Article V: On the Begun and Non-Consummated Copulation of Spouses

135. Can it be counseled, or at least permitted without grave sin, to spouses who are found in an ordinary and natural state, but who by mutual consent are determined to receive no children from marriage, to begin and break off copulation, and this in order to avoid the most grave sin of onanism?

Resp. The proposed question can be considered in two ways, speculatively and practically. The speculative question has already been treated generally at n. 28. 3. But if the question is made practically, the answer is simply: negatively. For if those spouses are in an ordinary and normal state, and therefore are still in youthful age and of warmer nature, morally speaking it cannot happen that pollution does not always, or at least ordinarily, follow. Cf. l. c. Hence St. Alphonsus, l. 6. n. 918., says, "Sanchez with Veracruz wisely observes that this, namely begun copulation, restraining semination, is ordinarily mortal, because ordinarily there is present danger from such withdrawal of pouring forth semen, unless the spouses have experienced the contrary." And the same holy doctor, ibid. n. 941., says, "the danger of incontinence, as Coninck well observes, will scarcely not be present if a spouse dwells in the same bed and the other asks the debt." Nor does it truly avail to object, as some oppose, that this copulation from its intrinsic nature is not at least gravely illicit, since it is an incomplete act of itself very proximately orderable to the complete act of marital copulation. For that act, because of this same reason, is of itself a grave, indeed a most grave, cause of the effusion of semen, and therefore of pollution, if the copulation is broken off. Therefore that act will be lawful only when, because of peculiar subjective dispositions, that same act ceases gravely to influence pollution. Cf. here n. 28. 3. and n. 96.; Elbel, de matr. n. 429.

136. Moreover, here are added certain resolutions of grave theologians, so that each may judge the matter for himself; by these, moreover, the doctrines set forth both here and above are confirmed.

Sporer 500.: "Titia, a young wife, jovial and of warm temperament, has a husband already nearly a septuagenarian, nevertheless the father of some children from her, but now worn out by old age and altogether impotent. Yet they love each other. The loving husband, because he cannot otherwise, does the thing by touches. Titia suffers it, and thence is polluted once, twice, three times; anxious, she asks help: on the one hand she fears God and sin; on the other hand she loves her husband and suffers very sharp stimuli of the flesh. It is asked whether nothing remains, or what remedy remains. Gobat answers in these very words: I answer from what has already been said, since those touches seem to be practiced ordinarily without pollution, although this sometimes follows besides the direct intention of each; since further it appears to be done not from mere lust, but to testify and foster conjugal love, which otherwise easily grows cold in so unequal a marriage, therefore according to the opinion of Sanchez and Filliucci they do not seem to sin mortally by those touches. I confirm this by the authority of Diana, who, consulted, answered absolutely and without limitation that spouses who embrace each other as a sign of conjugal love do not sin, although it is foreseen that pollution will follow, because conjugal affection is a sufficient cause excusing such an act. Thus he himself testifies, part 6. Res. 207. in Tr. 6. Thus far Gobat."

Diana, Tr. 6. de Sacr. matr. R. 205.: "Whether, when the danger of pollution has ceased in each spouse, the husband does not sin mortally if he breaks off begun copulation before semination, lest offspring be generated, provided he does this with the wife consenting or not reasonably unwilling; provided also that the woman does not seminate, otherwise the husband ought to seminate, lest the semen of the other be poured forth in vain?

"The doctors commonly note that, when the danger of pollution has ceased in each spouse, the husband does not sin mortally if he breaks off begun copulation before semination, lest offspring be generated, provided he does this with the wife consenting or not reasonably unwilling. Indeed, if there is a just cause for impeding semination, for example, on account of poverty and a multitude of children, and nevertheless of lying together for the calming of concupiscence, all fault is absent if mutual consent accedes, provided also that the woman does not seminate; otherwise the husband also ought ordinarily to seminate, lest the semen of the other be poured forth in vain. Thus Laymann, and before him Sanchez, T. 3. l. 9. disp. 10. n. 3., asserting thus. Where there is a just cause, for example, lest semination harm health, or the spouses are poor and abound in offspring whom they cannot feed, and they have such copulation without danger of semination, by which they calm concupiscence, I find no fault. These are his words. Hence spouses who are infirm and who would begin copulation for calming concupiscence, and voluntarily by no means complete it, are not to be condemned even of venial fault, and this case can frequently occur."

And R. 207: "Someone began copulation with his wife, and afterward, because of danger of disease, with her consent withdrew himself; but from this pollution sometimes followed. I was asked whether such an act was lawful. I answered affirmatively, because it is not a sin to give work to a lawful thing and to an honorable action, although it is foreseen that pollution will follow, provided the danger of consent is absent, as it was in the case about which I was asked; because then the pollution is not willed in itself, as is supposed, nor can it be said to be willed in the cause, because I am not bound to omit that action, lest pollution follow, when a just cause stands. Therefore...."

Struggl, Tr. XII. de matr. q. 2. a. 7. n. 89.: "It is inferred, third, that a wife can ask and render the debt, even if she knows that the husband is accustomed to break off copulation and pour forth semen, provided she does not consent or cooperate; because thus pollution does not follow from the action of the wife, but from the malice of the husband, as Sporer, l. c., with others, observes. Where likewise with others he teaches that newly married persons can try to complete copulation, although besides the intention it more often happens that the husband pours forth semen outside the vessel of the wife. Of this matter I will treat more fully below, quaest. 3. a. 11. de imp. impot. n. 145. In the same way, an old husband having a young wife, whom he ordinarily knows without pollution, can from conjugal affection exercise the conjugal act, and such a wife can ask it, even if sometimes by accident and besides the intention of each, because of the frigidity of the man, pollution follows; as, with Sanchez, Filliucci, and Gobat, Sporer teaches, l. c. n. 500. The reason of this is that conjugal affection and the necessity of preserving it can excuse them from all fault or at least mortal fault. Fourth: spouses do not sin mortally when, every danger of pollution having ceased in each spouse, by mutual consent they break off begun copulation, lest offspring be generated, either because of want or because of another cause, as Sporer, l. c. n. 490., wishes with Cajetan, Paludanus, Armilla, Sa, Sanchez, and several others. The reason of this is that such penetration of the feminine vessel, without semination and the subsequent danger of pollution, is considered like the touches of the shameful parts, which are permitted to spouses; therefore such breaking off of begun copulation without danger of pollution is lawful, or only venially sinful. But if the wife has already seminated, having been so excited by the copulation of the husband, that man sins mortally, deliberately ceasing before his own semination, as Sanchez, l. 9. disp. 19. n. 4., observes. But Sylvester, Henriquez, and others contradict with sufficient probability. Indeed Diana, 3. p. res. 37., thinks that it is lawful for the husband because of danger of disease, with the consent of the wife, to break off copulation, even if pollution follows by accident. Yet these more benign opinions seem to me to be restricted on account of the greater estimated danger of pollution or of full consent to it, as Sanchez, disp. 19. n. 3., well observes with others."

Cajetan, in 2. 2. q. 154. a. 1. quaest. 5. par. Ad hoc dicitur: "Just as, when the man seminates outside the due vessel, sin is committed against nature, because the partial matter is contrary to nature, so, when the woman seminates without commixture with male semen, sin is committed against nature, because the partial natural object is voluntarily omitted, namely the male semen. It would be otherwise, however, if a man from temporary impotence, lying together with hope and effort toward semination, as happened to a certain man who had begotten from his first wife, and when lying with the second wife could not seminate for many years. For this man, by the counsel of good men, continually rendering the debt thus, at length after six years begot from her. And in reality he did not sin, since he always intended to consummate the natural act."