Distinction XIV

GRATIAN. Part I. But this is understood in one and the same person. It is deservedly asked, however, whether the same dispensation has a place in diverse persons—namely, that we commit lesser offenses lest others become entangled in graver ones. Augustine writes thus concerning these matters in the book Questions on Genesis [c. 42]:

As to what Lot said to the Sodomites: “I have two daughters who have not yet known men; I shall bring them out to you; use them as it pleases you, only do no wrong to these men”: since he wished to prostitute his daughters by this compensation so that his male guests might suffer nothing of this kind from the Sodomites, it is deservedly asked whether a compensation of shameful acts or of any sins whatsoever is to be admitted, so that we may do some evil lest another do a graver evil; or whether it should rather be attributed not to Lot’s counsel but to the disturbance of the man who said this. And certainly this compensation is admitted most dangerously. But if it is attributed to human disturbance and to a mind agitated by so great an evil, it is in no way to be imitated.

Part II. GRATIAN. The rigor of custom or positive law, however, is sometimes relaxed. Hence Pope Leo says [to Rusticus, bishop of Narbonne, epistle XC, before c. 1]:

C. II. Which enactments may be moderated, and which may not.

Just as there are certain things that can be overturned for no reason, so there are many things that ought to be moderated either because of the necessity of the times or from consideration of ages, with this condition always preserved: that in those things that are either doubtful or obscure, we know that this is to be followed which is found neither contrary to evangelical precepts nor opposed to the decrees of the holy fathers.