Moral Theology: Its Method and Masters
Juan Caramuel y Lobkowitz
Drawn from the authors' own words; every quotation links to its place.
Cistercian · 1606–1682
In the Index: Caramuel; Caramuel, J.
Dates differ: Prümmer 1606–1682; Haringer 1602–1649.
In Prümmer's Catalogue and Haringer's Index
- “Caramuel (de Lobkowitz), Ioan., O.Cist. (1606-1682), born at Madrid of a German father and a Bohemian mother, bishop of Campagna and then of Vigevano, a man of truly wonderful intellect, wrote 77 folio volumes. In moral matters he was, not without merit, called by St. Alphonsus "the prince of the laxists." His principal work pertaining to moral theology is Theologia moralis fundamentalis. The different editions differ greatly among themselves. We have used the Roman edition of the year 1656. It is a work written with a flying pen, and in some parts is a rough and undigested mass, lacking every logical order.” — Prümmer, Catalogue of authors
- “Caramuel (Ioan. de Lobkowitz), Cistercian, Abbot of Mesros, Bishop of Vigevano in Italy. St. Alphonsus calls him the prince of laxists (Fundamental Theology, Moral Theology, Regular Theology), born 1602, died 1649.” — Haringer's index of writers (Gury-Ballerini) (p. XV, sign read on the page)
His Moral System, as Our Authors Report It
Every report quoted in the author's own words and linked to its place; point at a name to see his words. Haringer's signs give St. Alphonsus's judgment as Haringer found it in St. Alphonsus's works (his notice, Gury-Ballerini, 1884, p. XI); a sign on a writer the 1884 editor added to the list is the editor's own, and is said to be his.
| Probabilist | |
|---|---|
| “There is no leisure to refute the trifles and ineptitudes of Caramuel, who at length and breadth attempts to prove that Probabilism had already been applied by Adam and Eve, and that it excused them from many grave sins before the fall.”Prümmer dismisses his attempt to prove that probabilism was used by Adam and Eve | Prümmer, Manuale I, n. 350 |
| Charged with laxity | |
| Counted among them by 5 of our authors | Koch-Preuss, Handbook I, the moral systems; Noldin, Summa I, n. 232s; Prümmer, Manuale I, n. 350; Tanquerey, Fundamental Moral Theology, n. 398; Merkelbach, Summa II, excursus on the moral systems |
| “St. Alphonsus calls him the prince of laxists”Haringer’s index: St. Alphonsus calls him the prince of laxists | Haringer, Index of writers |
| “Ioannes Caramuel (+ 1682), who was called by St. Alphonsus "the prince of the laxists," expressed the same opinion under these words: "If opinions are now probable which previously were not, now men do not sin, although previously they sinned, since every probable thing excuses from sin."”Prümmer: called by St. Alphonsus the prince of the laxists; he expressed the same lax opinion | Prümmer, Manuale I, n. 343 |
| “Chapter I — First, the condemned propositions are recounted; then those which seem lax … VI. Caramuel, in his Theologia Praeterintentionalis, Tome II, precept 6, question 8, chapter 2, case 2, writes the following conclusions: "First. Servants can, with the knowledge that she is a prostitute or a concubine, minister foods at table — not only common foods, but also warm ones, and season food that provokes to Venus, and make ready a private bed."”Concina's censuses of lax opinions list 3 of his opinions and names him in 1 more as teaching or approving one (the first is quoted; every one is under 'Where Our Authors Discuss Him') | Concina, Compendium I, bk. III, diss. IV, ch. I, n. VI |
| “the prince of the laxists”Prümmer, after St. Alphonsus: the prince of the laxists | Prümmer, Catalogue of authors |
Where Our Authors Discuss Him
Each read in its full passage; the words quoted are the author's own. Where several authors say the same thing, one is quoted and the others follow “in nearly the same words”; point at a name to see his words.
| “Caramuel, O.Cist. (1682)”Vermeersch names him among the distinguished theologians of the age before St. Alphonsus, an age he calls morbid | Vermeersch, Theologia moralis I, n. 20 |
| “Thus Caramuel, the prince of the laxists, Diana, and others” | Marc, Institutiones I, n. 86 |
| “Chapter II — Lax propositions of certain Authors … IV. Juan Caramuel, in Theologia Fundamentalis, number 442: "I am a man, more fragile than myself, endowed with a keen and fiery temperament. In one moment I turn over the heavens, in the next I descend to the underworld.”Concina lists among the lax opinions of the casuists (on prayer and the divine office) | Concina, Compendium I, bk. III, diss. VI, ch. II, n. IV |
| “Caramuel, Book II of his Moral Theology, disputation 14, no. 778: I distinguish the troublesome from danger, or from emerging loss, and from ceasing gain. Is” | Concina, Compendium II, bk. IX, diss. I, ch. II, n. XL |
| “Fr. Thomas Tamburini, Book VIII, On the Decalogue, tract 3, § 5, no. 18: I have already said that under this title of a promise not to demand back the money” | Concina, Compendium II, bk. IX, diss. I, ch. II, n. XLV |
| “This heretical and blasphemous proposition, which made God a tyrant who gave orders which He knew could not be obeyed, was altogether out of harmony with the prevailing system of moral theology, and its Jansenist supporters began to attack probabilism in order to make an opening for their own rigoristic doctrine. According to Caramuel, who was at Louvain at the time and who wrote a book against them in 1639, they began to teach covertly that the use of probabilism was something new; that he who leaves the safe way and follows probabilism can not but be condemned by God; that opinions which are styled probable among us are not probable with God. The war between probabilism and antiprobabilism had broken out, a war conducted with the greatest heat and passion for two hundred years, and not even yet quite ended.”Slater cites his book of 1639 against the Louvain Jansenists for what they began covertly to teach | Slater, Short History, ¶ 87 |
Works Our Authors Used
- Caramuel, O. Cisterc., 1602-1682, Theologia moralis fundamentalis, Frankfurt, 1652. — Tanquerey's list
In the Catholic Encyclopedia (1913)
“Juan Caramuel y Lobkowitz”, vol. 3, by Leo Francis O'Neil. Public domain; transcription from Wikisource.
Spanish ecclesiastic and writer; b. at Madrid, 23 May, 1606; d. at Vigevano, 8 September, 1682. He was a precocious child, early delving into serious problems in mathematics and even publishing astronomical tables in his tenth year. After receiving a superficial education at college, where his unusual ability brought rapid advancement, this prodigy turned his attention to the Asiatic languages, especially Chinese. He was received into the Cistercian Order at the monastery of La Espina, in the Diocese of Palencia, and after ordination entered upon a singularly varied and brilliant career. His sermons attracted the favourable attention of the Infante Ferdinand, Governor of the Low Countries, while he was attached to the monastery of Dunes in Flanders, and in 1638 he was honoured with the degree of Doctor of Theology by the University of Louvain. When he was obliged to leave the Palatinate, the King of Spain made him his envoy to the court of the Emperor Ferdinand III. He was in turn Abbot of Melrose (Scotland), Abbot-Superior of the Benedictines of Vienna, and grand-vicar to the Archbishop of Prague. In 1648, when the Swedes attacked Prague, he armed and led a band of ecclesiastics who did yeoman service in the defence of the city. His bravery on this occasion merited for him a collar of gold from the emperor. Soon after he became Bishop of Konigratz, then Archbishop of Otranto, and at his death was Bishop of Vigevano.
His books are even more numerous than his titles and his varied achievements; for, according to Paquot, he published no less than 262 works on grammar, poetry, oratory, mathematics, astronomy, physics, politics, canon law, logic, metaphysics, theology and asceticism. But he produced little that is of permanent value. He loved to defend novel theories, and in "Theologia moralis ad prima atque clarissima principia reducta" (Louvain, 1643) tried to solve theological problems by mathematical rules. Some of his moral opinions gained for him from St. Alphonsus Liguori the title of "Prince of the Laxists".
Leo F. O'Neil.