The Basis of All Laws

The Basis of All Laws.—Prior to every other law and the ground and principle of all laws is the Eternal Law; for, since this is the plan of Divine Wisdom directing from eternity all acts and movements to their particular ends and to the end of the universe, it follows that all other laws are reflections of the eternal plan and realizations of the divine decree. The Eternal Law differs from other laws in various ways:

(a) as to duration. The Eternal Law existed before anything was made, whereas all other laws begin to exist when they are promulgated;

(b) as to breadth of application. The Eternal Law regulates, not only contingent things (such as actions) but also necessary things (such as that man should have a soul, hands and feet); for all things created, whether they be contingent or necessary, are subject to divine government. Human laws, as is evident, cannot regulate what is necessary (e.g., it would be foolish for them to decree that men must or must not have souls);

(c) as to subjects. The Eternal Law rules, not only rational creatures (i.e., angels and men), but also irrational creatures, such as matter, plants, and animals. The former are ruled through commands, which require that they direct themselves to their End; the latter are ruled through the inclinations given them by God, which move them to the ends He desires them to attain. Human laws cannot regulate the acts of irrational creatures, for these creatures cannot understand a command as such, and man cannot give them natural inclinations (e.g., it would be foolish to make a law for cats against the catching of birds).

The laws to be considered in the pages that follow are temporal and moral. Thus: (a) they are laws promulgated at some particular time, either from the beginning of humanity (as is the case with the Natural Law) or later (e.g., the Mosaic Law, the Christian Law, etc,); (b) they are laws regulating, not the necessary (as is the case with metaphysical or mathematical laws), but the contingent; (c) they are laws given, not to the irrational creature (as is the case with physical and biological laws), but to the rational, that it may attain its end through self-government in accordance with law.

St. Thomas, I-II, q. 91, a. 1.

238. Thesis. Eternal law exists. - It is proved: law is an ordination of reason in the prince who governs a community. But, supposing that the world is governed by divine providence, the whole community of the universe is ruled by divine reason. Therefore the very ordering reason of the governance of things, which is in God as in the prince of the universe, has the notion of law. But divine reason conceives nothing in time but from eternity. Therefore such a law is eternal. Cf. Job XXXVIII-XXXIX; Prov. VIII-IX; Wis. VI-XII; Ps. CXVIII.

Nor should you say that it is not a law, since it has not been promulgated. For promulgation is not of the essence of law; moreover, although eternal law has not been passively promulgated on the part of the term or of the hearing creature (in second act), nevertheless it has been actively promulgated on the part of God promulgating (in first act), because it has everything which is required on God's part for promulgation, so that, once the creature exists, it is applied to this creature by that very fact. For it is not required for promulgation that the law become known, but that it be able to be known. Whence, just as human law obligates future persons because, by the very fact that they become members of the community, they fall under the law without a new promulgation, so eternal law, by the very fact that a creature exists, can be known by it and obligates it (ad 2). In other words: although promulgation has not been received, nevertheless it has been made.

1. Law, namely, is essentially in the legislator (n. 221).

St. Thomas, I-II, q. 93, a. 3-6.

241. Thesis. From eternal law all other laws are derived. - It is proved:

In ordered movers, the power of the second mover is derived from the power of the first mover, because the second does not move except insofar as it is moved by the first; whence in a well-ordered city the reason of governance is derived from the first governor to the secondary governors, and in art the reason of things to be made is derived from the architect to lower artisans. But eternal law is the reason of governance in the first and supreme governor. Therefore all reasons of governance or laws in lower governors are derived from eternal law.

For: a) human reason has from divine reason or eternal law, of which it is a participation, that it be the rule of the will and of human acts (q. 19, a. 4); therefore if law must be conformable to reason, much more must it be conformable to eternal law.

b) For the first is the measure of the others. But eternal law or divine reason precedes every other reason or law as the fountain. Therefore it is the first rule of every reason and law. And therefore honesty must principally be estimated from commensuration to that rule.

Eternal law, namely, is law by essence; all others are laws by participation, which are derived from it, and indeed in three ways:

1. they are derived from eternal law as from an exemplar cause, because all laws, that they be just, must be conformable to right reason and thus to eternal law, as to their norm and measure: thus from eternal law they have that they are a norm of rectitude;

2. they are derived from eternal law as from an efficient cause from which they have the power of obligating, because every inferior legislative power is from God, according to that saying in Rom. XIII, 1: There is no power except from God: thus from eternal law they have that they are a norm of obligation.

Divine wisdom signified both when it said (Prov. VIII, 15-16): "By Me kings reign (as to the second: power), and lawgivers decree just things (as to the first: rectitude); by Me princes rule, and the powerful decree justice." Hence all laws also:

3. depend on and are derived from eternal law as from a directive and actually regulative cause, because eternal law, through the mediation of the light of reason, directs legislators, so that they may see what laws are to be instituted according to diverse circumstances: thus from eternal law they have that they are actually instituted.

242. To eternal law all things are subject which are subjected to divine governance:

1. All natural things, whether necessary or contingent: for God gave not only to intellectual creatures a rule, which is the principle of acting, by impressing upon their mind knowledge of the divine precept, but also to the whole of nature principles and instinct for proper acts; and therefore He is said to command the whole of nature. Thus all movements and actions of the whole of nature are subject to eternal law insofar as all creatures are inclined and moved by divine providence; likewise the defects which occur in nature against the order of one or another particular cause, because these do not occur against the order of the first cause but are also subjected to divine providence, from which nothing escapes.

2. All human affairs: for men are subject to eternal law, not only as to inclination toward that which is conformable to eternal law, but also because they have knowledge of law: the evil imperfectly, in whom the natural inclination to virtue is depraved by a vicious habit and the natural cognition of good is darkened by passions and vices; but the good perfectly, because in them to the natural inclination to good there is added the interior motive of grace and virtue, and to the natural cognition of good there is added the cognition of faith and of the gift of wisdom. Hence the good always act according to law, actually or habitually, but the evil often act against it; yet the more they fall short of it on the part of action, the more they are subject to it on the part of passion, because the more they must be punished according to it.

1. Nothing, namely, can escape the rule of eternal law: for he who acts against one directive precept of eternal law falls into another precept determining penalty, which commands that, insofar as man has failed in action, so much be compensated through passion.

3. But those things which pertain to the divine nature or essence are not subject to it: for these are really eternal law itself. Namely, the act of the mind does not really differ from God Himself; but nothing can be subject to itself.

Nor is it an obstacle that God is bound not to do moral evil, for example, to lie: for He is not bound to this by force of some law prohibiting it, but by reason of the repugnance which arises from His nature and perfection, insofar as if He did evil or lied, He would not be God. Hence it is said that "God is a law to Himself" (I, q. 21, a. 1, ad 2), not properly, because nothing can be subject to itself, but because by Himself He is right without law, as if He were a law to Himself.