Treatise: On Divine Charity

S. Th. I-II, qq. 26-28; I, q. 60; III Sent., d. 27, q. 1; C. G. IV, 19; Quodl. I, a. 8.

842. Charity according to the name. - The Latin word charitas is derived either from the Greek word charis, that is, grace, benevolence; or from the Latin word carum, that is, what is of great price. Each sense nearly falls back into the same thing, for one who is loved benevolently is generally esteemed of great price, and he who is held to be of great price is easily loved benevolently. Hence:

1. Charity originally and primarily signifies a gratuitous, liberal, honorable, benevolent, excellent love toward someone who is highly esteemed.

For although love, dilection, charity, and friendship in a certain sense pertain to the same thing, because they are the appetite of good, nevertheless in the proper and strict sense they are diverse: love and dilection properly signify an act; friendship is as it were a habit¹ or state; charity is said of both. Moreover, love is the most general term: for it signifies either a passion of the sensitive concupiscible appetite, or an act of the will; dilection adds, beyond love, a preceding election by which it happens that one thing is loved before another, whence it is an act of the will alone; charity adds, beyond dilection, some perfection of love, insofar as that which is loved by charity is esteemed of great price and is loved from benevolence. Finally friendship adds, beyond benevolence, mutual dilection or love in return: for it is mutual benevolence, founded upon a certain communication (Eth. VIII, 2; I-II, q. 26, a. 3). Hence St. Thomas says: "friendship is the most perfect among those things which pertain to love" (III Sent., d. 27, q. 2, a. 1).

¹ For human friendship is not a virtue but something consequent upon virtue. Q. D. de Virt. 2, a. 2, ad 8.

2. From the use of speech, however, charity is taken in a stricter sense, and is an eminent love of special friendship, whether natural or supernatural.

3. But in theological speech and in the strictest sense, only supernatural and divine friendship is called charity, as being more precious than all the others, esteeming God above all other things. Hence St. Thomas says: "friendship toward God is more precious and dear than all" (ibid., ad 7).

The aforesaid senses are handed down in Sacred Scripture: 1. charity is said of the uncreated love of God himself, a) by which he loves us (I Jn. IV, 8), indeed also b) the love of benevolence toward sinners who do not love him (Jer. XXXI, 3; Eph. II, 4); 2. natural friendship among men (II Mach. XIV, 26); 3. the love of supernatural friendship, namely, both a) the act by which we love God on account of himself and therefore our neighbor on account of God (Col. III, 14; Rom. XII, 10); and b) the habit of supernatural friendship toward God (I Cor. XIII, 13).

843. Charity is love. - Love is the coaptation of affection to the beloved good; under this respect knowledge and love differ: for a thing, through knowledge, is in a certain way drawn to the knower, because the agent intellect (by active virtue) acts upon the thing and takes and transforms the thing into itself; on the contrary, through love the lover is drawn to the beloved itself, because the thing acts upon the appetite and transforms the appetite (a passive virtue) into itself (I-II, q. 22, a. 2). Namely, affection or appetite is in some way informed and changed by the apprehended good, - is adapted, conformed, and assimilated to it, - is transformed into it, - and is united to it, one with it; and therefore it adheres to it as fixed in it, and rests in it and is complacent in it because it is fitting to itself; and as a weight it is inclined and tends toward it. Namely, it is the principle and beginning of tendency toward the good, and thus love differs from desire and joy: from desire, which is the movement or perfect tendency toward attaining the good, proceeding from the inclination of love; also from joy, which is rest in a good already possessed, because the complacency of love is completed by possession of the beloved.1 - Love is as it were a weight tending toward the beloved; desire is the weight already falling; joy is the rest of the weight in its proper place, namely, in the real possession and presence of the term.

But a threefold love is found in man. For, as St. Thomas says, I-II, q. 26, a. 1: Love is something pertaining to appetite, since the object of each is good; whence according to the difference of appetite there is a difference of love. For there is:

1. A certain appetite not following the apprehension of the one appetizing himself, but of another; and this kind is called natural appetite: for natural things desire what is fitting to them according to their nature, not through their own apprehension, but through the apprehension of the one instituting nature.

2. But another is an appetite following the apprehension of the one appetizing himself, yet from necessity, not from free judgment; and such is the sensitive appetite in brute animals, which nevertheless in men participates in some freedom, insofar as it obeys reason.

3. But another is an appetite following the apprehension of the one appetizing according to free judgment; and such is the rational or intellective appetite, which is called the will.

Moreover, in each of these appetites, love is called that which is the principle of the movement tending toward the beloved end:

a) But in the natural appetite the principle of this kind of movement is the connaturality of the one appetizing to that toward which it tends, which can be called natural love: just as the very connaturality of a heavy body to the middle place is through gravity and can be called natural love. Such natural love is in all the powers of the soul, and even in all parts of the body, and universally in all things, since each thing has connaturality to that which is fitting to it according to its nature.

b) Similarly, the coaptation of the sensitive appetite to some sensible good and the complacency of the sensitive appetite in a good apprehended sensibly is called sensible or sensitive love, which is concerned with qualities which please the senses and which are trifling and mutable, whence the love which arises from this is vain and inconstant.

c) Finally, the coaptation of the will to some intelligible good and the complacency of the will in a good apprehended by the intellect is called rational love, which arises from intellectual and moral endowments, such as perspicacity or promptness of mind, rectitude of judgment, wisdom, knowledge, prudence, benignity, fortitude and other virtues, nobility of soul, etc. This love is worthy of man, as being founded upon truly human qualities; and it is more constant, as relying on endowments which are less mutable and more stable.

1. All these things are taken from St. Thomas. Thus, for example, in I-II, q. 26, a. 2: "Passion is the effect of the agent in the patient. But the natural agent induces a double effect in the patient, for first indeed it gives form, secondly it gives motion consequent upon the form.... Thus also the appetible itself first gives to the appetite a certain coaptation to itself, which is a certain complacency of the appetible, from which follows movement toward the appetible.... For the appetible moves the appetite, making in it in some way its intention, and the appetite tends toward the appetible to be really attained, so that the end may be where the principle was. Therefore the first change of the appetite by the appetible is called love, which is nothing other than the complacency of the appetible; and from this complacency follows movement toward the appetible, which is desire; and finally rest, which is joy. Thus therefore, since love consists in a certain change of the appetite by the appetible, it is manifest that love is a passion, properly indeed according as it is in the concupiscible power, but commonly and by an extended name according as it is in the will." And in III Sent., d. 27, q. 1, a. 1: "Love pertains to appetite; but appetite is a passive power.... But every passive thing is perfected according as it is informed by the form of its active thing, and in this its movement is terminated and rests.... When affection or appetite is altogether imbued with the form of the good which is its object, it is complacent to itself in it and adheres to it as fixed in it; and then it is said to love it. Whence love is nothing other than a certain transformation of the affection into the thing loved. And because everything which is made the form of something is made one with it, therefore through love the lover becomes one with the beloved, which has been made the form of the lover, and therefore the Philosopher says that a friend is another self; and I Cor. VI, 17: He who adheres to God is one spirit. But each thing acts according to the exigency of its form, which is the principle of acting and the rule of the work. But the good is the end; the end, however, is the principle in operable things.... Whence... the lover, whose affection is informed by the good itself which has the aspect of end... is inclined through love to operating according to the exigency of the beloved." Summarily, in a. 3, ad 2: "Love makes the beloved fitting and connatural to the lover, insofar as it unites the affection of the lover to the beloved...," and a. 1, ad 2: "it is the union itself or bond or transformation by which the lover is transformed into the beloved and in some way converted into it." Cf. I-II, q. 28, aa. 1 and 2; q. 26, a. 2, ad 2.

844. Charity is benevolent love. - For there is a twofold rational love or love of election, namely, of concupiscence or desire, and of benevolence or friendship.1

In the former mode we love something (a thing or person) for our own advantage and utility, namely, on account of ourselves as a good to us or so that good may come to us from it. In the latter we love someone on account of himself, and therefore we will good to him as a good to him or so that good may come to him. To love a horse on account of utility, or food on account of delight, is of concupiscence: for no one has proper benevolence toward a horse or food; and similarly to love a man on account of utility or delight, for example, a master on account of wages. On the contrary, the love of a friend toward a friend or of a mother toward a son is of benevolence.

These differ in many ways:

1. By reason of the end for whom: for by love of concupiscence we love something on account of ourselves, so that it may be well for us; by love of benevolence we love someone on account of himself, so that it may be well for him.

2. By reason of the end which (the material object): love of concupiscence intends one's own advantage, namely, the proper good of the lover; love of benevolence, the good of another, namely, the good of the beloved himself.

3. By reason of the proximate motive (the formal object): by love of concupiscence we love something because it is good to us, insofar as good comes to us from it, so that the love does not rest in the beloved but returns to the lover; by love of benevolence we love someone because he is good in himself, so that the love rests in the person of the beloved because he has in himself the perfection by which he is lovable in himself.

That twofold love: a) relates as perfect and imperfect: the love of benevolence by which we love someone according to himself (as a good in himself), so that it may be well for him, is love in the full and proper sense; but the love of concupiscence by which we love something only on account of ourselves so that it may be a good to us, is love in an imperfect and analogical sense:² for we do not love it on account of itself but only as a good to us, insofar as we love ourselves so that that good may come to us. Hence:

² Benevolence is the principle of friendship, Eth. IX, c. 5.

b) they are always joined in some sense and subordinated to one another: for it is impossible that we covet something unless we will it to someone benevolently and loved on account of himself, and thus in the love of concupiscence by which we wish something for ourselves we also love ourselves benevolently - and vice versa, it is impossible that we love someone benevolently unless we covet some good for him;

c) nevertheless, love of concupiscence and benevolence differ morally: in the love of concupiscence by which we wish some good for ourselves, we also love ourselves benevolently; but because this benevolence is necessary and natural, it is not attended to in moral science, which judges moral and free human acts, and therefore this love is simply called of concupiscence; - on the contrary, in the love of benevolence by which we love someone on account of himself, we also covet and desire goods for him as for ourselves, but because this proceeds from the same benevolent motive, this love is simply called of benevolence.

And thus considered, love of concupiscence and benevolence are distinguished in moral species, according as they principally tend toward this or that proper good of the lover, or toward the good of another loved in himself. For our acts have their species from diverse objects or motives distinct from us.

1. "Just as a good... simply is that which has goodness itself, but what is a good of another is a good in a qualified sense; and consequently the love by which something is loved so that it may have good is love simply, but the love by which something is loved so that it may be the good of another is love in a qualified sense" (I-II, q. 26, a. 4). Hence Aristotle says, Eth. VIII, c. 3, that useful and delightful friendship are friendship per accidens, according to similitude and analogy, but not properly so called; and St. Thomas, q. 26, a. 4, ad 3: "because the good" (which someone wills to a friend) "is referred further to his own delight and utility, thence it is that useful and delightful friendship, insofar as it is drawn to love of concupiscence, falls short of the nature of friendship." Cf. q. 27, a. 3; Q. D. de Virt. 4, a. 3; in Jn. XV, lect. 4.

845. Charity is love of friendship. - Moreover friendship is: a) mutual benevolence or love in return, whence it is said: a friend is a friend to a friend (Eth. VIII); b) mutually known or manifested, for otherwise dilection would be mutual per accidens and would not be true love in return or dilection of another insofar as he too loves; whence it is said: friendship is love in return not hidden (Eth. IV); c) stable and therefore founded upon communication, that is, community of the same goods, in the fellowship of the same life and of one intimate society, so that among friends there is a certain equality, from which by parity they can use familiar commerce, live together amicably in the same life, and enjoy the same happiness. Hence it is said: friendship either finds equals or makes them.

Scripture speaks excellently about friendship, Eccli. VI, 14-16: "A faithful friend is a strong protection; but he who finds him finds a treasure; for a faithful friend there is no comparison, and the weighing of gold and silver is not worthy against the goodness of his fidelity; a faithful friend is a medicine of life and immortality."

846. The remote foundation of every love and the condition on the part of the subject is the necessary and natural love of oneself: because we love ourselves benevolently and will supreme perfection or happiness for ourselves, therefore by love of concupiscence we will for ourselves this or that good as something which pertains to our happiness; and by love of benevolence we love others as ourselves and will good to them as to ourselves (q. 27, a. 3).

The proximate foundation of benevolence is some community of goods: for the similitude of the lover with the beloved makes the lover love the beloved as another self, and love good for him as for himself.³ - The proximate foundation of friendship is similitude even to equality, at least of proportion, arisen from communion in the same goods, namely, communication of one's own goodness, association in the same life, or at least destination or aptitude for the same life.⁴

³ In love of another, man imitates love of himself: just as unity in substance with ourselves is the foundation of love toward ourselves, so union in form or similitude with others is the foundation of love toward them. Cf. I-II, q. 26, a. 2, ad 2; q. 27, a. 3; q. 28, a. 1, ad 2.

⁴ Thus conformably to St. Thomas, in III Sent., d. 28, q. 1, a. 3; and d. 27, q. 2, a. 2, ad 4; and II-II, q. 25, a. 3.

For experience shows: a) friendship naturally arises among those who lead the same life, but does not arise among those who are greatly distant; b) according to diverse communion of life, friendship is diverse: thus natural friendship is founded upon the communication of natural life through generation; domestic, civil, or military friendship is founded upon communion in the same domestic, civil, or military life, etc.; and the more excellent the goods of some life are, the more excellent the friendship is; c) where the union in the same life is greatest, friendship is greatest, as is clear from the union of husband and wife.⁵

⁵ Communication of goods is not to be taken in the active sense for benefits mutually conferred: this is an effect of friendship, not the foundation. This can be necessary so that community of life may be present, but that is per accidens; it can also preserve and foster friendship. Thus according to the mind of Aristotle, and in this sense the definition is to be understood, as borrowed from him.

847. The remote foundation of every love and the condition on the part of the object is its goodness known as such, that is, insofar as it is proposed as proportioned to us: for it is impossible that someone love that which does not seem good or fitting to him; hence also naturally we love someone first by love of concupiscence insofar as he is our good, than by love of benevolence or friendship (q. 27, aa. 1 and 2).

The foundation or proximate motive, that is, the formal object according to which concupiscence, benevolence, and friendship differ, is that goodness considered in a diverse mode: for the motive of the love of concupiscence is the relative goodness of the thing, precisely as it is good to someone, because apt for perfecting and beatifying him; the motive of the love of benevolence is the absolute goodness of the person in himself, or his perfection, by which he is not only good to the one loving, but also good and lovable in himself; finally, the motive of friendship is the same goodness of the person in himself, but which we have in common with him, and on account of which we are also loved by him.

848. The chief effects of love, according to St. Thomas, are union or mutual inherence, ecstasy, zeal, universal influence upon the activity of the agent and subordination of actions to the beloved object, and wounding (q. 28).

1. Union, for any love tends to join lovers and from two or more to make one morally, according to that: And of the multitude of believers there was one heart and one soul (Acts IV, 32). It effects a double union: a) one affective, by force of which friends endeavor to will the same things and not will the same things, and the lover is in the beloved as reckoning the goods and will of the friend as his own, and conversely the beloved is in the lover because he loves him as himself. Thus it is read in Scripture (I Kings XVIII, 1): "The soul of Jonathan was glued to the soul of David, and Jonathan loved him as his own soul." Love causes this union formally; - b) another real, which consists in the presence and possession of the beloved; this union love makes effectively. This, however, although desired by lovers, is sometimes impeded or delayed by obstacles.

2. Ecstasy (ek-stasis, departure), by which the lover is as it were placed outside himself; this happens by a double act of intellect and will: a) according to the intellect, the lover, forgetful of himself, frequently thinks of the beloved, and love makes this ecstasy dispositively, insofar namely as it makes one meditate upon the beloved; but intense meditation on one thing abstracts from others; - b) according to affection he is carried outside himself: through the love of concupiscence, not content concerning the good which he has, he seeks to enjoy something outside himself; through the love of friendship, he does not act for himself alone, but wills and works good for the friend, as if carrying care and providence for him on account of the friend himself, not as to his own good but toward the good of the beloved, and love makes this ecstasy directly. Wherefore it is of the greatest moment to love only honorable and holy things, since the lover as it were goes out from himself and is made similar to the beloved.⁶

⁶ Mystical ecstasy is nothing other than the connatural redundancy of the state of the soul and of the higher faculties into the lower faculties and the body, by which namely the higher faculties so altogether inhere in God that the internal senses, or even the external, indeed also the corporeal faculties, are impeded, suspended, or totally bound, and the body preserves the state. Yet God also preternaturally can produce such an external state in those who have not yet arrived at the aforesaid grades of mystical life. - Rapture is nothing other than ecstasy which snatches by a sudden impulse.

3. Zeal, which comes from the intensity of love: for the more vehemently we tend toward something, the more strongly we repel whatever is opposed to this propensity. Thus, in the love of concupiscence, he who intensely covets something is by that very fact borne against everything which stands in the way of its attainment or quiet enjoyment; and in this way husbands are said to be zealous for their wives. In the love of friendship, he who sincerely wills the good of a friend is by that very fact vehemently moved against everything which is repugnant to his good; and according to this someone is said to be zealous for a friend, or also for God, when he tries according to his power to repel those things which are against the good of a friend, or against the honor or will of God. Whence Ps. LXVIII, 10: "Zeal for thy house has eaten me." (Cf. III Kings XIX, 14).

4. Universal influence upon the activity of the agent. Since love of the good (or end) is the cause of all things which the lover does, hence if one love is predominant, all things are done on account of it. And therefore he who vehemently loves someone orders all his actions to him, namely, toward pleasing him and attaining his friendship. From this it follows that nothing is of greater interest than rightly ordering one's affections, so that life itself may be rightly instituted; for, as Augustine says, De Civ. Dei, l. XIV, c. 28: "therefore two loves made two cities: namely, the earthly, love of self even to contempt of God; but the heavenly, love of God even to contempt of self."

5. Wounding. To the aforesaid effects are also reduced liquefaction, fruition, languor, and fervor, which by one name can be called wounding (Cant. IV, 9). Liquefaction is a softening of the heart which makes the lover not contained within himself, and by which the heart is made fit so that the beloved may enter, and may easily be penetrated by the beloved. If therefore the beloved has been present and possessed, fruition from the presence is caused; but if he has been absent, there will be languor or sadness from absence, and fervor or intense desire of presence by which the lover is carried outside himself into the beloved. - It is called wounding because the lover is divided from himself so that the beloved may enter, and is carried outside himself so that he may seek the beloved. Concerning this St. Thomas notes, III Sent., d. 27, q. 1, a. 1, ad 4: "In love there is a union of the lover to the beloved, but there is also a threefold division. For from this, that love transforms the lover into the beloved, it makes the lover enter into the interior things of the beloved, and conversely, so that nothing of the beloved remains to the lover not united" (just as form reaches the inner parts of the thing formed, and conversely); "and therefore a) the lover in some way penetrates into the beloved, and according to this love is said to be acute: for it belongs to the acute by dividing to arrive at the inner parts of a thing; and similarly the beloved penetrates the lover, arriving at his inner parts, and on account of this it is said that love wounds, and that it pierces the liver. But because nothing can be transformed into another except according as it in some way withdraws from its own form" (because of one thing there is one form), "therefore b) this division of penetration is preceded by another division, by which the lover is separated from himself in tending toward the beloved, and according to this love is said to make ecstasy" (and languish), "and to burn, because what boils bubbles outside itself and exhales. But because nothing withdraws from itself unless that by which it was contained within itself has been dissolved" (just as a natural thing does not lose form except when the dispositions by which the form was retained in matter have been dissolved), "therefore c) it is necessary that from the lover that termination by which he was contained only within his own boundaries be removed; and on account of this love is said to liquefy the heart, because the liquid is not contained by its own boundaries, and the contrary disposition is hardness of heart."

But if love is vehement, it can also cause injury of the body or organic injury.

849. There is a threefold union in friendship. - One is the cause of friendship, and this is community of goods, or union of similitude. Another is essentially the very love of friendship, and this is affective or moral union, in affection, by which man considers a friend as one with himself and another self, whence it is said: a friend is another self (Eth. IX). The third is the effect of friendship, and this is effective and physical union of real presence which the lover seeks to have with the beloved person: this is not of the essence but of the fittingness of love (q. 28, a. 1, ad 2).

Union according to affection is mutual inherence (mutual penetration), not only a) because friends love one another mutually; but b) because the beloved is in the lover, for he remains impressed in his memory through continued knowledge, and in affection through complacency, whence the lover reckons the beloved as the same as himself, and wills and acts on account of the friend as for himself; and conversely the lover is in the beloved, because he tends to knowing him intimately, and because by affection he is transformed into him, whence he reckons the goods or evils of the friend as his own and the will of the friend as his own, and therefore wills and does the same things as the friend, and is saddened and rejoices with him, as if made the same as the beloved. Hence friendship is called the bond of lovers, a union between the lover and the beloved: for it is the union and agreement of two wills (q. 28, a. 2).

850. Divine or theological charity is defined: a virtue divinely infused by which we love God, the supernatural end, with our whole heart on account of himself, and ourselves and our neighbor as ourselves on account of God. In this definition:

1. there is indicated the genus to which charity pertains: a divinely infused or supernatural virtue;

2. the proper act of charity by which it is distinguished from other virtues: by which we love;

3. the material object of charity, both principal: God, the supernatural end, and secondary: ourselves and our neighbor;

4. the motive of charity: on account of God;

5. properties essential to charity: with the whole heart (above all things) is toward God, and toward neighbor it is as toward ourselves.

That this definition is real and adequate will be shown throughout the whole treatise.⁷

⁷ Concerning charity one can usefully consult: St. Thomas, in Eth. VIII-IX; in III Sent., dd. 27-31; Q. D. de Virt., 2 and 3; II-II, qq. 23-45; with the commentaries of Cajetan, Bannez, John of St. Thomas, Billuart, and the Salmanticenses; likewise Gregory of Valentia, Suarez, and Ripalda; - Goudin, Philosophia thomistica, 3 p., q. 3, a. 2, and Mercier, Psychologie; - St. Francois de Sales, Traite de l'Amour de Dieu, and Bossuet, in the writings on Quietism; - Theologia Mechliniensis, De Virtutibus; Bouquillon, De Virtutibus theologicis, with the annotations of Waffelaert; Billot, De Virtutibus infusis; Em. Card. Van Roey, De Virtute Charitatis; - Coconnier, La Charite d'apres S. Thomas d'Aquin, in Revue Thomiste 1906 and 1907; Janvier, Conf. de N.-D.: La Charite; Sertillanges, L'amour chretien; Noble, L'amitie avec Dieu; - Xenia Thomistica II: Keller, De Virtute charitatis tamquam amicitia quaedam divina; - and for the practical part: Ferraris, St. Alphonsus, Marc, Aertnijs, Ballerini, Lehmkuhl, Haine, Genicot, Noldin, Tanquerey, Prummer, Vermeersch.

851. Division of the treatise. - The treatise on charity comprises five parts: concerning charity itself, that is, concerning the habit of charity, - concerning the object of charity, - concerning its acts and effects, - concerning vices and sins opposed to it, - concerning the precepts of charity.

Ordinarily for the other virtues, from the object known the act is known, and then from the act the habit; on the contrary, for charity the habit is better known than the object and act: for since several and diverse loves can be referred to the same object under a diverse aspect, it must first be determined what kind of love charity is before it is determined under what formal aspect the object is considered and by what acts it is attained. Hence this treatise begins from the habit.

The first part treats of charity itself: 1. concerning the essence of charity; 2. concerning the excellence of charity, a) in itself, b) relative to the other virtues; 3. concerning the comparison of charity to the subject: a) concerning the subject and generation of charity, b) concerning its increase, c) concerning its diminution and loss.

The second part treats of the object of charity: 1. concerning the formal object; 2. concerning the material object, that is, concerning those to be loved: a) concerning those to be loved generally; then specifically, b) concerning God to be loved, c) concerning love of oneself, d) concerning sinners to be loved, e) concerning enemies to be loved; 3. concerning the order of charity: a) between ourselves and God, b) between ourselves and neighbor, c) between various neighbors.

The third part is concerning the acts and effects of charity: 1. concerning the proper act, dilection; 2. concerning the internal effects of charity: joy, peace, mercy, and the gift of wisdom; 3. concerning the external act, or beneficence: a) material, or almsgiving, b) spiritual, or fraternal correction.

The fourth part is concerning sins opposed to charity: 1. concerning hatred, which is opposed to dilection; 2. concerning sins opposed to joy, namely, concerning acedia and envy; 3. concerning sins opposed to peace; 4. concerning scandal, which is opposed to beneficence, namely, a) concerning active scandal, b) concerning passive scandal, c) concerning certain scandals in species.

The fifth part is concerning the precepts of charity.