Intrinsic motivation
November 10, 2010
Aquinas states:
Those, however, who have moral virtue are drawn to the exercise of virtuous works for the love of virtue, not on account of some external penalty or reward. And the New Law, consisting primarily in spiritual grace itself implanted in men’s hearts, is called the law of love; and it is said to contain spiritual and eternal promises, which are the objects of virtue, especially love. And so men are drawn to them intrinsically, not as to what is external to them but as to what befits their very being. That is why the Old Law is said to restrain the hand, not the soul . . . and the New Law, which is the law of love, restrains the soul.
Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologiae XXX, Latin Text and English Translation, New York: McGraw, 1972, AB’s Trans, p 25.
