Bellarmine · De Controversiis · On the Loss of Grace · Book IV: On Original Sin
Chapter 12: How original sin is transmitted
Our translation, from the Latin of the Opera Omnia (Paris: Vivès, 1870–74), vol. V, De Amissione Gratiae et Statu Peccati, Book IV. The Latin source text is public domain; this English rendering is released with the site. Scripture quotations follow Bellarmine's Vulgate citations, rendered in Douay-Rheims wording where he quotes exactly. Click “Show the Latin” for the original (raw OCR of the scan; scanning errors remain — the scan itself is the authority).
The question of the origin of the soul being explained, the manner must be explained in which original sin is transmitted. For on this hangs the solution of the argument of the Pelagians, which has always been held most difficult.
St. Augustine, then, never plainly satisfied himself in this question. Hence is that saying in book 1 On the Morals of the Church, chapter 22, that nothing is better known for preaching than original sin, nothing more secret for understanding. Hence too, in epistle 29 [al. 167] to Jerome, he consoles himself with these words: “It is related that a thing was elegantly said which suits this matter aptly enough. When a certain man had fallen into a well, where the water was so deep that it rather held him up, lest he die, than choked him, lest he speak, another came up, and, seeing him, wondering, said: How didst thou fall in here? But he said: I beseech thee, think how thou mayest free me hence — ask not how I fell in. So, since we confess, and hold by the Catholic faith, that even the soul of a little infant is to be freed by the grace of Christ from the guilt of sin as from a well, it is enough for it that we know the manner in which it may be saved, even if we should never know how it came into that evil.” Thus he in that place. Yet in book 5 against Julian, chapter 3 [al. 4], he explains his opinion on the proposed question in these words: “Assuredly either both, vitiated, are drawn from man; or the one is corrupted in the other, as in a vitiated vessel — where the hidden justice of the divine law is enclosed. But which of these is true, I more gladly learn than say, lest I dare to teach what I know not.” The sense of these words is this: either both — that is, soul and body — according to the opinion of those who defend the propagation of souls, are drawn vitiated; or the one in the other — that is, the soul in the body, as in a vitiated vessel — is corrupted, according to the opinion of those who judge that souls are created by God, and will have only the corrupted flesh transmitted from the parents.
Further, the same Augustine writes that the flesh is drawn corrupted because it is generated with lust; for it is not generation, but lust, which properly transmits the sin. See Augustine, book 1 On the Merits and Remission of Sins, chapter 9; book 1 On Marriage and Concupiscence, chapter 24; book 5 against Julian, chapter 2 [al. 15]; and Fulgentius, book On the Faith to Peter, chapter 2. This opinion, if it be taken as the words sound — as Peter Lombard, in the second of the Sentences, distinction 31, and Gregory of Rimini and Gabriel in the same place, seem to have taken it — seems not to be borne. For first, it cannot be understood how the flesh, which is a body, should infect the soul, which is a spirit. Next, a blemish of the flesh cannot properly be sin, especially before the rational soul comes to it; wherefore, even if the flesh infected the soul, yet it would not infect it with the contagion of sin. Moreover, it is certain that in Adam the vice was in the soul before it was in the flesh, and passed from the soul to the flesh, not from the flesh to the soul: “From the mind” (says Augustine, book 5 against Julian, chapter 3) “began the elation, and thence the consent to transgressing the precept; then the flesh became the flesh of sin,” etc. Why, then, in the sons of Adam, to whom the inheritance of the same sin has devolved, should not the same order be kept? Moreover, if someone were now created from nothing, such as we are born — which we demonstrated above can be done — he would neither have original sin nor transmit it to posterity, as the Council of Trent determined, session 5 [al. 6], where it says that they only can draw the sin of origin who are procreated from the seed of Adam; and yet he would not lack concupiscence and the burning of lust, as is known from what we taught above; therefore it is not properly a vice of the flesh which infects the soul and carries the sin over into posterity. Moreover, if two human beings, a man and a woman, born of Adam, by a singular privilege of God generated without lust, they would nonetheless transmit the sin into their sons; because the sons of these parents would truly be sons of Adam, and would have sinned in him in whom all sinned, Romans 5; nor would the personal grace of the nearest parents be poured over into them. It is not, then, the lust of the generators that is the cause of original sin. Let this come last: that if lust were the cause of the sin, he would draw a greater sin who was conceived with greater lust — which is manifestly false, since the sin of origin is equal in all men.
There were, then, those who judged that the soul is vitiated in the flesh — not that either sin properly so called cleaves in the flesh, or the flesh can properly defile the spirit; but that the flesh, destitute of original justice and made rebellious to reason, drags the soul downward, and thereby makes it bent and distorted; and that bentness is the sin. So seem to have thought Alexander of Hales, in part 2, question 105 [al. 103], member 4 [al. 1], and St. Bonaventure, in the same place, article 1, question 2. But this opinion is refuted by the same arguments, and especially by the four last. And moreover, if the matter stood so, it would follow that little ones, before the use of reason, have not the sin of origin except in potency. For the soul is not dragged downward by the flesh except when the flesh lusts against the spirit, which does not happen before the use of reason. Next, either the spirit resists the flesh lusting ill, or succumbs to it; if it resists, it does not sin; if it succumbs, it commits actual sin.
There is another opinion, which I doubt not to be most true — of St. Anselm, in the book On the Virginal Conception, chapters 7 and 10; of St. Thomas, in 1-2, question 81, article 1, and question 4 On Evil, article 1; and also of Scotus, Durandus, and others, on the second of the Sentences, distinction 31: that for the transmission of original sin nothing else is required than that a man descend from Adam through true generation. For by this very thing, that someone was in the loins of Adam when he transgressed the precept in paradise, he communicated in that his sin. For (as the Apostle speaks, Romans 5) in him all sinned — all, I say, who were in his loins. Nor do the words of St. Augustine mean anything else — “the one is corrupted in the other, as in a vitiated vessel”; for by these words it is signified that the soul is not polluted when it is created by God, but when, through conjunction with the flesh drawn from Adam, it is made a part of the man. For the soul, as it is considered before it is breathed into the body, is not a daughter of Adam; but the man is a son of Adam; and the man then first exists when the soul is joined to the flesh. By like reasoning, when St. Augustine so often repeats that it is not generation, but lust, which transmits the sin, he does not mean to signify that actual lust itself is the true cause of original sin — which we demonstrated a little before to be absurd; but he wished to indicate that the cause of original sin is not simply propagation — for there would have been propagation even in paradise, where nevertheless there would have been no sin — but propagation from a corrupted nature, of which corruption the most certain evidence is the burning of lust, without which burning not even the holiest spouses are wont to generate.
From these things which have been said hitherto, it will be easy to solve that argument of the Pelagians which was proposed at the end of the tenth chapter. The argument was this: sin has its seat not in the flesh, but in the soul; but the soul is not drawn from Adam; therefore neither is sin drawn from Adam. We answer, to the assumption of the argument, that the soul is not drawn from Adam as though it were made by Adam, or made from the soul of Adam; but that it is nevertheless a part of the man, who truly is drawn from Adam. Wherefore that consequence is to be denied: therefore neither is sin drawn from Adam. For, in order that sin be drawn from Adam, it is not necessary that the soul be made by Adam; it is enough if the man himself, of whom the soul is a part, be made from Adam. Further, a man is truly and properly said to generate a man, although the soul is not produced by the man, but breathed in by God. For generation is not terminated at the production of the form, or of the matter, but of the composite. Hence he who joins the soul with the flesh truly makes the man. Now he joins the soul with the flesh who so disposes the matter — which the man does through generation — that the soul infallibly follows. The man, then, truly produces a man through generation, from wheresoever the soul exists. From which we understand that the transmission of sin is not only not hindered by this, that souls are created by God, but neither is it much helped or illumined if the souls of men be understood to be made from stock, as the souls of beasts are made. For the souls of beasts are not made from stock as though some part of the soul of the parents were carried over into the offspring (for the father furnishes only the seed, which is a superfluity of nourishment, and the mother the menstrual blood, which is also a superfluity of nourishment, and neither is a part of the living creature); but because the parents, by generating, dispose the matter up to animation. And so, whether souls be made from stock or breathed in by God, no more convenient and expeditious account of the transmission of sin can be rendered than that which we have assigned: namely, that whoever are conceived through carnal generation are true sons of Adam. Hence there is no cause why, on account of original sin, we should any longer doubt of the creation of souls.
Show the Latin (Vives edition, OCR)
CAPUT XII. est, nihil esse notius, quam peccatum origi¬ nale traduci, nihil obscurius, quam quomodo traducatur. Hinc etiam in epist. 29. ad Hie¬ ronymum consolatur se his verbis : « Ele¬ ganter dictum esse narratur, quod huic rei satis apte convenit. Cum quidam ruisset in puteum, ubi aqua tanta erat, ut eum magis exciperet, ne moreretur, quam suffocaret, ne loqueretur, accessit alius, et eo viso ad- mirans, ait, quomodo huc cecidisti? At ille, obsecro (inquit) cogita quomodo hinc me li¬ beres, non quomodo huc ceciderim, quaeras. Ita quoniam fatemur, et fide Catholica tene¬ mus, de reatu peccati tanquam de puteo, etiam parvuli infantis animam Christi gra¬ tia liberandam, satis est ei, quod modum, quo salva fiat, novimus, etiamsi numquam quomodo in malum illud devenerit noveri¬ mus. » Haec eo loco. * Tamen in lib. v. adversus Julianum, cap. 3. explicat sententiam suam de proposita quaestione his verbis : « Profecto aut utrum¬ que vitiatum ex homine trahitur, aut alte¬ rum in altero tamquam in vase vitiato cor¬ rumpitur ; ubi occulta justitia divinae legis includitur. Quid autem horum sit verum, li¬ bentius disco, quam dico, ne audeam docere quod nescio. » Horum verborum sensus hic est : Aut utrumque, id est, anima et corpus, secundum illorum sententiam, qui propagi¬ nem animarum defendunt, vitiatum trahi¬ tur : aut alterum in altero, id est, anima in corpore tamquam in vase vitiato corrumpi¬ tur, secundum sententiam eorum, qui ani¬ mas a Deo creari censent : et solam carnem corruptam a parentibus traduci volunt. Porro carnem ideo corruptam trahi, scri¬ bit idem Augustinus, quia cum libidine ge¬ neratur. Non enim generationem, sed libidi¬ nem esse, quae proprie peccatum traducit. Yide Augustinum, lib. i. de peccatorum me¬ ritis et remissione, cap. 9. lib. I. de nuptiis, et concupiscentia, cap. 24. lib. v. in Julia¬ num cap. 2. et Fulgentium lib. de fide ad Petrum, cap. 2. Haec sententia si accipiatur ut verba so¬ nant, ut eam accepisse videntur Petrus Lom- bardus in secundo sententiarum, distinet. 31. et Gregorius Ariminensis, et Gabriel in eodem loco, ferenda non videtur. Primum enim non potest intelligi, quemadmodum caro, quae corpus est, animam inficiat, quas spiritus est. Deinde labes carnis proprie pec¬ catum esse non potest, praesertim antequam anima rationalis accedat, quare tametsi caro Explicatur quomodo peccatum originis tradu¬ catur, et solvitur argumentum Pelagiano - 7‘urn, quod cap. x. extremo propositum fue¬ rat. Explicata quaestione de origine animae, explicandus est modus, quo peccatum origi¬ nale traducitur. Hinc enim solutio pendet argumenti Pelagianorum, quod semper est habitum difficillimum. Igitur sanctus Augustinus nunquam plane in hac quaestione sibi satisfecit. Hinc est il¬ lud in lib. i. de moribus Ecclesiae, cap. 22. nihil esse peccato originali ad praedicandum notius, nihil ad intelligendum secretius. Hoc- * CAPUT XII. animam inficeret, non tamen inficeret con¬ tagione peccati. Adha?c, certum est, in Ada¬ mo vitium prius in anima, quam in carne fuisse, et ab anima ad carnem, non a carne ad animam transivisse : « Ab animo (inquit Augustinus lib. v. in Julianum, cap. 3.) cojpit elatio, et ad praeceptum transgre¬ diendum inde consensio, tunc est caro facta peccati, etc. » Cur igitur in filiis Adami, ad quos hereditas peccati ejusdem devoluta est, non idem ordo servetur. Praeterea, si quis jam ex nihilo crearetur, quales nos nascimur, quod posse fieri supra demonstratum est, is neque haberet, neque traduceret in posteros originale peccatum, ut Concilium Tridentinum statuit sess. 6. cap. 3. ubi dicit, eos solos peccatum originis trahere posse, qui ex Adami semine pro¬ creantur ; at is non careret concupiscentia et ardore libidinis, ut notum est ex iis, quae supra docuimus ; igitur non est proprie car¬ nis vitium, quod animam inficit, et peccatum in posteros trajicit. Praeterea si duo homines, vir et fcemina, ex Adamo nati, singulari privilegio Dei, sine libidine generarent, peccatum nihilominus in filios suos transmitterent, quia filii horum parentum, vere filii essent Adami, et in eo peccassent, in quo omnes peccaverunt, Rom. iv,. neque gratia personalis proximo¬ rum parentum in eos transfunderetur. Non igitur libido generantium originalis est causa peccati. . » Accedat postremo, quod si libido esset causa peccati, ille majus peccatum traheret, qui cum majori libidine conciperetui'. Quod est manifeste falsum, cum peccatum originis in omnibus hominibus sit aequale. Fuerunt igitur qui existimarent, animam in carne vitiari, non quod vel in carne pec¬ catum proprie dictum haereat, vel caro spi¬ ritum proprie inquinare possit : sed quod caro destituta originali justitia, ac rebellis rationi effecta, animam deorsum trahat : ac per hoc obliquam et distortam efficiat. Illa vero obliquitas est peccatum. Ita sensisse vi¬ dentur Alexander Alensis in 2. p. quaest. 103. memb. 4. et S. Bonaventura ibid. art. 1. qua?st. 2. Sed ha?c sententia refellitur iisdem argu¬ mentis, a*c prajsertim quatuor postremis. Et praeterea, si res ita se haberet, sequeretur parvulos ante usum rationis non habere 369 peccatum originis, nisi in potentia. Neque enim anima trahitur deorsum a carne, nisi quando caro concupiscit contra spiritum, quod non fit ante usum rationis. Deinde vel spiritus carni male concupiscenti x*esistit, vel succumbit ; si resistit, non peccat ; si succumbit, peccatum actuale committit. Est alia sententia, quam verissimam esse non dubito, S. Anselmi in libro de conceptu virginali, cap. 7. et 10, sancti Thomae in 1. 2. qua?st. 81. art. 1. et quaest. 4. de malo, art.*l. necnon Scoti, Durandi et aliorum, in secundum sententiarum, distinction. 31, ad traductionem peccati originalis nihil aliud requiri, nisi ut homo per veram generatio¬ nem ab Adamo descendat. Hoc enim ipso, quod aliquis in lumbis Adse fuit, cum is prae¬ ceptum in paradiso transgrederetur, in illo ejus peccato communicavit. Nam (ut Aposto¬ lus loquitur ad Roman. v.) in illo omnes pec¬ caverunt (1), omnes, inquam, qui in lumbis ejus erant. Neque aliud sibi volunt verba sancti Au¬ gustini : « Alterum in altero tamquam in vase vitiato corrumpitur. » Significatur enim his verbis, animam non pollui, cum creatur a Deo, sed cum per conjunctionem cum car¬ ne ex Adamo tracta, pars hominis efficitur. Neque enim anima, ut consideratur ante¬ quam corpori inspiretur, filia est Adami, sed homo est filius Adami : homo autem tunc primum existit, cum auima carni conjungi¬ tur. Pari ratione, cum S. Augustinus tam scope repetit, non generationem, sedlibidinemesse, qua? peccatum traducit, non vult significare, ipsam libidinem actualem esse veram cau¬ sam originalis peccati, quod absurdum esse paulo ante demonstravimus ; sed indicare voluit, causam peccati originalis non esse simpliciter propagationem, nam etiam in paradiso propagatio fuisset, ubi tamen pec¬ catum non fuisset, sed propagationem ex natura corrupta, cujus argumentum certissi¬ mum est ardor libidinis, sine quo ardore, ne sanctissimi quidem conjuges generare solent. Ex his, qua? hactenus dicta sunt, facile erit argumentum illud Pelagianorum solvere, quod ad finem capitis decimi propositum fuit. Argumentum hoc erat : peccatum non in carne, sed in anima sedem habet, sed anima non trahitur ex Adamo, igitur nec peccatum trahitur ex Adamo. 370 LIBEU IV. Respondemus ad assumptionem argumenti, animam non trahi ex Adamo, quasi ab Ada¬ mo fiat, vel ex Adami anima fiat, sed tamen esse partem hominis qui vere trahitur ex A- damo. Quare neganda est illa consecutio : Igitur nec peccatum trahitur ab Adamo. Ne¬ que enim, ut peccatum ex Adamo trahatur, necessarium est, ut anima fiat ab Adamo, sed satis est, si homo ipse cujus pars est anima, fiat ab Adamo. Porro vere et proprie dicitur homo homi¬ nem generare, tametsi anima non produca¬ tur ab homine, sed inspiretur a Deo. Nam generatio non terminatur ad productionem forma!, vel materiae, sed compositi. Proinde qui animam cum carne conjungit, is vere hominem facit. Conjungit autem ani¬ mam cum carne is, qui materiam ita dispo¬ nit, quod facit homo per generationem, ut infallibiliter anima consequatur. Homo igi¬ tur hominem per generationem, vere [pro¬ ducit, undecumque existat anima. Ex quo intelligimus, non solum non impe¬ diri traductionem peccati ex eo, quod animae creentur a Deo, sed neque multum juvari, vel illustrari, si animae hominum intelligan- tur fieri ex propagine ; quemadmodum ani¬ mae bestiarum fiunt. Nam bestiarum animae non fiunt ex propagine, quasi pars aliqua animae parentum trajiciatur in prolem (pa¬ ter enim solum praebet semen, quod super¬ fluum alimenti, et mater sanguinem men¬ struum, qui est etiam superfluum alimenti, et neutrum est pars animantis) ; sed quia pa¬ rentes generando disponunt materiam usque ad animationem. Itaque sive animae fiant ex propagine, sive inspirentur a Deo, non potest reddi commo¬ dior et expeditior ratio traductionis peccati, quam sit ea, quam assignavimus, quia vide¬ licet quicumque per carnalem generationem concipiuntur, veri sunt Adae filii. Proinde nulla causa est, cur propter originale pecca¬ tum de animarum creatione amplius dubi¬ temus.