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The reply is in the affirmative according to the words of
Scripture, "Thou hast wrought all our works for
us,"[972] "For in Him we live and move and
are,"[973] "The same God, who worketh all in
all."[974] In this article St. Thomas rejects
two errors which are opposed to each other. According to
nominalism, no created power operates in things; God
alone directly does all things, for example, fire does
not heat, it is God operating in the fire. On the other
hand, others say that the creature can act without divine
movement and thus the creature is not subordinate to the
first cause; God and the creature are two coordinate
causes, like two men rowing a boat.
St. Thomas takes a position above these opposing views.
The operation always follows being, and the mode of
operation follows the mode of being. Therefore God
alone, who is being "per se", operates of
Himself without any superior movement, whereas the
creature, which is being by participation, does not
operate except dependently on the divine movement. That
is, "God not only gives forms to things but He
conserves them in being, and He applies them to action,
and is the end of all actions."[975]
If the creature were to pass from potency to act, or to
action, without the divine movement, more would proceed
from less, the perfect from the imperfect in opposition to
the principle of causality, and the proofs for the
existence of God based on motion and on efficient causes
would lose their force. "Thus God is the cause of every
action inasmuch as He gives the power to act, inasmuch as
He conserves that power, inasmuch as He applies the
power to action, and inasmuch as every power acts by His
power."[976] "God could not have made a natural
thing so that it could operate without the divine
operation."[977] Nothing has been more explicitly
stated by the Thomists.
Molina, however, found himself at variance with this
teaching of St. Thomas. He said: "Two things in
this doctrine of St. Thomas cause me difficulty. The
first is that I cannot see or understand that movement and
that application in second causes by which God moves these
causes to act."[978] For Molina the influx of
God's general power is simultaneous, it does not flow
into the second cause and apply it to action but flows
directly into the effect of the second cause, "not unlike
two men rowing a boat."[979] Suarez maintained the
same view.[980] The Thomists reply that if this
were true the second cause would be coordinate with the
first cause and it would not be properly subordinated in
causality, and the transition from potency to act would
not be explained. On the other hand, we must say that
the second cause is subordinated to the first cause in such
a way that the whole effect is from God as from the first
cause and from the creature as from the second cause, just
as the fruit of the vine is entirely from the branch as the
proximate cause and from the whole vine itself as from the
radical cause.
God, therefore, actuates the vital functions of plants
and animals, just as He actuates the vitality of our
intellects and the liberty of our wills without any
violence being inflicted. For God moves our will
according to the inclination of the will, which He
conserves, and so God is more intimately present in our
liberty than this liberty is to itself. God, however,
never causes the disorder in a sinful act; this
inordination proceeds solely from a defective cause. Our
liberty is a secondary liberty which depends on the first
liberty, and the idea of liberty is predicated only
analogically of uncreated and of created liberty.
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