Article — Noldin, Summa of Moral Theology
Article First. On Depraved Desires.
328. Notions. 1. A depraved desire is an act of the will by which someone deliberately intends to accomplish an evil thing.
- It is called efficacious when someone absolutely proposes to execute the evil thing by deed, and inefficacious when someone intends to execute the evil thing conditionally, e.g. if I could, if it were licit. Therefore what is said of desire is valid by equal reason concerning purpose: for purpose is efficacious desire.
Even an inefficacious desire of itself tends toward the evil thing; wherefore of itself the same theological and specific malice is in it as in an efficacious desire; and therefore it is not necessary that it be declared in confession whether the desire was efficacious or inefficacious.
329. Principles. 1. The desire, efficacious and inefficacious, of an evil thing is a sin of the same gravity and species which the object, that is, the external act toward which it tends, has. The reason for the first is that desire receives malice from the object toward which it tends, and therefore in a grave matter it is grave, in a light matter light. The reason for the second is that desire tends toward the external thing itself as afterward to be accomplished, and therefore includes all the malices which are in the thing itself, provided they are apprehended.
Hence it is that Christ says: He who shall have looked at a woman to covet her has already committed adultery with her in his heart.1 Therefore the desire of stealing a consecrated chalice contains the twofold malice of theft and sacrilege. The desire of sinning with a relative by blood or with one consecrated to God is mental incest or mental sacrilege. Wherefore desires gravely evil, both efficacious and inefficacious, must be declared in confession in such a way that circumstances changing the species also appear.
- An inefficacious desire is not a sin if the condition attached removes the malice of the act: for in this case the will is borne toward an object which contains no malice, since the attached condition excludes it.
a. The attached condition, e.g. if it were licit, if it were not a sin, if God permitted, can exclude malice from the object: a. in those things which are prohibited only by positive law: I would wish to eat meat, unless it were a day of abstinence; I would take a wife if I were not a priest; b. in those things which indeed are prohibited by the law of nature, but nevertheless can sometimes be done licitly: I would kill an enemy, I would steal, if God permitted. Nevertheless desires of this kind are not only idle, but often also dangerous.
b. The attached condition cannot remove malice from the object: a. in those things in which the condition is impossible, because they are so intrinsically evil that they cannot be changed even by God, e.g. I would blaspheme, I would fornicate, if it were not a sin; b. if the attached condition is referred not to the malice of the act, but to another circumstance. Therefore these desires are sins: I would wish to take vengeance, if I were not a priest; I would fornicate, if there were no hell; I would steal, if it could be done secretly.
c. But if the conditioned desire of a thing intrinsically evil, I would fornicate, I would avenge myself, if it were licit, is not a true and deliberate desire, but rather the signification of a natural propensity by which the will or the sensitive appetite is borne toward an evil thing, it is not a sin, because this desire is explained in this way: nature indeed draws toward the evil thing, but I do not will it, because it is prohibited.
1 Matt. 5, 28.
330. Whether it is licit to wish evil to one's neighbor for a good end. It is licit under these conditions: a. if it is not done from hatred and vengeance, but merely on account of a good end; b. if it is done with the order of charity preserved, i.e. if the good on account of which temporal evil is wished to one's neighbor surpasses or at least equals the evil which is wished to him.
a. It is licit to wish death to one's neighbor on account of one's own or another's spiritual good necessary for salvation; thus it is licit for a father to wish the death of a son whom he foresees will be seduced if he lives longer: for the order of charity is preserved, since a good of a greater order is preferred to a good of a lesser order.
b. It is licit to wish death to one's neighbor also on account of a temporal good, not only common but also private, provided this good is not of lesser moment than the life of the neighbor. Thus it is licit to wish the death of a tyrant, that peace and common happiness may return; likewise it is licit for a wife to wish the death of a husband by whom, beyond hope of amendment, she is treated most harshly: for the temporal safety of the wife is a greater, or at least an equal, good than the life of the husband. In the same way a wife in this case can licitly wish death to herself: for death is better than a bitter life.1 The reason for these things is that also in this case the order of charity is preserved: for since anyone ought to love himself more than his neighbor, he licitly prefers his own good to a lesser or equal good of his neighbor.
c. It is not licit to wish death to one's neighbor on account of a temporal good of lesser moment than the life of the neighbor, because it is against the right order of charity. Therefore it is not licit for a mother to desire the death of a daughter whom, on account of deformity, she cannot place in marriage; nor is it licit for a son to desire the death of his father so that he may more quickly enter upon the inheritance. In the same way it is not licit, without sin, to wish death to oneself on account of the daily miseries of this life.
Note. In desires of this kind, however, one must take care lest the will tend directly and immediately toward the evil of the neighbor, but rather toward the good on account of which the evil is wished: otherwise the will would elicit an act evil in itself, by wishing the evil of the neighbor as it is his evil, not as it is the good of the one desiring or of another.