Article — Gury-Ballerini, Compendium of Moral Theology (8th ed., 1884)
Article I. On the Nature of Justice
- Definition. Justice in the broader sense 1 signifies some equality, or charity, or the universality of virtues. Thus Christ says, Matth. 5. 6: "Blessed are they who hunger and thirst for justice!" But in the stricter sense 2 it is a moral virtue constantly inclining the will to render to another his right. We must treat of justice thus accepted.
1 The Doctors commonly observe that the name justice is used in Sacred Scripture also in a multiple sense, so that sometimes it signifies: 1. the complex of all virtues; 2. charity or sanctifying grace; 3. generally a right act; 4. any good habit; 5. finally, the special virtue from the four cardinal virtues.
2 Commonly the definition handed down by Ulpian is received by the Doctors: "Justice is the constant and perpetual will of giving to each one his right." See St. Thomas, who explains its individual parts (2. 2, q. 58, art. 1).
Therefore justice is a special virtue which aims to urge the payment of a debt 3, and to preserve due equality among all men and each single man. Therefore to it pertains to restore things unjustly taken away, to repair things damaged, to abstain from frauds, to keep faith given in agreements, and to preserve intact to each one his right.
3 The word debt is too vague; for man owes, for example, worship to God, and obedience to parents; yet the virtue of justice does not urge the payment of these debts. Nevertheless the Author in some way confines the sense by the words immediately following.
It is said in the definition, to another; because justice is always toward another, and therefore requires diversity of persons; for no one can be called just toward himself, nor do injury to himself, which is the wounding of a right when the other is unwilling. - Lugo, disp. 1, n. 10 4.
4 "I infer," says Lugo, "that justice is always toward another, as St. Thomas teaches, q. 58, a. 2. For no one can inflict injury on himself or render a debt to himself, just as he cannot properly owe to himself, since he can do nothing except willingly; but to one knowing and willing there can be done neither injury nor deceit." From this, since between father and son, as the same Lugo adds in the same place, n. 31, insofar as they are father and son, there is not given with rigor such otherness and diversity as is required for justice, for the son seems to be part of the father and, as it were, another himself; therefore between them, as such, the notion or debt of justice is lacking; and generally, insofar as that distinction or diversity of persons seems to be lacking, to that extent there is departure from the perfect notion of justice.
- Division. Justice is distinguished as fourfold, namely legal, distributive, vindicative, and commutative 5.
5 There are some who, in order to establish a certain order among these diverse justices, affirm first indeed that it is twofold: one which orders man toward the community, and this is legal or general; but another which orders him toward other particular or private persons, and this with Aristotle and St. Thomas they call particular; then they divide this latter into others in such a way that one is commutative, another distributive, and besides another vindicative. But in all these things there is found in no way a partition of some genus into species; but you have one in which the perfect notion of justice is found, and which is called justice taken precisely, or commutative justice; but the rest, since in something they fall short of the former, nevertheless participate something from it as by analogy, whence they are also accustomed to be called justice in a qualified sense. See Valentia (tom. 3, disp. 5, punct. 2), and Lugo (De Iust., disp. 1, n. 50, 68, and 70).
- Legal justice 6 inclines each one to render his right to the society of which he is a part, or to the Prince, on account of the common good. Hence it orders the subject to the community as a part to the whole. It is called legal because it has for its object that which is owed to the community according to natural or positive law.
6 Legal justice, as Lugo has it (De Iust., disp. 1, n. 62), is a special virtue by which someone is borne toward the good of the republic or community, of which he himself is a part.
The material object of this virtue is any honorable act, or, as the Doctors are accustomed to speak, the acts of all the other virtues; whence the name general justice also has been given to it. For as St. Thomas says (2. 2, q. 58, a. 5), "the good of any virtue whatever... is referable to the common good, to which justice," namely legal justice, "orders. And according to this the acts of all virtues can pertain to justice, according as this orders man to the common good. And as to this, justice is called general justice."
But the formal object resides in this, that this virtue commands the acts of other virtues, namely any honorable acts, and orders them to the end proper to itself, namely to the common good. Hence St. Thom. (2. 2, q. 58, a. 6): "Legal justice is a certain special virtue according to its essence, according as it regards the common good as its proper object."
Moreover it is called legal justice because it belongs especially to law to order to the common good. "Because," thus St. Thomas, l. c., "it belongs to law to order to the common good, hence it is that such justice, general in the aforesaid way, is called legal justice; because evidently through it man is in concord with the law ordering the acts of all virtues to the common good."
But this justice has this singular feature, that it is not altogether and perfectly toward another. For as St. Thomas has it (2. 2, q. 58, a. 5), "All who are contained under some community are compared to the community as parts to the whole: but the part, as to what it is, belongs to the whole." And Card. De Lugo (De Iust., disp. 1, n. 68): "The community is not distinguished from its members, as is clear; and therefore it does not regard the common good in such a way that it abstracts from the good of the one acting, but rather it regards it precisely because it is considered to be the good also of the one acting, just as the good of the body is the good of the members: but justice properly regards the good of another by abstracting altogether from my utility." But according to the opinion of all, justice properly so called exists only between those things which are so mutually distinct that one is not something of the other. Therefore Lugo adds (ibid.): "Just as piety toward parents is not properly justice, because it does not regard the perfect otherness required for justice, a fortiori the same will be true in the present case," namely legal justice.
And from this it is clear that legal justice is not aptly confused with duties either of piety or of formal obedience toward the prince; for not only are the motives of these virtues plainly diverse, but moreover the distinction which intervenes between subject and prince is not present between citizen and the community of which he is a part; and the duties of the subject tend to the good of the prince alone, while those things which the citizen confers upon the community are conferred upon the good of that same citizen, as a part of the community. Indeed even the prince himself, as a member of the community, is ordered to it as a part to the whole through legal justice, although somewhat otherwise than the subject. "Legal justice," says St. Thom., 2. 2, q. 58, a. 6, "... regards the common good as its proper object. And thus it is in the prince principally and, as it were, architectonically," because he prescribes the mode of contributing to the common good, "but in subjects secondarily and, as it were, administratively."
- Distributive justice inclines the Superior or his ministers to an equal 7, or just, distribution of burdens and goods. Hence it orders the community or Superior to subjects, as the whole to parts 8.
7 The difference between the equality proper to distributive justice and that proper to commutative justice Lugo intimates thus (De Iust., disp. 1, n. 45), according to the common doctrine taken from Aristotle and St. Thomas: "Distributive justice," he says, "seeks in its object equality according to geometric proportion, not according to arithmetic, that is, it attends to equality between two proportions: for commutative justice regards equality between thing and thing, which is called arithmetic equality; but distributive justice attends to equality of proportions; so that if there are two persons, one of whom has merit as four, the other as eight, the latter exceeds the former in the distribution according to the double, so that if the former receives twenty, the latter receives forty." You may see these things set forth more fully in St. Thomas (2. 2, q. 61, art. 2).
8 But distributive justice is also in the subjects to whom distribution is made, insofar, namely, as they are content with a just distribution. St. Thom., 2. 2, q. 61, art. 1, ad 3.
- Vindicative justice inclines the Prince to punish the guilty with congruent punishments for the good of society. Therefore it consists in the congruent punishment of the guilty for the public good 9.
9 More commonly the Doctors do not hold vindicative justice as a fourth species of justice; but they call it back to legal justice, insofar as either a superior, by avenging crimes, looks to the common good, or a private person with the same affection desires or requires the punishment of crimes; but to distributive justice, insofar as it inflicts punishments congruent to the gravity of crimes; finally to commutative justice, insofar as from office a judge is bound to punish offenses, not otherwise than a guard is bound to keep off a thief, and likewise to inflict on a crime no graver punishment than the matter or the law bears.
- Commutative justice inclines the will to render his own strict right to each private person, by preserving equality of thing to thing. This regards only private persons, as distinct from one another 10. But it is called commutative because it is chiefly occupied with exchanges and contracts. Of this alone we shall treat, because it alone claims for itself the name of justice in the precise sense 11.
10 This seems to be expressed too generally. For he too will plainly injure commutative justice who brings damage upon the public treasury; and likewise the prince will sin against commutative justice who distributes burdens unequally, or who inflicts punishment short of demerit.
11 Distributive justice, namely, falls short of the proper and strict notion of justice in this, that it does not regard right strictly taken; and therefore, as will be said below, its violation per se does not impose the burden of restitution. But legal justice also departs from justice properly so called in this, that it is not, as we said, altogether toward another: for the community is not distinguished from its members, and therefore this justice does not regard the common good in such a way as to abstract from the good of the one acting.