Unlike many studies of Thomistic ethics, this book argues that Aquinas' treatise on the virtues cannot be read apart from his description of charity as friendship with God. For Aquinas, all the virtues stand in service of friendship with God and take their meaning from that love. But what makes this book especially original is the author's contention that the primacy of charity also discloses a relationship between the virtues and the passions, as well as the virtues and the Gifts of the Spirit, that is seldom noted in studies of Aquinas' ethics. Centering on charity as friendship with God, "Friends of God: Virtues and Gifts in Aquinas," is a fresh and insightful study of Aquinas' unique vision of the moral life.