Henry Edward Cardinal Manning in his discussion of the Indwelling of the Holy Spirit writes this:
"...original justice was no part of the nature of mane; it was a superadded gift, a supernatural perfection over and above the perfection or integrity of human nature. It was not due to man that he should have the gift of original justice: his perfection consisted in the body and the soul, the faculties and the powers-intellectual and moral-which constitute human nature. But original justice is more than this: namely, the gift of a supernatural grace and state, by the indwelling of the Holy Ghost in the soul, illuminating it by the infusion of His light in the form of truth: and sanctifying it by the infusion of His grace in the form of sanctity."
"This was original justice, and therefore Adam was in two ways the son of God. He was a son of God by nature, because he was created by God; and a son of God by grace, because the Holy Ghost dwelt in him. Further, because he had this original justice, he also had two other gifts. He had immortality in the body, because he was without sin; and he had perfect harmony and integrity, or order, in the soul, because the soul was under the direction and guidance of the Spirit of God. Therefore in Adam there were three perfections: there was perfection of nature, the body and the soul; there was the supernatural perfection or the indwelling of the Holy Ghost and of sanctifying grace; there was the preternatural perfection of immortality in the body and in harmony in the soul, in and with itself."
I shall continue this later, but this section deserves meditation and contemplation.
Notice how many of the great writers come back to the idea of perfection.
to be continued...
