96. (vii) _In all the procedure of His divine providence the Lord safeguards the two faculties in man unimpaired and as sacred._ The reasons are that without those two faculties man would not have understanding and will and thus would not be human; likewise that without them he could not be conjoined to the Lord and so be reformed and regenerated; and because without them he would not have immortality and eternal life. The truth of this can be seen from what has been said about the two faculties, liberty and rationality, but not clearly seen unless the reasons just given are brought forward as conclusions. They are, therefore to be clarified. [2] _Without those two faculties man would not have understanding and will and thus would not be human._ Man has will only in that he can will freely as of himself, and to will freely as of oneself is from the faculty called liberty, steadily imparted by the Lord. Man has understanding only in that he can understand as of himself whether a thing is of reason or not, and so to understand is from the other faculty, called rationality, steadily imparted to him by the Lord. These faculties unite in man as will and understanding do, for because a man can will, he can also understand; willing is impossible without understanding; understanding is its partner and mate apart from which it cannot exist. With the faculty called liberty there is therefore given the faculty called rationality. If, too, you take willing away from understanding, you understand nothing. [3] In the measure that you will, you can understand provided the helps, called knowledges, are present or available, for these are like tools to a workman. We say, in the measure you will you can understand, meaning, so far as you love to understand, for will and love act as one. This seems like a paradox, but it appears so to those who do not love or hence will to understand. They say they cannot understand, but in the following section we shall tell who cannot understand, and who can hardly understand. [4] It is plain without confirmation that unless man had will from the faculty called liberty, and understanding from the faculty called rationality, he would not be human. Beasts do not have these faculties. Beasts seem to be able to will and to understand, but cannot do so. They are led and moved to do what they do solely by a natural affection, in itself desire, which has knowledge for its mate. Something civil and moral there is in their knowledge, but it does not transcend the knowledge, for they have nothing spiritual enabling them to perceive or to think analytically of what is moral. They can indeed be taught to do something, but this is natural only, is assimilated to their knowledge and at the same time to their affection, and reproduced through sight or hearing, but never becomes with them anything of thought, still less of reason. On this see some things above, n. 74.