Article I. On Pollution

I. Notion. Pollution, softness, masturbation is a completed venereal act outside intercourse, both natural or copulation, and unnatural or sodomy and bestiality (St. Thomas, II-II, q. 154, a. 11; St. Alphonsus III, 465). Moreover, it has been explained above (p. 6) in what a completed venereal act consists, both among men and among women.¹

¹ Cf. Van Roey, Quaestio specialis de Sexto decalogi praecepto.

II. Morality. First note proposition 49, which was condemned by Innocent XI at least as scandalous and dangerous in practice: "Softness is not prohibited by the law of nature. Hence, if God had not forbidden it, it would often be good and sometimes obligatory under mortal sin." With these things noted, receive the following:

1. Pollution both of a man and of a woman is a sin. This is clear both from Sacred Scripture (n. 27) and from the fact that the said pollutions involve the use of semen or quasi-semen which lacks ordination to the natural end of semen or quasi-semen, that is, to the good of the species. But a use of semen of this sort is a sin (n. 27).

Moreover, authors dispute in what especially the malice of pollution is situated. According to Eschbach,¹ Noldin,² and several more recent authors, it must chiefly be placed in satiating venereal pleasure. But this opinion seems to be rejected. For pleasure according to itself is not evil, but only by reason either of the end (p. 90), of which there is no discussion here, or of the work concerning which or in which one takes pleasure, so that one must necessarily come to the malice of the work itself. Hence the malice of pollution is primarily and chiefly to be placed in the disordering of the work itself,³ that is, in the fact that it involves a venereal act, completed, which is not ordered to the good of the species (cf. St. Thomas, De malo, q. 15, a. 1, corpus, and a. 2, corpus).

2. Pollution both of a man and of a woman is a grave sin. This is again clear from Sacred Scripture (n. 27). Next, as regards the pollution of a man, it is drawn from the fact that this involves a use of semen which is neither apt for generating nor ordered to the education of the one to be generated; these privations are grave (n. 28). As regards the pollution of a woman, it is deduced from the fact that there is had a use of quasi-semen which - to say nothing of the defect of ordination to generation (n. 28) - is not ordered to education, which ordination ought to be present in every use even of quasi-semen, and the privation of which is grave (n. 28). Hence St. Thomas: "From one intercourse one human being can be generated; and therefore a disordering of intercourse which impedes the good of the offspring to be born is, from the very kind of the act, mortal sin" (II-II, q. 154, a. 2, ad 6). But the holy Doctor speaks about fornication, and therefore about the disordering arising from the fact that ordination to education is lacking; for ordination to generation indeed subsists in fornication.

Note 1. It is disputed whether pollutions of a man and of a woman differ in species; in other words, whether the disordering which we have said is present in the pollution of a man and of a woman is morally, and not only physically, diverse; this is difficult to determine.⁴

Note 2. According to some,⁵ the completed venereal act of a woman, to which a flow of vaginal fluid is joined, differs specifically from completed venereal commotion which occurs without a pouring forth of this sort. But the said pouring forth of fluid either is necessarily required for completed commotion, or is nothing except the complement of completed commotion, and therefore does not differ from it.

Note 3. It is asked whether the venereal act of old men, eunuchs, and boys, carried all the way to its end, is of the same species as the pollution of an adult. Now with respect to old men this is quite commonly affirmed, and seems altogether to be affirmed, because old men possess true semen, though infertile, and therefore in them there is emission of semen. With respect to eunuchs and boys, who lack true semen, some deny it,⁶ chiefly because emission of semen, and therefore true pollution, is lacking. Others affirm it, relying especially on this reason, that the action and intention of the agent constitute the species more than the material effect does. Now the act and intention of the agent of themselves suffice for producing pollution. St. Alphonsus (III, 476), Van Roey,⁷ and Waffelaert⁸ adhere to this opinion.

3. Another malice can be added to pollution, namely from the object thought of, from the circumstances of the subject, but not from the manner in which the pollution is excited. I said:

a) From the object thought of, as if someone, while polluting himself, desires intercourse with an unmarried woman, a blood-relative, and so forth (St. Alphonsus III, 476).

b) From the circumstances of the subject or of the sinner. Thus if a married person pollutes himself, the species of adultery is added; if a sacred person, the species of carnal sacrilege, and so forth (St. Alphonsus, loc. cit.).

c) From the circumstances of the object, that is, of the person by touching whom, with hand or body, by kissing, or by embracing, someone pollutes himself; as if he touches a married woman, a blood-relative, and so forth; in this case again there is had the species of adultery, incest, and so forth (St. Alphonsus III, 467, 476). These things, however, do not hold concerning the act of looking, unless the affection of libido is determined toward the person, for example, a married woman as such. The reason for the distinction is that touches, kisses, and embraces, since in the concrete and materially they reach such a person, cannot abstract from a circumstance inhering in the person; but looks, which are less material, commonly abstract from the person as such (St. Alphonsus III, 421).

¹ Disputatio physiologico-theologica, p. 548.

² De sexto praecepto, n. 29.

³ And these things hold concerning every sin of lust.

⁴ Cf. Waffelaert, De virtutibus cardinalibus, n. 167.

⁵ Cf. Bucceroni, Institutiones Theologiae Moralis I, n. 813.

⁶ Antonelli, Medicina pastoralis, I, n. 475; Vermeersch, De castitate et de vitiis contrariis, n. 328, and others.

⁷ Quaestio specialis de Sexto decalogi praecepto, p. 20.

⁸ De virtutibus cardinalibus, n. 162.

Question: whether another malice is added to pollution from the sex or species which someone pollutes himself by touching with hand or body; in other words, whether pollution provoked by touching with the hand a person of diverse or of the same sex, or a beast, has annexed to it the malice of fornication, sodomy, or bestiality.

Response. Quite probably, with St. Alphonsus, this is denied if only pollution is intended. It is true indeed that incomplete acts of themselves take on the species of the completed act in the same species, because by their nature they are ordered to it. Thus, for example, the touch of a woman of itself takes on the species of fornication (St. Alphonsus III, 416, 2; Homo Apostolicus, tr. 9, n. 3). But it is not clear that the same happens if the incomplete act is referred by the agent himself to an act completed in another species; for example, if the touch of a woman is referred by the one touching to pollution (St. Alphonsus III, 467; Homo Apostolicus, tr. 9, n. 25).

The same, strictly speaking, seems able to obtain if a joining of bodies outside the vessel intervenes; but then, regularly speaking, there will be had an affection toward true mingling, that is, toward an act completed in the same species. Hence if, for example, a male lies upon the body of a woman, the malice of fornication will scarcely be absent (St. Alphonsus, cited places, compared with III, 466, inferred 2).

d) But not from the manner in which the object is reached. Hence it is the same whether someone reaches the object with his own hand, with an instrument, or by sight and provokes pollution. Likewise, if there is question of bodily joining with a woman, it does not matter whether someone pollutes himself within the hands, between the breasts, or between her thighs. The reason is that these materially relate to the pollution in question, and they are not evil except by order to it, and therefore they do not change the species. Many except pollution in another's mouth, which is customarily called irrumatio; concerning this, see n. 57.

Note 1. If a penitent accuses himself of immodest touches, it seems that one can proceed thus:

I. If he is of more advanced age, or an adolescent of eighteen to nineteen years, or a girl of nineteen to twenty years, pollution can be presumed, and is sufficiently manifested by the very accusation of immodest touches; hence there is no obligation to ask about pollution having followed.

II. If pollution cannot be presumed, or rather if there is doubt whether it followed, let this be done:

1. If from the circumstances it is clear to the confessor that pollution is known to the penitent, he should ask about it.

2. If that is doubtful to the confessor, he should not ask, because it is better that the material integrity of confession be lacking than that the penitent learn things which up to that point he had been ignorant of, or that a desire of learning them be conceived by him, or that the confessor be exposed to suspicion and the Sacrament to hatred (cf. can. 868, § 2; St. Alphonsus, Praxis, n. 90). Hence impubescent boys and girls are not to be asked about pollution; the same should be applied to the pubescent in the first years after puberty, unless they appear corrupted.

III. In the case in which questioning seems to be required, women and girls should not be asked whether there was an effusion of semen or fluid, but whether they fully satisfied libido or nature, or whether they had vehement satisfaction, or whether they were greatly excited; but males who appear instructed in this matter can be asked whether they emitted nature.

Note 2. One who performs intercourse onanistically (n. 108) is guilty of pollution. Therefore its malice is added to the sin which fornicatorial, adulterous, incestuous, or sacrilegious intercourse already contains of itself.

But if it is asked whether, with foresight of the effusion of semen outside the vessel, it is licit to break off illicit intercourse, for example fornicatorial intercourse, the response is affirmative; indeed there is an obligation of doing so, that is, of desisting from the sin. Yet it would not be licit to break it off for this end, that offspring be avoided, by stopping at that; but it would be licit for this end, that offspring be avoided whose education is not provided for of itself.