Section CXLII

The salvific will, therefore, is not of one mode but twofold, according to the twofold effect which depends upon it and according to the twofold term, as it were, which it regards. For it is not sound to doubt that there are two effects which depend upon it and two terms to which the same will is referred. For in the first place there depends upon it the institution of the repaired order, with which are connected all the means that are necessary and sufficient for attaining reparation. Then there depends upon it the very bestowal of the reward, in which is contained the last and likewise most excellent fruit of the repaired order. Wherefore the salvific will also has a twofold term proposed to it. One of these corresponds to the former effect and embraces both the institution of the repaired order and the eternal preparation and temporal dispensing of those benefits without which salvation cannot be obtained and with which it most certainly can. But the other term corresponds to the latter effect in such a way that it is completed by the attainment of salvation and the reward of the immortal crown.

Now, as regards the former effect and the former term, the salvific will is a) the principal and adequate cause, and likewise b) the universal cause, from which equally derive their origin both universal reparation and the universal benefits by which the faculty of attaining beatitude is conferred upon the human race.

But as regards the latter effect and the latter term, the salvific will is indeed a) the principal cause, but b) it is equally not the unique and adequate cause. For since c) whatsoever things God wills, he wills them full of reason and counsel, therefore he wills that no one be saved without his own will, and he wills us, with himself going before, to will the good, so that when we shall have willed, he too may will to fulfill his own counsel in us. A will of this kind, therefore, d) is affected by a condition and is so conjoined with the free cooperation of men that it is deprived of its effect unless the subordinate cause harmoniously conspires with the principal and supreme cause. But it comes to pass e) that men, far from following God who goes before, depart very far from him, and not only depart but persevere in their most wretched separation as rebels even unto the end. And when they bind themselves by this crime, f) they create death for themselves, and they themselves are the cause why they do not obtain the fruit of the salutary divine counsel.

For as pertains to God, he is sweet and agreeable to all; and if at any time in this present mortality he punishes men, he intends this: that at least by threats and penalties he may save those whom he could not soften and join to himself by benefits. Jerome is a witness and abundant authority for this doctrine in more than one place. He is an authority for it where, on the occasion of the Alexandrian interpretation, he says¹:

Moreover, that which the Seventy translated, “provoking me,” or² “turning into bitterness,” signifies this: that God, benign and sweet by nature, is changed into bitterness by our vices. For just as it is said to the saints³, “Taste and see that the Lord is sweet,” so sinners perceive him as bitter.

Hence also the Apostle⁴ refers the goodness and severity of God to saints and sinners. And concerning the sinners who were lying fallen, it is written⁵: “The Lord raises those who are cast down; the Lord loves the just; the Lord looses those who are fettered.” But to the saints who stand he promises rewards.

He is an authority for the same doctrine where, speaking of God, he writes⁶:

But in that he says⁷, “My eye shall not spare you, and I shall not have mercy,” like a most clement physician desiring to cut out putrid flesh and to burn carious wounds with the cautery, he does not spare that he may spare; he does not have mercy that he may have greater mercy, lest anything putrid, which by its proximity would corrupt the living flesh, remain in the body. But the Lord strikes him whom he loves⁸, and chastises every son whom he receives. Of this meaning is that saying⁹, “I shall strike, and I shall heal.” For every medicine has bitterness for a time, but afterward the fruit of the pain is shown in health.

Jerome persists in the same judgment and, expounding the words of the Alexandrian version¹⁰, writes:

But in that they themselves likewise translated¹¹, “The rod has flowered,” we can use that testimony¹²: “Do not take the rod away from your son.” And the Apostle¹³: “What do you will? Shall I come to you with a rod, or in charity and the spirit of meekness?” But God also resounds through the mouth of the psalmist¹⁴: “I shall visit their iniquities with a rod, and their sins with scourges; but my mercy I shall not take away from them.” Therefore the Lord visits and strikes so that all pride which long lay hidden and enclosed may arise and become manifest, and injury may be stirred against pride arisen and germinating, and the strength of the iniquitous man may be broken, not with perturbation nor with haste.

For the end of the flowering rod is health and correction, which comes not by the merit of those who are corrected, nor by a beauty which they do not have in themselves, but by the mercy of the Lord.