"that which acquires perfect goodness by many aids and activities is more noble than that which acquires an imperfect goodness through fewer means, or by itself. . . ."
Thomas Aquinas, Commentary on the Sentences, q.1 a.1 ad3. "illud quod acquirit bonitatem perfectam pluribus auxiliis et motibus, est nobilius eo quod imperfectam bonitatem acquirit paucioribus, vel per seipsum. . . ." One might even call this, it seems to me, the "Catholic" principle par excellence. For in Catholicism and those Christian traditions most indebted to it, these "many aids and activities" are multiplied, reduplicated, collected, and (unselfishly) "hoarded" without embarrassment almost ad infinitum. (And yet the one true God is only all the more glorified thereby.)
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