I might content myself with denying the major or the minor, because the
term 'real' admits of interpretations capable of rendering these
propositions false. But in order to give a better explanation I will make a
distinction. 'Real' either signifies that which is positive only, or else
it includes also privative beings: in the first case, I deny the major and
I admit the minor; in the second case, I do the opposite. I might have
confined myself to that; but I was willing to go further, in order to
account for this distinction. I have therefore been well pleased to point
out that every purely positive or absolute reality is a perfection, and
that every imperfection comes from limitation, that is, from the privative:
for to limit is to withhold extension, or the more beyond. Now God is the
cause of all perfections, and consequently of all realities, when they are
regarded as purely positive. But limitations or privations result from the
original imperfection of creatures which restricts their receptivity. It is
as with a laden boat, which the river carries along more slowly or less
slowly in proportion to the weight that it bears: thus the speed comes from
the river, but the retardation which restricts this speed comes from the
load. Also I have shown in the present work how the creature, in causing
sin, is a deficient cause; how errors and evil inclinations spring from
privation; and how privation is efficacious accidentally. And I have
justified the opinion of St. Augustine (lib. I, _Ad. Simpl._, qu. 2) who
explains (for example) how God hardens the soul, not in giving it something
evil, but because the effect of the good he imprints is restricted by the
resistance of the soul, and by the circumstances contributing to this
resistance, so that he does not give it all the good that would overcome
its evil. 'Nec _(inquit)_ ab illo erogatur aliquid quo homo fit deterior,
sed tantum quo fit melior non erogatur.' But if God had willed to do more
here he must needs have produced either fresh natures in his creatures or
fresh miracles to change their natures, and this the best plan did not
allow. It is just as if the current of the river must needs be more rapid
than its slope permits or the boats themselves be less laden, if they [385]
had to be impelled at a greater speed. So the limitation or original
imperfection of creatures brings it about that even the best plan of the
universe cannot admit more good, and cannot be exempted from certain evils,
these, however, being only of such a kind as may tend towards a greater
good. There are some disorders in the parts which wonderfully enhance the
beauty of the whole, just as certain dissonances, appropriately used,
render harmony more beautiful. But that depends upon the answer which I
have already given to the first objection.