Cap. 6 Arg. 2: Divine goodness leaves application-media to free good pleasure
Second, we prove that it is not contrary to divine goodness—even once Christ’s death is granted—still to withhold the means of application from any people he pleases. Christ’s death itself is a benefit God freely spent on the human race. It is fair and fitting that free application of that benefit remain with the benefactor. From giving one gift he is never bound to give another unless a promise intervenes; and no one can rightly claim such a promise about the means by which Christ’s death is applied—neither the whole race in a lump, nor any single person for himself alone.
What jars with divine goodness is not that God does not lavish every benefit on every person, but that he would injure anyone, or unjustly deny or withdraw a good that is owed. Illumination by evangelical grace, even with Christ’s death supposed, is still not owed to nature already corrupted by sin. So Bannezius (on the First Part, question 23, article 3, page 279): natural and supernatural illumination do not stand on the same footing, for natural light is owed to nature itself, while the light of grace is not owed to nature—least of all to nature already spoiled by sin—but is conferred by grace. If it is conferred by grace, it is not owed to all. Among twelve sentences that belong to the Catholic faith, Augustine set this second one in Epistle 107: that the grace of God is not given to all people. If it is conferred by grace, it is not given or denied according to good or bad use of natural light. Prosper is right (Response 8 to the Chapters of the Gauls): it is impiety to say that the grace by which we are saved is either repaid to good merits or fenced off by evils. And in On the Calling of the Gentiles: there are no crimes so detestable that they can fence off the gift of grace.
Those who try to defend God’s justice and goodness by human guesswork, and contend that he supplies free means of salvation to everyone who uses natural gifts rightly or less badly, but denies them to those who have abused the same gifts, are—speaking with Augustine—ignorant of the height of grace, and have woven improbable fables. Like it or not, if we ask why those means by which people apply Christ to themselves for salvation are granted to these particular persons and not to others, we must set aside the disparity of persons or of human works and rise to God’s freest good pleasure: “When the same cause binds all at once, / nor are they discerned by merit who differ by gift,” as Prosper puts it elegantly in the Poem On the Ungrateful, chapter 25.
Latin
Secundo, probamus, non esse contrarium bonitati Divinae, etiam posita Christi morte, media tamen applicationis quibuscunque hominibus pro suo beneplacito haud impertire: Quia ipsa mors Christi est Beneficium ab ipso Deo gratis impensum humano generi: At aequum & congruum est, ut penes benefactorem sit libera sui beneficii applicatio; qui ex datione unius beneficii nunquam tenetur ad dationem alterius, nisi talis promissio intervenerit: quam promissionem, de concedendis mediis quibus mors Christi applicetur, neque omnes homines promiscue, nec quisquam singularis homo singulariter sibi factam potest recte asserere. Porro, bonitati Divinae disconvenit, non quodvis beneficium cuivis non elargiri, sed nocumentum cuiquam inferre, aut debitum aliquod bonum injuste cuiquam denegare aut subtrahere. Illuminatio autem per gratiam Evangelicam, supposita Christi morte, non est tamen debita naturae jam peccato corruptae. Sic Bannezius, In 1a. qu. 23. art. 3. pag. 279. Non est eadem ratio de illuminatione naturali & supernaturali, quia naturalis debita est ipsi naturae: illuminatio autem gratiae non est debita naturae, praesertim jam peccato corruptae, sed ex gratia confertur. Si ex gratia confertur, tum non omnibus debetur; Nam inter duodecim sententias quae ad fidem Catholicam pertinent, hanc secundam posuit Augustinus, Epist. 107. Gratiam Dei non dari omnibus hominibus. Si ex gratia confertur, tum non datur aut negatur pro bono aut malo usu luminis naturalis: nam ut recte Prosper, Resp. 8. ad Capit. Gallor. Impietas est affirmare ipsam gratiam qua salvamur aut bonis meritis rependi, aut malis arceri. Et, De vocat. Gent. Nulla sunt tam detestanda facinora quae possunt gratiae arcere donum. Qui igitur volentes humanis conjecturis justitiam & bonitatem Dei defendere, contendunt illum suppeditare gratuita salutis media illis omnibus qui recte aut minus male utuntur donis naturalibus, negare autem aliis qui iisdem donis fuerunt abusi (ut cum Augustino loquar) ignorantes altitudinem gratiae, fabulas improbabiles texuerunt. Velimus igitur nolimus, si causa quaeratur cur hisce singularibus hominibus concedantur illa media quibus Christum sibi applicant ad salutem, aliis non concedantur, disparitas hominum aut humanarum operationum praetermittenda est, & ad liberrimum Dei beneplacitum adscendendum; Cum causa eadem simul implicet omnes, Nec discernantur merito, qui munere distant, Ut eleganter Prosper, Carmine De Ingratis, cap. 25.