Theological Theses · §2548 · Louis Le Blanc de Beaulieu

On what grace is: a virtual motion, or affections of the will

Thesis CX. As for the essence of the grace by which the will is moved to the acts of conversion and which actually brings conversion about, the recent Thomists, as was said above, place it in a virtual motion. This motion has an incomplete kind of being and is in the will as colours are in the air, or as impetus is in a thing that is being driven along.

Molina places the grace that moves a person efficaciously to conversion, when free choice consents, in certain affections of the will that arise from a prior illumination of the mind. God inserts himself into them by his influence, draws the will to will, gives it the strength to will, and concurs with the will at the same time, if it wills.

Latin

CX. Quod spectat autem essentiam gratiae, qua movetur voluntas ad actus conversionis, & quae conversionem reipsa operatur, Recentiores Thomistae illam ponunt ut supra dictum, in motione aliqua virtuosa, quae habet esse quoddam incompletum, & est in voluntate per modum quo colores sunt in aere, & impetus in re quae impellitur. Molina vero gratiam quae, consentiente libero arbitrio, hominem efficaciter movet ad conversionem, ponit in affectibus quibusdam voluntatis, ex praevia mentis illuminatione ortis, quibus Deus per suum influxum se inserens, allicit voluntatem ut velit, & vires volendi tribuit, simulque concurrit cum voluntate si voluerit.

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