THE " SPECTATOR " AND INFALLIBLE TEACHING AS TO HELL.
[To THE EDITOR OF THE g. SPECTATOR."] SIR,—There appear to me to be one or two serious miscon- ceptions as to Catholic doctrine underlying your criticism of Mr. Mivart's paper in the Nineteenth Century : one, at least, too important to be allowed to pass unnoticed. You say :- "According to Mr. Mivart, those who love God, and love Him ardently, but only with a natural human love, are to have no share in this inconceivable bliss, if they have never had the grace of baptism. When did the Church first begin to put forth this kind of teaching ? "
I answer, if you mean by " the grace of baptism " the actual reception of the Sacrament of Baptism, the Church has never taught it. If you mean, as a Catholic writer in using those words could only mean, the grace which comes from baptism in voto (by desire), as well as from baptism in re (sacramental Baptism), then the Church has always taught the doctrine. On no point are Schoolmen and Fathers more universally agreed than on this. St. Thomas, for instance, in the " Summa" (pars. iii., q. 68, a. 2), gives the familiar distinction, and quotes St. Ambrose (De obitu Valentiniani) on the death of Valentinian, who died only a catechumen and unbaptised " Whilst he was still to be regenerated, I lost him : yet bath he not lost the grace for which he prayed." Furthermore, St. Thomas explains that this votuay, or desire of Baptism, need not be explicit, but is sufficient for regenerating grace, even if implicit. In q. 69, a. 4, ad second., he refers to the case of Cornelius the Centurion (Acts x.), who, of course, could not have had an explicit desire of Baptism, for he had never heard of it : yet he attained to sanctifying grace previous to Baptism, although when more fully instructed he was bound to receive it sacramentally. And as the implicit desire was sufficient for Cornelius, so is it, according to St. Thomas, with others. Coming now to the question of the lot of " those who love God, and love him ardently, but only with a natural human love," St. Thomas refuses to contemplate the possi- bility of that perfect good will and ardent natural love of God being left unaided by grace, or by some divine assistance which will transform it from a natural to a supernatural charity. Here are his words (De Veritate, q. 14, a. 11 ad prim.) :—" Si aliquis nutritus in silvis vel inter bruta animalia duetum rationis sequeretur in appetite boni et fuga mall, certissime est tenendum quod ei Deus vel per internam inspi- rationem revelaret ea gum aunt ad credendum necessaria, vel aliquem fidei prcedicatorem ad cum dirigeret, sicut misit. Petrum ad Cornelium." " If any one brought up in the depths of forests or amongst the brute beasts were to follow the guidance of reason in the desire of good and avoidance of evil, it is most certainly to be held that God would either reveal to him by internal inspiration the things necessary to believe, or would direct unto him some preacher of the Faith,. just as He sent Peter to Cornelius." Of course, St. Thomas may be taken as the best representative of Catholic theology. But there is a great principle equally insisted upon in all the schools, which gives a brief and sufficient answer to all such questions as this. The principle is the well-known " Facienti quod in se est, Deus non denegat gratiam." To him who does what is in his own power to do, God denies not grace.'' The idea of God "fettering Himself by imposing voluntary limits on His own power" of giving grace and glory by the institution of Sacraments, as though He could not give grace otherwise than through Sacramental channels, is just as abhorrent to Catholic theologians as to the writer of the Spectator. Nevertheless, when it is really possible to receive certain Sacraments, they mast, by reason of the Divine Pre- cept, be received as a means and a condition sine quit non. of eternal life. It will be clearly seen from the above that a human being, "loving God and loving him ardently, but only with a natural human love," who is left destitute of grace to supply the absence of Sacraments, when he cannot receive Sacraments, is, according to Catholic theologians, a mere figment of the imagination.
In reference to another point raised, in which the writer says he remembers having seen some book of instruction for children, in which it was asserted that a child of seven or -eight who was guilty of mortal sin, " say by telling a lie to his parents," would be condemned eternally for it, I cannot but think that the illustration of mortal sin must be the -critic's own, not that of the book. A mortal sin, besides demanding full knowledge, deliberation, and consent, requires also gravity of matter. No one possessed of the least .acquaintance with moral theology could classify a simple lie, told by a child to its parents, as a mortal sin which, if un- absolved or unrepented of, must be punished with eternal [Our correspondent will see, if he reads our article carefully, that we specially reserved the case of baptism by desire, but remarked that it could not apply to unbaptised infants who have never been intellectually able to form such a desire. As we understand the doctrine of the Church, death is a dividing point, after which infants can never recover the loss of the supernatural grace conferred by baptism, however great the natural love of God which grows up subsequently, may be. It is quite possible that the child's " lie " is the writer's own illustration, and not that of the book ; but we differ from the moral theology stated as Catholic by our correspondent, in thinking that a lie told deliberately by a young child, for the purpose of deceiving its parents, is, at least, as bad a sin as we can imagine a child of seven or eight could well commit ; and yet such a child is held to be capable of mortal sin. But there is no doubt at all about the statement as to the effect of a unrepented mortal sin, whatever it might be, in bringing upon him an eternity of the most inconceivable anguish.—ED. Spectator.]
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