Virtue

VIRTUE. - I. GENERAL NOTIONS. - Virtue is a quality that perfects an operative faculty, disposing it well in relation to its activity and to the attainment of the end toward which the subject tends or is destined. Thus one speaks of intellectual virtues and of moral virtues to indicate the good dispositions of the intellective faculty in order to theoretical-practical knowledge, or of the appetitive faculty in order to right action. Under the name of virtue there is therefore generally designated a quid intermediate between the faculty and the operation, and more properly only a perfective quality of the rational powers in order to their own operation.

1. Habit and the operative faculty

Already Aristotle characterized this disposition as a habit (ἔξις) or habitude, which adds to the idea of simple disposition (διάθησις) the specification of a stable and permanent disposition (Nicomachean Ethics, bk. II, ch. 6, 1106 b). Not every disposition of the faculties is therefore a habit or habitude. The disposition must be stable and with difficulty removable (difficile mobilis) in order to constitute a habitude (cf. Boethius, In categ. Arist., I. III: PL. 64, 242 D - 243 A). The positivistic, phenomenological and generally vitalistic currents of the end of the century cannot rise to the classical idea of the habitus, given the equalization they establish between the operative behaviors of brutes and of man, the activity of the latter being reduced to a phenomenological complex, or to a mechanism governed by biological, physical and chemical laws. The constancy of the determination of the faculty to a given act is in fact a factor of a spiritual nature. It is indeed like a second nature in man, a new state with respect to his own operation, rooted in his very being, and which in some way imposes itself upon the original being; but this imposition does not consist in a tyrannical determinism over the faculties, as though the habit imposed action with the force of automatic necessity, wholly replacing the spontaneity of the simple purely natural faculty. The faculty and the habitude become on the contrary almost connatural, in a mutual adaptation that leaves absolutely unchanged the proper nature of the faculties, and their subjection to the control of reason and will in operation. Far from creating a determinism, the habitus of the Scholastics renders the faculty more subject to reason and more manageable to the will, facilitating activity with a stable disposition to execution.

2. Habit and virtue

Not every habitude therefore is a virtue, but only that which: a) disposes well, that is, giving facility to act according to the nature of the disposed subject; b) disposes the power to operation, and in this it is distinguished from other permanent dispositions or substantial and entitative habits, which are subjected immediately in the substance or nature, and only indirectly in the faculties rooted in it; c) disposes not every power, but those of a rational order: that is, the powers of a rational nature or those connected with them, such as the sensitive powers; d) finally, and it is here above all that the Christian and spiritual sense of virtue resides, the habitude disposes the faculties not only to their own operation, but above all to the right exercise and good use of it (Sum. Theol., 1ᵃ-2ᵃᶜ, q. 55, a. 4; Lombard, Sent., bk. 2, d. 17, c. 5).

3. The moral order and virtue

Virtue in the strict sense is not an innate habit, but either acquired, or supernaturally infused. Only in these can one discern the moral aspect connected with the concept of virtue, that is, the stable disposition «qua recte vivitur et qua nullus male utitur»; the innate habit is a simple tendency, which entitatively is confounded with the powers themselves, and therefore the name of true virtue does not belong to it (Sum. Theol., 1ᵃ-2ᵃᶜ, q. 49, a. 3).

The salient point or, in the words of D. Scotus, the «formal element» of virtue is above all (but not exclusively) the relation between faculty, activity and the ultimate end to be attained. Thus a habit, in order to be a principle of moral action, must dispose not only to the perfect exercise of the faculty, but rises to moral value insofar as the good disposition to operation renders easier the use and the direction of the faculty to operate in order to the end to be attained.

II. THE DIFFERENT SPECIES OF VIRTUE

1. Diversity of the v. as regards the faculties informed

From this point of view, the intellectual v. are commonly distinguished from the moral v.: the former are habits disposing the intellectual faculties, the latter the appetitive faculties. But besides this rather external difference, there is a deeper one, whereby the moral v., influencing the will, bring it about that the will, besides acting perfectly, also makes good use of itself in order to the end and to what leads to the end (the specifically human acts); the intellectual habits, on the other hand, are ordered only to the perfection of the act in itself, but not to the right use of the faculty, because the use or application of the latter to the act depends solely on the will, that is, on another faculty which directs it. This disposition of the intellectual faculty acquires a moral value only insofar as it makes it more manageable for control, and therefore for the moral direction impressed by the will.

Moreover, the reduction of the speculative order to the moral one is required by another, more general consideration. Since morality embraces the end and all that leads to the end (human acts), the acts of the intellect cannot be definitively excluded from this consideration, both because the intellect, its habits and its object are either the efficient cause of subjective beatitude (contemplation) or objective beatitude itself (God, summum speculabile), and insofar as intellectual acts can, under the direction of the moving affection, merit in order to the attainment of the end, and finally because contemplation itself in this life is like the embryo of that future one (cf. Sum. Theol., 1ᵃ-2ᵃᶜ, q. 56, a. 3). It should also be observed that the v. of faith is an intellectual v. and is nevertheless a true v., and prudence is a true moral v., even though it resides in the intellect. It is the connection of the faculties among themselves, and the interpenetration of their fields of action, that brings it about that intellectual v. and moral v. are connected in a solid moral structure; the mutual influencing of the faculties - the intellect in rectifying the will and the will in applying the intellect and directing its activity toward the moral end - gives the seal of morality even to the intellectual habits, whose acts would not properly have a perfect moral value, since of themselves they do not fully measure up to the concept of a human act, and also because they proceed from purely speculative habits, which do not have the power to apply and direct them in moral or immoral use.

In conclusion, for the morality of human acts it is required that they be conformed to right reason and proceed from an affection well ordered in relation to man's end. Now if it is true that the intellectual v., e.g. prudence, is not sufficient for the goodness of such an act, insofar as it serves only to direct the will in choice and determination, and must in turn be moved by the will to apply itself to its directive act (act of prudence), on the other hand it is also true that the will needs to be directed by intellectual prudence in order to be morally right in applying man to the human act. It follows that, as regards what is interior in the human act, both the intellect and its v. are required in equal degree (to judge the rationality of the act to be performed), and also the will which, desiring the act insofar as it is good, orders it to the right end. As regards the exteriority of the act, however, it is only the will that moves to its execution. The speculative v., therefore, for that part of the act which is interior, is a true v. or operative habit, which participates in the morality of the act in the same proportion in which the internal act must correspond to the external act (Sum. Theol., 1ᵃ-2ᵃᶜ, q. 57, a. 3, ad 1).

2. Diversity of the v. as regards origin: innate, acquired and infused v

a) If habit is a permanent disposition brought about by the very specific and individual nature of the subject, we have the innate or natural v., which is nothing other than the predisposition of each faculty to develop in its own primordial acts. b) The acquired v., on the other hand, is the one that man himself procures for his own faculties, whether by the repetition of acts or by bending them through exercise to full submission. It is, as it were, the result of a training of the spirit in its field of activity. In this formative task of the v. it is clear that the personal will represents the principal part, above all external factors influencing the faculty, bringing it about that the innate predisposition or habit passes from unconscious spontaneity to personal dominion, so as to direct itself autonomously throughout the vast network of activity spread out before its possibility, in a full determination of the individual act to be performed and of its actual exercise. This is verified above all for the acquired moral v. or those of the rational appetite, but implicitly (secundum quid) also in the intellectual v. and in the habits of the sensitive appetite. c) The infused v. are those produced by God himself in man's operative faculties. They differ from the acquired ones first of all because they do not necessarily involve a power of man in determining the faculty to operation (facility of acting well), and consequently they do not facilitate activity by disposing the faculties to produce the act, which is proper to the v. acquired through human activity. This difference follows from the very manner of origin of the infused v., which is not an autonomous perfecting of nature in its specifically natural faculties, but a gratuitous addition, which surpasses every specifically natural power of theirs, and is therefore simply a new power given to the human faculty in order to a new act connatural to a new being of its own, rather than a gratuitous facility to produce such an act.

III. INFUSED VIRTUE

1. The Christian virtue is an infused virtue

The general concept of virtue set forth thus far applies commonly to acquired virtue and to infused virtue, with the difference that the former is originated through human activity, and the latter is produced by God immediately in man. Herein, according to the Scholastics, lies the specific difference of infused virtue.

In the general concept of virtue a twofold element must be distinguished: one material, which is the habit or constant quality disposing the faculty, and the other formal, which is a relation between faculty, act and ultimate end. Examining these two elements in the acquired virtues, while it is easy to establish that they consist in an operative habit, it is very difficult on the other hand to establish their relation to the moral end or ultimate end. If this end to be attained through human activity is beyond the natural exigencies of man, it is clear that no human activity can be proportionate to such an end, and therefore the operative habit of the acquired virtues, being of natural origin, can never transcend to a power that leads to the supernatural end. But since the Christian knows from Revelation that his destiny is supernatural, virtue is truly such, for him, when it makes him act in that sense. Such virtue cannot be other than of supernatural origin, independently of its activity.

2. Existence of the infused virtues

To prove the existence of the infused virtues, one must prove that there exist in man stable, operative qualities, distinct however from the operative faculties and from operation, which confer on man the power to operate in order to the attainment of a supernatural end, qualities acquired not through human activity, but infused directly by God.

On the part of reason, presupposing the revelation of the supernatural vocation, one can adduce a proof of a moral order or of fittingness. The mode of divine Providence requires in general that God's action upon man unfold gently (Wis. 8:1); therefore the supernatural activity of man postulates that God grant him operative principles proportionate to such a vocation and consequent activity, and by which man, as through the operative habits of the acquired virtues, is intrinsically empowered and perfected in his faculties, to operate connaturally in order to the higher end. Moreover, granted the infusion of Grace as a permanent habit, inherent in the substance or nature of the human soul (substantial habit), a certain necessity is deduced also of operative habits consequent upon or concomitant with it, so that the nature intrinsically elevated may also produce acts connatural to it through connatural operative habits, that is, infused and supernatural as well. This proof of fittingness is corroborated by Revelation. The messianic gifts, in fact, are described in the Old Testament as superior qualities that will make man act with justice and equity (Is. 11:2-4); as an interior renewal (Ez. 36:25-31). This will not be the fruit of human industry, but only of God (Is. 26:12). This Kingdom of men interiorly docile, in opposition to legal exteriorism (Jer. 31:53), entails, as is better expressed in the New Testament, an interior holiness, similar to that of God (Mt. 5:48). This perfection is a true participation in the divine nature (II Pt. 1:3-11), it is like a new nature superimposed on the old man (Rom. 6:6); the very life of Jesus engraved in our mortal flesh (II Cor. 4:10-11). It is opposed to the natural life as light to darkness (Eph. 5:8-9), as a living stone to a dead stone (I Pt. 2:4-5); it is a life blossomed from the word of truth (Jas. 1:16-18), which is identified with the truth (I Jn. 3:19). All this entails in the soul a new entitative form, a radical habit, that is, sanctifying Grace (v.) which pervades the very being of the soul, giving it newness of life. But this life would not be such if it did not have the principles to be able to act in conformity with itself. It is for this reason that Christian preaching always joins the exaltation of interior renewal with virtuous activity. Such is the revelation contained in the Sermon on the Mount. The new covenant foretold by Jeremiah (31:33) entails a new law, wholly interior (Mt. 5:6-7), which requires many virtues and the exercise of renunciation from those who wish to «enter into life» (Mt. 19:17); for narrow is the way that leads to it (Mt. 7:1-14). The good, the blessed are characterized by the virtuous life; purity, mercy, humility, simplicity, fidelity, constancy (Mk. 5:2-12); their life is like the anxious search for a transcendent «treasure», the Kingdom of God and his righteousness (Mk. 6:20 and 33); a law of life that is summed up, in Jesus' thought, in a constant will to love, to embrace all that is love of God and neighbor (Mk. 25:37-40), and whose quality and intensity is of a divine character: be perfect, as your Father is perfect.

That these are then true virtues is clear from the characteristics that accompany these gifts of God: 1) they are stable qualities, that is, operative habits: a) «without faith it is impossible to please God» (Heb. 11:6): in this text it is not a question of an activity, but of a habitual quality, otherwise children incapable of activity could not have it and could not please God; b) three virtues, says St. Paul, «remain» always (I Cor. 3:13): which expression indicates the presence of habits, more than of acts; c) above all, charity «never fails» (ibid. 8), a permanent and enduring quality that affects the operative principles of the man who wishes to please God. 2) These qualities are infused by God into our hearts (II Cor. 5:5); charity comes from God and is a communication of the Holy Spirit who works in us (Rom. 5:5; Eph. 3:16-19). 3) The character of true virtues of these stable qualities infused by God into man is given by the fact that with explicit activity through them the new life is realized in man, and with their use in this life, man walks in conformity with his celestial «vocation»: such is the virtue «qua recte vivitur, et qua nullus male utitur».

Already the apologetic Fathers, in opposing the Christian life to the pagan life, pointed out the superiority of the former because of the Christian virtues that lead and order man to the true good. Virtue makes the Christian live in holiness and justice (Aristides, Apol. 15: Ital. vers. by C. Vena, Rome 1950, pp. 105-10), while the pagans are not good because they have abandoned it (Lactantius, Div. instit., l. 5, chs. 5-6: PL 6, 564-69); knowledge is not enough, but the practice of the good through virtue is also needed (ibid., chs. 16-17: PL 6, 599-604). The Fathers of the first centuries insist above all on inculcating what Christian perfection must be, namely the imitation of Jesus, with a virtuous life and the practice of self-denial. St. Ambrose, St. Jerome, St. Augustine and later St. Gregory the Great take up in their works definitions and arguments of the Stoics and other pagan philosophers: but they always bring out the supernatural character of Christian virtue: 1) this is a gratuitous gift of God (cf. St. Polycarp, Ad Eph. 3, 2; St. Augustine, In Ps. 55, enarr. 19: PL 36, 695); 2) it is a habit of the soul (id., De moribus Eccl. cath., l. 1, n. 9: PL 32, 1314); 3) it is a good habit, that is, one that leads to God (id., Sermo 235, n. 1: PL 38, 1293; De Civ. Dei, l. 4, ch. 21; l. 9, ch. 4, n. 1); it is a supernatural habit, because the end to which it orders is eternal life (id., Ep. 140, n. 9: PL 33, 670), and because it is infused directly by God (id., De Civ. Dei, l. 20, ch. 25; De lib. arbitrio, l. 2, ch. 19: PL 32, 1267 f.).

In the revealed documents of Sacred Scripture and Tradition examined, one notices an implicit distinction between the state of Christian life and the exercise of that life: man is called to a higher life, and even now participates in the divine nature; he must walk in a manner worthy of his vocation, in order to reach the goal and perceive the "unfading crown"; he is blessed on condition that he walks along the "narrow way," the only one that leads to life; for this he receives from God many gifts through the Spirit who dwells in him permanently, to infuse in him charity, faith and hope, which "remain." The Fathers therefore speak of Christian virtues, gratuitous gifts of God, by which the Christian is good. In all these determinations one can discern an embryonic distinction between certain permanent gifts infused by God in man and distinct from activity and from the operative faculties, and which are the proximate principles of these activities.

The distinction between virtuous life and virtuous habits, under the influence of certain scholastic controversies, begins in the Middle Ages to make its way into ecclesiastical documents themselves. a) Innocent III in his letter to Ymbert of Arles (1201) alludes to this controversy: to the opinion of those who maintain that in Baptism the theological virtues and the other virtues and even Grace are not infused into infants, because they are incapable of making free use of them, he opposes another view, according to which the infusion of these gifts into baptized infants is certain, because those virtues are conferred on them "as habits," not as the actual use of them (Denz-U, 410). b) Clement V, at the Council of Vienne (1311-12), takes up this latter opinion and adopts it explicitly "tamquam probabiliorem" and more in conformity with the doctrine of the Fathers and theologians, and moreover availing himself of conciliar approval (Denz-U, II, 483). These decrees certainly teach that there exist permanent infused gifts distinct from acts: that is, operative habits; that they are infused by God, as is clear from the very words used and from the context, since they are given together with Grace to baptized infants incapable of acquired virtues. c) The Council of Trent (sess. 6, c. 7), having described the acts preparatory to justification — among which one must note the act of faith — affirms that "justification is not only the remission of sins, but also the sanctification and interior renewal of man through the reception of grace and of the gifts"; these gifts, insofar as they are distinct from Grace and from the acts of faith prior to justification, represent something permanent in the just man, and, like Grace itself, are inherent in the soul. They are "faith, hope and charity": all three true habits, since: 1) it is a question of that charity which "is poured forth into the heart of the just man and becomes inherent in him": 2) it is a question of that faith which "catechumens ask of the Church," and therefore distinct from the actual faith they already have in preparing for justification, and of which baptized infants are incapable. When in the documents referred to there is talk of the existence of infused virtues, one can distinguish in them a twofold assertion: a) the existence of permanent gifts, distinct from the acts produced by virtue of them; b) these gifts are true virtues or rather operative habits. The first assertion is to be held as of faith, according to the explicit words, especially in the Tridentine decree with regard to faith, hope and charity (B. Beraza, De virtutibus infusis, Bilbao 1929, n. 24). The second assertion, which bears rather on the terms and the corresponding philosophical concepts, is to be held as theologically certain and even proximate to faith according to Suárez (De gratia, l. VI, cap. 8, n. 15), and certain others.

IV. SUBDIVISION OF INFUSED VIRTUES

1. Infused virtues "per se" and "per accidens": the former are virtues that man cannot in any way procure for himself, because they dispose him to an end that surpasses every natural possibility of his; the latter are virtues that God, the author of all nature, sometimes infuses into man, although man can procure them for himself through his own activity (v. acquired). It is clear that in theology only the properly infused virtues (per se) are considered, since these alone are intrinsically supernatural.

2. Infused theological and moral virtues

Virtue must lead to the ultimate end which, objectively, is God; now, virtuous habits can make one attain God either immediately and directly in himself, or mediately through an activity intermediate between man and the end. In the first case there are the theological virtues, in the second the moral ones.

a) The theological virtues are recognized by their object, their origin and their knowability. Their object is God, whom they make one attain immediately through their acts, which unite the agent directly with the object of his end. This immediacy must be, as regards its material aspect, objective and not merely reducible, as in the moral virtue of religion. God is the principal material object of the theological virtues, since there are, for example, many other objects of faith that are not God (the Sacraments, the Church...), but which are believed because of their connection with the principal object believed. Furthermore, the formal object of the theological virtues must be immediately God as God, or some divine attribute. The origin of the theological virtue is through a true and proper infusion. The theological virtues are known only through divine revelation, as has been said for the infused virtues in general.

b) The infused moral virtues, of which we speak here, are not the moral virtues infused accidentally: these are possible, and sometimes God grants them to some of his privileged ones, but they are not necessarily required for justification. What is meant here are the moral virtues properly infused, which differ from the corresponding acquired ones, both by reason of the ultimate end to which they direct the one who possesses them, and by reason of their proper object: the end to which they lead is in fact eternal life, whereas the acquired ones intend to lead only to good human order; the proper or formal object of the acquired moral virtues is the good according to human reason, which establishes its consonance with man's nature, whereas the object of the infused virtues is the good established by a "divine rule," which posits the goodness of this object from a transcendent point of view (St. Thomas, In III Sent., d. 33, q. 1, a. 2, q. 1, 4, ad 2.; Sum. Theol., 1ᵃ-2ᵃᵉ, q. 63, a. 4). The existence of the infused moral virtues has been denied by some theologians, but this seems hardly in conformity with Sacred Scripture and the doctrine of the Fathers (cf. C. Mazzella, De virt. infusi, Rome 1884, p. 30).

V. THEOLOGY OF THE INFUSED VIRTUES

1. Intimate nature of the infused virtues

The Aristotelian conception of virtue as a habit was taken up and handed down to Scholasticism through the work of Boethius. For him virtue is a habit or "a permanent disposition to choose while remaining in the mean, determined by reason, as the wise man fixes it" (In categ. Aristot., l. III: PL 64, 242 D-243 A). In the same order of ideas, Abelard defines virtue as "a quality naturally impressed upon the soul... and not easily moved... which raises us to the merit of true beatitude" (Dial. inter philos. iudaeum et christ.: PL 178, 1651-52). Abelard's definition finds an echo in the schools, with some slight variation (cf. O. Lottin, Les premières définitions et classifications des vertus au moyen âge, in Rev. d. sciences philos. et théol., 18 [1928], pp. 369-89). St. Augustine, even while gathering and commenting on the definitions given by the philosophers, speaks of virtue as a "habit" (Div. quaest., 83, q. 31: PL 40, 20); but what characterizes his doctrine, against Pelagianism, is his insistence on declaring its divine origin (De civ. Dei, l. XX, cap. 25: PL 41, 762). On this characteristic another Scholastic current, headed by the Lombard (Sent., 1, II, d. 17, cap. 5), will insist above all; the virtue thus defined is distinguished from the virtuous act, inasmuch as it is an aid to it, while the latter is rather the exterior work of the virtue (cf. also ibid., cap. 6).

Becoming aware of these two ways of speaking, the Scholastics distinguish two kinds of virtue: the one natural or political, and the other Catholic, distinguished by the end to which they lead (Simon of Tournai).

The Aquinate united the two conceptions into one. Having accepted in the Commentary the Lombard's definition as the most complete (In II Sent., d. 27, q. 1, a. 2 and ad 9m), he insists there on defining virtue as a habit added to a faculty of the soul and which enables it to act well (a. 4). This Lombardian formula is re-examined and summarized in the Summa (1ᵃ-2ᵃᵉ, q. 55, a. 4), with the sole variant of habitus instead of qualitas: a habit in relation to action, and therefore inherent in the operative faculties (a. 2) and which renders them fit to operate well (a. 3).

Just as Grace is not a new substance juxtaposed to the substance of the soul, so the infused virtues cannot be conceived as new faculties or powers set alongside the natural ones. It is true that between the two there is a great similarity (cf. Sum. Theol., 1ᵃ-2ᵃᵉ, q. 110, a. 4, ad 1), but nevertheless the infused virtues always remain simple potentiating qualities, qualitative habits and not powers; because a power informs the substance immediately; whereas virtues or habits inform the faculties; because powers are indifferent to good or evil, whereas habits are determined to the one or the other.

The infused virtues can therefore also be called powers, but incomplete ones, since they already presuppose the radical powers of the soul. The supernatural act proceeds from the faculty of the soul insofar as it is informed by the infused virtue, so that the will and the virtue both influence the supernatural act by real concomitance. This does not mean that the natural faculty influences the act only by means of the virtue that informs it; on the contrary, it influences it directly of itself, insofar as it makes the act free and vital. Once informed by the supernatural habit, the natural faculty is a true proximate and immediate cause, in its own degree, of the supernatural act. In short, it can be said that the infused virtues are operative habits that confer upon the faculties of the soul the ability to be immediate principles of supernatural activity (cf. Sum. Theol., 1ᵃ-2ᵃᵉ, q. 110, a. 3; De verit., q. 27, a. 2).

If the infused virtue fully realizes the concept of an operative habit, as a permanent quality perfective of a faculty for acting connaturally, it seems, as experience shows, not to correspond to the other endowment of operative habits, which is to make one act with ease and enthusiasm. It is known that acquired virtues confer this ease of acting precisely because of their origin: the repetition of the act, in fact, creates in the faculty a habitual inclination to act in a certain sense and to avoid the opposite. This does not seem to be able to be said of the infused virtues; with their infusion the opposite inclinations do not vanish. It is easy to observe that the tepid, although receiving continuous infusions and increases of virtue through the Sacraments, do not feel greater ease in the practice of virtue (cf. Ripalda, De ente supernat., disp. 118, n. 16).

Some theologians admit an intrinsic "ease" given by the infused virtues, insofar as they dispose the faculties to their respective acts (F. Suárez, De gratia, l. VI, cap. 9, n. 9; cf. St. Thomas, De verit., q. 24, s. 4, 1 m). This ease does not, however, remove exterior obstacles; this will be the object only of the prolonged exercise of the infused virtues, by which man "acquires" the ease of exercising the supernatural virtue. This ease is explained in various ways.

Among the many opinions of theologians, that one seems to be preferred which teaches that the ease in question is given entirely by a natural habit acquired through the activity of the infused virtue. This acquired habit does not give true and proper ease regarding the formal objects of the infused virtues, but only regarding the material object common to it and to them. It is therefore a matter of a natural habit that is only dispositive, insofar as it renders the faculty really disposed to operate in a given matter, which in reality is carried out only by the infused virtue, which attains it under its own formal aspect (cf. J. G. Gonet, Clypena theol., tr. 4, disp. 4, n. 25). Knowing that repeated natural acts generate in the corresponding faculty a habit acquired from nature itself, it is obvious to ask whether the same can be said of the generation of supernatural habits through repeated supernatural acts corresponding to them. The problem concerning these acts is above all whether they are true causes concurring with God in the formation of the infused virtues, that is, whether they are causes not only moral-meritorious that move God to infuse the habits, but also physical, concurring by true physical influence in such formation. All theologians resolutely deny this causality, and some note that the contrary opinion is at least temerarious. It must therefore be affirmed: a) that God alone is the physical efficient cause of the supernatural virtues; b) that the supernatural acts of man are only dispositive causes of them: a disposition that can be either a simple removal of obstacles (material dispositive cause), or a positive direction and moral appeal to infusion (moral dispositive cause, also of a material order: for example, perfect contrition in the sinner).

This common doctrine rests on the explicit Tridentine affirmations (sess. VI, cann. 6-7: "disponimur"), and on all the anti-Pelagian struggles. It seems, moreover, contradictory to affirm that acts which of themselves, according to their nature, ought to proceed from a connatural habit, can of themselves, by their own nature (and therefore physically) cause those habits (F. Suárez, op. cit., l. VIII, c. 4, n. 10). And if this were by absurdity possible, it would also have to occur in sinners even before they are justified.

2. Increase of the infused virtues

The Council of Trent repeatedly canonizes the doctrine of the "incrementum iustitiae," explicitly condemning those who deny it (sess. VI, cann. 10, 24 and 32). In these Tridentine definitions the increase of justice "per bona opera" is dogmatically established; for these works are "the cause of the increase of justice" (can. 24), and "merit the increase of Grace" (can. 32). On the nature of the increase it must be observed that it cannot be a simple widening of the field of operation, since such an increase would not be intrinsic and habitual, but only limited to the duration of the virtuous act. Nor is it enough to say that the habit becomes stronger, since this could not apply to the theological virtues, which make the subject adhere to their object in a superlative way (super omnia). It remains therefore to say that the increase of the habit is to be conceived less from its increased power over the faculty than from a greater intensity of the habitual quality itself, which, remaining the same, that is, one in number and one with respect to the faculty informed, becomes intrinsically more perfect. This doctrine, which appeals both to the increase of "justice" mentioned in the Tridentine definition, and to the constitution of "justice" through entitative habits (Grace) and operative habits (infused virtues), and to the philosophical principle that the true intrinsic increase of a quality must be intensive, has the value of a theologically certain conclusion. On the degree of the increase the Council of Trent (sess. VI, can. 7, 10) seems to posit a perfect parallel between the increase of justice and that of the virtues: from this one may deduce that the virtues increase with the increase of Grace and vice versa; and this in the same degree of intensity.

All this is certain. But what in concrete terms the degree of increase is, is difficult and impossible to state. On the basis of the words of the Council of Trent, this measure depends on the will of the Holy Spirit and "according to the disposition and cooperation of each one" (sess. VI, can. 6). It is therefore on these two causes that the increase depends: on God, the principal efficient cause, and on man, the material dispositive cause, inasmuch as by acting supernaturally he has titles to merit from God the increase of the infused habits.

As is clear, besides the divine good pleasure, the degree of the increase depends in good part also on the cooperation of man through dispositive activity of a supernatural order. What then can man do to increase his virtues? It is here that all the preceding doctrine finds a full application in the Christian life. a) The Sacraments are the channels of Grace and of the infused virtues, which they confer ex novo (Baptism, Penance) or increase, whether unconditionally (Eucharist), or in relation to a special social need (Order, Matrimony) or individual need (Conformation, Extreme Unction). Here too, although the effect is infallible (ex opere operato), the degree of infusion and of increase depends also, though not efficiently, but only by disposing the subject, on the spiritual preparation of man. b) The influence that supernatural works also have on the increase of the infused virtues cannot be a physical influence (reserved to God alone), but only a moral one, by reason of merit "de condigno."

3. Loss of the infused virtues

Since the perfecting of the infused virtue is conditioned on that of Grace and vice versa, it is legitimate to ask whether with the loss of Grace through mortal sin the infused virtue is also lost. On the basis of the doctrine of the Church and of theological principles, a distinction must here be made among the behavior of the different virtues. Infused charity is lost with the loss of Grace; faith and hope remain after the loss of Grace; the infused moral virtues are lost by losing Grace. a) Charity is lost by losing Grace through mortal sin, since where there is mortal sin there is no love of God (Sum. Theol., 2ᵃ-2ᵃᵉ, q. 24, s. 12) nor friendship with God (ibid., 1ᵃ-2ᵃᵉ, q. 65, s. 5). The Council of Trent (sess. VI, can. 7) teaches that only he who has charity is a "living member of the body of Christ"; therefore he who does not have sanctifying Grace, being supernaturally dead, does not have vivifying charity. This doctrine is certain. b) Hope is not always lost by losing Grace. This conclusion, rather than a doctrine of faith (Medina), is only certain and based on the common sense of theologians (Suárez). Hope can nevertheless be lost by the contrary act or by the loss of faith. c) Faith is not always lost by losing Grace. Against the Protestant principle of justifying faith the Council of Trent (sess. VI, can. 28) asserts that in the sinner faith can remain (v.), already infused in justification, that is, habitual faith. This doctrine is held to be of faith by many theologians. It is clear that faith can be lost only by the contrary act of infidelity, which suffices to make one an infidel. d) The infused virtues are lost with the loss of Grace, since they are related to Grace as properties are to essence; and it is congruous to affirm that just as these virtues are given to man so that he may act connaturally to his state of Grace, so too they are lost by losing that state. This doctrine is less certain than the others, given also that many theologians deny the existence of these infused moral virtues.

4. Diminution of the infused virtues

Venial sin can certainly bring about an improper diminution of the virtue, that is, the loss of the facility to act and a disposition toward its total loss. But a true intrinsic diminution, according to the common opinion of theologians, is to be denied. For there seems to be no connection between the effect of venial sin and the diminution of supernatural habits, because they are compatible, and because ordinarily the just man cannot avoid them; above all because, although venial sin is outside the supernatural moral order, it is nevertheless not contrary to it, so that it neither entails by its nature a relaxation of the infused habit, nor does it seem to merit that God should have recourse to this to punish man, otherwise the latter would go further backward than forward on the path of perfection, given that often the effect of good works on the virtuous habits would be annulled by that of frequent venial sins.

5. Connection of the virtues among themselves

An extrinsic connection is certainly given by the supernatural end, with respect to which Grace and the virtues impose themselves as a necessary complex for its attainment. But can one speak of an intrinsic nexus, emanating from their very nature?

The principal answers are four: 1) the connection is such that not even the omnipotence of God can make one grow and disappear without the others; 2) the connection is given by the legislative will of God, who willed it; 3) only charity and the infused moral virtues are connected among themselves by their very nature; but with Grace, faith and hope they are so only by God's privilege; 4) all infused habits (entitative and operative) are connected of themselves, but by divine will faith and hope can remain without the other infused habits. The first opinion has no foundation, especially for the infused moral virtues, which depend on Grace as an emanation and exigency of it: insofar as they are effects of Grace, God can supply the causality of the latter; insofar as they are exigencies, God can, absolutely speaking, prescind from any exigency of the creature. The second opinion cannot be taken into consideration, since it denies the problem. The other two opinions have equal probability and valid defenders, and for practical purposes they have almost the same value.

6. Connection between the moral virtues and Grace

It is like that between nature and the proximate principles of connatural acts. Man, elevated by Grace to the state of a new creature, must have principles or faculties that allow him to act in conformity with that new state. This comparison some carry to its conclusion, affirming that the virtues derive from Grace itself, while others, insisting that they reside in the natural faculties of man and not in Grace, prefer to say that they are a simple exigency of Grace. As the moral virtues are bound to Grace, so are they bound to charity, since Grace and charity are inseparable. Furthermore, since the moral virtues must be directed by prudence and are inseparable from it, and since prudence cannot exist without the charity that disposes it well toward the ultimate end, it follows indirectly that the moral virtues are connected with charity.

Theologians hold various opinions on the bonds between faith and hope on the one hand, and Grace and charity on the other: a) they are infused simultaneously in justification; b) they grow, of themselves, in equal degree, and only accidentally could one admit a superiority of faith and hope, in one who, after having sinned, recovers charity and Grace in a degree inferior to the faith and hope that had remained as before, although it informs: c) faith and hope remain, when charity and Grace are lost.

Graf, De subiecto psychico virtutum cardin. sec. doct. scholasticorum usque ad medium saec. XIV, est. Studia Anselmiana, II, Rome 1944; A. Michel, Vertu, in DThC, XV, coll. 2739-90; O. Vighetti, Origine e connessione delle v. cardin. sec. 1. Bonaventura, Rome 1947; O. Lottin, La connexion des vertus morales acquises au dernier quart du XIIIe siècle, in Rech. de théol. anc. et médiév., 15 (1948), pp. 107-51; V. Iankelevitch, Traité des vertus, Paris 1940.

Alfonso Pompei

V. THE VIRTUES IN ART

The depictions of the virtues, which played so great a part in sacred iconography from the late Middle Ages to the nineteenth century, trace their literary origins to St. Thomas, to Fra Bartolomeo da S. Concordio, but above all to the Psychomachia, a poem by Prudentius written at the beginning of the 5th century.

Very often they were personified by warrior virgins who struck down the vices in demonic form; in other cases, they appeared set in opposition to them. Singular examples of Romanesque and Gothic sculpture, in which the vices appear vanquished by the virtues, are found in French churches; for the 12th century, mention should be made of the reliefs in a portal of Aulnay and a capital of the choir of Notre-Dame du Port at Clermont, by a Master Robert; for the 13th century, the sculptures in the main portal of Notre-Dame in Paris are typical. During the Romanesque period, in Italy, the graceful figurations carved in the intrados of the middle arch, on the main door of the basilica of St. Mark in Venice, take on particular importance. Among the examples based on the opposition to the vices, those sculpted in the cathedral of Chartres (13th century) stand out, to which are added the figures of twelve current virtues (gentleness, benevolence, patience, etc.), and the others painted in chiaroscuro fresco by Giotto, in the Scrovegni Chapel in Padua (c. 1305). These seven figurations sometimes betray reminiscences of Roman classicism, and particularly admirable appear the winged Hope, with hands outstretched to receive the crown, Faith, with her firm and solemn frontal bearing, and Temperance, resembling a gentle archaic priestess.

But more frequent and better known are those of the subsequent Gothic period in the fourteenth century. It will suffice to mention the original marble holy-water stoup of S. Giovanni Fuorcivitas in Pistoia, where Giovanni Pisano places the figures of the theological virtues supporting the basin, from which the cardinal virtues protrude as half-busts; the eight virtues modelled with exquisite elegance by Andrea Pisano for one of the bronze doors of the baptistery of Florence and, in the same city, those of the Tabernacle of Orsanmichele, by Andrea Orcagna, or of the shrine of St. Peter Martyr in S. Eustorgio in Milan (the work of Giovanni di Balduccio da Pisa) and of the tombs of the Angevins in the churches of Naples, with influences of Sienese art. Also noteworthy in this period are the depictions offered by miniatures, such as those of Niccolò da Bologna. In the fifteenth century, through the work of Antonio and Piero del Pollaiolo, we have the bronze marvels that adorn the tombs of Sixtus IV and Innocent VIII, in the Vatican Basilica, and the painted cycle, now in the Uffizi Gallery, which shows the seven virtues enthroned (the Fortitude, of dreamy spirit, is by Sandro Botticelli). From cartoons by this latter master, Baccio Pontelli executed the inlays of the cardinal virtues in the studiolo of the Ducal Palace in Urbino, and Domenico di Paris the polychrome stuccoes of analogous subject in a ceiling of the Este Palazzo Schifanoia in Ferrara. And Andrea Mantegna offered an original version of these allegories with the canvas of the Triumph of the Virtues over the Vices, today in the Louvre Museum. At the dawn of the 16th century, in the Sala del Cambio in Perugia, the cardinal virtues are frescoed by Perugino, but the beautiful Fortitude has been attributed to Raphael at the age of seventeen. Later, the supreme master of Urbino painted the Theological Virtues (among which the Charity is stupendous) in the predella, preserved in the Vatican Pinacoteca, of the Deposition in the Borghese Gallery, and created one of his masterpieces in the virtues of Temperance, Fortitude and Prudence in a lunette of the Sala della Segnatura in the Vatican, while a roundel of that ceiling is by Sanzio and dedicated to the austere image of Justice. Other memorable pictorial figurations, in the late sixteenth century, are the octagonal canvas of Wisdom, executed by Titian for the Marciana Library in Venice, and the two panels by Paolo Veronese, with the Virtue rewarded and Victory pursuing vice in the ceiling of the Sala dei Tre Capi in the Ducal Palace. Among the sixteenth-century sculptural representations stand out the figures of Justice and Prudence, modelled by Guglielmo Della Porta for the tomb of Paul III in the basilica of St. Peter; there too, in the front line, the allegories of Bernini that make precious the tombs of Urban VIII and Alexander VII.

A singular painted cycle of the cardinal virtues, with emblems of the Borromeo family, was painted in dazzling colours by Domenichino in the church of S. Carlo ai Catinari, in Rome. During the eighteenth century Giacomo Serpotta shaped lively and soft stucco figurations in the oratories of the confraternities of Palermo, and the Venetian Antonio Corradini reached the height of virtuosity with the marble and veiled figure of Modesty, in the Sansevero Chapel in Naples.

At the beginnings of eighteenth-century neo-classicism Antonio Canova executed, for the monument to Clement XIV in the church of the SS. Apostoli in Rome, the tender Temperance and the composed Meekness, and towards the middle of the nineteenth century an artist, not unmindful of certain realistic gifts of his Tuscan forebears, Lorenzo Bartolini, sculpted a most balanced Mercy for the Demidoff monument in Florence and a harmonious and affectionate Educating Charity, kept in the Florentine Palazzo Pitti. See also the illustrations to the entries of the individual virtues. - See pl. CXLVII.

Alberto Neppi