Chapter IV — On the necessity of the things to be believed

I. Question I. Is faith necessary to salvation? Answer. Necessity is twofold: one of means, the other of precept. That is necessary with the necessity of means, without which salvation cannot be had, even though its omission were free of fault. Thus infants dying without baptism do not attain eternal glory, even though the omission of baptism be blameless in them. But that is necessary with the necessity of precept, whose blameless omission does not impede the attainment of the end, though a culpable neglect impedes it. What is necessary with the necessity of means is at the same time necessary with the necessity of precept; but not conversely. The necessity of precept binds adults only. The necessity of means is twofold: one always in re, in fact — such as the necessity of habitual grace, of faith, hope, and charity; the other in voto, in desire — such as the necessity of baptism in respect of adults, who, adorned with habitual grace, can attain salvation with the mere desire of baptism.

II. That faith is necessary with the necessity of means, both in little children and in adults, no one calls into dispute. The discourse is now of actual faith.

III. For all adults endowed with reason there is necessary, with the necessity of means, an internal, actual, explicit, and supernatural faith, both for justification and for glory. Wherefore adults having the use of reason, though baptized in infancy, cannot attain eternal salvation without actual faith.

IV. Question II. Which articles are to be believed with the necessity of means? Answer. At every time, explicit faith in God as supernatural author and rewarder has always been necessary to all with the necessity of means, as St. Paul teaches, Hebrews 11: Without faith it is impossible to please God. For he that cometh to God must believe that he is, and is a rewarder to them that seek him.

V. After the fall of the human race into sin, both under the law of nature and under the law of Moses, actual faith in Christ the Redeemer, at least implicit, was always necessary to all adults with the necessity of means, as the Theologians commonly teach.

VI. For all adults, after the promulgation of the Gospel, explicit faith in the Trinity and the Incarnation is necessary with the necessity of means for the attainment of eternal salvation. This truth is expressly handed down in the Gospel. St. Matthew, chapter 28: Teach ye all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost. St. Mark, chapter 16: Preach the Gospel to every creature: he that believeth and is baptized shall be saved; but he that believeth not shall be condemned. The contrary opinion, which Fr. Sporer defends — who cites for it Laymann, Tanner, and other more recent writers — is false, and adverse to the luminous testimonies of God.

VII. The Salmanticenses, treatise 21, chapter 2, point 2, number 18, Roncaglia, treatise 6, chapter 2, question 3, and other Casuists defend the position that it can happen per accidens that someone be justified by a merely implicit faith in Christ. For, they say, it can come about that to a Catechumen God is proposed as supernatural author and end, no express mention being made of Christ and of the Trinity. True enough. But it can also happen that no mention be made of God as supernatural author. What then? Arbitrary and utterly fictitious is the distinction given between per se and per accidens in this cause. For the divine Scriptures are plain. The experience which the Salmanticenses adduce is too amusing, since the justification of the ungodly leaps beyond the limits of our experience. St. Thomas is ineptly alleged for this opinion.

VIII. Question III. Is absolution to be denied to one ignorant of the mysteries of the Incarnation and of the Trinity? Answer. The affirming opinion is common, and the contrary utterly false. Wherefore this thesis was deservedly condemned by Innocent XI: A man is capable of absolution, however much he labor under ignorance of the mysteries of the faith, and even if through culpable negligence he know not the mystery of the most holy Trinity and of the Incarnation of our Lord Jesus Christ. Fr. Viva, in his commentary on this thesis, number 7, distinguishes licit absolution from invalid absolution, and wraps up in that place several things which, in my judgment, are false. Wherefore adults who, wrapped in this ignorance, have frequented the sacraments, must repeat their Confessions, as being null.

IX. Question IV. Which are the heads of faith which adults are bound by force of precept to believe? Answer. All adults endowed with reason are bound to know and believe explicitly all the articles contained in the Creed. For that Creed contains the sum of the Christian profession, says St. Augustine in his book On faith and the Creed, chapter 1: Now the catholic faith is made known to the Faithful in the Creed, and committed to memory, in as brief a form of words as the matter allowed; so that for beginners and sucklings — for those who have been reborn in Christ, but are not yet strengthened by a most diligent and spiritual handling and knowledge of the divine Scriptures — there might be set forth in few words what is to be believed. All adults, therefore, must hold in memory the aforesaid mysteries of the Creed, so that, being questioned about them, they know how to answer. They must therefore believe and know expressly that God is one, omnipotent, creator of the universe, of all things visible and invisible, savior of the human race, giver of all sanctity and of graces, who forgives sins, bestower of glory; and that this one God is threefold in three distinct persons, of which one is not another, and all three are one.

X. Concerning the articles which regard the humanity of Christ, all must know and believe that the second person, namely the Son of God, was made man, who is called Christ, and is God-man. It is not required that they expressly know that the union of the human nature with the divine was made in the person, and the other difficulties, etc. They must also know and believe that Christ was conceived by the power of the Holy Ghost, and born of the Virgin Mary; likewise that he suffered and died — nor is explicit faith in the passion under Pontius Pilate required. They are equally bound to believe that he descended into hell according to his soul; that on the third day he rose again from the dead; and finally that he ascended into heaven, to the right hand of the Father, and will come to judge the living and the dead on the last day of judgment. The communion of Saints, moreover, must be expressly believed, although it does not constitute an article distinct from the ninth, which is: I believe the holy catholic Church. And the express faith of this article is supremely necessary. But they can scarcely believe that the Church is one assembly, one body, gathered in unity of doctrine and of sacraments under one head — invisible, Christ, and visible, the Roman Pontiff, Vicar of that same Christ on earth — unless at the same time they perceive that the Faithful, who are members of this mystical body, mutually aid one another, and that all spiritual goods, of which each partakes, are common.

XI. Implicitly, moreover, the Faithful must believe all the things which God has revealed in the holy Scriptures and in the word handed down, and which the catholic Church proposes to be believed.