Title I: On Laws in Common

The order of speaking will naturally be this: first we shall treat of laws in common, then of divine law, then of human ecclesiastical law, finally of civil law. Between divine and human law we shall briefly explain the account of the law of nations.

Disposition of the title. We shall distribute this first Title into ten chapters in this way: I. The notion and essentials of law, where we shall speak of promulgation itself; II. The properties of law; III. The sanction of law; IV. The divisions of laws; V. Interpretations of law; VI. The author of law; VII. The subject of law; VIII. The observance of law; IX. The cessation of law; X. The diminished account of law in precepts and counsels.

Yet in the general exposition this must never be omitted: that the account of legislator is not univocal in God and in man, but principally belongs to God, and analogically, under God, to men.

The usefulness of the treatise is manifest, since there is question of the very measure of human actions, which are the most formal object of moral theology.