Chapter XXXII. The guilt and opstinacy of the devils
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First ARTICLE
WHETHER THE EVIL OF GUILT CAN BE IN THE ANGELS (Q. 63, A. I)
HE affirmative reply is of faith, because many angels sinned; therefore they are able to sin.
That the angel can sin, St. Thomas proves as follows:
Only that will which is the rule of its own action is unable to depart from the proper rectitude. But only God’s will is the rule of its own action because it has no superior end. Therefore any created will is able to sin.
Can the angels sin directly against the natural law, and could they have sinned if they had been created simply in the natural order? According to the more common opinion of the Thomists the negative reply is more probable.
Because at all times the angels see intuitively the natural law in their own essence, even with regard to singular instances, and therefore they cannot be in error, or be ignorant, or lack consideration about the natural law, consequently they cannot sin against the natural law.
Because the angel naturally and efficaciously loves God as the author of nature more than itself, and this love virtually contains the fulfillment of the entire natural law. This love remains in the devil to the extent that the devil loves God as the author of his physical life although he does not love God as the author of the moral law and as the judge.
Can the angel sin indirectly against the natural law?
Reply. He can by sinning directly against the supernatural law.
How can the angel sin against the supernatural law?
Reply. Because the angel knows the supernatural law not with 552 intuitive evidence but in the obscurity of faith, and inasmuch as this law commanded something that could be displeasing to the proud angels.
Is every direct sin against the supernatural law indirectly against the natural law?
The reply is in the affirmative, because the natural law already commands that God is to be obeyed in whatever He commands.
Objection. Then the angels’ elevation to the order of grace was the cause of their sin.
Reply. It was not the cause but the occasion, just as the redemptive Incarnation was an occasion of sin for the Jews.
Objection. But the angels could not have sinned even against the supernatural law.
Proof. Sin, or a defective choice, supposes an erroneous judgment. But there can be no error in the angels, at least not prior to sin, since they have no passions or any inordinate precipitation of the will.
Reply. I distinguish the major: the angels have no defective choice with regard to the object willed, I concede; with regard to the manner of tending toward the object good in itself, I deny.
What does this sin of the angels presuppose on the part of the intellect ?
Reply. A lack of consideration of the supernatural law to be observed here and now.
Is this lack of consideration a negation or a privation ?
Reply. It is a privation since the angel begins to operate without consideration of the rule.
Was this lack of consideration voluntary?
Reply. It was at least indirectly voluntary inasmuch as the angel could have and should have considered the rule.
Was this lack of consideration more voluntary in the angel than in man?
Reply. Many Thomists say that this lack of consideration was interpretatively voluntary.
What is the meaning of interpretative in this connection?
Reply. It does not mean that the consent was such as would be given if there were sufficient attention; in this case it means something willed virtually or implicitly, by an implicit act rather than an explicit act. If it had been an explicit act, such as, “I do not wish to consider,” this act of unwillingness would presuppose not only lack of consideration but also an error, which could not have been in the angels before sin.
How then did the angels sin?
Reply. They sinned by inordinately desiring their own excellence, or their natural happiness as derived from the power of their natures, and refusing the supernatural happiness that comes from the gratuitous gift of God, the supernatural happiness that they have in common with men, the happiness that is to be had by way of humility and obedience."
Were there two acts, one concerning natural happiness and the other concerning supernatural happiness?
Reply. There was but one act, preferring natural happiness to the other.
How could such stupidity enter the mind of the higher angels?
Reply. In the same way that some men prefer the study of mathematics or physics to the study of the Gospel.
WHETHER THE ANGELS COULD SIN IN THE FIRST INSTANT
Reply. They could not because in the first instant the angel operated under a special divine inspiration. Since nothing is willed unless first known, the first cognition was not from the application of the created will but from the special inspiration of God, and under this influence the creature does not sin. The angels sinned in the second instant, in which they fully deliberated. The third instant was the instant of damnation, in which there was no longer any demerit or possibility of merit.’
WHETHER THE ANGELS COULD HAVE SINNED VENIALLY
According to St. Thomas they could not have sinned venially.? The reason is that the angelic intellect is not discursive; it sees conclusions in principles intuitively, and it beholds means as they are in the order to an end. Therefore in the angels there cannot be a deordination1 with regard to the means (venial sin) unless there is also a deordination with regard to the end.
Scotus and Suarez hold the contrary opinion, that the angels have discursive knowledge.
THE OBSTINACY OF THE DEVILS *
It is of faith that the devils are in fact obstinate in evil. We read: “Depart from Me, you cursed, into everlasting fire which was prepared for the devil and his angels.” * The words of the Psalmist are referred to the bad angels: “The pride of them that hate thee ascendeth continually,” ë that is, this pride always produces new effects.
St. Thomas, Scotus, and Suarez differ in their explanations of the obstinacy of the devils’ will.
Scotus explains this obstinacy by an extrinsic cause alone, namely, because God denies the devils grace.
St. Thomas assigns also an intrinsic cause, namely, the connatural mode according to which the angel judges irrevocably and adheres to an end in such a way that its decision 1s inflexible.
Suarez explains that because of the angel’s nature it is merely difcult to retract what the angel has once willed deliberately.
St. Thomas proves his opinion as follows: the appetitive faculty is in all things proportionate to the apprehending faculty, by which it is moved. But the angel apprehends immovably and intuitively those things that we apprehend discursively. This is particularly true when the angel judges something to be an end to be loved above all things. The angel sees intuitively and not successively all those things that pertain to the choice of a thing, and once the choice has been made the angel can say, “I have already considered everything.” Therefore the will of the angel is affixed immovably to the end. St. Thomas remarks in this article that it was customary to say that man’s free will was flexible with regard to opposites both before and after the choice, but that the angel’s free will was flexible to the opposites before the choice but not after it.
4 Ibid., la, q.64, a.2; De veritate, q.24, a.10, I1. 5 Matt. 25:41. 8 Ps. 73:23.
Objection. But the angel remains free after the choice and is therefore not inflexible.
Reply. Liberty does not require the possibility of changing a proposition, for example, the most free decrees of God are immutable.
Objection. It appears then that free will is predicated univocally of God and of the angels.
Reply. The predication is only analogical, for in God alone is this immutability from eternity, and in God it is never in evil.
OBJECTIONS BASED ON THE IDEA OF THE INDIFFERENCE OF FREEDOM AFTER THE CHOICE
Freedom excludes inflexibility and immutability. But after the choice the angel remains free. Therefore the angel is not immutable.
Reply. I distinguish: freedom excludes absolute immutability, I concede; hypothetic immutability, I deny. Thus God’s free decrees are immutable. I concede the minor and distinguish the conclusion.
I insist. When the object remains indifferent the choice is mutable. But after the sin of the angel the object of its choice remains indiferent.
Reply. I distinguish the major: when the object remains indifferent the choice is mutable on the part of the object, I concede; on the part of the subject, that is, on the part of the angel’s connatural mode of acting intuitively, I deny. I concede the minor, and distinguish the conclusion.
OBJECTIONS BASED ON THE IDEA OF A RETRACTED JUDGMENT
According to St. Thomas the devil sinned because of lack of consideration of a higher rule. But the devil can now give that consideration especially since he has learned through his misery. Therefore the devil can change his judgment.
Reply. I distinguish the major: the devil sinned from lack of consideration that was voluntary, I concede; he sinned from a lack of consideration arising out of ignorance, I deny.
The devil was not ignorant that in thus proudly refusing supernatural happiness he would bring on himself damnation. He was certainly more certain than we theologians that turning away from his final supernatural end was for him an unforgivable mortal sin which implied indirectly an aversion from his final natural end.
I insist. But it seems incredible that any intelligence would refuse supernatural happiness, especially when such refusal brought with it future damnation.
Reply. Nevertheless this is a characteristic of unbounded pride: to cling to one’s own individual good and pride one’s self on it rather than accept supernatural happiness from the goodness of another and to possess that happiness in common with men. The devil closed the eyes of his mind to the light of grace and haughtily refused to follow that light. Doellinger wished to defend the Church, but he wished to defend it in his own way and not under the direction of the Supreme Pontiff.
I insist. But the devil foresaw his damnation only speculatively; now he knows damnation experimentally and therefore because of this new experience he can change his judgment.
Reply. If the devil now practically understands his crime of pride as a moral evil that must be rejected, I concede; if he only speculatively understands this pride as an evil, I deny.
In order that the devil could practically understand his crime of pride as an evil that should be rejected he should also incline to humility, to obedience, and to prayer for mercy. But the devil’s pride “ascends continually,” not intensively, but by always producing new effects. The damned do not ask for pardon. For them there could be but one way to retract their judgment, namely, the way of humility and obedience, and they do not will to follow this way.
We find a similar state of mind in some of the apostates, in Lamennais and Loisy. They strove for an object that was apparently the object of magnanimity; they strove for excellence but they strove for it in the spirit of pride. Magnanimity is the well-ordered love of excellence; pride is the inordinate love of one’s own excellence without subjection to God.
Objection. According to St. Thomas some remorse of conscience remains in the damned because of synteresis, and therefore it seems that they are able to change their judgment.
Reply. Such remorse of conscience does remain because of synteresis, but it is without the least attrition or hope, indeed it is the remorse of desperation, without the least veleity of true repentance.’
For the damned, sin is a bitter thing but not because of any repentance. Although they still have synteresis and remorse of con-2 science, they do not have infused faith, hope, prudence, or fear of sin; their minds are overwhelmed by pride, of which it is said that it “ascendeth continually.” The damned do not repent of their evil deeds because of the guilt; they rue their deeds only because of the punishment. More than this, they wish all others to be damned, because they are filled with unbounded hatred for all good things, and they are grieved by every good, by every deed done according to God’s will, and especially by the happiness of the blessed.
I insist. But the damned still have a desire for happiness, at least for natural happiness, which they do not possess, because they are turned away not only from their final supernatural end but also from their natural end. Therefore because of this desire for happiness they are able to change their judgment.
Reply. In order to change their judgment practically they would have to follow the way of humility and obedience, but because of their unremitting pride they do not will to follow this road. They are therefore confirmed in evil. In the damned the desire for the happiness they have lost is filled with envy; indeed this is part of damnation. The damned persevere in the hatred of God, for although the devil naturally loves God as the author of his nature in its physical aspect, he hates God as the author of the law that commands obedience, he hates God as the judge, as the author of grace, because under these three aspects God commands something that displeases the devil.
Practically then the devil does not apprehend his crime of pride as a moral evil that must be rejected; only speculatively does he apprehend it as evil. At the same time pride rules him completely and in this pride the devil loves himself above all things with the bitterness of desperation and hatred of God.’
How is man’s obstinacy explained? Can we say with Cajetan that man is made immovable in good or evil by a meritorious or demeritorious act elicited in the first moment of non-being (in primo non esse viae), that is, in the first instant of the separation of the soul from the body? Some Thomists reject this idea, since it would not be man but a separated soul that would be meriting. Our Lord said, “The
8 This comprehension of the devil is said to be quasi-speculative even though it proceeds from synteresis and deals with guilt as individual, because this comprehension does not lead to a practical judgment in the proper sense since it is clouded over and suppressed by another contrary practical judgment which is in conformity to the devil’s all-pervading pride.
night cometh, when no man can work.” ° In the final chapters of Contra Gentes St. Thomas explains that after the separation from the body the soul is no longer on the road to salvation (in via), since the - body is for the perfection of the soul that the soul may reach its end, and the separated soul therefore is no longer on the road to its perfection, and that final merit or demerit is rendered definitive by the soul’s separation from the body.”
10 Cf. below in the treatise on man, the chapter on the separated soul.
Footnotes
Chapter 33 of 46