Mozley: A Treatise on the Augustinian Doctrine of

290 Scholastic Doctrine CHAP. x.
exclusion from a good exceeding nature, if he is. But the
combination of blamelessness in himself and excess in the
good protects him. Such a case comes under the rule of
Seneca, that perturbation does not fall on the wise man
for that which is unavoidable ; and children dying under
original sin alone are wise sed in pueris recta est ratio
nullo actuati peccato obliquata. They will therefore feel
no more pain under the want which attaches to their con
dition, than a reasonable man does because he cannot fly
like a bird, or because he is not a king or an emperor.
Bather they will rejoice in their share of the Divine bounty,
and in the natural perfections they will have attained. 1
It will be seen that the whole of this elaborate position
rests upon a particular interpretation of original sin; viz.,
as a privation or loss of perfection, and not a positive evil.
Having constructed his system on the strict Augustinian
sense of original sin, Aquinas falls back on the Clementine
when he comes to an individual case and avails himself of
;
the milder theology of the early fathers. Such a position,
however, when once laid down in the case of infants dying
under original sin, evidently cannot stop short of a much
wider application. Man is the same, as regards his nature,
whether he dies as an infant or grows up to maturity ; and
therefore the whole condition of the natural man, whether
1 Sicut nullus sapiens homo affli- putes at the Council of Trent, in
gitur de hoc quod non potest volare which the majority appear to have
sicut avis, vel quia non est rex vel favoured the position of Aquinas ;
imperator; cum sibi non sit de- but not without distinctions; For
bitum. . . . Si ab hoc deficiant (qui the Dominicans said that the chilliberum
arbitrium habent), maximus dren dead without baptism before
erit dolor eis quia amittunt illucl the use of reason remain after the
quod suum esse possibile fuit. Pueri resurrection in a limbo and darkness
autem nunquam fuerunt proportion- under the earth, but without fire ;
ati ad hoc, quod vitam aeternam the Franciscans say they are to re-
haberent, quae nee eis debebatur ex main upon the earth, and in light,
principiis naturae, nee actus proprios Some affirmed also, that they should
habere potuerunt : et ideo nihil be philosophers, busying themselves
omnino dolebunt de carentia divinse in natural things,- not without that
visionis: immo magis gaudebunt de greatest pleasure which happeneth
hoc quod participabunt multum de when curiosity is satisfied by invendivina
bonitate, et perfectionibus tion, Paul s History of the Council
naturalibus. In Lomb. A. 2. of Trent.
The question came up in the dis-