Chapter III. On Duel

Duel in general is the fight of two or of a few among themselves. In the stricter sense it is a dangerous fight of two from a preceding agreement concerning place, time, and arms.

Duel is: 1. public or private, according as it is done by public authority or not; 2. solemn or simple, according as it is done before witnesses or with these omitted.

404. Principles. - I. A duel undertaken by public authority is lawful if it is done for the common good, for example so that war may be ended ¹; otherwise, if it is commanded or permitted for other causes ². The reason of each is manifest.

¹ Sanchez (In Dec., lib. 2, c. 39, n. 13-14) indicates another end, namely for preserving estimation among enemies, and lest the army fall in spirit. Bonacina (De Cens. in spec., disp. 2, q. 3, p. 58, n. 4) calls duels of this sort a part of war.

² Thus, for example, if it is done for the sake of spectacle and pleasure, or for vainly showing off the strength of soldiers (Sanchez, In Dec., lib. 2, c. 39, n. 12).

II. A duel undertaken by private authority can never be lawful. The reason is that it is opposed: 1. to natural law, since God has given dominion over one's own or another's life, nor over the members, to no man outside the case of defense against an actual aggressor; 2. to canon law, as is clear from Trent, sess. 25, cap. 19, where duel is called: "A detestable usage, introduced by the devil as fabricator." - St. Alphonsus, n. 399, 400.

405. Resolves. - 1. It is not lawful to accept a duel even for averting ignominy; because it is repugnant to reason to apply that cruel means with evident danger of one's own life or that of the neighbor, indeed even of eternal salvation, on account of a non-necessary or even useless end. True esteem, praise, and honor are not placed in the vain opinion of this world, whose wisdom before God is foolishness. - St. Alphonsus, Hom. apost., n. 27.

2. It is not lawful for a military man to accept a duel, even if for that reason he must yield his office necessary for the sustenance of himself and his own. The reason follows from what was said: for the killing of another by private authority is never lawful except against an actual aggressor with the moderation of blameless defense; but one provoking to a duel is not an actual aggressor.

3. It is not lawful to undertake a duel under this law, that when one has been wounded or a certain number of blows has been completed, the fight ceases; 1. because even in this there is the greatest danger of a lethal wound; 2. because Clement VIII prohibited even non-fatal duels; 3. because that kind of duel creates scandal and provides occasion for fatal duels.

4. It is not lawful to undertake a duel, even with public authority acceding, for knowing the truth, for proving innocence, or for ending a private lawsuit; because it is not a means ordered to these ends. Nor can the guilty be compelled to duel, even with hope of life given to the future victor. - St. Alphonsus, Hom. apost., ibid. ³.

³ St. Alphonsus in the cited place speaks only of the first part of this resolution. But as regards the last part (Theol. moral., lib. 3, n. 400), he reports the opposite opinion without any censure; but Laymann (lib. 3, tr. 3, p. 3, c. 5, §2), with other Doctors alleged, has these things as regards the judge: "Although, estimating the matter according to itself and speculatively, this does not seem alien to natural law, since it is nothing other than to decree each guilty person a minister of justice against the other, so that he may execute a just sentence of death; but to him who shall have prevailed, life is remitted; nevertheless on account of the adjoined circumstances it is not free from danger of scandal; wherefore it is neither expedient nor lawful." But as regards the guilty, he adds: "After the prince has conceded to the guilty a faculty of this sort of contending by duel, it seems lawful to accept it, not from hatred, but both from zeal for public justice and for the cause of saving one's own life."

5. But it is lawful to fight in a duel for mere defense, even by accepting arms from an adversary, if death is intended by him, or loss of goods is going to follow unless the fight is accepted, and there is no other way of escaping this danger; but it is not lawful to betake oneself to another place ⁴, or to appoint another determinate time for defense; because then a duel properly so called would be had.

⁴ Yet if death is intended against you unless you go immediately to another place where you can defend yourself, this circumstance does not seem to change the reason of the preceding resolution.

St. Alphonsus (lib. 3, n. 400), after he reported the opinion of several Doctors concerning the cause of loss of goods, adds that this opinion is no longer probable because of the first and fourth of the propositions proscribed by Benedict XIV and reported by the Author a little later. But it is not clear that this case is comprehended in them. For those propositions speak of a duel even to be offered; but here there is question only of acceptance for the necessary defense of goods of great moment from actual invasion. Moreover, everyone knows that the condemnation of a complex proposition by no means requires that all its members be judged false, but it is enough if either is found false; indeed the former would of itself lead to absurdity. For if, for example, you say: "The head was cut off from the holy Apostles Peter and Paul," from the condemnation it would have to be concluded that not even Paul's head was cut off, which is plainly false. Therefore that rule of logicians is to be kept religiously: of a condemned and therefore false proposition, what is to be held true is not indeed the contrary, but only the contradictory. Moreover, of a copulative proposition, of which sort are the first and fourth objected, the contradictory will be of this sort: Either to offer, or to accept a duel, etc., is illicit. But by force of that disjunctive thesis you would absurdly infer that each member of it at the same time is illicit. Therefore from the condemnation of those propositions nothing certainly can be drawn against that opinion, so that it can be called condemned.

Perhaps the condemnation of proposition 3 could more plausibly be objected, which establishes that the penalties issued against duelists are not incurred if a military commander or official accepts a duel from grave fear of loss of reputation or office. For mention of the one accepting only is made in it. But, to pass over other things for the moment, another reason, and indeed a twofold one, offers itself, on account of which the force of the objection is plainly blunted. The first is that nothing in that Proposition is said concerning actual invasion of goods; for this reason it pertains nothing to the present question. The other is that the Proposition could rightly have been condemned for this one thing alone, because it most falsely supposes that he who refuses a duel is gravely endangered in reputation. Therefore this Proposition also is objected in vain. And in reality Marcus Struggl, an eminent theologian from the Order of Servants of the Blessed Virgin Mary, after he most diligently weighed these Propositions also proscribed by Benedict XIV, nevertheless establishes (Th. Mor., tr. 7, q. 3, art. 6, n. 65) that "a duel can become lawful..., if against an unjust aggressor it must necessarily be undertaken for the defense of life or immense goods; as if someone were actually to intend certain death, plundering of goods, or burning of a house, unless you actually enter a duel with him; for it is lawful to defend oneself against an unjust aggressor of life and of immense goods irrecoverable by another way." From these things it appears that this doctrine scarcely, or not even scarcely, differs from that which the Author also proposes in the fifth and sixth resolutions, if indeed the question treated above (n. 397, Q. 4) concerning the defense of immense goods even with the killing of an unjust aggressor is recalled hither.

Therefore it must be concluded that it is certainly right for each one to inquire into reasons by which he may attack that opinion or whatever probability it has; but reasons of this sort ought plainly to be sought from elsewhere than from those proscribed Propositions.

6. They do not enter a duel properly so called, and consequently do not incur the excommunication reserved to the Pope and the other penalties inflicted by the Council of Trent on duelists, who, blazing up in sudden anger on account of an injury and challenging each other to a fight, immediately come together; because it is more truly a brawl, not a duel, which ought to happen from an agreement of place and time. And for the same cause, on account of an unforeseen encounter of this sort, the aforesaid penalties are not incurred, although the fighters from the same impulse of the brawl immediately betake themselves together to some suitable place. - S. Congr. 5 Octob. 1744. - Scavini. - St. Alphonsus, n. 401. - See Cases, n. 403 and following.

406. • Here it is useful to report the five propositions concerning duel condemned by Benedict XIV in the year 1752 in the Bull Detestabilem ⁵. They are the following:

⁵ Benedict XIV, §10 of this Constitution, earnestly beseeches princes and all magistrates that with every effort and constancy they vehemently oppose the license of duels. Then he warns the same persons that they should not think it enough that the horrendous crime has been proscribed by laws and most grave penalties added, unless they actively urge the execution of them and show themselves inexorable avengers of the crime. "For if they bear with delinquents either sluggishly, or punish them softly, they will pollute themselves with the crime of another and will constitute themselves guilty of all that blood."

Thus, with wisdom plainly divine, did the Roman Pontiff speak through that age in which this wicked crime was restrained in the whole Christian commonwealth by most just laws. But that in the course of time among certain nations the laws against this crime have been scraped from the codes, and indeed somewhere one is punished who, by refusing a duel, was unwilling to pollute himself with this crime, this openly makes clear that those nations, while with proud foolishness they think that they have attained the summit of civil perfection, have already fallen into that savage barbarity from which the Christian religion had led them out, and are moreover being plunged more deeply.

1. A military man who, unless he offers and accepts a duel, would be held as fearful, timid, abject, and unfit for military offices, and thereby would be deprived of the office by which he sustains himself and his own, or would have to lack perpetually the hope of a promotion otherwise owed and merited by him, would be free from fault and penalty, whether he offers or accepts the duel.

2. Those accepting a duel, or provoking to it, can be excused, even for the sake of protecting honor or avoiding human contempt, when they know certainly that the fight is not going to follow, as being prevented by others.

3. A commander or official of the military accepting a duel from grave fear of loss of reputation or office does not incur the ecclesiastical penalties issued against duelists.

4. It is lawful in the state of natural man to accept and offer a duel for preserving fortunes with honor, when by another remedy their loss cannot be driven away.

5. The asserted license for the state of nature can also be applied to the state of an ill-ordered commonwealth, in which, namely, either by negligence or by malice of the magistrate, justice is openly denied.