§ 6. Concerning Gluttony

Besides the general consideration of gluttony, certain things concerning drunkenness occur to be said particularly.

— Notion. 1. Gluttony is the inordinate appetite of food and drink. But inordinateness is committed in five ways: 1. By eating before the time; 2. Things too exquisite; 3. More than is just; 4. Voraciously; 5. Things prepared too elaborately; or more briefly, by eating "too hastily, sumptuously, too much, eagerly, studiously" (2, 2, q. 148 art. 4).

This vice is opposed to abstinence.

Excess in food and in drink is called crapula.

Gluttony from its own kind is a sin only venial, because the glutton sins only in the mode by which he refers food and drink to man's good, which truly have an order to that end. Therefore it will be venial to fill oneself with food or drink even to vomiting; venial, to procure vomiting in order to dine or drink again. Crapula becomes mortal by which the law of the Church is violated; which, in grave matter, impedes the duties of one's state; which gravely harms health.

Already above, where pleasure was treated, the reason was given why, among the propositions condemned by Innocent XI, this is found, n. 8: "To eat and drink even to satiety for pleasure alone is not a sin, provided it does not harm health, because the appetite can licitly enjoy its own acts."

It is clear to all that one who procures salutary vomiting does not sin at all (2, 2, q. 150 art. 2).

2. As a capital vice, gluttony begets, in the soul: dullness of mind; foolish gladness, that is, which moves one to sing, say, and do dishonorable things; loquacity; buffoonery. Foolish gladness is in the appetite; loquacity in words; buffoonery in words and gestures: from levity, in order to excite laughter, words are said which are little decent, and uncivil things are done.

But in the body, gluttony begets uncleanness, vomiting, emission of semen; this is not imputed, if it was merely foreseen as naturally going to follow after crapula, without danger of consent.

— You ask whether one sins or not who feeds on human flesh or blood?

Without a just cause of medicine or of appeasing hunger, that is repugnant to the piety owed to the dead. Its guilt is revealed to us by the very instinct of nature, which abhors it. To preserve life in this way is permitted, but not commanded.

— I. Notion. Full drunkenness designates the state of him who, because of drink or a similar cause, is immediately deprived of the use of reason with proximate incapacity of recovering that use. Immediately, I say, insofar as natural sleep is not interposed. With this, moreover, whether naturally or accidentally shaken off, morally the use of reason is restored at once.

During the time in which someone is drunk, the superior faculty is morally suppressed, since it can now direct nothing. Physiology itself teaches us that the drunken man is withdrawn from higher associations and placed under the rule of lower ones. Wherefore this privation of the use of reason is to be assimilated to a certain temporary or reparable mutilation.

II. Morality. As such, the intention or choice of drunkenness will be intrinsically illicit, unless it is morally necessary for the good of the whole, for example, for recovering health.

That also will be illicit which is permitted without a proportionate cause.

And of itself, this sin is grave. "For that a man without necessity render himself powerless to use reason, through which man is ordered toward God and avoids many occurring sins, from the mere pleasure of wine, is expressly contrary to virtue" ¹. That is, he perturbs order in himself who takes away from himself the very principle of ordination, or reason, the directive faculty. And therefore it will be grave if material sins are foreseen, if the necessity is foreseen of having the use of the superior faculty unimpeded; or if, because of the time through which it lasts, there has been a notable unnatural interruption of rational life.

Whether by excessive drink or by some other means you deprive yourself of the use of reason and of proximate capacity to recover it, drunkenness remains specifically the same (contrary to what Lacroix thinks, l. 5, n. 316); but, in the former case, there will accede the sin of gluttony, venial according to itself.

But is drunkenness grave in its whole kind, or does it admit smallness of matter? Several, whom St. Alphonsus alleges without censure, think that drunkenness which deprives of reason for a short time, that is, not beyond an hour, is not mortal. Lehmkuhl ¹, Genicot-Salsmans (2), Noldin (3) think the same; but they do not excuse from grave sin him who, before he is deprived of reason, commits himself to sleep, since sleep does not prevent drunkenness. St. Thomas himself seems to admit smallness of matter. For he uses this formula: "Drunkenness, speaking of itself, is a mortal sin"; and he indicates the reason: "He sins mortally, committing himself to the danger of sin" (4). Therefore if that danger is not present, the alleged reason of grave sin also will be absent (5).

Observe that the gravity of the sin flows not from the quantity of drink but from the effect of drunkenness. Wherefore not even a few drinks are licit by which you know that you are going to be drunk. But a proportionate cause will more easily be able to be present here.

Corollary. Therefore it will be licit to make oneself drunk in order to repel disease, according to the counsels of physicians; and in order to lessen or not feel the bitter pains of a surgical operation or of difficult childbirth, especially since that relief may be useful or even necessary to the safety of the patient himself.

Moreover, what, in an intoxicating drink, lessens pain, and what produces drunkenness, has not yet been able to be defined accurately; nevertheless this seems able to be said: that relief is not sought from full drunkenness itself, or from an adequate cause of drunkenness; which is enough for drunkenness to be considered as merely permitted because of a just cause.

¹ 1, 2, q. 88 art. 5 ad 1.

¹ I, 892. - (2) I, 183. - (3) Princ. 343. - (4) Summa, 2, 2, q. 150 art. 2. - (5) Earlier, St. Thomas had classed even frequent drunkenness, according to itself, among sins venial from their own kind. QQ. De Malo, q. 2 art. 8 ad 3 and q. 7, art. 5 ad 1.

— Concerning the use of morphine. When no particular pains are to be soothed, it is not licit, for cutting off the mere anxieties of agony, to deprive the dying man, for example by the aid of morphine, of sense and reason and thus to hasten the end or terminus of rational life. That cause is not sufficient; and that suppression of reason deprives the sick man of many merits. But if he bears a soul not yet prepared for death, and positive hope of preparation is had, necessary penance is impeded by a wicked crime. Witnesses ought to resist that sin as much as they can.

But if at the same time bitter pains are to be soothed, although, even then, theologians are accustomed to answer with the same severity, we incline toward the more benign side whenever no preparation for death is impeded. For then this cannot be objected, that it is wrong to break off rational life before the hour appointed by divine Providence: for this cessation of rational life is not intended but merely permitted. And since the man is prepared, and pains can indeed be an occasion of merit but also of sin, the cause seems proportionate. Lehmkuhl (1), however, does not excuse the very silence of a witness except when the matter concerns a dying man well prepared, and one who from the continued use of reason is situated in danger of grave sin. Noldin (2) speaks with equal severity. Gen.-Sals. (3) speaks more mildly, rightly warning that morphine then cannot be given without at least the presumed consent of the dying man.

— Another's drunkenness. Another can be made drunk in two ways: either in such a way that he himself has sinned formally, or in such a way that without his own fault he is made drunk.

1. The former mode is certainly illicit, if the other is not already determined toward a greater sin: suppose, toward homicide. But if he has been determined toward a greater evil, the question returns whether or not you can persuade another to a lesser sin. This, when the sin is of another kind, with the more probable opinion we have denied to be licit. Wherefore Laymann ¹, consequently, reproves it. But according to St. Alphonsus (2), Lehmkuhl (3), the more benign opinion is probable, which, for example, Lessius defends, l. 4, c. 34, n. 32.

2. But he who by fraud and without knowing it is induced into drunkenness does not even sin materially, but suffers a physical evil. Therefore, one detained in prison, who has the right of escaping from prison, can of itself employ this as a means of just defense; so can an upright citizen, to impede the vote of an unjust law, or to detect a traitor.

Moreover, more easily, from other grave causes, it is right to place an occasion of drunkenness, even formal drunkenness. Lehmk. l. c. after St. Alph. l. 5, n. 58.

¹ L. 3, n. 4, n. G. - (2) Theol. mor. l. 5, n. 77. - (3) I, 894.

— Imperfect drunkenness, which does not substantially deprive of the use of reason, is a venial fault. Wherefore for a lesser cause, varying according to the very degree of drunkenness, it will be able to be permitted, indeed chosen, for repelling a person's evil.

Therefore, to repel sadness and melancholy, they allow that you drink even to cheerfulness.

— Signs of perfect drunkenness (probable but not infallible) are given as these: If someone does not remember what he said, did, how or when he was led home; if he has done altogether unusual things, for example, contrary to custom has spoken shameful things, has disturbed the house, beaten his wife, etc. Cf. Lessius, l. 4, c. 3, n. 30; Lehmk. I, 892.

But as long as he continues to discern between evil and good, a man is not yet judged to be perfectly drunk, although he bears his imagination somewhat disturbed, his tongue stammers, his feet totter, his eyes see double, the house seems to turn around for him, vomiting follows. Since quite many then think that a grave sin has been committed by them, they are prudently to be untaught this.

— Subjective guilt. Quite many are excused from grave sin, because they did not notice the danger of drunkenness, and they were seized by wine, whether, going out into the air, they then first experienced its force, or whether they judged prudently enough that they could still tolerate a little draught without harm. But, after contrary experience, this excuse is taken away from them.

— Evils committed in drunkenness are imputed in their culpable cause, if, as sufficiently connected, they were foreseen and remained evils. Thus insults, in circumstances where they rather move laughter, lack the force of injuring or their own effect, and therefore cease to be true insults.

What is to be said concerning blasphemies! Some excuse drunken persons from the sin of blasphemy, because it is of the nature of blasphemy that it be uttered knowingly. Thus Vasquez ¹, the Salmanticenses (2); and, if the blasphemies are not extraordinary, but middling and common, Gobat (3). Most judge them guilty, because the objective signification is preserved in the words: thus Sanchez; or because drunk persons preserve true concepts in such a way that the whole essence of material blasphemy is preserved: thus Ballerini on Gury, I, 183, note 6.

A distinction seems to us to have to be used. Often drunken persons utter blasphemies almost mechanically and without advertence to the signification: when those standing by observe this, not only subjective but also objective signification seems to perish. But if, having been corrected in this way, they assail God with insults, the insult will remain imputable in the cause, if it was at least confusedly foreseen.

Nevertheless it will always be wrong to provoke drunken persons to blasphemies. For if you have directly provoked them, you seem to blaspheme through them as through an instrument: which is gravely to be blamed; if only indirectly, at least venial irreverence toward God will subsist, whose name is usurped in a vain and rather hateful way. Cf. Laymann, l. 1, tr. 4, c. 9 n. 3, and our Questions concerning Religion, n. 169.

¹ In 1, 2, disp. 76, n. 11. - (2) Tr. 25, c. 2, n. 30.31. - (3) Opera moralia, tr. 5, c. 19, n. 34-39. - (4) Decal. l. 1, c. 16, n. 44.

— Remedies. The healing of a drunken man, or of one who is frequently made drunk, is judged very difficult and laborious. And already St. Augustine inveighs against such persons with very grave words. (Cf. ep. 29, n. 5, P. L. 33,116; sermon 151, P. L. 38, 816). And a resolution of temperance or moderate drinking often remains ineffective for them, so that only complete abstinence from intoxicating liquor establishes hope of health. Wherefore those certainly are to be praised who, for this cause, establish and govern societies called temperance societies, and voluntarily, without any personal necessity, abstain from every alcoholic drink, so that they can draw by their own example others who need such a remedy ¹. Moreover, there exist in various regions, for example in Switzerland, special institutes where drunkards are treated by a scientific method. Concerning the conquering of drunkenness and immoderate drinking of alcohol, cf. Noldin, Princ. 347. 348.

¹ Concerning the reason and opportunity of complete abstinence, cf. writings by P. Lehmkuhl, S.I. in Linzer Quartalschrift, 1917, p. 97 ff. and 1918, p. 13 ff.; and by R. P. Prummer, O. Pr., 1917, p. 322 ff.