Controversies on Grace
These are concerned chiefly with the relation between grace and free will. How
can the all-persuasiveness of grace, which imposes such a potent influence on
the human will and elicits therefrom such good works, reside harmoniously in the
same subject with the simultaneous consent of the free will? Since merely
sufficient grace (gratia mere sufficiens) in its very concept contains the idea of a
withholding of consent on the part of free will, and is therefore at the very outset
destined to inefficiency (gratia inefficax), the question in its last analysis reduces
itself to the relation between free will and efficacious grace (gratia efficax), which
contains the very idea that by it and with it the free will does precisely that which
this grace desires should be done. The most radical solution would be simply to
cut the Gordian knot, and with the Pelagians set aside supernatural grace, or
with the Reformers and Jansenists banish entirely all free will. For whether we
boldly set aside the first or the second alternative, in either case the great
problem of the relation between grace and free will will have been disposed of,
and the great mystery solved in the simplest manner possible. For if there be no
grace, why, then, all things are accomplished by the liberum arbitrium; if there
be no freedom, then grace reigns supreme. As against the Pelagians and
Semipelagians the existence and necessity of efficacious grace for all
meritorious acts was duly treated in the article GRACE. Here we propose to
defend briefly the preservation of free will with grace as against the systems of
the Reformers and Jansenists, which are hostile to free will.
I. HERETICAL SOLUTIONS
According to Luther's theory, man's free will was so impaired by original sin that
like a horse it could perform good or bad acts only as "it was ridden either by
God or the devil". Nor did the Redemption by Christ restore the will as it was
enjoyed in Paradise; therefore the will influenced by grace must by an interior
necessity follow in all things the coercion of grace. Of all the Reformers, Calvin
(Instit., lib. II) has given the most consistent and scholarly theory of the loss of
free will under grace. He maintains that the sin of Adam annihilated the freedom
of the will; that the Redemption did not restore this primitive freedom, though it
released man from the bondage of Satan; that, however, the will influenced by
grace does not remain entirely passive, but preserves the spontaneity of its
unfree acts. The later Lutherans, as well as those of the present time, scarcely
ever emphasize as harshly as their master the moral impotence of nature in the
domain of ethical good, but the followers of Calvin still cling stubbornly to his
teaching. In opposition to both sects, the Council of Trent, (Sess. VI, can. iv-v)
defined as dogma not only the survival of moral freedom in spite of original sin,
but also the preservation of the freedom of the will acted upon and working with
grace, especially efficacious grace.
The definition of Jansen (d. 1638) is not materially different from that of Luther
and Calvin, save only that, in distinguishing more closely between freedom from
external coercion (libertas a coactione) and freedom from intrinsic necessity
(libertas ab intrinseca necessitate), he concedes to the will under the influence
of grace only the former kind of liberty, at the same time maintaining against all
sound ethics that in our fallen state the mere freedom from external coercion is
sufficient for merit and demerit, and that therefore the really decisive freedom
from intrinsic necessity is not required. In its exterior form this system seeks to
clothe itself completely in Augustinian attire, and to give the impression that even
St. Augustine taught unqualified Jansenism. The system teaches that the will of
fallen man sways like a reed between two delights, the heavenly delight of grace
(delectatio coelestis s. caritas) and the earthly delight of concupiscence
(delectatio terrena s. concupiscentia). Both are ever present in man; like hostile
forces, each strives for the mastery, the irresisting will being necessarily
overcome by whichever delight happens to be the stronger. If the heavenly delight
be stronger than the opposing earthly one, it overcomes as efficacious grace
(gratia efficax s. magna), the will with an irresistible impulse for good. If, on the
other hand, the evil delight be the stronger, it compels the will to sin and this in
spite of the likewise present heavenly delight, which as sufficient grace (gratia
sufficiens s. parva) is just too weak to gain the ascendancy over the other. If
both these delights are exactly equal in strength so as to maintain a perfect
equilibrium, then the will remains trembling in the balance. It will be seen that
this theory is conceived in perfect accord with the parallelogram of forces, and
reduces itself in its last analysis to the most extreme determinism, and
absolutely kills all freedom. Not the conquering power of the heavenly delight
(delectatio coelestis victrix), which is emphasized in the Augustinian system
also, but the idea that this delight cannot be resisted (gratia irrestibilis) was
branded as heresy by Innocent X on 31 May, 1653(cf. Denzinger, "Enchiridion
Symbolorum", ed. Bannwart, S.J., 1908, n. 1093 and 1095).
The sources of our faith record a decided protest against the subjugation of free
will by efficacious grace. For if grace, instead of elevating and ennobling free will,
subverts it, then all the Biblical counsels and prohibitions relative to the affairs of
salvation which can be accomplished only with the help of efficacious grace,
become vain and meaningless. Only in the event of the will remaining free have
the words of Christ any significance: "If thou wilt enter into life, keep the
commandments" (Matt., xix, 17). Saint Paul presupposes the cooperation of free
will when he writes to his disciple Timothy: "Exercise thyself (exerce te ipsum)
unto godliness" (I Tim., iv, 7), and again when he says generally: "And every man
shall receive his own reward, according to his own labour" (I Cor., iii, 8). Tradition,
as Calvin candidly admits (Instit., II, 3, 10), regards freedom of will and the
efficacy of grace not as antagonistic principles, but as harmonious factors. Like
Jansen, however, Calvin believes that he can regard St. Augustine as a supporter
of his heresy. How unfounded and mistaken is this claim has been clearly
demonstrated in the article AUGUSTINE, SAINT.
II. CATHOLIC SYSTEMS OF GRACE
According as the theological examination of grace and free will in its efforts to
demonstrate the mutual relations between the two took as its starting-point
respectively either grace or free will, two pairs of closely related systems were
evolved: Thomism and Augustinianism, which take grace as the starting-point,
and Molinism and Congruism, which set out from free will. These are the
extremes. The middle ground is held by Syncretism, which may be regarded as
an eclectic system making an effort at compromise.
(1) Thomism
This system rests upon thoughts to which St. Thomas himself in his time gave
expression. It received its most significant development from the subtle Michael
Bañez (1528-1604), a Dominican gifted with a remarkably clear and acute mind,
who was the chief opponent of Molina. From the idea that God is the primal
cause (causa prima) and the prime mover (motor primus), it is concluded that
every act and every movement of the thoroughly contingent secondary causes
(causae secundae) or creatures must emanate from the first cause, and that by
the application of their potentiality to the act. But God, respecting the nature of
things, moves necessary agents to necessary, and free agents to free, activity --
including sin, except that God is the originator only of its physical entity, not of
its formal malice. Inasmuch as the Divine influence precedes all acts of the
creature, not in the order of time, but in that of causality, the motion emanating
from God and seconded by free intelligent agents takes on the character of a
physical premotion (proemotio physica) of the free acts, which may also be
called a physical predetermination (proedeterminatio physica), because the free
determination of the will is accomplished only by virtue of the divine
predetermination.
In this premotion or predetermination is also found the medium of the Divine
knowledge by which God's omniscience foresees infallibly all the future acts,
whether absolute or conditional, of intelligent creatures, and which explains away
at once the undemonstrable and imaginary scientia media of the Molinists. For
just as certainly as God in His predetermined decrees knows His own will, so
certainly does He know all the necessarily included determinations of the free will
of creatures, be they of absolute or conditional futurity. Now if we carry these
philosophical principles from the domain of the natural to the supernatural, then
efficacious grace (gratia efficax) must be regarded as a physical premotion of the
supernaturally equipped will to the performance of a good act, for revelation
undeniably refers back to grace not only the possibility, but also the willing and
the actual performance of a good act. But the will predetermined to this free good
act must with a metaphysical certainty correspond with grace, for it would be a
contradiction to assert that the consensus, brought about by efficacious grace,
can at the same time be an actual dissensus. This historical necessity
(necessitas consequentiae), involved in every act of freedom and distinguishable
from the compelling necessity (necessitas consequentis), does not destroy the
freedom of the act.
For although it be true that a man who is freely sitting cannot at the same time
be standing (sensus compositus), nevertheless his freedom in sitting is
maintained by the fact that he might be standing instead of sitting (sensus
divisus). So it remains true that grace is not efficacious because free will
consents, but conversely the free will consents because grace efficaciously
premoves it to the willing and performance of a good act. Here gratia efficax is
intrinsically and by its nature (ab intrinseco s. per se) efficacious, and
consequently intrinsically and extrinsically different from sufficient grace (gratia
sufficiens), which imparts only the posse, not the agere. To make merely
sufficient grace efficacious a new supplementary grace must needs be supplied.
How then is such a grace really sufficient (gratia vere sufficiens)? To this most of
the Thomists reply: If the free will did not resist the grace offered, God would not
hesitate to supply the efficacious grace so that the failure of the grace is to be
referred to the sinful resistance of the free will.
A survey of the strictly regulated uniformity of this system, of the relentless and
logical sequence of the idea of the causa prima and the motor primus in every
natural and supernatural activity of creatures, and lastly of the lofty and resolute
defense of the inalienable right of grace to be considered the chief factor in the
affair of salvation, must instill into the minds of impartial and dispassionate
students a deep respect for the Thomistic system. Nevertheless the Molinists
claim that there are certain gaps and crevices in this majestic structure, and, by
inserting the levers of criticism in these, they believe they can shake the
foundations of the edifice and encompass its downfall. We shall here confine
ourselves to the four greatest objections which Molinism marshals against
Thomism.
The first objection is the danger that in the Thomistic system the freedom of the
will cannot be maintained as against efficacious grace, a difficulty which by the
way is not unperceived by the Thomists themselves. For since the essence of
freedom does not lie in the contingency of the act nor in the merely passive
indifference of the will, but rather in its active indifference -- to will or not to will, to
will this and not that -- so it appears impossible to reconcile the physical
predetermination of a particular act by an alien will and the active
spontaneousness of the determination by the will itself; nay more, they seem to
exclude each other as utterly as do determinism and indeterminism, necessity
and freedom. The Thomists answer this objection by making a distinction
between sensus compositus and sensus divisus, but the Molinists insist that
this distinction is not correctly applicable here. For just as a man who is bound
to a chair cannot be said to be sitting freely as long as his ability to stand is
thwarted by indissoluble cords, so the will predetermined by efficacious grace to
a certain thing cannot be said to retain the power to dissent, especially since the
will, predetermined to this or that act, has not the option to receive or disregard
the premotion, since this depends simply and solely on the will of God. And does
not the Council of Trent (Sess. VI, cap. v, can. iv) describe efficacious grace as a
grace which man "can reject", and from which he "can dissent"? Consequently,
the very same grace, which de facto is efficacious, might under other
circumstances be inefficacious.
Herein the second objection to the Thomistic distinction between gratia efficax
and gratia sufficiens is already indicated. If both graces are in their nature and
intrinsically different, it is difficult to see how a grace can be really sufficient
which requires another grace to complete it. Hence, it would appear that the
Thomistic gratia sufficiens is in reality a gratia insufficiens. The Thomists cannot
well refer the inefficacy of this grace to the resistance of the free will, for this act
of resistance must be traced to a proemotio physica as inevitable as the
efficacious grace.
Moreover, a third great difficulty lies in the fact that sin, as an act, demands the
predetermining activity of the "first mover", so that God would according to this
system appear to be the originator of sinful acts. The Thomistic distinction
between the entity of sin and its malice offers no solution of the difficulty. For
since the Divine influence itself, which premoves ad unum, both introduces
physically the sin as an act and entity, and also, by the simultaneous
withholding of the opposite premotion to a good act, makes the sin itself an
inescapable fatality, it is not easy to explain why sin cannot be traced back to
God as the originator. Furthermore, most sinners commit their misdeeds, not
with a regard to the depravity, but for the sake of the physical entity of the acts,
so that ethics must, together with the wickedness, condemn the physical entity
of sin. The Molinists deny that this objection affects their own system, when they
postulate the concursus of God in the sinful act, and help themselves out of the
dilemma by drawing the distinction between the entity and malice of sin. They
say that the Divine co-operation is a concursus simultaneus, which employs the
co-operating arm of God only after the will by its own free determination has
decided upon the commission of the sinful act, whereas the Thomistic
co-operation is essentially a concursus proevius which as an inevitable physical
premotion predetermines the act regardless of the fact whether the human will
can resist or not.
From this consideration arises the fourth and last objection to the claim of the
Thomists, that they have only apparently found in their physical premotion an
infallible medium by which God knows in advance with absolute certainty all the
free acts of his creatures, whether they be good or bad. For as these premotions,
as has been shown above, must in their last analysis be considered the knell of
freedom, they cannot well be considered as the means by which God obtains a
foreknowledge of the free acts of rational agents. Consequently the claims and
proper place of the scientia media in the system may be regarded as vindicated.
(2) Augustinianism
Just as Thomism appeals to the teachings of St. Thomas as its authority,
Augustinianism appeals to St. Augustine. Both systems maintain that grace is
intrinsically and by its very nature efficacious, but Augustinianism claims merely
a proedeterminatio moralis, and proceed not from the concept of God as the first
and universal cause and prime mover, but with Jansen builds upon the idea of a
twofold delight in human nature. The exponents of this system are: Berti, Bellelli,
Louis Habert, Bertieri, Brancatus de Lauria, and others. The greatest defender of
the system is Laurentius Berti (1696-1766), who in his work "De theologicis
disciplinis" (Rome, 1739-) propounded the theory with such boldness, that the
Archbishop of Vienne, Jean d'Yse de Saléon, in his work entitled "Le Bajanisme
et le Jansénisme resuscités dans les livres de Bellelli et Bertieri" (s. l., 1745),
declares it to be nothing other than a revival of Jansenism. After an official
investigation, however, Benedict XIV exonerated the system.
The foundation of the system is the same as that of Jansenism, though it claims
to be thoroughly Augustinian. In Augustinianism also there is a ceaseless
conflict between the heavenly delight and the evil delight of the flesh, and the
stronger delight invariably gains the mastery over the will. Sufficient grace, as a
weak delight, imparts merely the ability (posse), or such a feeble will that only
the advent of the victorious delight of grace (delectatio coelestis victrix, caritas)
can guarantee the will and the actual deed. Therefore, like Thomism, the system
postulates an essential difference between sufficient and efficacious grace. The
necessity of gratia efficax does not spring from the subordinate relation between
causa prima and causa secunda, but from the inherited perversity of fallen human
nature, whose evil inclinations can no longer, as once in Paradise, be overcome
by the converting grace (gratia versatilis; adjutorium sine quo non), but only by
the intrinsically efficacious heavenly delight (gratia efficax; adjutorium quo).
Augustinianism differs, however, from Jansenism in its most distinctive feature,
since it regards the influence of the victorious delight as not intrinsically coercive,
nor irresistible. Though the will follows the relatively stronger influence of grace or
concupiscence infallibly (infallibiliter), it never does so necessarily (necessario).
Although it may be said with infallible certainty that a decent man of good morals
will not walk through the public streets in a state of nudity, he nevertheless
retains the physical possibility of doing so, since there is no intrinsic compulsion
to the maintenance of decency. Similar to this is the efficacy of grace. We may
refrain from a criticism of Augustinianism since it never really became a school,
and since it has as little in common with true Augustinianism, as Jansenism
has. (See the article AUGUSTINE, SAINT.)
(3) Molinism
The famous work of the Jesuit Molina, "Concordia liberi arbitrii cum gratiae donis"
(Lisbon, 1588), brought in Spain the learned Dominican Bañez to the valiant
defence of Thomism. In 1594 the dispute between the Thomists and the Molinists
reached a fever heat. Pope Clement VIII in order to settle the dispute convened in
Rome a Congregatio de Auxiliis (1598-1607), and to this the Dominicans and the
Jesuits sent, at the pope's invitation, their ablest theologians. After the
congregation had been in session for nine years without reaching a conclusion,
Paul V, at the advice of St. Francis de Sales, permitted both systems, strongly
forbidding the Jesuits to call the Dominicans Calvinists, or the Dominicans to call
the Jesuits Pelagians. The deliberations of the congregation are fully set out in
the article CONGREGATIO DE AUXILIIS.
It seems fitting to say a few words here concerning the celebrated Spanish
Jesuit, Peter Arrubal, who took a leading part in the controversy between the
Dominicans and the Jesuits (from 22 Feb., 1599, to 20 March, 1600) as well as
in the disputations held before Clement VIII (1602-1606). Peter Arrubal was born
in 1559 at Cenicero in the Diocese of Calahorra; he died at Salamanca on 22
Sept., 1608. On 21 April, 1579, he entered the Jesuit novitiate at Alcalá, Rome,
and Salamanca. During the disputation on Grace, he distinguished himself by
refuting the Apologia of the Dominicans, composed by them against the
teachings of Molina. In the public disputations held before the Holy Father, he
was the leader of the Jesuits. Successfully and impressively he demonstrated in
these disputations that the teaching of Molina was altogether removed from
Semipelagianism, and that he (Molina) merely taught the holdings of the Council
of Trent and in no wise introduced into the Church any new doctrine. The Holy
Father forbade the publication of any work on the disputed question by reason of
the intense excitement then prevalent, consequently Arrubal's great work "De
auxiliis gratiae divinae" remained unpublished. But two folio commentaries, "In
primam partem Summae theol. S. Thomae" (Madrid, 1619, 1622); 2nd ed.,
Cologne, 1630), were prepared by him and published through the agency of P.
De Villegas and P. De la Paz, both Jesuits.
The fundamental principles of the Molinistic system of grace are the following:
efficacious grace and sufficient grace, considered in actu primo, are not in natura
and intrinsically different one from the other (as the Thomists hold), but only
accidentally so and according to their external success, inasmuch as sufficient
grace becomes efficacious just as soon as the free will corresponds to it. If the
will withholds its consent then sufficient grace remains efficacious and is termed
"merely sufficient grace" (gratia mere sufficiens). Now since one and the same
grace may in one instance be efficacious, and in another inefficacious, it follows
that the so-called gratia efficax must be conceived according to its essence as
efficax ab extrinsico. In this conception there is no lessening of the dignity and
priority of grace. For since the anticipatory grace invests the created will, quite
irrespective of its consent in actu primo, supernaturally with moral and physical
powers, and since moreover, as a supernatural concursus, it influences the actus
secundus or good act and thus becomes efficacious grace, it follows that the
good act itself is the joint product of grace and free will, or rather more the work
of grace than of free will. For it is not the will which by its free consent
determines the power of grace, but conversely it is grace which makes the free
good act possible, prepares for it and co-operates in its execution. The infallibility
of the success, which is contained in the very idea of efficacious grace, is not to
be explained by the intrinsic nature of this grace, nor by a supernatural proemotio
physica, but rather by the Theologoumenon of the scientia media, by virtue of
which God foreknows from all eternity whether this particular will would freely
co-operate with a certain grace or not. But since God by virtue of His scientia
media has at His own disposal all the sufficient and efficacious grace, the
infallibility of the successful outcome remains in perfect accord with the freedom
of the will, and furthermore the dogma concerning final perseverance and
predestination is entirely preserved.
It is apparent that above all Molinism is determined to throw a wall of security
around the free will. The Thomists maintain that this is done at the expense of
grace. Instead of making the free will dependent on the power of grace, it is will
which freely determines the success or failure of grace. Thus in the last analysis
it is human will which decides whether a particular grace shall prove efficacious
or not, although revelation teaches that it is God, who with His grace gives both
the willing and the doing of a good act. Even friends of Molina, notably Cardinal
Bellarmine (De grat. et lib. arbitr., I, 12), saw the force of this difficulty and
declined to follow the extreme Molinism, which, by the way, was not taught by
Molina. This explains the Instruction issued by Claudius Acquaviva, the General
of the Jesuits in the year 1613, directing all the teaching body of the Society to
lay increased stress on the fact that efficacious grace differs from sufficient grace
not only ab extrinsico, but also in its moral (not its physical) nature even in actu
primo, inasmuch as efficacious grace being a special gift of God has a higher
moral value than merely sufficient grace, which according to the infallible
foreknowledge of God recoils ineffectively in consequence of the resistance of the
will. Thus it remains true that God Himself effects our good deeds, not that He
merely supplies us with the potentiality.
(4) Congruism
Congruism is based on an unessentially modified form of Molinism, than which it
is more carefully worked out in its details. It was endorsed by the Jesuit General
Claudius Acquaviva (d. 1615) and by his successors Muzio Vitelleschi (d. 1645)
and Piccolomini (d. 1651), and was made the official system of the Society of
Jesus. The system was really originated by Molina himself, but received its
definitive form from the labours of Bellarmine, Suarez, Vasquez, and Lessius. It
takes its name from the gratia congrua, that is, a grace suited to the
circumstances of the case, which is opposed to the gratia incongrua, a grace
namely which is not suited to the circumstances of a certain case. Both of these
concepts are purely Augustinian, as a reference to Augustine (Ad Simplicianum,
I, Q. ii, n. 13) will show.
It is quite obvious that gratia congrua corresponds with efficacious grace, and
gratia incongrua with merely sufficient grace. Accordingly the efficacy of a grace
depends upon its peculiar agreement or congruity with the interior and exterior
disposition of the recipient, whereby a certain relationship of choice is
established between grace and free will, which at the hand of God in the light of
His scientia media becomes the infallible means of carrying out all His designs of
grace in great things and small with certain success and without violence. Even a
small grace, which by reason of its congruity is attended with success, has an
incomparably greater sanctifying value than an ever so much more powerful
grace, which by reason of unfavourable circumstances of inclination, training, and
environment fails in its purpose, and therefore as a gratia incongrua appears to
the Divine foreknowledge as merely sufficient. Concerning the method of
operation of the efficacious, or the congruous grace, the Congruists like the
Molinists make three divisions: the efficacy of power (efficacia virtutis); the
efficacy of union (efficacia connexionis); the efficacy of infallibility (efficacia
infallibilitatis).
The efficacy of the power to will and to do is peculiar to the efficacious and
sufficient grace, that is to say, it is derived neither from the human will nor from
the Divine foreknowledge. The efficacy of the union between act and grace
depends upon the free will, because according to the dogma efficacious grace is
not irresistible, but can be rejected at any time. The efficacy of infallibility springs
not from the physical nature of grace but from the infallible foreknowledge of God
(scientia media), which cannot be deceived. After due consideration of all the
various phases of the Catholic doctrine of grace, it would seem that the
congruistic remodelled Molinism comes fairly near the truth, because it is
intelligently adjusted between the anti-grace Pelagianism and Semipelagianism
on the one hand, and the anti-free-will Calvinism and Jansenism on the other.
Nevertheless there are numerous critics who find much to object to in
Congruism, and who fail to see in it a clear solution of the problem of grace and
free will. They find it difficult to believe that grace adjusts itself slavishly to all the
circumstances of the recipient, when the story of many a conversion shows that
grace simply lays hold of man and without much parley leads him whithersoever
it would have him go. Thus, grace does not depend for its efficacy on the
congruity of the circumstances, but conversely the congruity of the
circumstances is shaped and brought about by grace. Like all the other systems
Congruism is forced to the confession: "We are standing before an unsolved
mystery."
(5) Syncretism
In the conviction that in each of the four systems we have thus far considered
there must be in spite of imperfections many grains of truth, the Syncretic
system hopes by proceeding in an eclectic manner, by adopting the good points
of the various systems and eliminating all that is improbable and secondary, to
evolve another or fifth system. The first incitement to the creation of this system
came from the Paris Sorbonne (Ysambert, Isak, Habert, Duplessis d'Argentre,
Tournely), whose views received a certain consecration from the fact that St.
Alphonsus Liguori, the great Doctor of the Church, endorsed them ("Op.
dogmat.", ed. Walter, I, 517 sqq. ; II, 707, sqq.). Among more recent exponents
of this system may be mentioned: Godfrey a Graun, Schwetz, Cardinal
Katschthaler, Herrmann. The distinguishing trait of the Syncretic system is found
in the acceptance of two quite distinct sorts of efficacious grace, namely, the
(Thomistic-Augustinian) gratia ab intrinseco efficax and the
(Molinistic-Congruistic) gratia ab extrinsico efficax. Their respective functions are
so apportioned, that the intrinsically predetermining grace of the Thomists (i.e. of
the Augustinians, as in e.g. in the writings of St. Alphonsus Liguori) is employed
in the difficult works, e.g. in the patient endurance of great trials, in the
overcoming of sever temptations, in the execution of difficult duties, etc.- while on
the other hand the non-predetermining grace of the Molinists is reserved for the
less difficult good works, such as a short prayer, a slight mortification, etc. Both
these graces are given by God for the performance of their respective functions.
Prayer is placed a a link joining the two, and as the proper and practically
infallible means of obtaining the Thomistic grace necessary for the performance
of the difficult works of salvation. Who prays will secure his eternal salvation; who
does not pray will be lost forever. If any one thing is to be specially singled out for
commendation in this Syncretic system of grace, it is its insistence on the fact,
which cannot be too strongly emphasized, that prayer is our individual duty, an
absolute necessity and an infallible means in the attainment of our eternal
salvation. Our minds cannot be too thoroughly imbued with the truth of the
statement that our present provision of grace is essentially and intrinsically a
magnificent economy of prayer. Even though Syncretism had performed no other
service than the vigorous proclamation of this great truth, it alone were sufficient
to rescue the system from oblivion. The system has not, it is true, solved the real
problem of the relation between grace and free will. On the contrary, the linking
together of the two kinds of efficacious grace only increases the difficulties found
in the other systems. Consequently this system ends like the others in the
inevitable conviction that we are confronted by a great mystery.
J. Pohle
Transcribed by Sean Hyland
The Catholic Encyclopedia, Volume VI
Copyright © 1909 by Robert Appleton Company
Online Edition Copyright © 1999 by Kevin Knight
Nihil Obstat, September 1, 1909. Remy Lafort, Censor
Imprimatur. +John M. Farley, Archbishop of New York
The Catholic Encyclopedia: NewAdvent.org