Treatise: On Habits and Virtues in General

556. Object of the treatise. - Moral theology considers human acts by which man is moved toward God, the supernatural ultimate end: for it is the science concerning human acts in order to God the supernatural end, from revealed principles. Hence it treats of our ultimate end itself, and of the human acts by which we come to the end or beatitude, and of all things which pertain to those acts. Now acts need rules (an exemplar principle) to which they ought to be conformed, namely, both the proximate rule, or conscience, and the remote rule, or laws; and if they are not conformed to these, they are evil and are called sins. But acts also have (efficient) principles from which they are produced: the extrinsic principle is God through grace; the intrinsic principles are the powers and habits. Whence, after the treatises on the end, on human acts in themselves, on conscience, on laws, on sins, - with the doctrine on grace from dogmatic theology and the doctrine on the powers of the soul from psychology being supposed, - there rightly comes the consideration of habits, especially of good habits, the chief of which are virtues.

557. Division of the treatise. - Just as in a human act physical being, moral being, and supernatural being can be distinguished, so also in a habit. Hence the treatise is divided into three parts, and each into four questions.

The first part is on habits according to physical and psychological being, or on habits in general, that is, on their 1. essence, 2. subject, 3. cause, 4. distinction;

the second is on habits according to moral being, or on acquired virtues, that is, on their 1. essence, 2. subject, 3. distinction into intellectual, moral, and cardinal virtues, 4. properties: mean, connection, equality, duration;

the third is on habits according to supernatural being and on infused virtues, that is, on their 1. existence and essence, 2. distinction into theological virtues, moral virtues, and gifts of the Holy Spirit, 3. cause, 4. properties, as above.

558. The treatise is at once theological and philosophical. - The first part is merely philosophical, and provides the notions necessary for understanding the other parts. The third part is wholly theological, as treating of the supernatural element. The second part is at once philosophical, founded upon human reason; and theological, because it is partly confirmed by divine revelation or by the authority of the Church, and is employed as a means for explaining supernatural habits.¹

¹ Cf. St. Thomas, in Quaestiones disputatae de Virtutibus; and I-II, q. 49-70, with the commentaries of Cajetan, John of St. Thomas, Sylvius, and Pegues; also in part Billuart; - Goudin, Philosophia, in Logic and in Moral Philosophy; - Lehu, Philosophia moralis et socialis; - Satolli, De Habitibus; - de Roton, Les Habitus, leur caractere spirituel; - Waffelaert, De Virtutibus Cardinalibus; - Mazzella, Schiffini, and Billot, all of the Society of Jesus, each of whom wrote De Virtutibus Infusis; - Prummer, Th. M. I, n. 437 sq.; - Sertillanges, La Philosophie morale de S. Thomas d'Aquin; - Gardair, Les vertus naturelles; - Massoulie, Meditations sur les Vertus; - Janvier, Conf. de N. D.: La Vertu; - Masi, De Virtute Fidei, where an introduction on virtues in general is found.

On virtues, the modern authors of manuals are not accustomed to have many things; they are wholly occupied in distinguishing, numbering, and measuring sins, so that someone rightly said that their moral theology is now nothing but a catalogue or code of sins. And if this is true of the special virtues, it is verified much more of virtues in general. On this argument, for example, St. Alphonsus, Gury, Ballerini, Genicot, Lehmkuhl, and Aertnijs have nothing; Vermeersch almost nothing; Haine few things. But many things are found in Marc, Tanquerey, and Noldin; nevertheless their doctrine is not complete nor always accurate. Better and more completely than all these, Prummer wrote. In the last editions of the work of Aertnijs, Fr. Damen added a good treatise on virtues.