Question II: Whether latria is distinct from dulia

I assert that Latria is distinct from Dulia.

It is proven by D. Bonaventure, from the Gloss on Psalm 98, at the words Adorate scabellum pedum eius (Adore his footstool), where he says: Latria is the adoration that is owed to God alone. Dulia is the adoration that is shown even to a creature.

Hence he argues secondly. Habits are differentiated by acts; and acts by objects: Therefore, if Latria is the worship owed to God, and Dulia the worship owed to a creature as creature, it seems that Latria is a worship distinct from Dulia.

Thirdly, because, just as the gifts that regard the Creator and the creature are differentiated, as wisdom and science, so too must the virtues and their acts be differentiated: But Latria regards the worship owed to the Creator, and Dulia the worship owed to the creature: Therefore.

Fourthly it is proven by the Holy Doctor: If the same honor were shown to the creature that is shown to the Creator, it would no longer be an act of virtue but of vice: For if anyone were to sacrifice to a man, he would commit the crime of Idolatry. Hence Exodus 22: Qui immolat Diis, occidetur, praeterquam Domino soli (He that sacrificeth to gods shall be put to death, save only to the Lord alone), and D. Augustine, book 10 of de civitate, chapter 4: Many things are assumed in Divine worship that are paid to human honors: whether out of excessive humility, or pestilent flattery: yet so that those to whom they are paid are held to be men, who are said to be to be honored and venerated: but if much is added to them, then to be adored. Who indeed judged that sacrifice should be offered, save to him whom he knew, or thought, or feigned to be God?

You will object first with the Gloss on that Psalm 7, Domine Deus meus in te speravi (Lord my God, in thee have I hoped), which says: Lord of all by power, to whom Dulia is owed; God of all by creation, to whom Latria is owed: Therefore both are owed to God.

The Holy Doctor answers that Dulia is there taken broadly, according to the common analogy of Latria and the species of Dulia. Moreover, Dulia is said more of the Lord than of God, because Lord is communicated to the creature, and is said analogically of the Creator and the creature; but God is not so communicated; and if it is said of the Creator and the creature, it is said equivocally. Yet Dulia is not properly to be shown to God, but Latria.

You will object secondly. Just as there is one faith by which everything to be believed is believed, so there ought to be one virtue by which everything to be worshiped is worshiped.

The Holy Doctor answers that there is one Faith by which the same object is believed under the same formal aspect. Such is theological faith, which believes all things true on the divine truth revealed; but faith that has different objects is different, as the faith by which I believe something asserted by a creature, and this faith looks to the Cardinal virtue, and is rather to be called fidelity: But the worship of God regards different objects, namely the uncreated Excellence and the created excellence, and therefore must be constituted as different.

You will object thirdly. Just as God and neighbor are loved by one charity, though they are different objects, so God and the creature ought to be honored by one worship.

The Holy Doctor answers that the account is different, for in Charity there is one principal object, namely the goodness of God, which is lovable in itself, and the neighbor is loved for God himself: But Latria and Dulia regard an altogether and ultimately different worship, the one and the other.

You will object fourthly: More and less does not differentiate the species: but Latria and Dulia differ as greater honor and lesser: Therefore they are not different species.

The Holy Doctor answers first that the major is false in the moral genus: the minor is also false; because Latria and Dulia have different (as I said) formal objects.

Therefore some conditions of each adoration are common, some proper. The common ones are, that due worship be shown both to God and to the saints devoutly and piously, as the Holy Doctor shows on chapter 6 of Luke at these words: exiit in montem orare (he went out into the mountain to pray). And so the same conditions press, as were said of prayer in disp. 3, question 5 and 10. And so he brings the example of Abraham, Genesis 22, who, wishing to go to adore and sacrifice, compelled his servants to wait on the slope: Expectate hic cum asino: Ego autem, et puer illuc properantes, postquam adoraverimus, revertemur ad vos (Wait here with the ass: but I and the boy, hastening thither, after we have adored, will return to you). This the Holy Doctor explains most beautifully at those words, John 4: Veri adoratores adorabunt Patrem in spiritu, et veritate. Nam Deus tales quaerit adoratores (True adorers shall adore the Father in spirit and truth. For God seeks such adorers).

HENCE also the Apostle, 1 Corinthians 14: Orabo spiritu, orabo et mente: psallam spiritu, psallam et mente (I will pray with the spirit, I will pray also with the mind: I will sing with the spirit, I will sing also with the mind). The reason is the one Christ gives there, John 4: Spiritus est Deus: et eos, qui adorant, in spiritu, et veritate oportet adorare (God is a spirit: and they who adore him must adore him in spirit and truth). In the same way, proportionally, the Angels and the blessed souls of the saints are to be adored in spirit and truth, as Chrysostom observes on this passage, homily 32 on John, Augustine tractate 15 on John.

HENCE the Holy Doctor infers that God is to be adored especially in purity and sanctity, as I said of the one praying in disp. 3, questions 4, 5, and 10. Whence Chrysostom compares sinners who adore while offering supplication to those who offer dung. He infers that God is to be adored with humble subjection together with the protestation of the Divine majesty. Whence also to adore is to prostrate the body at the feet, and to incline our summit to his depths, as D. Augustine explains. Isaiah 60: Adorabunt vestigia pedum tuorum (They shall adore the footsteps of thy feet). Therefore he says God is to be adored with due honorification: Venite adoremus, et procidamus ante Deum (Come let us adore, and fall down before God), Psalm 99: Praeoccupemus faciem eius in confessione (Let us come before his face with confession), and Matthew 2: Procidentes adoraverunt Deum (Prostrating, they adored God). Thus adoration is a suppliant inclination, even for making petition.

LIKEWISE God is to be adored with due solemnity according to place and time, as is said, Psalm 5: Introibo in domum tuam, adorabo ad templum sanctum tuum in timore (I will enter into thy house; I will adore toward thy holy temple in fear). And Isaiah 66: Veniet omnis caro, ut adoret coram facie mea (All flesh shall come to adore before my face).

BUT presently the Holy Doctor, in conference 22 on chapter 4 of John, again expounding those words: Veri adoratores adorabunt Patrem in spiritu, et veritate (True adorers shall adore the Father in spirit and truth): first, he says, they ought to be true adorers, or supplicants; for to adore and to supplicate are the same thing, as Papias and Valla say, book 5 of elegances, chapter 11. But truth is that which shows what is, as D. Augustine says, de vera religione, chapter 36. Therefore the true adorer is he who, conscious of his own unworthiness and vileness, has acknowledged it, and at the same time confesses that God is the forgiver of sins, Christ the Savior, and the saints, especially the Blessed Virgin, are intercessors. Whence St. Gregory, book 5 of the Morals, chapter 27, says: He offers prayer who humbly sees that he himself is dust, who attributes nothing of virtue to himself, who acknowledges that the good things he does are from the mercy of the Creator. Such was Abraham, who said, Genesis 18: Loquar ad Dominum, cum sim pulvis, et cinis (I will speak to the Lord, since I am dust and ashes). The Publican, Luke 18. Such adore in spirit and truth in the temple of the heart, as D. Augustine says in the cited Tractate on John; thus the Apostle said, 1 Cor. 14: Orabo spiritu: Psallam spiritu, etc. (I will pray with the spirit: I will sing with the spirit, etc.).

MOREOVER, they adore (the Holy Doctor says) in spirit and truth who adore in simplicity and sincere truth. And so the Holy Doctor does not confound, in distinction 3, question 9, question 4 and the cited place, adoration and prayer, as Tanner thinks, disp. 5, question 2, dubium 1.

HENCE Hugh of St. Victor says, de sacramentis, book 1, part 12, chapter 6: To adore God is to subject to him the whole mind in humility unto devotion, and to believe him the beginning and end of all good: Thus Deuteronomy 6: Dominum Deum tuum timebis, seu adorabis (Thou shalt fear, or adore, the Lord thy God), as the Holy Doctor reads according to another version, with Hugh: On the contrary the Pharisee, not adoring but standing, prayed thus within himself, Luke 18, as D. Gregory notes, book 19 of the Morals, chapter 12.

THESE, according to the analogy, are the things Latria and Dulia have in common; but yet some objects belong to God altogether properly, as objects of Divine worship.

MOREOVER the proper matter of Divine worship is discerned first from the quality of the office and rite, of which kind are the sacrifices, which are offered to God alone, especially the most holy sacrifice of the Mass, and the internal sacrifice of the mind, whereby we vow to God.

SECONDLY from the intention, by which we worship the excellence, as Divine, which is an object of prayer other than the creature, which is the object of Dulia.

THEREFORE the adoration of Latria is due to God alone; as the Holy Doctor notes everywhere, and D. Thomas, article 3, and as I said above.

THEREFORE the Platonists erred, wishing to show Latria even to the Angels, as D. Augustine relates, books 8 and 10 of de civitate; and this error is refuted by the Apostle, to the Colossians 2: Nemo vos seducat, volens in humilitate, et religione Angelorum (Let no man seduce you, willing in humility and religion of Angels, etc.), expounding which passage Chrysostom, homily 7, there mentions their errors. I shall treat of these more gladly in part 3, Tomus 1, disp. 27.