Chapter IV — What are the causes on account of which restitution may be omitted or deferred

I. Impotence, which excuses from restitution, is twofold. The one physical, of which no one doubts; the other moral, which brings a most grave, or grave, difficulty. Beforehand, nevertheless, I would have you observe that there is a difficulty innate in any restitution whatsoever, on account of the cupidity and avarice of men. But this difficulty in no way excuses from making restitution. Under the name therefore of the difficulty which constitutes moral impotence is understood either extreme want, or a notable and grave evil, or scandal, or a danger of sinning to be undergone on account of the restitution.

II. Hence you may infer, first, that a debtor can defer restitution when a danger of grave loss is imminent — say, if the creditor were going to abuse his thing to the harm of the common good or of a neighbour. Secondly, if the debtor himself would undergo a grave loss by restoring at once, whereas the creditor would suffer little or no inconvenience. For restitution is ordained to preserve equality between the parties. But there would not be equality when the debtor had to restore to the creditor at so great a cost, and the latter scarcely feels an inconvenience on account of the delay. And in this case a man would be unreasonably injured. Thirdly, the precept of restitution does not urge when from the execution of it a spiritual danger would be imminent; as if on account of restitution the chastity of one's daughters would have to be prostituted, or if you could not in fact feed your sons. A craftsman is not bound to sell the instruments of his art, by labouring with which he acquires what is necessary for his food; he ought nevertheless to exercise his art, that he may pay his debts. In an equal case, extreme necessity of someone excepted, the creditor ought to be preferred, as the innocent to the guilty. Delay of restitution is not lawful for the procuring of gain, especially if the creditor suffer loss.

III. Wherefore the greatest caution is needful with debtors, since men are prone to retain what belongs to others. Debtors, as I have said elsewhere, are commonly rich men or nobles, who under pretext of maintaining their estate defer the payment of debts, and strive to foster the splendour of their pomps and the pride of their display with the blood and sweat of hirelings and merchants. Wherefore again and again confessors are to be admonished that they altogether keep these back from the sacraments until they have paid their debts. For these are tramplers upon every justice, inhuman and savage, both because they defer the payment of the wages they owe, and because they cruelly compel poor debtors, like that creditor in the Gospel, to pay them to the last farthing.