Prima Secundae
Lecture 166: Faith, Hope, and Charity: Perfect and Imperfect Virtue

Transcript
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How he's going to get into the last two articles here, right? Again, he's going to go both ways, right? He's looking before and after, right? Where there hope, where there faith and hope can be without what? Charity. And then where the charity can be without faith and hope, right? He usually turns it out to faith, though. Some of us like to call it beliefs, though, right? Some of us want to believe something to be more accurate, you know? Because sometimes people talk about faith. They seem to almost mix it up with hope, you know? Have faith. The word kind of lends it, you know? If I say I have faith in you, I trust you or something like that, you know, it doesn't get to me as sharply what it is as the word belief does, right? And actually, what do we say in the creed, you know? We say, I believe in it. So why not call it belief, you know? And they think they're enriching the virtue, you know, by bringing in this faith, this sense of trust, you know? But isn't trust? Trust in me seems to be more hope, you know? But what does they say, you know, the... What's wrong, December? You have one of these sons in here. Trust in you, right? God's mercy? Oh, divine mercy. Yeah, yeah. But she says, I trust in you, right? But trust is hope, isn't it? It's not belief. And mercy seems to be almost the object of what? Hope, right? The justice of God is kind of the object of your fear of God, right? And the mercy of God is the object of your what? Your hope, huh? So you use the word trust there, right? So sometimes the word faith, they kind of use it to mean trust, you know? It doesn't seem to me as... There's a little confusion there sometimes, I think. Okay? So notice he does then in 4 and 5 what he did in 2 and 3, right? You know, both ways, right? But now it's going to be the same, in both ways, or just one way. To the 4th one goes forward thus. It seems that faith, or belief, and hope are never, what? Without charity, right? For since they are theological virtues, these three, God himself for their object, they seem to be of more worth than the what? Moral virtues, right? Even more worth than the what? Infused, right? But the infused moral virtues cannot be without charity, right? Therefore, neither can belief and hope be without charity. Moreover, as the great Augustine says, upon the Gospel of St. John, no one believes except, what? Willing, right? So in the act of belief, the reason is moved by the will to believe, not by its own object, the evidence of it, right? But charity is in the will, as it's what? Perfection, right? Therefore, belief or faith cannot be without charity, right? Moreover, Augustine, huh? Who is this Augustine? He's always quoted. Moreover, Augustine says the ingredient. It's ingredient, I guess, in faith, hope, and charity, right? Have you read that at all? But kind of the educated layman, you know, asked Augustine for kind of a summary of our faith and so on, right? And he gave him this ingredient on faith, hope, and charity, right? And Thomas does that in his catechetical instructions, the Naples ones. So Augustine says in the ingredient that hope without love, not able to be, right? So the second argument is trying to say that belief cannot be without charity, right? Because no one believes except he wills, right? And now he's saying that hope, according to Augustine there, cannot be without love, right? And the love is charity that he's speaking about in that place on the ingredient, huh? Therefore, hope cannot be without what? But against this is what is said in Matthew chapter 1, verse 2. It says in the gloss that belief generates hope, and hope generates, what, charity, huh? That's kind of spiritual meaning of Abraham begot Isaac, and Isaac begot Jacob, right? You know, Abraham, faith begot hope, and hope begot, what, love, huh? That's quoted kind of a statement about that effect, not because that text had a wonderful gust in there. At the end of the famous, what, premium to the Word of God, right? To the Vatican II document, the one on Revelation. So in terms of what Shakespeare says, there are a look before and after, right, huh? When St. Paul says, you know, there remains these three, belief, hope, charity, but the greatest of these is charity, right, huh? It kind of indicates more than one order there, right, of those three, huh? Because charity is before hope and belief in the fourth sense of before, which is better, right, okay? But in the second sense, in the first sense, yeah, in time, in the order of generations in time, right, then belief is before hope and hope is before love. And he gives them that order, right, see? And perhaps, now, we have to see what he says in these two articles, right? But if you can have belief and hope without charity, right, in some way, but you can't have charity without belief in what? Hope and belief in hope are before charity, also in the second sense of before, which is before and being, right, huh? Herostalga's example, one is before two, right? One can be without two, but two cannot be without one because you need two ones to have two, right? And it's like we say, bricks are before a brick wall, right, in that second sense, huh? Whereas the letter C is before the word cat. The letter C can be without the word cat, but the word cat can't be without the letter C, right? And then she spells the case. It's not correct. So it might be that when he gives them in the order, faith, hope, and charity, he's giving them in the first and second, and even in the, what, third sense, right? The third sense is the order, the discourse, the reason, right? Well, both Augustine and then Corinthian on faith, hope, and charity, he takes up faith first, then hope, and then charity. And Thomas in the Catechetical Instructions does the same thing. So it might be that faith and hope are before charity in the first three senses, but then Augustine, and that's the order in which he gives the three. But then he adds that the charity is better, right, than it is. So it's before in the fourth sense, right? So you've got to know those senses of before in Aristotle, right? In the twelfth chapter, the category, so he distinguishes in order of those four senses, in order of imposition. The third sense? The third sense is the discourse of reason, right? Why would it be? Well, I'm just saying that if Thomas in the Catechetical Instructions and Augustine in the Inchredient, right, and he's going to explain the whole teaching, right, he first takes up the Creed, which is according to faith, and then the Our Father, which is according to hope, and then the two commandments of love and the Ten Commandments according to charity, right? That's the order in which you learn those things, and you have to kind of learn them, right? You have to kind of know what God is before you can hope in God, right, and love him and so on. Let's see what the Master says here, though. I can hardly wait here to see what the Master says. Let's see. Let's see. I used to have this professor when I was a freshman in college, you know, and he's talking about the play music shakes or something like that, and he says, oh, I can't wait any longer, you know. He talks his explanation of the play and goes right into the play itself. It's kind of funny, but it's kind of joy. I like the proper attitude, you know, if I be just, you know. I always tell the story, you know, of the kind of who's teaching, of course, on police, you know, and I was standing in the hall before a class around the hall there, and he kind of looked down, and he stops in front of me, and he says, isn't this wonderful, he says, you know. I could see he had more wonder than anybody else in the whole class, you know. He'd been teaching this, you know, since, you know, the 1930s, right? Just a full wonder of it, seeing this text. He says, never go through this, you know, without seeing something I didn't see before, right? Now, Thomas, again, is a guy who can see distinctions, right? That's what the mind has to see first. I answer, it should be said that faith or belief and hope, just as, what, the moral virtues, are able to be considered in two ways, right? In one way, according to a certain, what? Beginning, you might say, right? Another way, according to the perfect being of, what? Virtue, huh? For since virtue is ordered to, what? Doing, huh? A good work, right? A virtue is perfect, is said to be perfect, from this that it can, it's able to, or is able to go to a work that is perfectly, what? Good, right? Right? Which is, when not only is it good what comes about, but also it comes about, what? Well, right, huh? Otherwise, if it is good that comes to be, but does not come to be well, it will not be a, what? Perfectly a good, huh? So if I pay my, what? My debts, but I regret doing it? Doing something good, right? But, am I doing it well? No. And sometimes people do something, you know, so, begrudgingly, right? That it's not, what? It's not perfect virtue, or something, you know? Very material. I mean, suppose you're taking care of somebody who's ill or something, right, huh? And you're making soup for them, or you're doing other things for them, right, huh? But, you know, just, you know, very irritable about it, right? Or you're doing something good, but it's not perfect because you're not doing it well, right? You know, you're coming in, you know, they can tell you don't want to be there and taking care of them, you know, or changing their, whatever else has to be changed, and so. I won't go into how St. Catherine Sianian would overcome any reluctance, I mean, but she's, she's one tough male, you know? I'm sure. Yes. Right. If you don't do it well, is it even virtue? Well, there's something, well, it's in quatio, to me says, right? Kind of a beginning, right? Yeah. Okay. I mean, sometimes, I mean, it's good, you know, to do it, even in that way, but not to do it at all, right? Yes. And, which you should enjoy doing what's good, right, you know? You walk your way. So if I owe you some money, you know, and I can, obviously don't want to give it up, you know? That's the perfect virtue, is it? But you can still say I'm just, you can say in some way, couldn't you, that I pay you what I owe you, right? Right. Shake hands after the game, right? Even if you're lost. You can do it more graciously or more. Otherwise, if it be good that comes about, but it does not come about well, right, you will not be perfectly good, right? Whence neither does the habit which is the beginning of such a work have perfectly the notion of what? Virtue. Yeah. What's the example our Lord does, doesn't he? The two sons there, and the Father tells one of them to go out, and jumps, and of course they do it, right? The other one first does it, and then later on he comes and does it, right? Some reluctance, right? But he's more, he's got the beginning of virtue there, right? Just as if someone does just things, he does a good thing, right, huh? But this will not be a, what? A work of perfect virtue, unless he does this, what? Well, right? That is according to right choice, right? Which is through, what? Prudence, right? And therefore justice without prudence is not able to be a, what? Perfect virtue. Perfect virtue, right? Thus, therefore, belief and hope without charity are able, all equaliter, in some way to be, right? But they cannot have perfectly the notion of what? Virtue without what? Charity, huh? For the work of what? Faith is to what? To believe is to assent by one's own will to summon, right, huh? If he does not will this in a suitable way, it will not be a perfect work of what? Yeah. Yeah. I was reading this biography of Cardo Luminum and you kind of see his, you know, hesitating to become a Catholic, you know. You have the opus perfectum. But that he wills it in a suitable way, right? This is through, what? Charity, huh? Because that perfects the will, right? And every correct motion of the will proceeds from right love, huh? There's some truth in that first objection, right, huh? Or a second objection, wasn't it, yeah? Okay. As Augustine says in the 14th book about the city of God. Thus, therefore, belief without charity, there is, therefore, belief without charity, but not a perfect, what? Virtue, huh? Just as temperance or fortitude without, what? Prudence, huh? You know, it's the thing that George Washington, you know, a young man there, first being out in battle, you know, and writing his letter back home, you know, saying that, you know, the boats are whistling, and... He was exhilarating. He was exhilarating. And he asked him later on in life, you know, what he thought of that. He said, well, I was young then. He said, well, I was kind of without prudence, right, huh? He was kind of excited there in the battlefield. And likewise, it should be said about hope. For the act of hope is to expect future beatitude from God, huh? That's interesting what he's saying there about hope, huh? The act of hope is to what? Expect of hope. Yeah. Future beatitude from God, huh? You trust that God will give you character. Which act, he says, is perfect if it is from the merits which one has? Yes. Okay. And you cannot have merits without, what? Charity, right? So you can't perfectly hope and beatitude from God without, what? Charity, yeah. Because you can only have merit through charity. Yeah, and why would God unite himself to someone who doesn't love him, right? If however one expects this for merits we does not yet have, is he expecting deathbed in tenants or something? But he proposes to acquire the future, right? It would be an imperfect act, right? And this can be without what? Charity. So this is the sinner, like we can have hope, right? But imperfectly, right? And some people, you know, like Judas there, they despair, right? And therefore belief and hope are able to be without charity, but without charity, speaking properly, they are not what? Virtues, huh? Not their full notion of virtue. Because it pertains to the notion of virtue that not only according to it one does something good, but also he does it what? Well, right? As is said in the second book of the what? Ethics, huh? So, you know, a lot of people, you know, they think that they can live just about any kind of a life and God will still, what? Love it. Yeah. Unconditional love, you hear all this talk about unconditional love, right? And so they have a hope of what? Yeah. But it's kind of imperfect sort of thing, right? It's not really a virtue in the full sense, huh? Because they don't have maybe charity, huh? God's a good guy, you know, he'll take care of him. Is it a virtue at all if they have no intention to seek help in perfecting themselves so that they merit it? In other words, if they're, you know, thinking, you know, God, with his unconditional love, I can just follow with whatever I want to want. Yeah, yeah. That's kind of a false sense. Maybe not even a virtue at all, right? Yeah. Presumption? When the Falstaff is dying, you know, and he's starting to, you know, a few ejaculations and so on, you know, and the landlady there, you know, says, I told him it wasn't time for that yet, you know. You know, but he wasn't going quite yet. He still has time, you know, before he has to get down. Let's look at the plight of ejections here. To the first, therefore, it should be said that the moral virtues depend upon, what? Prudence. Prudence or foresight, huh? But infused foresight, infused prudence, neither is able to have the notion of foresight without charity. Whence failing the suitable relation to the first beginning, which is the last end, huh? It is lacking in the proper relation to the first beginning, which is the ultimate end. But belief and hope according to their, what? Reasons. Neither depend upon prudence nor upon, what? Charity, right? And therefore, without charity, they are able to be. Although they are not virtuous without charity, as has been said, right? That's a very subtle thing he's saying there, huh? See, prudence is about what? The means to the end. You've got to be well disposed towards the end to have prudence, right? But you can believe God and even hope in God without, what? Loving Him, right, huh? But you're believing in Him and hoping Him to not have the notion of a perfect, what? Virtue without your loving God, huh? That's true from that in the same country over there. If belief generates hope, right, in time and hope, charity, well then in some way they come before, right, huh? And can be, it's not virtuous to be speaking, but belief there first, right? You must in some way believe before you can hope. How could you hope in God to beatitude unless you believe there was a God in such a thing as beatitude and so on, huh? Now, the second should be said that that argument proceeds about faith which has the perfect notion of what? Virtue, huh? Therefore, it's got to have the will be perfect too, right? So the will more perfectly moves reason to ascend once it's perfected by charity, huh? But they still can be a willing to believe, right, without having charity, huh? But it's not going to be a perfect will because the willing is not, it's always perfected by what? By love, huh? Now, that hope cannot be without love in the third objection. Augustine speaks there about hope according as one expects which of attitude through the merits which he already has, which would not be without what? Charity. So he's admitting that hope and belief can be without charity but they don't have the full, what, character of virtue, right? But now can there be charity without hope and faith? That's the thing he's going to do. Should we take a little break here? Yep. Hmm. Hmm. Hmm. now the last article five okay to the fifth one goes forward thus it seems that charity can be without belief and hope for charity is the love of god but god is able to be loved by us naturally right even not presupposing faith or the hope of future beatitude therefore charity he's able to be without what belief and hope so i have to see what he says about that natural loving of god moreover charity is the root of all the virtues according to that of ephesians chapter 3 verse 17 rooted and founded in what charity he's kind of marvelous there because radicata kind of comes from what nature right that word fundate is more like you know foundation mobility right so charity is rooted in charity and founded in it but the root sometimes is without the what branches in it ramese branches therefore charity is able to be sometimes without what yeah the root you like they kind of you know spring up for it right it's the root of them right my wife plants those roots in the those you know sprouted moreover in christ there was perfect charity right but god but he did not have what faith and hope because he was a perfect what comprehensor right he saw god as he was therefore charity is able to be without faith and hope right so christ is said to be a comprehensor right in his mind but in his body he's on the way right his body's not yet glorified them but against this is what the apostle says what figure of speech is that the apostolists yeah it's the same paul and peter called apostles but again this is what the apostle says in hebrews chapter 11 verse 6. without belief it is impossible to please god which most of all pertains to charity as is clear according to that of proverbs 8 i will love those what loving me but hope also it is that leads one into charity as has been said above therefore charity cannot be had without belief and hope i answer thomas says that charity not only signifies the love of god but also a certain friendship towards him now friendship adds above love that there is a what mutual loving back one for the other with a certain common what mutual communication as is said in the eighth book of the ethics aristotle devotes two books to what friendship period to nine aristotle regards friendship as a very important important topic right and this pertains to what charity as is clear to what is said in the first epistle of the apostle saint john chapter 4 verse 16 who remains in charity remains in god and god in him and in one to corinthians chapter one first epistle of the corinthians chapter one verse nine he said god is what faithfully i got the word fidelis right it's god belief through whom we are called in the society of his what son now this society of man to god association of man with god which is a familiar what conversation right living together with him is begun in the present through grace right but will be perfect in the future through glory of him both of whom are what held by faith and hope when just as someone is not able to have friendship with someone if he does not what believe him right or he disparate that he could have some what yeah familiar conversation with them right so someone is not able to have friendship with god which is what charity is i call you no longer servants but friends like christ said he sometimes quotes that particular passage right to say it's friendship and not just love unless he has what belief right through which or by which he believes such a what society and conversation of man with what yeah and he hopes what to pertain to this what society right and that's charity without belief and hope in no way is able to be here just ask kids there when you're talking about human friendship you know can you really be a a friend to someone that you don't trust you can't believe what he says you don't trust him so how could you have friendship with god here if you didn't believe him and what trust him right now do you know what he's saying here a little bit yeah but you know if you go to um who's the guy wrote the thing on uh you should say merner claveau wrote the thing on love of god he's doing four stages right now of our love the first stage we love ourselves for our own sake right don't love god at all but then we run into trouble and we need god's help so we turn to god right and then we begin to what um love god for our own good right you see him as useful right so we turn to god in our need right that's not really charity yet because you're not loving god for his own sake right but you see god is being useful to getting you out of the jam you're in and uh so you're kind of um hoping that he will help you right now so yeah i have hope there right now but then as you get to know god and become familiar when you turn to him in prayer right which is what hope is as an act of hope um then you realize that he's a nice guy and he's he's worth uh beginning to love him for his own sake right and not just because of what he can do for you right and then that's kind of like starting friendship there right and then the last stages of perfection of this where you love uh yourself just for the sake of god right and he says that's hard to ever realized in this life right you know that's kind of the ultimate stage there but just go to the second the third stage there right you can say you you turn to this person because you what yeah and and you hope that he can you know you trust that he can help you, you know? So the kind of hope is there disposing you to turn to him and then you become what? Eventually he becomes familiar to you and then you begin to love him for his what? Yeah, yeah, yeah. Isn't that somewhat true even among human beings, right? That we become friends and we turn to somebody because we need their help or something, right? And he brings over his, you know, snow blower, you know, sometimes. Okay, well. Oh, I see. Yeah, yeah. See, I get to know him, you know? Get talking to him or something, you know? Or something in common. Yeah, hope we bring it over, you know, because the snow is so deep and heavy. I'm not loving him for his own sake yet, right? You know, that's where you get to know him, right? Okay. My father used to go to the baseball games with the guy who sold paint to his company, right? What brought these two guys together? Well, obviously this guy wanted to sell paint. My father needed paint for all the farm wagons he made and so on, right? So they got to know each other, right? It was a friendship of utility, you might say. Well, not really friendship in the full sense. But then they got to know each other and got to know each other as a company, so they go out to the ball games together or something, you know? And that's what happens, right, huh? People come together because they need somebody, right? They get to know that person and they begin to like them for their own qualities, right, huh? And that's hope, kind of what? Disposing for love, right, huh? Okay. Now what about this loving God, huh? God is able to be loved naturally by us, right? To the first thereof it should be said that charity is not just any love of God, right, huh? But the love of God by which he is loved as the object of what? The attitude, huh? To which we are ordered through what? Faith and hope, huh? What's the definition of faith there that you have in the epistle to Hebrews, huh? Yeah. The substance of things hoped for, right? The conviction of what is not seen, right? And substance, you know, there doesn't mean substance in the sense of the essence, that you already have your Beatitude, right? But it's kind of like a foundation, right? So in a sense you believe the things that you will see, right? The Trinity and the Incarnate Son, right? And so you are being what? It's the foundation of your Beatitude there, right? Okay. So you see a connection there between faith and hope and Beatitude, huh? Okay. So you're loving God as the object of what? Beatitude, huh? Yeah. Now what about charity being the root of faith and hope, right? Well now, I was telling the professor the other day there, in the dialogue of Plato called The Sophist, huh? He says that likeness is a most slippery thing. So, when you try to grasp the likeness, it can escape from you, right? Or you might grasp the likeness improperly, right? Not seeing exactly what way these things are, what? Alike, right? When Aristotle begins the book on Sister Reputations, he says likeness is a cause of deception, right? That's why something, a mistake that is like the truth is more dangerous than one that is unlike it, huh? And in the four tools of dialectic, right? The tool of difference is put before the tool of likeness, huh? And the tool of difference is to find the difference, the ability to find the difference. But the tool of likeness is not the ability to find the likeness, but the ability to consider a likeness, right? And that is to see in what way they are, what? Alike in. So the mind is deceived very often by likeness, huh? Because it doesn't see exactly which two things are alike in. So you've got to be careful here with the idea of root there, right, huh? Second, it should be said that charity is the root of belief and hope insofar as it gives them the perfection of virtue, right, huh? Okay? But they're not, what? It's not before them in every way, right? In the way the root is. But belief and hope, according to their proper definition, are presupposed to charity, as has been said above, huh? And thus charity is not able to be, what? Without them, right? Can geometry and natural philosophy be without wisdom? The Hedronicus of Rose, he called the 14 books of wisdom the metta tafuzika, right? They come after the books in natural philosophy, right? They come metta tafuzika, too, and they come after, what, logica? But wisdom is going to perfect all the, what? All the lesser sciences, right? So if you look at Thomas's commentary on the De Trinitate of Boethius, right, huh? Where he distinguishes mathematics and natural philosophy and wisdom, right? And he shows how each of them proceeds and so on, right? He's perfecting, right, these other, what, sciences, huh? But yet they can exist in the way before, right? And unless you learn those first, you wouldn't be able to, what, acquire wisdom, right? But then when you acquire wisdom, it perfects the lower sciences, huh? So, but like charity, right, huh? You can't acquire charity without first having belief and hope in God. But then once you acquire the love of God, right, in the sense of charity, then that perfects that belief that you already have and that, what, hope, right? Because, you know, we hope most of all for good things from our friends, you know, human things. So until we have this friendship with God, which you have by charity, it's not just love, it's a mutual love, it's a kind of friendship, you don't have, what, perfection of hope, right? To the theory it should be said that belief and hope were lacking, right, to Christ on account of that which is an imperfection in them, right? Because the idea of belief is that you don't have, what, you don't see and understand what you believe, right, huh? But in place of belief, he had, what, a partum visionum, right? He saw God as he is, even in his human, what, soul, right? And in place of hope, right, he had full comprehension because he had God in his soul, right? And thus there was perfect charity in him, right? So you see God as he is, face to face, you will love God more than you love God on this earth. And I used to wonder about the passage here in Scripture, you know, where he talks about no one being greater than born of woman and John the Baptist, right? Yet he who is least in the kingdom of heaven is greater. It doesn't make sense at first sight, right? But maybe he's talking about, even he was lowest in the kingdom of heaven, right, sees God as he is, face to face. face, right? And now this is, after the good, the cause of love, right? So he's going to love God maybe more than John the Baptist did when he was on this earth, right? But John the Baptist will get, you know, a greater vision of God and therefore love more when he gets to heaven, right, than this lowest person in the kingdom of heaven, right? That's the way I can understand that, you know? It makes sense, right? I have somebody tell you, she's a beautiful girl, you know, maybe you like her, you know? But until you see her, you're not going to love her as much as you do, you know, and you just believe, you know, it's just a nice girl you're going to meet. You know about the comparison I made there to Roman Juliet, right? He's in love with Rosalind, right, at the beginning of the play. He really is, right? But once he sees Juliet, he just forgets entirely about Rosalind. So I say, once he sees God, he's going to forget even about Juliet, right? So your love's going to be much more perfect, right? So belief will pass away. Belief is when you don't see something as it is, right? Face to face. And hope, now you've already reached your goal, right? You know this will last forever, right? This vision. So it won't be the hope, right? It was not to say, you know, in hell there, I've been in all hope for you to hear. But in heaven you give up hope too in a sense, right? At least as far as yourself are concerned, right? Maybe there's something, you know, when you're praying for others. But I was thinking, you know, which is more apt to be heard when you're praying for yourself or you're praying for a friend, would you say? Yeah. Yeah. Why? What? It's more selfless. It's more, it's more, it's more selfless. Yeah, yeah. And what about when you're praying now for an enemy? Even more selfless. Yeah, yeah. Because a friend is another self, right? So, that doesn't mean that necessarily the prayer for the enemy, or even the prayer for the friend, is more heard by God than the prayer for yourself, because there might be in your friend or in your enemy, an impediment to receiving the grace of God, right? You know, so even though you pray for him, he's not going to be, what, he's not going to profit from it, right? When you pray for yourself, you can maybe be open, right, to receiving what God will choose to give you, right? But just consider, you know, the fact that you're praying for yourself, you're praying for, so it's kind of important that we pray for each other, right, and even for our enemies, right, and then we're apt to have our prayers heard, and we'll profit more, right? And it's by nature, social animals. So should we stop there, or should we just try to go into the next question?