Bellarmine · De Controversiis · On the Grace of the First Man
Chapter 15: That in paradise, in the state of innocence, not only men but also the animals lacking reason would have lived
Our translation, from the Latin of the Opera Omnia (Paris: Vivès, 1870–74), vol. V, De Gratia Primi Hominis. 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).
It is also wont to be asked by the theologians: “Whether men alone, or also the living creatures lacking reason, would have had place in paradise, if man had not sinned.” And indeed John Damascene denies it, book 2 On the Faith, chapter 11; him follows St. Thomas, part 1, question 102, article 2, and certain others of the Scholastics, on book 2 of the Sentences, distinction 17.
But weightier seems to us the authority of St. Basil, in the book On Paradise, and of St. Augustine, book 14 On the City of God, chapter 11 [al. 10], who think the contrary. The words of St. Augustine are these: “In the bodily paradise, with those two human beings, male and female, the other land animals also moved about, subdued and harmless.” And truly no small ornament would have been wanting to the earthly paradise, if no fishes could have been seen in the waters, no little birds in the woods, no cattle in the meadows and fields — to omit this, that it was not in vain that it was said to the first human beings by God that they should rule over the fishes, the birds, and the other living creatures. Nor indeed was it to be feared lest the brute animals should take of the fruits of the tree of life and become immortal. For neither would they have taken foods not congruent to their nature; nor, if they had been able to feed on the fruits of the tree of life, would they by any means attain immortality. For the tree would have brought immortality to men not from its own nature, but from a hidden inbreathing of healthfulness — nearly in that manner in which the Christian sacraments, bodily and sensible, work a spiritual and invisible grace. For so teaches St. Augustine, book 8 On Genesis, chapter 4: “In the other trees there was for him nourishment; in this one, a sacrament.” And chapter 5: “This too I add: that, though a bodily food, yet that tree furnished such that by it the body of man was made firm with stable health — not as from other food, but by some hidden inbreathing of healthfulness. Just as, assuredly, the bread was ordinary, and yet had something more, by one cake of which God freed a man from the want of hunger for the space of forty days.” See to the same purpose Theodoret, question 26 [al. 28] on Genesis; Eucherius, book 1 on Genesis, chapter 13; and Augustine himself, book 13 On the City of God, chapter 20. Wherefore, as the brute animals, if perchance they should taste the most sacred Eucharist, would obtain thence no spiritual fruit, so neither could they by any means have won immortality from the tree of life.
Show the Latin (Vives edition, OCR)
centiae , sed etiam animantia rationis exper¬ tia habitatura fuisse. Solet etiam quaeri a Theologis : « Soline homines, an etiam animantia rationis exper¬ tia in paradiso locum habitura fuissent, si homo non peccasset, » Et quidem Joannes Damascenus id negat lib ii. de fide c. 11. Eum sequitur S. Thomas 1. p. quaest. 102. art. 2. et alii quidam ex Scholasticis in 2. Sentent. dist. 17. At gravior nobis auctoritas esse videtur S. Basilii in lib. de Paradiso, et S. Augustini lib. xiv. de Civit. Dei cap. 11. qui contra sentiunt. Verba S. Augustini haec sunt : « In paradiso corporali cum duobus illis homini¬ bus masculo et foemina animalia etiam ter¬ restria caetera subdita, et innoxia versaban¬ tur. » Et sane non modicum ornamentum terreno paradiso defuisset, si nulli in aquis pisces, nullae in sylvis aviculae, nulla in pra¬ tis et campis pecora conspici potuissent. Ut illud omittam, non frustra primis homin- nibus dictum a Deo fuisse, ut piscibus, vo¬ lucribus, et caeteris animantibus dominaren¬ tur. Neque vero metuendum erat, ne animan¬ tia bruta sumerentde fructibus ligni vitae, et immortalia fierent. Nam neque illa cibos sumpsissent naturae suae non congruentes, neque si fructibus ligni vitae vesci potuissent, immortalitatem ulla.ratione consequerentur. Siquidem lignum non ex natura sua, sed ex inspiratione salubritatis occultae immortalita¬ tem hominibus attulisset, fere ad eum mo¬ dum, quo Sacramenta Christiana corporalia ac sensibilia gratiam spiritualem, atque in¬ visibilem, operantur. Sic enim docet S. Au¬ gustinus lib. vm. de Genes, cap. 4 : « Erat ei in lignis caeteris alimentum, in ista autem sacramentum. » Et cap. o : « Illud quoque ad¬ do, quamquam corporalem cibum , talem tamen illam arborem praestitisse, quo corpus hominis sanitate stabili firmaretur, non sic¬ ut ex alio cibo, sed non nulla inspiratione salubritatis occulta. Profecto enim licet usi¬ tatus panis, aliquid tamen amplius ha¬ buit, cujus una collyride hominem Deus ab indigentia famis dierum quadraginta spatio 20 5 LIBER I. vindicavit. » Vide in camdem sententiam Theodorctum quaest. 26. in Genes. Euche- riura lil) i. in Gen. cap. 13. et ipsum Augu¬ stinum lib. 13. de Civitate Dei cap. 20. Qua¬ re quemadmodum animantia bruta, si forte sacratissimam Eucharistiam gustarent, nul¬ lum inde fructum spiritalem consequeren¬ tur : ita neque ex ligno vitee immortalitatem adipisci ulla ratione potuissent. CAPUT XVI. Cherubin custodientia paradisum, non spectra