Tuesday, May 26, 2009

Q96 A3: Whether men were equal in the state of innocence?

No. In the primitive state, which was most proper and orderly, inequality would have existed, because order chiefly consists in inequality.

In primo statu, qui decentissimus fuisset, disparitas inveniretur, quia ordo maxime videtur in disparitate consistere.

Augustine says (De Civ. Dei xix, 13): "Order disposes things equal and unequal in their proper place."

Dicit enim Augustinus, XIX de Civ. Dei, "ordo est parium dispariumque rerum sua cuique loca tribuens dispositio."

As regards the soul, there would have been inequality as to righteousness and knowledge.

Secundum animam diversitas fuisset, et quantum ad iustitiam et quantum ad scientiam.

In the primitive state there would have been some inequality, at least as regards sex, because generation depends upon diversity of sex: and likewise as regards age; for some would have been born of others; nor would sexual union have been sterile.

Necesse est dicere aliquam disparitatem in primo statu fuisse, ad minus quantum ad sexum, quia sine diversitate sexus, generatio non fuisset. Similiter etiam quantum ad aetatem, sic enim quidam ex aliis nascebantur; nec illi qui miscebantur, steriles erant.

There might also have been bodily disparity.

Ex parte etiam corporis, poterat esse disparitas.