Jansenius: every good work is meritorious; no virtue is barren
Jansenius himself draws this corollary from his doctrine in book 4 of On the state of fallen nature, chapter 2, where his words are: 'It is in no way possible that a work born of faith and the love of God should not by that very fact also be a work of piety, of righteousness, of the worship of God, meritorious and beatific. For what piety, righteousness and worship of God is more excellent than the love of God from faith? What is more meritorious and beatific, that is, more conducive to blessedness, than the love of God from faith?'
Later he declares that he holds with Augustine that there neither is nor can be any good work which, just as it requires faith and the love of God as its principle, is not by that very fact also a work of piety and of the worship of God and in its own way meritorious of eternal life.
In chapter 15 he criticizes the division of virtues and affections that Julian the Pelagian once used, saying that there are some through which we are good barrenly and others through which we are good fruitfully, that is, those which, as the Schoolmen teach, either help toward obtaining eternal life or do not. 'Since there neither is nor can be any virtue,' he says, 'that does not do its work from faith and love of the true God, to whom every work of virtue must be referred, and if it is not so referred it is a sin by the very fact that its end is not right, no virtue can possibly be barren. For faith and the love of God can in no way be barren; if it is barren, it is no longer virtue but must be vice.'
Latin
XLV. Quod corollarium Jansenius ipse ex doctrina sua educit, de statu Naturae lapsae libro quarto capite secundo, ubi haec sunt illius verba, Fieri enim nullo pacto potest ut opus quod ex fide & amore Dei nascitur, non etiam hoc ipso sit opus pietatis, justitiae, cultus Dei, meritorium, beatificum. Quae namque praeclarior pietas, & justitia, & cultus Dei, quam Dei amor ex fide? Quid magis meritorium atque beatificum, id est, ad beatitudinem aliquid conferens, quam Dei amor ex fide? Et postea, se sentire cum Augustino declarat, quod nullum omnino sit, vel esse possit bonum opus, quin hoc ipso, sicut fidem amoremque Dei, velut sui principium, postulat; ita sit etiam pietatis & cultus Dei, aeternaeque vitae suo modo meritorium. Et cap. decimo quinto reprehendens divisionem virtutum & affectuum, qua utebatur olim Julianus Pelagianus, dicendo quosdam esse per quos sumus steriliter boni; alios vero per quos fructuose boni sumus, id est, qui ad vitam aeternam consequendam, ut docent Scholastici, aut prosunt, aut non prosunt, Cum enim, inquit, nulla virtus aut sit, aut esse possit, quae non faciat opus ex fide atque dilectione veri Dei, ad quem omne opus virtutis referri debet; & si non referatur, ipso non recto fine, peccatum est: impossibile est virtutem ullam esse sterilem. Fides enim & amor Dei sterilis esse nullo modo potest: sed si sterilis est, non jam virtus, sed vitium esse debet.