Morality of the External Act

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.

Morality of the External Act.—Having considered the morality of the internal act, we shall now turn to the external act (such as giving an alms, stealing, and the like), and inquire whether it has a morality of its own distinct from that of the internal act (see 56 Sqq.).

If the external act be considered precisely as it is the object, or effect, of the internal act of the will, it does not add any essential morality to the internal act, since, having no freedom of its own, it is moral only in so far as it proceeds from the will. In this sense, then, he who gives an alms to the poor, and he who would give it if he could, are equal in goodness of will; and he who wishes to defraud, and he who actually defrauds, are equal in malice of will.

If the external act be considered precisely as it is the term towards which the internal act tends, it completes the essential morality of the internal act by extending and communicating it without. For, though this external act cannot add a distinct morality of its own, it does carry the internal morality to its natural conclusion and diffuses its good or evil. In this sense, he who actually gives an alms is more deserving than he who really desires to give but is unable; and he who really defrauds is more reprehensible than he who wishes to defraud but cannot.

If the external act be considered precisely as something added to the internal act, it can increase the accidental morality of the internal act by the reaction of the external circumstances on the will. This can happen in such ways as the following: (a) the performance of the external act, being pleasurable or difficult, increases or decreases the intensity of the will to act; (b) the performance of the external act, since it requires more time than the internal act, prolongs the latter; (c) the external act by reason of repetition may also increase the strength of the internal act.

Furthermore, it is through the external act that edification or scandal is given, that penalties or rewards for overt action are deserved, etc. Examples: Titus bears murderous hatred towards Balbus, but keeps it concealed. Caius also hates Balbus, and first calumniates him, thus giving scandal, and then kills him, thus making himself liable before the law.

"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.

27. Whether morality, or moral goodness or malice, is found only in the interior act of the will, or also in the exterior act? — In an exterior act, a twofold moral goodness or malice can be distinguished. For 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 from the circumstances by which it is objectively affected, according to the right order of reason. Goodness or malice of this sort, which the exterior act has according to 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 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. Secondly, moral goodness or malice can be considered in the exterior act in order to the end, according as this exterior act is subject to the interior act of the will. For the end is the proper object of the will. And thus the character of good or evil which the exterior act has from order to the end is found prior in the act of the will, and from it is derived to the exterior act. Likewise, in so far as the exterior act consists in the execution of the work, it is an effect of the will and follows the will. The will then is compared to the exterior act as an efficient cause; whence the moral goodness or malice of the act of the will is the form of the exterior act as existing in the acting cause. St. Thomas, 1. 2. q. 20. a. 1. Therefore “the goodness of the end from the will redounds into the exterior act, and the goodness of the matter and circumstances redounds into the act of the will.” St. Thomas, 1. 2. q. 20. a. 3.

28. Therefore the moral goodness or malice of the exterior act can be considered in the order of intention, as merely willed, as an object, and in the order of execution, insofar as the aforesaid act is commanded by the will, as execution or effect. In the first way, the goodness or malice of the exterior act gives moral goodness or malice to the interior act of the will, as the object specifying it. Therefore the goodness and malice which is in that act objectively is transferred into the act formally, so that the object has nothing objectively which is not in the act formally. Therefore the exterior act as object does not have any goodness or malice distinct from the goodness or malice of the interior act, since it is the same in both, with this difference, that it is objectively in the exterior act as in the object and motive of the will, and formally in the interior act as in the subject. In the second way, the exterior act has its moral goodness or malice from the act of the will, from which it has that it is voluntary and human. The exterior act, precisely as the execution or effect of the interior act, has no intrinsic moral goodness or malice, but is good or evil extrinsically, only denominatively from the goodness or malice of the interior act. “As from the healthy which is in the animal, healthy is derived to medicine and urine....; in this way from the goodness of the will is derived the goodness of the exterior act.” St. Thomas, 1. 2. q. 20. a. 3 ad 3. The reason is manifest, because formal morality is placed in a foreknown and freely willed conformity with the end and law, or with the rule of morals; and this free volition of the will is only in the interior act of the will itself.

29. Now the exterior act and the interior act of the will, as they are considered in the genus of morals, are one human act, St. Thomas, q. 20. a. 3. If the human act is thus considered adequately, the formal moral goodness or malice of the human act is intrinsically only in the interior act of the will, but in exterior acts only by a merely extrinsic denomination. For the morality of a human act, considered formally, is not found except in a free act, and freedom formally is only in the will. Likewise formal moral goodness is from order to the end. “But since the end is the proper object of the will, it is manifest that this character of good or evil which the exterior act has from order to the end is found first in the act of the will, and from it is derived into the exterior act.” St. Thomas, q. 20. a. 1. Whence it is clear that in the exterior act moral goodness of this sort, which is according to order to the end, depends entirely on the will. St. Thomas, ibid. 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; yet it is not 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.” St. Thomas, in the cited place, a. 4 ad 2. It is confirmed: “For however much the exterior act may seem good of itself and conformable to reason, if nevertheless it is commanded by an evil internal act, or by a depraved intention and choice, it is not good insofar as it is a human act. Therefore it is a sign that in the account of a human act it is good only by denomination from the interior act. The argument is similar because the exterior act, taken precisely and in itself, does not add formal moral goodness to man, nor does it make him more virtuous; for if we understand someone, thinking that he can perform an exterior act of virtue, to have an efficacious will of exercising such an act, he is right and virtuous, whether he can truly perform it or cannot, because virtue does not depend on a faculty, which can be lacking to us against our will, 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, D. 10, S. 1; Becanus, Tr. 1, c. 6.

30. Hence another question arises: whether the external act in some way adds morality to the internal act. — “First it must be said that the exterior act of itself does not bring an increase of goodness or malice, other things being equal, in the interior act: thus St. Thomas, 1. 2. q. 20. a. 4..... because the exterior act does not have goodness distinct from the interior act, and necessarily follows from it, if it is in our power; but if it is not in our power, it does not lessen the goodness of the will.... Secondly, it must be said that external action is sometimes necessary for the goodness of the will, or for such goodness; this also is what St. Thomas intends in that a. 4. For when it is in man’s power to execute an external action, he cannot have a perfect interior will unless he execute the exterior action, because the exterior act is the term and end of the interior act, and because an absolutely perfect will is one that works when it can.... Thirdly, it must be said that accidentally the exterior act can increase goodness or malice simply. Thus St. Thomas in the place cited above, and it is easily clear. For 1. on account of the exterior act a man often lasts and perseveres more in the interior act, indeed often also 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 which way 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 affection of satisfaction for the temporal punishment due for sin, because satisfaction is not taken only from goodness, but chiefly from the penality of the act; but the exterior act of itself brings its proper punishment and pain. Finally it must be added that exterior acts are necessary for certain effects of grace, which are conferred either ex opere operato or from 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, conversely, evil external acts, or even their effects, are necessary for incurring certain punishments or censures which are not incurred through the interior act alone.” Suarez, D. 10, S. 2; Becanus, in the cited place. Hence the exterior act does not add goodness or malice to the interior act, but, as it were, extends and consummates it, or rather shows the perfection of the interior act. The matter concerns, as is clear, an interior act efficacious of itself. For if the interior act is inefficacious of itself, as, for example, to will to perform all possible good or all possible evil, one does not contract the same goodness or malice as if he were to carry out every possible good or evil. Cf. Commentary 4, nn. 7, 8.

25. • YOU WILL ASK 2. Whether the external act adds morality to the internal act?

I answer 1. Per se the external act adds no morality to the internal act, and thus neither increases nor diminishes the substantial merit or demerit of the internal act. - The reason is that all morality is taken from the intrinsic, or from the will; nor does the external act have any imputability unto merit or demerit proper to itself and distinct from the imputability of the internal act. Wherefore the external act is not formally, but only materially, honest or dishonest.

It is also clear from sacred Scripture, which often reckons the will for the deed itself. Thus in Gen. 22 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 in Matt. 5 Christ himself said: He who shall look upon a woman to lust after her has already committed adultery with her in his heart. - Nor does the obligation of declaring the external act in confession stand in the way; for it must be declared because it constitutes one and the same act with the internal act, as will be said where the integrity of confession is treated.

I answer 2. Nevertheless per accidens the external act for the most part increases morality, because very often it is the occasion why the goodness or malice of the internal act is increased, for example, that it be 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 one, or on account of the longer delay of time necessary in completing the external work.

Besides, often in the external work there is scandal or harm to the neighbor, or on the contrary good edification, from which the morality of the internal act is also increased. Thus commonly the Theologians. Compare Suarez, On the Goodness of Human Acts, disp. X, sect. 1.

132. Preliminary Note. External acts are taken here in the broader sense; they are not only those which are completed by external organs, as walking, speaking, etc., but also all acts commanded by the will, whether they are of the intellect, or of the sensitive appetite, or of the members of the body:¹²⁹ "We do not ask whether the exterior act is good or evil; we suppose as certain that it is so; for by this very fact, that it is voluntary, conforming or difforming to reason, it has everything which is required that it be good or evil. Moreover eight precepts of the Decalogue concern external acts. - But we ask whether the exterior act is good or evil by a formal goodness or malice distinct from the goodness or malice of the interior act, which it superadds to it. And the question concerns the exterior act as it is the mere execution of the interior. For if some goodness were accidentally and from without annexed to the exterior act, for example, special grace to the exterior reception of the sacraments, or the grace of an indulgence to almsgiving or exterior prayer, it is certain that the exterior act would add this accidental goodness to the interior act." Thus Billuart, l. c. - The state of the question becomes still clearer by an example. Peter wishes to give one hundred francs in alms and truly gives them; another time the same Peter wishes to give the same sum in alms, but by an unforeseen event a thief carried off the one hundred francs destined for alms, so that Peter now cannot execute his purpose. It is asked whether Peter in the first case placed an act of greater moral goodness than in the second, in which he truly did not complete the purpose externally.

¹²⁹ Cf. Cajetan, Comm. in I-II, q. 20, a. 1, who treats this question very subtly. Billuart, l. c. a. 8, however, thinks that the external act is only the act of external members.

133. Principle. The external act by itself does not increase the morality of the internal act, but only sometimes by accident. Thus St. Thomas,¹³¹ all Thomists, St. Alphonsus,¹³² and other theologians most commonly, against Scotus¹³³ and many Scotists.¹³⁴

The first part is proved. 1. From Scripture, in which everywhere perfected volition is no less praised or rebuked, rewarded or punished, than if it had been completed in work. For example, Abraham is equally rewarded for the will of sacrifice as if he had truly immolated his son. And therefore the angel says to him: "Because thou hast done this thing, and hast not spared thy only-begotten son for my sake, I will bless thee."¹³⁵ Christ¹³⁶ says: "Every one who shall look on a woman to lust after her, hath already committed adultery with her in his heart." Concerning these words St. Chrysostom¹³⁷ says: "It is not the work, but the will, which is rewarded, whether good in good things or evil in evil things; works, however, are testimonies of the will."

2. From reason. a) What does not have its own proper and distinct liberty also does not have its own proper and distinct morality, since liberty is the first condition of all morality. But the external act does not have its own proper and distinct liberty, but as much as it has, it has entirely from the interior act of the will, of which it is the complement. Therefore the external act, if it is considered separately, has no morality, and consequently by itself is able neither to increase nor to diminish the morality of the interior act from which it proceeds. But the external act has the same morality numerically which the internal act of the will has. - b) It is then proved from an inconvenience: If the exterior act added a distinct morality, it would follow that someone could deprive another, against that other's will, of moral goodness; for someone can impede another, against that other's will, from the external act, as if a thief carried off money destined for alms, or if he detained by force one going to church. But these things seem absurd. Therefore the external act by itself does not increase the morality of the internal act,¹³⁸ and it is not moral except by a certain analogy or denomination taken from the internal act. Wherefore St. Thomas¹³⁹ says: "As from the healthy which is in the body of an animal, healthy is derived to medicine and urine; nor is the health of medicine and urine other than the health of the animal, which the medicine causes and the urine signifies. And in this way from the goodness of the will is derived the goodness of the exterior act and conversely, namely, according to the order of one to the other."

The second part is proved. By accident morality is increased through the external act, and indeed:

a) By reason of greater intensity, insofar as the will is borne toward the object with greater vehemence; for example, fornication desired through an internal act is not usually accustomed to procure disordered pleasure so intensely as fornication actually perpetrated.

b) By reason of greater duration, insofar as the execution of the work is accustomed to require a greater duration of deliberate volition than a simple internal act; for example, someone wishes devoutly to say the whole Rosary; another truly devoutly says the whole Rosary. The volition of the second man lasts longer than the simple internal act of the first man.

c) By reason of multiplication, because the act of volition is often repeated in external execution.

"Moreover, through an external act the senses are more dulled, and the exterior powers are rendered more prone to evil; scandals are brought forth; sometimes excommunication is incurred, or irregularity, or an obligation to restitution, which are not incurred through an interior act."¹⁴⁰

¹³¹ S. theol. I-II, q. 20, a. 4, and 2, dist. 40, q. 1, a. 3.

¹³² Theol. mor. l. 5, tract. praeamb., n. 40.

¹³³ 2, dist. 42, q. 4, n. 2, and Quodlib. q. 18, n. 12.

¹³⁴ Elbel-Bierbaum (l. c. n. 70) says: "Most probably [the external act] superadds morality. Thus holds Scotus, whom the Scotists follow, with few exceptions."

¹³⁵ Gen. 22:16 sq.

¹³⁶ Matt. 5:28.

¹³⁷ Hom. 19 in Matth. (Migne, Patr. graec. 57, 274).

¹³⁸ Cf. Billuart, De act. hum. diss. 4, a. 8, where this matter is abundantly treated and the objections of the Scotists are perfectly solved.

¹³⁹ S. theol. I-II, q. 20, a. 3 ad 3.

¹⁴⁰ Thus St. Alphonsus, Theol. mor. l. 5, tract. praeamb., n. 40.

134. Scholion. On Declaring the External Act in Confession. Although the external act by itself does not change the morality of the interior act, nevertheless it must always be declared in confession whether the sin was done only internally or also externally, because otherwise the confessor cannot sufficiently judge concerning the condition and obligation of the penitent. For example, one man with vehement desire wishes to steal one hundred francs; another actually steals one hundred francs. Certainly the sin of each thief is equal (other things being equal), but the confessor is bound to lead the second penitent to restitution of the thing taken away, while on the contrary he is bound only to deter the first from his depraved desire. More broadly on this matter will be treated in the chapter on the integrity of confession.

135. The event or effect foreseen and in some way intended increases the goodness or malice of the act, whether it follows by itself or by accident. The reason is obvious. For the better or worse is the act, the better or worse is the will producing this act. But the will of him who, foreseeing and intending good or evil events that will follow from his work, does it, is better or worse than if he foresaw and intended none of these things. Therefore the following event, foreseen and intended in some way, increases the morality of the act.¹⁴¹ - It is by no means required that the event or effect always be directly intended, but it suffices that it be indirectly intended, that is, that it could and ought to have been foreseen. Wherefore, for example, a man who, although he could and ought to have foreseen scandal that would arise from his lascivious speeches, nevertheless makes such speeches, incurs not only the guilt of lascivious speech, but also of caused scandal.

But if the event (especially an evil one) is indeed foreseen, but not intended, then the rules given above n. 57 sqq. for the indirectly voluntary must be applied.

¹⁴¹ Cf. S. theol. I-II, q. 20, a. 5, and Billuart, l. c. a. 9.

St. Thomas, I-II, q. 20, a. 1-4 and 6; q. 19, a. 8.

168. Principle I. The external act can have a twofold goodness and malice, namely:

1. one subjective and formal, which it has immediately from the end of the agent; and this is prior in the internal act of the will, and from it is derived into the exterior act, and depends wholly upon the will.

2. Another objective and material, which it has immediately from the due object and due circumstances; and this is more from reason than from the will, since on the contrary the goodness of the will depends upon it according as the will is borne toward it as toward an object. Hence in the ordination of reason and intention, objective goodness is prior to the goodness of the will; but in the execution of the work the goodness of the will is prior (a. 1 and 2). Hence sometimes the interior and exterior act are in the same species of goodness or malice; sometimes in a diverse species, and then each, just as the completed act itself composed of both, contracts a double species (a. 3), as was said in n. 155.

Therefore, in order that the external act be simply good, formal goodness from the intention of the end and from the will is not sufficient, but there also can be no defect in the external act on the part of the object and circumstances: for good is from an integral cause, evil from any defect whatever (a. 2).

169. Principle II. The external act per se, that is, insofar as it is the mere execution of an efficacious internal act, does not superadd to it formal and simply so-called goodness or malice (a. 4).

It is proved: a) from Scripture, which reckons the sincere will as the deed, Gen. XXII, 16; Mt. V, 28.

b) By reason: liberty is the foundation of morality; hence goodness and malice formally are only where there is liberty. But the interior act of the will alone is of itself intrinsically and formally free; the exterior act is not free except from an extrinsic cause and by an analogical denomination: for it is not voluntary except by the voluntariness of the internal act whose effect it is. Therefore formal goodness and malice are not per se in the exterior act, but this is good or evil in this way only by the goodness or malice of the interior act.

1. Understand analogy not of mere attribution (secundum dici), which is had by metaphor alone, but of proportionality through real participation (secundum esse), as is clear from the examples (a. 3, ad 3).

It was said:

1. Per se, for per accidens or by reason of another it adds accidental goodness or malice, both by reason of the interior act, insofar as the exterior act is often the occasion why the interior act is multiplied, exercised more intensely, continued longer; and by reason of effects, insofar as a special grace, value, or privilege is connected with it, such as grace given by a sacrament, an aureole by martyrdom, an indulgence by a pious work, or evils and inconveniences follow from it, for example, the burden of restitution, censure, irregularity. Hence:

a) When the will is prepared to operate if it could, and does not operate solely because it cannot or because it does not have the occasion of operating, the will without the external act is as good or evil as with it, because the absence of the external act is simply involuntary; whence it simply and essentially merits the same praise or punishment.

b) One who gives alms, fasts, or afflicts the body does not merit more than one who has the efficacious will of doing this; nevertheless he satisfies more, because satisfactory value depends also upon the exterior work insofar as it is penal, that is, upon the penalty insofar as it is actually inflicted.

2. Insofar as it is the execution of the interior act, and not insofar as it is its object: for thus it communicates its objective goodness (if it has any) to the will which intends it, and so formal goodness is already had. But supposing that it is the object of the will, the external execution itself does not add.

3. Formal goodness or malice; for the exterior act, insofar as it perfects and consummates the goodness or malice of the will, adds material goodness or malice and goodness or malice in a certain respect: for although it does not increase formal goodness or malice, nevertheless it extends that same goodness or malice to the exterior act and so perfects it; hence it merits accidental reward or punishment.

4. Efficacious, that is, which of itself suffices for placing the external act and would operate it, if it could. For if it were inefficacious for this, it would not be a proportionate means for obtaining the external act and its effect: thus the will to convert the whole world, to feed all the poor, to free all the souls of purgatory, although it is very good because it participates in something of the goodness of the external act which is its object, nevertheless does not have the same goodness as the work itself, because a single act of the will is not able to effect it (q. 19, a. 8).

170. It is objected:

The interior and exterior act are two moral acts; therefore there is more morality. Resp. St. Thomas, De Malo, q. 2, a. 2, ad 8: "Quantity added to quantity signifies something greater, where both are called quantity according to the same account. But where one is the reason why the other is a quantity, this is not necessary. Thus if wood is long, a line will be long, nor is it necessary that the wood with the line be longer than the line, because the line is the reason of length in the wood: similarly also it was said that the external act has the notion of fault from the act of the will."

171. Observation.

The external act is rightly said and truly is good and evil, because it is conformed or difform to reason and at the same time voluntary; it also has formal goodness or malice, not indeed its own, but derived from the interior act. For with that it constitutes one moral act, to which it concurs as the material element (n. 155). Whence also in confession not only evil wills or intentions are to be declared, but also external acts: for sins must be confessed not only according to distinct species, but entire, such as in fact they were perpetrated, namely, perfect and consummated. In other words, the whole evil must be said (which is truly evil), even if only participatively and analogically it is evil (cf. treatise on Sins).

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.

§ III. — Certain little questions concerning preceding paragraphs briefly resolved.

You will ask 1° from what act good from object, commanded unto good end, draws specific and essential goodness.

I answer. Commanded act taken in itself and specifically draws its specific and essential goodness from object, accidental from end: 1° Because what comes upon act constituted in its species is accidental to it. But command and ordering of act good of itself unto extrinsic end comes upon it already constituted in its species. Therefore. 2° Act takes essential species from what it primarily and immediately regards. But commanded act, considered in itself and specifically, primarily and immediately regards object: thus e.g., volition of giving alms, commanded by penance, primarily and immediately regards honesty of mercy, only secondarily and mediately honesty of penance. Therefore.

But if commanded act be taken formally and reduplicatively as commanded, it has essential species from end; because, as such, it is reckoned one and same with commanding act, and regards same object.

Nevertheless, because it happens to that act, considered in itself, that it be commanded, and command and ordering unto extrinsic end supervenes upon it already constituted in its species, simply speaking, comparison made between those species, it must be said that that which it has from object is essential, and that which it has from end accidental.

You will ask 2° how goodness or malice both of object and of circumstances ought to be intended that act be good or evil.

I answer. That act be morally evil, it suffices that malice be indirectly virtually or implicitly willed in another to which it is annexed; that however it be good, there is required that goodness be formally and directly in itself willed, at least in exercised act.

Our Doctor expresses this whole response in these words here q. 19, a. 7, ad 3 : « Evil happens out of singular defects, good truly out of whole and integral cause. Wherefore, whether will be of that which is of itself evil and under reason of good, or be of good under reason of evil, always will will be evil. But unto this that it be good will, it is required that it be of good under reason of good, that is that it will good, and on account of good. »

Reason moreover of first part is: 1° because otherwise malice cannot be intended; for no one intending evil operates, as I said above and philosophers commonly teach; and if anyone be so wicked that he seem to covet malice in his act, he covets it not except by reason of some goodness which he apprehends in it. 2° Because malice not only is not to be coveted, but is to be avoided. It is not avoided however, by this very fact that indirectly and implicitly it is intended. Suffices therefore that one covet in a thing delectability, to which he sees malice annexed.

Reason of second part is, because honesty is per se and on account of itself appetible, and thus right reason says it to be appetend.

I said : « At least in exercised act ; » because it is not necessary that agent say in signed act, e.g.: « I will give alms because honest, » but suffices that he will alms under that reason whereby it is honest, namely because it relieves misery of neighbor.

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.