Chapter I. On the Nature of Sin

143. • DEFINITION. Sin is commonly defined: A free transgression of divine law, that is, of any law obliging in conscience. - St. Lig., book 5, no. 1. - Or "it is a voluntary departure from the law of God." - Thus St. Thomas, 1.2, qu. 72, art. 1. - Or "it is a word, deed, or desire contrary to the eternal law of God." - St. Aug., book 22, Against Faustus, ch. 27.

DIVISION. Sin is distinguished in manifold ways, namely:

1. Actual, or habitual, according as it is either an act or omission disconformed to law, or a state of sin not yet destroyed.

2. Mortal, or venial, according as it either dissolves divine friendship, or is only a light offense of God, which can easily obtain pardon.

3. Sin of commission, or omission, according as it is done by placing a prohibited act, or by omitting a commanded act.

4. Sins against God, neighbor, and oneself, according as they specially and immediately are opposed to God, or are adverse to justice and charity due to the neighbor, or especially regard temperance and moderation of the passions ¹.

¹ ** Perhaps you would say better: according as they violate duties due either to God, or to neighbor, or to oneself. For otherwise there are certain sins against the neighbor which are opposed properly neither to justice nor to charity, for example disobedience.

5. Sins of malice, or ignorance, or infirmity, according as they are committed either from mere malice, or from vincible ignorance, or from mere frailty.

Sin is called formal when the law is violated freely and knowingly. But it is called material when the transgression of the law is wholly involuntary.

We shall say nothing about original sin, the treatment of which pertains to speculative theology.

144. Principles. - I. For formal sin, besides the objective malice of the act, advertence of mind and consent of will are required. And 1. advertence of mind to the malice is indeed required, because the malice of sin cannot be the object of the will unless it is known in some way by the help of the intellect: for there is no desire of a thing unknown; 2. consent on the part of the will is required; for sin is completed by the will, according to that saying, Matth. 18.19: For from the heart come forth evil thoughts, adulteries, etc. - Recall what was said On Human Acts, no. 3 and following.

II. For actual sin actual advertence is necessarily required. For it is repugnant that a man should sin unless in some way, either here and now, or in the cause, at least confusedly, he adverts to the sin. For nothing is willed unless it has been known beforehand. - Thus commonly with St. Lig., book 5, no. 4. - Suarez, etc. ².

² ** Even in this question the VV. (page 910) wished to find a discrepancy between the opinions of the Holy Doctor and Gury; and for this end they bring forward the words of St. Alphonsus (book 5, no. 4), saying that many evils, although actually and expressly they are not adverted to, ... nevertheless are imputed to fault to those perpetrating them, if their ignorance is in some way voluntary either because of negligence, or because of passion, or a depraved habit, or because of voluntary inconsideration in acting.

I answer: In bringing forward Gury's text the VV. (l. c.) ought not to have cut off those words: For it is repugnant that a man should sin, unless in some way either here and now, or in the cause, at least confusedly, he adverts to the sin. These words indeed contain that some advertence which even the Holy Doctor admits both to be present and to be necessary, so that those many sins which proceed from voluntary inconsideration and ignorance may be imputed. And advertence of this kind the Holy Doctor explicitly mentions not only when he explains that fourfold origin, but sufficiently and more than sufficiently asserts it when he calls that ignorance voluntary. For nothing can be voluntary without any advertence.

But, what is more to be wondered at, see the text of the Holy Doctor, which you would say was transcribed almost to the letter by Gury. It must be concluded, he says (l. c.), that the opinion of those, if perhaps there are any, who say that all errors which he commits are to be imputed to one acting against the law, even if no actual advertence ever intervened, neither direct nor indirect, in itself or in the cause, at least confusedly, but only interpretative advertence was present, consisting in this alone, that he ought and could, by physical and remote power alone, advert to the malice: this opinion can in no way be sustained.

Some indeed contradict this, asserting that virtual or interpretative advertence suffices for sin, which consists in this, that a man ought and is able to advert, although he does not actually advert. - Thus Collet, Concina, etc. - But this opinion must be entirely rejected. For nothing can be willed except in the manner and at the time in which it is known; for the effects of a voluntary cause are not determinately voluntary unless they are determinately known. Therefore sin committed without any actual cognition is merely material. Nor should they say that it is perhaps voluntary in cause: for if it was truly voluntary in the cause, then some cognition was necessarily present, and therefore then the sin was perpetrated ³.

³ ** The VV. (page 911, no. 15) exhibit the last period of this paragraph, and likewise the last of the sixth resolution, as discrepant from the doctrine of St. Alphonsus.

I answer: 1. A priori every sensible man will not believe this. For here are contained the first principles of ethics, from which no one will believe St. Alphonsus to have departed.

2. In the first text which the VV. bring forward, St. Alphonsus (book 5, no. 4) says that to one acting according to his passion, which he deliberately follows, every depraved effect connected with such a passion is imputed, even if it is not known in particular. But then the VV. cut off these following words: Which (effects), although they are not foreseen in particular, are foreseen at least confusedly... Whence the effects proceeding, although they are not voluntary in themselves, are nevertheless voluntary in their cause. Where then is the disagreement of opinions?

3. The VV. then bring forward as a text of St. Alphonsus a text which is not St. Alphonsus's, but Collet's, the very unhappy continuer of Tournely (vol. 2, On Sins, ch. 4, art. 1). Truly strange! For do the VV. not know that Collet defends the doctrine which St. Alphonsus there attacks, concerning the sufficiency of interpretative advertence, so that he does not hesitate to accuse as guilty from erroneous conscience even those who, nourished in heresy by condition of birth, have drunk in, as it were with milk, this persuasion: that the religion which they hold is the one which is true; and concerning this they never suffer any remorse? Let it be then that the Holy Doctor reported certain words of this many-colored writer, as though arguing ad hominem; for the rest, whatever finally this man wished for himself, it is of no concern.

But what the VV. add (page 911, note 1), that from the doctrine of St. Alphonsus those things which are noted at § 300, resolution 3, vol. 1 of Gury are not to be admitted, will be weighed in its place.

145. Resolves. - 1. Vincible ignorance concerning some precept is a sin, and in a grave matter can be grave, if the negligence was notable; the reason is that every law obliges first to knowledge of itself, and consequently the precept is violated not only through an act opposed to it, but also through voluntary ignorance of it.

2. Evil acts have that malice which is apprehended. Hence if cognition falls upon such malice, or malice specific in such a way, this is truly contracted by the act of the will. - Thus commonly.

3. If some sin has been foreseen in the cause, and then is placed with advertence, there will be a twofold sin, namely 1. in the voluntary cause, 2. in itself ⁴.

⁴ Namely, by two acts, as we suppose, formally distinct, and he consents into the same sin. See below, On the numerical distinction of sins.

3. If ignorance, culpable in the beginning, becomes invincible, the evil act is not a sin in itself, but the reason of sin must be sought from the cause alone. Now it will become invincible if no thought any longer arises concerning the past negligence or the actual ignorance, because then proximate and ready power for driving away the ignorance is lacking. Ignorance also becomes invincible if a doubt arising concerning it cannot be driven away.

5. Those blinded and habitual sinners, although because of the defect of clearer cognition at that time they perhaps sometimes sin less gravely in act than others, nevertheless are not excused, because a state of this kind, where there is no care for amendment, is voluntary and culpable for them ⁵.

⁵ State the opposite if, as is fitting, they apply themselves to amendment.

6. Moreover perfect inadvertence is scarcely to be admitted in habitual sinners, because at least confusedly they advert to the malice of sin. Yet if at any time they perpetrate evil acts wholly inadvertently from custom, these acts indeed cannot be called actual sins ⁶, because here and now they are not voluntary; nevertheless they are voluntary in the cause, and therefore are always imputed to them, because the strict obligation of correcting a depraved custom always urges. The very same must be said of other sins which are voluntary merely in the cause; namely, then guilt is contracted when the cause is placed voluntarily; and since the whole guilt resides in the cause, it will be present here in the same way, whether acts of this kind follow or not, and whether these same acts are repeated in a smaller or greater number ⁷.

⁶ It is said less exactly and against the opinion of all the Doctors that sins of this kind cannot be called actual. For that division is common to all, according to which actual sin is distinguished from original, and therefore whatever of sin is not original must be called actual. But the Author, as is clear, here uses the word actual in a less usual sense to signify sin which is voluntary in itself, and is distinguished from that which is voluntary only in the cause.

⁷ But all guilt will cease if, the cause having been retracted through penance, one applies care for amendment equal to the necessity.