The Morality of Human Acts

64. What it is. 1. Actions are called moral, and their objects are called moral. That by which something is and is called moral, in an abstract term, is called morality. Therefore a twofold morality is distinguished: one objective, which belongs to the object of the moral act, or to the act considered objectively; the other subjective, which belongs to the moral acts themselves.

2. Whether an action is moral, and specifically whether it is morally good or evil, depends on its object, so that the action is moral, and morally good or evil, because its object is moral and morally good or evil. Therefore the question is what that is by which the objects of moral actions are constituted moral and specifically morally good or evil. The objects of the will are constituted moral and morally good or evil by some norm, which is called the norm of morality; so that an action which is conformable to this norm is and is called morally good, but one which is difform from it, morally evil. Therefore the morality of moral objects consists in a certain relation to the norm of morality and can be defined: the relation of a moral object to the norm of morality. The norm of morality is twofold: one proximate, the other supreme and ultimate. Therefore the question is what the norm of morality is.

Morality is a generic notion and consists in that property of moral objects by which they have a relation to their norm. But this relation can be twofold, either of conformity or of difformity; therefore two supreme genera of moral objects are distinguished: the morally good and the morally evil.

¹ The question of morality and of the principle or norm of morality easily occupies the chief place in moral philosophy, from which it will be useful to take the principal notions for the plan of moral theology. Cf. Suarez, De bonitate et malitia humanorum actuum. Schiffini, Philosophia moralis (Augustae Taurinorum: Marietti, 1891), I, n. 57 ff., n. 133. Frins, "Zur Philosophie der Sittlichkeit," Zeitschrift fur kath. Theologie (1886), p. 577 ff. The same, De actibus humanis (Freiburg: Herder, 1904), II, p. 54 ff. Theod. Meyer, Institutiones iuris naturalis, 2nd ed. (Freiburg: Herder, 1906), I, n. 140 ff. W. Schneider, Gottliche Weltordnung und religionslose Sittlichkeit (Paderborn: Schoningh, 1900), chapters 6 and 7. V. Cathrein, Moralphilosophie, 4th ed. (Freiburg: Herder, 1904), I, p. 156 ff.

65. The proximate norm. The proximate norm of morality is rational nature as such, elevated to the supernatural order, so that the good is that which is fitting to rational nature, and evil that which is unfitting to it.

The norm and measure according to which man must direct his actions is: a. human nature, indeed whole, not according to the superior part alone, but insofar as it is rational, that is, insofar as it is the nature of this species, diverse from brutes, human and rational. Hence in order that an action be morally good it is not enough that it be fitting to a nature which is rational, but it is required that it be fitting to nature insofar as it is rational. For it can happen that something is fitting to the nature of man insofar as it is sensitive, which nevertheless is not fitting to it insofar as it is rational. b. Human nature considered not only in itself and according to itself, but in its relations, namely as it is part of the universe created by God (n. 24). c. Human nature as it really exists in the present order of providence, namely elevated to the dignity of divine sonship.

a. The norm according to which the actions of all beings are directed and measured is their nature, and their actions are judged according to this norm: those which are fitting to their nature are called good, those which are unfitting to their nature are called evil; there is no reason, with regard to man, to seek another norm and to judge his actions according to another norm.

b. In the moral order, that is called fitting to rational nature which befits rational nature, or which, when the dignity of rational nature has been considered, is fitting to be sought and loved or rejected (n. 62). Now if it is asked what in particular that is which befits rational nature and is fitting to its dignity, one must say: that which is consonant with its relations (n. 34).

a. The same norm is exhibited in other ways:

a. Some call the norm of morality the moral order, so that the good is that which is, and because it is, consonant with right order; evil is that which is, and because it is, difform from right order. For since human nature considered according to its relations is the norm of morality, and the relations by which human nature is referred to God, to itself, and to other created things constitute the moral order, it comes to the same thing whether human nature or the moral order is called the norm of morality.

b. Others call right reason the norm of morality, so that the good is that which is, and because it is, according to reason; evil is that which is, and because it is, against reason. For since the will in its actions follows the guidance of reason, the dictate of reason is the immediate and proximate norm of the will; but reason takes its judgments from objects, or from the objective order. Therefore the goodness of the will depends upon reason in the way in which it depends upon the object, or upon the moral order.

b. The norm of morality is also called the principle of morality, and this for a twofold reason: because it determines the morality of acts, or constitutes moral acts morally good or evil; and then because it is the criterion from which we know moral acts and acts morally good and evil. Therefore, from what has been explained above, morally good acts are those which are consonant with the nature of man created by God and elevated to the supernatural state according to relation to God, to himself, and to other creatures; but acts which are unfitting to man considered in this way are morally evil.

66. Divisions of morality. 1. By reason of the subject, morality is objective and subjective.

a. Objective morality is that condition of the object (of the moral act) on account of which it deserves that a rational being either embrace it by the will or turn away from it. A twofold objective morality is distinguished: internal, which belongs to the object from itself; and external, which belongs to the object from the precept of a superior.

b. Subjective morality is that condition of the act by which the agent deliberately embraces or turns away from an object which deserves that a rational being embrace it or turn away from it.

a. Subjective morality depends essentially upon objective morality and designates the mode in which a moral act is produced, namely that condition by which it is exercised freely and with knowledge of the moral quality of the object. By this morality a man is constituted morally good or evil.

b. Objective morality is also called material, insofar as it belongs to actions considered objectively in themselves, independently of the agent's apprehension; and subjective morality is also called formal, insofar as it belongs to an action dependently upon the apprehension of the agent. Because the agent is fallible in his knowledge, it can happen that the same action is formally good and materially evil, and conversely it can happen that the same action is formally evil and materially good.

2. By reason of perfection, morality must be distinguished into incomplete and complete: actions obtain the former from mere fittingness with rational nature, the latter also from conformity with the divine will. For in the complete sense, that is called good and evil which is worthy of reward and punishment; but that is worthy of reward or punishment which is conformable to law or difform from it.

a. Once creation has been supposed, God wills, and indeed necessarily wills, that man observe the moral order. This act of the divine will is the eternal law, by which man is held to observe the moral order. Therefore one must say that good is that which is conformable to the divine will or to the eternal law, and that evil is that which is difform from the divine will or from the eternal law.

b. The principle of obligation must be distinguished from the norm of morality. Indeed, it is one thing to ask why a human act is morally good or evil, and another to ask why a human act is morally (positively or negatively) necessary, or to be placed or omitted from obligation. The norm of morality is the moral order constituted by God insofar as He is author of human nature; the principle of obligation is the eternal law, or God insofar as He is supreme legislator. Morality extends much more broadly than obligation: for although a morally evil action is also prohibited, nevertheless there are very many morally good actions which are not commanded. These things are aptly confirmed by the well-known definition of St. Augustine, according to which eternal law is the reason and will of God commanding that the natural (moral) order be preserved and forbidding that it be disturbed.

67. The supreme norm. The supreme norm of morality is the divine essence. The supreme norm of morality is the ultimate reason and foundation of the proximate norm; but the ultimate reason on account of which human nature is such, has this essence and these relations, and on account of which some actions are fitting to it and good, others unfitting to it and evil, is this: because the divine essence is imitable ad extra according to this mode. For the human essence, as created by God, is a finite image of the divine essence, which manifests itself ad extra through created things. Therefore what is good in the moral order is good for this reason, that it is fitting to the divine essence; and what is evil in the moral order is evil for this reason, that it is unfitting to the divine essence. Therefore Christ the Lord admonishes: "Be you therefore perfect, as your heavenly Father is perfect."¹

¹ Matt. 5:48.

68. There is no morality without God. Morality can be taken in a twofold sense, in a broader and imperfect sense, in which it signifies the moral order, that is, actions which are fitting to the moral order; and in a strict and perfect sense, in which it signifies the moral order, or actions fitting to the order and commanded by immutable law. In both senses it is true that, if abstraction is made from God, morality is not had.

a. Actions fitting to the moral order are moral principles, which are understood to be necessary and immutable; but the foundation of principles of this kind can be nothing except a necessary and immutable being, God, who, just as He is the source of all truth, so also is the source of all moral goodness. Therefore without God moral principles lack a foundation, and therefore they lose their absolute necessity and their immutability.

b. All understand that law or moral obligation contains in itself the absolute necessity of the end and the equal necessity of the means; but only the supreme legislator, God, can constitute for rational beings an end to be obtained by absolute necessity and determine the means to be employed with equal necessity.¹

¹ Cf. Cathrein, Religion und Moral (Freiburg: Herder, 1900). Th. Meyer, Die Grundsatze der Sittlichkeit und des Rechtes (Freiburg: Herder, 1868).

69. On the sources themselves. 1. The sources, or also the principles, of morality are called those elements of human acts which constitute a moral action in the concrete as fitting to the moral order or discrepant from it: these elements are object, circumstances, and end. Therefore three sources of morality are numbered: object, circumstances, and end.

a. Namely, the morality of actions in general is taken from their fittingness or discrepancy with the moral order; but moral acts, both good and evil, are diverse. Now it is asked what constitutes actions as fitting to the moral order or discrepant from it; and since there are three things which constitute actions in the concrete as conformable or difform to the moral order - object, end, and circumstances - and no other element is found in the action, rightly and deservedly it is said that morality is derived into an action from a threefold source.

b. That the morality of actions is derived from this threefold source does not signify that morality in any given action is taken from these three things simultaneously, but that it is derived from one of these three: therefore in the concrete, according to the diversity of acts, it is taken now from one or another, now from all simultaneously.

2. In order that an act be good, all the principles on which morality depends must be conformable to rational nature; if even one is difform, the action becomes evil. Hence the axiom has prevailed: good from the whole cause, evil from any defect. Therefore, if an act from object, from end, and from circumstances is fitting to rational nature, it is good simply; but if either from object or from circumstances or from end it is unfitting to rational nature, it is evil simply.

Whether and when this principle, good from the whole cause, evil from any defect, must be restricted, will be said in its proper place; for it is asked whether an act good from its object always loses its whole goodness through an evil end or through an evil circumstance.

1. On The Object

70. Notion and principle. 1. The object of a moral act is called that about which the tendency of the will is proximately and primarily concerned.

a. That about which the tendency of the will is concerned is diverse according as the act of the will is merely elicited or elicited and at the same time commanded: a. some thing; thus God is the object of love of God, money the object of avarice for money; b. some external action, as in these acts: to will to bestow alms, to will to steal, to will to walk; c. some internal act, as in these acts: to will to love God, to will to believe.

b. It is said proximately and primarily because also the end and circumstances are that toward which the will tends, but not proximately and primarily.

c. To the object of an act pertain all those things which constitute its substance, considered not physically but morally; moreover, all those things constitute the substance of an act which are so essential and necessary to it that, if something is lacking or another thing is added, the act becomes diverse. Thus the object of theft is a thing of another taken while the owner is reasonably unwilling: for if the thing is not another's, or if it is not taken while the owner is unwilling, or not while he is reasonably unwilling, there is no theft.

d. The proximate object is the commanded act of the will itself (to steal, to believe), or the object of the elicited act (God, money); the remote object is that about which the commanded act is concerned (the thing of another in theft, revealed truth in an act of faith).

2. Human acts receive their first and essential morality from the object: for the object, just as in the physical order, so also in the moral order, gives species to acts per se and primarily, because powers are moved to act by the object per se and primarily.

Therefore it happens that the morality which belongs to an act from the object is conceived before every other which belongs to it from the end or from the circumstances. One who from love of God gives alms to relieve the misery of the poor exercises an act of mercy, and one who steals in order to become drunk places an act of theft, because the object, not the end, primarily constitutes the moral species of the act. Therefore the morality which acts receive from the object is called objective, essential, and substantial.

71. Division. 1. The object is called good if it is consonant with rational nature, as to adore God, to will to give alms; it is called evil if it is dissonant from it, as to blaspheme, to will to steal; it is called indifferent if neither obtains, as to eat, to walk, to write, which of itself is neither fitting nor unfitting to rational nature.

2. One object is internally and per se good or evil, another is per accidens and by reason of a precept good or evil. The former is from itself and by its nature conformable or difform to rational nature, as to love or to hate one's neighbor; the latter is not from itself and by its nature, but only by reason of a supervening law, good or evil, as to eat meats or to abstain from them.

Objects of the former kind are commanded because they are good, and prohibited because they are evil; but objects of the latter kind are good because they are commanded, and evil because they are prohibited.

3. Objects evil in themselves are of two kinds: some are evil absolutely and independently of any condition whatever, because of themselves they are so repugnant to rational nature that not even God Himself can change them, for example hatred of God, perjury; others are evil conditionally, that is, by reason of some condition which lies under the power of God because of the dominion which He exercises over created things; if God removes this condition, they cease to be evil and become licit, as to take another's thing, to kill a man, etc.

4. The material object is called that about which the act of the will is concerned, for example another's money which is desired, the taking of another's thing; the formal object is called the same material object insofar as it is attained freely by the agent with knowledge of its morality, for example the desire or taking of another's thing done with knowledge of moral malice.

2. On Circumstances

72. Notion and number. 1. Circumstances are conditions which are added to the substance of a moral act and affect it morally, as in theft the circumstance of a sacred place or of a sacred thing. Because circumstances are added to the moral act already constituted in its substance, they are called accidents of moral acts.

a. Only those conditions are customarily called circumstances of moral acts which are added to the moral substance of the act, or to the act already constituted in its moral species. Thus in the theft of a sacred thing, not the being another's, but only the being sacred, is called a circumstance of the act.

b. Those circumstances affect the object morally which contain some relation to rational nature or to the moral order.

2. Seven circumstances are customarily numbered, which are presented in this little verse:

Who, what, where, by what aids, why, how, when.

Who indicates the special quality of the person who acts, for example that he is a cleric, bound by vow or by marriage.

What denotes the quality or quantity of the object itself: whether a striking is grave or light, of a father or of a stranger; whether a thing taken by theft is great or small, sacred or profane.

Where signifies the aspect of place: whether it was sacred or profane, hidden or public, so that scandal could arise.

By what aids signifies the special character of the means which the agent employed, as to become drunk with money taken by theft, to wound with prohibited weapons.

Why indicates the end of the one operating, as to steal in order to become drunk. Although the end pertains to the circumstances, nevertheless because of its peculiar influence on morality it deserves a peculiar consideration.

How signifies the mode of the action, both interior, as to act intensely or remissly, advertently or inadvertently, in good or evil faith; and exterior, as to kill by poison or by the sword, to cut up limb by limb with cruelty.

When denotes the quantity and quality of time: whether something was done for a long time or briefly, in sacred time or non-sacred.

3. Not only objects are indifferent, but also many circumstances must be called indifferent, which do not influence the morality of an act nor confer any morality upon it, because they are neither fitting nor unfitting to rational nature, as to give alms with the right hand or the left, to steal on the second feria or the third.

73. Principles. 1. A human act receives morality also from circumstances, which determine the object in the concrete: for circumstances can bring it about both that an act is or is not fitting to rational nature, and that it is more or less fitting. Thus to refresh oneself temperately is fitting to rational nature, but to refresh oneself intemperately is unfitting to rational nature; to worship God fervently is more conformable to rational nature than to worship Him remissly; to kill a brother is more difform to rational nature than to kill a man.

2. Circumstances confer morality upon human acts in a fourfold way, in that:

a. an act indifferent from its object becomes good or evil from circumstances; thus to eat meats on a day of abstinence is evil, to refresh oneself temperately is good;

b. an act good from its object becomes evil from a circumstance; thus it is evil to pray against the precept of a superior;

c. an act good or evil from its object receives a new goodness or malice from circumstances; thus one who abstains from meats by vow places an act of temperance and religion, and one who steals a sacred thing places an act of injustice and irreligion;

d. an act good or evil from its object becomes more or less good or evil from circumstances; thus if a poor man gives alms, the act of mercy is greater, and if a priest sins, the malice of the sin, other things being equal, is greater.

It must be noted that those circumstances which confer the first moral species upon an action indifferent from its object are commonly referred to the object itself and are not distinguished from the object, so that an act is said to be objectively good or evil when, indifferent from its object, it is constituted good or evil from some circumstance; thus to eat meats on a fast day is customarily called an act evil from its object.

3. A gravely evil circumstance removes the whole goodness of the act, but a lightly evil circumstance accompanying an act (to attend remissly, to act precipitately, to pray tepidly, to give alms with distaste) does not remove the whole goodness of the act. The reason for the first is that an act which fully turns away from the ultimate end cannot conduce to the end. The reason for the second is that an act of this kind does not turn away from the ultimate end, and therefore the tendency of the will toward evil does not destroy the whole goodness of the act; and indeed, unless this were so, very few good acts would be found even in holy men.

With the circumstances of actions, which affect the actions themselves, there must not be confused actions, whether internal or external, which occur during an action but are in no way referred to the action itself, as a pious sigh or idle word while studying, an act of impatience or of prayer while working. Acts of this kind, whether they are good or evil, neither increase nor diminish the merit or demerit of the action, but have their own morality in themselves.

74. Division of circumstances. Circumstances are divided:

1. Into those changing species and those not changing species, according as they modify an action only within the same moral species, or make the moral species of the action diverse, or rather add another moral species to the action.

2. Circumstances not changing species are either aggravating or diminishing, according as they increase or diminish moral goodness or malice, as if someone performs acts which endure for a longer or shorter time, or if one committing a grave theft takes a greater or lesser sum. These circumstances increase or diminish the morality of the act either lightly or gravely, or notably.

We are indeed accustomed to speak of diminishing circumstances, but when the matter is considered more accurately, there are properly no diminishing circumstances. Thus if, with regard to an act of prayer, the circumstance of longer duration is lacking, nothing is taken away from the act, or the act is not diminished, but rather a greater perfection is not added to it. Likewise, if with regard to the evil act of theft the circumstance of a greater quantity is lacking, properly the objective malice of the act is not diminished, but a greater malice is not added.

3. Circumstances changing species change the theological species of the action if they bring it about that an action which from its object is a light sin becomes grave, and one which is a grave sin becomes light, for example because of smallness or greatness of matter; but other circumstances change the moral species if they confer upon the action a new species of goodness or malice besides that which it has from the object, as if someone steals a sacred thing.

3. On The End

75. Notion. 1. The end of a human act is that on account of which the agent operates. There is distinguished the end of the work and the end of the one operating, or the internal and external end.

a. The internal end, or end of the work, is called that into which the act per se and by its nature is ordered, as alms to relieving the misery of the poor. The end of the work, or internal end, is not distinguished from the work itself or from the object; therefore it does not confer upon the act a morality distinct from that which it has from the object. The external end, or end of the one operating, is that to which the act is ordered by the one operating, as alms to making satisfaction for sins. Now it can happen that only the internal end is intended by the one operating, or the internal end and at the same time some external end, or, with the internal end neglected, only some external end; as if someone bestows alms only to relieve another's misery, or also to draw another back from sin, or only to draw another back from sin.

b. The discussion here is only of the end of the one operating, because only that end can introduce into a human act a morality distinct from the object.

2. Ends indifferent in themselves must be admitted, which confer no morality upon acts, because they are neither conformable nor difform to rational nature, as to sing in order to make profit, to go into a field for the sake of relaxing the mind.

76. Division. The end of the one operating is divided in multiple ways:

a. Into proximate end and remote end: the proximate is that which is intended with no other intervening; the remote is that which is intended by means of another end. Thus if someone sings so that, after receiving a stipend, he may procure support for himself, the stipend is the proximate end, support the remote.

b. Into ultimate end and intermediate end: the ultimate is that which is intended for its own sake, in which therefore the agent rests without referring the act to a further end; the intermediate is that which is intended for a further end. Thus if someone composes books in order to acquire for himself money to be spent on the salvation of neighbor and on the glory of God, the glory of God is the ultimate end, while money and the salvation of neighbor are intermediate ends.

c. The ultimate end can be simply or absolutely ultimate, besides which there is no other to which the work is referred; and ultimate in a qualified sense, which is ultimate only in some order of things or in some series of actions. Thus knowledge is the ultimate end in a qualified sense in the order of studies; the glory of God is the simply ultimate end.

d. The ultimate end (in a qualified sense) is either positively or negatively ultimate, according as a further end is excluded, or indeed is not excluded, but neither is intended.

a. For one who studies only in order to acquire knowledge for himself, knowledge is the positively ultimate end, because he excludes a further end, for example the glory of God. For one who studies in order to acquire knowledge for himself and does not think about a further end, knowledge is the negatively ultimate end, because he neither intends nor excludes a further end, for example the glory of God.

b. The ultimate end can be excluded not only explicitly and formally, but also implicitly and virtually, namely by the fact that an action, as disordered and sinful, cannot be referred to the ultimate end. Thus one who eats intemperately for the sake of pleasure excludes (virtually) the ultimate end of the glory of God, even if he does not think about the ultimate end.

e. Into total end, which alone moves to the action, so that, if it were not present, the action would not be done; and partial end, which moves to the action together with another. A partial end can be so constituted that it is equal with another, or equally principal, if each is sufficient to move to the act; or so that one is primary, which is first intended, and the other secondary, which is intended only with subordination to the primary and moves to the act. The former is called moving and alone would suffice for the action; the latter is called impelling and indeed influences the action, but alone would not suffice for the action.

For a priest who celebrates Mass only to worship God, the worship of God is the total end of the Mass. If he celebrates Mass both to worship God and to gain a stipend, the worship of God and the stipend are partial ends of the Mass. But if the priest is so disposed that he would celebrate even if he did not have the stipend, the worship of God is the primary end; if, with the stipend lacking, he would not celebrate, the stipend is the primary end of celebrating.

77. Principles. 1. A human act receives morality also from the end on account of which it is done: for the end to which an action is ordered by the one operating can bring it about that, by reason of this ordering, the action is conformable or difform to rational nature. Thus not only to give alms, but also to give in order to redeem sins, is conformable to rational nature; and not only to steal, but also to steal in order to become drunk, is difform to rational nature.

The end which confers the first moral species upon an act indifferent from its object is said to enter the object itself and to pertain to the object; thus to bestow money in order to relieve misery, to sing in order to praise God, are called actions good from their object; and to sing in order to create annoyance for another is called an action evil from its object.

2. It can happen in diverse ways that the end confers morality upon an action: for an act good, evil, or indifferent from its object can be referred by the agent to a good, evil, or indifferent end.

a. An act good from its object receives from a good end a new goodness, indeed as many species of goodness as there are diverse good ends which the agent intends. If someone, for example, bestows alms for the honor of God and to redeem sins, the action has a threefold goodness: of mercy from the object, and of religion and penance from the end.

b. If an act good from its object is ordered to an evil end, one must distinguish:

a. If the evil end is the total end, or the sole and adequate cause of the action, whether it is gravely or lightly evil, it corrupts the goodness of the act and renders the whole work either gravely or lightly evil; for example, to give alms to a poor man in order to turn him away from the faith, or to pray only for vainglory, is evil, because the will does not intend the good except under the aspect of evil, or as a means to an evil end, and therefore wills only evil.¹

b. If the evil end is a partial end, or if the action is done on account of a good end and an evil end which is only lightly evil, whether it is primary or secondary, it does not vitiate the whole act, but the act is partly good and partly evil. For the will can will both at the same time, good and evil; but the tendency toward good is not destroyed by a lightly evil tendency, because the will is not turned away from the ultimate end by it, as if someone gives alms to relieve the poor and at the same time to catch the praise of men.

This partial end can relate itself to a good action in three ways: antecedently, so that it does not influence the action afterward to be placed, but rather is its occasion, as if someone from human respect approaches the sacred rite, at which he then assists with due intention; this occasional end does not vitiate the action. Concomitantly, so that together with another good end it is the cause of the action, as if someone plays the organ to praise God and for vainglory; this vitiates the action in part. Consequently, if, when an action has already been begun from a good end, an evil end is added, as if someone began to sing in order to worship God and then something of ostentation also creeps in; this end likewise vitiates the action in part.²

Authors explain in diverse ways how the will can will both at the same time. For some teach that the same act can be at once good and evil; others say that in the will there can be at the same time, concerning the same object, two acts, one good and the other evil.³ Commonly, however, we are accustomed to consider acts of this kind as one act, even if composed of several.

c. If the evil end is a partial end and gravely evil, it vitiates the whole work and constitutes it evil, for example to extinguish a fire in order to help one's neighbor and at the same time to commit a grave theft; for it is impossible that an action be pleasing to God by which man is totally turned away from God.

c. An act good from its object does not become evil from an indifferent end to which it is ordered by the agent, whether the indifferent end is the partial reason of willing the good object or the total reason, as if someone sings in church either solely or also in order to earn money.

d. An act evil from its object cannot receive goodness from a good end, but is and remains evil: for if the object is evil, the good end does not prevent the will from really willing evil; but good is from the whole cause, evil from any defect. Hence that saying of the Apostle: let us not do evils that goods may come.⁴ Nevertheless a good end diminishes the malice of the action, as if someone steals in order to do good, because the affection toward evil is less, since the will does not seek it except from love of some good.

From these things it is clear that he offends against the first principles of ethics who teaches that the end sanctifies the means, that is, that a good end constitutes an action good when it is evil from its object or from its circumstances. For although a good end can bring it about that an action indifferent from its object or circumstances is good, nevertheless it cannot bring it about that an action evil from its object or circumstances is good.⁵

e. An act evil from its object receives from an evil end a new malice, indeed as many malices as there are evil ends into which the action is ordered by the agent. If someone, for example, steals in order to become drunk, the action has a twofold malice, of injustice and of intemperance.

f. An act evil from its object is not changed by an indifferent end to which it is referred by the agent, but retains its malice.

g. An act indifferent from its object receives moral goodness from a good end to which it is ordered by the agent; for example, to sing in order to praise God is an act of religion.

h. An act indifferent from its object receives moral malice from an evil end to which it is ordered by the agent; for example, to sing in order to create annoyance for another is a sin against charity.

i. An act indifferent from its object, which is ordered by the agent to an indifferent end, for example to sing in order to earn money, remains indifferent in the abstract; whether also in the concrete will be said presently.

In the manner of a proverb it is said that the value and merit of our works do not depend on what is done, but on how it is done. In order that this may be rightly understood, it must be noted: a. If there is question of two works, of which one from its object is nobler and more perfect than the other, other things being equal, that is, if they are performed with equally perfect intention (from obedience, from charity), the work more perfect from its object is of greater merit, provided that the objective goodness is also intended by the agent. b. Of two works equal from the object, that is of greater merit which is performed with a more perfect intention (end of the one operating), whether as to substance or as to intensity. c. It can happen that a work less perfect from its object (indifferent) has greater merit than a work more perfect in itself, if the end of the one operating is more perfect in one than in the other, whether as to essence or as to intensity.

¹ Cf. Matt. 6:1, 5, 22, 23.

² Cf. Ballerini-Palmieri I, n. 98.

³ Cf. Billuart, De actibus humanis, art. 4, n. 2.

⁴ Rom. 3:8.

⁵ Cf. Reichmann, Der Zweck heiligt die Mittel (Freiburg: Herder, 1903). Supplement to Stimmen aus Maria-Laach 68.

a. External acts here are not called only the acts which are performed by external organs, but all acts of other powers which are commanded by the will. Now concerning these acts two things are asked: a. whether they have a morality of their own distinct from the morality of the internal act; and b. whether they increase the goodness or malice of the internal act, whether, for example, theft or the bestowal of alms adds anything to the morality of the internal act of the will by which someone efficaciously wills to steal or to give alms.

b. The Scotists solve this question in one way, who attribute to external acts a proper morality in themselves, but the Thomists in another, who deny proper morality to the same acts. The theologians of other schools, by almost common consent, accede to the Thomists.¹

¹ Cf. Suarez, De bonitate et malitia actuum humanorum, disp. 10. Frins II, n. 332 ff.

78. External acts do not have their own morality. 1. External acts do not have a goodness or malice of their own distinct from the morality of the internal act. For only those acts are properly called moral which are free in themselves; for liberty is the foundation and condition of morality. Therefore, because external acts are not free in themselves, they cannot be moral in themselves. Nevertheless they are and are called morally good or evil from the goodness or malice of the internal act by which they are commanded; for they are moral insofar as they are free, and they are free insofar as they are commanded by a free will; therefore they are moral by a denomination taken from the elicited acts of the will.

Therefore, because external acts participate their goodness or malice from the internal act, there is one moral goodness or malice of both acts. The external act perfects and completes the morality of the internal act by which it is commanded; therefore the internal and external act constitute one act in number, morally good or evil, completed and consummated in its species.

2. From these things it now follows that the external act per se, or other things being equal, does not superadd a special goodness or malice to the internal act; for the whole goodness or malice of the external act is had from the internal act; therefore it cannot add anything to the internal act. Hence also the omission of the external act per se detracts nothing from the morality of the internal act: for if the will, perfectly disposed for execution, does not place the external act only because it cannot place it, the omission of the external act is involuntary with respect to the will; but what is involuntary cannot detract anything from morality.

a. Therefore a serious and efficacious will of doing something, when the deed itself is not completed for this reason, that it cannot be completed, is praised in Sacred Scripture equally as if it had been done.¹ Therefore those err greatly who think that they have committed less sin because they did not complete it in deed, provided that they had the efficacious purpose of the will of completing the sin when opportunity was given.²

b. But if it is affirmed that a good will and the desire of executing something are pleasing to God per se equally as if the thing had been done in deed, this does not hold: a. of an inefficacious desire, for example of executing whatever missionaries carry out in the whole world. The merit of a desire of this kind depends upon the disposition of the one who elicits it. Nor does it hold: b. of the desire, even efficacious, of those external actions to which by the institution of God a peculiar efficacy belongs, such as the sacraments or martyrdom. But it holds only of the truly efficacious will of exercising some external act which nevertheless, because of an external impediment, has not in fact been done per accidens.

3. Nevertheless it is not denied that an external act per accidens increases the goodness or malice (and therefore also the merit or demerit) of the internal act, and this in three ways: namely insofar as the external work brings it about that the internal act of the will becomes more intense and more lasting, or that it is repeated more often, or insofar as through the external act there is added good or evil example, edification or scandal of the neighbor.

That external acts are of the highest importance in moral matters is clear from those arguments by which the Scotists try to demonstrate that morality belongs to external acts per se, distinct from internal acts; namely: a. external acts are the object of precept; thus evil desires and evil acts are prohibited by distinct precepts in the Decalogue; but diversity of precepts is a sign of diverse malice. b. Not only in the sacraments, but also in indulgences and in martyrdom, the efficacy which these acts have from the work worked is annexed to external acts. c. In confession not only internal acts, but also external acts must be declared.

To a. Diversity of precepts would be a sign of diverse malice if, with the external act, the internal act also were not prohibited simultaneously; but by the sixth and seventh precept the external act is prohibited together with the internal. Then in the ninth and tenth precept the internal act is again prohibited, lest the uneducated think that the internal evil act is not evil unless external execution is added.

To b. We must confess external acts from the will of Christ instituting the sacrament of penance, because we are commanded to confess not only the formal malices of sins, but the sins themselves. But sins are not completely declared unless the external act also is accused, when external execution is added to the internal purpose.

¹ Gen. 22:16.

² Matt. 5:28.

93. Declarations. 1. It is not asked whether human acts are morally indifferent: for it is clear that human acts which are done without advertence to the moral order are neither good nor evil (n. 55). But the question is instituted concerning moral acts: namely, whether acts which are done with advertence to the moral norm are all either good or evil, or whether moral actions must be admitted which are indifferent.

2. This question concerns moral acts considered concretely and in the individual, namely as they are exercised by an individual person operating here and now, and therefore together with the end of the one operating and with the remaining adjuncts accompanying the action in the concrete, for example to sing in church in order to praise God. For if moral acts are considered abstractly and according to species, that is, only according to their object, for example to sing, with abstraction made from the end of the one operating and from the remaining circumstances, it is certain that moral actions can be indifferent, because per se they have neither conformity nor difformity with the norm of morality.

It is clear that an act considered according to species does not exist except in the abstraction of the mind: for as often as an act is performed, it is performed in certain circumstances and unto some end which the agent proposes to himself.

3. Now concerning moral acts considered concretely and in the individual, there is not one opinion of philosophers and theologians. For the Scotists, affirming with St. Bonaventure,¹ and the Thomists with St. Thomas,² and the greater part of other theologians, denying, are opposed concerning whether any moral act considered in the individual can be indifferent. Nevertheless, they affirm this only of truly moral acts, which are done deliberately and with advertence to the moral order. For it cannot be denied that acts which are done without advertence either to the act itself or to the morality of the act are indifferent even considered in the individual.

These things, however, hold concerning the natural order and the natural goodness of actions. For indifferent actions are sometimes also called supernatural actions which are not meritorious and yet are not sins, that is, actions which are neither meritorious nor demeritorious. It is readily conceded that there are indifferent supernatural actions, of which kind are works both of sinners and of unbelievers which are done from grace, but especially works by which they dispose themselves for justification. Whether such actions must also be admitted in the just, who are in the state of sanctifying grace, depends upon the conditions which are required for a meritorious act.

¹ In II Sent., dist. 4, q. 1, a. 3.

² Summa I-II, q. 18, a. 9.

94. There are no indifferent moral acts. For the one operating either intends an honorable end or does not intend one. If the first, the action is morally good. If the other, the one operating either apprehends the action to be exact according to the norm of reason, or apprehends it as opposing the norm of reason. There is no middle in him who adverts to the morality of the action. If the first, the action is good; if the other, the action is evil (n. 87).

1. Many Thomists reason in this way: any action which is exercised deliberately is ordered by the one operating to some determinate end, because man acting deliberately always acts from some end. Now this end is either an honorable end or it is not. If the first, the action will be good; if the other, the action will be evil. For as often as man acts deliberately, he must act according to the dignity of rational nature. But he acts according to the dignity of rational nature only if he acts for an honorable end; therefore in the concrete there is no morally indifferent action.

This argument supposes that actions must be positively directed to an honorable end in order that they be good. Therefore, if it is taken strictly, as the words sound, those actions indifferent from the object which are done from an indifferent end or on account of sensible delight, but are nevertheless ordered according to the mode prescribed by reason, would have to be called morally evil.

2. The reason of the Scotists, by which they fortify the contrary affirmative opinion, is this: in order that man act fittingly to rational nature, it is not necessary that always and in all things he tend toward a positively honorable end. Therefore if an action is ordered to some advantage of nature or is exercised for relieving a need of nature, it will not be good, because it does not tend toward an honorable end; nor will it be evil, because on the one hand it is not unfitting to rational nature, and on the other it is not necessary that every action be referred to an honorable end. Therefore it will be indifferent.

This argument also supposes the same theory, namely that actions must be positively directed to an honorable end in order that they be good. Nevertheless it affirms that those actions which are done on account of an indifferent end, whether their object is good or indifferent, but nevertheless ordered according to the prescription of reason, are morally indifferent.

95. Things to be noted concerning this question. 1. From the premises it is clear that the whole controversy concerning indifferent acts depends upon two heads of doctrine: a. whether an obligation can be demonstrated of always and in all deliberate actions intending a positively good end; for if this obligation exists, actions placed on account of an indifferent end become evil because of this neglected obligation. b. But if this obligation is not established, it is further asked whether those actions which are exercised on account of an indifferent end, but nevertheless according to the prescription of reason, must be called good or indifferent.

2. Whatever is said, certainly those theologians are not to be tolerated who on the one hand deny acts indifferent in the individual, but on the other hand absolutely require for the moral goodness of an act that an honorable end be positively intended. For the rigor of this doctrine is too greatly opposed to the mind and practice of the faithful, who are not persuaded that in absolutely all actions a positively honorable end must be sought lest they be evil. Therefore no one, whether uneducated or learned, whether of lax or timorous conscience, recognizes a moral defect in the omission of this good intention, and therefore no one ever accuses himself of it. And indeed it cannot be understood why, for example, an action is evil by which someone tries to drive away the sensation of cold only to relieve this annoyance without a higher end. Therefore it will be either good or at least indifferent; the Scotists call it indifferent, but according to the theory expounded it must be called morally good, if the agent judges it licit in the concrete and explicitly intends it as such.

100. Definition. Merit, considered abstractly, is that property of a human action by force of which it is worthy of reward or punishment: for a good action done in service of another is worthy of reward, but an evil action which redounds to the detriment of another is worthy of punishment. Merit, considered concretely, is a work worthy of reward or punishment. Therefore some work has the character of merit by the fact that it redounds to the good or detriment of another. Theological merit is a work which before God is worthy of reward or punishment; but more precisely that is called theological merit which, known from revelation, is referred to the supernatural end of eternal life, concerning which the words hold: for God renders to each one according to his works.¹

The moral goodness or malice of a human act, insofar as it redounds to the service or offense of God, is the cause of merit; reward or punishment is the effect of merit. In theological usage, the merit of a good act is commonly understood under the name merit, while the merit of an evil act is customarily called rather demerit.

¹ Rom. 2:6; Matt. 16:27.

101. Division. a. Merit is divided into natural and supernatural, according as it is ordered to a natural reward, which consists in goods of the natural order, or to a supernatural reward, which consists either solely or chiefly in supernatural goods. Natural reward belongs to works which are performed by the powers of nature alone; for since all morally good actions redound to the glory of God, they are worthy of retribution. But in this order of nature elevated through grace, no other merit and reward is considered except supernatural, which belongs to works that are done from grace.

b. It is divided into merit de condigno, to which wages are due from justice because its value is equal to the reward, and merit de congruo, to which wages are due only from a certain fittingness because its value is not equal to the reward. The former is also called perfect, the latter imperfect; the former is the merit of the just, the latter also belongs to sinners.

A twofold distinction intervenes between merit de condigno and merit de congruo: a. with regard to the value of the work: a work to which merit de condigno belongs is equal to the reward, not indeed with mathematical equality but with moral equality, or, as St. Thomas has it, with equality of virtue: "as the seed of a tree, in which there is the virtue unto the whole tree."¹ In merit de congruo, the reward surpasses the value of the work. b. With regard to the right to reward: in merit de condigno, on the part of the one meriting there is a right to the reward and a debt of justice on the part of the one rewarding; in merit de congruo, wages are bestowed only from a certain equity, and if the reward is owed because of a promise on the part of the one rewarding, it is owed only from fidelity.

c. As regards the infallibility of merit, it depends upon the divine promise. Now every merit de condigno, because of the divine promise joined to it, is infallible; but merit de congruo is one kind infallible, another fallible, according as a divine promise is or is not joined to it. Thus a sinner through the ultimate disposition for sanctifying grace merits this grace de congruo infallibly, but not through a remote disposition.

d. By reason of the good which is repaid in the homeland, it is divided into essential or substantial reward, which contains: a. eternal life or the beatific vision universally; b. increase of glory or greater grades of the beatific vision; and accidental reward, which contains all goods which besides the beatific vision come to the blessed in the heavenly homeland, and which are called secondary: the three aureoles (of martyrs, doctors, and virgins); familiar fellowship of the angels, the blessed, and the very queen of heaven; the vision of the humanity of Christ; joy concerning one's own body; a singular place assigned to the saints in heaven.

¹ Cf. Summa I-II, q. 114, a. 3, ad 3.

102. What the conditions of merit are. Only those special conditions which are required on the part of the one meriting for merit must be proposed more accurately here.

a. The general conditions of merit, which are required for every merit both de condigno and de congruo, are four, of which two are referred to the person meriting, but two to the meritorious work: a. the state of the way, which by the free disposition of God has its terminus in death; b. liberty from coercion and necessity; c. the moral goodness of the work; d. the supernaturality of the work.¹

b. The special condition of merit de condigno is the state of grace on the part of the person meriting. For true merit does not depend on the supernatural work alone, but also on the state and dignity of the person meriting. Therefore supernatural actions, unless sanctifying grace is added, do not have true and perfect merit; since sanctifying grace gives to works that value by which they are constituted proportioned and equal to the reward.

a. The Council of Trent attributes true and properly so-called merit, or merit de condigno, only to the works of the just;² b. Sacred Scripture declares that man cannot bear the fruit of good works unless he has remained in Christ through sanctifying grace.³ Besides this, it calls only sons heirs, that is, he does not merit the inheritance unless he is a son through sanctifying grace.⁴ c. And indeed, if one who is not in the state of grace were capable of merit, someone could be at the same time worthy of eternal life and eternal death. Besides this, the reward is the good proper to the sons of God, since it is the inheritance of the sons of God through adoption; but only through grace is man elevated to the state of sons of God. Therefore works done outside the state of grace have no proportion to the reward.

¹ The necessity of these conditions is shown by the dogmatic theologians, among whom may be compared: Schiffini, De gratia divina (Freiburg: Herder, 1901), n. 344 ff. Chr. Pesch, Praelectiones dogmaticae, 3rd ed. (Freiburg: Herder, 1900), V, n. 397 ff. Hurter, Compendium theologiae dogmaticae, 9th ed. (Innsbruck: Wagner, 1903), III, n. 225 ff.

² Sess. 6, c. 16, can. 32.

³ John 15:4.

⁴ Rom. 8:16 ff.

103. Many theologians further require that the work be done from charity: for without charity neither faith nor any other good work of whatever kind has any value before God.¹ But how the work must proceed from charity in order that it can be meritorious, not all explain in the same way.²

a. Some explain it so that only elicited acts of charity and acts commanded by charity, namely those which are ordered to God from the motive of charity actually or at least virtually, are meritorious. Therefore these require for merit an intention at least virtual by which all works are ordered to God from charity. By an argument taken from the nature of the thing they confirm this opinion in this way: for merit de condigno, which is the noblest merit, an act of the supreme and most perfect virtue, which is charity, is required. To confirm their opinion they appeal to the authority of St. Thomas,³ whom St. Alphonsus understands and follows in this sense.

b. Others explain it so that acts of charity and works which through an act of charity are habitually ordered to God are meritorious. Therefore these require for merit a habitual intention by which all works are ordered to God from charity. In order that this condition be satisfied, it is required that an act of charity precede, that it never have been retracted by a subsequent grave sin, and that it be renewed as often as the precept of charity urges. By this reason they judge all works to be habitually referred to God from the intention of charity. The patrons of this opinion also appeal to St. Thomas, whom they think must be understood in this sense.⁴

c. Finally, others explain it so that acts of charity and all works which proceed from habitual charity, or from the habit of charity, which is always conjoined with sanctifying grace, are meritorious. Therefore these require for merit no peculiar intention or preceding act of charity by which works are ordered to God from charity, but teach that for merit the state of grace suffices, which embraces charity by an indissoluble bond, and that objective or natural ordering to God which the works of a just man have of themselves and by their nature, provided that they are good in themselves and placed through the influence of supernatural grace. For through sanctifying grace man is ordered to God, the supernatural end, and becomes a son of God, whose good works by this very fact are works of a son of God; but the works of a son of God are of themselves worthy of the eternal inheritance.

¹ 1 Cor. 13:1-3.

² Cf. Schiffini, l.c., n. 364 ff.

³ Summa I-II, q. 100, a. 10, ad 2; De virtutibus, q. 2, a. 11, ad 3; II Sent., dist. 40, q. 1, a. 5, and ad 6.

⁴ De malo, q. 2, a. 5, ad 10; II Sent., dist. 40, q. 1, a. 5, and ad 6.

104. The opinion to be preferred. a. The reasons which show that this third opinion is altogether to be preferred to the others can be compared among the dogmatic theologians. The principal ones are these: a. In Sacred Scripture not only acts which in some way proceed from actual charity, but also acts of other virtues, and these named simply, are promised and attributed eternal beatitude itself.¹ b. The Council of Trent, recounting all the conditions required for merit de condigno, with no mention made of an act of charity or of another good intention, declares all good works of the just which are done through grace to be meritorious.² Nor by the words "which have been done in God" does it signify anything other than works which are done in grace and through grace. That these words must be understood in this way is clear from the words placed in the canon (32): "which are done through the grace of God"; for these are equivalent to the former. Therefore from the mind of the Council of Trent, besides the state of grace and the influence of actual grace, nothing else is required for merit. c. And indeed all good and supernatural acts which are exercised by a just man are by their nature ordered to God the supernatural end, redound to the glory of God, and by this very fact are means proportioned to the ultimate end; therefore they have everything which can be required for merit de condigno. For through the habit of charity, which necessarily follows sanctifying grace, man is ordered to God the supernatural end, and since through the same grace and charity he is constituted son and friend of God, all his works are implicitly and habitually referred to God and consecrated to Him. Therefore for merit it is not required that also on the part of the one operating they be ordered to God the supreme good.

b. The first of the other opinions brings forward a gratuitous exaggeration and in its confirmatory argument contains a begging of the question: for this very thing is asked, whether the highest merit de condigno belongs only to the noblest virtue of charity, or also to others. The charity of which St. Paul speaks (1 Cor. 13) is not actual charity but habitual charity. Therefore the Apostle does not teach that good works, even heroic ones, are of no profit unless they are done from love of God, or unless they are referred to God through a good intention (through an act of charity), but he teaches that charisms, or graces gratuitously given, are of no profit for the merit of eternal life if they are severed from habitual charity and from sanctifying grace.³ The second opinion, besides the fact that it demands for merit a condition which the Council of Trent does not require, is pressed by another difficulty not light. Let us imagine a child baptized in infancy, who, after he has come to the use of reason, does not advert to the obligation of eliciting an act of charity, and therefore for a notable time in the state of grace does good works without having elicited an act of charity; or an adult who, justified through attrition and the sacrament of penance, lives in grace without eliciting an act of charity, since the precept is not yet urging; or finally a just man who for a notable time from inadvertence omits renewing an act of charity when the precept already urges: that all these throughout this whole time can merit nothing, after the Council of Trent there will hardly be anyone who contends it.

Note. If this opinion were not certain, supernatural intentions, especially from the motive of charity, would have to be elicited frequently by a just man: for where there is question of conditions required for merit, the probability of an opinion does not help, but only the truth. But even if the truth of these opinions is not to be doubted, the faithful are to be induced by apt motives to operating from the most perfect intentions, especially of charity frequently renewed: for the more perfect the intention of the agent is, the greater is the merit of the action. Besides this, a good intention, especially a supernatural one, renewed more often, contributes much, indeed sometimes is necessary, for efficaciously strengthening the will in the purpose of resisting even more vehement temptations and of constantly fulfilling even the more difficult Christian laws.

¹ Cf. Matt. 19:16 ff.; 25:34 ff.; 1 Tim. 6:17 ff.

² Sess. 6, c. 16, these words are read: Nothing more is to be believed to be lacking to those justified themselves, by which they should be considered to have fully and truly merited by those works which have been done in God ... eternal life to be obtained in its own time, provided nevertheless that they have departed in grace. And can. 32 has these words: If anyone shall say ... that the justified man by good works which are done by him through the grace of God and the merit of Jesus Christ, of whom he is a living member, does not truly merit increase of grace, eternal life, and the attainment of that eternal life ... and also increase of glory, let him be anathema.

³ Cf. Cornely (Cursus scripturae sacrae) on this place.

The object of law is whatever the law can command or prohibit; and since law is the means by which public power procures the end of the community, the object of law can be whatever is necessary or useful for obtaining the end of the community. From this general principle it follows that for the validity of a law it is required that its object be marked by these four properties: it must be honorable, just, possible, and useful.

136. Honorable: for every legislative power is from God; but God cannot give the power of obliging to that which is dishonorable.

a. From this it follows that a law which commands a dishonorable thing is not to be obeyed; but in doubt whether that which is commanded by law is good, generally it must be presumed to be honorable and licit.

b. Nevertheless even actions indifferent in themselves can be the matter of law: for even indifferent actions can be useful or harmful to the good of the community. Actions of this kind, by the fact that they are the matter of law, are ordered to the good of subjects and, because of the motive from which they are commanded or prohibited, become the object of some virtue; for example, to abstain from meats on a certain day becomes an exercise of mortification, to stand while praying an exercise of religion.

137. Just; law is called just from a threefold head: a. by reason of the end, because it is referred to the common good; b. by reason of the matter, because burdens are imposed upon subjects while the proportion of equality is preserved between the burdens and their faculties; c. but chiefly by reason of the author, because it does not exceed the power of the legislator. But if that is commanded which in some way is repugnant to justice, the subject per se is not held to obey.

Just and unjust law are ordinarily taken in a broader sense, so that both that law which exceeds the competence of the legislator and that law which does not exceed competence but commands what is illicit are called unjust. Therefore unjust laws are of two kinds: some which exceed the competence of the legislator, although that which is commanded is licit; others which command that which is illicit. A subject is sometimes held per accidens to obey laws of the former kind, namely when disobedience brings greater evils either to a particular person or to the community, as if political power establishes impediments of marriage or imposes unjust taxes. It is not licit to obey laws of the second kind. Concerning these are the words of Sacred Scripture: "It is necessary to obey God rather than men,"¹ and "it is better to die than to be defiled."²

¹ Acts 5:29.

² 2 Macc. 7:2.

138. Whether human law can command merely internal acts:

a. Merely internal acts are called both internal acts which have no external act joined to them, and internal acts which per accidens are joined with an external or rather mixed act. For mixed acts are of two kinds: some in which the internal act, either per se and by its nature or certainly by moral law, is required for the external act to be duly performed, for example the intention of invoking God as witness in an oath, of sorrow in confession, of attention in prayer; others in which the internal act is joined with the mixed act only per accidens, which would be duly done even without it, as a determinate intention in reciting prayer. Internal acts joined per accidens with external acts are to be referred to merely internal acts.

b. Internal acts which pertain to mixed acts either essentially or morally, not only per accidens, can be commanded in two ways: directly, if the internal act itself is commanded in itself; and indirectly, if only the external act is commanded in itself and the internal act because of its conjunction with the external act, which by another law must be duly done.

1. It is certain that human law (even civil law) can command mixed acts, namely internal acts which are so joined with external acts that the external acts would not be duly done without them. And indeed the Church commands worthy Paschal communion and fruitful reception of penance, and civil power commands an oath.

These internal acts necessarily joined with external acts are commanded, according to some, even by ecclesiastical law, only indirectly; but according to others, not only by ecclesiastical law but also by civil law, directly.

2. It is certain that civil power cannot command merely internal acts: for these directly contribute nothing to the end of civil society, since this can be sufficiently obtained even without them.

3. They dispute whether the Church can command merely internal acts. The opinion of many authors indeed teaches that merely internal acts cannot be commanded by human law, but that internal acts necessarily joined with external acts are commanded only indirectly. Nevertheless the affirmative opinion is altogether to be preferred, namely that the ecclesiastical legislator can directly command not only mixed acts, but even merely internal acts.

a. St. Thomas, Suarez, St. Alphonsus, to whom the negative is more probable (n. 100), and most others with them hold the negative opinion; Cardenas, Elbel (n. 332), Holzmann (n. 314), Ballerini-Palmieri (n. 308), Bouquillon (n. 114), to whom some others join themselves, defend the affirmative. Practically this question is not of great moment, because it rarely happens that it is expedient to command merely internal acts; but the Church, with all conceding, can command mixed acts at least indirectly. But if an ecclesiastical superior commands merely internal acts, even if his power is said to be doubtful, nevertheless one must presume for the validity of the precept and obey it. Hence if spiritual exercises are enjoined, the one upon whom they are enjoined cannot excuse himself from performing them integrally under the pretext that the superior cannot command merely internal acts.

b. Those who deny argue in this way: that cannot be commanded or prohibited by human law whose execution cannot be urged by human means and whose omission cannot be punished; for such a law would be imposed in vain. Besides this, the Church is a visible community; but the matter of laws by which a visible community is governed is only external and sensible acts. Finally, the Church never commands merely internal acts; but what the Church never does, she is judged unable to do. But those who affirm say thus: a. the Church can command whatever conduces to her end; but although the Church is a visible society, she is nevertheless also a spiritual society intending a supernatural end, to which merely internal acts are well consonant. b. Legislative power was granted to blessed Peter without limitation ("whatever you shall bind"); therefore it is not to be restricted to external acts unless this is proved by manifest arguments. c. The first argument of the prior opinion proves too much: for from it would follow that neither mixed acts nor hidden external acts can be the matter of ecclesiastical law. Besides this, merely directive power and power both directive and coercive at the same time must be distinguished. But it is not necessary that the Church command merely internal acts by power directive and coercive (external) at the same time; it suffices that she command them by directive power, even if she cannot punish their transgression. For the rest, she can punish even merely internal acts, namely by a penalty to be incurred by the very fact. Finally, d. the Church not only exercises power concerning merely internal acts, as is clear from those things which are said soon (under c.), but in fact commands merely internal acts. For example, priests celebrating Mass are commanded, after the reception of the body of Christ, to rest somewhat in meditation on the most holy sacrament, and this meditation certainly is a merely internal act; and the supreme pontiff under penalty of suspension commands that clerics to be ordained at Rome perform spiritual exercises, which are composed of mixed acts and merely internal acts (meditations, examinations).¹ The same power of prescribing spiritual exercises to the clergy of his diocese belongs also to the bishop.²

c. In the following cases all concede this power:

a. A confessor in the sacramental forum can impose merely internal acts, for example pious meditation.

b. The Church can interpret natural and divine law, which is concerned with merely internal acts; thus she can determine how often an act of faith or charity is to be elicited; how often the sacrifice of the Mass is to be applied for the people by pastors of souls.

c. She can prescribe merely internal acts as a condition for obtaining a grace; thus she prescribes meditation on the mysteries of the life and passion of the Lord for gaining the indulgence of the Way of the Cross.

d. Regular superiors can enjoin internal acts upon their subjects by reason of the vow of obedience, by which they have subjected themselves to superiors also in relation to these acts, for example mental prayer, examination of conscience.

¹ Constitution Apostolicae Sedis, V, 7.

² S.C.C., September 20, 1878. Cf. Acta Sanctae Sedis XII, p. 609 ff.

139. Possible, not only physically, but also morally: for no one is held to the impossible. Certainly, law must redound to the common good; but it would not redound to the common good if it were not morally possible. For a law which exceeds the ordinary powers of subjects is not observed by the greater part of the community; but a law which is not observed by most redounds rather to the detriment of the community. Therefore by common consent the principle is admitted: an affirmative law does not oblige with a proportionately grave inconvenience which per accidens is joined with the observance of the law.

a. That is called morally impossible which can be done only with great difficulty, namely one which in the judgment of prudent persons surpasses human powers. But since precepts, both divine and human, are of diverse necessity and gravity, the same difficulty does not excuse from observing a precept in all cases; rather, the graver the precept is, the greater must be the inconvenience to be undergone in its observance in order that one be excused from the precept.

b. The shame to be undergone in confessing one's own sin and one's own defamation to be incurred before the confessor from the accusation of sin are per se and intrinsically joined with confession of sin; therefore they do not excuse from confession. But defamation to be incurred before others because of the confession of sins is joined with confession per accidens and extrinsically; therefore it can excuse from confession.

140. Whether law can command heroic acts, namely acts which are of extraordinary difficulty.

a. Positive divine law can command heroic acts: for on the one hand God is the absolute lord of men, and on the other He can increase the powers of men, by which the observance even of a most difficult law becomes morally possible. Nevertheless, since it is not to be presumed that God wills to oblige Himself to performing miracles in the moral order, positive divine law is not judged to command heroic acts; therefore in a case of great difficulty the law is rather said to cease.

b. Human law per se cannot command heroic acts, unless either the common good demands this, or acts of this kind are enjoined upon a determinate group, because it would command what is morally impossible and therefore would furnish occasion for innumerable transgressions.

Nevertheless sometimes even human law can command very difficult acts. a. If the law is imposed upon a determinate group of men, which each one freely enters; thus nuns are obliged to perpetual enclosure, priests to perfect chastity, some religious to the service of the sick who are infected with plague. b. If the common good demands this: for the common good prevails over private good; thus soldiers are commanded, even with danger of life, to attack the enemy and not desert their station, and pastors in time of contagious disease are commanded to remain in the parish. There are, however, those who say that in this case natural law rather than positive law commands the difficult act, namely the law that the common good is to be preferred to private good.

141. Useful to the community, which must be understood in such a way that not only the matter of the law, but also the mode in which the law is commanded (whether merely penal or preceptive, prohibiting or also invalidating, obliging under grave or under light obligation), must be useful to the community: for the power of making laws has been granted for the common good.

Hence a law which was not useful to the community or which redounded only to the utility of the prince or of a few would not be a valid law, since it regards only a private good. And therefore a law loses the force of obliging when it begins to become useless or harmful to the community.

Whether law extends itself to past acts.

This must be denied: for since law is the rule of things to be done, by its nature it regards future acts. Therefore the axiom arose: law does not look backward. Nevertheless, if a new law contained a (comprehensive) declaration of a prior law, it without doubt would affect all acts placed from the time when the prior law was issued.

By performing good actions a man becomes a good man morally, and he is a bad man morally if he performs bad actions. Actions are called good or bad morally with reference to the norm or rule of human conduct. So that the morality of an action is its relation to the rule of human conduct. It will be a morally good action if it be conformed to the rule of conduct; otherwise it will be a morally bad action. As men have differed, and do differ, widely in their views as to the meaning of human life and as to man’s destiny, they naturally have differed, and do differ, widely in deciding what is the rule of human conduct. The rule in different systems will be progress, or the greatest happiness of the greatest number, or pleasure, or the categorical imperative of the individual reason. Even among Catholic philosophers and divines there is some difference of opinion as to what constitutes the fundamental norm of morality. Practically the different opinions come to much the same, especially as there is greater agreement among Catholics as to what are the formal and proximate rules of morality. The teaching of St Thomas and many others seems to be that the fundamental norm of morality is rational human nature as such. Good in general is that which is conformable to the being whose good it is; and so morally good actions will be such as are conformable to the rational nature of man considered in itself and in all its relations.. Man’s intellect can know man himself, the existence of God and our relation to him, our relations to other human beings, and to the world round about us; knowing these things, our reason can tell us what actions are becoming and what unbecoming to such a nature. Moreover, reason tells us that although we have the physical liberty to do wrong, we are nevertheless under a moral obligation to abstain from it. Our most wise, and good, and provident Creator, who has given us our nature and placed us in the position which we hold, cannot be indifferent as to the manner in which we conduct ourselves. The still, small voice of conscience is there to tell us what is right, in the name of God whose herald it is, to approve of what we do well, to condemn what we do ill. The fundamental norm of right conduct, then, is man’s moral nature, morally right conduct is conduct in conformity with man’s nature in itself and in all its relations. This constitutes right order in the moral world, which God the Creator and provident Ruler of the universe cannot but will us to observe, and this divine Will or Reason bidding us to observe right order and prohibiting its violation is the eternal law of God, the formal objective rule of morality. Human reason, applied to conduct, or conscience, is the formal subjective rule which makes known to us and applies the objective rule¹

¹ V. Frins, De Act. Hum. 2, n. 65. 2, n. 65.

The morality of a human act belongs to it inasmuch as it issues freely from the will with knowledge of its moral quality. Because it is the free product of the human will, a human or a moral act makes a man culpable or praiseworthy. Now the will alone is free, and so morality belongs properly to the internal act of the will. In a perfect human action, indeed, the external act must follow, if it is in the agent’s power, in order to the completeness and perfection of the internal act; otherwise there will be no perfect and efficacious will, But the external act, which is called free only with reference to the will from which it proceeds, cannot have any separate morality of its own, nor of itself can it add to the morality of the internal act. In a complete human act, therefore, consisting of an internal and external action, morality is formally in the internal act alone. Accidentally, on account of longer duration, or repetition, or greater intensity which the external act causes, it may add something to the goodness or malice of the internal act, but not in and by itself. A man is good or bad as his will is good or bad.

From this it must not be concluded that an external sin is the same as an internal sin; that if a man has committed fornication, it is sufficient to confess the desire and intention to do so; the malice of the internal and external acts are the same substantially, but an internal act is different from an external act; and so the sins also differ, for sin is a bad human act.

There is considerable difference of opinion as to whether, besides the division into good and bad actions, we must also admit a third class, neither good nor bad, but indifferent. In the abstract, indifferent actions certainly exist; to take a walk, for example, in itself and in the abstract, is neither a good nor a bad action. But in the concrete, a man’s intention, and the circumstances in which the action is performed, necessarily give it a moral quality. The intention must be honest or not, the circumstances must be such as to make the action conformableto right reason or not, and so in the concrete any particular action must be either right or wrong; it must be either good or bad, it cannot be indifferent. An action may of course be morally good, and yet not supernaturally meritorious, and so indifferent from a supernatural point of view; and this perhaps is the meaning of some of those divines who contradict the above teaching of St Thomas and the common opinion of the schools.¹

¹ St Thomas, 1-2, q. 18, a. 9.

An action which in itself is not conformable to right reason and order is against the law of nature and intrinsically bad. An action which in itself is not bad, but only bad because forbidden for good reasons by a lawful authority, as eating flesh meat on a day of abstinence, is said to be bad because forbidden; while intrinsically bad actions are forbidden by God because they are bad and inordinate. However, not all these intrinsically bad actions are bad in the same degree. Some are necessarily and always so, because in all circumstances they remain inordinate, as hatred of God, our first beginning and last end. Others in certain circumstances may become lawful, as taking what belongs to another, which in certain circumstances may be done without sin. The State for good reason may grant leave to take another’s land for a new railway; and a fortiori almighty God, the supreme Lord of all created things, may, without doing an injury, take the life, rights, or property of his creatures. Many divines explain the spoliation of the Egyptians, and the divine toleration of polygamy in the Old Law, by the aid of this principle.

Finally, some actions, as obscene touches and looks, are commonly inordinate and sinful; but if there is good reason for them, and due caution be exercised, they become lawful.¹

¹ Gury, I, n. 26.

We saw in the preceding section that there are various rules by which we know whether a human action is good or bad. It will be a good action if it be conformable to right order, otherwise it will be a bad action. It remains for us to cor- sider what elements in an action make it conformable or not with right order. What have we to attend to in order to know whether an action is according to right reason or not ?

There are three such elements, of which sometimes one, sometimes another, sometimes all together, contribute to make the actions in right order or, on the contrary, inordinate. They are the-object, the end, and the circumstances of the action.

By the object is here meant that to which the will primarily and directly tends; that which it determines to do looked at in itself, apart from the circumstances with which the action when done will be clothed; or it is the action considered in the abstract.

It is obvious that some objects, in the sense above defined, have an objective morality of their own, and this causes the will which tends towards them to be either good or bad as the object is good or bad. To blaspheme God is an action which no creature of his can will without the greatest inordinateness. The will to commit murder, or to steal another’s property, is essentially an evil will, because it tends to an evil object. On the contrary, to love God, to relieve human misery, to show love, honour, and reverence to one’s parents, are good actions, because these objects are good, and the will that tends to them is good.

Human actions, then, derive their specific morality from the object, whenever that object is of itself conformable to rational human nature or, on the contrary, not conformable to it. If the object is indifferent, without any objective moral quality, as walking, the action will derive its morality from the circumstances in which the action is performed.

By the end is here understood the reason or motive which induces the agent to act.

The end of all human life is called the last end; other motives for action are intermediate ends. An end is primary if it holds the first place among several, and would be sufficient by itself to induce action; otherwise it is secondary.

It is obvious that the end or motive which induces the agent to act holds a very prominent place among the sources of the morality of an action.

For it is the object to which the will tends, the prospect of gaining which moves the agent to act; but, as we saw in the last point, the motion of the will takes its moral quality from the object; a will, then, which tends to a good end will so far be good; a will which tends to a bad end will be bad. But the morality of an action resides chiefly in the will, so that a good or bad will, derived from the motive of an action, must necessarily contribute to the goodness or badness of that action. It is the end or motive which sets the will in motion and gives its own moral quality to the action which follows. One, then, who steals money in order to be able to commit adultery commits a sin against justice, induced thereto by a desire to sin against chastity, and as St Thomas, following Aristotle, says, he is more of an adulterer than a thief.¹

¹ St Thomas, 1-2, q. 18, a. 6.

The end which the agent has in view may coincide with the natural scope of the action, as when a man eats to support life. The extrinsic end is then said to correspond with the intrinsic end of the object. Or it may be different, as when a man eats merely for the sake of pleasure; and a man may be moved to action by a variety of subordinate ends, as when he eats to keep up his strength, to be able to work, to obtain the money wherewith to be able to support his family, and so fulfil his duty.

If the object of the action be good, and the extrinsic end of the agent be good also, the action will have a twofold merit. And so there is a twofold merit in giving an alms to relieve distress for the love of God. On the other hand, a grievously sinful motive corrupts and makes an otherwise good action grievously wrong. It turns the agent altogether away from God, his last end. And so it would be a mortal sin to give an alms to a poor woman in order to seduce her.

Even a venially sinful motive, if it be the whole or the primary motive for the action, corrupts the whole act and makes it venially sinful; for then a bad object is sought by good means indeed, but the means are infected with the purpose to which they are prostituted. And so one who preaches merely out of vanity commits a venial sin.

If, however, an end be only venially sinful, and be not the whole or primary motive of the agent, the resulting action will be partly good and partly evil. We suppose that the object is good, a partial motive or motives are also good; in this case a partial and secondary bad motive, which is only venially sinful, cannot corrupt the whole action. One who preaches principally out of obedience, but more willingly because his vanity is flattered, performs an action which is substantially good, but which is infected with a slight defect.

A good motive gives its own moral quality to an indifferent action and makes it good. And so I do an act of charity by depriving a man of a knife with which he was threatening to commit suicide, while the same action done with a view to making the knife my own would be theft.

There is a controversy among theologians as to whether the purpose or intention with which an action is performed can make an action unjust, which, apart from that intention, is not so.

Would a man, for example, be guilty of an act of injustice towards his enemy, and bound to make restitution to him, if he committed a crime, foreseeing and intending that it should be imputed to his enemy, who would be punished for it? Of course he is guilty of a grave sin by giving way to such an act of hatred, and if by any means he procures the false accusation of his enemy he is also guilty of injustice by causing his undeserved punishment. But supposing the false accusation, though foreseen, was in no way procured by him, but was brought about by other causes, would his intention make him guilty of injustice towards his enemy and bound to make restitution to him ? Many theologians affirm that it would,¹ but seeing that the false accusation is indeed occasioned by the crime, but not caused by it, it would seem that the bad intention of the man who committed the crime was incapable of supplying the . causal connection between the crime and the false accusation. The intention alone cannot change the nature of the external action. But if this be so, he is not the effective cause of the injury done to his enemy, and he is not bound to make restitution to him, A good intention certainly cannot make a bad action good. It is not lawful to tell a lie even to save another’s life, according to the teaching of Innocent III. Evil must not be done that good may come of it. This is the teaching of Holy Scripture and of the Catholic Church, nor have Jesuits any other doctrine different from that of the Church. Father Dasbach promised to give anyone two thousand florins who would prove in open court that the Jesuits had ever taught that the end justifies the means, Count Paul von Hoensbroech undertook to do so, but he failed in his suit when it was tried at Cologne in the spring of 1905.² Here we must touch upon a question which has raised a good deal of controversy among divines, and which still divides them. Some, following the great St Augustine, hold that it is a venial sin to eat and to perform other operations of our animal nature for the sake of the pleasure which they give us. Others, on the contrary, hold that the sensible pleasure which accompanies the satisfaction of our animal appetites is good, inasmuch as it is natural and intended by the Author of nature, and so to perform actions which are not wrong in themselves from the motive of pleasure cannot be sinful. If it were not for the sake of the pleasure afforded by eating and by other animal functions many men would abstain from them altogether through disgust. The imperious Stimulus of our fleshly appetites and their satisfaction is required for the preservation and increase of the human race. These satisfactions of our animal nature must indeed be ruled and moderated by right reason, the norm of human conduct. If they are thus moderated, they are conformable to man’s nature, they are in right order and morally good. This seems to be the teaching of St Thomas;³ it is the commoner opinion among modern theologians, nor is it involved in the condemnation of the eighth and ninth propositions condemned by Innocent XI on March 2, 1679.⁴

¹ Lugo, De Justitia, disp. 8, n. 75.

² Civilta Cattolica, Oct. 7, 1905, p. 3.

³ Cont. Gent. 3, c. 9, n. 1; Summa, 2-2, q. 141, a. I, ad I.

⁴ V. Frins, De Act. Hum. 2, n. 505.

By the circumstances of an action we understand certain accidental conditions, which, as it were, surround (circumstant) and complete the substance of the action. enumerated in the doggerel line— There are seven Who, what, where, when, by what means, why, and how.

The circumstance indicated by who does not signify the agent merely as the author of the action; the action must necessarily be done by someone; but it signifies some special quality in him or condition which affects the morality of the action. Thus if a son strike his father, the circumstance of the parental relation changes the morality of the act, and makes it a sin not only against justice, but also against the fourth commandment or the virtue of piety. If a thief steals a consecrated chalice, the sacredness of the object makes the sin a sacrilegious theft, a circumstance indicated by what. And so of the rest.

It is obvious that circumstances of this kind are sources of morality, for they make the action conformable or not to the norm of morality. It is against right reason to strike anyone unjustly, but it is still more inordinate to strike a parent. At the proper time it is a good action to play in the proper place and with good playmates; if any of these circumstances be wanting, the action becomes so far bad.

Some circumstances affecting the intensity, or quantity, or duration of an action add to or lessen its malice, but they do not change its moral species; such circumstances are called aggravating circumstances. Although they do not change the moral species of the act, they sometimes make a venial sin mortal, or vice versa, as the quantity in theft; they are then said to change the theological species of the action. If the circumstances add to the action a special and distinct malice of their own, they change its moral species, as the sacred object or place in a sacrilegious theft. Such a theft is not only against justice, but also against the virtue of religion.

In order that an action may be altogether and simply good, the object, the end, and the circumstances must all be good; for good indicates completeness and perfection; there is evil in any defect. If all the sources of morality are evil, the action may have a triple malice; as when a thief steals Church plate in order to be able to indulge his vicious propensities. If only one source or circumstance of an action be mortally sinful, the perpetration of it turns the evil-doer away from God and makes the action wholly bad. An accidental and secondary circumstance, when only venially sinful, does not corrupt the whole action; it only lessens its merit. Thus it is a grievous sacrilege to receive Holy Communion in a state of mortal sin; a state of venial sin only makes the Communion less fruitful.

It follows from what has been said in the preceding section, that an action will be morally good if the object, end, and circumstances are good, The object, end, and circumstances will be good if they are conformable to man’s rational nature and to the eternal law of God. An opinion was held by some theologians that besides these conditions it is necessary to refer, actually or at least virtually, all our actions to God; otherwise they will at least be venially sinful. These theologians rested their opinion on certain texts of Holy Scripture and on passages from some of the Fathers, especially St Augustine. The principal Scripture text is from St Paul’s First Epistle to the Corinthians, x 31: “‘ Therefore whether you eat, or drink, or whatsoever else you do; do all to the glory of God.” There are various interpretations of the passage, but the meaning seems plain from the context. St Paul is teaching the Corinthians the duty of avoiding scandal to Jews, Gentiles, and to the Church of God. They must so order their actions, even those that are indifferent in themselves, such as eating certain kinds of food, as not to be a cause of offence to others. Then will their actions all tend to the honour and glory of God, then will they do all things in charity (1 Cor. xv 14). There is obviously no word here which can be legitimately construed into a command to direct all our actions to God by an actual or virtual intention of the will. Such a merely internal act would not tend to edify others, and in the text quoted this is what St Paul is urging the Corinthians to do. Other passages which are quoted in support of the opinion are similarly capable of being explained in a sense which affords the opinion no support. It is indeed a truth, which is insisted on by other theologians, that if an action be honest and good and performed because it is conformable to right order, it is thereby implicitly directed to God, who wills the observance of right order, and who is himself the end to which rightly ordered action tends. In this sense it is true that every good action must be referred to God; but every good action is thus referred to him by the very fact that the object, the end, and the circumstances are good.¹

¹ V. Frins, De Act. Hum. 2, n. 290.

Something else is required to make a naturally good action supernaturally meritorious. The question of merit belongs to the dogmatic treatise on grace; here it will be sufficient to give something about the subject in outline, in order to round off our treatment of human acts.

Merit in general is a certain value in an action which gives the agent the right to be rewarded by him in whose behalf the action is performed. Merit, then, with God will bea to be rewarded for one’s actions by God. right Theologians distinguish between condign and congruous merit. The former implies that there is some sort of equality between the value of the action and the reward, so that the reward is due to the agent in justice. If there is not this equality and title in justice, the merit will be only congruous. We can merit condignly an increase of grace, life eternal, and an increase of glory, as the Council of Trent defined.¹ Efficacious graces, by which we receive, preserve, and increase sanctifying grace, and the gift of final perseverance, are the objects of congruous merit.

¹ Trent, sess. 6, can. 32.

In order that an action may be condignly meritorious, two conditions are required on the part of the agent, two on the part of the action, and one on the part of God.

The agent must be still on his probation in this present life; there is no meriting when man’s day is done. He must also be in the state of grace and friendship with God; the actions of one who is out of grace and who is a rebel and an enemy of God cannot deserve any reward from him.

The action itself must be morally good, not bad, as is obvious; and it must be supernatural, elicited by means of grace and from a motive which is rooted in faith. Otherwise it will be merely of the natural order, deserving indeed of a natural reward, but having no proportion to the supernatural end to which we know by faith that man is destined by God.

On the part of God there must be a promise made by him to grant such a reward to such an action. For otherwise, after doing all that we can, we must acknowledge that we are useless servants, who cannot claim anything as due to them in justice from God, their Creator and Lord. He has every claim to our service without our having a strict right to any reward in return. According to the very probable teaching of St Thomas,¹ all the deliberate actions of one who is in a state of grace are either meritorious or sinful. In order to be in a state of grace, such a one must have fulfilled all the duties which bind him under pain of grievous sin, and among these is the obligation of eliciting at the proper times an act of love of God. By such an act the just man refers himself and all he does to God, and thus his good actions are elicited by the help of grace and tend to man’s supernatural end, the beatific vision of God. In any case, if we are careful frequently to renew our intention of pleasing God, and with his grace remain free from mortal sin, we may rest in the assured hope that all our good actions are meritorious of life eternal.

¹ De Malo, q. 2, a. 5, obj. 10; in lib. 2, dist. 40, a. 5, ad 6.

We shall speak first of morality in general, then of morality considered according to its supreme species, namely concerning the good, evil, and indifferent act.

The sources of morality are called those things from which a human act takes, or, as from sources, draws, its morality, that is, goodness or malice. The sources are: the object and circumstance of the act, and finally the end on account of which it is placed. They are sources of morality because and insofar as they themselves are subject to the rules of morals, so that morality can be contracted from them. We shall speak of each.

The species, at least the supreme species, of morality are goodness, indifference, and malice (n. 62). Hence:

(Summa Theologica, I-II, qq. 18-20.)

In order that an act be a means by which man may tend to his Last End, it is not sufficient that it be human (proceeding from knowledge and will); it must also be morally good.

What is the division of the treatment of human acts in relation to the end? - We have spoken of human acts in relation to man, who through them orders himself to the ultimate end of human life, or beatitude. We must now speak of the same acts in order to the aforesaid end; or of the morality of those same acts. For the order of human acts to the common end of human life constitutes the moral order, or the morality of human acts. First, however, we must speak generally of morality itself; then of the various sources of this morality in human acts. S. Th. 1. 2. q. 21. a. 2 ad 2.

What is the generic and specific notion of the morality of human acts? - Moral is said from mos, which is a repeated mode of acting in free acts. Hence a moral act and a free, human, voluntary act are the same in reality, but not in notion. For morality adds to a free, human, voluntary act a relation or bearing toward the rule and norm directing it; and this norm, namely the supreme norm, is the end, the ultimate end of the whole of human life. Therefore human acts can be considered either generically, all of them, or specifically, these or those. If they are considered generically, insofar as they are human acts, they are capable of leading man to the end, namely to the ultimate end, in whose possession happiness and beatitude and his full perfection consist. For through them man orders and leads himself to the end. S. Th. 1. 2. q. 1. a. 1. 2; q. 2. a. 2.

If they are considered specifically as these or those acts, insofar as they are such acts, they actually order and lead, or do not, to the end, according as they are or are not conformed to the end. And thus, for example, knowledge of God, love of God, by their nature order and lead man to the end; ignorance of God, hatred of God, by their nature turn man away from and remove him from the end. If human acts are regarded in the first way, generally, they are called moral. If, in the second way, they are considered as constituted in a particular species, they are called morally good or evil, honorable or shameful. "Good and evil," says S. Th. 1. 2. q. 18. a. 5, "diversify the species in moral acts." Therefore morality constitutes the genus; goodness or malice the species.

What is the adequate nature of morality? - By morality is commonly understood the bearing of human acts toward their proper norm and rule, according to which they are ordered and directed. And thus also commonly, the genus being taken for the species, acts are distinguished as moral and immoral, to designate upright human acts and voluntary acts deficient from their proper rectitude. Now morality, according to its primary and fundamental concept, considered generically, can be defined as: the capacity which human actions have in themselves to be good or evil in order to the end of creation, that is, to be conformable or suitable, or not, for attaining this end; but considered specifically, it is the notion of conformity or deformity which human actions have in themselves in order to the end of creation, as means to the end, namely insofar as they are suitable or unsuitable to lead man, or not, to his end.

For by the morality of human acts is commonly understood the notion of rectitude or non-rectitude of those same human acts; and since human acts are means to the common end of human life, the end is the rule and measure of that rectitude or non-rectitude. "Rectitude of the will... is nothing other than the due order of the will to the ultimate end." S. Th. 1. 2. q. 5. a. 7; Ethic. l. 6, lect. 2.

Again, by morality is understood that acts are according to reason or apart from reason: now reason manifests this and dictates that this is to be followed in human acts, namely that the end of creation is to be attained by acts congruent and conformable to it. Likewise by moral goodness or malice is commonly understood that human acts are ordered to that end, are according to right reason ordering one's proper acts to the aforesaid end, or apart from this right reason. Hence the goodness of acts exists insofar as they are useful for man's end. S. Th. 1. 2. q. 7. a. 2, a. 4 ad 2. And consequently from that end, and from the object ordered or not ordered to that end, the human act is constituted in the species of a morally good act or a morally evil act. S. Thomas 2. 2. q. 153. a. 2.

According to its primary and fundamental concept; for proximately and formally that conformity or suitability, deformity or unsuitability, is only from law, which is manifested through right reason. For by the very fact that law commands something to be done or omitted, it formally and proximately constitutes that thing in the notion of a means in order to attaining the end, the use of such a means producing an obligation in conscience. Hence rightly S. Alph. 1. 5. n. 3. 4 says: "The moral goodness of a human act consists in a certain conformity and suitability of the free act with right reason and law." S. Th. q. 18. 19. 20; Suarez tr. 3. d. 1, d. 2. s. 1. 2, d. 3. s. 2. 3, d. 7. s. 1-6, d. 10, d. 11.

"In those things," says S. Th., "which are done through the will, the proximate rule is human reason, but the supreme rule is eternal law.... Every voluntary act is evil by the fact that it departs from the order of reason and of eternal law. Hence it follows that a human act, by the fact that it is good or evil, has the notion of rectitude or of sin." 1. 2. q. 21. a. 1. "The rule of the human will is twofold: one proximate and homogeneous, namely human reason; the other is the first rule, namely eternal law, which is, as it were, the reason of God." 1. 2. q. 71. a. 6. "It must be said," says S. Th. 1. 2. q. 19. a. 4, "that in all ordered causes, the effect depends more on the first cause than on the second cause, because the second cause acts only in virtue of the first cause.

But the fact that human reason is the rule of the human will, by which its goodness is measured, it has from eternal law, which is divine reason. Hence in Ps. 4 it is said: Many say, Who shows us good things? The light of thy countenance, O Lord, is signed upon us: as if he were saying: the light of reason which is in us can show us good things and regulate our will insofar as it is the light of thy countenance, that is, derived from thy countenance. Hence it is manifest that the goodness of the human will depends much more on eternal law than on human reason." On human reason.

For since eternal law is unknown to us according as it is in the divine mind, yet becomes known to us through natural reason, hence reason itself too is a rule and norm of human acts, and indeed the proximate one, as presenting immediately to the will good or evil according to eternal law. But this proximate rule is subjective, merely proposing the object; law is the proximate objective rule, constituting rectitude. But what is said of eternal law must be understood of any law whatever: since any law is an ordinance of reason, constituting the order and rectitude of human acts to the end; nor indeed are all human acts commanded or prohibited by eternal law itself.

Hence many human acts are commanded or prohibited only by positive law; and thus they are proximately and formally constituted in the notion of a necessary means to the end. Laws, "if indeed they are just, have the power of obliging in the forum of conscience from eternal law, from which they are derived, according to that saying of Prov. 8:15, By me kings reign and lawgivers decree just things." S. Th. 1. 2. q. 96. a. 4. - Lugo De Incarn. d. 5. n. 75; Less. De Perfect. divin. l. 13. c. 26; E. M. Wherefore "he who sins acts both against reason, and against human law, and against divine law." S. Th. 1. 2. q. 87. a. 1; and "that is licit which is prohibited by no law." S. Th. 4. D. 15. q. 2. a. 4. Wirceburg. c. 3. art. 3. 4. 5; E. M. 6. 69. 79.

Is the twofold assigned rule of morality universal? - The remote and fundamental norm of morality, namely man's ultimate end, embraces all human acts; otherwise it would no longer be the remote and fundamental rule of morality. The reason is evident, because all human acts are means to the end of the whole of human life. Yet not all have the same bearing toward this end; for some are ordered per se, namely by their intrinsic nature ordered to this end, as, for example, knowledge and love of God, love of neighbor, justice to be observed toward others, etc.; and these acts are called intrinsically good, and because they are good, namely intimately and necessarily consonant with the order of reason, therefore they are then commanded by the natural law. Others, on the contrary, are per se opposed, or by their intrinsic nature discordant from the common end of human life, as, for example, blasphemy, perjury, sacrilege, theft, etc.; and these acts are called intrinsically evil, and because they are evil, namely intimately and necessarily discordant from the order of reason, therefore they are then prohibited by the natural law. Finally there are acts which per se, or by their intrinsic nature, are not necessarily connected with the aforesaid end, and consequently with the order of reason, as, for example, to converse with a friend, to go into the country, etc.; and these acts are called intrinsically indifferent. Therefore by the necessity of attaining the end these acts neither must necessarily be placed, nor must necessarily be omitted; but if someone freely wishes to place them, he certainly must exercise them in such a way, by the very necessity of attaining the end, that he does not withdraw from the end, but always tends toward the end, since for this reason nature itself gave man the faculty of acting freely, that through free action he might lead himself to the end. Hence by the very fact that the act, namely the act in the concrete, is not opposed to the end, it is already at least in some way consonant with the end, and morally good. S. Th. 2. D. 40. q. 1. a. 5.

Likewise the proximate and formal rule, namely law, embraces all human acts: for it commands some, prohibits others; but those which it neither commands nor prohibits, but permits either positively or negatively, must, by the same commanding law, be performed in such a way that they are not opposed to the order and rectitude of reason; and thus acts of this kind are by that very fact morally good, since, if in effecting them the order of reason is observed, they are already suitable to reason, and morally good and honorable. E. M. 6. 69. 79.

You will resolve: 1. And from this it is clear what the order and rectitude of reason signifies, namely it imports the proportion of the means to the end, which reason does not make, but knows and proposes to the will. And thus A. D. says that moral good is that which is suitable to the order of reason; likewise honorable good, that which is suitable to the rectitude of reason. S. Th. 1. 2. q. 18. a. 8; q. 39. a. 2. The rectitude of human acts exists according as the human will is regulated by the divine will, S. Th. 1. p. q. 63. a. 1, or according as it has order to the end, 1. 2. q. 7. a. 2.

2. Therefore it must be concluded that those things are morally good or evil which are suitable to rational nature and to law, or unsuitable to it, in order to the ultimate end, to which the same nature is destined. Nor indeed is it necessary that they be informed by the motive of charity, or even that they be referred to God from a supernatural motive. E. M. 7. 54. 58. 69. 75. 79. - Likewise it must be concluded that it is wholly erroneous to assign as the supreme rule of human actions either human nature itself or even human reason itself, whose part is only to manifest the rule. For otherwise, if human reason itself were the rule of rectitude, it certainly could never decline from it. S. Th. 1. p. q. 63. a. 1.

Whether morality, or moral goodness or malice, is found only in the interior act of the will, or also in the exterior act? - Morality formally is only in the interior, free act of the will; materially, however, it is only also in the exterior act. For a twofold moral goodness or malice can be distinguished in the exterior act. First, the objective moral goodness or malice of the exterior act can be considered, which that act has of itself, namely from its proper object and circumstances, by which it is objectively affected, according to the right order of reason. Goodness or malice of this kind, which the exterior act has in itself because of due or undue matter and due or undue circumstances, is derived from reason, according as that object and those circumstances exhibit the rectitude of reason or a deviation from the right order of reason. This objective goodness or malice of the exterior act is prior to the goodness or malice of the act of the will. And thus the exterior act is the object of the will, insofar as it is proposed to the will by reason as a certain good apprehended and ordered by reason, or as departing from this order; and it causes moral goodness or malice in the will.

Second, moral goodness or malice can be considered in the exterior act in order to the end, according as this exterior act stands under the interior act of the will. For the end is the proper object of the will. And thus the notion of good or evil which the exterior act has from order to the end is found first in the act of the will, and is derived from it to the exterior act. Moreover, insofar as the exterior act consists in the execution of the work, it is an effect of the will and follows the will. The will is then compared to the exterior act as an efficient cause; hence the moral goodness or malice of the act of the will is the form of the exterior act, as existing in the acting cause, S. Th. 1. 2. q. 20. a. 1. Therefore "the goodness of the end redounds from the will into the exterior act, and the goodness of the matter and circumstances redounds into the act of the will," S. Th. 1. 2. q. 20. a. 3.

Now the exterior act and the interior act of the will, as they are considered in the genus of morals, are one human act, ib. If the human act is considered adequately in this way, the formal moral goodness or malice of the human act is intrinsically only in the interior act of the will, but in the exterior act only by extrinsic denomination. For the morality of a human act, formally considered, is found only in a free act, and freedom formally is only in the will. Likewise formal moral goodness is from order to the end, which is the proper object of the will, q. 20. a. 1. Hence it is clear that in the exterior act moral goodness of this kind, which is according to order to the end, depends wholly on the will, ib. a. 2.

But that "goodness of the exterior act which it has from matter and circumstances is other than the goodness which is from the end; it is not, however, other than the goodness of the will which it has from the very act willed, but is compared to it as its reason and cause," q. 20. a. 4 ad 2. This is confirmed, "for however much the exterior act may seem good in itself and conformable to reason, nevertheless if it is commanded by an evil internal act or depraved intention and election, it is not good insofar as it is a human act. Therefore this is a sign that in the notion of a human act it is good only by denomination from the interior act. A similar argument is this: because the exterior act precisely and taken in itself does not add formal moral goodness to a man, nor render him more virtuous. For if we understand someone who, thinking that he can execute the exterior act of virtue, has an efficacious will to exercise such an act, he is upright and virtuous, whether he can really execute it or not, because virtue does not depend on a faculty which can be lacking to us unwillingly, but on the will, supposing that the will is equal.... This doctrine concerning external acts proceeds in the same way in acts of the intellect and of the sensitive appetite." Suarez tr. 3. d. 10, s. 1. n. 6. 11. "What is clearer than that the will is reputed as the deed, where necessity excludes the deed?" S. Bernard Ep. 77; Gen. 22:16; Matt. 5:28. The will, namely a will efficacious of itself. E. M. 6. 71. 72.

Does the external act add morality in some way to the internal act? "It must be said first, that the exterior act of itself does not bear an increase of goodness or malice, if the other things are equal, in the interior act. Thus D. Th. 1. 2. q. 20. a. 4.... because the exterior act does not have a goodness distinct from the interior, and necessarily follows from it if it is in our power; but if it is not in our power, it does not diminish the goodness of the will.... Second, it must be said that external action is sometimes necessary for the goodness of the will, or for such goodness.... For when it is in man's power to execute an external action, he cannot have a perfect interior will unless he executes the exterior action, because the exterior act is the term and end of the interior, and because an absolutely perfect will is one that acts when it can.... Third, it must be said that accidentally the exterior act can increase goodness or malice simply.... For 1. because of the exterior act a man often endures and perseveres more in the interior act; indeed he often multiplies interior acts, and in this way it is morally worse to kill. 2. Because the exterior action itself both kindles the affection, and thus contributes to the interior act, in the way in which vocal prayer is accustomed to contribute to interior devotion. 3. External actions are useful for moderating the passions and habituating the body, so that it may more easily serve justice.... It must also be added that good external acts are useful for the effect of satisfaction for temporal punishment due for sin, because satisfaction is taken not only from goodness, but especially from the penal character of the act; but the exterior act of itself brings its own pain and sorrow. Finally it must be added that exterior acts are necessary for certain effects of grace, which are conferred either ex opere operato, or from a special privilege; such as are the effects of the sacraments and the effects of martyrdom, and any others that are similar, because, since these effects do not depend on the mind alone of the one acting, they have been promised to one exercising such a work not only in affection, but also in effect; and in the same way on the contrary, evil external acts, or even their effects, are necessary for incurring certain punishments or censures, which are not incurred by the internal act alone." Suarez tr. 3. d. 10. s. 2. n. 2. 3. 4. 6; Wirceburg. c. 3. a. 1; L. 1. 2. n. 42; S. Th. 1. 2. q. 13. a. 5 ad 1, q. 20. a. 5, 2. D. 40. a. 3; E. M. 71. 72.

Can the same exterior act be good and evil? - "It must be said that nothing prevents something from being one according as it is in one genus, and multiple according as it is referred to another genus.... And according to this nothing prevents some act from being one according as it is referred to the genus of nature, which nevertheless is not one according as it is referred to the genus of morals.... For continuous walking is one act according to the genus of nature; yet it can happen that there are many according to the genus of morals, if the will of the walker is changed, which is the principle of moral acts. Therefore if one act is taken as it is in the genus of morals, it is impossible that it be good and evil by moral goodness and malice; and yet if it is one by the unity of nature and not by the unity of morals, it can be good and evil." S. Th. 1. 2. q. 20. a. 6.

Are there indifferent human acts, that is, acts which are neither morally good nor morally evil, neither honorable nor shameful? - If human acts are considered in the abstract, or according to their species, which they have intrinsically from their proper object, abstraction being made from the end and from determining circumstances, then there certainly are indifferent acts, namely those which from their species are neither evil nor good, just as man considered in himself, or according to his species, is neither virtuous nor vicious. And the reason is that every object has some goodness or malice, at least natural; yet it does not always import moral goodness or malice, which is considered by comparison to the order, namely of reason. For not every object of a human act includes something pertaining to this order of reason: indeed not all actions are per se necessarily connected with the ultimate end, nor are all commanded or prohibited by law, but many are merely permitted, such as to walk, to go into the field, to lift a straw from the ground, and the like. Therefore such acts according to their species are indifferent. S. Th. 1. 2. q. 18. a. 8.

But if human acts are considered in the individual, or concretely, namely according as they are determined both by particular circumstances and by the end, the Scotists affirm that indifferent acts are given in the individual. The reason is that no certain law commands that they be directed to the ultimate end of human life, namely God, nor that one always act from a higher motive of honorableness and virtue; but, given human frailty and weakness, God himself permits man to act from this very weakness and frailty for the necessity and convenience of nature itself, as, for example, sometimes to eat more sumptuously, to arrange banquets, to be refreshed by the sight of the sky, the field, etc. Therefore these and other similar actions can be exercised from a merely indifferent end. And the same should be said of a greater good which is often omitted; this omission is neither good nor evil, but indifferent. From this, however, it follows that there are human acts which are not moral.

The Thomists, on the contrary, deny that there are indifferent acts in the individual, and more truly. The reason is that either someone does a thing necessary, useful, suitable to rational nature, namely to the soul, the body, or external things ordered to both; or he does a thing wholly useless and idle. If the first, this action tends to an end naturally good, and is good. If the second, he does a thing unsuitable to rational nature, as being at least superfluous; for reason dictates that entities are not to be multiplied without necessity, or utility, or some suitability. Besides, since it is proper to reason to direct and order to a due end human acts which are done from deliberation, either a human act is actually ordered to the due end, and has the notion of good, or it is not ordered to the due end, and then by this very fact it is opposed to right reason, and has the notion of evil. Certainly the indifferent will cannot pursue something indifferent, but good, either according to reason or according to sense. From this it follows that there are no human acts which are not at the same time moral. "For moral acts and human acts are the same." S. Th. 1. 2. q. 1. a. 3, 2. D. 40. q. 1. a. 5; Suarez tr. 3. d. 9. s. 3.

And from the reason adduced it is brilliantly clear that those indifferent acts of the Scotists are not really such, but are morally honorable; for if they are done because of necessity, utility, suitability, they are according to the order of reason, and consequently morally honorable. Indeed both to eat more sumptuously at times, and to arrange banquets, and to be refreshed in mind and body, are acts according to reason, if these things are kept within due limits. Therefore those acts are truly done from the motive of honorableness and virtue, although they are done from natural frailty, necessity, utility, suitability: since honorableness and virtue consist in this, that the rectitude of reason be preserved. They are moreover also ordered to God, at least implicitly, although not explicitly, as we shall explain more shortly, since by the very fact that they are according to reason and good, they are referred to God by their own nature. Therefore the omission also of a greater good, which takes place because of the good work which someone does, with no evil circumstance mixed with it, is not evil, nor is it indifferent; but good. "And he who joins his virgin in marriage does well; and he who does not join her does better." 1 Cor. 7:38. Good, namely if someone, acting well, adverts to the aforesaid omission; otherwise it is neither a human act nor moral, consequently. S. Th. 1. 2. q. 18. a. 9, q. 24. a. 2, q. 39. a. 2, 2. 2. q. 23. a. 3, q. 141. a. 6 ad 2, q. 145. a. 1. 3, q. 168. a. 3 ad 3, q. 169. a. 1 ad 1, S. q. 49. a. 2 ad 6; L. tr. De Act. hum. XLI seq.; Wirceburg. c. 3. a. 2; E. M.

Is it necessary for the moral goodness of human acts to direct all actions to the glory of God; and do human acts, insofar as they are good or evil, have the notion of merit or demerit before God? - R. To the 1st: The more common and truer opinion affirms it. The reason is most clearly evident from what has been said; since every moral action, in order that it be good, must tend to the ultimate end and be ordered to it by reason. But if a human action tends and is ordered to the ultimate end, it is already directed to the glory of God. Therefore it is as necessary to direct all actions to the glory of God as it is necessary for them to be morally good. "The goodness of the will depends on the intention of the end: but the ultimate end of the human will is the highest good, which is God. Therefore it is required for the goodness of the human will that it be ordered to the highest good." S. Th. 1. 2. q. 19. a. 9. "The whole that man is, and what he can and has, must be ordered to God." S. Th. 1. 2. q. 22. a. 4 ad 3. - 1 Cor. 10:31.

Hence it is enough to direct them to God virtually on the part of the work, or by the very act exercised, namely by acting for the end of some virtue, or for what is honorable and consonant with rational nature; for such an act tends to the glory of God from its intrinsic nature. To the point S. Th. 1. 2. q. 8. a. 3 ad 2: "Whenever someone wills those things which are for the end, he wills the end by the same act; but not conversely." And q. 21. a. 4: "He who does an evil act not referable to God does not preserve the honor of God which is due to the ultimate end." Cajetan on the same q. 8. a. 3: "one who always seeks what is for the end seeks the end, not habitually, but actually, as actually extends itself to virtually. For virtually to use something is within the breadth of actual use; otherwise that precept would never be fulfilled: Do all things for the glory of God; for to do imports to operate actually."

Much more, moreover, is it enough to direct all actions to God virtually on the part of the one operating himself, who by an act of charity has ordered his whole life to God and remains in habitual charity. Cajetan says this on 1. 2. q. 8. a. 3: "Between the movement of the will toward something habitually and actually, there is the middle movement of the will toward it virtually.... For when one having charity sins venially, he indeed habitually loves God, but not actually, as is clear, nor virtually, because sin is not directable to God. But when one having charity walks or preaches, and whatever else he does not do evilly, although he does not actually think of God, nevertheless that act is not only an act of such virtue, but of charity, and the will then is borne virtually toward God, and not only habitually, which belongs to one sleeping and to one sinning venially." S. Th. 2. D. 10. q. 1, a. 5; E. M.

R. To the 2nd: A human act has the notion of laudable or blameworthy, or of fault, from the fact that it is from the power of free will: "For to be praised or blamed is nothing other than to impute to someone the malice or goodness of his act." S. Th. 1. 2. q. 21. a. 2. It has the notion of good or evil from the fact that it is suitable or unsuitable to right reason. It has the notion of rectitude from the fact that it has order to the end. It has the notion of honorable or of sin from the fact that it is conformable or deformable to law. Finally it has the notion of merit or demerit according to the retribution of justice toward another, from the fact that it is performed in service of another. Retribution is made to someone from the fact that he acts for the advancement or harm of another. By giving something from those things which are in our dominion, we acquire for ourselves a certain right to receive something from another's. S. Th. De Verit. q. 29. a. 6. Therefore from the fact that a human act is referred to God as to the ultimate end, and consequently promotes his honor and glory, and God is the governor and ruler of the whole universe, to whom it belongs to make retribution for those things which are done well or badly in it, human acts have before God the notion of natural merit or demerit. For a human act considered precisely according to its moral goodness, in the present order of divine providence, is not formally meritorious of grace and eternal life; for grace is necessary for supernatural merit, by which it is elevated to a supernatural condition. Materially, however, such an act is capable of becoming meritorious of supernatural reward, presupposing divine ordination and grace being added. For if these are removed, there is had only natural merit toward a merely natural reward, from the fact that good works yield to God's service. S. Th. 1. 2. q. 5. a. 7, q. 21. a. 2. 3. 4, q. 114. a. 1. 2; Wirceburg. c. 3. a. 3; E. M. 75. 89.

1. Human or moral acts, as has already been said in the preceding Commentary, are divided into two species; for some are morally good, others morally evil. For differences which are such of themselves diversify the species. Good and evil, as being that which is according to nature or contrary to nature, namely according to the fittingness or requirement of nature, or contrary to this fittingness and requirement, are differences of themselves, and consequently constitute diverse species. For the good for each thing is what agrees with it according to its form, and evil is what is beyond the order of its form. Whence evil is commonly defined as the privation of due form. Therefore, just as in natural things good and evil, which are according to nature and contrary to nature, diversify the species of nature, for a dead body and a living body are not of the same species, similarly in morals, good insofar as it is according to reason, and evil insofar as it is contrary to reason, diversify the moral species, since acts are called moral insofar as they are from reason: reason is the principle of moral acts. St. Thomas, 1. 2. q. 18. a. 5; q. 19. a. 1 ad 3. — It is confirmed: “good and evil are differences of the act of the will of themselves. For good and evil pertain of themselves to the will, just as true and false pertain to reason, whose acts are distinguished of themselves as true and false, as when we say that an opinion is true or false. Whence a good will and an evil will are acts differing according to species.” St. Thomas, 1. 2. q. 19. a. 1. Indeed the difference of species in acts is according to objects. For every act has its species from its object; whence it is necessary that some difference of the object make diversity of species in acts. But this is that which through itself and not accidentally, with respect to the faculty whence the act proceeds, because nothing that is accidental constitutes a species, but only what is of itself. And thus knowledge of sound and of color, with respect to the intellect, do not differ of themselves, and consequently the acts are not diverse in species; but they differ of themselves with respect to sense, and consequently by comparison to sense the acts are diverse in species. But the differences of good and evil are differences of themselves by comparison to the will; for good, which is the proper object of the will, is what is fitting to the rational will, and evil is what is unfitting to the rational will, namely what fits the will according to reason or is unfitting to it according to reason. “The good of man is to be according to reason, but evil is what is beyond reason.” St. Thomas, 1. 2. q. 18. a. 5; q. 19. a. 1.

2. Here the question is raised whether there are indifferent human acts, i.e. acts which are neither morally good nor morally evil, neither honorable nor base. — If human acts are considered in the abstract, or according to their species, which they intrinsically have from their proper object, with precision made from the end and from determining circumstances, then indeed there are indifferent acts, namely those which from their species are neither evil nor good, just as man according to himself, or according to his species, is neither virtuous nor vicious. And the reason is that every object has some goodness or malice, at least natural; nevertheless it does not always import moral goodness or malice, which is considered by comparison to reason, namely to the order of reason. For not every object of a human act includes something pertaining to this order of reason: indeed not all actions are of themselves necessarily connected with the ultimate end, nor are all commanded by law or prohibited by law, but many are merely permitted, such as to walk, to go into the field, to lift a straw from the ground, and things of this sort. Therefore such acts according to their species are indifferent. St. Thomas, 1. 2. q. 18. a. 8. — But if human acts are considered in the individual, or concretely, namely according as they are determined both by particular circumstances and by the end, the Scotists affirm that there are indifferent acts in the individual. The reason is that no certain law commands that they be directed to the ultimate end of human life, namely God, nor that one always act from a higher motive of honorableness and virtue; but, human frailty and infirmity being considered, God Himself permits man to act from this very infirmity and frailty on account of the necessity and advantage of nature itself, as, for example, sometimes to eat more abundantly, to hold banquets, to be refreshed by the sight of the sky, a field, etc. Therefore these and other similar actions can be exercised from a merely indifferent end. The Thomists, on the contrary, deny that indifferent acts are given in the individual, and more truly. And this indeed is the opinion of the Angelic Doctor. The reason is that either someone does a thing necessary, useful, fitting to rational nature, namely to soul, to body, to exterior things themselves, which are ordered to both; or he does something wholly useless and idle. If the first, this action tends to an end naturally good, and it is good. If the second, he does a thing unfitting to rational nature, as being at least superfluous; for reason dictates that beings are not to be multiplied without necessity, or utility, or some fittingness. St. Thomas, 1. 2. q. 18. a. 9, paragraph Sed contra; 2 D. 40. q. 1. a. 5. Moreover, since this is proper to reason, to direct and order human acts which are done from deliberation to a due end, either a human act is in reality ordered to the due end, and has the character of good, or it is not ordered to the due end, and then by this very fact it is repugnant to right reason and has the character of evil. St. Thomas, q. 18. a. 9; Suarez, D. 9, S. 3. And from the reason adduced it is luminously clear that those indifferent acts of the Scotists are not truly such, but are morally honorable; for if they are done on account of necessity, utility, or fittingness, they are according to the order of reason and consequently morally honorable. Nor indeed is it necessary to intend another extrinsic honorable end, besides the end intrinsic to acts of this sort, in order that one act honorably. For indeed sometimes to eat more abundantly, to hold banquets, and to be refreshed in mind and body are acts according to reason, if these are contained within due limits. Therefore these acts are truly done from a motive of honorableness and virtue, although they are done from natural frailty, necessity, utility, or fittingness, since honorableness and virtue consist in this, that the rectitude of reason be observed. Moreover they are also ordered to God, at least implicitly, although not explicitly, as we shall soon explain more, since, by the very fact that they are according to reason and good, they are referred by their nature to God. St. Thomas, 1. 2. q. 18. a. 9 ad 3; q. 39. a. 2; 2. 2. q. 23. a. 3; q. 141. a. 6 ad 2; q. 145. a. 1, 2, 3; q. 168. a. 3 ad 3; S. q. 49. a. 2 ad 6; q. 169. a. 1 ad 1; 2 D. 39. q. 3. a. 3 ad 6; D. 40. q. 1. a. 5; 4 D. 16. q. 2. a. 2 q. 1; C. G. l. 2, c. 29; de Caritate q. un. a. 7 ad 13 and ad 14; Suarez, D. 4, S. 1, n. 12.

3. Another question arises here: whether, for the moral goodness of human acts, it is necessary to direct all actions to the glory of God? — The more common and truer opinion affirms it. The reason is most clearly evident from what has been said: since every moral action, in order that it be good, must tend to the ultimate end, and be ordered to it by reason. But if a human action tends to and is ordered to the ultimate end, it is already directed to the glory of God. Therefore it is as necessary to direct all actions to the glory of God as it is necessary that they be morally good. “The goodness of the will depends on the intention of the end; but the ultimate end of the human will is the highest good, which is God. Therefore it is required for the goodness of the human will that it be ordered to the highest good.” St. Thomas, 1. 2. q. 19. a. 9. “The whole that man is, and that he can do and has, must be ordered to God,” St. Thomas, 1. 2. q. 22. a. 4 ad 3. Hence it is enough to direct them to God virtually on the part of the work, or in the very act exercised, namely by acting on account of the end of some virtue, or an honorable end, and one consonant with rational nature; for such an act from its intrinsic nature tends to the glory of God. To the point is St. Thomas, 1. 2. q. 8. a. 3 ad 2: “Whenever someone wills those things which are for the end, he wills the end by the same act; but not conversely.” And q. 21. a. 4: “He who does an evil act not referable to God does not preserve the honor of God, which is owed to the ultimate end.” Cajetan, on the same q. 8. a. 3, says: “one always seeking what is for the end seeks the end, not habitually, but actually, as actually extends itself also to virtually. For it is virtually, as using something within the breadth of actual use; otherwise that precept would never be fulfilled: Do all things for the glory of God; for to do imports actually to operate.” Much more, besides, is it enough to direct all actions to God virtually on the part of the one operating himself, who by an act of charity has ordered his whole life to God and remains in habitual charity. These are the words of Cajetan on 1. 2. q. 8. a. 3: “Between the movement of the will toward something habitually and actually, there is the movement of the will toward it virtually.... For when one having charity sins venially, he indeed habitually loves God, but not actually, as is clear, nor virtually, because sin is not directable to God. But when one having charity walks or preaches, and whatever else he does without doing evil, although he does not actually think of God, nevertheless that act is not only of such a virtue, but of charity, and the will then is borne virtually to God, and not only habitually, which belongs to one sleeping and to one sinning venially.”

4. From all things which have thus far been said, the distinction is clear between a good and evil human act, a right and sinful one, a laudable and culpable one. — A human act, from the fact that it has the form fitting to it, or on the contrary lacks the form fitting to it, namely from the fact that it is according to the order of reason or beyond this order, is good or evil. For a human act is so called according as it is from reason directing and ordering. “In (human) acts good and evil are said by comparison to reason; because, as Dionysius says, the good of man is to be according to reason, but evil is what is beyond reason. For the good for each thing is what agrees with it according to its form, and evil is what is beyond the order of its form. Therefore it is clear that the difference of good and evil considered about the object is compared of itself to reason, namely according as the object is fitting or not fitting to it. But certain acts are called human or moral according as they are from reason.” St. Thomas, 1. 2. q. 18. a. 5.

5. Moreover an order of reason of this sort is the order of the eternal law, and the order of human acts to the end. And thus a human act, good or evil, has the character of rectitude and of sin according to this order to the law and to the end. “Therefore whenever the act of man proceeds to the end according to the order of reason and of the eternal law, then the act is right; but when it is bent away from this rectitude, then it is called sin. But it is manifest from the premises, q. 19. a. 3 and 4, that every voluntary act is evil by this, that it recedes from the order of reason and of the eternal law, and every good act accords with reason and the eternal law. Whence it follows that a human act, from the fact that it is good or evil, has the character of rectitude or of sin.” St. Thomas, 1. 2. q. 21. a. 1. Therefore evil is more common than sin, good more common than right.

6. A good or evil human act, according as it proceeds freely from the will, has the character of laudable or culpable. For a laudable or culpable act is an act imputable to the agent for praise or blame; and this cannot be unless the agent is the author of that act, or the cause determining it in its being. Whence it is clear that if sin is taken for any defect whatsoever of an act, or for the deviation of an act from the end, sin is more common than fault. But if sin is not taken in a merely objective sense, but subjectively and morally, sin is the same as fault, and so it is commonly taken by theologians. Hence St. Thomas says: “It must be said that just as evil is broader than sin, so sin is broader than fault. For from this an act is called culpable or laudable, that it is imputed to the agent; for to be praised or blamed is nothing other than for the malice or goodness of one’s act to be imputed to someone. But then an act is imputed to the agent when it is in his power, so that he has dominion over his act. But this is in all voluntary acts, because through the will man has dominion over his act, as is clear from what was said above, q. 1. a. 1 and 2. Whence it remains that good or evil only in voluntary acts constitutes the character of praise or blame, in which evil, sin, and fault are the same.” 1. 2. q. 21. a. 2.

7. From all things said thus far it is also clear that the moral good is the same in reality as the honorable. For the moral good is what is according to the order of reason; and the honorable is said to be what fits man insofar as he is man, and what is sought for its own sake by a rational appetite. St. Thomas, 2. 2. q. 145. a. 3 ad 1. Nevertheless they differ in reason. For something is called honorable insofar as it has a certain comeliness from fittingness with rational nature and from the ordering of reason. St. Thomas, in the cited place, a. 3. For honorableness is said as though “a state of honor.” Whence from this something is called honorable, because it is worthy of honor. Honor is owed to excellence. But the excellence of man according to virtue is a certain disposition of someone holding himself fittingly according to the mode of his nature, or a disposition of the perfect toward the best. St. Thomas, in the cited place, a. 1, and 1. 2. q. 71. a. 1. Moreover both clarity and due proportion concur in the account of comeliness or beauty. Whence the beauty of the body consists in this, that man has the members of the body well proportioned, with a certain due clarity of color. And similarly spiritual beauty consists in this, that the conduct of a man, or his action, is well proportioned according to the spiritual clarity of reason. And this renders man worthy of honor. St. Thomas, 2. 2. q. 145. a. 2. But glory is the effect of honor. For from this, that someone is honored or praised, he is rendered clear in the eyes of others. And therefore, just as the honorable and the glorious are the same, so also the honorable and the comely are the same. St. Thomas, in the cited place, a. 2 ad 2.

8. As the moral good is the same in reality as the honorable, although distinguished in reason, so the moral good and the honorable are the same in reality as the pleasurable and the useful, although they are distinguished in reason. For that which is morally good and honorable, or ordered according to reason, is naturally fitting to man. But each thing is naturally delighted in what is fitting to itself. And therefore the honorable is naturally pleasurable to man. Nevertheless not every pleasurable thing is honorable, because something can also be fitting according to sense, and not according to reason. But this pleasurable thing is beyond man’s reason, which perfects his nature. Moreover even virtue itself, which according to itself is honorable, is referred to something else as to an end, namely to happiness. “And according to this the honorable and the useful and the pleasurable are the same in subject. But they differ in reason; for something is called honorable according as it has a certain excellence, worthy of honor because of spiritual beauty; pleasurable insofar as it quiets the appetite; and useful insofar as it is referred to another. Nevertheless the pleasurable is broader than the useful and the honorable, because every useful and honorable thing is in some way pleasurable, but not conversely.” St. Thomas, in the cited place, a. 3. But nothing “can be simply and truly useful which is repugnant to honorableness, because it must be repugnant to man’s ultimate end, which is good according to reason, although perhaps it can be useful in a certain respect, with respect to some particular end.” St. Thomas, in the cited place, ad 3. Whence it is clear that, as not every pleasurable thing reaches the account of the honorable, so also not every useful thing reaches the account of the honorable, but only that which is pleasurable and useful according to reason.

9. Therefore the moral good is always an honorable good. For moral good is good according to reason, and honorable good is nothing other than good fitting to rational nature, and therefore according to reason. But the moral good is not always a useful good and a pleasurable good, but only when they observe the right norm of reason.

It will be said 1. of the essence of morality; 2. of its sources.

1. Caius, an ingenuous youth, indeed confesses rather often, because he knows that this is very pleasing to his directors. Likewise he is accustomed to hear Mass daily, moved by the example of his companions, lest he seem less devout than they. Moreover, he not rarely distributes among the poor money received from his father, but almost always experiences in himself a desire for vain glory. Hence, after spiritual exercises have been completed, he greatly fears lest his confessions were invalid and sacrilegious, and lest he acquired no merit from his pious works, but, on the contrary, incurred demerit and sin.

Q. 1. Do human actions take their species from the end? 2. Has Caius received the sacrament of penance invalidly, and has he lost all merit of pious works?

R. To the first, cf. I. M. 79. To the second: the confessions of Caius were neither sacrilegious nor invalid. For for the validity of confession there is required, and there suffices, sincere sorrow and purpose. But Caius could well have sincere sorrow and purpose, even if he approached confession because he knew that this was pleasing to his directors. Nor indeed, since Caius is an ingenuous youth, can it be supposed that he principally intended this end, or that he confessed without due sorrow and purpose. Therefore the confessions of Caius were neither invalid nor sacrilegious, but substantially good and meritorious, although perhaps he was moved in some way by the impulse of vain glory; because such an impulse does not intrinsically affect the very substance of confession, but is related to it merely concomitantly and extrinsically. Therefore granted that such an impulse was venially evil, confession nevertheless, as having been made from a good intrinsic end, namely of reconciling himself to God and obtaining grace remissive of sins, could well remain morally good and sufficient for validity and for merit. And thus also it remains substantially good and sufficient for validity, although in confession perhaps you lie lightly, or without cause lightly defame your neighbor. For although such a lie and such defamation are morally evil, nevertheless, because they are related accidentally in order to confession, and since venial sins from elsewhere do not obstruct divine grace and reconciliation, they leave confession good in itself, and sufficient for validity and for merit. Hence the same must be said of Masses heard and of alms bestowed. - Elbel 78, 79; G. 33, 34; I. M. 77, 78, 81.

2. Sebastianus, being scrupulous, in order to abstract himself from every creature, resolved to deprive himself of every pleasure not necessary for the sustaining of life. He thought that pleasure not necessary to life could be sought only from the satisfaction of natural inclination, since pleasure is not referred to the glory of God. But in order that he might live wholly for God and seek the glory of God in all things, he resolved actually to offer all his actions to God before he did anything. Hence in a short time it happened that, gravely ill in the head, he died in an asylum of the insane.

Q. 1. Is it licit to act for the sake of pleasure? 2. Must all actions be referred to God? 3. What as to the case?

R. To the first and to the second, cf. I. M. 75, 82. To the third: Sebastianus is deceived, with grave detriment to his body and soul. In order that one may live wholly for God and seek the glory of God in all things, he does not therefore necessarily have to be deprived of every honest pleasure, not altogether necessary for the sustaining of life. Pleasure also, even only useful for restoring the bodily powers by moderate delight and recreation, is honest, and by its own nature is implicitly and mediately ordered also to the ultimate end, or to God. Hence it is altogether licit to act for the sake of pleasure and delight, and to intend it, provided that another honest end, to which by its very nature it is referred, is not excluded, namely that man may act better and may be able to persevere longer in honest operation; by which intermediate end as mediator, it is referred to God himself. Therefore, whenever one does not exclude that honest end, the pleasure or delight sought is virtually referred to God, nor is it necessary that one actually offer it to God, since a virtual offering suffices.

Indeed, honest recreations and amusements have been created by God himself for the use of men. Therefore they are naturally good in themselves and honest. Therefore, as one who intends another honest thing acts honestly, and the action is virtually referred to God without his explicitly and actually offering that action to God, so also someone acts honestly by accepting an honest recreation of mind and an honest amusement, without actually and formally offering it to God. Hence the same must consequently be said of pain and inconvenience, to be avoided and repelled by honest means. Whence it is also clear that, in order that an action be honest and be referred to the glory of God, it is not necessary actually and explicitly to offer it to God. It suffices that one intend an honest action and act honestly. It suffices that each day in the morning one offer to God all his actions to be done during the course of the day. "In this way every act, even one indifferent in species, becomes good and virtuous in the individual." L. tr. De Act. hum. XLIV. - G. 29, 30, 35, 36.

1. Marianna is accustomed to tell slight lies to prevent quarrels, oaths, and blasphemies of her husband, which have the best success in constantly preserving the peace of the family.

2. Monica confesses that she has sometimes spoken badly about her neighbors, because, she says, they are truly evil and do evil to all.

3. Aurelius confesses that he, pressed by grave necessity, stole a grave sum of money. But when the confessor declares to him the obligation of restoring, Aurelius replies: it is impossible, because I have nothing. Indeed, since that necessity perseveres, I still ought to continue in the same theft, and afterwards I shall restore everything.

Q. 1. Do human acts derive morality from the object? 2. What must be thought concerning the various cases?

R. To the first, cf. I. M. 84. To the second: Marianna, speaking in itself, sinned; but only venially, and this as many times as she lied. The reason is that a lie, as intrinsically evil, cannot be rendered honorable by any extrinsic end, however good, unless perhaps it is done from an invincibly erroneous conscience. For evils are not to be done that goods may come, Rom. 3:8. Therefore Marianna must be advised to abstain altogether from lies; and, when grave necessity urges, rather to use some tergiversation and equivocation, since she is not held always to manifest the truth openly. Elbel 74; G. 27. Cf. I. M. 86, 1523 seqq.

Monica, speaking in itself, must furthermore declare whether she spoke badly about her neighbors in a light matter or in a grave matter; and if in a grave matter, how many times this happened, and whether any other damage happened besides damage to reputation. Speaking in itself; for it is otherwise if from the confession itself it is understood that it is a matter of a thing known and public, whence no damaging of reputation has come; just as already seems sufficiently to be drawn from her words, because they are truly evil and do evil to all. - Elbel 11, 102; G. 31.

Aurelius indeed sinned gravely; for grave necessity does not excuse from theft. Therefore neither can he continue in theft. And if in the present he cannot restore, how will he be able to restore an always greater quantity in the future? Whence neither does his excuse avail. But he sufficiently explained his sin; for the various degrees of grave theft do not change the species. L. 1, 6, n. 47; G. 31; I. M. 1313.

1. Henricus confesses thus: 1. I committed carnal sins. 2. I performed gravely immodest acts. 3. I had evil thoughts. 4. I injured the reputation of my neighbor. 5. Besides homicide, I committed all other sins.

2. Paschalis, a priest, confesses thus: I am a priest and once sinned with a woman; omitting that he has care of souls, and that he had previously solicited his own parishioner in confession.

Q. 1. Is the morality of human acts derived from circumstances? 2. Do Henricus and Paschalis confess rightly?

R. To the first, cf. I. M. 88. To the second: Henricus by no means confesses rightly. For first, besides the number, he ought to declare the various species of carnal sins, for example whether he sinned by himself alone, or with another person; and if with this person, whether unmarried, or bound in marriage, etc. But, speaking in itself, it is not necessary that he say whether he committed fornication twice, three times, etc., with the same person or with different persons. - Elbel 103; La-Croix l. c. p. 2, n. 1040; I. M. V. 2, n. 708.

In the second case, acts even gravely immodest, unless they are acts consummated, must be declared by their proper number and proper species. For acts of this sort also differ in species, as for example if someone mixes in filthy conversations, or looks upon himself; or touches a woman or himself shamefully, etc. I. M. 307, 310, 783.

In the third case it is also necessary to declare, besides the number of internal acts, the objects of desires or of delights, varying in species. For desires and morose delights take their species from their objects, Elbel 80, 102; and those evil thoughts, voluntary and deliberate, appear from the context of the case. For Henricus does not seem to be a man who is accustomed to resist temptations of this sort.

In the fourth case he ought to explain whether he gravely injured the reputation of his neighbor; and, if gravely, how many times he injured the reputation of his neighbor, and whether any other damage followed thence for the neighbor. But, speaking in itself, he is not held to declare whether he injured the reputation of his neighbor by simple detraction or by calumny. I. M. 1486.

Finally, in the fifth case it is clear that the confession of Henricus is very imperfect; and so he must be directly questioned by the confessor concerning other special sins against the precepts of the Decalogue and of the Church, and against the obligations of his proper state, which Henricus could probably have committed. Cf. Elbel 96.

Nor has Paschalis confessed rightly. For he ought to have explained the circumstance of solicitation in confession, which adds the malice of real sacrilege, and the circumstance of the care of souls, which made the sin specially repugnant to the virtue of justice. Elbel 97, 98. - G. 31, 32.

"15. God does not command an external act. - 16. An external act is not properly good, nor does God properly perform it. - 17. Let us bring forth the fruit, not of external acts, which do not make us good, but of interior acts, which the Father dwelling in us makes and performs. - 18. God loves souls, not the external work." Condemned propositions of Eckhart, condemned by John XXII in the year 1329.

"9. He truly sins who hates sin merely because of its turpitude and incongruity with nature, without any regard for God offended. - 10. The intention by which someone detests evil and pursues good merely in order to obtain heavenly glory is not right or pleasing to God. - 11. Everything that is not from supernatural Christian faith, which works through love, is sin. - 13. Whoever also serves God with a view to eternal reward, if he should lack charity, is not free from fault whenever he acts, even with a view to beatitude. - 14. Fear of hell is not supernatural. - 15. Attrition, which is conceived from fear of hell and of punishments, without the love of benevolence for God on account of Himself, is not a good and supernatural movement." Propositions condemned by Alexander VIII, 7 Dec. 1690.

"60. If fear of punishment alone animates penance, the more violent this penance is, the more it leads to despair. - 61. Fear restrains only the hand; but the heart is devoted to sin as long as it is not led by the love of justice. - 62. He who abstains from evil only through fear of punishment commits it in his heart and is also guilty before God." Condemned propositions of Pasquier Quesnel, condemned by Clement XI.

"2. Just as an evil work by its nature is meritorious of eternal death, so a good work by its nature is meritorious of eternal life. - 4. Eternal life was promised to man in his integrity and to the angel in view of good works, and good works by the law of nature suffice of themselves for attaining it. - 15. The reason of merit does not consist in this, that those who act well have grace and the indwelling Holy Spirit, but in this alone, that they obey the divine law." Condemned propositions of Michael Baius, condemned by St. Pius V.

"1. If anyone shall say that man can be justified before God by his works, whether done through human nature or through the teaching of the law, without divine grace through Jesus Christ: let him be anathema. - 2. If anyone shall say that divine grace through Christ Jesus is given only for this, that man may more easily live justly and merit eternal life, as though through free will without grace he could do both, though with hardship and difficulty: let him be anathema." Council of Trent, sess. 6, canons.

"To establish as the supreme law the will of the people, manifested by what they call public opinion or in some other manner, released from every divine and human law; and, in the political order, to hold that accomplished facts, by the very fact that they have been accomplished, have the force of law." Proposition condemned by Pius IX, Encyclical Quanta cura.

"56. Moral laws do not require a divine sanction, and there is no need whatever that human laws be conformed to the law of nature or receive their binding force from God. - 57. The science of philosophical and moral matters, and likewise civil laws, can and ought to depart from divine and ecclesiastical authority. - 58. No other forces are to be acknowledged except those which are placed in matter, and every discipline and uprightness of morals ought to be placed in accumulating and increasing riches by every means and in satisfying pleasures. - 60. Authority is nothing other than the sum of number and material forces." Propositions condemned by Pius IX, Syllabus.

"28. It is not lawful for Bishops, without the permission of the government, to promulgate even Apostolic Letters themselves." Proposition condemned by Pius IX, Syllabus.

"11. The proposition asserting that, according to the ancient institution of our forefathers, derived from Apostolic times and preserved through the better ages of the Church, it was received that decrees, definitions, or sentences even of the greater Sees were not accepted unless they had been examined and approved by a diocesan Synod: false, rash, derogatory in its generality from the obedience due to Apostolic Constitutions and also to sentences emanating from a legitimate superior hierarchical power, fostering schism and heresy." Proposition of the Synod of Pistoia condemned by Pius VI.

"28. The people do not sin even if, without any cause, they do not receive a law promulgated by the prince." Proposition condemned by Alexander VII.

Cf. n. 180, paragraph Legislative Power of the Church; n. 184.

"38. The decretal epistles are apocryphal and lead away from the faith of Christ; and the clerics who study them are foolish." Proposition of John Wycliffe condemned by the Council of Constance.

"1. Some commandments of God are impossible to just men willing and striving according to the present powers which they have; the grace by which they might become possible is also lacking to them. Declared and condemned as rash, impious, blasphemous, deserving condemnation by anathema, and heretical." Proposition of Cornelius Jansen condemned by Innocent X.

"19. Likewise, the things which it adds, that man under the law, since he was powerless to observe it, became a transgressor, not indeed through the fault of the law, which was most holy, but through the fault of man, who under the law without grace became more and more a transgressor; and it further adds that the law, if it did not heal the heart of man, caused him to know his own evils and, convicted of infirmity, to desire the grace of the Mediator: in this part it generally insinuates that man became a transgressor through the non-observance of a law which he was powerless to observe, as though He who is just could have commanded something impossible, or He who is merciful were to condemn man for that which he could not avoid; ... false, scandalous, impious, condemned in Baius." Proposition of the Synod of Pistoia condemned by Pius VI.

"54. This definitive sentence, that God commanded man nothing impossible, is falsely attributed to Augustine, since it is Pelagius's." Proposition of Michael Baius condemned by St. Pius V. Cf. nn. 180, 183.

"Whether decrees issued by the Sacred Congregation of Rites, and whatever responses formally issued in writing by it to proposed doubts, have the same authority as if they proceeded immediately from the Supreme Pontiff himself, although no report concerning them was made to His Holiness? - Resp. In the affirmative." S. R. C., 23 May 1846, n. 2916. - Decrees subscribed by the Prefect and Secretary of the S. R. C. and furnished with its seal are to be held as formally issued in writing; nor is it required that they be promulgated either at Rome or by Bishops in their dioceses. Decrees inserted in the Authentic Collection are to be held as formally issued. - S. R. C., 8 April 1854, n. 3023.

"6. The difference between the Jewish and Christian covenants is that, in the former, God demands flight from sin and fulfillment of the law from the sinner, leaving him in his powerlessness; but in the latter God gives the sinner that which He commands, by purifying him with His grace. - 7. What advantage was there for man in the old covenant, in which God left him to his own infirmity, imposing His law upon him? But what happiness is it not to be admitted to a covenant in which God gives us that which He asks of us? - 8. We do not belong to the new covenant except insofar as we are sharers in that new grace which works in us that which God commands us. - 63. One baptized is still under the law like a Jew if he does not fulfill the law, or fulfills it from fear alone." Propositions of Pasquier Quesnel condemned by Clement XI.

"The legal observances of the Old Testament, or the ceremonies, sacred rites, sacrifices, and sacraments of the Mosaic law, ceased when the Lord Jesus Christ came, and after the promulgation of the Gospel cannot be observed without sin." Profession of Faith for the Orientals prescribed by Urban VIII and Benedict XIV, Constitution Nuper ad nos.

"The sacrosanct Roman Church, founded by the voice of our Lord and Savior.... Firmly believes, professes, and teaches that the legal observances of the Old Testament, or of the Mosaic law, which are divided into ceremonies, sacred rites, sacrifices, and sacraments, because they were instituted for the sake of signifying something future, although they were suitable for divine worship in that age, ceased when the Lord Jesus Christ, who was signified through them, came, and the sacraments of the New Testament began. It teaches that anyone who, even after the Passion, places hope in the legal observances and subjects himself to them as necessary for salvation, as though faith in Christ could not save without them, has sinned mortally. It does not, however, deny that from the Passion of Christ until the promulgation of the Gospel they could have been observed, provided that they were in no way believed necessary for salvation; but after the promulgation of the Gospel it asserts that they cannot be observed without the loss of salvation. Therefore, after that time, it declares all observers of circumcision, the Sabbath, and the other legal observances alien from the faith of Christ and wholly unable to be participants in eternal salvation unless at some time they recover from those errors. Therefore it commands absolutely all who glory in the Christian name, at whatever time, whether before or after Baptism, to cease from circumcision, because, whether one places hope in it or not, it cannot be observed at all without the loss of eternal salvation....

"It firmly believes, professes, and proclaims that every creature of God is good and nothing is to be rejected which is received with thanksgiving, because, according to the word of the Lord, not that which enters into the mouth defiles a man; and it asserts that the distinction of the Mosaic law between clean and unclean foods belongs to the ceremonial observances, which passed away when the Gospel arose and ceased to be efficacious. It also says that the Apostles' prohibition from things sacrificed to idols, and from blood, and from that which was strangled was suitable to that time, when one Church was arising from Jews and Gentiles who previously lived by diverse ceremonies and customs, so that the Gentiles also might observe something in common with the Jews, and that an occasion might be offered for coming together in the one worship and faith of God, and the material of dissension might be removed: for, because of ancient custom, blood and that which was strangled seemed abominable to the Jews, and from the eating of things sacrificed to idols the Gentiles could be thought likely to return to idolatry. But when the Christian religion had been propagated to such a point that no Jew appeared in it, but all who passed over to the Church came together in the same rites and ceremonies of the Gospel, believing all things clean to the clean, then, when the cause of that Apostolic prohibition ceased, its effect also ceased. It therefore declares that no nature of food which human society admits is to be condemned; nor is any distinction to be made among animals by anyone, whether man or woman, and by whatever manner of death they perish; although for the health of the body, for the exercise of virtue, and for regular and ecclesiastical discipline many things not forbidden can and ought to be set aside, because, according to the Apostle, all things are lawful, but not all things are expedient." Decree for the Jacobites, or of Eugene IV, Cantate Domino.

"20. If anyone shall say that a justified man, however perfect, is not bound to the observance of the commandments of God and of the Church, but only to believe, as though the Gospel were a bare and absolute promise of eternal life without the condition of observing the commandments: let him be anathema. - 21. If anyone shall say that Christ Jesus was given by God to men as a Redeemer in whom they are to trust, but not also as a Legislator whom they are to obey: let him be anathema. - 7. If anyone shall say that by Baptism itself the baptized are made debtors only of faith alone, but not of the entire law of Christ to be observed: let him be anathema. - 8. If anyone shall say that the baptized are free from all the precepts of holy Church which are either written or handed down, so that they are not bound to observe them unless they should wish of their own accord to submit themselves to them: let him be anathema." Council of Trent, sess. 6, canons; sess. 7, canons on Baptism. Cf. n. 74.

"4. The proposition asserting that it would be an abuse of the authority of the Church to transfer it beyond the limits of doctrine and morals, and to extend it to exterior things, and to exact by force that which depends upon persuasion and the heart; and also, much less, that it pertains to her to exact by exterior force subjection to her decrees: insofar as, by those indeterminate words extending it to exterior things, it brands as an abuse of the authority of the Church the use of that power received from God which the Apostles themselves used in establishing and sanctioning exterior discipline: heretical. - 5. In the part in which it insinuates that the Church does not have authority to exact subjection to her decrees otherwise than by means which depend upon persuasion; insofar as it intends that the Church does not have a power conferred upon her by God not only of directing by counsels and persuasions, but also of commanding by laws, and of restraining and compelling the wayward and contumacious by exterior judgment and salutary penalties; from the Brief Ad assiduas of Benedict XIV, in the year 1755, to the Primates, Archbishops, and Bishops of the Kingdom of Poland: introducing into a system a doctrine otherwise condemned as heretical." Propositions of the Synod of Pistoia condemned by Pius VI.

"15. Ecclesiastical obedience is obedience according to the invention of the priests of the Church apart from the express authority of Scripture." Proposition of John Hus condemned by the Council of Constance.

"The laws of the Church do not bind in conscience unless they are promulgated by the civil power; - The acts and decrees of the Roman Pontiffs concerning religion and the Church require the sanction and approval, or at least the assent, of the civil power; - Apostolic Constitutions by which secret societies are condemned, whether an oath concerning the keeping of secrecy is or is not required in them, and their followers and supporters are punished with anathema, have no force in those regions of the world where associations of this kind are tolerated by the civil government; - The excommunication imposed by the Council of Trent and the Roman Pontiffs upon those who invade and usurp the rights and possessions of the Church rests upon a confusion of the spiritual order with the civil and political order, solely for the pursuit of worldly good; - The Church ought to decree nothing which can bind the consciences of the faithful in relation to the use of temporal things; - The Church has no right to restrain violators of her laws by temporal penalties; it is conformable to the principles of sacred Theology and public law for the civil government to assert and claim ownership of goods possessed by Churches, religious families, and other pious places. - Assent and obedience can be refused without sin and without any loss of Catholic profession to those judgments and decrees of the Apostolic See whose object is declared to pertain to the general good of the Church and to her rights and discipline, provided that it does not touch dogmas of faith and morals." Propositions condemned by Pius IX, Encyclical Quanta cura.

"That those who are in the aforesaid degree of perfection and spirit of liberty (namely, because they cannot sin or grow further in perfection) are not subject to human obedience, nor are bound to any precepts of the Church; because, as they assert, where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty." Condemned as error, Clementine Ad nostrum, 3, De Haereticis.

"14. The Doctors who maintain that anyone who is to be corrected by ecclesiastical censure, if he should refuse to be corrected, is to be handed over to the secular judgment, certainly follow in this the Pontiffs, Scribes, and Pharisees, who handed Christ over to the secular judgment when He would not obey them in all things, saying: It is not lawful for us to put anyone to death; and such men are more grievous murderers than Pilate." Article of John Hus condemned by the Council of Constance.

"24. The Church does not have the power of employing force, nor any temporal power, direct or indirect." Proposition condemned by Pius IX, Syllabus.

Cf. the preceding paragraph, The Legislative Power of the Church.

"8. If the Pope is foreknown as reprobate and evil, and consequently a member of the devil, he does not have power over the faithful given to him by anyone, unless perhaps by Caesar. - 9. After Urban VI no one is to be received as Pope, but one must live in the manner of the Greeks under one's own laws. - 37. The Roman Church is the synagogue of Satan, and the Pope is not the proximate and immediate Vicar of Christ and the Apostles." Propositions of John Wycliffe condemned in the Council of Constance. Cf. also articles 24 and 25, concerning which those suspected of the errors of Wycliffe and Hus are to be questioned by mandate of Martin V, Bull Inter cunctas; propositions 9-13, 20, 22-24, 26-29 of John Hus condemned by the Council of Constance.

"27. It is certain that it is entirely outside the power of the Church or the Pope to establish articles of faith, indeed even laws of morals or of good works." Proposition of Martin Luther condemned by Leo X, Bull Exsurge Domine, 16 May 1520.

Cf. the following paragraph, The Power of Bishops.

"... All the more deplorable is the headlong and blind temerity of the man who, in his ill-fated little book, endeavored to restore errors condemned by so many decrees; who said and everywhere insinuated through many circumlocutions: that every Bishop called by God to the government of the Church is no less than the Pope and is endowed with no lesser power; that Christ of Himself gave the same power to all the Apostles; that whatever some believe can be obtained and conceded by the Pontiff alone can equally be obtained by any Bishop, whether it depends upon consecration or upon ecclesiastical jurisdiction; that Christ willed the Church to be administered in the manner of a republic; that this government indeed requires a president for the good of unity, but one who may not dare to involve himself in the affairs of others who govern together with him; nevertheless, that he has the privilege of exhorting the negligent to fulfill their duties; that the force of the primacy is contained in this one prerogative of supplying for the negligence of others and providing for the preservation of unity by exhortations and example; that the Pontiffs can do nothing in another's diocese except in an extraordinary case; that the Pontiff is the head who receives his force and firmness from the Church; that the Pontiffs made it lawful for themselves to violate the rights of Bishops and to reserve to themselves absolutions, dispensations, decisions, appeals, collations of benefices, and, in a word, all other offices, which he enumerates individually and denounces as undue reservations injurious to Bishops." Pius VI, Brief Super soliditate, 28 Nov. 1786, by which Eybel's book What Is the Pope? is condemned.

"6. The doctrine of the Synod, by which it professes itself persuaded that a Bishop has received from Christ all the rights necessary for the good government of his diocese, just as if superior ordinances pertaining either to faith and morals or to general discipline, the right of which belongs to the Supreme Pontiffs and General Councils for the universal Church, were not necessary for the good government of each diocese: schismatic, at least erroneous. - 7. Likewise, in that it exhorts the Bishop to pursue vigorously the more perfect constitution of ecclesiastical discipline, and this against all contrary customs, exemptions, and reservations which are opposed to the good order of the diocese, the greater glory of God, and the greater edification of the faithful: by that which it supposes, that it is lawful for a Bishop by his own judgment and will to establish and decree against customs, exemptions, and reservations, whether those which have place in the universal Church or even in any province, without the permission and intervention of the superior hierarchical power by which they were introduced or approved and have the force of law: leading into schism and the subversion of hierarchical government, erroneous. - 8. Likewise, in that it also says that it is persuaded that the rights of a Bishop received from Jesus Christ for governing the Church can neither be altered nor impeded, and, when it has happened that the exercise of these rights has been interrupted for any cause, the Bishop can and ought always to return to his original rights whenever the greater good of his Church requires it: insofar as it insinuates that the exercise of episcopal rights can be hindered or restrained by no superior power whenever a Bishop by his own judgment shall have deemed this less expedient for the greater good of his Church: leading into schism and the subversion of hierarchical government, erroneous." Propositions of the Synod of Pistoia condemned by Pius VI.

"1. Whether Bishops lawfully assembled in either a Plenary or a Provincial Council are to be considered to possess true legislative power? - 2. Whether decrees of either Plenary or Provincial Councils, confirmed, approved, or at least reviewed by the Holy See in either common or specific form, lack every force unless they have already been incorporated into diocesan statutes; and indeed have force only insofar as they have thus been incorporated? - Resp. To the 1st, in the affirmative. To the 2nd, in the negative, and according to the mind." Holy Office, 10 Sept. 1896.

"9. The doctrine which establishes that the reformation of abuses concerning ecclesiastical discipline ought in diocesan Synods to depend equally upon and be established by the Bishop and the parish priests, and that without freedom of decision there would be undue subjection to the suggestions and commands of the Bishops: false, rash, injurious to episcopal authority, subversive of hierarchical government, favoring the Arian heresy renewed by Calvin. - 10. Likewise, the doctrine by which parish priests or other priests assembled in a Synod are declared together with the Bishop to be judges of faith, and at the same time it is insinuated that judgment in causes of faith belongs to them by their own right, and indeed even by reason of ordination received: false, rash, subversive of the hierarchical order, derogatory from the firmness of the definitions or dogmatic judgments of the Church, at least erroneous." Propositions of the Synod of Pistoia condemned by Pius VI.

Cf. also proposition 11 reported above at n. 168.

"That Christians are bound to the observance of civil laws, even if these have been enacted by unbelieving princes, provided that they are not opposed to the Christian religion and to the moral doctrine of the Gospel, there is no room for doubt; nor does the Apostle leave any room for doubt, who, making no distinction among higher powers, says: Let every soul be subject to higher powers: for there is no power except from God.... Therefore he who resists the power resists the ordinance of God; but those who resist acquire damnation for themselves.... Therefore be subject of necessity, not only because of wrath, but also because of conscience. Rom. 13, v. 1 ff.

"From this most clear testimony it is manifest that those who rule supreme in civil government can enact laws for their subjects which bind them even in conscience; and this is also urged by the reason of the public good, namely, of warding off from civil societies the monster of anarchy, worse than dog and serpent; and it is commended by the illustrious examples of the first Christian faithful, who obeyed the civil laws of gentile princes as long as they could do this without loss to faith and good morals.

"Although these things are most true, nevertheless, with regard to the law forbidding the trade in opium, many doubts can arise because of the various opinions of theologians concerning the obligation of civil laws; and since the solution of these is not very easy, in particular cases they can trouble not a little the mind of missionaries and confessors. The Sacred Congregation has learned from their letters that this has happened several times.

"For there are very many theologians, and these also of the highest name, who judge that there are civil laws whose transgression indeed has a penalty annexed, but by no means also theological guilt, and which therefore they call purely penal. These do not deny what is clear from the cited testimony of St. Paul, that supreme rulers can enact laws which bind subjects in conscience, that is, not only to the penalty but also to theological guilt; but they contend that they do not always will this by their laws, and that those laws are purely penal. According to this doctrine, which seems to be more common among theologians, it can be doubted whether the civil law forbidding in your regions the trade in opium is a law having theological guilt annexed, or rather is a merely penal law, excluding all theological guilt. It could seem that this latter ought rather to be judged, from the fact that that law was enacted by an unbelieving prince, who, since he can rightly be thought to make no account of that which Christians call obligation in conscience and theological guilt, seems to have wished to compel his subjects to the observance of that law by the penalty indeed and by its severity, but by no means by fear of wounding conscience and of theological guilt.

"That Christians are bound to the observance of civil laws, even if these have been enacted by unbelieving Princes, provided that these are not opposed to the Christian Religion and to the moral doctrine of the Gospel, there is no room for doubt; nor does the Apostle leave any room for doubt, who, making no distinction among higher powers, says: Let every soul be subject to higher powers: for there is no power except from God... Therefore he who resists the power resists the ordinance of God; but those who resist acquire damnation for themselves... Therefore be subject of necessity, not only because of wrath, but also because of conscience. Rom. 13, v. 1 and following.

From this most clear testimony it is manifest that those who rule supreme in civil government can enact laws for their subjects which bind them even in conscience; and this is also urged by the reason of the public good, namely, of warding off from civil societies the monster of anarchy, worse than dog and serpent; and it is commended by the illustrious examples of the first Christian faithful, who obeyed the civil laws of gentile Princes as long as they could do this without loss to faith and good morals.

Although these things are most true, nevertheless, with regard to the law forbidding the trade in opium, many doubts can arise because of the various opinions of Theologians concerning the obligation of civil laws; and since the solution of these is not very easy, in particular cases they can trouble not a little the mind of Missionaries and Confessors. The Sacred Congregation has learned from their letters that this has happened several times.

For there are very many Theologians, and these also of the highest name, who judge that there are civil laws whose transgression indeed has a penalty annexed, but by no means also theological guilt, and which therefore they call purely penal. These do not deny what is clear from the cited testimony of St. Paul, that supreme rulers can enact laws which bind subjects in conscience, that is, not only to the penalty but also to theological guilt; but they contend that they do not always will this by their laws, and that those laws are purely penal. According to this doctrine, which seems to be more common among Theologians, it can be doubted whether the civil law forbidding in your regions the trade in opium is a law having theological guilt annexed, or rather is a merely penal law, excluding all theological guilt. It could seem that this latter ought rather to be judged, from the fact that that law was enacted by an unbelieving Prince, who, since he can rightly be thought to make no account of that which Christians call obligation in conscience and theological guilt, seems to have wished to compel his subjects to the observance of that law by the penalty indeed and by its severity, but by no means by fear of wounding conscience and of theological guilt.

Nor does the most grave penalty of death against transgressors of that law seem a sufficient reason to show that it binds also to guilt, and not merely to penalty, because, as Roncaglia says, it is many times expedient for the common good that those also be punished with most grave penalties who violate some law without theological guilt. Thus Theologians commonly admit that a defendant can, without theological guilt, break out of prison in order to avoid, for example, death; yet the civil laws punish this most gravely. Hence from such penalties the intention of the legislator to bind to theological guilt is not sufficiently gathered. Tract. 3, On Laws, q. 2, c. 2, resp. 2, ad 9. 2.

But even if it be supposed that the aforesaid law enacted against the trade in opium binds also in conscience, nevertheless it would not follow from this that its violation in all circumstances brings theological guilt with it; for human laws, ordinarily speaking, do not oblige with grave harm to oneself to their observance. This has place in the divine laws themselves. Thus the observance of the Sabbath in the Old Law, and abstinence from blood, did not oblige with danger to life (St. Thomas, I-II, q. 100, a. 8; Suarez, bk. 3, On Laws), and in the New Law the law concerning the integrity of Confession, concerning the reception of the Sacraments, etc., does not oblige with the same danger.

Since these things are so, the mind of the Sacred Congregation is not to define those controversies of Theologians concerning a merely penal law, nor, on the supposition of the existence of laws of this kind, whether the law about which there is here discussion is to be counted among their number. Likewise, considering that a human law, although ordinarily speaking it does not oblige with grave harm, can nevertheless oblige with grave harm when a great public good requires it, which is the supreme law; and likewise considering that this necessity of the public good depends on circumstances which accompany the particular cases that can occur, all of which it is impossible to foresee; therefore it comprises this Instruction in two admonitions to be given to the Missionaries and Confessors of your Vicariate: namely, it teaches and wills that, in the resolutions of the various cases which can happen, they ought not to disregard, but ought to take great account of, the civil law forbidding the trade in opium; secondly, it wills that great account also be taken of the most grave evils which are accustomed to flow from the abuse of opium in the regions of your Vicariate.

As regards the first of these, it is an established matter that public order is guarded by civil laws, that the public good depends very greatly on the observance of the same laws, and that everything is overturned in that society whose citizens do not obey its laws. This reason is very weighty in the regions of your Vicariate, where violations of civil laws on the part of Christians could bring the greatest scandal, and stir up hatred in the civil government against Christians and their Religion, as though they were taught by the Religion which they profess to disturb public order by the violation of civil laws, and at the same time to violate the rights of sovereignty.

But as regards the second, this ought to be very well known in relation to Christians, whose Religion is founded wholly on charity, not only toward God but also toward neighbor. For this teaches that each person is bound to ward off evils from his neighbor, whom he is bound by divine law to love as himself. This law of charity toward neighbor indeed has its limits, but those limits are the broader in proportion as the evils to be removed from him are more numerous and more grave. But there are very many and very grave evils, both temporal and spiritual, which flow from the abuse of opium in the regions of your Vicariate, and which can be removed by the observance of the law prohibiting the trade in opium.

If, therefore, the Missionaries and Confessors of your Vicariate have these two things before their eyes, as the Sacred Congregation wills them to have them before their eyes, it will not be very difficult for them to know what they ought to answer and do in particular cases which can happen to them in relation to the observance or violation of the aforesaid law, and to find the way by which they can extricate themselves from perplexities and avoid anxieties of mind." Instr. S. C. de P. F. 23 June 1830.

Cf. the preceding number, paragraph beginning But, and following.

"Children after the seventh year are bound to observe the quality of foods prescribed by the Church." S. Poenit. 15 March 1837.

"Although practice and prudence teach that occult cases pertaining to the Forum of Conscience are to be proposed to the Sacred Penitentiary by sealed letters sent to the Most Eminent Lord Cardinal Major Penitentiary and with names withheld, nevertheless someone, whether from among Confessors or from among pastors of souls, departing from this practice, sometimes does not shrink from not only setting forth those cases by open letters and through procurators, even laymen, but also from narrating them to the same Procurators, so that concerning them they may compose supplicatory petitions to be presented to the Sacred Penitentiary. How unbecoming this is, and how much scandal it carries before itself, there is no one who does not see. Therefore the Sacred Penitentiary, wishing wholly to remove this entirely reprehensible manner of acting from the midst, gravely admonishes all and each of the Confessors and Pastors of souls that they entirely abstain from the aforesaid manner of having recourse. Moreover, if they wish to use the service of some Procurator in the gracious City, they will indeed be able to send to that Procurator sealed letters, with names suppressed, to be handed to the aforementioned Cardinal Major Penitentiary; but they must never and in no way dare to narrate or manifest the aforesaid cases to be proposed to the Sacred Penitentiary." Cf. Acta S. Sed. Vol. 7, pp. 208-209; Vol. 1, p. 126 ff.

Cf. Bizzarri, Collectan., ed. 1885, p. 612.

"Whether decrees issued by the S. R. C., and whatever responses, formally issued in writing by it to proposed doubts, have the same authority as if they proceeded immediately from the Supreme Pontiff himself, even though no report concerning them was made to His Holiness? - Resp. In the affirmative." S. R. C. 23 May 1846, with the approval of His Holiness, 17 July 1846. Decrees and responses inserted in the authentic collection of Gardellini are to be held as formally issued. S. R. C. 6 Sept. 1854.

"The decrees of the S. R. C. which, although they do not stand forth in the Gardellinian Edition, are nevertheless known to be authentic, have the same authority which those retain that are read in the said Edition, provided that these Decrees, placed outside the Collection of Gardellini, are not opposed to later Decrees contained in the same Collection." S. R. C. 10 Dec. 1870.

"Whether decrees of the S. R. C., when they are issued, derogate from any contrary introduced custom whatever, even immemorial, and, in the affirmative case, oblige in conscience? - Resp. In the affirmative, but recourse must be had in the particular case." S. R. C. 11 Sept. 1847.

"Whether decrees, indults, and decisions of the Sacred Congregation of Rites, given or to be given in particular cases, are applicable and to be adopted in similar cases, as though they had been decided everywhere, especially because the Sacred Congregation itself seems to hint at this when, to proposed doubts, it is accustomed to respond: Let the Decrees be given, according to other Decrees, provided for in one case, etc. - Resp. In the negative, and recourse must always be had in particular cases." S. R. C. 8 April 1854. Cf. Acta S. Sed. Vol. 3, p. 563 ff.

"With the distinction presupposed of the Decrees of the Sacred Congregation of Rites into Decrees formally general, equivalently general, and particular, can the opinion be sustained... that only those Decrees oblige universally which are either formally general or equivalently general, so that they were not issued on account of a peculiar cause of some place or Diocese, and in addition the approval of the Supreme Pontiff has acceded? - Resp. Let him consult approved authors." S. R. C. 10 Dec. 1870. Acta S. Sed. Vol. 12, p. 144.

On the extension of Resolutions of the Sacred Penitentiary and of the Holy Office from case to case, cf. On the Sixth Precept of the Church, n. 513; On Particular States, n. 1; On Indulgences and Jubilee, n. 1074.

"Holding the Index by these Our Letters as expressly inserted, by Apostolic authority, by the tenor of the present letters, we approve and confirm it, and we command and order that it be observed inviolably and unshakenly by all and singular persons, wherever in the world they exist, under penalties," etc. Benedict XIV, Brief Quae ad catholicae, 23 Dec. 1757.

Cf. N. 84.

"... Therefore we have judged it good by the present Constitution, in order that abuses may be met, to declare what and of what sort a legitimate custom according to the canons ought to be, by which episcopal and ecclesiastical courts can have the right of taking cognizance of and judging the criminal causes of lay defendants. Therefore we order that not every custom for this purpose, but only that custom, have force which is both forty years old and perpetually constant, not indeed contradicted or interrupted. Moreover, we will that it be constituted by a multiplicity and frequency of acts, not slight but grave, which are known to have been performed with the intention of prescribing secular jurisdiction, not tolerated from favor or connivance; nor such acts as perhaps could have taken place apart from the certain and precise knowledge either of Us and of Our Successors for the time being, or at least of the supreme magistrates of this Our City, whom we are accustomed especially to set over the prosecution of the public vindication of crimes. We command that absolutely no account be taken, in a matter so grave, of the knowledge and patience of local rectors and of other inferior secular magistrates, to whom, when they are sometimes either negligent, or conniving and tolerating out of a certain reverential fear, we establish that it is not lawful, and has not been lawful, by their favor, acquiescence, and patience, to make legitimate a custom by which the jurisdiction entrusted to them is diminished, with the order of both powers disturbed. If, therefore, a custom such as we have now established is brought forward, we will that it be kept and observed; but a custom introduced otherwise we reprove, and by this Our Constitution we decree it to be of no force..." Clement XIII, Const. Praestat Romanum.

139. When the will elicits a human act, it tends toward an object, on account of some end, in certain determinate circumstances, and often under its command an external act is effected. Therefore there are four elements which can influence morality: the object, the end, the circumstances, the external act; concerning these we must speak separately.

¹ St. Thomas, Ia IIae, q. 18-20; Suarez, De bonitate et malit. human. act., disp. IV-X; Billuart, diss. IV; St. Alphonsus, n. 34-40; Ball. B., n. 81-102; Bouquillon, n. 351-374; Lehmk., n. 27-36; Noldin, n. 56-65.

158. (A) A circumstance is something accidental, coming upon a human act already constituted in its substance, and affecting it in some way.¹ This, if it regards the act morally, is called moral. Thus in theft, a threefold element morally constitutes the substance of the act: another's property, the appropriation of it while the owner is unwilling, by one who does not have the right of taking the thing away; now many conditions can come upon this threefold element and influence its morality, for example whether the property of another is sacred or profane, precious or vile; whether the owner is altogether unwilling or has yielded something of his right; whether the thief is poor or rich, layman or priest, etc.

¹ The origin of this name St. Thomas declares, Ia IIae, q. 7, a. 1: "The name circumstance is derived from those things which are in place, and is applied to human acts. But in local matters something is said to stand around, which is indeed extrinsic to a thing, yet touches it or approaches it according to place. And therefore whatever conditions are outside the substance of the act, and yet in some way touch the human act, are called circumstances."

(B) Seven circumstances are usually recounted, contained in this verse:

Who, what, where, by what aids, why, how, when.

Aristotle, however, had added an eighth, namely concerning what. St. Thomas¹ expounds the matter thus: "A circumstance is so called as existing outside the substance of the act, yet in such a way that it touches the act itself in some way. Now this can happen in three ways: in one way, insofar as it touches the act itself; in another way, insofar as it touches the cause of the act; in a third way, insofar as it touches the effect. But it touches the act itself either by way of measure, as time and place (when, where); or by way of the quality of the act, as the mode of acting (how). But on the part of the effect, as when one considers what someone has done. But on the part of the cause of the act, as regards the final cause, why is taken; but on the part of the material cause, or of the object, concerning what is taken; and on the part of the principal efficient cause, who acted is taken; but on the part of the instrumental efficient cause, by what aids is taken." - One of these circumstances is the final cause (why), concerning which we have already spoken.

¹ Ibid., a. 3.

159. 1. Principle: A human act receives some morality, although less principal, from circumstances. For (a) Christ Himself declared that the poor widow, who put two mites into the treasury, gave more than the rich who cast in many things; and this indeed is not explained otherwise than by reason of circumstances, namely because "of her want she cast in all that she had, her whole living."² (b) Trent defined that it is necessary to confess the circumstances of sins which change the species of sin;³ certainly because they increase moral malice. (c) For circumstances, when considered in their relation to such a determinate act, can be conformable to the rule of morals or not; for not rarely law determines in what place, time, mode, etc., this act is to be performed. Now, if they are conformable to right reason, they have some goodness which they confer upon the act; but if they are difform, they add a certain malice to the act.

² Mark, XII, 41-44.

³ Trent, sess. XIV, can. 7.

160. 2. Applications. Circumstances can attribute morality to a human act in a fourfold way:

(a) An act indifferent from the object can become good or evil from circumstances; thus to eat temperately, for refreshing one's strength, is good; to do this with excess is evil.

(b) An act good from the object is sometimes rendered evil from circumstances, gravely or lightly, according to the degree of malice which is present in them; thus, for example, the exercise of trade in a sacred place, servile labor on Sunday, marriage entered into with a person bound by a vow of chastity, etc., by reason of circumstances, bear something evil before them.

(c) An act good or evil from the object can receive a new species of goodness or malice from circumstances; for example, he who from a vow preserves continence attains not only the goodness of chastity, but also that of religion; conversely he who unjustly carries off a sacred thing from a place contracts not only the malice of theft, but also of sacrilege. Circumstances of this kind are called those changing the species.

(d) An act good or evil from the object can acquire some degree of goodness or malice from circumstances, or, conversely, lose it. For there are circumstances which, although they do not change the species of the act, nevertheless increase or diminish its goodness or malice. Thus a poor man giving alms performs, other things being equal, a more excellent act of mercy than a rich man; a priest committing the same act of intemperance as a layman sins more gravely; he who steals because he is placed in a certain grave necessity sins less gravely than he who already abounds in wealth.

161. 3. Required conditions. In order that an act derive morality from circumstances, two things are required: (a) the circumstances must bear some goodness or malice before them; for if they are indifferent, they do not morally influence the act; thus generally it matters little whether a theft was committed on Monday or Tuesday; (b) they must be apprehended as moral and intended at least implicitly and in the confused; otherwise, although good or evil in themselves, they are not sought under this respect.

N. B. A gravely evil circumstance takes away the whole goodness of an act; otherwise, if it is lightly evil, as was said above concerning intention, n. 150. - From circumstances differ actions, internal or external, which sometimes are done during the principal action: for example, an idle word during prayer, an act of impatience while working; these are truly distinct acts, which can be evil, but do not take away the goodness of the principal action.

162. 1. State of the question. The things which thus far we have said concerning morality regard the human act, whether internal or external. But here the question arises whether the external act, or the execution of the interior act, adds to it a special goodness or malice. (a) We suppose here that there is question of an efficacious internal act, to which full consent has been given, and of an external act which is nothing else than the mere execution of this interior act; for according to all, between a desire more or less ineffectual and its execution there is a great difference; likewise, if the external act adds something to a merely internal desire, as not rarely happens, by that very fact it introduces new morality. (b) All concede that the external act increases per accidens the goodness or malice of the internal act, and indeed especially in a threefold way: by reason of intensity, insofar as the will, in the very execution of the act, is borne toward the object with greater vehemence, on account of the delight or difficulty which is found in it; by reason of duration, insofar as the one executing, by continuing the act of the will until he has completed the work, perseveres in it longer; by reason of multiplication, because often, on the occasion of the external act, the internal act is renewed several times, and from this becomes better or worse.

163. 2. Opinion of the Scotists. These things posited, the Scotists say that the external act of itself increases the morality of the internal act. For (a) internal and external acts are prohibited by diverse precepts of the Decalogue; thus by the seventh precept the external act of theft is prohibited: you shall not steal; but by the tenth the very desire of theft: you shall not covet; therefore theft outwardly perpetrated has a special malice of itself.

(b) From the common sense of the faithful, the external act of sin must be accused, nor does it suffice for the thief to say: I efficaciously willed to steal; but if the external act adds no malice to the internal act, why are we bound to confess it?

(c) If the opposite opinion is true, something false follows; for example, if someone has an efficacious desire of killing a thousand men, he sins as gravely as if in reality he had killed them; if, conversely, he has an efficacious will of feeding a thousand poor persons, he merits equally as if in fact he had fed them; yet no one admits this.

164. 3. The common opinion of the Thomists and others. The Thomists, with whom in this matter most theologians agree, teach that the exterior act, as it is precisely the execution of a truly efficacious interior act, does not of itself add to this a new goodness or malice.

(a) For here belong the words of Christ:¹ "Everyone who looks at a woman to lust after her has already committed adultery with her in his heart"; for there the merely internal act is equated with the external act. Many Fathers, explaining the aforesaid words, in reality declare this explicitly.

¹ Matt., V, 28.

(b) There is no morality without liberty; but the whole liberty of the external act proceeds from the internal one, so that, if that act happens without the free consent of the will, it is neither free nor imputable; therefore the external act of itself has no morality, and consequently cannot increase the goodness or malice of the interior consent.

Hence if desire and its execution are prohibited by diverse precepts, it does not follow from this that these two have distinct malice, but that God willed that a rude people, such as the Israelite people was, should better understand that not only the external act, but also the internal desire, although separated from its execution, is evil.

165. (c) If the opinion of the Scotists were true, someone could deprive another unwilling person of moral goodness by impeding the external act; for example, a thief, by taking away money destined by someone for alms, could deprive this person of the special goodness annexed to the external act of almsgiving; which indeed is altogether repugnant.

Nor is it absurd to say that he who efficaciously wills to feed a thousand poor persons, although he is prevented from accomplishing this by theft or another cause, attains the goodness annexed to such an action; for God looks upon the heart, and rewards the very volition as well as its execution. Thus He said to Abraham, who had immolated his son only intentionally: "Because you have done this thing, and have not spared your only-begotten son for My sake, I will bless you."² - Nevertheless the external act must be declared in confession, not because it has per se a distinct malice, but because for the most part it becomes graver per accidens, and besides the confessor can scarcely fulfill his office concerning avoiding occasions, imposing restitution, or suggesting remedies, unless together with the internal consent, the external action is candidly set forth.

² Gen., XXII, 16.

166. Conclusion. Speculatively speaking this latter opinion seems more probable. But in practice, for the most part the execution of the interior act supposes a more intense volition and a greater goodness or malice, as was explained above, n. 162. Whence one would be much deceived who cared little about external acts. (a) If it is a question of good acts, these things are to be kept before the eyes: the volition is not truly efficacious which, where it can, does not pass to the external act; besides, by acting externally, we strengthen the will itself by forming good habits; finally many external acts are prescribed by positive laws, and deservedly, since the exterior act often suggests the interior.

(b) If the question is about evil acts, from their execution there not rarely follow scandals, the obligation of restitution, depraved habits, and greater facility for sinning.

Therefore, although care must chiefly be taken about rightly ordering internal acts, the right ordination of external acts cannot be passed over.

167. Corollary concerning the sense of the axiom: Good from the whole cause, evil from any defect. That axiom, which is found in the works ascribed to St. Dionysius the Areopagite,¹ has been commonly received by theologians in this sense: that moral goodness does not belong to an act which, whether from the object, or from the end or circumstances, is evil. Yet this must be understood with the restrictions set forth above.

¹ Lib. de divinis nominibus, cap. 4, apud Migne, P. G., t. III, 730.

(A) As regards the object, an act evil from the object and known as such cannot become good from the end or circumstances, n. 151. But an act indifferent of itself can become good from the end or circumstances, nn. 152, 160. Therefore for the goodness of an act, it is not required that the object be good of itself, but it suffices that it receive some goodness from the end or circumstances.

(B) If it is a question of the end, an intention totally and adequately evil suffices for vitiating an act otherwise good from the object and circumstances, n. 150; likewise an intention gravely culpable, although it is not the adequate cause of the act, vitiates it; but an intention lightly culpable accompanying a good intention more probably does not vitiate the whole act, n. 150.

(C) When speech is about circumstances, a gravely evil circumstance vitiates the whole act, but not a lightly evil one, nn. 150, 161.

From this it is likewise understood that the conditions required for moral honorableness are: 1. that the act be free; 2. that the object not be evil at least formally or in knowledge; 3. that the act be good at least on the part of the end, whether of the work or of the one operating; 4. nor otherwise be vitiated by some gravely evil circumstance.

196. Preliminary notes. As was said above, n. 8, the end toward which we tend is supernatural, and is attained by us by way of remuneration, n. 29. Therefore it does not suffice to act honorably, but supernatural and meritorious acts must be elicited.

¹ Dogmatic theologians treat concerning this matter in the Treatise De Gratia, namely St. Thomas, Ia IIae, q. 114; Suarez, lib. XII, c. 2 sq.; Salmanticenses, disp. I-II, and others whom we list in Synopsi Th. Dogmat., De Gratia, n. 184-204.

When someone, by a free and honorable action, brings to another an emolument not owed, he is said to merit with him, or he acquires a right to some retribution; but conversely, if someone freely and unjustly inflicts some detriment on another, he demerits, or incurs the obligation of undergoing some punishment. Yet in order that a reward can be demanded by strict right, it is necessary that some pact, at least implicitly, be entered into, by force of which one of the contracting parties promises some determinate work in favor of the other, and the other promises a determinate reward in retribution for the work. For although a good and free action, performed in favor of another, is of itself apt for obtaining some reward, the strict obligation of conferring it, and also the nature, quantity, and quality of this reward, are by no means determined of themselves; therefore it is necessary that a pact be entered into for determining these things.

From this it is asked whether man can merit with God. The reason for doubting is that, since he has received his whole being from God, he can do nothing which is not owed to God. Nevertheless, since man is of his own right and is endowed with liberty, he can furnish something of his own to God, namely a free act of the will (above, n. 30); and, although this free submission is essentially owed, God, nevertheless, most good, deigns to accept it as worthy of reward, and promises the unfading crown of glory to all those who freely operate good. This promise posited, we acquire a right to retribution, not indeed from an explicit pact, but from the fidelity by which God always fulfills His promises. - But because we have been elevated to the supernatural state, here we shall treat not of natural retribution, but of supernatural merit, setting forth its nature, and also the conditions required for merit on the part of the one operating, of the work, and of God.

1. KINDS OF OBLIGATION. —Every human law, ecclesiastical or civil, which has the properties described in the preceding section of this treatise, binds not only externally, under pain of punishment, but also internally, i. e., in the court of conscience. This proposition is evident from the very nature of things, for the provisions of a just law are simply the will of God applied to some special condition.¹ St. Paul says: "Let every soul be subject to higher powers: for there is no power but from God, and those that are, are ordained of God. Therefore he that resisteth the power, resisteth the ordinance of God.... Wherefore be subject of necessity, not only for wrath, but also for conscience' sake. For therefore also ² you pay tribute. For they are the ministers of God, serving unto this purpose. Render therefore to all men their dues: tribute, to whom tribute is due, custom, to whom custom; fear, to whom fear; honor, to whom honor.”³

¹ Cfr. St. Thomas, Summa Theol., 1a 2ae, qu. 95, art. 2; qu. 96, art. 4.

² διὰ τοῦτο γὰρ καί. (Rom. XIII, 6).

³ Rom. XIII, 1-7.

And St. Peter: "Be ye subject therefore to every human creature for God's sake: whether it be to the king as excelling, or to the governors as sent by him for the punishment of evildoers, and for the praise of the good: for so is the will of God, that by doing good you may put to silence the ignorance of foolish men: as free, and not as making liberty a cloak for malice, but as the servants of God." ⁴ "SS. Peter and Paul insisted that men owe obedience to civil authority for conscience' sake and by virtue of a divine command. This doctrine at that time was utterly new in the world.... According to Apostolic teaching, the ruling power of the State, or public authority, no matter what its form or composition, is ordained for the purpose of administering the divine law on earth. Hence every Christian is in duty bound to recognize those constituted in authority, without regard to their moral or religious qualifications, and to obey them for conscience' sake, not merely for fear of punishment. All power, civil as well as paternal, is from God. Obedience to authority is a necessary duty deeply ingrained in the soul of every man." ⁵ The teaching of Tradition is in perfect harmony with that of Scripture. Thus we read in the Epistle to Diognetus: "Christians differ from other men neither in country nor language nor customs.... They share all things as citizens.... They obey the appointed laws, and go beyond the laws in their own lives."⁶ Tertullian writes: "We venerate in the emperors the decisions of God, for God has placed them over the nations."⁷ St. Augustine says that the Christian soldiers of Rome "distinguished between their eternal and their temporal lord, and obeyed the latter for the sake of the former."⁸

⁴ 1 Pet. II, 13-16.

⁵ Döllinger, Christentum und Kirche, Ratisbon 1868, pp. 14 sq.

⁶ Epist. ad Diognet., c. 5 (Lake, The Apostolic Fathers, Vol. II, London 1913, pp. 359 sq.).

⁷ Apol., c. 32.

⁸ Enarrat. in Ps., 124, n. 7. —Many other Patristic passages of similar tenor will be found collected in F. Hamm, Zur Grundlegung und Geschichte der Steuermoral, Treves 1908, pp. 138 sqq.

Hence there can be no doubt that every just law obliges in conscience, i. e., under pain of sin (sub culpa morali s. theologica). However, not all laws bind always and in every case. An affirmative law binds "always" but not "for always" (semper, sed non pro semper, i. e., at every moment, in all circumstances), whereas a negative law binds "always" and "for always" (semper et pro semper). Thus a person is not bound to profess his faith under all circumstances, but he is never allowed to deny it.

The rule, "Lex positiva obligat semper, sed non pro semper" has one exception: the law of charity, which binds always and for all time because the obligation of loving and serving God is the foundation of all other precepts, negative as well as positive.⁹

⁹ Cfr. J. Ernst, Ueber die Notwendigkeit der guten Meinung, Freiburg 1905, p. 201.

Unjust laws do not bind in conscience because they "are acts of violence rather than laws," as St. Thomas says.¹⁰ In regard to the above the following principles should be borne in mind: a) No one is obliged to obey a precept which it is morally impossible for him to fulfill (ultra posse nemo tenetur). However, when the whole of an obligation cannot be fulfilled, and the matter is susceptible of division, we are not excused from fulfilling a part. Innocent XI condemned the proposition that a priest who is unable to say the whole of his daily office is therefore excused from saying any portion of it.¹¹ b) A law which runs counter to the moral law of nature not only does not oblige in conscience,¹² but must be resisted passively.¹³

¹⁰ Summa Theol., 1a 2ae, qu. 96, art. 4. —Cfr. St. Augustine, De Lib. Arbitr., I, c. 5, n. 11: "That which has not been just does not seem to me to be a law." (Migne, P. L., XXXII, 1227). —Cfr. also the Syllabus of Pius IX, prop. 56 and 57 (Denzinger-Bannwart, n. 1756 sq.). V. supra, Sect. 3, note 3.

¹¹ Cfr. the 54th of the propositions condemned by Innocent XI: “He who cannot recite Matins and Lauds, but can recite the remaining Hours, is bound to nothing, because the greater part draws the lesser to itself." (Denzinger-Bannwart, n. 1204).

¹² Cfr. Acts IV, 18-19; V, 29. — St. Augustine, Epist., 105, c. 2, n. 7: "If emperors were in error—which God forbid—they would enact laws in accord with their error against the truth, through which the just would both be proved and crowned by not doing what those emperors commanded, because God forbade it. Thus Nebuchadnezzar had commanded that a golden statue be adored; those who refused to do this pleased God, who forbade such things." (Migne, P. L., XXXIII, 398). —St. Thomas, Summa Theol., 1a 2ae, qu. 96, art. 4: "Laws can be unjust through opposition to the divine good, as are the laws of tyrants inducing men to idolatry or to anything else contrary to the divine law; and such laws may in no way be observed, because, as is said in Acts V, 29: We ought to obey God rather than men.”

¹³ Cfr. Ph. Hergenröther, Der Gehorsam gegen die weltliche Obrigkeit, Freiburg 1877.

Authority, be it civil or ecclesiastical, can never oblige a man to commit even a venial sin, for we must obey God more than men. Such has always been and always will be the teaching of the Church. Wiclif and Hus held that no one is obliged to obey a superior if the latter is in the state of mortal sin. The Church teaches that one must not obey a sinful command.¹⁴ When a command is clearly contrary to the law of God, obedience would be sinful.¹⁵

¹⁴ Cfr. Prop. Damnat. Wiclif., n. 15; Huss., n. 30 (Denzinger-Bannwart, n. 595, 656).

¹⁵ Cfr. St. Thomas, Summa Theol, 2a 2ae, qu. 104, art. 5, where the question, Utrum subditi teneantur suis superioribus in omnibus obedire, is treated exhaustively.

The oft-quoted dictum of Gregory VII, "Sententia pastoris, sive iusta sive iniusta fuerit, timenda est," means not that an unjust command must be obeyed, but that it should not be transgressed lightly and in a spirit of contempt. The phrase "ad peccatum obligare," which is found in the constitutions of some religious orders, signifies an obligation which binds under pain of sin (sub peccato), not a command to sin.¹⁶

¹⁶ Cfr. Bishop von Ketteler, Kann ein Jesuit von einem Obern zu einer Sünde verpflichtet werden? Mayence 1874, pp. 10 sqq.; B. Duhr, S.J., Jesuitenfabeln, 4th ed., pp. 515 sqq.

"Active resistance to authority," says a non-Catholic writer, "is not unreservedly condemned by Christian ethics. Those who maintain that it is, are inspired by absolutistic notions. When persons in authority are faithless and violate the constitution, even a Christian subject is justified in resisting them." ¹⁷ c) An indubitably unjust law does not bind. If, however, a law is just in its object (lex honesta), and unjust only in its origin or purpose, it may be obeyed, provided obedience does not involve the violation of some other moral duty. Obedience may even be a strict duty, namely, when some higher moral good would be jeopardized by disobedience, as in the case of public scandal or revolt, provided always that no just law is violated. In the words of the Angelic Doctor, "[unjust] laws are not binding in the court of conscience, except perhaps to avoid scandal or turmoil, for which cause a man ought to abate something of his right...." ¹⁸ Laws which imperil higher rights or interests may be resisted by all legal means, such as remonstrances, appeals, petitions, agitation in the public press. To employ illegal means is tantamount to sedition. No matter what the provocation, revolution against a legitimate government is forbidden, because revolution by its very concept is an attack upon actually existing and divinely sanctioned rights. Pius IX solemnly condemned the proposition that "It is permitted to withhold obedience from legitimate rulers, nay even to rebel against them."¹⁹

¹⁷ Theologische Literaturseitung, Leipsic 1902, p. 617.

¹⁸ Summa Theol., 1a 2ae, qu. 96, art. 4: "Laws are called just from their end, namely when they are ordered to the common good; from their author, namely when the enacted law does not exceed the power of the one enacting it; and from their form, namely when burdens are imposed upon subjects according to proportional equality in order to the common good. ... Hence such [unjust] laws do not bind in the court of conscience, except perhaps for avoiding scandal or disturbance, for which reason a man ought even to yield his own right, according to Matthew V, 40-41."

¹⁹ Syllabus Errorum, n. 63: "It is permitted to withhold obedience from legitimate rulers, and even to rebel against them. (Denzinger-Bannwart, n. 1763). Cfr. Fr. Heiner, Der Syllabus, Mayence 1905, pp. 283 sqq. —Cfr. Rom. XIII, 2; Sophocles, Antigone, 672 sqq.

So far as obligation is concerned, laws may be divided into moral, penal, and mixed.

(1) A moral law (lex moralis) binds in conscience and under pain of sin (ad culpam).

(2) A purely penal law (lex mere sive pure poenalis) binds only under pain of suffering the penalty imposed for its infraction.

(3) If a law binds under pain of sin, and, in addition, imposes a penalty, it is called mixed (lex mixta).

The Schoolmen teach that if one transgresses a purely penal law, he is bound in conscience to pay the penalty imposed, but incurs no moral guilt (culpa theologica) and therefore commits no sin. His transgression is merely a technical violation of the law (culpa iuridica).

As examples of purely penal laws Catholic moralists are wont to cite (1) the statutes of certain associations, institutes or seminaries, especially the constitutions of religious orders which distinguish between the rules of ordinary and those of stricter observance,²⁰ and (2) such civil ordinances as regard taxes, permits, licenses, etc. Some writers include in the category of leges mere poenales police regulations, nay all laws made by "infidel or unchristian" States.²¹ Scholastic theology as a system merely teaches the possibility of purely penal laws; whether such laws actually exist is a question in dispute.²² When it is certain that the civil authorities do not intend to bind their subjects in conscience, a law may be considered penal only.

²⁰ Cfr. St. Thomas, Summa Theol., 2a 2ae, qu. 186, art. 1-2.

²¹ Cfr. K. Wagner, Die sittlichen Grundsätze bezüglich der Steuerpflicht, Ratisbon 1906, pp. 50 sqq.; A. Müller, Die staatlichen Gesetze in ihrer Beziehung zur sittlichen Weltordnung, Treves 1906, pp. 11 sqq.

²² Cfr. Ballerini-Palmieri, Opus Theol. Mor., tr. 3 de Leg., n. 107: "This is the very celebrated question: whether merely penal laws are given." —A. Vermeersch, S.J., Quaestiones de Iustitia, 2nd ed., Bruges 1904, p. 134: "In truth, more recent authors have gone off into various and diverse opinions; in this variety of opinions it is permissible to suspect the influence of climate or region."—W. McDonald, The Principles of Moral Science, pp. 98 sqq. —Thomas a Kempis says of the rules of religious orders: "Every religious discipline holds out two goods: that the statutes be diligently observed and that the negligent be corrected for their faults." (De Disciplina Claustralium, c. 1; Op. Omnia, ed. Pohl, Vol. II, p. 269).

2. DEGREES OF OBLIGATION. —Unlike divine laws, human laws never bind absolutely. The obligation they impose depends in each case primarily on the will of the lawgiver and secondarily on the matter involved. a) When the matter is light and trivial (materia levis), i. e., when the precept is of no importance for the common good, either in itself or by reason of attendant circumstances, the obligation is slight. When, on the other hand, the matter is grave (materia gravis), i. e., when the law or its object is in itself important or rendered so by circumstances, the resulting obligation is serious. b) The intention of the lawgiver may either be gathered from the purpose of the law or inferred from the wording chosen or the penalty imposed. c) A human law ordinarily does not bind cum gravi incommodo, and hence may be disregarded if its observance involves any serious inconvenience, such as danger to life and limb, loss of honor, health or fortune, etc. The reasons for this exemption are: (i) A law, to be binding, must be physically and morally capable of fulfilment; (2) No human legislator has power over the life, health, or property of his subjects, unless higher interests are at stake.

In matter of fact, even positive divine laws do not bind where life is in danger,²³ and the Church does not enforce even such important precepts as the sanctification of the Lord's Day, fasting, or the recitation of the Breviary as obligatory on those who cannot observe them without grave inconvenience.

²³ Cfr. 1 Kings XXI, 6; Matth. XII, 1-5.

There are, however, circumstances in which human laws bind even at the risk of life or death, e. g., (1) When the common good or the eternal salvation of one's fellowmen are involved, as often happens in the case of priests and soldiers; (2) When disobedience involves formal contempt of authority or the danger of grave scandal.

In all such cases a law binds even at the risk of life or health, for the reason that the common good (bonum commune) is superior to that of the individual.

That all men are bound under pain of grievous sin to obey the "higher powers," appears from the passage we have quoted ²⁴ from St. Paul's Epistle to the Romans. This is not, however, tantamount to saying that all human laws bind sub gravi. The question whether a human lawgiver can impose a serious obligation when the matter at issue is slight (materia levis), is answered negatively by most theologians. The reasons given are two: (1) Even the divine law binds but slightly in matters of no importance, and a human lawgiver cannot impose a heavier obligation than God, from whom his jurisdiction is derived; (2) To impose a serious obligation in matters of small importance would be contrary to the common good, give cause for scandal, and work mischief.

²⁴ Rom. XIII, 1-6 (supra, p. 163).

Note, however, that a matter small in itself may become important by virtue of its purpose or outward circumstances, and thus involve a serious obligation. This was the case with the command God gave to our first parents in Paradise.²⁵ Though the matter involved was slight, the law itself possessed great importance on account of the purpose for which it had been given and the severe punishment threatened.

²⁵ Gen. II, 16 sq.

READINGS.—Th. Slater, S.J., A Manual of Moral Theology, Vol. I, pp. 97 sqq. —IDEM in the Cath. Encyclopedia, Vol. XI, pp. 189 sqq. —A. Sweens, Theologia Moralis Fundamentalis, 2nd ed., pp. 177 sqq. —A. Vermeersch, S.J., Theol. Mor., Vol. I. Bruges 1922, pp. 210 sqq.

I. THE OBJECT. —The object of an act (obiectum materiale) is that act itself, considered in the abstract. Though there are objects that are in themselves indifferent (e. g., eating and drinking), as a rule the object of an act has an inherent morality of its own, which causes the will of the agent to be either good or bad, according as the object is good (e. g., prayer, fasting), or bad (e. g., lying, stealing).³

³ St. Thomas, Summa Theol., 1a 2ae, qu. 18, art. 8: "Every act has its species from its object, and a human act, which is called moral, has its species from the object as related to the principle of human acts, which is reason. Hence if the object of an act includes something that agrees with the order of reason, the act will be good according to its species, as giving alms to one in need; but if it includes something contrary to the order of reason, the act will be evil according to its species, as stealing, which is taking another's property. It can happen, however, that the object of an act includes nothing pertaining to the order of reason, as lifting a straw from the ground, going into a field, and things of this kind; and such acts according to their species are indifferent." — Ibid., art. 9: "Every individual act must have some circumstance through which it is drawn toward good or evil, at least on the part of the intention of the end. Since it belongs to reason to order, an act proceeding from deliberative reason, if it is not ordered to a due end, by that very fact is opposed to reason and has the character of evil; but if it is ordered to a due end, it agrees with the order of reason and therefore has the character of good. It is necessary that it either be ordered or not be ordered to a due end. Hence every act of man proceeding from deliberative reason, considered individually, must be good or evil. But if it does not proceed from deliberative reason, but from a certain imagination—as when someone strokes his beard or moves his hand or foot—such an act is not, properly speaking, moral or human, since an act has this character from reason; and thus it will be indifferent, as though existing outside the class of moral acts." —Cfr. St. Ambrose, Expos, in Ps., 118, s. 14, n. 23: "Omnia cum ratione [facias], nihil sine ratione, quia non es irrationabilis, o homo, sed rationabilis." (Migne, P. L., XV, 1400).—St. Jerome, Epist., 112 (al. 89), n. 16: "For indifferent things do not stand between good and evil as the philosophers argue. Continence is good; luxury is evil. Walking, discharging the refuse of the bowels, casting the purgings of the head from the nostrils, and casting out phlegm by spitting are indifferent between the two. This is neither good nor evil; for whether you do it or do not do it, you will have neither justice nor injustice. But to observe the ceremonies of the law cannot be indifferent, but is either good or evil." (P. L., XXII, 926).

Objectively indifferent acts become good or bad when they are willed with a good or bad intention, or when good or bad circumstances surround them.

According to its gravity in the moral order, an act is called materia gravis or levis.

In regard to their object or matter human acts are either intrinsically good or intrinsically bad, according as their objects are good or bad in themselves. Intrinsically good acts may be good either absolutely or relatively. An absolutely good act (secundum se bonus), which can never be bad, is, e. g., the love of God. A relatively good act (in se bonus) is one that may be good or bad according to the reason or motive which inspire or the accidental conditions or circumstances which surround it. Such relatively good acts are, for example, prayer, fasting, almsgiving.

Intrinsically bad acts are such as run counter to the moral order by their very nature. Some are absolutely bad and can never become good, as, e. g., hatred of God, perjury. Others are bad merely because the agent has no right to perform them or because they are a source of danger or temptation, e. g., manslaughter, viewing unchaste pictures. Acts of the latter kind are called relatively bad. A relatively bad act may become good by virtue of special conditions or circumstances, e. g., self-defense or study.

Extrinsically bad acts are bad simply because they are forbidden. As Göpfert rightly remarks, however, "the terms 'extrinsically good' and 'extrinsically bad' do not denote merely the conformity or nonconformity of an act to the law, regardless of its intrinsic ethical character; but they indicate that the relation existing between such an act and the moral order owes its existence to a command or prohibition of the lawgiver.”⁴

⁴ Göpfert, Moraltheologie, Vol. I, 6th ed., p. 191.

II. THE END. —By the end of an action (obiectum formale) is meant the reason or motive which induces the agent to perform that action, or, to employ a more familiar term, the intention with which he acts.⁵ i. An intention may be actual, virtual, or habitual. It is actual if it is elicited immediately before the act is performed and with direct reference to the same. It is virtual if its force is borrowed from a previous act of the will, which is accounted as continuing in effect. It is habitual if it once existed and has never been retracted.

⁵ Cfr. Matth. VI, 1-8. —St. Augustine, De Serm. Dom. in Monte, II, c. 13, n. 45: "Therefore we must consider not what each person does, but with what intention he does it. For this is the light within us, because this is manifest to us: that we do what we do with a good intention." (Migne, P. L., XXXIV, 1289). —St. Bernard, De Baptismo, c. 2, n.

To be morally good an act must be inspired by an actual, or at least a virtual, good intention. A merely habitual intention is not sufficient for this purpose because it may exist in an unconscious subject, and is strictly speaking non-existent while the action is being performed.

The Catholic Church exhorts her children to make a good intention frequently, at least every day, in order to sanctify all their actions by referring them directly to God.⁶ There is no nobler motto than, "All for the greater honor and glory of God." ⁷ The end of an action may be primary or secondary, ultimate or intermediate, natural or supernatural.

⁶ (P. L., CLXXXII, 1035).

⁶ 1 Cor. X, 31; 1 Pet. IV, 11; Col. III, 17; cfr. John XV, 8; Phil. I, 10 sq. —St. Ignatius of Antioch, Epist. ad Polycarp., c. 5: Πάντα εἰς τιμὴν Θεοῦ γινέσθω. (Funk, Patres Apost., I, 2nd ed., 292, 8). —St. Augustine, Enarr. in Ps., 34, s. 2, n. 16: "Who endures praising God all day? I suggest a remedy by which you may praise God all day, if you wish. Whatever you do, do it well, and you have praised God." (Migne, P. L., XXXVI, 341).—On the good intention as a requisite of supernatural merit see Pohle-Preuss, Grace, Actual and Habitual, pp. 413 sqq.

⁷ Cfr. H. Lammens, "L'Antiquité de la Formule 'Omnia ad Maiorem Dei Gloriam,' " in the Revue de l'Orient Chrétien, VIII (Paris 1903), pp. 477 sqq.

2. As regards the influence of the intention on the morality of an act, note the following considerations: a) An act that is morally indifferent, so far as its object is concerned, becomes good or bad by the intention of the agent. Thus the act of eating, which is in itself indifferent, becomes good if done for the purpose of sustaining life and strength, bad if done exclusively for pleasure.⁸ b) An act that is objectively good (e. g., prayer, almsgiving) becomes bad if done for a wicked purpose. Conversely, an objectively good act derives an increase of moral value from a good intention.⁹ c) A materially bad act (e. g., a lie) is never rendered good by a good intention. The reason is that a good end cannot be attained by evil means.¹⁰ No advantage that could possibly be gained by sin is large enough to outweigh the injury inflicted on the moral law. Christ Himself said: "What doth it profit a man, if he gain the whole world, and suffer the loss of his own soul? Or what exchange shall a man give for his soul?”¹¹ It is never allowed to do evil that good may come, which is but another way of saying that the end never justifies the means.¹² "This," says Father Slater, S.J., "is the teaching of Holy Scripture and of the Catholic Church, nor have the Jesuits any other doctrine different from that of the Church. Father Dasbach promised to give anyone two thousand florins who would prove in open court that the Jesuits had ever taught that the end justifies the means. Count Paul von Hoensbroech undertook to do so, but he failed in his suit when it was tried at Cologne, in the spring of 1905." ¹³

⁸ Eccles. X, 17.

⁹ Cfr. Matth. V, 16; VI, 1 sqq.; XXIII, 5, 15.

¹⁰ Cfr. Job XIII, 7; Rom. III, 8; VI, 1.—St. Augustine, De Mendacio, c. 21, n. 42: “No one is to be led to eternal salvation with a lie lending assistance.” (Migne, P. L., XL, 516).

¹¹ Matth. XVI, 26.

¹² Cfr. St. Augustine, Contra Mendacium, c. 7, n. 18: “It matters very greatly from what cause, for what end, and with what intention something is done; but things which are known to be sins must not be done under the pretext of a good cause, for any supposedly good end, or with any apparently good intention.” (Migne, P. L., XL, 528).

¹³ Th. Slater, S.J., A Manual of Moral Theology, Vol. I, p. 49.—P. Roh, S.J., Das alte Lied: “Der Zweck heiligt die Mittel,” 3rd ed., Freiburg 1894; M. Reichmann, S.J., Der Zweck heiligt die Mittel, Freiburg 1903; Fr. Gerard, S.J., Does the End Justify the Means? C. T. S. pamphlet.—B. Duhr, S.J., Jesuitenfabeln, 4th ed., pp. 542 sqq.; J. Mausbach, Catholic Moral Teaching and its Antagonists, pp. 92 sqq.; Pilatus (Dr. V. Naumann, a Protestant), Der Jesuitismus, Ratisbon 1905, pp. 280 sqq.; F. Heiner, Der Jesuitismus, 3rd ed., Paderborn 1902, pp. 81 sqq.; IDEM, Die Jesuiten und ihre Gegner, Munich 1906, pp. 73 sqq.; Catholic Encyclopedia, Vol. III, p. 87; Vol. XIV, pp. 104 sq.; Brou, S.J., Les Jésuites de la Légende, Paris 1906; Concerning Jesuits, London 1902; Maynard, The Studies and Teaching of the Society of Jesus, London 1855.

However, while the sinfulness of an act is never neutralized, it may be diminished by the intention of the agent, if the choice of means results from imperfect knowledge or is made for the sake of a good purpose. To choose a bad means for the attainment of a good end manifestly indicates less malice than to choose a bad means for its own sake.¹⁴ An apparently good purpose may, on the other hand, augment the wickedness of an act because of the intrinsic contradiction contained in the attempt to employ a bad means for the attainment of a good end, e. g., if one meant to honor God by committing murder or fornication.

¹⁴ Cfr. St. Augustine, Enchiridion, c. 18, n. 6: "It seems to me that every lie is indeed a sin, but it makes a great difference with what intention and about what matters each person lies. For he who lies with the intention of advising does not sin in the same way as he who lies with the intention of harming; nor indeed does the person who by lying sends a traveler onto a different road do as much harm as the one who corrupts the way of life by a deceiving lie." (Migne, P. L., XL, 240).—IDEM, Contra Mendac., c. 8, n. 19: "Someone will say: then is every thief to be equated with the thief who steals from a will of mercy? Who would say this? Yet neither of these two is good merely because one is worse. For he who steals from covetousness is worse than he who steals from pity; but if every theft is a sin, every theft must be abstained from." (P. L., XL, 529).—St. Bernard, De Praec. et Dispens., c. 7, n. 13: "It certainly matters from what cause, with what disposition, with what intention, by whose command, and in regard to what precept this evil is committed. Indeed, I say that no disobedience at all is to be regarded lightly, yet not every disobedience is to be judged of equal danger. For God's command is: You shall not kill [Ex. 20, 13]. Suppose, then, two murderers, one of whom committed the crime from a desire to plunder and the other from the necessity of defending himself. Does not the cause here quite evidently distinguish leprosy from leprosy, making the guilt of one and the same transgression very unequal? What if sudden anger drove the one, but calculated malice or an old hatred drove the other, to the same crime? Must that which is known to have been done with such dissimilar dispositions be weighed by a similar judgment? Further, nothing is more incestuous or obscene than those daughters of Lot having usurped intercourse with their father [Gen. 19, 32-36]; yet who does not see how greatly the piety of their intention and their intention of piety removed or diminished the guilt of that shameful and unspeakable crime?" (Migne, P. L., CLXXXII, 868).—The legend that St. Crispin stole leather to make shoes for the poor, is based upon a misunderstanding. Cfr. V. Cathrein, S.J., Moralphilosophie, Vol. I, 4th ed., p. 286.

By the circumstances of an action are understood certain accidental conditions which determine and distinguish it from others of the same kind.¹⁵

¹⁵ Cfr. St. Thomas, Summa Theol., 1a 2ae, qu. 7, art. 1: "In matters of place something is said to stand around a thing which is indeed extrinsic to it, but nevertheless touches it or approaches it according to place. Therefore whatever conditions are outside the substance of the act and yet touch a human act in some manner are called circumstances. That which is outside the substance of a thing but pertains to the thing itself is called its accident. Hence circumstances must be called accidents of human acts." Cfr. ibid., qu. 18, art. 3, 10, 11. —Sweens, Theol. Mor. Fundament., pp. 106 sqq.

There are seven such conditions, enumerated in the old-time versus memorialis:

"Quis, quid, ubi, quibus auxiliis, cur, quomodo, quando?" (Who, what, where, when, by what means, why, and how?)

Some circumstances (circumstantiae gradum moralitatis mutantes) merely augment or diminish the malice of an act, whereas others completely transform its moral species (circumstantiae speciem moralitatis mutantes). This distinction is of great practical importance, for the circumstances which alter the species of a sin must be mentioned in confession.¹⁶

¹⁶ Conc. Trident., Sess. XIV, de Poenit., c. 5 and canon 7; Catechismus Romanus, P. II, c. 5, qu. 47.

However, it is not so much the external circumstances as the interior disposition or intention of the agent manifesting itself in and through the circumstances, that furnishes the criterion for determining the moral character of an act.

A modern writer on ethics somewhat paradoxically says: "It depends on time, place, and circumstances whether a virtue is a vice, or a vice, a virtue." This dictum is not true except in the limited sense explained above.¹⁷

¹⁷ Matth. VI, 1 sqq.; Luke X, 30 sqq.; XVIII, 9 sqq. —St. Thomas, Summa Theol., 1a 2ae, qu. 7, art. 3.

The circumstances that augment or lessen the malice of an evil action (circumstantiae aggravantes vel minuentes peccatum) are enumerated in the following hexameters by a medieval writer: 15 "Aggravat ordo, locus, peccata, scientia, tempus, Aetas, conditio, numerus, mora, copia, causa, Et modus in culpa, status altus, lucta pusilla." ¹⁸ The circumstances that alter the moral species of an act may be variously classified.

¹⁸ Frater Conrad of Saxony, d. 1279. Cfr. A. Franz, Drei deutsche Minoritenprediger, Freiburg 1907, p. 30.

There are (1) Circumstances which render an act a transgression of more than one commandment or duty, e. g., when a man kills his parents or commits fornication with a married woman; (2) Circumstances by which a sinful act becomes a source of injury to others, as, e. g., when scandal is given; (3) Circumstances in which the matter of the sin committed (where such matter is divisible) ceases to be materia parva and becomes materia magna, as when one eats several ounces of meat on a day of abstinence, or steals, say, thirty-five dollars.¹⁹

¹⁹ This is the amount put down in the latest editions of Sabetti as materia absolute gravis. (Compendium Theol. Mor., ed. 23, New York 1915, p. 340.

The usefulness of this title, since it concerns the knowing of a thing which is so much ours that from it our discipline draws its name, does not need to be demonstrated. The considerations to be made are truly essential.

Distribution of the title into parts. We must treat successively three matters of great moment: 1. An accurate notion of morality must be handed down. 2. How widely morality extends must be investigated. 3. The sources of morality, with the proper force of each, must be indicated.

No human act is morally indifferent. Although, as to the genus of the work, several acts contain nothing which pertains to the order of reason and therefore are indifferent, nevertheless no deliberate act in the individual, or as it is placed, can be morally indifferent. For it proceeds from reason either ordinately or inordinately: if ordinately, it will be morally good; if inordinately, it will be evil. Cf. St. Thomas, 1, 2, q. 19, art. 9. But if there has been no attention to the moral order, the act will not be moral; but, in our opinion, then neither will it be human or free.

Whether there are good acts which are supernaturally indifferent will be said below, where merit is treated.

1. An external act, just as denominatively it is human and free, so denominatively it is moral. And it is such from the will by which it is done and sustained. But does the external act add anything to the morality of the interior act of the will from which it depends, or which is terminated at it? This is disputed not lightly between Scotists and Thomists; but it seems to us that it must be solved in this way. Because the external act is not moral except from the will by which it is informed, in itself, as external, it has nothing whence it formally contributes anything to morality ¹. Yet it supplies matter to be informed by the act of the will; and, in order that the external act itself follow, there is need of a persevering and therefore more intense act of the will. Whence, on account of the external act, there is had a morality more extended and intense. Wherefore the external act materially and specifically adds to the morality of the interior act.

2. And if you ask whether an action efficaciously proposed but impeded and an action completed in execution are of the same value in the same moral subject, this, strictly speaking, must be denied. For the will itself, while it executes the purpose, endures, is repeated, and is perfected in various commands. At the end of the act it is other than it was at the beginning. Wherefore the external act adds to the interior act of purpose the morality which it possesses from the will; nor can we fully approve what Noldin has, Princ., n. 78, 79, insofar as he seems there to equate the act completed by external action and the internal act, if the omission is involuntary. Indeed nothing is taken away from the act internally commanding; but there is lacking the external act informing the interior act.

Thus man is from the soul; yet the separated soul is one thing, man another.

It is indeed true that, into the action which is done, merit is derived from intention; but intention strictly does not supply for the action which is not done ². Besides, often the acceding merit of good example is proper to the exterior act.

Thus far concerning acts which can be included in the power of one purpose. But one purpose, one will, does not avail for many things. Thus by an efficacious desire of leading the life of a missionary or religious, a long series of difficult actions and sacrifices certainly cannot be commanded: this would be angelic power, not human. Therefore let us not judge that the merits of such a life belong to us from the fact that we were truly prepared to embrace it; but let us highly value the very faculty of carrying out the good things which we proposed, as a new divine grace.

3. Much less shall we equate with acts ineffectual desires, such as are often exhibited in formulas of oblations and consecrations: I would wish to repair scandals everywhere, to be present at all Masses. In these protestations there is present the value of a good affection, which will have to be estimated according to its varied intensity. Say the same concerning several pious but arbitrary agreements which are sometimes commended: as often as I shall have touched my breast, I intend to express an affection of love. That intention operates nothing in touches which cannot virtually be referred to it.

4. Finally, a pious will can in no way supply the efficacy ex opere operato which belongs to the sacraments and also in some way to martyrdom.

¹ Cf. St. Thomas, in 1, 2, Sent., d. 40, q. 1, art. 3.

² It could be said: intention defines the action which is done; but it does not supply the action which is not done.

An act which, with attention to the disposition of the will, would be done, but has not been done, confers no morality, whether good or evil, upon the subject. We are to be judged from a present will, not from an interpretative will.

The internal act is moral, and also the external act. The latter formally contributes no morality; materially, however, it produces morality more extended and intense. Wherefore by an intention, even an efficacious one, much less by an inefficacious intention and by formulas of oblations, an external action or effect ex opere operato can be supplied.

But an act which would be done confers no morality.

Connection of the matter. Since enough has been said concerning the nature, division, principles, and impediments of human acts, now it is necessary to treat of their morality and of supernatural merit. For by our acts we shall not obtain the end of our life unless they are not only morally good, but also supernaturally meritorious. Wherefore first one must treat of the morality of human acts and then of their merit. The first chapter on the morality of human acts we subdivide into three articles: 1. on the nature and division of morality; 2. on the principles or sources of morality; 3. on the extension of morality.

From what has been said concerning the nature and sources of morality, it is easily deduced how far morality extends in individual acts. But since theologians specially dispute concerning two questions pertaining here, namely, whether an indifferent act is given not only in species, but also in the individual; and whether the external act and the event following from the internal act have a special morality, we also, following this method, shall answer these two questions in two paragraphs.

St. Thomas, 1.2, q. 19, a. 4; q. 21, a. 1; q. 71, a. 6; St. Alphonsus, V, n. XXXIV; ed. G., II, p. 698; Frins, II, sect. 1 and 2; Cathrein, Moralph., P. 1, l. 11; Tanquerey, Theol. mor., II, p. 19; Willems, Phil. mor., III, p. 32-104.

294. DEFINITION. The morality of human acts is their habitude or relation to the rule of morals, with which they agree, or from which they disagree. Just as artificiality consists in the respect which an artifact has to the rules of art, so morality consists in the respect which a human act has to the rule of morals, that is, according to the Angelic Doctor, to "the dictate of right reason, whether uncreated, which is the eternal law, or created, which is the natural light of man, or participation of the eternal law" (1.2, q. 91, a. 2). Cf. n. 9 and 114 ff., and what St. Thomas teaches, Q. disp. de Virtutibus, q. 1, a. 13.

Hence it is established: "that the nature of moral good is situated in the conformity of action with the laws of order, which God requires from men for His own honor and universal happiness" (V, l. c.).

a) Therefore they err who constitute morality either in liberty or in the voluntary. Certainly, liberty and the voluntary are required as the foundation of morality, but its essence is by no means to be placed in them. For the morality of a human act says imputability to praise or blame: but an act is worthy of praise or blame not precisely because it is free, but because it is freely made conformable or deformed to the rule of morals, that is, to divine law, intimated through conscience. Others settle the question thus: He exists in general worthy of praise, and therefore places a moral act, who acts autonomously; but he alone will be worthy of special praise who acts deliberately in relation to such and such an order. Cf. Lehmkuhl, I, n. 93.

b) They likewise err who place the nature of moral good in the useful and delectable alone; wherefore in the Syllabus, under n. 58, Pius IX reprobated this error: "...all discipline of morals and honorable things ought to be placed in heaping up and increasing riches in any way whatever and in fulfilling pleasures."

c) Finally they err who seek the distinction between good and evil in public opinion, in the order of justice, as if that alone were good which is done from the motive of obligation which reason alone dictates.

DIVISION. Morality is divided 1. into GOOD and EVIL. For a human act either agrees with its rule, or wanders from it. If it agrees, it is called right, good, honorable: right, because conformable to its rule; good, because this conformity is owed to it; honorable, because it adorns human nature. But if it wanders from its rule, it is called depraved, evil, dishonorable: depraved, because through its wandering it is truly distorted; evil, because it is deprived of the perfection owed to it; dishonorable, because it befouls the rational creature (St. Thom., 1.2, q. 21, a. 1).

It is divided 2. into material or objective, and formal or subjective. The foundation of the division is the twofold rule to which human acts are to be conformed: namely the law, to which they are to be conformed materially and objectively; and the conscience of the one operating, to which they are to be conformed formally and subjectively. Therefore MATERIAL morality is the agreement or disagreement of an act with the external rule or law; but FORMAL morality, agreement or disagreement with the internal rule or conscience of the agent. From this it is clear that one morality can exist without the other, namely when a man acts from an invincibly erroneous conscience. Thus, for example, an act which is consonant with the law, but which the agent thinks opposed to the law, is materially good, formally evil; on the contrary, an act opposed to the law, which the agent invincibly thinks conformable to the law, is materially evil, but formally good. Cf. Bouquillon, Theol. fund., n. 348 ff.

It is divided 3. into intrinsic and extrinsic. Morality is called intrinsic if it arises from the nature itself of the thing; thus the love of God is intrinsically good, hatred of God intrinsically evil; but it is called extrinsic if it rises from positive law alone: thus to eat meats on Friday is extrinsically evil (cf. n. 112).

295. For greater understanding of the matter, it must be explained what is intrinsically and extrinsically good or evil (Reuter, Theol. mor., P. I, tr. I, n. 32).

1. Intrinsically good is that which, by its nature, agrees with right order, so that it either necessarily ought to be prescribed, for example, adoration of God, or at least can deservedly be counseled, for example, the evangelical counsels. A twofold kind is distinguished: one is good absolutely, for example, an act of faith, hope, and charity; another is good relatively, for example, a vow of chastity.

Intrinsically evil is that which, by its nature, is so repugnant to right order that it necessarily ought to be prohibited. A threefold kind is distinguished: a) Evil absolutely, which is such independently from every circumstance, necessarily and immutably, because in itself it involves repugnance with right order, for example, hatred of God, blasphemy. b) Evil conditionally, which is such not precisely in itself, but by reason of an adjunct, which depends on the dominative power of God or of man: wherefore it can become good, namely by the concession of God or of man acceding. Thus, for example, the killing of a man is intrinsically evil, but conditionally, insofar as concession from one having the right does not accede. c) Evil relatively, which is such only by reason of the danger which it ordinarily has joined to it, as the sight of a base object, the reading of a depraved book, etc. These, when a just cause is given and the proximate danger of sinning removed, can become lawful, as we shall see in its place.

Note. Some authors call conditionally evil actions evil-sounding, insofar as they regularly recall the notion of evil into memory and become good only under certain conditions (St. Thom., Quodl. IX, a. 15 in corp.).

2. Extrinsically good or evil is that which becomes good or evil not from its own nature, but by force of some precept. Such are, for example, servile works which have been prohibited by the Church on certain days, and therefore on those days become evil. Likewise, walking, indifferent in itself, if it is undertaken for the sake of piety or charity, becomes good.

With these things premised, we shall treat: 1. concerning the principles of morality; 2. concerning its extension.

296. Theologians call the principles or sources of morality all those things from which it comes about that some action is good, or evil, or indifferent. For just as the natural goodness of a thing rises from the fullness of its being, or from the collection of all those things which are required for its integrity, so moral goodness rises from the collection of all those things which befit a human act according to right reason; but moral malice rises from the defect of that integrity (St. Thom., 1.2, q. 18, a. 1).

But the integrity of a human act coalesces from object and from circumstances. Hence, so that a right judgment may be made concerning some act, it must be compared with the rule, both as to object and as to circumstances. But one circumstance, namely the end, which on account of its peculiar influence on morality demands for itself a peculiar consideration. Wherefore three principles of morality are counted, namely object, circumstances, and end. Now more about each.

297. DEFINITION. Object, in the broader sense, designates everything which is set before the will. In this sense, it can include both end and circumstances. In the stricter sense, as it is taken here, object is that thing, or person, morally considered, concerning which a human act is occupied, and toward which by its nature and of itself it tends. Thus another's thing is the object of theft; God the object of an act of love (V, n. XXXVI).

DIVISION. Object is good, or evil, or indifferent, according as it has a relation of agreement, or disagreement, or no relation to the rule of morals.

298. PRINCIPLE. A human act takes morality from the object, and indeed essential, or specific, morality.

The first part is clear: 1. From Scripture: They became abominable, as those things which they loved (Hos. 9:10). The contrary, on account of the same reason, must be said concerning good acts. 2. From St. Augustine (tr. 2, in 1 Ep. St. John, n. 14): "Each one is such as is his love. Do you love earth? you are earth; do you love God? what shall I say? as it were, you are God." 3. By reason: an act takes its morality from that from which it has relation to the rule of morals; but it has this from the object; therefore. Recall the things said n. 294.

The second part is proved: Essential or specific morality of an act is that which is conceived to be in it before every other, without which it cannot be conceived, and which, when other things are changed, remains invariable. Now indeed, such is the morality taken from the object; for to this, by hypothesis, the act by its nature tends, and to this it has itself as to its formal principle. Thus, for example, theft which someone commits in a sacred place in order to intoxicate himself, although it can be conceived without the malice of sacrilege and intemperance, nevertheless cannot be conceived without the malice of injustice.

"Hence, in human actions, before all things one must attend to the object, concerning which they are as concerning their proper term. If the object is agreeable to right reason, the action will be specifically good. If the object disagrees from right reason, the action will be essentially or specifically evil." Zigliara, Ethica, l. 2, c. 1, a. 6.

299. DEFINITION. Circumstance, as if standing around the act, is an accidental quality morally affecting a human act already constituted in its moral being (St. Thom., 1.2, q. 7, a. 1).

Therefore two things are required for a circumstance: 1. that it does not attribute first being to the act; 2. that it affect the act morally, that is, modify it in order to the rules of morals. For here the discourse is not concerning circumstances affecting the act only physically or juridically, for example, with which hand someone committed theft (Billuart, de act. hum. Diss. 4, a. 3, § 2).

DIVISION. Seven classes of circumstances are numbered, expressed by this little verse of Tully:

Who, what, where, by what helps, why, how, when.

For qualities affecting an act can adhere: 1. to the person of the agent, for example, whether he is a priest, religious, married; 2. to the object of the act, for example, whether the thing taken by theft is in great or small quantity, sacred or profane; whether the person struck is a cleric or layman, etc.; 3. to the place where the action is committed, whether it is public or secret, sacred or profane; 4. to the means of acting, whether they are just or unjust; 5. to the extrinsic end of the one operating, concerning which below (n. 304); 6. to the mode of acting, for example, whether the one operating acted maliciously or in good faith, intensely or remissly, from contempt or levity, from ignorance or fear, etc.; 7. to the time, for example, whether on a feast day, whether by long or brief delay.

300. PRINCIPLES. I. A human act takes true morality from circumstances. This is proved from Sacred Scripture (Mark 12:43), where the woman is praised who cast only two coins into the treasury, before the Pharisees casting many. The reason is, because circumstances have a relation of agreement or disagreement with right reason: thus in sacrilegious theft the circumstance of the sacred thing violated has a peculiar disagreement with right reason, besides that which it has from the object, or from the fact that it is another's thing. Thus also, other things being equal, greater quantity of alms renders the act more praiseworthy (V, n. XXXIX).

301. II. Circumstances are given which add a new morality to the act. This is clear from the fact that there are circumstances which according to themselves, separately and independently from the first morality sought from the object, import a special and distinct relation of conformity or deformity to right reason or the rule of morals, as in sacrilegious theft.

Circumstances of this kind are said to pass into the object, because with relation to the superadded species they become the object: thus in sacrilegious theft, the thing insofar as it is another's is the object of theft; insofar as sacred, it is the object of sacrilege. Those circumstances are commonly called species-changing.

302. III. Circumstances are given which increase or lessen morality in the same species; wherefore they are called AGGRAVATING or lessening. For there are circumstances which do not have of themselves a distinct morality, but modify that which comes from the object; such as more and less, intense and remiss, etc. Thus the quantity of money says no morality of itself; but it says good morality if the matter concerns alms; evil, if the matter concerns theft. Whence the saying: More or less does not change the species.

But if circumstances transfer sin from venial into mortal, or vice versa, they are said to change not the objective species, which they only increase or lessen, but the theological or demeritorious species. Thus theft of one as does not differ, as to the virtue to which it is opposed, from theft of ten gold pieces; nevertheless it differs as to fault, namely theologically: for the one is a venial sin, the other a mortal sin. Whence a circumstance which makes mortal from venial is called by some increasing unto infinity, because it brings with itself privation of grace and glory (cf. n. 334 and 342, q. 2 and 3).

Note. "A lightly evil circumstance, for example, precipitation in acting, tepidity in prayers, light indignation, concomitant vainglory, etc., coming to an act, does not take away its whole goodness, nor destroy every merit" (V, n. XXXIX). Thus commonly. "If it were otherwise," says Billuart (l. c.), "scarcely any good act would be found, even in the Saints themselves, since it happens so easily that any work whatever is infected by some lightly evil circumstance."

303. DEFINITION. End, in general, is that for the sake of which something is done, namely whose goodness, true or judged, entices the will and determines it to operating.

DIVISION. End is distinguished by reason of origin, or source, into the end of the work or intrinsic end, and the end of the one operating or extrinsic end. The end of the work is called that to which the work is ordered from its nature, as a house to dwelling, alms to relieving the want of a poor person. This end is one and the same as the object, concerning which n. 297. The end of the one operating is called that to which the one operating himself, from his own choice, orders his work: as if someone deceitfully builds a house on another's soil so that he may acquire it for himself; likewise, if someone bestows alms on account of empty glory.

If the one operating intends only the end of the work, the act therefrom contracts a morality not diverse from the morality which it has from the object; whence discourse concerning that does not return.

304. The end OF THE ONE OPERATING, concerning which here the matter is properly treated, is subdivided:

1. By reason of the motion of the will, it is primary or secondary.

Primary is said of that which is esteemed before the others, and which the agent, if perhaps a collision among various ends should arise, would retain first of all. Secondary is that which is subordinated to the primary end, and, with this presupposed, is intended as annexed to the primary. Let there be as an example the twofold end of an adolescent entering Religion: his primary end is that he provide for his eternal salvation; the secondary, that he be exempted from secular cares.

The secondary end sometimes is the cause why the agent applies himself to the work, yet with subordination to the primary end: for example, if a priest not intending to celebrate determines himself to this, that he may show himself pleasing to a friend. Ordinarily then it obtains the name of impulsive cause.

2. By reason of coordination among themselves, it is ultimate or intermediate. The ultimate end is that on account of which we will the rest, but it for its own sake only. The intermediate end is that on account of which we will something, but which again we refer to another: as if someone afflicts the body on account of virtue, which he seeks so that he may please God: God is the ultimate end of this affliction, but virtue the intermediate end.

3. By reason of formal morality, it is good or evil; but there is not given an indifferent end. This is clear from the fact that the end, as such, necessarily involves the notion of some good which the agent pursues. But the pursuit of this good either is according to right reason, or not: in the first case, the end is called good, in the other evil, and thus it is clear that an indifferent end is not given.

The act by which the will bears itself toward the end is called INTENTION: which is distinguished into actual, virtual, habitual, and interpretative; explicit or implicit, according as was said above concerning the voluntary (n. 272, 6.).

305. PRINCIPLES. I. The end of the one operating attributes true morality to a human act. This is clear from the things said; for the end, not otherwise than other circumstances, can say a relation of conformity or deformity to reason. Whence Christ the Lord (Matt. 6:22, 23): If thy eye shall be single, thy whole body will be lightsome. But if thy eye shall be evil, thy whole body will be dark. By the eye, however, the intention of the end is commonly understood; by the body, the action.

Hence St. Alphonsus (H. Ap., III, 5): "Every human act," he says, "whether it is elicited or commanded by the will, is specified by the end for the sake of which it is exercised. Wherefore those acts which have the same end, although materially they are diverse, nevertheless assume the same species; for example, if someone fasts, prays, preaches on account of the glory of God: all these acts are acts of charity. On the contrary, if one and the same material act is elicited by the will on account of diverse ends, it assumes diverse species": for example, if someone serves the sick from charity, from penance, from humility, etc.

The morality which is had from the extrinsic end is accidental with respect to the act to which it comes; for this act has its essential morality from the object, or from the intrinsic end: nevertheless it is called principal with respect to the agent, who primarily intends the extrinsic end, and is borne toward it with greater affection than toward the object itself. For we are denominated not from the act, but from the affection. Thus, for example, he who steals in order to commit adultery is, speaking per se, more an adulterer than a thief (Aristotle apud St. Thom., 1.2, q. 18, a. 6).

306. II. The end of the one operating sometimes attributes multiple morality to an action; but from the end of the one operating and from the end of the work, sometimes only one moral quality results. For distinguishing well this diverse morality, St. Alphonsus gives the following RULES (l. V, n. XXXVIII; ed. G., II, p. 701):

1. If the object is good, but the end of the one operating is evil, the human act is either simply evil, or partly good and partly evil.

a) It is simply evil, if the end is gravely evil. For the agent, by sinning mortally, totally recedes from God; for example, if someone gives alms to a needy girl in order to allure her to sin. b) Likewise, it is simply evil, if the lightly evil end is the total cause; for example, if someone gives alms solely for empty glory; for right reason disapproves that good be chosen on account of a depraved end (St. Thom., 1.2, q. 18, a. 4 and 6). c) It is partly good and partly evil, if the lightly evil end is a partial cause: for example, if someone, from a sincere affection of mercy, wishes to give alms to a poor person; but because the poor person asks publicly, there also enters in a stimulus of empty glory, which is not repelled.

This diverse morality in the same work can easily be understood from this, that about the same object there can be a multiple act of the will.

2. If the object is good and the end also good, the human act has a double species of moral goodness, as is giving alms in satisfaction for sins. Indeed, as many as are the good ends in the one operating, so many are the goodnesses in the act (as was said n. 305).

3. If the object is indifferent, a good end makes the act morally good, as is walking from obedience.

4. If the object is indifferent, an evil end makes the act morally evil, as is walking for a display of luxury.

5. If the object is evil, an evil end makes the act worse from evil, as to steal in order to support a concubine: in which act a double malice is involved, one against justice, the other against chastity.

6. If the object is evil, but the end of the one operating is good, the act does not lose its malice; nevertheless its deformity is less. The reason for the first is because a good end also ought to be intended well, namely through honest means. And Paul the Apostle (Rom. 3:8) condemns those who do evils that goods may come. The reason for the second is because the agent, from a good end, is borne into sin with a lesser affection: for example, if someone lies in order to free his neighbor from danger.

The things which have hitherto been explained regard the principles of morality in general, insofar as they belong both to good and to evil acts. With respect to good acts, some things must be discussed more specially.

307. Resp. I. An act, in order that it be good, ought to be done from an honest motive. Thus St. Thomas, 1.2, q. 18, a. 9; St. Alphonsus, V, n. XLIV; ed. G., II, p. 709; and the Thomists against the Scotists, who admit an indifferent end. The reason is because man, when he acts deliberately, is bound to propose to himself an end consonant with an intellectual creature. Now, according to the order established by God for rational nature, only the honest good has the nature of an end. The useful good cannot have the nature of an end, because it is appetible not for its own sake, but for the sake of another: as are, for example, goods of fortune, which are sought not on account of themselves, but on account of something else. But neither is it lawful to pursue the delectable good as the ultimate end of action. For, as St. Thomas writes (Contra Gent., l. 3, c. 26, n. 7): "Delight is on account of operation, and not conversely." For delight is, as it were, a certain salt and seasoning, which serves for enticing one to actions necessary or useful for life; and therefore it is lawful to act with delight, or even by intending delight, as an intermediate end subordinated to an honest end; but never on account of it alone, so that one rests in it; because it is a disorder if the primary end is ordered to the secondary. And generally, it is not lawful to use things which are to be enjoyed, or to enjoy things which are to be used: in this, according to St. Augustine, is the whole perversity of life. Therefore only the honest good is to be sought on account of itself. Cf. St. Alphonsus, VI, n. 882, fin.; ed. G., IV, p. 64; Peter Lombard, Lib. Sent., I. D. I, n. 2-8.

Hence two propositions condemned by Innocent XI: 8th: "To eat and drink unto satiety, for pleasure alone, is not a sin, provided that it does not harm health; because the natural appetite can lawfully enjoy its acts." 9th: "The work of marriage, exercised for pleasure alone, is entirely without fault and venial defect."¹ See Vind. Alph., P. VII, q. 8.

From these things, however, it does not follow that the actual pursuit of an honest end is necessary. The arguments brought forward prove two things: 1. neither the useful nor the delectable can be the ultimate end of acting; 2. a rational creature ought to propose to himself an end consonant with reason.

If, therefore, someone, in using things to be enjoyed, or enjoying things to be used, does not directly attend to an honest motive (for example, the conservation of life), but uses them moderately, as befits a being endowed with reason, so that there is present a norm ruling and tempering all things, certainly by force of the action and in the action an honest motive will be present. Whence St. Alphonsus writes, V, n. XLIV, fin.; ed. G., II, p. 703: "If someone approaching the table does not think of the conservation of life, but only of the quality of the food, as Gonet says (Clyp., P. II, tr. 3, disp. 5, n. 38), he does not sin, because he wills such delight, at least virtually, on account of the conservation of life, and thus does not desire it inordinately." Cf. what Lehmkuhl has, I, n. 107.

II. An act, in order that it be good, ought not only to be done from an honest motive, but also to be referred to God. This is clear from the words of the Apostle (1 Cor. 10:31): Whether you eat, or drink, or do anything else, do all things unto the glory of God. The Fathers more commonly teach that in these words there is contained not mere counsel, but a precept.² And the reason is because "the ultimate end of the human will is the highest good, which is God," as the Angelic Doctor speaks (1.2, q. 19, a. 9).

"However, an actual reference of all things, whether words or works, to the honest good is not required, which would be an unbearable weight and a thing entangled with six hundred scruples; but a virtual reference suffices" (V, l. c.).

But this is had sufficiently when, on the one hand, God as the ultimate end is not excluded, and on the other hand the act, contaminated by no disorder of mortal or venial fault, is sought on account of its own honesty, or is referred to some honest end, whether by its nature or from a preceding act of the will. For every honesty is, of itself, ordered to God, the fountain of all honesty.

Things to be noted. 1. Many theologians express their opinion thus: In order that an act be good, it suffices that implicitly, by force of the action, by the weight of the operation, they have an ordination to an honest end, and be referred to God. They call this implicit relation objective. Cf. what Noldin has, I, n. 86. St. Alphonsus (l. c.), with the learned Gonet, speaks only of a virtual relation. As is clear from the example of one approaching the table, by these words he intends a relation implicitly contained in the object; whence his opinion in reality does not differ from the sayings of the moderns. Nevertheless it could be affirmed, not without foundation in the thing, that for this reason such a relation ought rather to be called virtual: because, in any operation whatsoever which is regulated by reason, the preceding intention, directed at least at the beginning of the use of reason to the general goods of man (as are, for example, health, honor, reputation, liberty), and especially to God, as it were revives and acts.

2. A supernatural relation to God is not required in order that our actions be honest; otherwise all the works of unbelievers and sinners, who lack faith or charity, would be sins: which doctrine was condemned by the Church in the proscribed propositions of Baius: "25th: All the works of unbelievers are sins, and the virtues of philosophers are vices," and "35th: Everything which a sinner, or a servant of sin, does is sin."

3. The words of the Apostle, according to some, establish the obligation of a supernatural reference of our acts to God. Nevertheless this obligation is satisfied through fulfillment of the precept of faith, hope, and charity (II, n. 7). For all know that man is bound at times to elicit a formal act of charity. But in this act, according to St. Thomas (1.2, q. 100, a. 10, ad 2), this relation is contained sufficiently. But if someone wishes to act more securely, let him often during the day, or at least in the morning, offer all his acts generally to God. Thus often actually, but always truly virtually, he will accomplish all things unto the glory of God. Read the words of St. Alphonsus, l. c., ed. G., II, p. 703.

308. An act, in order that it be simply supernatural, ought to proceed from a supernatural principle, and to be done on account of a supernatural motive.

Thus St. Thomas, de Malo, q. 2, a. 5, de Carit., a. 11, ad 2; St. Alphonsus, Op. Dogm. in Trid., Sess. 6, n. 88 (ed. Walter, I, p. 514); Suarez, de div. Gr., l. 12, c. 10, n. 15; Mazzella, de Grat. Chr., n. 54; Lehmkuhl, I, n. 368; and very many others.

The first part of the proposition scarcely needs proof, since it is evident that no act can be supernatural unless the eliciting principle surpasses the powers of nature.

The second part is supported by the words of the Apostle (Heb. 10:38): Without faith it is impossible to please God; and (Rom. 2:7): To those who seek glory, and honor, and incorruption, eternal life (he will render). By these words is indicated the necessity of tending toward incorruption, that is, heavenly goods (cf. Cornely, Comm. on this place), and the necessity of walking before God in faith, so that man may be able to attain eternal life. And reason supports this: for since acts are specified by the object, only that operation will be supernatural whose motive is taken from faith.

There is given another opinion, which nevertheless does not please us. It denies that a supernatural motive is required, and says it suffices (so that the act can be called meritorious) that it be ethically good and arise from a supernatural principle. See Noldin (I, n. 97). The principal reason which the patrons of this opinion use is this: Where the root is supernatural, the fruits also must be supernatural. This can be considered especially among unbelievers, who, by the motion of actual grace, are disposed toward faith.

But the fundamental principle thus set forth must be denied, in which, if we attend well, a begging of the question lies hidden. Especially it must be denied from this, that, if it is admitted, the axiom celebrated by all utterly collapses: namely, that human acts receive their specification primarily from the object. Whence those acts which, under the inspiration of grace, dispose unbelievers toward faith cannot be called simply supernatural.

Note. This discussion is not merely theoretical; for in the treatise on Penance (n. 1667) the question is put whether contrition, also on the part of its motive, ought to be supernatural.

309. I. For the goodness of an act it is required that it be deficient from no source of morality, neither from the object, nor from the end, nor from the circumstances; but for the malice of an act it suffices that it be deficient on one part alone. The reason is because "good is from an integral cause, evil from any defect."

II. For contracting goodness, a directly voluntary element is required; but for contracting malice, an indirectly voluntary element suffices, as St. Thomas says (1.2, q. 19, a. 7, ad 3). The reason for the first is because the goodness of the will consists in this, that it wills the good. Now the agent does not positively will an effect only indirectly voluntary, but merely permits it. Therefore. The reason for the second is because evil not only cannot be sought, but ought to be avoided; but it is not avoided by him who freely posits an action to which evil is annexed.

To the point St. Thomas speaks thus (l. c.): "For this, that the will be good, it is required that it be good under the aspect of good, that is, that it will the good and on account of the good"; at least virtually or implicitly, as was explained above (n. 307).

III. Goodness and malice are the supreme genera of morality, each of which is divided into various species. The species of goodness are the various virtues; the species of malice are the diverse vices and sins, as will be said more fully in its place (cf. treatise on Virtues and treatise on Sins).

In order that the extension of morality may be rightly defined, two things must be investigated: 1. whether morality extends itself to all human acts, or: whether there is given a human act neither good nor evil, but indifferent? 2. whether and how it extends itself to those effects which follow human acts?

310. For a right understanding of the matter we note beforehand: 1. here the matter treated is solely the indifference of a human act in order to its morality; not at all its indifference in order to supernatural merit; for such treatment, as we have already observed, belongs to dogmatic theology; 2. that a human act

can be considered in the abstract according to species, and on the part of the object only; or in the concrete and in the individual, insofar as it is on the side of the thing and clothed with all circumstances. With these things briefly noted beforehand, let there be

311. PRINCIPLES. I. Not all human acts, according to their species, are indifferent (of faith). For some are of themselves good, as acts of faith, hope, and charity; others, however, of themselves evil, as fornication, the killing of the innocent. The reason is because the objects of these are of themselves consonant with reason, or dissonant from reason (V, n. XLII).

II. Nevertheless there are given human acts according to their species indifferent. Thus St. Thomas (1.2, q. 18, a. 8) with the common opinion. To this comes the condemnation of article 16 of John Hus, affirming "that there are no indifferent works." This condemnation cannot be understood of things indifferent in the individual, because very many good Catholics probably defend this same thing; therefore it must be understood of things indifferent in species (Concil. Constant., s. 15, a. 16).

III. There are not given human acts indifferent in the individual. This is the more common opinion, which St. Alphonsus, V, n. XLIII, confirms by these words of St. Thomas: "It is necessary that any individual act have some circumstance by which it is drawn to good or evil, at least on the part of the intention of the end. For since it belongs to reason to order, an act proceeding from deliberative reason, if it is not ordered to the due end, by this very fact is repugnant to reason and has the nature of evil; but if it is ordered to the due end, it agrees with the order of reason, whence it has the nature of good. But it is necessary that it either be ordered, or not be ordered, to the due end. Whence it is necessary that every act of man proceeding from deliberative reason, considered in the individual, be good or evil. Thus nervously the Angelic Doctor" (1.2, q. 18, a. 9).

Therefore: to walk in the garden, to smell a flower, to rub the beard, or the hands in order to drive away cold, etc., which ordinarily are done indeliberately, are not human acts, but acts of man. But if they are done deliberately, then either they are posited according to the dictate of reason, and therefore are good; or they are done from some dishonest end, or with some vitiated circumstance, and then they are evil, and in no way indifferent.

312. IT IS ASKED. Whether an external act adds morality to an internal act, for example, in him who efficaciously proposes that he will give alms?

Resp. 1. That, PER SE, the external act has a special morality which it adds to the internal act, the Scotists indeed affirm, because, they say, externally to operate something good or evil is something greater than only to will to operate it. But the Thomists and others commonly deny it. Their opinion is proved first from Sacred Scripture, where an efficacious will is everywhere reputed as the deed: thus a man desiring a woman is declared guilty of adultery; and Abraham received precisely the same reward as if he had actually immolated his son. The reason is because the external act obtains its whole morality from the internal act, that is, from the free voluntary, without which no morality can be conceived. Whence St. Thomas (in 2. D. 40, q. 1, a. 3): "He merits as much, with respect to the essential reward, who has the perfect will of doing some good, as if he did it, the will remaining equally perfect. Nevertheless the external act adds something to the accidental reward." Thus martyrs who really suffer for Christ have an accidental reward, or aureole, above those who, with equal fervor of charity, merely desire death for Christ.

2. But that, PER ACCIDENS, the external act, regularly speaking, adds some goodness or malice, must be affirmed: "For the external act is often the cause and occasion that the internal act becomes worse, either because the interior acts are multiplied until we execute the acts extrinsically; or because the interior act has a greater duration until it completes the work, which cannot be completed at once; or because it becomes more intense through the extrinsicness of the act. Besides, by the external act the senses are more dulled, and the exterior powers are rendered more prone to evil; scandals are produced; sometimes excommunication is incurred, or irregularity, or the obligation to restitution, which are not incurred through the interior act" (V, n. XL). For the rest, the external act is the complement of the internal act, and from the whole there arises one moral act, and therefore it must necessarily be declared in confession, as will be seen in its place (cf. n. 1692).

313. Things to be noted beforehand. For a right understanding of the things which follow, certain notions concerning cause and effect must be premised (II, 63 seqq.; III, 571).

A. A multiple CAUSE is distinguished:

1. By reason of influence, it is physical or moral. Physical is that which acts through a physical influence, as fire produces conflagration, the sun light. Moral is that which efficaciously moves another free cause to acting. Thus one commanding homicide is a moral cause of the killing.

2. By reason of mode, it is immediate or mediate. Immediate is that which produces the effect with no other cause intervening: for example, if someone pierces the breast of another, he is the immediate cause of his death. Mediate is that which does not produce the effect except with another cause interposed. Hence, if you except the sin of scandal, a moral cause is always a mediate cause.

3. By reason of connection with the effect, it is proximate or remote. Proximate is said of that which has a necessary, or at least ordinary, connection with the effect which it produces for the most part: for example, poison, administered in an undue quantity, is a proximate cause of death. That is called remote from which the effect, for the most part, does not occur: for example, the reading of a slightly base thing is a remote cause of pollution.

4. By reason of the order of production, there is given a cause per se or per accidens. A cause per se is that which by its nature tends or is ordered to producing the effect: thus excessive drink is a cause per se of drunkenness. A cause per accidens is that to which an effect is joined beyond the ordination of nature. Thus homicide can follow from drunkenness.

Especially to be kept before the eyes are the two latter distinctions, which give place to a fourfold hypothesis, because both a cause per se and a cause per accidens can be proximate and remote (cf. n. 315).

B. The EFFECT is voluntary either directly and in itself, or indirectly and in the cause (cf. n. 272, 7). Now, an effect voluntary in itself is certainly to be morally imputed, since it is truly intended by the will. An effect voluntary only in the cause cannot be imputed to good: for goodness is not contracted unless it is intended (cf. n. 309, II); but an effect of this kind can be morally evil and be imputed to fault. When this happens will be clear from the following principles.

314. PRINCIPLES. I. An evil effect, voluntary only in the cause, is imputable to fault when it is foreseen as going to follow in such a way that it could and ought to have been impeded, and nevertheless is not impeded. Therefore three things must concur, namely:

1. That the effect was foreseen, at least confusedly. The reason is because if it was in no way at all foreseen, it was not voluntary; for nothing is willed unless foreknown. Hence neither is it voluntary, nor imputable to fault, when drunkenness follows from a moderate drinking of wine whose intoxicating force was unknown. On the contrary, blasphemies, quarrels, obscene speeches, which are accustomed to accompany the drunkenness of wine-drinking men, are voluntary and imputable as sin. For that such things would occur is sufficiently clear from experience.

2. That the effect could have been impeded, that is, that it was in the power of the agent either not to posit the cause, or to remove it once posited: for with liberty lacking, the voluntary lacks; nor is there ever any obligation concerning the impossible. Hence a priest is not guilty of sacrilege who gives Communion to a hidden sinner publicly asking it; for the cause of the sacrilege which is committed, in such circumstances, he cannot fail to posit.

3. That the effect ought to have been impeded, that is, that the agent is bound not to posit the cause, or to remove it once posited, and indeed precisely for this end, lest such an effect follow: For where there is no law, neither is there prevarication (Rom. 4:15), nor does he sin who uses his right.

If therefore a law, although it exists, has not yet begun to urge, for example, if someone, for the sake of recreation alone, already on Wednesday undertakes a long journey, then certainly the evil effect (omission of Mass), arising from this, cannot be imputed to him. Cf. Lehmkuhl, Cas. Consc., I, n. 97.

But here a great question arises: When ought the effect to have been impeded? when is the agent bound to omit the cause, lest a depraved effect follow from it? Resp. He is bound whenever not all the conditions are present which make the positing of the cause lawful. But what these conditions are, the following principle will indicate.

315. II. It is lawful to posit an honest cause from which there immediately follows a double effect, one good, the other evil; provided that only the good is intended by the agent, and there is present a proportionately grave cause for permitting the evil effect. The reason is because, when a proportionately grave cause accedes, the law ceases by force of which that evil effect had to be guarded against. For fear of grave harm excuses from law (n. 223). But when the law ceases, nothing now stands in the way of the effect being permitted. Cf. St. Alph., III, 483; ed. G., I, p. 702; St. Thom., 2.2, q. 64, a. 7.

The conditions which therefore are required from this second principle are precisely four, namely:

It is required 1. That the cause which is posited, or once posited is not removed, be honest, that is, good, or at least indifferent, that is, not intrinsically evil, and therefore already in itself and independently from every effect illicit, as a lie, adultery, etc., would be. Hence a girl sins gravely who fornicates in order to avoid death.

2. That the good effect follow immediately from the cause, just as the evil; for, if it followed mediately, namely with the evil effect intervening, this evil effect would now obtain the nature of a cause with respect to the good effect: which the Apostle forbids by the words already cited, saying: Let us not do evils, that goods may come (Rom. 3:8).

Hence it is not lawful for a servant to write amorous letters, so that he may please his master.

3. That the evil effect not be intended, nor approved, but merely permitted. Whence it is necessary that there not be present a danger either of intending the depraved effect, when its cause is posited, or of consenting to it, when afterwards it is produced.

Thus a physician who treats women, a student of theology who studies matters little chaste, a confessor who hears sins against chastity, are bound both to remove a dishonest end and to guard against consent in base movements, if perhaps they arise from their action.

4. That the effect not be permitted except from a proportionately grave or sufficient reason; because the natural law by which we are bound to guard against an evil effect ceases only then, when, the nature of things having been weighed and the order of precepts inspected, a cause is had properly excusing, or just and sufficient for permitting the effect. Now, in order that someone may be able, in view of a good effect, to permit an evil, the greater is the excusing cause required, the worse the effect is, or the closer to the act, or also the more probable (Konings, Theol. mor., n. 8).

a) Worse. Hence one must see what the gravity of the evil effect is. For, for example, a reason sufficient for permitting slight harm to another will not be sufficient that someone expose himself to the danger of killing another.

But for weighing this gravity, it will often be useful to attend to what law the evil effect must be guarded against by, whether by the law of charity, or of religion, or of justice? For not all laws oblige with the same rigor. Thus a cause sufficient

for excusing from a common obligation perhaps is not sufficient for excusing from a special obligation which someone has from office.

b) Closer to the act. Hence one must see whether the cause influences the effect proximately or remotely. If it influences the evil effect just as proximately as the good, the good effect ought to compensate the evil, because otherwise the good effect would not cancel the evil.

Whence a physician can treat women, although he feels base movements (provided that he does not consent to them), because the good effect, or the restoration of health, compensates the evil. But if it influences the evil effect only remotely, a lesser necessity or utility is required than in the preceding case. Hence you are not bound to abstain from an honest and useful conversation with a person of the other sex on account of carnal movements perhaps arising from it.

c) More probable. Whence one must consider whether the cause influences the depraved effect per se or per accidens. If per se, the effect will be more probable, because a cause per se is one which by its nature is ordered to the effect. If per accidens, the various circumstances which make the effect more or less probable must be weighed (Billuart, Diss. I, a. 1).

Note. 1. What effect, namely good or evil, some cause is naturally apt to produce, and what kind its influence is, must be judged from the estimation of prudent men. Many cases will be discussed in their own places, especially where the discourse is on cooperation, on scandal, on justice, on the sixth, etc., where also the studious reader will be able to see various examples of the indirect voluntary. Cf. n. 515, 521, etc.

2. The question concerning the imputability of effects which are voluntary in the cause has been weighed here only in a general way; below (n. 322) it will be said when this imputability begins, and how it ought to be judged.

113. The being of a human act is twofold: physical being and moral being; physical being or the being of nature, which is called material, namely, the very physical entity and natural tendency toward the object; and moral being or the being of conduct, which is called formal, because it belongs to the act precisely insofar as it is human and free.

Moral is said from conduct; but conduct is distinguished in two ways: conduct improperly so called, which is a mere custom or usual mode of acting and is found even in brute animals; and conduct properly so called, of which we are speaking here, which is the mode by which a free being is accustomed to act, or even acts, in order to some end according to some norm, and consequently well or badly, and in a mode worthy either of praise and reward or of blame and punishment. Therefore a human act is called moral insofar as it depends upon a deliberate will with subjection of the act to rules; and moral being is the tendency of the act to the object as subject to the rules of conduct.

That which is called moral first of a free act consequently also indicates whatever is founded in free activity, such as moral beings which are fashioned or produced by a deliberate will: moral persons, moral effects, moral faculties; or whatever pertains to that activity, such as a moral cause, impotence, certitude, virtue, law, order, science, etc.

1. Cf. Bouquillon, Theologia Moralis Fundamentalis, n. 341. Billuart notes: "The will is denominated moral because it produces the moral act; law, because it directs it; object, because it terminates it; end, because it moves toward it; circumstances, because they affect it. Therefore nothing is called moral except by order to the moral act; therefore in it alone is morality principally and formally. This last consequence is clear, because analogates of attribution are said by order to that in which the denominating form is principally and formally," diss. 4, a. 1.

We shall speak of the essence and species of morality, of its foundations, of its principles, and of specific distinction. And of these in acts in general and in particular.

St. Thomas, I-II, q. 19.

162. Principle I. The goodness and malice of the interior act properly and per se depends upon its object. For moral good and evil are per se and properly differences of an act of the will as moral, just as truth and falsity are differences of reason, because good per se pertains to the will as truth pertains to reason. Hence the will morally good and evil differ according to moral species. But an act properly and per se has moral species from the object proposed by reason, as was proved. Therefore goodness and malice in acts of the will properly and per se depend upon the object.

163. Principle II. The goodness and malice of the interior act depends upon the object alone.

Thus St. Thomas, whom Fr. Lehu explains almost as follows, Phil. Mor. et Soc. I, n. 182: "The sense is not that circumstances and the end are altogether irrelevant to the morality of interior acts, which would be altogether false... (for the circumstances of intensity or duration have value for the increase of goodness and malice, q. 20, a. 4)... Thus therefore it must be understood...: The interior act receives morality immediately only from the object, that is, from the willed thing; and in this the interior act differs both from the exterior act and from the human act considered in its integrity, which receive their morality from object, circumstances, and end as from three disparate and independent sources; whence there can be an exterior act good from the object and evil from circumstances or end. But there cannot be an interior act good from the object and evil from a circumstance: 'supposing that the will is of the good, no circumstance can make it evil' (q. 19, a. 2, ad 2)... For, 'when it is said that someone wills some good when he ought not or where he ought not, this can be understood in two ways. In one way, so that this circumstance is referred to the willed thing. And thus the will is not of the good: because to will to do something when it ought not to be done is not to will the good. In another way, so that it is referred to the act of willing; and thus it is impossible that someone will the good when he ought not, because man always ought to will the good; unless perhaps per accidens insofar as someone, by willing this good, is impeded from then willing some due good. And then evil does not arise from this, that someone wills that good, but from this, that he does not will another good. And similarly one must speak of the other circumstances.'

"Therefore an evil circumstance will make the willed thing evil, that is, the object of the will, and only by means of the object will it render the interior act evil, which does not happen in the exterior act. Therefore we assert: the morality of an elicited act depends immediately upon the object alone."

It is proved: the principle in each genus is something one and simple. But the principle of the goodness and malice of all human acts is from the act of the will, and this of itself has goodness from the object, as was said in the preceding number. Therefore the goodness and malice of the will is attended to according to the object alone and not from the accidents of circumstances.

1. The foundation of the argument is: the principle in each genus is per se, not per accidens, for everything which is per accidens is reduced to that which is per se as to a principle.

Therefore, since the end is the object of the will, in acts of the will the goodness which is from the object does not differ from the goodness which is from the end, except per accidens, if it happens that an end depends upon an end and a will upon a will (a. 2, ad 1), for example, if someone by one act wills medicine for health and health for the good of the republic, or if by a twofold act he wills adultery because he wills theft.

164. Corollary I. - The goodness and malice of the interior act, because it depends upon its object, therefore also depends upon those things upon which the goodness of the object depends:

1. Upon reason, because the object is proposed to the will through reason, which apprehends it as a good proportioned to the will; hence the proposing reason is the measure of the goodness of the will.

2. Upon the eternal law: for every effect depends more upon the first cause than upon the second cause, which does not act except through the power of the first cause. But that human reason shows us what is good and thus is the rule of our will, it has from the eternal law or divine reason, of which there is a participation in the created mind. Therefore the goodness of the will depends much more upon the eternal law than upon human reason.

Hence a twofold rule of human acts is distinguished: the first, fundamental and extrinsic, namely, divine reason by which God from eternity contemplates in his essence the order to be observed by creatures, namely, the essential relations of natures both to God their end and to one another; and the secondary, relative and intrinsic, namely, practical human reason insofar as it dictates that this order is to be observed. The first rule is objective and altogether remote; the other is twofold: for reason can be considered:

a) objectively, insofar as it is common to all men, and is a habitual light which is born to dictate in a universal mode which acts in general are good and which are evil (for example, it is good to praise God, evil to fornicate), and indeed is born to dictate the same thing in all and generally does dictate the same thing: thus it is law or the cognition of law;

b) subjectively, it can be considered insofar as it is proper to each one, and is the act by which someone judges in particular that such an act to be placed here and now in the individual is conformed or difform to law: it is the application of law to particular acts, which is called conscience and often varies in various men.

Reason considered objectively, although it is a nearer rule than the eternal law, nevertheless is more remote in relation to conscience, which is the altogether proximate and immediate rule.

165. Corollary II. - The goodness and malice of the interior act, because it depends upon the end or good, therefore depends upon all those things upon which the goodness of the end depends, namely, upon the ultimate end and upon the divine will.

It is proved: that which is first in each genus is the measure of the others of that genus. But the ultimate end of the human will, which it ought first to intend, is the Supreme Good, which first and per se is the proper object of the divine will. Therefore in order that the human will be right or conformed to the measure, it ought (at least implicitly) to tend to the Supreme Good and thus to be conformed to the divine will.

166. On the way in which our will ought to be conformed to the divine will. - Our will can be conformed to the divine will both negatively, by not contradicting it, and positively, by willing the same thing as it; moreover a threefold willed object is distinguished: the material willed object, or that which we will, for example, the life of one's father; the formal willed object, or the reason, end, motive on account of which we will, and indeed the particular or proximate motive, for example, because the father is good and necessary to the family; the formal willed object or ultimate and universal motive, that is, the glory of God.

Now 1) we are bound in all things to be conformed to the divine will negatively, that is, we can never disapprove the things which God wills (or murmur against them), because he is the supreme Lord who disposes all things wisely; 2) we are bound to be positively conformed to him in the ultimate formal willed object, for God wills all things for the sake of himself and his glory, to which the human will ought at least implicitly to refer all acts (n. 159, 2), as we do when we tend to good under the notion of good (a. 10, ad 1); 3) generally we are not bound to be positively conformed to him in the material willed object and the proximate formal willed object: for the same thing under a diverse respect can be good or evil, for example, the death of a robber considered by a judge or by his wife; but God considers things under universal reasons, that is, in order to the common good and to his glory (for example, damnation, death, disease, hunger of one's father), while a private man is not bound to attend to this but can consider things under particular reasons (that is, in order to a particular good), under which they can be evil; therefore he can will things opposed to what God wills, for example, the life of a father who is about to die, but under a diverse reason. And yet there is no opposition of wills, because we will diverse things but not according to the same reason (ad 3); 4) we are bound to be conformed to him in the material willed object, if God sometimes commands or prohibits something, because then God wills us to will that thing, that is, he wills to oblige us to this willing.

Hence a) we do not have to will positively virginity or other things which God only counsels, but it suffices negatively that we regard them as good and do not disapprove them; b) we cannot will the things which God only permits, for example, sins, but we can will their permission, and we are bound not to disapprove it; c) we can conform our will, even in the material willed object, to the divine will, which is most right, provided we will it for the same reason; indeed from a better motive we act best thus; d) God wills many things by antecedent and conditioned will or by preceptive will (for example, the salvation of one about to be damned, the life of a father about to die), which nevertheless he does not will by consequent or efficacious will; indeed thus he wills the opposite. Hence sometimes we are bound to will the opposite of that which God wills by efficacious will; indeed we are bound to strive to obtain it, because God wills us to will and procure it. Yet once the fact has been posited, we are bound not to contradict the will of God nor disapprove it.

167. Observation.

We can be conformed to the divine will in two ways: according to the notion of final cause, by willing under the same notion of divine good, and according to the notion of efficient cause, by willing that which God wills us to will. "As to both, in some way the human will is conformed to the divine will: because according as it is conformed to the divine will in the common notion of the thing willed (formally), it is conformed to it in the ultimate end; according as it is not conformed to it in the thing willed materially, it is conformed to it according to the notion of efficient cause; because a thing has from God as from an effective cause this proper inclination... or particular apprehension of this thing" (a. 10).

It is said: 1° Of the essence of morality; 2° of the sources of the same.

21. - As was said above in n. 1, for theologians a human act is the same as a moral or imputable act. Yet theoretically each must be distinguished; for a twofold being is found in any human act, namely physical and moral. A human act considered according to physical being, or in the genus of nature, is an act which proceeds from the free will of man. But a human act according to its moral being, or in the genus of morals, is that same act insofar as it agrees with or is opposed to the rule of morals; and therefore the morality of human acts in general is their agreement with the rule of morals, or their discrepancy from the same. With certain more obscure formulas of speaking from the schools being set aside, the essence of morality can be said to consist in the bearing or relation of a human act to the rule of morals.

22. - But the one rule of morals is right reason; if the human act has been conformed to it, it will be called morally good; but if deformed from it, morally evil. Now since right reason is distinguished as twofold, one uncreated, which exists in the divine mind and is called the eternal law; the other created, which is the light impressed by God upon the rational creature, by which the eternal law itself is known; therefore:

I. The essence of morality consists primarily in the bearing or relation of a human act to the eternal law, which is the divine reason, or the will of God commanding the natural order to be preserved and forbidding it to be disturbed. The reason is that the eternal law alone can be the primary rule of morals. And indeed a rule of this sort must be infallible, indefectible, and capable of obliging in conscience; but such is the eternal law alone, from which alone other laws receive the force of obliging; therefore. Thus from St. Thomas.²

II. The essence of morality consists secondarily in the bearing of a human act to right reason. The reason is that right reason alone can manifest to man the eternal law, or the primary rule of morals. Therefore it belongs to right reason to direct the act of the will to God as to the ultimate end. Therefore right reason is the subjective rule manifesting the primary rule. Therefore the essence of morality consists secondarily in the conformity or deformity of the human act with right reason.¹

23. Resolutions. - 1° Therefore a moral being is all and only that which lies under the rule of morals, or under the law of God commanding, forbidding, or permitting. For through this alone we are ordered to our ultimate end, or disordered from it. Therefore, that our acts may be good, they must be in some way conformed to the divine will, since this is the supreme and primary rule of morals.

2° Liberty is pre-required for the foundation of morality; otherwise the act would not be human, and therefore all sins and merits would be removed from the midst.

3° It is false that the essence of morality must be placed in liberty alone. For the morality of a human act embraces its imputability to praise or blame, to reward or punishment; but an act is not worthy of praise or blame only because it is free, but also, and most of all, because it is conformed to or deformed from the rule of morals, or the divine will.

4° It is false, a fortiori, that morality consists in the voluntary alone. For the voluntary can be necessary, as, for example, in the natural appetite for happiness in general (n. 4 under 4°).

5° Moral goodness or malice is twofold, namely objective or material, and subjective or formal. The former is the very conformity or discrepancy of the action with the rules of morals considered in itself and in the object itself, independently of the will of the agent; but the latter is the same conformity or discrepancy, insofar as it is freely willed by the agent.

24. Questions. - It is asked 1° whether there are acts properly indifferent, or lacking morality, whether in species or in the individual.

Resp. 1° It is certain that there are acts indifferent in species, or acts which in their own species are without morality. For there are acts which, considered in themselves, abstracting from end and circumstances, have no agreement or repugnance with law or right reason, and therefore are to be judged neither good nor evil. Thus to walk, to write, and innumerable similar things are acts indifferent in themselves.

Resp. 2° But there is controversy with respect to acts in the individual, or as considered in the agent. The more common and more probable sentence with St. Thomas denies this, and St. Alphonsus proves it in these words: "It cannot happen that some singular act proceeding from deliberate will is done without circumstances: therefore either those circumstances are consonant with reason; namely, so that the act is done when, where, how, and on account of what it ought to be done, and thus it is good; or they are not consonant with right reason, at least not all of them, but some one is lacking, and thus it is evil: therefore no act in the individual, and considered according to all circumstances, can be indifferent."¹

25. - It is asked 2° whether the external act (actually to assist or harm one's neighbor) adds morality to the internal act (to will to assist or harm one's neighbor).

Resp. 1° In itself the external act adds no morality to the internal act, and therefore neither increases nor diminishes the substantial merit or demerit of the internal act. Thus with St. Thomas,² St. Alphonsus³ against certain others. - The reason is that, since the internal act of the will is the cause of the external act, and the effect (the external act) is wholly in the cause (in the internal act), the whole goodness or malice of the former must be placed in the goodness or malice of the latter.⁴

This is also clear from Sacred Scripture, which often regards the will as the deed itself. Thus, with respect to goodness and merit, it is clear from Gen. 22. vv. 16, 17, where God said to Abraham, who only willed to immolate his son: "Because thou hast done this thing, and hast not spared thy son ... I will bless thee." And, with respect to malice, from Matth. 5, 28, where Christ says: "He who shall have looked at a woman to lust after her has already committed adultery with her in his heart." - Nor is the obligation of declaring the external act in Confession an obstacle; for it must be declared because from the internal act of the will and the exterior work there arises one and the same moral act.⁵ Nor again is an aureola an obstacle, which is attributed to martyrs, doctors, and virgins, and is not granted to those who are inwardly prepared to suffer and do the same things which the former have done and suffered; for an aureola is a certain accidental reward or joy corresponding to a special difficulty joined with an exterior act. Nor, moreover, is it an obstacle that the real reception of a Sacrament confers greater effects than the will alone of receiving it; for in the question the matter is not of an equal effect of the internal and external act, but of the equal morality and imputability of them. Add that the real effect of the reception of a Sacrament comes from the privilege of Christ, who willed that it have power ex opere operato, and not by reason of a greater goodness in the recipient. Finally, the matter is also of effect, not of morality, when we say that by an internal act an indulgence is not acquired which the Church has granted to an external act; that a censure or irregularity is not incurred by the mere will of placing the work to which by law they are annexed; and that the burden of restitution does not exist from affective injustice alone.

It must also be noted, if the matter is concerning goodness, that the internal act is supposed to proceed from a will so disposed that, given the opportunity, it would operate, and besides that the case of an internal act is excluded which by its nature would be necessarily inefficacious in order to the execution of the action which it would even sincerely will. Thus an elicited act by which I would will only to please and obey God as much as Christ did could not reach that goodness which the actions of Christ had; for however much I should will this, I would will it inefficaciously, since I am not capable of a theandric action.¹

Resp. 2° Per accidens, the external act generally increases morality, because very often it is the occasion by which the goodness or malice of the internal act is increased, for example so that it is prolonged or multiplied, etc. For the internal act is increased because of the arduousness of the good external work, or because of delight in evil, or because of the longer delay of time necessary in completing the external work. Besides, often in the external work there is scandal or harm to one's neighbor, or, on the contrary,

his edification; from these also the morality of the internal act is increased. Thus commonly the theologians.

The sources or principles of morality are those things from which it comes about that a human act is good or evil, better or worse.

Three sources of morality are numbered, namely: 1° the object; 2° its circumstances; 3° the end of the agent. These three are altogether required for a good act; if even one is evil, the act will become evil. Hence the commonly known axiom: Good is from an integral cause; evil, from any defect whatsoever.

I say: are required. Yet, in order that goodness be imputed, it is required besides that it be directly willed; for "for the will to be good, it is required that it be good under the aspect of good, that is, that it will the good and on account of the good."¹ Wherefore it is imputed to no one for praise that, for example, he visited the sick only for the sake of conversation. Yet it is not required that it be intended explicitly and reflexively, or in a signate act, for example that you say or think: I will to fast because it is honorable; but it suffices that it be sought implicitly and equivalently, or in an exercised act, that is, that the act be apprehended as becoming, praiseworthy, worthy of reward, commended by pious men, or especially as a work, for example, of mercy, etc., and thus be done with a good intention. Cf. n. 31. Corol. 2. - On the contrary, in order that the malice of an act be imputed, it suffices that it be indirectly willed. Hence it is not necessary that the agent tend into the act as evil, because in that way scarcely anyone would sin; but it suffices that he intend an act to which malice is known to be annexed, although this malice in itself does not please him, or that he not avoid the act or the effect of the act which here and now he can and is bound to avoid; because by this very fact he virtually contemns the law and indirectly wills the malice. The reason for the difference is that good must be sought; but evil not only cannot be sought, but must be avoided; and it is not avoided by him who freely places an action to which evil is annexed. Hence he who voluntarily makes himself drunk, although he does not directly will the malice itself of drunkenness, but intends only the delight from drinking, nevertheless acts shamefully and sins. Haine, ib. p. 17. q. 42.

26. - The object is everything (thing or person) about which some action is morally¹ concerned. Hence in theft the object is another's thing which has been unjustly taken away; in an act of justice, another's thing which has been restored; in detestation of sin, an evil action which has been perpetrated. - Now this object can be something either good, as to venerate parents; or evil, as to steal another's goods; or indifferent, as to walk, to speak, to sleep. Again something can be either evil from its own nature, as drunkenness; or evil only because it is prohibited, as to eat meat on Friday without permission. But things evil from their own nature, or intrinsically evil, are of a threefold class, namely:

1° Certain things are such absolutely, or independently of every circumstance, because of themselves they involve repugnance with an absolutely necessary right order, as is hatred of God, blasphemy, etc.

2° Other things are intrinsically evil, not precisely in themselves, but by reason of some adjunct or condition which depends on the dominative power of God or man; such are the taking away of another's thing, the injuring of body or reputation, and similar things, which sometimes become lawful.

3° Finally, other things are evil only by reason of the danger which is ordinarily joined to them, as the sight of a base object, the reading of a wicked book, etc. ... These, when a just cause has been given and the proximate danger of sinning removed, can become lawful.²

That a human act derives its distinct morality from the object is clear from this, that from the object it has that it is such a moral action and not another, that is, good or evil; justice or religion; lust or blasphemy. And indeed from the object the act derives its first and essential morality. First, because it belongs to the act before any other morality (arising from circumstances or end); essential, because it cannot be absent from the act, although others (arising from circumstances

or end) were absent. Thus theft of a sacred thing in order to make oneself drunk is primarily conceived as evil by reason of the object, insofar as it is the unjust taking away of another's thing; and this injustice cannot be absent from theft, even when the end, which is drunkenness, and the circumstance of the sacred thing, are absent. Haine, ib. p. 19. q. 44.

27. - Circumstances, so called as if standing around the act, can be defined: "Accidental determinations, or certain accidents of an act, without which this act could indeed exist as to substance, but which nevertheless add to it a morality in some way different from that which that act already participates from the object and the end." Therefore, in order that a circumstance confer some morality upon an act, it is required that, for example, the circumstance of the sacred place in which it is perpetrated confer the malice of sacrilege upon an act of lust; but that the fact that a theft was committed with the right or left hand confers nothing of morality upon the theft.

Circumstances, as also the end, as such, attribute to the act a secondary and accidental morality. Cf. the things said at the end of n. 26. I said: as such; because sometimes they attribute to the act a first and essential morality, as if either a work objectively indifferent becomes evil from the end for which it is placed (to sing for vain glory) or good (to sing so that the profit coming from it may fall to pious causes), or if an evil circumstance is the whole reason why a good work is chosen (to sing divine praises in church merely so that you may be praised by men). But then circumstances, as being intended in themselves, induce the notion of object in the genus of morals. Haine, ib. p. 19. q. 46.

I say: A human act derives true morality from circumstances. The reason is that circumstances determine the act as moral, namely as having a relation of agreement or disagreement with reason and right order; indeed, as I have said, sometimes circumstances alone induce agreement or disagreement into an act, as happens in the acts about which we spoke above. Hence some circumstances leave the object in the same moral species, as the quantity of money stolen by theft or given in alms; for the species of malice in theft, or of goodness in alms, is not changed by the quantity of money stolen or given. But others change the species itself, or add a new one over it; thus the circumstance that the thing taken away is sacred adds over the malice of theft a new species, namely sacrilege.

From the former circumstances, some aggravate malice, but others diminish it, and that gravely or lightly. Thus the greater or lesser quantity of money taken away by theft, or given in alms, renders either the malice of theft or the goodness of alms greater or lesser, and that gravely or lightly lesser, according as the quantity of money is notably or not notably greater or lesser.

But if circumstances transfer a sin from venial into mortal, or conversely, then they are said to change not the objective species, which they only increase or diminish, but the theological or demeritorious species. Thus the theft of one cent does not differ as to the virtue to which it is opposed from the theft of a gold coin; nevertheless it differs as to fault, namely theologically, because the theft of one cent, as being a light sin, does not deserve the privation of grace and glory, as does the theft of a sum that is grave, as being mortal.

Number of circumstances. - Seven circumstances of human acts are commonly enumerated, and they are comprehended in that common little verse:

"Who, What, Where, By what helps, Why, How, When."

See the reason for precisely this number, if you wish, in St. Thomas.¹ Bouquillon² and Haine³ explain them clearly in the following practical way.

Who, or the one acting, is considered not by reason of himself, for thus he belongs to the substance of the human act, but by reason of his accidental quality or condition, which morally attributes to the act in moral estimation either a diverse value (changing the species), or a greater or lesser value (aggravating or diminishing in the same species). It changes the species, for example, in a sin of lust, if it is committed by a religious; it aggravates in theft, if it is perpetrated by a priest, insofar as, other things being equal, any sin whatever is graver in a priest than in a layman. I say: other things being equal, that is, supposing that in each the act is voluntary in the same degree, and thus in a holy man the same venial sin, committed from frailty or subreption, is wont to be lighter than in one not holy, because the holy commonly neglect less to guard against sins of this sort.¹ Similarly it also increases goodness, if, for example, an eminent man humbles himself, or a poor man gives alms.

What, that is, not the object itself into which the will is borne first and of itself, for a circumstance comes to the object; but the quantity or accidental quality joined to the object. In theft, for example, it is aggravating insofar as it signifies quantity, and thus the theft of 1000 coins is worse than of 100; but it can change the species insofar as it signifies quality, as if the thing stolen is sacred.

Where, or the circumstance of place, namely sacred, profane; public, private. If it operates anything morally, it ordinarily changes the species. Thus the holiness of the place adds the species of sacrilege to a homicide perpetrated in a church; publicity adds the species of scandal to a sin which is committed in a public place. But if you cling to base thoughts in church, it is only aggravating. But if an act, lawful in itself, is prohibited in reverence for a place, for example the extraction of a thief from an immune place, the quality of the place passes into the substance and gives the first species.

By what helps, or by what means which is not necessarily joined to the act; for, as I again admonish, circumstances are accidents of a human act. It changes the species if, for example, by the help of a demon or magician you have brought evil upon your neighbor, or have put on sacred vestments in order to deceive another; it aggravates if, for example, someone steals the ladder of one person in order that he may take away the money of another.

Why, or the end of the one acting, about which presently.

How, or by what accidental manner an act of virtue or of sin is placed; intensely or remissly; from malice or from vincible ignorance; with force brought upon someone or without it, etc. It changes the species, for example, in violation and in robbery; it aggravates, for example, if you sin from malice; it diminishes if you sin from vincible ignorance, from grave fear, from strong temptation, etc.; it changes the theological species if with semi-full advertence.

When, or the accidental quantity (for a long or short time) or quality of time, namely sacred or not sacred. The quality of time ordinarily does not notably aggravate the malice of an act; but, according to Lugo,¹ to a sin which is perpetrated on a feast day it can add a malice diverse in species (namely sacrilege), and that grave, if from the circumstance of sacred time notable irreverence were inflicted upon divine worship; as if someone should exhibit public games, etc., on the Parasceve of the Lord.² I would add: in places where that day is publicly or at least commonly distinguished from other days. - If an act not evil in itself is prohibited at that time, for example the eating of meat, the time passes into the object.

28. - The end is that for the sake of which something either is of itself, namely independently of the will of the one acting (the end of the work; proper; intrinsic), or is made at pleasure by the agent (the end of the one acting; extrinsic). Thus the relief of the poor person is the end of the work in almsgiving; but in the one giving it, either that very relief or vain glory will be able to be the end of the one acting. Concerning this alone, as being the only thing properly called end (motive), we must speak.

But this is: 1° either primary, which flows into the act as an efficient cause, so that without it the act would not be done; or secondary, which only allures to acting, without nevertheless being the efficient cause of the action. Thus a priest in celebrating Mass primarily intends the worship of God, secondarily the stipend.

For others, the primary end is that on account of which the act is chiefly placed; the secondary is that which moves the agent less than the primary, yet so that nothing prevents the agent, if that (secondary end) were lacking, from not acting. Primary in the former sense (which is ours) is equivalently the only or total end, and thus it is understood by St. Alphonsus (H. A. XVI. 136), when he explains who are to be judged to pass otherwise into fraud of reservation. Secondary, in the latter signification, is employed by the same holy Doctor, L. IV. n. 206, § Nota igitur, and is called by him the secondarily motive, without which the act (he is treating of a vow) would not be done. The Vindiciae give an example (Ed. 2. T. I. p. 307 (1); Ed. 1. p. 919. 1) in one who resolves to enter Religion in order to work out his eternal salvation; but since he is borne inordinately toward the eating of fish, he wishes to enter none but that of the Carthusians.

2° The end is intermediate or ultimate, according as it is referred to another end, or the will rests in it. Again the ultimate end is either a) positively or negatively ultimate, according as it is intended, or is not intended, with the exclusion of another end; or b) explicitly or implicitly intended, according as the agent is moved by an end of this sort expressly or only virtually. Thus the dealings by which a miser strives to increase riches, in which he places his beatitude or ultimate end, can be called so many intermediate ends. But if in riches the will rests in such a way that it excludes God, these will constitute an end positively ultimate; otherwise negatively ultimate. Again, if it expressly excludes God, those dealings will be an ultimate end explicitly intended; if not expressly, but he acts in such a way that he must be said by his deed to exclude Him, as if for increasing riches he commits mortal thefts, those dealings will be an ultimate end implicitly intended; for through mortal sin he renounces God. - A means is that which is intended insofar as it is useful for the end, without the will taking pleasure in it, as, for example, the lack of food which the miser unwillingly tolerates in order to increase his riches. Hence the intermediate end participates in the nature of a means insofar as it is referred to a further end; but in the nature of an end insofar as the will takes pleasure in it.

I say: 1° A human act derives true morality from the end, as being consonant with or dissenting from reason. Thus it is conformed to right reason not only to give alms, but also to give them for the remission of sins; just as likewise it is repugnant to right reason not only to steal, but also to steal in order to make oneself drunk.

I say: 2° He sins who acts for delight alone. The reason is that he acts inordinately, perverting the order of things instituted by the author of nature. For according to the order instituted by the author of nature, delight exists on account of operation, and not conversely; namely delight, for example in eating or drinking, is as a certain salt and seasoning, which serves for enticing one to actions necessary or useful for life. Therefore delight is only a means for carrying out those actions more easily, better, and more constantly, but is not the ultimate end of the action. For thus St. Thomas says: The divine intellect, which is the institutor of nature, has appointed delights on account of operation.¹ Confirmation from proposition 8 condemned by Innocent XI (p. XV). - Yet this disorder of itself is not grave, and therefore does not exceed venial sin; because ordinarily the ultimate end is not excluded, not even implicitly, unless the matter is of those "whose," as the Apostle says, "God is the belly."

29. Resolutions. - 1° Every choice of an evil means is evil, but, conversely, not every choice of a good means is good. Thus no one is praised from the fact that he abstains from drink from avarice; but he is to be held guilty who steals money for making alms.

2° He who chooses an honorable means for an honorable end places an act of twofold honorableness, if each honorableness is intended. Likewise he is guilty of twofold malice who chooses an evil means for an evil end, for instance if someone steals money in order to make himself drunk.

3° He who employs an evil means for a good end contracts only the malice of the means, for example if someone lies in order to free his neighbor from danger. Likewise, conversely, he who employs an honorable means for an evil end contracts only the malice of the end.

4° He who employs an indifferent means for a good or evil end contracts only the goodness or malice of the end. Thus, for example, if you take up a journey in order to show a traveler the way, you have only the merit of the end; likewise if you sing in order to cause annoyance to another, you contract only the guilt of the end.

30. Questions. - It is asked 1° whether any evil end corrupts the whole goodness of the act.

Resp. 1° A gravely evil end always wholly infects the act, however good the object may be in itself. For an act by which someone, by sinning mortally, totally withdraws from God, can in no part be approved by God. Thus if someone gives alms to a needy girl in order to entice her to sin, although also in order to relieve her poverty, the act is wholly infected by the evil end.

Resp. 2° A lightly evil end also corrupts the whole act if it is the total end, or at least the primary end of the agent. For the total end (i.e. the end intended solely), since it embraces the whole object, infects the whole, because the agent wills the good under the aspect of evil, and therefore, insofar as it is willed by him, it is evil.²

This is also clear from the words of Christ:¹ "If ... thy eye be evil, thy whole body will be dark." But if there is a twofold end, and the evil one is primary, it must be resolved in the same way, because in such a case there is not indeed physically, but morally, one act of the will, since the secondary end is subordinated to the primary end² (in the sense declared above in n. 28 in the former place); as if someone gives alms from mercy and from vain glory, and would not give unless he expected the praises of men.

Resp. 3° But if the end, lightly evil, is merely secondary, more probably it does not corrupt the whole act, which is partly good and partly evil. The reason is that in this case two acts of the will are present, even morally, of which one is not subordinated to the other, and of which one is good, the other evil. If it were otherwise, fewer good acts would be found. - You have an example in one who from a sincere affection of mercy wishes to give alms to a poor person, but because the poor person asks publicly, there also enters the stimulus of vain glory, which is not repelled. - Let the same be the judgment concerning a lightly evil circumstance sometimes accompanying an act good from the object, as when someone, rebuking another from charity, incidentally consents to a movement of anger. For a movement of this sort is an act standing of itself. Wherefore properly it does not deprave the act which it accompanies, but mixes evil with it.²

31. - It is asked 2° whether all our actions must be referred to God, according to the words of the Apostle:³ Whether therefore you eat, ... do all things unto the glory of God?

Resp. More commonly, with St. Thomas, Doctors teach⁴ that in the words of the Apostle a precept is truly contained.

It is asked 3° what is required so that one not sin against this precept.

Resp. "This relation" of all works "unto the glory of God is understood either in act, or in aptitude of being referred, which is not only in good things, but also in indifferent things."⁵ With these things set down, I say:

1° On the part of the work, it is required that it be referable to God; such is also a work indifferent from the object. Therefore it suffices that it be neither mortally nor venially evil.

2° On the part of the agent, some positive relation of works to God is certainly required. But what kind?

Resp. a) An actual relation is required as often as the precept of eliciting an act of charity urges; for "under the precept of charity it is contained that God be loved from the whole heart; and therefore a man cannot fulfill the precept of charity unless all things also are referred to God."¹

b) When the precept of eliciting an act of charity is not urging, a virtual relation is required and suffices. It is required, "so that an actual relation to God be joined to every action of ours, not indeed in act but in virtue, according as the virtue of the first ordering," i.e. of the actual ordering previously had, "remains in all following actions, just as the virtue of the ultimate end also remains in all ends ordered to it."²

c) In neither case is an explicit relation required, but an implicit one suffices. It suffices in the former case, namely when the precept of eliciting an act of charity urges, "because whenever the habit of charity goes forth into act, the ordering of the whole man to the ultimate end takes place, and consequently of all the things which are ordered to him."³ It likewise suffices in the latter case; for "it is not necessary," nor possible, "that someone always think of the ultimate end whenever he desires or does something."⁴

d) It is not required that we refer our works to God from the motive of charity; for the mode of charity does not fall under the precept of the divine law, except when from precept an act of charity is to be elicited.⁵ St. Alphonsus agrees,⁶ requiring nothing other and nothing more, except that works be referred "to any honorable good."

e) Nor is it required that all things be done from a supernatural motive. "And therefore when some unbeliever, from the dictate of reason, does some good thing, not referring it to evil, he does not sin."⁷ This is confirmed from proposition 8 among those condemned by Alexander VIII (p. XXII).

Corollaries. - 1. Those are to be said to observe this precept, insofar as it demands an actual relation, who elicit an act of charity when the precept of eliciting it urges.

2. Likewise those who, when this precept does not urge, deliberately place a work honorable in itself, "not referring it to evil";¹ - who study to preserve the mean of virtue in jokes, games, recreations, adornment, etc.;² - who collectively order all their works to God. For those who deliberately place a work honorable in itself, by this very fact that they do not refer it to evil, are to be judged to intend, at least implicitly, the honorableness of the work. But those who study to preserve the mean of virtue in jokes, etc., by this very zeal of theirs show themselves to seek the good of virtue. Finally, the collective relation of all works to God implicitly contains the relation of each one.

3. "Although someone approaching the table does not think of the conservation of life, but only of the delight of food, ... he does not on that account sin, because he wills such delight," at least virtually (as is supposed), "on account of the conservation of life, and thus he does not inordinately seek it."³

4. "That the intention may remain more in virtue in our daily actions,"⁴ and that the precept of the Apostle may be fulfilled in a more perfect and more salutary manner, "one ought more often in the day, at least in the morning, generally to offer all one's acts to God."⁵

It is asked 4° in what way the human will, that it may be good, ought to be conformed to the divine will.

Resp. 1° In all things it ought to be conformed at least negatively, i.e. it is never permitted to disapprove that which God wills, or to murmur against it; for He disposes all things wisely.

Resp. 2° Positively our will can be conformed to the divine will in two ways, namely in the thing willed materially and in the thing willed formally. The thing willed materially is the thing itself or object which we will; the thing willed formally is the reason or end on account of which we will that thing. Again, the thing willed formally is of two kinds: one proximate or particular, i.e. the particular reason on account of which we will that thing; the other universal or ultimate, and it is the glory of God. Thus, while I will my father to live, whom God wills to die, the thing willed materially is the life of the father; the thing willed formally and proximately is the reason of piety toward one's father, the good of the family, etc. But if I should will this ultimately on account of the glory of God, my will is conformed to the divine will in the thing willed formally and ultimately; because just as the ultimate reason on account of which God wills my father to die is the glory of God, so the ultimate reason on account of which I will my father to live is also the glory of God. With these things set down:

I say: a) Our will ought positively to be conformed to the divine will in the thing willed formally and ultimately, but not always in the thing willed formally and proximately. - I say: "it ought positively to be conformed to the divine will in the thing willed formally and ultimately"; for the motive of the divine will is ultimately referred to the glory of God, to which the human will, that it may be right, ought to refer all its actions, at least virtually, as was said above.

I added: "but not always in the thing willed formally and proximately"; because, although it is unlawful to will something opposed to the divine will under the same reason under which God wills it, nevertheless it is not always unlawful to will it under a diverse reason, namely one which is not dishonorable. Thus it can happen that a son, on account of reasons of particular good, lawfully wills his father to live; but God wills him to die on account of other reasons, for example on account of sins, or because the course of nature demands it.

I say: b) Our will ought to be positively conformed to the divine will also in the thing willed materially, where the matter concerns a sufficiently known precept or prohibition; for the will of God commanding or prohibiting, when sufficiently known, always has annexed the will of obliging man to willing and doing what He commands, or to not willing and not doing what He forbids. I said: "where the matter concerns a precept or prohibition." - Wherefore 1. of itself I am not bound to will to follow the evangelical counsels. Yet I am bound, as is clear from the things said under Resp. 1°, to be conformed negatively to the divine will with respect to them, insofar as it is not permitted to disapprove them, since they are good and salutary. - Nor 2.

am I bound to will all things harmful to me which, God willing, happen to me, hunger, sickness, the death of parents, etc., in such a way that it is lawful for me, as much as I can, to flee them or strive against them. But after and insofar as these things have already happened, it is not permitted with an absolute and consequent will to oppose them, because again this would be the same as not being conformed to the divine will even negatively. But with an antecedent or conditioned will I am not bound in these things to be conformed to the divine will; and in this way it is lawful for a son to will his father, who is already dead, to live, namely while he wills this under another reason than that under which God willed the opposite. For the antecedent or conditioned will considers the life of the father under the reason of a particular good, abstractly from the circumstance of the divine will. - Haine,¹ Dens.² Cf. S. Th.³ and St. Alphonsus.⁴

IX. Lust indirectly voluntary, which the will does not procure nor intend, to which it neither positively consents nor resists, but toward which it behaves negatively, and which it only permits because it does not repress it when it can and ought to repress it, is of itself venially evil; per accidens, sometimes mortal on account of danger of consent.

It is proved: in this a man sins, because reason and will are lacking in their office of directing and repressing the motions of the lower powers, nor can he bear himself indifferently to whether his motions and acts are inordinate or not; but:

a. per se he does not sin mortally, because positive consent of the will is lacking;

b. per accidens he would sin mortally if from this there were a proximate danger of consenting to venereal pleasure.

Hence man is bound to resist those motions positively, insofar as is necessary and morally possible for not consenting and for repressing the motions:

1. ordinarily not directly, that is, by contrary or violent acts, such as suppression of imagination, compression of the members, chastisement of the body, and so forth, because this is not necessary for the aforesaid end, or is too difficult, or even excites more;

2. but indirectly, by applying the mind to other incompatible things, especially those which more strongly affect the mind, for example by interrupting the work, pursuing business, an external occupation requiring special attention, praying, and so forth; indeed:

3. sometimes, if there is a just cause for not resisting otherwise and for not repressing the motions, positive resistance by a simple act of displeasure, at least implicit, suffices. This act is not to be frequently repeated, since until it is retracted it is judged morally to persevere. Thus if someone has experienced that other resistance is useless for checking the motions, or excites and increases them more; or if the motions have their origin from a necessary cause or from a useful action, as was said in the preceding number, c, and it is too troublesome to repel them, for example on account of duration; or if the motions are light and transitory, both because the causes exciting such motions are very frequent and therefore the obligation of repressing them would be too difficult, and because they are repressed better and more effectively by contempt: for solicitude about impeding them is accustomed to excite imaginations and increase the motions. All these things are easily verified in the scrupulous person, who therefore will show sufficient displeasure by simply despising the motions.

A moral act can be defined : « An act proceeding from deliberate will, with subjection to the rules of morals, » which are eternal law and right reason.

I say 1° : Morality in common does not consist in extrinsic denomination drawn from the rules of morals.

It is proved². Moral being, and above all moral goodness, is a perfection existing in human acts on the side of the thing, caused by virtue, by free will, and by God. Therefore it is not mere extrinsic denomination and being of reason. ² Here q. 18, a. 4, ad 2.

It is confirmed. God rewards and punishes unto eternity on account of acts good or bad morally. But it is absurd that eternal reward, or torment, be decreed on account of extrinsic denominations and beings of reason. Therefore.

I say 2° : Liberty is requisite unto morality; nevertheless morality does not formally consist therein.

The first part stands established, because necessary acts are not subjected to the rules of morals, nor are they directible by them, but only free acts; for in vain would law be applied to a necessary and unvarying act. Therefore liberty is the foundation, or condition sine qua non, of morality. And therefore the Angelic Doctor says : « There begins the genus of morals where dominion of will is first found. »

Proof of the second part. Liberty is conceived in the act before morality. For by this very fact that an act going forth from will under indifference of judgment is conceived, it is conceived free, and not yet moral, because not yet conceived the law to which it be subjected : nay, granting there were no law or rule of morals, it would still be conceived free, and there would be no morality. Therefore.

It is confirmed. To be free pertains to the order of nature; for thereby are free agents distinguished from those not free. Therefore.

I say 3° : Morality in common consists formally in tendence, or real transcendental relation, toward the object subjected to the rules of morals.

It is proved. In the same manner, proportion being preserved, must one speak of the act in esse moris as of the act in esse naturae; for the act in physical esse is the foundation of the act as moral. But the act in esse naturae is constituted formally through order and real transcendental tendence toward the object considered in esse naturae or physically; for it compares to the object as motion and way to term. Therefore the moral act is constituted formally through order and real transcendental tendence toward the object considered in esse moris, that is, as subjected and regulable through the rules of morals.

You will ask how many be the species of morality.

Answer. It stands agreed among all that goodness and badness are species of morality. Goodness is real transcendental order toward an object consonant with the rules of morals. Badness, if placed positively, it is plain that it is a real order of the act toward an object dissonant from the rules of morals; but if placed privatively, it will be privation of consonance and rectitude.

How in this opinion it is saved that badness be a species of morality, we shall try to explain in the treatise on Sins, where this difficulty will be ventilated more fully.

The difficulty here is whether indifference also be a species of morality. Both sides are disputed among the Thomists.

It seems to us somewhat more probable that indifference be a species of morality; because St. Thomas, below, q. 92, a. 2, c., teaches that law has three acts, namely to forbid, to command, and to permit; and adds : « There are moreover three differences of human acts. Some acts are good from their own genus...; and with respect to these is placed the act of law commanding or imperating... Some indeed are acts evil from their own genus, as vicious acts ; and with respect to these law has to forbid. But some are acts indifferent from their own genus ; and with respect to these law has to permit. » — I subjoin. But that act is truly and formally moral which is subjected to law, and concerning which law has a special act. Therefore.

This reason of St. Thomas is further strengthened. That act is truly moral which proceeds from deliberate will with positive subjection to the rules of morals. But an act indifferent from its object can proceed from deliberate will with positive subjection to the rules of morals. Therefore. — Proof of the minor. He who doubts whether some work be licit — suppose, whether it be licit to labor today — suspends the work, consults the law or reason, nor indulges in labor unless previously the law or reason has answered that no feast day falls, that it is licit to labor. He, as is evident, acts deliberately and with subjection to the law which he first consults and to which he subjects himself so far, that he would abstain from the work if the law forbade it, and he exercises it because he sees it not forbidden by the law, but left most free to him through it. Which assuredly is altogether to subject oneself to the law and to be ruled through the law, not to refuse the disposition of the law, as the opposite opinion says.

We do not inquire here whether the exterior act is good or evil. We suppose this as certain; for by the very fact that it is voluntary, conformable or disconformable to reason, it has all that is required in order that it be good or evil. Moreover, on exterior acts there are the eight precepts of the Decalogue.

But we inquire whether the exterior act is good or evil by a goodness or malice formally distinct from the goodness or malice of the interior act, which it superadds to it¹. And the question concerns the exterior act inasmuch as it is the mere execution of the interior act. For if some goodness were annexed accidentally and from without to the exterior act, e. g., the special grace of the exterior reception of the sacraments, or the grace of indulgence attached to almsgiving or to exterior prayer, it is certain that the exterior act would add this accidental goodness to the interior act. Likewise, if for the execution of the exterior act the interior act must needs be intensified or multiplied, as often happens, then also it is evident that the exterior act adds goodness or malice to the interior: yet not per se and by reason of itself, but only occasionally, because on occasion of the exterior act the interior act is intensified or multiplied. ¹ Here q. 20, a. 4, c.

I say 1°: The exterior act, precisely as the execution of the interior act, adds to it no goodness or malice simply, in the order to essential reward or punishment, but only secundum quid, in the order to accidental reward or punishment: whence it does not render the one acting better or worse simply, but only secundum quid.

It is proved first part¹. The exterior act is either considered as the object of the interior act, or as its effect or execution. But in neither way does it add to the interior a distinct goodness or malice. Therefore. — The first part of the minor is proved. If the exterior act be considered as the object of the interior act, the whole goodness or malice which is in it objectively is transfused into the act formally, so that the object has nothing objectively which is not in the act formally. Therefore the exterior act, as object, has no distinct goodness or malice which it superadds to the goodness or malice of the interior act, since it is on both sides the same, with this difference, that it is objectively in the exterior act, as in the object and motive of the will, and in the interior act formally, as in the subject. — The second part of the min. is proved, concerning which especially is the difficulty. The exterior act, precisely as effect and execution of the interior act, has no intrinsic moral goodness or malice, but is good or evil denominatively and extrinsically only from the goodness or malice of the interior act. Therefore it adds to the interior no distinct goodness or malice. — The foregoing is proved 1° by the most formal words of St. Thomas here a. 3, ad 3: « As, he says, health is derived from what is healthy in the animal to medicine and urine...; in this manner the goodness of the exterior act is derived from the goodness of the will. » Therefore, as health is in medicine and urine denominatively and extrinsically only, so moral goodness or malice in the exterior act. The same foregoing is proved 2° by a decisive reason. Liberty is the foundation of morality, and therefore intrinsic moral goodness or malice can be only there where there is intrinsic liberty. But in the exterior act of the executive power there is not intrinsic liberty; for this is intrinsically subjected in the will alone. Therefore. ¹ Ibid.

It is confirmed. If the exterior act adds something to the interior act, either that superadded thing is willed by the interior act, as by the exterior act it is exercised, or it is not: if it be not willed, it is not a moral good or evil, and thus it adds nothing of goodness or malice; if it be willed, by this very fact it is prehad in the interior act of the will, in which is the foundation of all morality. Therefore.

It is proved the second part of the conclusion¹. The interior act is compared to the exterior as tendency and motion to the term and end. But every tendency and motion is perfected and consummated in this, that it attain the end and reach the term; whence the will is not perfect unless it be such that, the opportunity being given, it operate. Therefore the exterior act adds to the interior goodness or malice, not simply, or distinct from the goodness or malice of the interior, but secundum quid, that is, the same extended and consummated, or its extension and consummation. ¹ Ibid.

Whence it follows that it makes the one acting better, not simply, but secundum quid, and that it is in the order to punishment or reward, not essential, but accidental.

I say 1° : The event following, foreseen and in some manner intended, adds to goodness and badness of exterior act, whether it follow per se or per accidens². ² Ibid., a. 5, c.

It is proved. So much better or worse is the act, so much better or worse is the will. But better or worse is the will of him who, foreseeing and intending many goods or evils about to follow from his work, performs it, than if he foresaw and intended none of these. Therefore.

I said, « in some manner intended »; because, in order that the event following add to malice, it need not be directly intended, but suffices that it be intended indirectly and interpretatively. Now it is indirectly and interpretatively intended when it is thus foreseen as about to follow that it could and ought to have been impeded. Then there exists obligation of impeding and desisting from the act to which it follows, when there underlies no right or legitimate reason for performing that act.

But what, when right or legitimate reason of not performing the act is present or absent, notwithstanding the evil event followed thence? This is work, this labor; nor can one rule be assigned. To this must attention be given : whether the event follows from that act per se or per accidens and by intervention of another cause; whether the act influences that evil event gravely or lightly, remotely or proximately. Moreover the evil of the event must be compared with the goodness of the act. Greater indeed reason is required that an act be legitimately performed from which evil follows per se, than if it follows per accidens and by intervention of another cause; greater, if the act influences proximately and gravely, than if lightly and remotely; greater, if the utility of the act do not preponderate, or at least not equal the evil of the event. With all these things attended to, judgment must be formed morally whether there be or be not right and legitimate reason for performing the act. Wherefore consult what I said concerning indirect voluntariness or voluntariness in cause, art. 1 of the first dissertation of this Treatise.

I say 2° : The event following per se from the act, even though it be not foreseen, nor willed in itself, adds to goodness or badness¹; because what follows per se from the act pertains in a certain manner to its species, and therefore is virtually and implicitly willed in the very act. Moreover that act is the better from whose nature several goods are wont to follow, and that the worse from whose nature several evils are wont to follow. But an event is judged to follow per se from the act when it happens always or usually. Hence scandal following public fornication augments its malice, although the fornicator thought not of it, because it follows per se from such an act. ¹ Ibid.

Understand nevertheless this conclusion with this modification : that from the same act there follow not per se two effects equally immediate, one good, the other bad, according to the other principle of the holy Doctor, IIa 2ae, q. 64, a. 7, c., namely that, when of one act there are two effects equally immediate, one can be within intention, the other beside intention and not imputable, as appears in defense against unjust invader, from which equally immediately follow salvation of the invaded and death of the invader. Concerning which I shall speak more fully on Right and Justice.

I say 3° : The event following per accidens from the act, if it be not somehow intended, as was said in the first conclusion, adds not to goodness or badness¹ : 1° because no judgment is given concerning any thing according to what it is per accidens; 2° because such an event is in no manner voluntary, neither in itself nor in its cause. You have example in the woman who for just cause goes forth into public, from which she foresees the lapse of someone about to follow. ¹ Ibid.

I say, 1st. The essence of morality consists primarily in the habitude or relation of a human act to the eternal law, which is the divine reason, or the will of God commanding that the natural order be preserved and forbidding that it be disturbed. The reason is that only that can be the primary rule of morality which is the supreme norm of an infallible and indefectible order, and able to oblige in conscience; but such is the eternal law alone, from which alone the other laws receive the force of obliging. Therefore.

I say, 2nd. The essence of morality consists secondarily in the habitude of a human act to right reason. For human actions cannot be measured against the supreme norm of morality except by means of human reason, which is a certain participation in, and consequently manifestation of, the divine reason. Hence:

1st. That, and that alone, is a moral being which stands under the rule of morals, or under the law of God commanding or permitting. For through that alone are we ordered to our ultimate end, or disordered from it.

2nd. It is false that the essence of morality is to be placed in liberty alone. For this is prerequired as a condition that an act can be imputed, but it is not the reason why it is imputed unto praise or blame. For he who acts freely is not for that reason worthy of reward, but only he who, since he is free, acts conformably to the divine reason.

3rd. It is false also that morality consists in the voluntary alone. For the voluntary without liberty is in no way imputable, because without it man would not be master of his own actions.

4th. It is false that public opinion is the rule of morality, because it is neither infallible nor immutable, and consequently tomorrow that could be called unjust which today is reputed honest.

5th. Indeed the civil laws themselves cannot be the supreme rule of morals, because laws measure the goodness or malice of an act only insofar as they are honest and reasonable, and consequently insofar as they participate in some higher criterion. Cf. St. Thomas, 1-2, q. 19, art. 4; q. 71, art. 6; and q. 93, art. 3. - St. Alphonsus, nn. 34 and 35.

Question 1. Are there acts properly indifferent, or lacking morality, either in species or in the individual?

Response. It is certain that there are acts indifferent in species, or acts which in their species are without morality. For there are acts which, considered in themselves while abstracting from end and circumstances, have no agreement or repugnance with law or right reason, and therefore are to be reputed neither good nor bad. Thus walking, writing, and innumerable similar things are acts indifferent through themselves.

But there is controversy concerning acts in the individual, or considered in the agent; but the more common and more probable opinion, which with St. Thomas denies it, is held. The reason is that it belongs to a man acting deliberately, and therefore master of his act, to order the act to a due end; but the due end is that which befits rational nature, as it is rational. Moreover an act otherwise good from the object, or at least indifferent, and thus ordered to a due end, is necessarily good; but an act lacking such ordering is bad; therefore in no case will there be given an act properly indifferent in the individual. Cf. St. Thomas, 1-2, q. 18, arts. 8 and 9; and QQ. DD., De Malo, q. 2, arts. 4 and 5. - St. Alphonsus, nn. 42 and seq.

Question 2. Does an external act add morality to an internal act?

Response. Through itself an external act adds no morality to an internal act; and the reason is that all morality is taken from the intrinsic, or from the will; nor does an external act have any imputability unto merit or demerit proper to itself and distinct from the imputability of the internal act. Wherefore an external act is not formally, but only materially, honest or dishonest. Nor does the obligation of declaring the external act in confession stand in the way; for it must be declared both because reservation, scandal, or some damage of neighbor is often present, and because it constitutes one and the same act with the internal act, as will be said where there will be discussion concerning the integrity of confession. But by accident an external act usually increases morality, because very often it is the occasion why the goodness or malice of the internal act is increased, for example, that it is prolonged or multiplied, etc. For the internal act is increased on account of the arduousness of the good external work or the delight of the evil, or on account of the longer delay of time necessary in completing the external work. Cf. Suarez, in 1-2, tract. 3, disp. 10, sect. 1, nn. 3 and 9.

The sources of morality are named those principles which bestow upon human acts their species, or a modification of the species, in the genus of morals.

Three sources of morality are numbered, namely: 1st, the object of the act; 2nd, its circumstances; 3rd, the end of the agent. These three are altogether required for a good act; if even one is bad, the act will become bad. Hence the well-known axiom: Good is from an integral cause, evil from any defect whatsoever.

The object is that about which a moral act is immediately concerned, and in which the will of the agent proximately and through itself is terminated.

The object is good or bad or indifferent according as it agrees or does not agree with reason, law, or right order, or stands apart from law or right order. Likewise it can be intrinsically good or bad, that is, by reason of itself from the requirement of right order; or not intrinsically, but only by reason of a positive precept.

I say. From the object morally considered is taken the first and essential morality of a human act; for the morality which the object bestows upon the action is conceived before every other morality, whether it proceeds from the end or from the circumstances.

The morality which is taken from the object is called morality, or objective goodness or malice. If the object has been indifferent in itself, then the act will receive its morality from the end or from the circumstances.

But intrinsically bad objects are of a threefold class, namely: 1st. Some are such absolutely, and independently from every circumstance, because from themselves they involve repugnance with an absolutely necessary right order, as hatred of God, blasphemy, etc. 2nd. Others are intrinsically bad, not precisely in themselves, but by reason of some adjunct or condition which depends on the dominative power of God or of man: such are the taking away of another's thing, injury to body or reputation, and similar things which at times become licit. 3rd. Finally, others are bad only by reason of the danger which they ordinarily have joined to them, such as the sight of a base object, the reading of a depraved book, etc. These, given a reasonable cause and the danger being removed, can become licit.

Circumstances are accidental determinations of an act, without which the act could exist as to substance, and which nevertheless in some way touch its morality. Seven classes of circumstances are numbered, expressed in this little verse:

Who, what, where, by what aids, why, how, when?

Namely: Who, or what sort the agent is, married, cleric, etc.? What, or what is the accidental quality or quantity of the object? Where, or in what place, whether sacred or profane, etc.? By what aids, that is, what means, instruments, etc., the agent has used? Why, or from what end, namely extrinsic? How, namely whether maliciously or in good faith, whether in an intense or remiss manner, whether advertently, or not? When, that is, at what sort of time or for how much time? Cf. St. Thomas, 1-2, q. 7, arts. 3 and 4.

I say. A human act takes true morality from circumstances. The reason is that circumstances, which cannot together with the object not be intended directly or indirectly, by that very fact affect the act insofar as it is a human act and lies under the rules of morals; but often they have a relation of agreement or disagreement with reason and right order. Therefore they affect the act in the being of morals, or as to morality; indeed sometimes the circumstances alone introduce agreement or disagreement of this kind into the act, as happens in acts indifferent from the object.

Hence, 1st, some circumstances are those which pertain to the morality of an act, others which contribute nothing to it, and which therefore are to be held wholly indifferent. 2nd. Some leave the object in the same moral species, and others change the species itself, or add a new species. 3rd. Of the former, some aggravate malice, but others diminish it, and they do this gravely or lightly. If they so aggravate that they render a sin mortal from venial, or so diminish that they render it venial from mortal, the act, remaining in the same moral species, is said to be changed as to its theological species.

Ordinarily a circumstance is said notably to aggravate malice either when to this malice, grave in itself, it adds an excess which alone would itself be a lethal sin, which in quantitative things is obvious to anyone, as if someone steals ten horses; or when one sinning notably exceeds the mode of delinquency in things not quantitative, as if a murderer cuts an enemy limb by limb.

An end in general is that for the sake of which something is done; but it is distinguished as twofold, namely the end of the work, that is, the end intrinsic to the work itself and to which the work tends through itself; and the end of the one working, that is, the end to which the agent directs his intention at will, or which the agent has set before himself, whether it is the same as the end of the work, or is diverse from it and extrinsic to the work. Concerning this latter end only must we speak, since it alone is properly called the end.

But that end is: 1st, intermediate or ultimate, according as it is referred to another end, or the will rests in it; 2nd, positively or negatively ultimate, or, what is the same thing, simply and as to all things, or in a certain respect and in only some series ultimate, according as it is or is not intended with the exclusion of any other ultimate end whatsoever; 3rd, primary or secondary, according as it is intended first and through itself, or only consequently and with subordination to the primary. Again, the ultimate end can be intended explicitly or implicitly, according as the agent is moved by an end of this sort expressly or only virtually.

I say, 1st. A human act takes true morality from the end. The reason is that the freely intended end ultimately orders the act to this, that it be or not be conformable to right reason. But this ordering is diverse from that which the object and the other circumstances besides the end bestow upon the act. Thus it is conformable to right reason not only to give alms, but also to give them unto the remission of sins; just as likewise it is repugnant to right reason not only to steal, but also to steal in order to make oneself drunk.

I say, 2nd. He sins who acts on account of delight alone, which he does not refer even implicitly or virtually to a further end. The reason is that delight is only a means for carrying out actions more easily, better, and more constantly, but not the ultimate end of an action. Therefore he who acts on account of delight alone perverts the order of things instituted by the author of nature. The same is clear from proposition 8, condemned by Innocent XI, which sounds thus: "To eat and drink even to satiety on account of pleasure alone is not a sin, provided it does not harm health, because the natural appetite can licitly enjoy its acts." Moreover this proposition, as Father Viva observes, was condemned both on account of the clause even to satiety, and on account of the word alone. Cf. St. Thomas, 1-2, q. 4, art. 2. - Viva, on the cited proposition, nn. 5 and 6.

Yet it must be noted, 1st, that this disordering through itself is not grave, and therefore does not exceed venial sin; for he who behaves thus seeks, on the one hand, not a bad thing, but rather a good thing in an undue order, since, as St. Thomas says, Contra Gentiles, lib. 3, cap. 26, n. 6, "delight is good, and to be sought, if it follows a good operation"; and on the other hand he does not ordinarily place the ultimate end of his life in this undue mode of seeking, unless he is of the number of those concerning whom the Apostle says, Philipp. iii, 19: "whose God is the belly." Cf. St. Alphonsus, tract. on sins, n. 73; and tract. on matrimony, n. 912.

It must be noted, 2nd, that this disordering then only has place when someone so acts on account of delight alone that he positively excludes a further honest end. For he does not sin, not even venially, who expressly seeks the delight of food, for example, or of games, even if he does not actually think about a further end, provided only that in some way he virtually intends this further end; for instance, because he wills generally in all these things to behave honestly, and to admit nothing against the prescription of right reason, or because he is accustomed to assume them on account of some utility of soul or body, etc. For such a one must perhaps be said to act on account of delight, but not on account of delight alone. Cf. Viva, on prop. 8, condemned by Innocent XI, n. 6. - Salmantic., de matr., cap. 3, n. 33. - Baller., note (a), p. 26.

Question 1. Does any bad end corrupt the whole goodness of an act?

Response. An end gravely bad always wholly infects an act, however good the object may be in itself. For that act can be good from no part, since the agent, by sinning mortally, totally recedes from God. But an end lightly bad also corrupts the whole act if it is the total end, or at least the primary end, of the agent. For if it is total, it embraces the whole object, and therefore infects the whole, because, as St. Thomas says, "the agent with a bad end wills the good under the aspect of evil, and therefore, insofar as it is willed by him, it is evil." But if a double end is had, and the bad end is primary, it must be resolved in the same way, because that act is still chosen so that it may be an instrument for evil, and therefore it is substantially vitiated. Finally, if an end lightly bad is merely secondary, more probably it does not corrupt the whole act, and therefore this act will be partly good, partly bad. The reason is that that act retains its goodness from the object; but the bad end behaves only concomitantly, and does not flow into the very substance of the action. If it were otherwise, fewer good acts would be found. Cf. St. Thomas, 1-2, q. 19, art. 7. - Billuart, dissert. 4, art. 4.

Question 2. Are all our actions commanded to be referred to God by the words of the Apostle, I Cor. x, 31: "Do all things unto the glory of God"?

Response. Negatively, if there is question of an obligation of actually and explicitly referring all and each of our actions to the glory of God. The reason is not only that the aforesaid words can be taken, and in reality are taken by many Doctors, in a negative sense, insofar as they would mean: do nothing against God; but also because, if they are understood in an affirmative sense and at the same time concerning the actual reference of all our actions to God, they report a mere counsel and not a precept, which would be altogether impossible.

But if there is question of another reference besides actual and explicit reference, at times a sharp controversy has existed among theologians. Those who were called Augustinians, especially from among the Louvain theologians, said that an intention of this kind was necessary, which they called virtually explicit, and that it was commanded by the words of St. Paul, I Cor. x, 31, and Coloss. iii, 17. But indeed, while they thought thus, it could scarcely happen that they would not fall under the condemnation of proposition 25 of Michael Baius: "All the works of unbelievers are sins"; indeed they were to be accused of notable temerity, because, against the sense of the Church, they would condemn of sin very many works of innumerable faithful who operate without such an intention. For that reason their opinion was vehemently attacked by nearly all the other theologians. But these established: 1st, that through an act of charity elicited at due times, the obligation of directing all works universally to God as the ultimate end is sufficiently fulfilled; 2nd, that no law can be brought forth by which we are obliged to refer the same works to God in a more particular mode; 3rd, that, besides, a work honest from its object and vitiated by no depraved end and no bad circumstance, from itself, and therefore in the implicit intention of the one working, is referred by a certain necessary order to God, who is the source, rule, and end of the good and the honest.

"Who endures to praise all day? I suggest a remedy, from which you may praise God all day, if you wish. Whatever you do, do it well, and you have praised God. When you sing a hymn, you praise God: what does your tongue do, unless your conscience also praises? Have you ceased from singing a hymn, and do you go away to refresh yourself? Do not become drunk, and you have praised God. Do you go away to sleep? Do not rise to do evil, and you have praised God. Are you doing business? Do not commit fraud, and you have praised God. Do you cultivate a field? Do not stir up a lawsuit, and you have praised God. In the innocence of your works prepare yourself for praising God all day." St. Augustine, Enarratio in Ps. 34, serm. 11 (M. 36, c. 340). - Cf. St. Thomas, 2 dist. 40, q. 1, art. 5; 2 de Carit., art. 11, ad 2; and 2-2, q. 44, art. 4. - Perrone, de Caritate, cap. 5, art. 1, prop. 4. - Theol. Wirceb., de Act. hum., cap. 3, art. 3.

Question 3. Whether, just as there is not given an act in the individual indifferent in relation to natural honesty, so it can be said that no act is posited by a just man which is indifferent in relation to eternal life?

Response. Negatively. For in order that some act be meritorious of eternal life, it is required that it be supernatural; but it cannot be supernatural unless, besides the honesty of the work and the state of grace of the principle operating, there is also present some supernatural motive. This third condition being lacking, and no one will deny that it can be lacking, that work will be neither meritorious nor demeritorious. Besides, if some act were to be called meritorious of eternal life insofar as it proceeds from a just man, it would follow that every act which proceeds from a sinner is demeritorious, which can in no way be said. And this is the doctrine which is constantly and certainly handed down by St. Thomas in several places. Cf. Suarez, de Merito, lib. 12, cap. 7, nn. 2 and seq., and cap. 10, n. 15. - Mazzella, de Virt. Inf., prop. 55, nn. 1345 and seq.

I say, 1st. Any law induces a true obligation, at least to penalty; for in this law differs from counsel, that the subject cannot with impunity set the latter aside according to his own pleasure.

I say, 2nd. Any human law can of itself oblige in conscience before God. The reason is that superiors have been constituted by God with the power of commanding. Hence the Apostle says, Rom. xiii, 2: "He who resists power resists the ordinance of God. But those who resist acquire damnation for themselves."

I say, 3rd. Law obliges under grave or under light obligation according to the gravity of the matter or circumstances, or of the end specially intended by the superior. But an affirmative law obliges always, but not for always; a negative law, however, obliges both always and for always, that is, for each single moment.

I say, 4th. Positive divine law and human law generally do not oblige with a very grave inconvenience, or with grave harm, which is accidentally joined to the observation of the law. This is clear from natural and canonical right, from the practice of the Church, and from the consent of all.

I say, 5th. Laws, even invalidating and inhabilitating ones, do not urge in doubt of law; but in doubt of fact the Ordinary can dispense in them, provided that it concerns laws in which the Roman Pontiff is accustomed to dispense (Can. 15).

Question 1. Can a legislator command under light obligation in grave matter?

Response. Affirmatively, at least more probably, because the quantity of the obligation depends on his will, just as the law itself does. Yet he cannot oblige under grave obligation in light matter, because then proportion would be lacking, unless the matter, light indeed in itself, should become grave by reason of the end or circumstances. - Cf. St. Alphonsus, n. 143.

Question 2. What matter of law must be judged grave or light?

Response. This must be gathered, 1st, from the very words of the law; 2nd, from the gravity of the penalty inflicted; 3rd, from its interpretation; 4th, from its object, end, and circumstances. Thus, for example, it is grave for one celebrating Mass if he omits to pour into the chalice a few little drops of water; it will be light if on a day of fasting you chew an ounce of bread outside the refection. - Cf. St. Alphonsus, n. 144. - Lacroix, n. 663.

Question 3. Is the violation of law in a light matter grave from contempt?

Response. Affirmatively, if the contempt directly affects the legislator formally as such, because the very authority from which laws obtain force is contemned. But the sin will not be grave if the contempt regards only the matter as light in itself, or if someone transgresses the law from carelessness, anger, or another cause of this sort. - Cf. St. Alphonsus, n. 142.

Question 4. Does a law founded on presumption always oblige?

Response. Laws made for guarding against a general danger urge, even if in a particular case the danger is not present (Can. 21).

But a law founded on a presumption of fact does not oblige if the fact does not really subsist, because presumption yields to truth. - Cf. St. Alphonsus, nn. 100, 150.

The circumstances of sins are distinguished in various ways. For 1°. some change the species, namely those which by reason of themselves add to the act a malice distinct in species from that which the act has by reason of its object; thus the circumstance of a vow or of marriage adds to fornication the malice of sacrilege or adultery; 2°. others are only aggravating, but notably or lightly, according as, notably or lightly, within the same species they increase the malice of the sinful act by reason of duration, intensity, degree, mode, time, person, place, etc.; and finally 3°. others are diminishing, as those which render the malice of sin less, for example, defect of advertence, etc. - Consult what was said above, n. 26.

Titius and Caius, priests, sometimes converse about matters pertaining to morals. One day they enter into a conversation about the subject in which the morality of human acts resides. “I venerate,” says Caius, “the practice of the Church, for, as the Angelic Doctor says, ‘The custom of the Church has the greatest authority and is always to be emulated in all things, because even the doctrine of Catholic doctors has authority from the Church’ (II–II, question 10, article 12). Nevertheless, I have never been able to understand the necessity of confessing the external act of sin; rather, it seems to me that it ought to suffice to confess the internal act, because the malice of sin is from the will, and the species of the internal and external sin is the same: ‘Everyone who has looked at a woman to lust after her has already committed adultery with her in his heart.’” Titius admits that he has the same difficulty, increased by the fact that, according to several doctors, the effect of a sin does not have to be confessed, although it would seem that the effect, as at least voluntary in its cause, should be confessed rather than the external act. It is asked:

1. Is the morality of human acts in the internal act or in the external act?

2. How do the effect of a sin and the external act of sin differ?

3. How are the difficulties of Caius and Titius to be answered?

1. Is the morality of human acts in the internal or in the external action?

The morality of human acts, or their goodness and badness, is there where freedom resides, for it is only because an action is freely produced by the agent that it is imputable to him. Freedom, however, is formally and strictly only in the will, and an external act is only called free inasmuch as it proceeds from a free will.

2. How do the effect of a sin and the external act of sin differ ?

Three stages may be distinguished in a bad action, as, for example, murder. First of all there is the deliberate purpose to commit the crime; then the blow is struck; finally, perhaps after an interval of some days or weeks, death ensues. The internal and the external act, or the purpose and the blow, form together one complete human action, of which the formal part is the purpose and the blow is the material. From this complete human act we must distinguish its effect which follows after some time, as we here suppose for the sake of clearness. The effect is due to a free exercise of will, and is therefore imputable to the agent, but it is not a human act; it is the consequence of a human act.

3. What is to be said in answer to the difficulties of Caius and Titius? Caius does not see the reason why the external act should be confessed if the malice of sin is in the internal act of the will. Caius confounds two different things — sin and the malice of sin. The malice of a purpose to commit murder is the same as that of actual murder, but a purpose is an internal act and actual murder is a complete human act made up of the internal and of the external act of execution of the purpose. They are, then, two different human acts, and therefore they are two different sins; for sin is a bad human act, and so one must not be confessed for the other.

Titius has the same difficulty, and in his case it is increased because many theologians allow that the effect of a sin need not be confessed, although it is voluntary in its cause. In answer to this it may be said that the effect of a sin is not itself sin, and only sins need be confessed. On the contrary, an inordinate external act is a sin, for sin is any word, deed, or desire against the law of God. The effect of an action may follow while he who put its cause is asleep, and a man can not commit sin while he is asleep. The effect might even follow after the death of the person who caused it, and certainly a man can not commit sin when he is dead.¹

1 Cf. Lugo, De Poenitentia, disp. 16, sec. 9.

1. A granite boulder lying on an upland moor stands indifferently the August sun and the January frost, flood and drought. It neither blooms in spring, nor fades in autumn. It is all one to the boulder whether it remain in the picturesque solitude where the glacier dropped it, or be laid in the gutter of a busy street. It has no growth nor development: it is not a subject of evolution: there is no goal of perfection to which it is tending by dint of inward germinal capacity seconded by favourable environment. Therefore it does not matter what you do with it: all things come alike to that lump of rock.

2. But in a cranny or cleft of the same there is a little flower growing. You cannot do what you will with that flower. It has its exigencies and requirements. Had it a voice, it could say, what the stone never could: "I must have this or that: I must have light, I must have moisture, a certain heat, some soil to grow in." There is a course to be run by this flower and the plant that bears it, a development to be wrought out, a perfection to be achieved. For this end certain conditions are necessary, or helpful: certain others prejudicial, or altogether intolerable. In fact, that plant has a progressive nature, and therewith is a subject of good and evil. Good for that plant is what favours its natural progress, and evil is all that impedes it.

3. All organic natures are progressive: that is, each individual of them is apt to make a certain progress, under certain conditions, from birth to maturity. But man alone has his progress in any degree in his own hands, to make or to mar. Man alone, in the graphic phrase of Appius Claudius, is faber fortunæ suæ, "the shaper of his own destiny." Any other plant or animal, other than man, however miserable a specimen of its kind it finally prove to be, has always done the best for itself under the circumstances: it has attained the limit fixed for it by its primitive germinal capacity, as modified by the events of its subsequent environment. The miserable animal that howls under your window at night, is the finest dog that could possibly have come of his blood and breeding, nurture and education. But there is no man now on earth that has done all for himself that he might have done. We all fall short in many things of the perfection that is within our reach. Man therefore needs to stir himself, and to be energetic with a free, self-determined energy to come up to the standard of humanity. It is only his free acts that are considered by the moralist. Such is the definition of Moral Science, that it deals with human acts; acts, that is, whereof man is master to do or not to do. (c. i., nn. 1, 2.)

4. We have it, then, that a morally good act is an act that makes towards the progress of human nature in him who does it, and which is freely done. Similarly, a morally evil act is a bar to progress, or a diversion of it from the right line, being also a free act. Now, that act only can make for the progress of human nature, which befits and suits human nature, and suits it in its best and most distinctive characteristic. What is best in man, what characterises and makes man, what the old schoolmen called the form of man, is his reason. To be up to reason is to be up to the standard of humanity. Human progress is progress on the lines of reason. To make for that progress, and thereby to be morally good, an act must be done, not blindly, brutishly, sottishly, or on any impulse of passion, however beneficial in its effects, but deliberately, and in conscious accordance with the reasonable nature of the doer.

5. Whatever be man's end and highest good, he must go about to compass it reasonably. He must plan, and be systematic, and act on principle. For instance, if the public health be the highest good, the laws which govern it must be investigated, and their requirements carried out, without regard to sentiment. If pleasure be the good, we must be artists of pleasure. If, however, as has been seen (c. ii.) the highest good of man is the highest play of reason herself in a life of contemplation, to be prepared for, though it cannot be adequately and worthily lived, in this world, then it is through following reason, through subjecting appetite to reason by temperance, and the will to reason by justice, and reason herself by a "reasonable service" to God, that this end and consummation must be wrought out. Thus, in Plato's phrase (Rep., 589 B), the moral man acts so that "the inner man within him, the rational part of his nature, shall be strongest; while he watches with a husbandman's care over the many-headed beast of appetite, rearing and training the creature's tame heads, and not letting the wild ones grow; for this purpose making an ally of the lion, the irascible part of his nature, and caring for all the parts in common, making them friends to one another and to himself." In this way he will meet the true exigency of his nature as a whole, with due regard to the proper order and subordination of the parts. He who lives otherwise, acts in contradiction to his rational self. (c. v., s. iii., n. 3, p. 74).

6. The result of the above reasoning, if result it has, should be to explain and justify the Stoic rule, naturae convenienter vivere, to live according to nature. But some one will say: "That is the very ideal of wickedness: all good in man comes of overcoming nature, and doing violence to natural cravings: live according to nature, and you will go straight to the devil." I answer: "Live according to a part of your nature, and that the baser and lower, though also the more impetuous and clamorous part, and you will certainly go where you say: but live up to the whole of your nature, as explained in the last paragraph, and you will be a man indeed, and will reach the goal of human happiness." But again it may be objected, that our very reason, to which the rest of our nature is naturally subordinate, frequently prompts us to do amiss. The objection is a just one, in so far as it goes upon a repudiation of the old Platonic position, that all moral evil comes of the body, wherein the soul is imprisoned, and of the desires which the body fastens upon the soul. Were that so, all sins would be sins of sensuality. But there are spiritual sins, not prompted by any lust or weakness of the body, as pride and mutiny, self-opinionatedness, rejection of Divine revelation. The objection turns on sins such as these. The answer is, that spiritual sins do not arise from any exigency of reason, but from a deficiency of reason; not from that faculty calling upon us, as we are reasonable men, to take a certain course, in accordance with a just and full view of the facts of the case, but from reason failing to look facts fully in the face, and considering only some of them to the neglect of others, the consideration of which would alter the decision. Thus a certain proud creature mentioned in Scripture thought of the magnificence of the throne above the stars of God, on the mountain of the covenant, on the sides of the north: he did not think how such a pre-eminence would become him as a creature. He had in view a rational good certainly, but not a rational good for him. Partial reason, like a little knowledge, is a dangerous thing.

7. As it is not in the power of God to bring it about, that the angles of a triangle taken together shall amount to anything else than two right angles, so it is not within the compass of Divine omnipotence to create a man for whom it shall be a good and proper thing, and befitting his nature, to blaspheme, to perjure himself, to abandon himself recklessly to lust, or anger, or any other passion. God need not have created man at all, but He could not have created him with other than human exigencies. The reason is, because God can only create upon the pattern of His own essence, which is imitable, outside of God, in certain definite lines of possibility. These possibilities, founded upon the Divine essence and discerned by the Divine intelligence, are the Archetype Ideas, among which the Divine will has to choose, when it proceeds to create. The denial of this doctrine in the Nominalist and Cartesian Schools, and their reference to the arbitrary will of God of the eternal, immutable, and absolutely necessary relations of possible things, is the subversion of all science and philosophy.

8. Still less are moral distinctions between good and evil to be set down to the law of the State, or the fashion of society. Human convention can no more constitute moral good than it can physical good, or mathematical or logical truth. It is only in cases where two or more courses are tolerable, and one of them needs to be chosen and adhered to for the sake of social order, that human authority steps in to elect and prescribe one of those ways of action, and brand the others as illegitimate, which would otherwise be lawful. This is called the making of a positive law.

Readings.—St. Thos., 1a 2æ, q. 18, art. 5, in corp.; 1a 2æ, q. 71, art. 2; Plato, Rep., 588 B to end of bk. ix.; Ar., Eth., IX., iv., nn. 4-10; Suarez, De Legibus, II., vi., nn. 4, 11; Cicero, De Legibus, i., cc. 15-17.

36. Having discussed in the preceding chapter the end of human acts, we shall next proceed to study their nature. With this purpose we shall examine: 1. The essential difference between morally good and morally bad acts, or the essence of morality; 2. The determinants of morality in any given action; 3. Accountability for moral acts; 4. Circumstances that lessen accountability; 5. The passions as influencing accountability; 6. Habits as facilitating moral acts.

We need not go beyond the words of Our Lord in the Sermon on the Mount (Matt. vi. 22; vii. 17), for a proof of the important bearing of our intention | on the morality of our actions. In the sight of God the aim, the intention, with which we perform our actions, is of more importance than what we do. This is a commonplace of theology and of asceticism, and it is admitted by all who profess to guide their conduct by the maxims of the Gospel. But though it be admitted on all hands that the intention is the principal part of our deliberate actions, there is considerable difference of opinion among theologians on several points in the general doctrine of intention. Theologians do not usually discuss these points together, but it may be worth while to consider them together as forming a portion of one body of doctrine, every part of which throws light on every other part. I propose, then, to take St. Thomas principally for my guide, and bring together for the purposes of comparison and mutual illustration a few points in the doctrine of intention.

Intention is nothing more than an efficacious wish or desire of an object; it is a movement of the will towards an end, with reference to the means which must be taken in order to attain that end.

The ends of our intentions are manifold and various as are human nature and human actions, but there is one which is common to all men, and in regard to which we are not free. Man necessarily desires happiness, and if happiness be taken in the abstract, it forms the object of all our endeavors. The will is attracted only by what seems good; it is moved only by what seems likely to contribute to our well-being; in every action, then, we seek for happiness, and cannot do otherwise. If we found ourselves in presence of an object which was wholly good, we could not but love and desire it; and so when the blessed find themselves face to face with God, the infinite source of all goodness and beauty, they are necessarily ravished with love of Him; they cannot but love Him.

However, as no other object but God is wholly good, and as in this world we cannot see Him face to face, and the attainment of the possession of God is accompanied by labor and difficulty, so while we live on earth, though we necessarily seek happiness, yet we do not seek it necessarily in any one object; in other words, we are free to determine the end of our intentions according to our choice.

If we accept the teaching of St. Thomas, we are under a moral obligation to direct all our actions to the honor and glory of God.¹

¹ St. Thomas, Sum. I.-II., q. 100, a. 10 ad 2.

In this sense he interprets the words of St. Paul.² However, this must not be understood as imposing on us an obligation to form ‘an actual intention of doing our every action for God. This would be requiring more than man’s weakness can bear. It will be sufficient if we refer every action to God virtually. St. Thomas explains his mind very fully and clearly on this point in various places of his works. Thus in De Caritate, a. 11, ad 2, he says:

² I Cor. x. 31.

To the second it must be said that it is not possible in this life actually to refer all things to God, just as it is not possible always to think about God, for this belongs to the perfection of the heavenly homeland; but that all things be referred virtually to God belongs to the perfection of charity to which all are bound. To make this evident, it must be considered that, just as in efficient causes the power of the first cause remains in all subsequent causes, so also the intention of the principal end remains virtually in all secondary ends. Hence whoever actually intends some secondary end virtually intends the principal end; thus, while a physician actually gathers herbs, he intends to prepare a potion, perhaps thinking nothing about health; nevertheless he virtually intends the health for which he gives the potion. Thus, therefore, when someone orders himself to God as to his end, in all the things which he does for his own sake there remains virtually the intention of the last end, which is God; hence he can merit in all things, if he has charity. Therefore it is in this way that the Apostle commands all things to be referred to the glory of God.

In the next paragraph St. Thomas distinguishes a virtual from an habitual intention of pleasing God:

To the third it must be said that it is one thing habitually to refer to God and another virtually. For even one who does nothing and actually intends nothing, such as one sleeping, habitually refers to God; but virtually to refer something to God belongs to an agent acting for an end ordered to God. Hence habitually to refer to God does not fall under a precept; but virtually to refer all things to God falls under the precept of charity, since this is nothing other than to have God as the last end.

It is then necessary and sufficient, according to St. Thomas, to refer all our actions to God virtually. What he means by virtually is clear enough from the passages just quoted, but he explains his meaning more fully and more clearly in other places, especially in his commentary on the Second Book of the Sentences, Dist. xl., q. 1, a. 5. There we read the following passages:

To the sixth it must be said that a wholly habitual ordering of an act to God does not suffice, because no one merits from what is in habit, but from what he actually does. Yet it is not necessary that the actual intention ordering to the last end always be joined to every action which is directed to some proximate end; rather, it suffices that at some time all those ends be actually referred to the last end, as happens when someone resolves to direct his whole self to the love of God: for then whatever he orders to himself will be ordered to God. And if it is asked when it is necessary to refer an act to the last end, this is nothing other than to ask when it is necessary for the habit of charity to go forth into act; because whenever the habit of charity goes forth into act, the whole man is ordered to the last end, and consequently all those things which are ordered to him as goods for him.

To the third it must be said that not only an act of charity is meritorious, but also acts of the other virtues insofar as they are informed by grace; although they cannot be meritorious except insofar as they are brought back to the end of charity. It is not necessary, however, that acts always be brought back to that end; rather, for the efficacy of meriting it suffices that they be actually brought back to the ends of the other virtues. For one who intends to preserve chastity, even if he thinks nothing about charity, certainly merits if he has grace. Now every act tending to some good, unless it tends to it inordinately, has as its end the good of some virtue, because the virtues sufficiently perfect a person concerning all things which can be human goods.

It is clear, then, that St. Thomas teaches that it is of obligation to refer all our actions to God, our last end. However, this obligation is sufficiently fulfilled by one who acts from any motive that is not bad; for in thus acting he intends something which he sees to be good, as every human act is either good or bad, according to St. Thomas. But in directing his intention to something that is good, he is necessarily, though only virtually, not actually, directing his intention to God, his last end; for the very notion of moral goodness implies conformity to man’s last end.

St. Thomas further teaches that in him who is in the grace of God, in him who fulfils all the obligations which bind him under pain of grave sin, every act that is ethically good is also meritorious of life eternal. For among our other obligations there is the positive precept of charity, by which we are bound at times to think of God, and elicit an act of love towards Him. By this act of charity we have referred ourselves and all our actions to God, and so unless it be recalled by one that is contrary to it, or by mortal sin, which destroys the bond of friendship between God and the soul, it continues to exert its influence on our subsequent actions, and informs them with the spirit of charity. It thus makes them supernatural and meritorious of a crown of glory in heaven.

The precept of charity obliges us to love God with all our heart, mind, and strength, but our condition here on earth does not permit us to be always engaged in actually thinking of God and forming acts of love towards Him. The limitations of our nature and the necessities of life, as a rule, only permit us to observe this greatest of all commandments by never doing anything directly contrary to it, and by fulfilling it virtually, that is, by virtually directing our every action towards God in the sense explained by St. Thomas. However we are bound at all events occasionally to think of God explicitly, and to give Him the service of our explicit love and affection. This St. Thomas teaches, as we have already seen, and it is certain doctrine, approved and enforced by the Church. Nevertheless, it seems impossible to say when and how often we are bound under pain of sin to form explicit acts of the love of God. St. Thomas³ teaches that at least when a man begins to have the use of reason he then begins to think about his last end, and that he is then bound under pain of mortal sin to refer his whole being and all his actions to God. If he do this, he thereby obtains the sanctifying grace of God if he was still in original sin; if he fail to do it he commits his first sin, so that one who is still in original sin cannot commit venial sin before he has committed mortal sin.

³ Sum. I.-II., q. 89, a. 6.

Although this opinion of St. Thomas has always had its supporters, especially among his followers, yet it does not seem ever to have won the common assent of theologians. The opinion seems not sufficiently grounded in revelation, reason, or experience. At some time, indeed, after coming to the use of reason, and after learning his obligations towards God, his Creator and Lord, every man is bound to give himself to the service of God by an act of love; but other theologians think that the particular time when this obligation must be fulfilled under pain of grave sin cannot be so exactly determined as St. Thomas lays down. All are agreed that we must frequently during our lives form explicit acts of the love of God, but it seems impossible to determine more accurately at what intervals this obligation must be fulfilled under pain of sin.

Intimately connected with the obligation of referring our actions to our last end is the question concerning the influence of our intention on the moral quality of our actions. Some early Christian writers misled by a false interpretation of the words of Our Lord in the Sermon on the Mount, taught that the intention with which we perform our actions is everything, the actions themselves are of no moral quality. Thus the unknown author of the Opus imperfectum on St. Matthew, generally published with the works of St. Chrysostom, says:

Therefore a servant of God cannot do evil; and if it sometimes seems to you that he has acted badly, consider carefully his evil itself, and you will find him inwardly good. For from a good purpose even what seems evil is good, because a good purpose excuses an evil deed; but an evil deed does not condemn a good purpose.

Cassian, too, in his Collationes writes:

For God is not only the examiner and judge of our words and deeds, but also the examiner of our purpose and determination.

4 Hom. xix.

If He sees anything done or promised by anyone for the sake of eternal salvation and with a view to divine contemplation, although it may seem harsh and unjust to men, nevertheless He, looking into the inward piety of the heart, judges not the sound of words but the resolve of the will, because the end of the deed and the disposition of the doer must be considered; by reason of this some, as was said above, could even be justified through a lie, and others through an assertion of truth could incur the sin of eternal death.

Peter Lombard had perhaps these and other authors in mind when he wrote in the Second Book of the Sentences:

But it is asked whether all the works of a man are good or bad from their effect and end. Some think that they are, who say that all acts are indifferent, so that they are neither good nor bad in themselves; but every act is good from a good intention and bad from a bad one.

As it is clear from these extracts, the doctrine that the end justifies the means had its supporters in very early times among Christian writers; it was indignantly and triumphantly refuted by the great St. Augustine, whom St. Thomas and orthodox teachers in the Church have always followed on this point.

In order to have a clear notion of what influence the intention has on the morality of an action, it may be worth while briefly to summarize St. Thomas’s doctrine on the point.

He first of all examines the human act in its totality,’ and teaches that it derives its moral quality from the object, the end, and the circumstances. The object is that about which the human faculty is engaged when the action is produced, or it is that which the faculty produces or does; it is the substance of the action considered in the abstract, and apart from its circumstances. Thus, in the act of theft, the object is the taking away of something which belongs to another, and if this be considered in relation to right reason, it is obvious that it is an act which is contrary to it; or theft is morally wrong because the object of the action is against right reason, which is the rule of human actions.

5 Collat. xvii., c. 17.

6 Dist. xl.

7 Sum. I-IL, q. 18.

The end, on which the morality of an action also depends, is the motive of the action, the reason why it is done. It is obvious from what has been said above that the moral quality of an act depends on its motive or on the intention with which it is done; it is bad to steal, it is worse to steal in order to be able to commit adultery, according to the well-worn illustration.

Finally, the circumstances which accompany an action give it its moral quality, as well as the object and the end. It is wrong to steal, but to steal the Church plate, or the pittance on which a poor man depends for the support of himself and his family is worse.’ To play in the field at the proper time is right, to play in church is wrong. After laying down these principles about the morality of human acts in general, St. Thomas considers in detail the morality of the two chief component parts of a complete and consummated act, the interior act of the will and the exterior act. When a theft is committed, the thief first of all determines to commit the crime, and then sets about its execution. The crime morally considered is one completed human action, but physically it is composed of many, both interior and exterior acts. The will determines upon the theft, and then sets the external faculties in action to accomplish it. We are chiefly concerned with the interior act of the will.

The will is set in motion by some object or end which it wishes to attain. Thus one may come to know of a case of distress, and natural good feeling prompts the desire to relieve it. The relieving of distress in the case is the object towards which the will tends, and which causes the will to form the intention of giving relief. This object, therefore, is the cause of the action of the will, it is the term from which the action starts, and it is the goal towards which the action is directed. And as all motion is specified by the term to which it is directed, so the motion of the will, which we call intention, receives its moral quality from the object or aim to which it tends. So the intention to relieve distress is an act of virtue, and an intention to do an injury is vicious. In other words, the morality of the intention depends upon the object or end in view.

When the will has formed the intention of relieving the case of distress, the next step is to discover the means. If the means are not at hand, it is necessary to work to obtain them, the work undertaken for so charitable a purpose will be colored by the object for which it is undertaken, and itself become an act of charity. The means are desired for the sake of the end, they become the object of the will because of their connection with the end, they therefore put on the moral quality of the end. In the same way, if the end be bad, means, though good in themselves, taken with a view to attain such an end, become corrupted and bad. And so to work in order to obtain money to indulge in debauchery is itself wrong and wicked.

And here we touch upon the celebrated question whether a good end justifies wrongful means. In the sphere of politics there is too much reason to suppose that the view that the end does justify the means is largely acted upon by statesmen of all parties and nationalities. Machiavelli, who has given his name to the theory, lays down the principle with the utmost candor:

A prince, therefore, is not obliged to have all the forementioned good qualities in reality, but it is necessary he have them in appearance; nay, I will be bold to affirm, that having them actually, and employing them upon all occasions, they are extremely prejudicial, whereas having them only in appearance, they turn to better account; it is honorable to seem mild, and merciful, and courteous, and religious, and sincere, and indeed to be so, provided your mind be so rectified and prepared that you can act quite contrary upon occasion. And this must be premised, that a prince, especially if he come but lately to the throne, cannot observe all those things exactly which make men be esteemed virtuous, being oftentimes necessitated for the preservation of his State to do things inhumane, uncharitable, and irreligious; and therefore it is convenient his mind be at his command, and flexible to all the puffs and variations of his fortune: Not forbearing to be good, whilst it is in his choice, but knowing how to be evil when there is a necessity. . . . Let a prince therefore do what he can to preserve his life, and continue his supremacy, the means which he uses shall be thought honorable, and be commended by everybody, because the people are always taken with the appearance, and event of things, and the greatest part of the world consists of the people: those few who are wise, taking place when the multitude has nothing else to rely upon.⁸

⁸ The Prince, c. 18.

More briefly, but perhaps still more to the point, he says in his Discourses on Livy:

And this ought to be considered and observed by every man whose office it is to advise for the good of his country; for where the safety of that is in question no other consideration ought to be coincident, as whether the way be just or unjust, merciful or cruel, honorable or dishonorable, but postponing all other respects, you are to do that which shall procure the safety of your country, and preservation of its liberty.⁹

⁹ Book III., c. 41.

It is by no means an uncommon thing to meet with an almost equally explicit approval of the doctrine that the end justifies the means in the daily press and in modern periodical literature. Such approvals are specially frequent in more or less appreciative accounts of the careers of such men as Bismarck and Rhodes. But Machiavellianism is not confined to politicians, nor of course did unscrupulousness first appear in the days of the crafty Florentine. As we have already seen there are traces of the doctrine that the end justifies the means in several writers of the early ages of the Church.

However, with a few obscure exceptions, theologians have constantly rejected the view. They point out with St. Thomas that an action is not morally good merely because the end or intention is good; it must be good in all particulars; Bonum ex integra causa, malum ex quocumque defectu, was the axiom applied in the case. And so if a man steals in order to relieve a case of distress, he does wrong though his intention be never so praiseworthy. It is wrong to steal, and it remains wrong though the theft be committed with a good intention, and the otherwise good action of relieving distress is vitiated by the wrongful means employed to do it, for the will to relieve distress by robbery is a vicious will. As the Society of Jesus is constantly being attacked on this point, it may not be out of place to quote the words in which Vasquez, one of its greatest divines, sums up the doctrine which it has always taught: