Reply Obj. 2: Faith regards such things as are unseen by him who believes; and hope, too, is of such things as are not possessed by the one who hopes; but prophecy is of such things as are beyond the sense of men, with whom the prophet dwells and converses in this state of life. And hence faith and hope are repugnant to the perfection of Christ's beatitude; but prophecy is not.
Reply Obj. 3: Angels, being "comprehensors," are above prophets, who are merely "wayfarers"; but not above Christ, Who was both a "comprehensor" and a "wayfarer." _______________________
NINTH ARTICLE [III, Q. 7, Art. 9]
Whether in Christ There Was the Fulness of Grace?
Objection 1: It would seem that in Christ there was not the fulness of grace. For the virtues flow from grace, as was said above (I-II, Q. 110, A. 4). But in Christ there were not all the virtues; for there was neither faith nor hope in Him, as was shown above (AA. 3, 4). Therefore in Christ there was not the fulness of grace.
Obj. 2: Further, as is plain from what was said above (I-II, Q. 111, A. 2), grace is divided into operating and cooperating. Now operating grace signifies that whereby the ungodly is justified, which has no place in Christ, Who never lay under any sin. Therefore in Christ there was not the fulness of grace.
Obj. 3: Further, it is written (James 1:17): "Every best gift and every perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of lights." But what comes thus is possessed partially, and not fully. Therefore no creature, not even the soul of Christ, can have the fulness of the gifts of grace.
On the contrary, It is written (John 1:14): "We saw Him [Vulg.: 'His glory'] full of grace and truth."
I answer that, To have fully is to have wholly and perfectly. Now totality and perfection can be taken in two ways: First as regards their intensive quantity; for instance, I may say that some man has whiteness fully, because he has as much of it as can naturally be in him; secondly, as regards power; for instance, if anyone be said to have life fully, inasmuch as he has it in all the effects or works of life; and thus man has life fully, but senseless animals or plants have not. Now in both these ways Christ has the fulness of grace. First, since He has grace in its highest degree, in the most perfect way it can be had. And this appears, first, from the nearness of Christ's soul to the cause of grace. For it was said above (A. 1) that the nearer a recipient is to the inflowing cause, the more it receives. And hence the soul of Christ, which is more closely united to God than all other rational creatures, receives the greatest outpouring of His grace. Secondly, in His relation to the effect. For the soul of Christ so received grace, that, in a manner, it is poured out from it upon others. And hence it behooved Him to have the greatest grace; as fire which is the cause of heat in other hot things, is of all things the hottest.
Likewise, as regards the virtue of grace, He had grace fully, since He had it for all the operations and effects of grace; and this, because grace was bestowed on Him, as upon a universal principle in the genus of such as have grace. Now the virtue of the first principle of a genus universally extends itself to all the effects of that genus; thus the force of the sun, which is the universal cause of generation, as Dionysius says (Div. Nom. i), extends to all things that come under generation. Hence the second fulness of grace is seen in Christ inasmuch as His grace extends to all the effects of grace, which are the virtues, gifts, and the like.