§ I. On the Sins of Spouses by Excess

Three kinds of acts are distinguished which, besides intercourse but on its occasion or pretext, can be exercised by spouses. 1. Some are harmful to generation, such as sodomy and pollution, and are against nature.

2. Others are useful, such as touches exciting nature and fostering love. 3. Others are neither harmful nor useful, and are said to be besides nature.

918. Principles. - I. Whatever is necessary for completing the conjugal act, or useful for exercising it more easily, quickly, or perfectly, is entirely licit for spouses. The reason is that he who has a right to a thing also has a right to the necessary or useful means not otherwise prohibited; and for those to whom the principal is licit, the accessory and the means ordered to it are also licit.

II. Whatever in the conjugal act harms generation, or of itself induces an effusion of the generative substance outside natural union, is gravely illicit. The reason is that such voluntary effusion is not licit except in order to generation, and therefore matrimony gives the faculty only for an effusion of this kind which can of itself serve generation; but otherwise, if men could enjoy that pleasure without the consequent burden of supporting and educating offspring, the generation of children would easily be placed second, indeed would deliberately be avoided, and thus society itself would incline toward destruction.

III. Whatever does not indeed harm, but of itself is less necessary or less useful for the act of generating, cannot be imputed as more than a light fault; but other ends intrinsic to acts of this kind excuse from it, namely, that conjugal affection be preserved and fostered, or at least that concupiscence be calmed ¹. Yet there is no need expressly to intend these ends; rather, as was said above, it suffices that they not be positively excluded.

¹ Compare what was said above in the Note to no. 908, where, from the doctrine of Chrysostom and St. Thomas interpreting Paul the Apostle, it was shown that the gain and fruit of marriage especially consists in this: that the ardor of concupiscence be extinguished and thus a chaste life be led. Concupiscence is extinguished when marriage provides the means by which the appetite for pleasure can be satisfied honorably. A chaste life is led when satisfaction of that appetite is not sought outside the legitimate marriage bed.

919. Resolutions. - 1. All honorable kisses between spouses are free from fault, as are touches upon parts both honorable and even less honorable (provided they are done cautiously), for the sake of demonstrating conjugal affection or fostering love, even if involuntary pollution should sometimes accidentally follow; because all honorable signs of love, even tender ones, as means to an end, are licit to those who from the matrimonial bond ought to become one heart and one flesh. - St. Ligorius, no. 934, and others commonly.

2. Less honorable touches and looks are also free from fault of themselves if they are referred immediately to intercourse. Indeed, the same must be held even if they were simply dishonorable but necessary or useful for exciting nature; for then they are a certain preparation for and, as it were, beginning of intercourse. But if the acts by which a spouse disposes himself or herself for the conjugal act are such that of themselves they easily provoke pollution, they can be culpable if diligence to avoid it outside intercourse is lacking ²; and the omission of diligence, where it is of such a kind that through it one is judged nearly to will pollution outside the vessel, can even be a grave fault; but if, due diligence having been employed, such pollution follows beyond the intention, there will be no fault ³.

² For this reason the Doctors warn that these things are especially to be avoided if spouses are in a place where they cannot have intercourse. Sanchez (On Matrimony, book 9, disputation 45, no. 35) indicates two examples of touches which of themselves easily provoke pollution, and St. Alphonsus also indicates one of them (book 6, no. 934).

³ This doctrine must be kept before one's eyes also with regard to the case which the Author presently subjoins, namely, regarding imperfect acts which are exercised between spouses without the intention of intercourse. And the Author indeed indicates only the opinion which does not condemn these acts as gravely guilty. But another opinion, itself sufficiently common (see St. Alphonsus, book 6, no. 934), must not be passed over in silence, which excuses these acts from every fault even in the one seeking, if pollution is not intended and there is no danger of consent to it, and provided that some grave cause is present, for example, to foster mutual love ... or to avert the jealousy of the other. And he adds (ibid.) that, probably, even immodest touches on the part of the one rendering (unless they are such that they appear to be an inchoate pollution) are licit, although danger of pollution is present in either spouse, because then the one rendering attends to a licit thing.

But according to the common opinion, which St. Alphonsus also follows (loc. cit., no. 933), these things hold even when intercourse would be entirely forbidden to the spouses, or even would be impossible on account of impotence. And regarding this latter case, when spouses are to be called truly and entirely impotent, we have already made observations above (in the Note to no. 855). But regarding the former, the cause why the use of marriage is forbidden must be considered. For the stated rule will be true if it is forbidden on account of affinity contracted through a crime with one's own wife; but it is otherwise if on account of the nullity of the marriage.

And regarding these imperfect acts, those things which Diana has (vol. 2, tract 6, resolution 205, no. 2) must be recalled: The Doctors commonly note, he says, that when the danger of pollution has ceased in both spouses, the husband does not sin mortally if he breaks off intercourse begun before seminal emission, lest offspring be generated, provided that he does this with the wife consenting or not reasonably unwilling. Indeed, if there is a just cause for impeding seminal emission, for example, on account of poverty and the multitude of offspring, and nevertheless a cause for lying together in order to calm concupiscence, every fault is absent if mutual consent is present.... Hence infirm spouses are not to be condemned even of venial fault who, in order to calm concupiscence, begin intercourse and voluntarily by no means complete it; and this case can frequently occur. And immediately afterward (resolution 207) he proposes this case: A certain man began intercourse with his wife, and afterward, on account of danger of illness, withdrew himself with her consent; but pollution sometimes followed from this. It was asked of me whether such contact was licit. I replied affirmatively, because it is not a sin to attend to a licit thing and an honorable action, although the pollution which will follow is foreseen, provided danger of consent is absent, as it was in the case concerning which I was questioned; because then the pollution is not willed in itself, as is supposed, nor can it be said to be willed in its cause, because I am not bound to omit that action lest pollution follow, when a just cause stands. You have the reason for this resolution more clearly proposed in the doctrine of St. Alphonsus which we reported elsewhere (vol. 1, Note to no. 412). See also Sporer (On Matrimony, no. 500), where concerning a similar case which he takes from Gobat (Experimental Theology, tract 10, nos. 668, 669), he thinks the same with Diana and others and observes that it is a very practical and frequently occurring case.

** The VV. here object (page 828, note 1) to these words of St. Alphonsus (book 6, no. 918):

Nevertheless, I think that in no way can they (the spouses) be excused at least from venial sin, whatever Sanchez with others may say. Reply. The Doctors, as even St. Alphonsus acknowledges, do not agree among themselves whether in the case some fault, even venial, intervenes. Therefore, it is not certainly established that there is some law which is thus violated, and consequently no convincing reason is present why the act in question should be condemned as venial fault. But according to the doctrine so strongly inculcated by St. Alphonsus, we neither can nor ought to call something illicit or instill a consciousness of sin when the sin is not established. Therefore, it is fitting that the VV. also not prohibit others from preferring in the case the opinion of other Doctors opposed to the opinion of St. Alphonsus.

Moreover, these words are read in the Note: You have the reason for this resolution more clearly proposed in the doctrine of St. Alphonsus which we reported elsewhere (vol. 1, Note to no. 412). Why, I ask, did the VV. think that no account should be taken of this citation? In that place the Holy Doctor Alphonsus discusses the guilt of those actions which are a cause of carnal movements, indeed even of pollution, and specifically a proximate cause or one gravely influencing; and concerning causes of this kind he writes these things: An exception is made, however, if the aforesaid actions are performed from a cause necessary, useful, or fitting for the soul or body; for then the pollutions arising from them, even foreseen, are not sins, provided consent or danger of it is absent. Thus COMMONLY Silvius, etc., from St. Thomas. But, as is apparent from the texts of Antoninus Diana adduced in the Note, a just cause is supposed to be present in the case. Therefore, the VV. ought to permit us to prefer St. Alphonsus thinking with the COMMON opinion of the Doctors to St. Alphonsus wherever perhaps he appears to depart from his own doctrine and from the common doctrine of others.

3. Spouses do not sin gravely, even if, from touches had without the intention of intercourse, there arises a commotion of the spirits or of the members which serve generation, or a distillation follows, although these things would be mortal sins in the unmarried; the reason is that, apart from the crime of voluntary pollution outside the vessel or of sodomy, nothing is done against the good of matrimony ⁴. - Thus commonly. - St. Ligorius, no. 934. - Sanchez, etc. But the light fault which can be present in acts of this kind is easily excused on account of ends intrinsic to matrimony itself or other extrinsic ends, for example, because they are suitable for fostering affection or for calming concupiscence.

⁴ Not without reason does the Author either establish or suppose this general principle: that apart from that inordination which is against nature, scarcely anything can intervene among spouses in this matter which can certainly be condemned as a grave fault. For indeed among these or those Authors you will find now these acts, now others, represented as gravely guilty; but in these you have merely certain particular opinions, and these deduced not from solid and certain principles but rather from fanciful apprehensions. Some, namely, have recourse to indecency and baseness, and, conducting the matter almost by exclamations and declamations, proclaim it a horrible, unspeakable, most shameful thing, etc.; as though either the character of sin in general or the gravity of fault were to be sought from the character of indecency in that kind of matter in which even those things which are most licit, indeed commanded, are by the guidance of nature itself to be committed in secrecy and darkness on account of indecency. Others have recourse to the character of unbridled lust; as though lust does not show itself most unbridled in that in which the end of marriage is consummated, or as though matrimony was not also instituted for this reason, that it might be a remedy for unbridled lust (see St. Thomas above in the Note to no. 908); or as though matrimony could be a remedy for lust otherwise than that the vehement appetite for pleasure be satisfied, with this law alone finally placed upon it, which St. Thomas also intimates (loc. cit.), that it neither run outside legitimate matrimony nor oppose the end of nature! And certainly, unless sin is committed against one or the other of these, a solid reason on account of which any other inordination can certainly be accused of grave sin nowhere clearly appears.

With this principle therefore established, as is fitting, a most expeditious method is supplied to the Confessor, both to provide for the sanctity of the Sacrament and for the salvation of penitents.

For the sanctity of the Sacrament requires that discourse concerning these things not be introduced unless necessity urges; whence it follows that the Confessor ought to be most averse to investigating these things and consequently to employ scarcely any question besides perhaps this general one: whether any scruple in any way keeps the mind anxious; yet even this ought not to be asked without cause. Nevertheless, it is necessary that he reply if he is questioned. But that the reply may be most expeditious and may so satisfy necessity that, out of reverence for the Sacrament, it does not touch what ought not to be touched, nothing will be more apt than the proposed norm.

The salvation of penitents then requires it; for they certainly can be distressed by scruples, and indeed concerning acts of this kind which the mind shrinks from expressing in words and concerning which the Confessor ought never to ask. But for removing all scruples and, together with them, the necessity of expressing those things which can neither be named by penitents nor ought to be by the Confessor, the proposed norm is most useful. For once it is signified to the penitent that, where nothing is positively opposed to the end of matrimony or generation, nothing is had among spouses in this matter which is a mortal sin, and therefore which is necessary matter of Confession, although light faults can intervene for various causes, it is apparent that all the aforesaid inconveniences are most effectively met.

The inconveniences regarding the past are met; for as soon as the penitent has confessed generally, as usually happens first, that he has offended in some respect in this matter, while the Confessor by means of a generic question has learned that, in the persuasion of the penitent, something grave intervened, then, cutting off at once every other investigation, he will easily settle the matter, being content, namely, with a general confession either of a sin against nature, if either of the aforesaid was present, or generally of grave guilt against conscience; and, having asked the number if there is need, he will judge that the necessity of confession has been satisfied.

The inconveniences regarding the future are met, both because, when that norm is employed, the danger of sinning gravely solely on account of an erroneous conscience is averted, and because an easy manner of confessing is handed down to penitents if they need it. And as regards light faults, there are three things concerning which the penitent can usefully be admonished: 1. that the spouse who cannot refuse certain things without offense to the other is excused from these faults when he or she conducts himself or herself in a somewhat passive manner, namely, not demanding them but merely consenting or permitting them; 2. where this excuse is not present and the penitent prefers to confess these light faults (for it is not necessary to confess venial sins), an entirely general formula of some light fault in performing the conjugal office is to be used in confession, nor is it ever to be specified what kind those acts were; for the sanctity of the Sacrament and the danger inherent in this matter altogether require that only what is sufficient be expressed and nothing superfluous; 3. if perhaps the penitent falls in with a Confessor so imprudent that he asks something further by investigating, the penitent can, indeed ought, modestly to reply that there is nothing which he adds concerning that matter.

Since discourse has now arisen concerning the necessary caution of the Confessor regarding this matter, it is well to subjoin here what the dignity and sanctity of the Sacrament dictates should be answered to a woman soon to marry and very solicitous to avoid every sin in conjugal offices, who questions the Confessor about this matter. Gobat, after others, replies to this question thus (Experimental Theology, tract 10, case 17, nos. 648, 649): If a girl of this kind has a mother surviving, she should be commanded in kindly words to question her mother rather than

the Confessor (or also other women related in any degree, Burghaber adds).... If she lacks a mother, or out of modesty does not dare to ask her, let it be said to her that she should obey her husband as her head even in those matters. If he perhaps seeks something concerning which she doubts whether it is licit, let her modestly beg to be excused; if by begging she accomplishes nothing, because the husband asserts that he already knows what the laws of marriage permit, then let her obey, certain that she will not offend God while in doubt she obeys her husband as her superior; then, at the next opportunity, let her herself ask the Confessor whether that in which she obeyed is licit for spouses or not.

920. • 4. A wife who excites herself by touches to seminal emission immediately after intercourse in which the husband alone emitted semen does not sin gravely; indeed, according to the more common and more probable opinion, she does not sin even lightly: 1. because the seminal emission of the woman pertains to completing the conjugal act, so that the spouses may properly be one flesh; and just as the wife can prepare herself by touches for intercourse, so also can she complete it; 2. because if women after such irritation were bound to restrain their natural movements, they would be continually exposed to great danger of sinning. - St. Ligorius, no. 919.

5. Touches of oneself from venereal pleasure, while the other spouse is absent, according to the opinion of many cannot be excused from grave sin even when pollution or proximate danger of it is excluded. The reason is that a spouse does not have the right of using his or her own body in order to fulfill pleasure with oneself, but only in order to intercourse. - Lacroix, no. 339, etc.; St. Ligorius, no. 936. - Nevertheless not a few others cited by St. Alphonsus himself say that, when danger of pollution is excluded, this does not exceed venial fault. St. Alphonsus judges the first opinion more probable and to be counseled ⁵.

⁵ When St. Alphonsus says that this opinion is to be counseled, he in no way signifies that the opinion concerning grave guilt in these acts is to be instilled into penitents by the Confessor; for he openly and vehemently rebukes and condemns (see Note to no. 152, vol. 1) those who instill a consciousness of mortal sin where they are not most certain of the matter. St. Alphonsus therefore intends this alone: that penitents are to be deterred with the greatest care from acts of this kind. Concerning this question Andreas Mendo is to be seen (Statera Opinionum, dissertation 5, question 19), where for the opinion denying grave guilt in these acts he reports ad hominem arguments (no. 152) to which it is certainly difficult to give a fitting reply.

6. Morose delight concerning intercourse which has been had or is to be had remotely, with danger of pollution excluded, according to the common opinion is only a venial sin. 1. It is some sin, because in this pleasure not referred to proximate intercourse an inordination is found, since an honorable end is lacking and the genital spirits are moved in vain, at least inchoatively. 2. It does not exceed venial sin, because, since intercourse is licit of itself for spouses, it cannot be gravely illicit to delight in it ⁶. But a simple thought about these things to be had or already had is not illicit. - St. Ligorius, no. 937. - Voit, no. 110. - Indeed, neither desire for future intercourse nor approval of past intercourse is illicit of itself, because desire for a licit thing cannot be illicit. - See Cases, no. 1102.

⁶ St. Alphonsus (book 6, no. 937) adduces for this matter that saying of St. Thomas (On Evil, question 15, article 2, reply to objection 17): Delights in goodness and malice follow the delightful operations; and therefore, just as carnal union is not a mortal sin for a married person but is a mortal sin for an unmarried person, so also there is a similar difference concerning delight and consent to delight. For consent to delight cannot be a graver sin than consent to the act, as is apparent through Augustine.

But this argument proves not only that consent to delight (for this is what morose delight means) is not mortal, but that it is not even a venial sin. And the reason adduced by the Author also leads directly to this, namely, that it cannot be gravely illicit to delight in a licit thing; for why will it be illicit in any degree to delight in a licit thing when, as St. Thomas says, the goodness or malice of delight is derived from the good or evil thing in which one delights? See the things adduced from St. Thomas concerning morose delight in the Note to no. 169, vol. 1.

** The VV. transcribe (page 827) the sixth Resolution of the Author, to which this Note is appended, and add: Yet these things, reported with sufficient fidelity from St. Alphonsus, do not please Father Ballerini; hence he attempts to demonstrate that the aforesaid opinion is entirely opposed to the doctrine of St. Thomas and consequently to the authority of St. Alphonsus himself invoking the Angelic Doctor. Then, having copied this Note of ours, the VV. subjoin (page 828): With these things set forth, it is fitting to examine what must be thought concerning the aforesaid doctrine of Father B. But afterward the VV. omitted to say what must be thought concerning the present Note.

It will therefore be useful to observe here that the Note is not referred to the doctrine of the Author or of St. Alphonsus, but to the reason or argument by which they wished to prove that delight of this kind is not a grave sin. For, as is manifestly shown in the Note, delight in an honorable act of itself can be illicit neither gravely nor lightly. Therefore some guilt must be derived from elsewhere. Hence Gury repeats the fault because an honorable end is lacking and the genital spirits are moved in vain, at least inchoatively. This reason brings the matter to this point: that if some honorable end or just cause of the delight perceived from a conjugal act thought about were present, even that venial guilt could now be absent, and consequently guilt would be absent from the carnal movements arising beyond the intention, since in the case (see above, Note to no. 919, resolution 2) they would be permitted for a just cause.