Value, Price, and St. Thomas

THE THOMIST A SPECULATIVE QUARTERLY REVIEW OF THEOLOGY AND PHILOSOPHY EDITORS: THE DoMINICAN FATHERS oF THE PRoVINCE OF ST. JosEPH Publishers: The Thomist Press, Washington 17, D. C. VoL. XXV JULY, 1962 No.8 VALUE, PRICE, AND ST. THOMAS lntrodootion "WHENHe shall appear, we shall be like to Him; and we shall see Him as He is." 1 With this citation from the First Epistle of St. John, St. Thomas climaxes his discussion in the Summa Theologiae of man's last end. " Final and perfect happiness," Aquinas concludes , " can consist in nothing else than the vision of the Divine Essence." 2 St. Thomas is a philosopher with great confidence in the rational powers of man, and he does not hesita.te to place man on a pinnacle above all material creation.3 Even as a theologian he does not hesitate to verify from revelation man's preeminence over material creation. For he quotes the Psalmist as saying, " Thou hast subjected all things under his feet." 4 But as a theologian he cannot stop there. For man is not his own end, and so his own happiness, his own good, 1 1 John 3, 2. • Sumnna Thoologiae I-ll, 8, 8. "Ibid. I, 98, 6. 'Pa. 8, 8 cit. in Sumnna Tkeol. I-ll, 2, 10. 825 826 ERNEST BARTELL ultimately cannot consist in his natural domination and enjoyment of the creatures whom he excels.5 Revelation teaches us that man's natural excellence stems from his creation in the image of the Triune God, who by nature is true and good in Himself. Moreover, through God's creative generosity, man participates in the kind of activity that characterizes God Himself. But for this very reason man will never achieve his own fulflllment until that image with its powers and acts of knowing and loving is adequately realized in intimate vision and union with Him who is true and good.6 Meanwhile, despite the weight of sin that man inherits and enlarges, the image of God in him has already acquired some of the brilliance and strength to which it is ultimately destined. For a created share of the very life of his Creator is already present and operative in man through the redemptive grace of Christ. Consequently, commensurate with this state in which man finds himself as created, redeemed and elevated by God, he must live a life that is ordered and structured to his ultimate happiness. St. Thomas points out that in so doing man will already achieve a partial, although imperfect, happiness in this life.7 The ordering and structuring of this life is to be accomplished through a life of virtue, for " happiness," says St. Thomas, " is the reward of virtue." 8 The words of St. John, " You shall be blessed if you do them," 9 provide Aquinas with theological verification of this enlargement on the teaching of Aristotle. Although man's body is not necessary for the happiness of the Beatific Vision/0 its well-being is necessary in this life for an unhampered life of virtue according to St. Thomas in a paraphrase of Aristotle.11 And indeed he finds in the words of • Ibid. I-ll, 1, 2. 8 Ibid. I-ll, 8, 8. 7 Ibid. 1-11, 4, 6. 8 Ibid. I-ll, 4, 6, sed CO'I/,tra. • John 18, 17. 10 Su'IT/IIna Tkeol. I-ll, 4, 6. 11 Ibid. I-ll, 4, 6. VALUE, PRICE, AND ST. THOMAS 8~7 Isaia the theological evidence that bodies of the blessed will someday share in their eternal happiness.12 Clearly then, what St. Thomas terms external goods, like material wealth, are by no means necessary for perfect happiness in the vision of God that the blessed in heaven enjoy. After all, the vision of God is accomplished with no need for the body and its limited senses. The saints in heaven at this moment enjoy a spiritual intimacy with God that is unhampered by the limitations of material go-betweens, and hence by the need for material sustenance.18 Even after bodies and souls are reunited on the last day, there will be no need for external goods to sustain a...