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THOMAS AQUINAS INSISTS that there are two different ways to attain correct judgment. One is by way of "perfect use of reason," and another is by way of "connaturality" (connaturalitas):
Wisdom denotes a certain rectitude of judgment according to the divine ideas. Now rectitude of judgment is twofold: first, on account of perfect use of reason, secondly, on account of a kind of connaturality with the matter about which one has to judge. Thus, about matters of chastity, a man who has learnt the science of morals judges rightly through inquiry by reason, while he who has the habit of chastity judges rightly of such matters by a kind of connaturality. Accordingly it belongs to the wisdom that is an intellectual virtue to form a right judgment about divine things through inquiry by reason, but it belongs to wisdom as a gift of the Holy Spirit to form a right judgment about them on account of a kind of connaturality with them: thus Dionysius says, in Chapter Two of On the Divine Names, that Hierotheus is perfect in divine things, for he not only learns, but he also receives divine things. Now this sympathy or connaturality for divine things is the result of charity, which unites us to God, according to 1 Cor. vi. 17: He who is joined to the Lord, is one spirit.1
Aquinas refers to the latter mode of cognition, that is, that by connaturality, by different names. Sometimes he calls it "judgment by inclination"2 and other times "affective cognition" (cognitio affectiva)3 or "experiential cognition" (cognitio experimentalist).4 "Cognition" (cognitio) in Aquinas is a generic notion applicable to different cognitive activities and their results, comprising both apperehension and judgment. Based on the text quoted above, scholars often call this mode of cognition "connatural knowledge." As observed in the text, connatural knowledge is, to be exact, "judgment by connaturality." The modes of this cognition are twofold:
(i) "He who has the habit of chastity judges rightly of such matters [of chastity] by a kind of connaturality."5
(ii) "Because where there is the greater charity, there is the more desire; and desire in a certain degree makes the one desiring apt and prepared to receive the object desired. Hence he who possesses the more...