Scholion. On Mutilation, Imprisonment, and Beating of an Innocent Person

What mutilation is, and what direct and indirect mutilation are, has been set forth in the treatise on charity (n. 526). Now proceed:

I. Direct mutilation of an innocent person, with the required consent posited, is lawful if it is ordered and necessary for the preservation or well-being of the whole body. Otherwise it is illicit. For the reasons brought forward where there was discussion of direct mutilation of oneself have force (n. 526).

II. Indirect mutilation of an innocent person is per se illicit; but for a proportionate cause it becomes lawful, as was said about indirect mutilation of oneself (n. 526).

III. Imprisonment of an innocent person is likewise illicit, because each person has a right of procuring his own good even by external action; this right is violated by one who imprisons someone (St. Thomas, II-II, q. 65, a. 3).

IV. Finally, beating of an innocent person is illicit, because each person has a right to the delight or quiet of his senses, "to which beating is opposed, or anything whatever that affects the sense with pain" (St. Thomas, loc. cit.).

V. Nor is it lawful for public authority directly to mutilate an innocent person; for just as it is not lawful for it to deprive an innocent person of life (n. 731), so also and for the same reason it is illicit to deprive him of the integrity and use of members (St. Thomas, II-II, q. 108, a. 4, ad 2). Likewise it is illicit for it to imprison or beat an innocent person, because neither can public authority injure the goods of the body of innocent persons; and goods of the body, besides life and integrity of members, are the use of members, which is impeded by imprisonment, and the quiet of the sense, to which beating is opposed (St. Thomas, II-II, q. 65, a. 3).

Nor does public authority lawfully impose mutilation, for example vasectomy, oophorectomy, and so forth, for this end, that the procreation of weak, miserable, and similar offspring may be forestalled. Thus expressly Pius XI in the encyclical Casti connubii.¹ And the Holy Office, to the question, "What must be thought of the theory called eugenic, whether positive or negative, and of the means indicated by it for improving human progeny, with laws, whether natural, divine, or ecclesiastical, concerning marriage and the rights of individuals set aside," answered on March 31, 1931: "That it is altogether to be disapproved and to be held as false and condemned, as in the encyclical letter on Christian marriage, Casti connubii, given on December 31, 1930."² And indeed, first, the end does not justify a perverse means, such as the mutilation of an innocent person. Next, neither can public authority directly impede the good of the species, since it is ordered to no intermediate end, but to God alone, and therefore cannot be impeded for any intermediate end.³

Objection 1. Public authority can provide for the common good; consequently it can mutilate an innocent person and impede the good of the species, if that is necessary for the common good.

Resp. I deny the consequence; or rather, public authority can provide for the common good, but not by an evil means, of which sort are mutilating an innocent person and impeding the good of the species.

Objection 2. Public authority can provide for the good of the species. But by impeding the procreation of weak offspring it provides for the species.

Resp. That public authority can provide for the good of the species by using an evil means, such as mutilation of an innocent person, I deny. Besides, the Minor must be denied, because the good of the species pertains in no way to the accidental condition of the offspring.

¹ December 31, 1930.

² Acta Apostolicae Sedis, 1931, p. 118.

³ Cf. Brouillard in Etudes, 1931, p. 440 sq. and 578 sq.; Dr. Grosam in Theologisch-praktische Quartalschrift, 1931, p. 497 sq.