BANEZ
248
BANEZ
to the objections and to some other observations were
added as an appendix, T\-ith which, sanctioned anew
(25 and 30 August, 1589), the work was permitted
to circulate. It was regarded as an epoch-making
study, and many Fathers of the Society of Jesus
ralhed to its defence. From Valladolid, where the
Jesuit and Dominican schools in 1594 held alternate
public disputations for and against its teaching on
grace, the contention spread over all Spain. The in-
tervention of the Inquisition was again sought , and by
the authority of this high tribunal the litigants were
required to "present their respective positions and
claims, and a number of universities, prelates, and
theologians were consulted as to the merits of the
strife. The matter was referred however, by the
papal nuncio to Rome, 15 August, 1594, and all dis-
pute was to cease until a decision was rendered. In
the meantime, to offset his Dominican and other crit-
ics, Molina brought counter accusations against Bafiez
and Zumel. The latter submitted his defence in three
parts, all fully endorsed by Banez, 7 July. 1595. The
Dominican position was set forth about the same time
by Banez and seven of his brethren, each of whom
presented a separate answer to the charges. But the
presiding officer of the Inquisition desired these
eight books to be reduced to one, and Baiiez, to-
ge'ther with Pedro Herrera and Didacus Alvarez, was
instructed to do the work. About four months later,
Alvarez presented their joint product under the title:
"Apologia fratrum prjedicatorum in provincia His-
panise sacrce theologis professorum, adversus novas
quasdam assertiones cujusdam doctoris Ludo\'ici
Molin* nuncupati", published at Madrid, 20 No-
vember. 1595. It is noteworthy that this work was
signed and ratified by twenty-two masters and pro-
fessors of theologj'. To it was added a tract on the
intrinsic efficacy of Divine grace. Xearly two years
later, 28 October, 1597, Banez resumed the case in a
new summary and petitioned the pope to permit the
Dominican schools to take up their teaching again
on the disputed questions. This was the "Libellus
supplex dementi VIII oblatus pro impetranda im-
munitate a lege silentii utrique litigantium pani im-
posita", published at Salamanca. An answer to the
"Libellus" was conveyed in a letter of Cardinal
Madruzzi. 25 February, 1598, wTitten in the name
of the pope, to the nuncio in Spain: "Inform the
Fathers of the Order of Preachers that His Holiness,
moderating the prohibition that was made, grants
them the faculty freely to teach and discuss, as they
did in the past, the subject-matter de auxiliis div-
ina gralicE et corum efpcacia, conformably to the doc-
trine of St. Thomas; and likewise the Fathers of the
Society, that they also may teach and discuss the
same subject-matter, always holding, however, to
sound Catholic doctrine". (Serry, Hist. Cong, de
Aux., I, XXVI.) This pronouncement practically
ended whatever personal participation Baiiez had in
the famous controversy.
It has been contended that Baiiez was at least virtually the founder of present-day Thomisra, es- pecially" in so far as it includes the theories of physical premotion, the intrinsic efficacy of grace, and pre- destination irrespective of foreseen merit. To any reader of Baiiez it is evident that he would have met such a declaration with a strenuous denial. Fidelity to St. Thomas was his strongest characteristic. "By not so much as a finger-nail's breadth, even in lesser things", he was wont to say, "have I ever departed from the teaching of St. Thomas". He .singles out for special animad\ersion the views in which his pro- fessors and associates dissent even lightly from the opinions of the Angelic Doctor. "In and throughout all things, I determined to follow St. Thomas, as he followed the Fathers", was another of his favourite assurances. His zeal for the integrity of Thomistic teaching could brook no doctrinal novelty, partic-
ularly if it claimed the sanction of St. Thomas's
name. In the voluminous literature on the De Au-x-
iliis and related controversies, the cardinal tenets of
Thomism are ascribed by its opponents to a varied
origin. The Rev. G. Schneeman, S. J., (Controver-
siarum de divinae gratis liberique arbitrii Concordia
initia et progressus, Freiburg im Br., 1881), the Rev.
Father De Regnon, S. J. (Banez et Molina, Paris, 1SS3)
and the Rev. Father Baudier, S. J. (in the Revue des
Sciences Eccl^siastiques, Amiens, 1887, p. 153) are
probably the foremost modern writers who designate
the Thomists as Bannesians. But against them ap-
pears a formidable list of Jesuits of repute who were
either Thomists themselves or authorities for other
opinions. Suarez, for instance (Op. omn., XI, ed.
Vives, Paris, 1886; Opusc, I, Lib. Ill, De Auxiliis,
\'ii), credits iledina with the first intimations of
physical premotion and elsewhere (Op. omn., XI, 50;
Opusc. I, Lib. I, De Cone. Dei, xi, n" 6) admits that
St. Thomas himself once taught it. Toletus (Com-
ment, in 8 Lib. Aristotelis, Venice, 1573, Lib. II,
c. iii, q. 8) and Pererius (Pref. to Disquisit. Magicarura,
Lib. VI, I Ed.) considered as Thomistic the Cate-
chism of the Council of Trent, which was the work
(1566) of three Dominican theologians. [For Delrio
see Goudin, Philosophia (Civita Vecchia, 1860), IV,
pt. IV, 392, Disp. 2, q. 3, § 2.] The Rev. Victor Frins,
S. J., gives it as his opinion (S. Thomre Aq., O. P. doc-
trina de Cooperatione Dei cum omni natura creatil
pra>sertim libera; Responsio ad R. P. Dummermuth,
O. P., Paris, 1893) that whilst Medina and Pedro Soto
(1551) taught physical predetermination, the origi-
nator of the theory was Francis Victoria, O. P. (d.
1546). The Dominicans Ferrariensis (1576), Cajetan
(1507). and Giovanni Capreolus (d. 1436) are also ac-
credited Thomists in the estimation of such authori-
ties as the Jesuits Becanus [Summa Theol. Schol.
(Mainz, 1612), De Deo, xviii, no 14] and Azorius
[Institut. Moral. (Rome, 1600-11), Lib. I, xxi, § 7],
and the theologians of Coimbra (Comment, in 8
libros Phys., Lib. II, q. 13, a. 1). Molina, strangely
enough, cites the doctrine of a "certain disciple of
St. Thomas" — supposedly Baiiez — as differing only
in words from the teaching of Scotus, instead of
agreeing with that of Aciuinas [Concordia (Paris,
1S76), q. 14. a. 13, Disp. 50], These striking dive:--
gences of opinion of which only a few have been cited
would seem to indicate tliat the attempt to father
the Thomistic system on Banez has failed. [Cf.
Defensio Doctrinie S. Thomae, A. M. Dummermuth,
O.P., Louvain and Paris, 1895, also Card. Zigliara,
Simima Phil. (Paris, 1898), II, 525.]
The development of Thomistic terminology in the Dominican school was mainly due to the exigencies not only of the stand taken against Molina and the forbidden propositions already mentioned, but of the more important defence against the attacks and aberrations of the Reformers. The "predetermina- tion" and "predefinition" of Baiiez and his contem- poraries, who included others besides Dominicans, emphasized, on the part of God's knowledge and providence, a priority to, and independence of, future free acts, which, in the Catharino-Molinistic theories, seemed to them less clearly to fall under God's causal action. These terms, however, are used by St. Thomas himself. (Comment, de divinis no- minibus, Lect. iii.) The words " physical premotion" were meant to exclude, first a merely moral impulse and, secondly, a concurrence of the Divine causality and free will, without the latter's subordination to the First Cause. That such terms, far from doing violence to the teachings of their great leader, are their true expression, has, of course, been an unvaried tenet of the Thomistic school. One of the presiding officers of the Congregation De Auxiliis, Cardinal Madruzzi, speaking of Banez in this connexion, said: "His teaching seems to be deduced from the princi-
