Doubt VI: On adultery

Adultery is a sin of Lust by which conjugal fidelity is violated, and access is made to another's bed. So D. Thom. art. 8. D. Bonavent. p. p. Centil. sect. 14. and part. 2. sect. 32.

GRAVE is this sin, as the S. Doctor proves 4. dist. 38. dub. 7. and 8.

FIRST from Deuter. 22., where the penalty of stoning was imposed on adulterers, and Levit. 20: If anyone commit adultery with his neighbor's wife, he shall surely be put to death, both the adulterer and the adulteress.

IT IS grave, moreover, because, as the S. Doctor argues dub. 8., it is against concord and peace, against the good of the Republic in legitimate successions, and from it arise innumerable evils, because against justice the honor, succession, and other goods of a spouse are harmed. Whence Iob 31: For this is a wickedness, and iniquity most great.

HENCE you have that this sin has a special malice, distinct from fornication.

IT COMES about, however, in three ways. First, if a married person couples with an unmarried one. Second, if an unmarried person with a married one. Third, if both are in marriage; and certainly it is graver for a married woman with an unmarried man than for a married man with an unmarried woman; for it is worse for a woman to be with many men than for a man with many women; nevertheless on some account a man sins more, because he is bound, by reason of the greater use of reason, to abstain; also he is excused on another ground, because he is urged more to lust by the abundance of heat, and is not so ashamed as a woman. Therefore they stand as the exceeding and the excess; as the S. Doctor notes 4. dist. 35. dub. 2. litt.

From these it follows that there is adultery with the spouse of another already ratified, because the handing over of the body has been made; but not with a betrothed de futuro, because the handing over has not yet been made. See Sanchez lib. 1. de matrim. disp. 2., who proves it from Pope Gelasius.

TRULY COMPARING adultery, stuprum, and incest, adultery is graver than stuprum; the reason is, because by adultery the Justice owed properly to the innocent party is violated, nor is it sufficiently vindicated except by death in civil laws, and it corrodes the soul like a devouring fire, as is said in Iob. 31. But by stuprum the honor of the parent of the ravished virgin is not harmed, except through the will and consent of the virgin, as Fagundez cap. 7. num. 13. says; whence I gather that he is compelled to hold that stuprum is a distinct sin, even if the virgin consents, when she is under the power of her parents. Then, by adultery the Republic is harmed more in its successions, and greater infamy arises, as the S. Doctor says 4. dist. 41. dubio 4.

¶ BUT COMPARING adultery with Incest, the latter is graver at least in the first degree of ascendants and descendants, in which there is a monstrous deformity.

YOU WILL ASK: Whether one abusing his wife sins more gravely than one abusing a harlot.

D. Bonav. ANSWERS dist. 38. dub. 9., and with him others, that one sins more gravely with one's spouse, who is to be treated more honorably, and the union is to be directed to the goods of matrimony.

Wherefore it is adultery, because he does not chastely keep his body for his spouse, as Bassaeus num. 10. says. The S. Doctor calls this meretricious in Comp. Theol. lib. 3. cap. 1.

Hence that this is to be explained in confession, Caiet. quaest. 155. art. 1. Sot. 4. dist. 31. quaest. unic. art. 4. Sanchez de matrim. lib. 9. disp. 18. Petrus Ledesma de matrim. quaest. 49. art. 6. dub. 2. Diana part. 7. tract. 12. resol. 23. teach, where he reports those who say it suffices to confess that one committed the sin of Sodomy; Mazuchellus subscribes.

The penalties of adultery are inflicted by CANON and CIVIL law.

By canon law the adulteress loses her dowry, cap. Plerumque de donat. inter virum. She forfeits the earnest money, and loses the right to the debt, from D. Bonavent. in 4. dist. 35. art. unic. quaest. 3. D. Thom. quaest. unic. art. 3. and the common sense of the TT. Both are excommunicated and thrust into a monastery, cap. Gaudemus, de divort. A notorious adulterous Clerk is deposed, cap. Si quis Clericus, cap. Romanus, 81. dist. 70. cap. Significasti, de adult. See Farinac. quaest. 141. num. 31. Tom. 4.

By the law of the Code the penalty of death is inflicted, leg. 1. Quamvis, 2. in fine, Cod. ad Legem Iul. de adult., and there the Jurists, apud Farinacium 4. quaest. 141. Nor is the wife excused on account of poverty or the cruelty of her husband, leg. Palam, §. Non est ignoscendum, ff. de ritu nupt. cap. ex litt. cum ibi not. de divort. Menoch. consil. 31. Clarus lib. 5. sentent. §. adulterium, num. 45. Parisius consil. 23. Nay, even if the marriage is false, but presumed true, leg. si uxor, §. Divus, ff. ad leg. Iul. Bartol. Alberic report this there, and Gomez ad leg. 80. Tauri, num. 48.

They also incur infamy, leg. 2. §. Miles, ff. de his, qui not. inf. See Farinac. loco cit.

It pertains to the civil judge for laypersons; yet the Ecclesiastical can compel them to desist, cap. cum sit generale, de foro comp.

An adulterer certainly knowing that she is his own offspring is held to re-endow for the loss inflicted on his legitimate sons. So Azor part. 3. lib. 5. cap. 6. quaestio 6. Lessius lib. 2. cap. 10. num 43. Marquez de test. cap. 5. §. 2. num. 22. Nauar. cap. 16. num. 40. Sylvius 2. 2. quaest. 62. art. 2. quaest. 7. Bonacina de matrim. quaest. 4. puncto 15. num. 13. Malder. 2. 2. tract. 3. cap. 4. dub. 9. Rodriquez sum. cap. 205. Bassaeus num. 5. Whatever Diana may say, part. 2. tract. 3. miscel. resol. 55.

The reason is, because naturally from adultery there follows a spurious child, bringing loss.

They answer that this is a remote cause, when he willed only the lust; wherefore the loss is not to be imputed to him, just as homicide would not be imputed to him if the woman procured the abortion of the infant begotten by him.

These things are slight, although to Bassaeus, Diana, and others they seem solid. For birth follows per se and naturally from the union, from which abortion is not caused effectively. In doubt, however, whether she is his own offspring, he is not held, as Lugo warns in de iust. tom. 1. disp. 13. sect. 2., because it is presumed for marriage.

What the adulteress is held to, I said in the disp. de Restitutione.

This also I shall defer still further to the 3. part. Tract. de matrimonio.