Morals of the Church
Library › Concina, Compendium › Book III — On the First Commandment of the Decalogue — That is, on faith, hope, and charity, by which God is worshipped › Dissertation III — On charity towards the Neighbor

Chapter — Concina, Compendium

Chapter I — The propositions condemned against the charity of the Neighbor are recounted

¶1.

Since some have gravely whittled down, and almost taken out of the way, the precept of charity towards God, it is no wonder that they have published lax opinions against the charity by which we are bound to love our Neighbor. The propositions proscribed by Innocent XI in this matter are the following:

  1. We are not bound to love our Neighbor by an internal and formal act.

  2. We can satisfy the precept of loving our Neighbor by external acts alone.

  3. Scarcely in secular persons will you find, even in Kings, anything superfluous to their state; and so scarcely anyone is bound to almsgiving, when he is bound only out of what is superfluous to his state.

  4. If you act with due moderation, you can without mortal sin be saddened over someone's life, and rejoice over his natural death, seek it with an inefficacious desire, and long for it — not indeed from displeasure at the person, but on account of some temporal advantage.

  5. It is licit, with an absolute desire, to wish for the death of one's father — not indeed as an evil to the father, but as a good to the one wishing it: because, namely, a rich inheritance will fall to him.

  6. It is licit for a son to rejoice over the parricide of his parent, committed by himself in drunkenness, on account of the immense riches thence obtained by inheritance.

The Commandment of Love of Neighbor