As we have already intimated, we regard this opinion of the learned Spanish divine as erroneous.[204] Three solid reasons militate against it. The first is that, to guard against Baianism, Vasquez is compelled to assume the existence of morally indifferent acts of the will, which is untenable, as “St. Augustine and St. Thomas, and theologians generally teach that there is no such thing in the concrete as a morally indifferent act of the free will, and consequently, if the will is able, without grace, to perform acts that are not evil, it is also able [pg 071] to perform good acts.”[205] Second, Vasquez's theory counterfeits the notion of Christian grace. “Good thoughts” come so natural to man, and are so closely bound up with the grace of creation, that even Pelagius found no difficulty in admitting this sort of “grace.”[206] Surely fallen nature is not so utterly corrupt that a good child is unable to honor and love his parents without the aid of “grace” (in the sense of cogitatio congrua ex meritis Christi). The third reason which constrains us to reject Vasquez's theory, is that it leaves no room for natural morality (naturaliter honestum) to fill the void between those acts that are naturally bad (moraliter inhonesta, i.e. peccata) and such as are supernaturally good (supernaturaliter bona, i.e. salutaria). The existence of such naturally good acts would seem to be a highly probable inference from the condemnation, by Pius VI, of a certain proposition taught by the pseudo-Council of Pistoia.[207]
b) Martinez de Ripalda (+1648) tried to improve Vasquez's theory by restoring the Christian concept of grace and adding that Providence invariably precedes all naturally good works, including those performed by heathens and sinners, with the entitatively supernatural grace of illumination and confirmation.[208] In this hypothesis [pg 072] the necessity of grace is not theological but purely historic.[209]
Despite the wealth of arguments by which Ripalda attempted to prove his theory,[210] it has not been generally accepted. While some, e.g. Platel[211] and Pesch,[212] regard it with a degree of sympathy, others, notably De Lugo[213] and Tepe,[214] are strongly opposed to it. Palmieri thinks it may be accepted in a restricted sense, i.e. when limited to the faithful.[215]
Ripalda's hypothesis of the universality of grace is truly sublime and would have to be accepted if God's salvific will could be demonstrated by revelation or some historic law to suffer no exceptions. But Ripalda has not been able to prove this from Revelation.[216] Then, too, his theory entails two extremely objectionable conclusions: (1) a denial, not indeed of the possibility (Quesnel), but of the existence of purely natural good works, and (2) the possibility of justification without theological faith. Neither of these difficulties probably occurred to Vasquez [pg 073] or Ripalda,[217] because at the time when they wrote Pius VI had not yet condemned the teaching of the pseudo-Council of Pistoia,[218] nor had Innocent XI censured the proposition that “Faith in a broad sense, as derived from the testimony of creatures or some other similar motive, is sufficient for justification.”[219] If the love of God, even perfect love, (such as we have shown to be possible in the natural order), were of itself necessarily supernatural, as Ripalda contends, it would be possible for a pagan to receive the grace of justification without theological faith, which he does not possess, as is evident from the Vatican teaching that it is “requisite for divine faith that revealed truth be believed because of the authority of God who reveals it.”[220]
Thesis III: Not all actions performed by man in the state of mortal sin are sinful on account of his not being in the state of grace.
This is de fide.
Proof. Though this thesis is, strictly speaking, included in Thesis II, it must be demonstrated separately on its own merits, because it embodies [pg 074] a formally defined dogma which has been denied by the Protestant Reformers and by the followers of Baius and Jansenius. Martin Luther taught,—and his teaching was adopted in a modified form by the Calvinists,—that human nature is entirely depraved by original sin, and consequently man necessarily sins in whatever he does,[221] even in the process of justification. Against this heresy the Tridentine Council defined: “If any one shall say that all the works done before justification ... are indeed sins, ... let him be anathema.”[222]
The Protestant notion of grace was reduced to a theological system by Baius[223] and Jansenius,[224] whose numerous errors may all be traced to their denial of the supernatural order.
The Jansenist teaching was pushed to an extreme by Paschasius Quesnel, 101 of whose propositions were formally condemned by Pope Clement XI in his famous Constitution “Unigenitus.”[225] The Jansenistic teachings of the Council of Pistoia were censured by Pius VI, A. D. 1794, in his Bull “Auctorem fidei.” The quintessence of this heretical system is embodied in the proposition [pg 075] that whatever a man does in the state of mortal sin is necessarily sinful for the reason that he is not in the state of grace (status caritatis). Baius[226] and Quesnel[227] gave this teaching an Augustinian turn by saying that there is no intermediate state between the love of God and concupiscence, and that all the works of a sinner must consequently and of necessity be sinful. This heretical teaching is sharply condemned in the Bull “Auctorem fidei.”[228] Quesnel pushed it to its last revolting conclusion when he said: “The prayer of the wicked is a new sin, and that God permits it is but an additional judgment upon them.”[229]
The teaching of Baius and Quesnel is repugnant to Revelation and to the doctrine of the Fathers.