking of what are essential with respect the first existence of a thing.

Reply Obj. 13: To the thirteenth it must be said that the objection argues with respect to whatever is natural that pertains to the constitution of nature, but not with respect to what is natural to which nature is ordered; and in this way being capable of goodness is natural.

Reply Obj. 14: To the fourth it must be said that the sin that happens to free choice does not remove anything of what is essential, for then the form of free choice would no longer remain. But something is added by sin, namely a certain uniting of free choice with a perverse end, which in some way becomes natural to it: and it possesses a certain necessity from this, just like other things which are natural for free choice.

Reply Obj. 15: To the fifteenth it must be said that in some way the will always obeys itself, such that in whatever way a man wills what he wants, he wants himself to will it. But in a certain sense it does not always obey itself, namely inasmuch as someone does not perfectly and effectively want that he should will himself to perfectly and effectively will, as Augustine says. (See Augustine, On Grace and Free Will, ch. 15 (PL 44:899); cf. Pseudo-Hugh of St. Victor, Summa Sententiarum, tract. 3, ch. 9 (PL 176:103).) Nor does it follow that if the demon's will should obey itself that it is not for this reason established in evil, for it is impossible that it should want itself to effectively will the good: thus, even if the conditional should be true, it does not follow that the consequence is possible, for the antecedent is impossible.

Reply Obj. 16: To the sixteenth it must be said that in itself charity is stronger than sin if one makes a comparison of one to another with respect to the same mode of possessing, namely, that in each case one takes the free choice of one arriving at the goal or still on the way; yet one who is at the goal of wickedness stands more firmly with regard to evil than one on the way to charity stands with respect to charity. However, demons either never had charity, according to some, (Cf. supra q. 8 a. 3 obj. 1) or if they had it, they never had it except as possessing it as on the way; but damned men were similarly unable to fall except from the grace of a wayfarer.

Reply Obj. 17: To the seventeenth it must be said that that objection argues concerning the goodness and uprightness of nature itself, not that of free choice: for the appetite by which the demons desire the good and the best is a certain inclination of nature itself, but it is not from the choice of free will; and so this uprightness is not opposed to to the obstinacy of free choice.

Reply Obj. 18: To the eighteenth it must be said that Anselm is looking for a common notion of free choice in God, angels, and men according to a most common analogy: hence it is not necessary that there be a likeness with regard to all the particular conditions.