Proemium

No one will deny that the matter which we shall treat in these pages is very practical; practical, I say, for confessors, to whose judgment sins opposed to chastity are especially wont to be submitted; for preachers, upon whom lies the duty of stirring up both love of chastity and hatred of lust; and finally for spiritual directors of souls, to whom, as to the Apostle, the privilege has been granted of presenting chaste virgins to Christ.

Moreover, in handing down and explaining the doctrine, we shall chiefly tread in the footsteps both of St. Thomas, whose authority no one today has called into doubt as being preferable to all others, and of St. Alphonsus, who "among the tangled opinions of theologians, whether laxer or stricter, laid down a safe way by which the directors of the souls of Christ's faithful might walk with unoffending foot"; and whose authority was held in such esteem by the Sacred Penitentiary that it did not hesitate to answer that a confessor is not to be disturbed who, in the practice of the Sacred Penitence, follows all the opinions of Blessed Alphonsus, although he does not read the works of the Blessed Doctor except in order to know his doctrine accurately, and does not weigh the arguments or reasons upon which the various opinions rest.

May God grant, through the intercession of the Immaculate Mother of God and standard-bearer of virgins, that this little work, however slight, may bring some fruit, and may prepare the way for a complete Moral Theology to be published at some time.

Wittem, 2 August 1928.

¹ Decree Urbis et Orbis, 23 March 1871, concerning the grant of the title Doctor.

² 5 July 1831.