Question One: On Chastity

S. Th. II-II, q. 151 and 152.

994. Chastity (chastete; kuischheid) has affinity with the word castigare, to chastise; and therefore, in a general sense, it indicates the chastisement or repression of concupiscence according to right reason. For just as children, when they are chastised, are corrected, but if they are left to their own will, become worse; so concupiscences, which are likened to children, when they are restrained, are diminished, but if they are nourished by the consent of the will, are increased.

But in the strict and proper sense it concerns concupiscences which most need to be chastised and restrained by reason, insofar as they are more vehement and more oppressive of reason; but sexual pleasures of the flesh in the genital organ are the most vehement of all, and more oppressive of reason than the pleasures of foods, and therefore they more need to be chastised and restrained. Hence chastity is the virtue moderating the sexual appetite, or venereal pleasures, according to right reason, or the virtue restraining inordinate venereal pleasures, preserving in them the mode of reason from the motive of honesty.

Therefore it immediately and per se moderates the appetite of venereal pleasure. It regards the other senses mediately and accidentally, insofar as they concur in exciting venereal pleasure. Venereal pleasure is that which arises from a commotion or alteration of the lower part because of the motion of the organs serving generation, such as is perceived especially in pollution or copulation. It is called venereal because it is naturally ordered to promoting generation, over which mad and impious gentility made the goddess Venus preside (q. 151, a. 1 and 2).

Sometimes, however, chastity is taken improperly and metaphorically for the moderation of pleasure in the conjunction of the mind to certain things, insofar as the mind ought to be joined to that to which it ought to be joined, for example, to God, and abstains from delighting in things to which it ought not be joined, for example, creatures apart from God. Thus understood, chastity designates a general virtue and is every virtue withdrawing the mind from illicit things; principally, however, it is in charity and in the other theological virtues by which we are immediately joined to God, just as, on the contrary, spiritual fornication is to leave God for the sake of creatures.

995. Chastity is a virtue. - For it renders man perfect: it preserves the good of reason, which is most difficult to preserve against the most vehement passions and pleasures, namely the concupiscences and pleasures of the sexual flesh. It is one virtue, because it has one object: venereal pleasures to be moderated by reason. It is a special virtue distinct from abstinence. For where there is pleasure of a different species and a special impediment of reason, there it is necessary that there be a special virtue for moderating and removing it. Venereal pleasures, which tend toward the conservation of the human species, differ in species from all others, especially from the pleasure of foods, which is ordered to the conservation of the individual; besides, they constitute a special impediment of the use of reason, because they are the most vehement of all, and oppress reason more than the pleasures of intoxicating drink, since drink, not its pleasure, oppresses reason. Therefore chastity is a special virtue (a. 3).

996. The proximate matter of chastity is the interior motions of the appetite concerning venereal things; its remote matter is external acts, namely copulation, kisses, touches, pollution, and carnal motions or excitation of the genital organ with pleasure. The office of chastity is to compress or compose each according to right reason: to restrain venereal desires and pleasures, lest we use them more than right reason dictates.

997. Modesty (pudicite; schaamachtigheid) is named from shame, which a man conceives concerning those things which do not fall under reason and in which bashfulness is signified; and therefore it concerns those things of which man is most ashamed. But this is concerning venereal things, and especially concerning the pleasures surrounding venereal things and concerning the signs of venereal things, of which man is most ashamed before others; for shame is more occasioned by the signs of venereal things, which usually are more detected. Hence modesty concerns venereal things, especially the exterior signs of venereal things, such as immodest looks, kisses, touches, etc., while chastity is more concerned with carnal intercourse itself. Hence modesty expresses a special circumstance of chastity (a. 4), insofar as luxury especially brings shame, both because of the disobedience of the genital members, and because reason is especially absorbed by venereal things.

Yet each is the same virtue, because they regard the same matter: venereal things or signs of venereal things, and from the same motive of special honesty shining forth in the moderation of these.

998. Various grades of chastity. - Chastity in some moderates, in others excludes venereal pleasure, by reason of the diverse state. Hence it is usually distinguished as:

1. Juvenile, which abstains from every venereal pleasure until the time of nuptials.

2. Conjugal, which moderates the appetite of sexual pleasure in spouses and excludes whatever is illicit in the use of marriage.

3. Widowed, which after marriage has been dissolved abstains from every carnal pleasure, whether in perpetuity or until other nuptials.

By reason of the mode in which it is preserved, it is distinguished as imperfect, which abstains only from illicit pleasures of the flesh; and perfect, which abstains from all pleasures, even those licit in marriage.

999. Virginity (maagdelijkheid) is named from freshness, because it implies immunity from corruption or from the burning of concupiscence concerning venereal pleasures; and it differs from chastity, because it abstains not only from illicit pleasures but from all venereal pleasures, and therefore proposes to preserve juvenile chastity perpetually (q. 152, a. 1). Hence:

1. It is a virtue, because it implies a firm purpose of the will of abstaining from all venereal pleasures, both illicit and licit, in a subject never corrupted by lust. But to do this for the good of the soul, so that it may more freely attend to the contemplation of truth and to divine things, is virtuous, because according to right reason it is to renounce lower goods for the sake of higher ones (a. 2); which also we know from the Apostle, 1 Cor. 7:34, and from Christ, Mt. 19:11-12.

Indeed, it is more excellent than marriage, as the Apostle says, 1 Cor. 7:34, and as the Council of Trent defined, sess. 24, can. 10, because it is ordered to the good of the soul, indeed according to the contemplative life, which is to think on the things which are of God; while marriage is ordered to the good of the body, which is the multiplication of the human race, and pertains to the active life, by which a man and woman living in marriage must think on the things which are of the world, as the Apostle says. But the good of the soul is preferable to the good of the body, and the good of the contemplative life to the good of the active life, as the divine good is preferable to the human good (a. 4).

2. It is a special virtue, distinct from common chastity, because it has a special excellence, since it preserves one immune not only from inordination but from every experience of venereal pleasure (a. 3).

And although it is most excellent in the genus of chastity, nevertheless it is not the greatest of virtues; for the theological virtues and religion, which are occupied about divine things and are the end of virginity, are preferable; likewise fortitude in martyrs, who renounce their own life, and obedience in monks, who renounce their own will, while virgins renounce only venereal pleasure (a. 5).

3. It differs from perfect chastity in that it is joined to integrity of the flesh, while perfect chastity can also be preserved by one who previously has already been corrupted by lust. Hence two things are required for virginity understood in the perfect sense:

a) the material element, namely integrity of the flesh, which consists in voluntary immunity from complete carnal pleasure and from corruption of the flesh;

b) the formal element, namely the purpose of the will of preserving chastity perpetually, without which purpose the virtue cannot be had (a. 1).

Virginity understood in the moral sense must not be confused with virginity in a quasi-physical sense. For thus it signifies only integrity of the flesh or of the genital organ, which is lost in men by voluntary pollution which is apt to provoke the effusion of seed, and in women by voluntary breaking of the virginal enclosure or seal of virginity, which happens through carnal copulation with a man or through another touch. Thus virginity is not a virtue but a good of nature given to all from birth; and in this physical sense a woman who has never had copulation, although she has sinned against chastity by solitary internal and external acts, is called a virgin, as also she who, while preserving integrity of the flesh, intends to pass to nuptials.

Corruption, however, can be threefold: a) bodily only, that is, involuntary breaking of the seal of virginity or involuntary release of seed; b) corruption of the mind alone, that is, consent to a venereal thing without the work, whether it happens by incomplete venereal pleasure or by revocation of the purpose of abstaining perpetually from pleasure; c) both at once, namely voluntary complete pleasure, or voluntary or lustful breaking of the seal of virginity. In the third case the virtue of virginity is lost irreparably; in the second, reparably; in the first, in no way.