Article — Marc, Institutiones Morales
Article I: On the Distinction of Virtues in the Natural Order
- DEFINITION. Virtues of the natural order are those which are acquired by repeated acts, and are ordered to the natural end, that is, to beatitude proportioned to nature. Some are intellectual, others moral.
Moral virtues are divided into principal or cardinal virtues, by which, namely, as by hinges supporting it, the whole human life is turned; and into adjunct or companion virtues, which flow from the cardinal virtues, or are referred to them.
- PRINCIPLES. I. There are four cardinal virtues, namely, PRUDENCE, JUSTICE, FORTITUDE, TEMPERANCE. This doctrine rests upon these words of Sacred Scripture: For she teaches sobriety (temperance) and prudence, and justice, and virtue (fortitude), than which there is nothing more useful in life for men (Wis. 8:7).
Now this number of four is had both by reason of the subject and by reason of the object (1.2, q. 61, a. 2).
It is had by reason of the subject: for a fourfold subject of virtue is given, namely: the rational by essence, which prudence perfects; and the rational by participation, which is divided into three, that is, into the will, which justice orders; into the concupiscible appetite, which temperance rectifies; and into the irascible appetite, which fortitude rightly disposes.
It is also had by reason of the object: for either virtue has for its object the very consideration of reason, namely that it assign measure and mode in every operation, and this is prudence; or it is occupied about operations, which it makes right, and thus it is justice; or it is occupied about passions which impel toward something contrary to reason, so that it may repress them, and thus temperance is had; or it is occupied about passions which draw back from that which reason dictates, so that it may despise them, and thus fortitude obtains.1
(1) Note, the cardinal virtues perfectly heal the four wounds of nature, namely the ignorance of the intellect, the malice of the will, the weakness of the irascible appetite, and the ardor of the concupiscible appetite (Schouppe, Dogm., tr. 18, n. 297). - St. Bernard (in Cant., serm. 49, n. 5): "Discretion is not so much a virtue as a certain moderator and charioteer of the virtues.... Take this away, and virtue will be vice."
- II. The other moral virtues can be reduced to the four cardinal virtues. Thus commonly.
They are reduced in a threefold way. For some virtues help a cardinal virtue, so that its act may become perfect; and these are called integral or integrating parts: because without them the virtue cannot be whole, just as a house without foundation, wall, and roof would not be whole. Others are subjected to a cardinal virtue as species to a genus, and therefore are called subjective parts of the same virtue: because a genus is predicated of a species as of a subject. Others finally serve a cardinal virtue in certain secondary acts or matters, and in these observe the mode which that virtue observes in principal matters; and therefore they are named potential parts, as if not having the whole power of the principal virtue (2.2, q. 48, a. 1).
Now concerning the several virtues.