273. The immediate consequences of original sin were that Adam lost for himself and his posterity the gifts of the state of original innocence. Thus: (a) the soul in subjection to God was endowed with the beauty of holiness, to which succeeded the deformity of enmity against Him; (b) the powers of the soul were in harmony, the lower subject to the higher, but to this succeeded a state of disunion and rebellion and what are called the four wounds of nature, the intellect and will becoming prone to error and sin, and the sensitive appetites tending inordinately towards delights or away from difficulties; (c) the body which had been in subjection to the soul and endowed with freedom from suffering and mortality, became burdensome to the soul and subject to pain and death. 274. The consequences that are common to all sin, both original and actual, are: (a) the sinner loses the spiritual beauty to which sin is opposed, and this loss is called the stain of sin, since the soul defiles itself by inordinate contact with what it loves; (b) the sinner incurs the debt of punishment, since sin is an injustice against the internal law of reason and against the external law of God and man. 275. The stain of sin is not: (a) a mere privation or absence of grace, for otherwise all sins would be the same; nor (b) a mere passing shadow over the soul, since the bad state of the will can remain after the act of sin. 276. The stain of sin differs according to the sin. (a) The stain of original sin is the privation of original justice (i.e., of the subjection of reason and will to God), as being a voluntary privation through the will of the first parent Adam; (b) the stain of mortal sin is the privation of sanctifying grace, as connoting the act of the individual will through which it was incurred; (c) the stain of venial sin is the privation of the fervor of charity resulting from the sin, inasmuch as it, to some extent, hinders the beauty of interior grace from appearing in external acts. 277. The stain of grave sin is the disfigurement of death, for (a) it removes the principle of supernatural existence (i.e., grace); (b) it takes away the principles of supernatural activity (i.e., the infused habits), though faith and hope may remain; (c) it deprives the soul of the rights that belong to the spiritually living (i.e., of merits already acquired). 278. The stain of venial sin is the disfigurement of disease, for (a) it disposes one for spiritual death (i.e., for mortal sin); (b) it lessens spiritual vitality, by setting up habits that make the practice of the virtues more difficult. 279. The penalty of sin is threefold according to the threefold offense of sin. (a) Inasmuch as sin is against reason, it is punished by remorse of conscience; (b) inasmuch as it is against ecclesiastical, civil or other human law, it is punished by man; (c) inasmuch as it is against divine law, it is punished by God.