The Rules of Morality

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).

Rules of morality are understood as the rules from relation to which morality arises. A twofold rule is distinguished, namely law, which is the primary rule, and conscience, which is the secondary rule.

Obligation of Human Laws.—All human laws that are just, whether they be ecclesiastical or civil, made by believers in God or unbelievers, are obligatory in conscience, (a) From the beginning the Church has made laws and imposed them as obligatory (Acts, xv. 29; I Cor., vi. 4; I Cor., xi. 5; I Tim., v. 9-12), and has recognized as obligatory the laws of the State, without regard to the moral or religious qualifications of the rulers (I Peter, ii. 13-16; Rom., xiii. 1-7).

(b) Human laws are necessary. The Natural Law does not prescribe definite penalties, while the Positive Divine Law prescribes only such as are remote and invisible; and hence, if there were no human laws holding out the threat of determined and present punishments, the Divine laws would be contemned. Moreover, since the higher laws are sometimes unknown, or prescribe no time, place or manner of accomplishment, or do not command things that would be useful for their observance, it is necessary that there be laws made by man to secure the better knowledge and fulfillment of the laws given by God Himself.

A human law is unjust in two ways:

(a) if opposed to the rights of God. Examples: The command of Pharaoh that the Hebrew male children be murdered (Exod., i. 17), the command of Antiochus that his subjects sacrifice to idols (I Mach., ii. 16-20), the command of the Sanhedrin that the Apostles should cease to preach (Acts, v. 29);

(b) if opposed to the rights of man. This happens in three ways: First, when the purpose of the law is not the common good, as when the lawgiver seeks only his own profit or glory; secondly, when the maker of the law has not the requisite authority; thirdly, when the law itself, although for the common good and made by competent authority, does not distribute burdens equally or reasonably among the people. Examples: Achab and Jezabel, in the affair of the vineyard of Naboth, had in view not the public, but their own private benefit (III Kings, xvi). The sentence of death pronounced on our Lord by the Sanhedrin was illegal, because, among other reasons, the body was not assembled according to law, and hence had no authority to give sentence. The commands given the Israelites by Pharaoh (Exod., v. 18), and to their subjects by Oriental despots (I Kings, viii), were unjust, because the former discriminated against the Israelites, and the latter bore down too heavily on all the people. The former civil laws that prescribed the same penalty of hanging for a slight misdemeanor (such as the theft of a loaf of bread by a boy) as for the capital crimes of piracy or murder, the Stamp Act of George III, and some modern laws that sentence to life imprisonment those who have been four times convicted of slight offenses, are more recent examples of unjust laws.

Obedience to unjust laws is not obligatory in the following cases. (a) If a law is opposed to the rights of God, it is not lawful to do what that law commands or permits, nor to omit what it forbids. Examples: If a law permits one to practise polygamy, or commands one to blaspheme religion, one may not use the permission or obey. If a law forbids one to give or receive Baptism, it has no force. (b) If a law is certainly opposed to the rights of man in any of the three ways mentioned in the previous paragraph (376, b), it does not of itself oblige in conscience, since it lacks some essential condition of a true law, and even the consent of the majority or of all does not make it just. However, it may oblige accidentally, on account of the greater evils that would follow on disobedience, such as scandal, civil disturbances, etc. The duty of subjects is to remonstrate against such a law and to work for its repeal.

The obligation of all laws is not the same in kind, or degree. (a) Moral laws oblige one to do what is commanded or to omit what is forbidden, as a duty owed in conscience; hence, he who violates a law of this kind is guilty of moral fault. Penal laws oblige one to follow what they prescribe, if one would be free from guilt before the law and not liable in conscience to the penalty prescribed; hence, he who violates a penal law is guilty of juridical fault, and, if he further illegally resists the penalty, he becomes guilty also of moral fault. (b) Moral laws are not all of the same obligatory force, some of them obliging under grave sin, others under venial sin.

The following human laws are recognized as moral laws: (a) ecclesiastical laws, with few exceptions; (b) civil laws that confirm the Eternal or Divine Law, or that pertain directly to the common welfare, such as the laws that determine the duties of public officials, the rights of inheritance, etc.

The following human laws are generally regarded as merely penal: (a) ecclesiastical laws which expressly state that their observance is not required under pain of sin (e.g., the statutes of many Religious Orders); (b) civil laws of minor importance, or which the legislator imposes as a purely civil duty (e.g., some traffic regulations).

Moral laws oblige under grave sin if the two following conditions are present: (a) if the thing prescribed by the law is of great importance, because of its nature or circumstances; (b) if the lawgiver intended to impose a grave obligation.

A matter of light moment cannot be made the object of a law that binds under grave sin, for this would impose an intolerable burden, and would thus be contrary to the common good. What is unimportant in itself, however, may become important on account of its purpose or other circumstance.

The intention of the legislator to impose a grave moral obligation is recognized either: (a) from his own declaration, as when a church law is commanded under threat of the divine judgment; or (b) from circumstances that indicate such an intention, such as the gravity of the subject-matter of the law or the kind of penalty it prescribes, the general opinion of authorities, or the common practice of the community.

By obliging to the observance of what they command and the avoidance of what they forbid, laws indirectly oblige to what is necessary for such obedience. (a) Hence, the law obliges one to make use of the ordinary means for its fulfillment. Examples: He who has not used ordinary diligence to know the law, sins against the law if he violates its prescriptions. He who eats meat on a day of abstinence, because he neglected to provide himself with other food, is guilty of sin. (b) The law obliges one to use sufficient diligence in removing impediments to its fulfillment or dangers of its violation. Examples: The law of hearing Mass on Sunday obliges one not to stay up so late on Saturday that fulfillment will be impossible. The law of fasting obliges one to avoid dangerous occasions of its violation.

Dispensation.—Human law has not the immutability of the Divine Law. Hence, not only may it be changed, but it may also be dispensed. Dispensation is a relaxation of the positive law made for a particular case by him who has the competent authority.

(a) It is a relaxation of the law—that is, it takes away the obligation of the law. Thus, it differs from permission, which is fulfillment of what is conditionally allowed by the law.

(b) Dispensation is made for a particular case—that is, it is granted when the provisions of the law, though beneficial to the community as a whole, are not suitable for a particular person or case. Thus, it differs, first, from abrogation and derogation, which remove the obligation of the whole or a part of the law for the entire community; and, secondly, from privilege, which is granted permanently as a private law.

(c) Dispensation is given by competent authority—that is, by the legislator or others who have the lawful power. Thus, it differs from epieikeia and private interpretation, which are made by those who have no power to dispense.

(d) Dispensation is a relaxation of the positive law, for since the Natural Law is immutable (see 305), no dispensation can be given from its requirements. Thus, dispensation differs from the official declaration or interpretation of the Natural or Divine Law (see 315).

Those who have the power to dispense from a law are the lawgiver and others duly authorized. (a) The lawgiver himself can dispense as follows: in his own laws, since he was able to make them; in the laws of his predecessors, since his authority is equal to theirs; in the laws of his inferiors, since they are his subordinates. (b) Others can dispense who have received from the law, from their superior, or from custom the necessary authority to dispense.

Those Who May Be Dispensed from a Law.—(a) Since dispensation is an act of jurisdiction, only those can be dispensed who are in some way subject to the dispenser. Since, however, the jurisdiction used in dispensing does not impose an obligation but grants a favor, it is held that he who has the power to dispense others may also dispense himself, if his power is not restricted. (b) Since dispensation is an act of authority, it may be exercised even in favor of one who is absent, or ignorant of the dispensation or unwilling to accept it. But, since as a rule favors should not be forced, the validity of a dispensation generally depends upon the consent of the one dispensed.

The power of dispensing has for its end the common good, and therefore it must be exercised: (a) faith fully, that is, not for reasons of private interest or friendship; (b) prudently, that is with knowledge of the case and with judgment that there are sufficient reasons for dispensation.

In order that the reason for a dispensation be sufficient, it is not required that it be so grave as to constitute a physical or moral impossibility of keeping the law, since the obligation of the law ceases in the face of impossibility (see 317, 487), without the need of dispensation. Hence, lesser reasons suffice for dispensation.

A dispensation must be granted whenever the law itself or justice requires it. The following cases are usually given: (a) when there exists a reason that requires, according to law, that a dispensation be granted; (b) when the common good, or the spiritual good of an individual, or his protection from some considerable evil, demands the concession of a dispensation.

A dispensation may be either granted or denied, when the case does not demand it and the superior after careful investigation is not certain whether the reason is sufficient or insufficient; otherwise, a greater responsibility would rest on the superior than the law can be thought to impose—viz., that of attaining certainty where it cannot easily be had.

He who dispenses without a sufficient reason is guilty of the sin of favoritism, and is responsible for the discontent and quarrels that result. He is guilty of grave sin thus: (a) if serious scandal or other inconvenience is caused, even when the dispenser is the lawgiver himself; (b) if the law obliges under grave sin and the dispensation is not granted by the lawgiver, but by an inferior who usurps the right to dispense.

The subject of dispensation is guilty of sin: (a) if he asks a dispensation when he knows for certain that there is no sufficient reason for it; (b) if, having been denied a dispensation, even though unjustly, he acts against the law; or if he knowingly makes use of an invalid or expired dispensation.

Sufficient reasons for a dispensation can be reduced to two classes: (a) private welfare (e.g., the difficulty of the law for the petitioner, a notable benefit he will receive through the dispensation, etc.); (b) public welfare (e.g., the benefits that are secured to the community, or the evils that are avoided through the dispensation).

1. We have spoken of human acts in relation to man, who through them orders himself to the ultimate end of human life, or beatitude. It must now be said 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 the whole of human life constitutes the moral order, or the morality of human acts, as will soon be explained, St. Thomas, 1. 2. q. 21. a. 2. ad 2. But first it must be said generally of morality itself, and specifically of the moral goodness and malice of human acts. Then indeed we shall speak of the various sources of this morality in human acts. And this we shall furnish in distinct Commentaries.

2. Human acts can be considered either all generically, or these or those specifically. If they are considered generically as human acts, they are capable of conducting man to the end, namely to the ultimate end, in the possession of which happiness and beatitude and his full perfection are constituted. For through them man orders and leads himself to the end. St. Thomas, 1. 2. q. 1. a. 1. 2., q. 7. a. 2. If these or those specifically, as such acts, are inspected, they are actually ordering and leading, or not, to the end, according as they are conformable to the end or not. And thus, for example, cognition of God and love of God, by their nature, order and lead man to the end; ignorance of God and hatred of God, by their nature, turn and remove man from the end.

3. If human acts, in the first way, are viewed 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 base. “Good and evil,” says St. Thomas, q. 18. a. 5., “diversify species in moral acts.” Therefore morality constitutes the genus; goodness or malice the species. Let us first consider the reason of each appellation; then, for declaring the matter itself, by the way indicated from the name of the thing to the thing itself, we shall come to it.

4. The reason of the former appellation is that human acts, by which man directs himself to the end, are free acts; namely, they are in reality those acts from whose repetition habits are properly begotten, which by the Latins are called mores. For mos signifies a frequent and more often repeated mode of operating proceeding from the free determination of the will. St. Thomas, 1. 2. q. 58. a. 1. Certainly the free pertains especially to habits and mores. St. Thomas, 1. 2. q. 49. a. 4. “There the genus of morals begins, where dominion of the will is first found.” St. Thomas, 2. D. 24. q. 3. a. 2. But acts from which habits or mores are begotten are most aptly called moral. Moreover, since human or free acts of this kind are those means with which man has been furnished so that he can tend to the end, namely so that he may use them not only once or another time, with attention to the nature of man, but so that he may exercise himself in them, and persevere in doing well unto the end of life, St. Thomas, 1. 2. q. 5. a. 7.; hence also this whole order of human actions to the end is most aptly called the moral order. “And because,” says St. Thomas, 1. 2. q. 1. a. 3., “Ambrose says.... mores are properly called human, moral acts properly receive species from the end: for moral acts and human acts are the same.”

5. There is no real difference between a human act and a moral act. The difference is only from the diverse account by which the human act is considered. For if it is viewed according to its physical being, insofar as it is an act proceeding from reason and free will, it is held as a human act. But if it is viewed according to the relation which it has to its norm, whence is its goodness and malice in order to the end to be attained, it is a moral act. Wherefore morality adds to the voluntary and the free a relation to the norm of honorableness.

6. We proceed to the reason of the other appellation, namely of an act morally good or evil, honorable or base. Now if human or moral acts are conformable to obtaining the ultimate end, then nothing is lacking to them, not only insofar as they are physical actions done with advertence and deliberation, but also insofar as they are a means, instituted by nature, for attaining the end. But, on the contrary, if they do not lead to the end, although nothing is lacking to them insofar as they are physical actions done with advertence and deliberation, nevertheless something is lacking to them insofar as they are a means to the end. But that to which, considered under some respect, nothing is lacking, is called good under that respect; but evil, if something is lacking, under the same respect. But this respect or order of human acts to the end, as has already been said, is called the moral order or respect. Therefore human acts, if they are viewed specifically, are rightly called morally good or evil. “Thus therefore it must be said,” says St. Thomas, 1. 2. q. 18. a. 1., “that every action, insofar as it has something of being, has so much of goodness; but insofar as something of the fullness of being which is due to human action is lacking to it, so far it falls short of goodness, and thus is called evil.” And 1. 2. q. 18. a. 5: “For each thing, good is that which befits it according to its form; and evil is that which is beyond the order of its form.... Whence it is manifest that good and evil diversify species in moral acts, for differences per se diversify species.”

7. Moreover to praise someone is to impute to him, or to attribute to him as author, the goodness of his act, just as to blame someone is to impute to him the malice of his act. Wherefore acts are imputable to praise or blame according as they are good or evil. But if the goodness or malice by which an act is imputed to someone for praise or blame is in the moral order, then the act which is imputed to praise is called honorable from being honored, and that which is imputed to blame is called base from being blamed. “From this,” says St. Thomas, q. 21. a. 2., “an act is called culpable or laudable, because 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. For 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... Whence it remains that good or evil in voluntary acts alone constitutes the account of praise or fault.”

8. And hence it is clear that honorable can be taken in two ways: 1.º according as it is contradistinguished from useful and pleasurable; 2.º according as it is contradistinguished from base. In the first way it signifies the good which is sought per se; a good ordered to an end is called useful, q. 7. a. 2., q. 8. a. 3.; it is called pleasurable insofar as by possession of itself it quiets the appetite and brings delight, St. Thomas, 2. 2. q. 145. a. 3. In the other way it signifies an action which, beyond the entity of a human action, also has the account of a means to the end, that is, an action which not only is done with advertence and deliberation, but which is done conformably to the end, which consequently is consonant with right reason, and fitting to man insofar as he is man, and bringing decorum: “Something is called honorable insofar as it has a certain decorum from the ordering of reason.” St. Thomas, 2. 2. q. 145. a. 3. Hence moral good can be honorable good, useful good, and pleasurable good, when namely a human act is concerned with these goods according to the order of right reason, according as they can lead man to the end. St. Thomas, 2. 2. q. 145. a. 1. 2. 3. Cf. Commentary Tenth n. 7.

9. Coming to the matter itself, we note first that the Doctors commonly understand by morality the relation of human acts to their proper norm and rule, according to which they are ordered and directed. The diversity of opinions is situated rather in determining this norm and rule. And thus also commonly, genus being taken for species, acts are distinguished as moral and immoral, to designate right human acts and voluntary acts falling short of their proper rectitude. Moreover, omitting the discrepant opinions of others, and insisting upon the doctrine of the Angelic Doctor, morality considered generically, according to its primary and fundamental concept, can be defined: the capacity which human actions have in themselves to be good or bad in order to the end of creation, that is, to be conformable or fitting, or not, to attaining this end. But specifically it is the account of conformity or deformity which human actions have in themselves in order to the end of creation, as means to the end, insofar as namely they are fitting or unfitting for leading man, or not, to his end. It is said according to its primary and fundamental concept; for proximately and formally that conformity or fittingness, deformity or unfittingness, is only from law, which is manifested through right reason. For by this very fact that law commands something to be done or omitted, it formally and proximately constitutes that thing in the account of a means in order to attaining the end, the use of such a means bringing forth obligation in conscience. Whence St. Alphonsus rightly says: “The moral goodness of a human act consists in a certain conformity and fittingness of the free act with right reason and law.” Treatise on Human Acts XXXIV. For then there is right reason, when it proposes an act ordered to the due end of man, which cannot be if the act is discordant from the aforesaid end, if it is contrary to law. But this law is the eternal law, from which every other law is derived and in which it is founded. Cf. St. Thomas, qq. 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.

10. And indeed, if morality is the relation of human acts to their proper norm and rule, according to which they are ordered and directed, this primary and fundamental norm of all human acts can be nothing other than the end of the whole of human life. For acts are essentially ordered and directed to an end, and all human acts, that they may be ordered and right, ought essentially to be directed to the common end of the whole of human life. According to the Angelic Doctor, 1. 2., throughout, all human actions ought to be directed and ordered to the end, 1. 2. q. 5. a. 7.; the end is the proper and chief object of the will, q. 8. a. 2.; from the end human and moral acts are principally specified, q. 87. a. 6. ad 2. Therefore the primary and fundamental account of morality must be taken from the end. Moreover by the morality of human acts this also is commonly understood, namely the account of the rectitude or non-rectitude of those same human acts; and since human acts are means to the end, the end is the rule and measure of that rectitude or non-rectitude. By morality, again, this also is understood, that acts are according to reason or beyond reason; moreover reason manifests this and dictates that this must be followed in human acts, namely the end to be attained through acts congruent and conformable to it. But by moral goodness or malice this is commonly understood, that human acts are ordered or not ordered to that end; that they are according to right reason ordering proper acts to the end, or beyond this right reason. Hence the goodness of acts is insofar as they are useful for the end, q. 7. a. 2. ad 1. a. 4. ad 2.; and consequently from that end, and from the object ordered or not ordered to that end, a human act is constituted in the species of an act morally good or morally bad.

11. Since man is under God, the mind of man must be ordered under God, and all other things which are in man must be ordered under his reason. St. Thomas, Contra Gentiles, l. 3. C. 229. Then certainly human acts, rightly ordered as the very nature of man requires, will be right, and the reason proposing them and directing one to them will be right. Moreover the rectitude of any thing is taken from its proper nature and proper end, which has been placed in all things by God himself, according to the proper determinate nature of each thing. Therefore a human act which in itself does not preserve this order of nature itself, just as it does not follow right reason, which proposes the aforesaid order and manifests that it must be preserved, so consequently it will naturally be an unfitting act, and will not be able to be ordered by man to God the founder of nature. On the contrary, an act which bears before itself the natural order, which right reason also shows, is intrinsically ordered to God the founder of nature, since it is fitting to nature itself, and consequently can be referred by man in his human act to God by right reason.

12. Therefore the rectitude or aberration of a human act is only from its fittingness or unfittingness with the ultimate end, which is not had intrinsically in it except from fittingness or unfittingness with rational nature itself. “There cannot,” says St. Thomas, 2. D. 40. q. 1. a. 5., “be any act proceeding from someone deliberating without intention of the end. But that end is the good fitting to man either according to the soul, or according to the body, or according to exterior things.” The body is ordered to the soul, exterior things to both. And therefore if the use of the body and of exterior things is not contrary to the good of the soul, and is in the middle between excess and defect, the use will be right; otherwise the use will be vicious.

St. Thomas, in the cited place. The former use, corresponding to the nature of the thing, is of itself referred to God, the creator of nature and the ultimate end; but the latter use, contrary to the natural order of things, cannot of itself be referred to God. Whence it is that the former is right and good, the latter morally aberrant and evil. Reason apprehending this order of things and proposing it as to be observed practically in its own acts is that right reason of which St. Alphonsus speaks, n. 9. Therefore the ultimate account of morality is in this relation of human actions to the ultimate end of man, or God, which in the actions themselves intrinsically flows forth from the very nature of the things about which those human actions are concerned.

13. The Angelic Doctor explicitly teaches concerning this matter: “Human actions, 1. 2. q. 18. a. 4..... have the character of goodness from the end... as it were according to relation to the cause of goodness,” namely to the primary and fundamental cause of goodness, since it is the first cause. “The specific difference which is from the end is more general; and the difference which is from the object ordered of itself to such an end is specific with respect to it,” q. 18. a. 7. Moreover all objects are of themselves ordered to the ultimate end. Therefore the specification of morality from the ultimate end is primary and fundamental. And ibid. ad 2: “It must be said that the end is last in execution, but is first in the intention of reason, according to which the species of moral acts are taken”; and consequently the species of good and the species of evil. And ibid. a. 5 ad 1, q. 18. a. 8: “Good, insofar as it is according to reason, and evil, insofar as it is beyond reason, diversify the species of morals.” “Whence, if the object of the act includes something that agrees with the order of reason, the act will be good according to its species... But if it includes something that is repugnant to the order of reason, the act will be evil according to its species.” But good is according to reason and evil beyond reason, as is said in q. 18. a. 5 in the body, insofar as it is fitting or not fitting to it. Moreover an object is fitting or not fitting to reason insofar as it corresponds or does not correspond to the end; and this is the same as to fit or not to fit the order of reason. “For since it belongs to reason to order, an act proceeding from deliberative reason, if it is not ordered to a due end, by this very fact is repugnant to reason and has the character of evil. But if it is ordered to a due end, it agrees with the order of reason; whence it has the character of good.” For this reason the whole rectitude of reason must also be taken again from the end. “In those things which are for the end, rectitude of reason consists in conformity to the appetite for the due end; but nevertheless the very appetite for the end presupposes a right apprehension concerning the end, which is through reason,” q. 19. a. 3 ad 2. “In moral matters reason is ordered to the common end of the whole of human life..... But since sin is through deviation from order to the end..... in moral matters, where the order of reason to the common end of human life is considered, sin and evil are always considered through deviation from the order of reason to the common end of human life,” q. 21. a. 2 ad 2. If the deviation of a human act is to be taken from the ultimate end, from the same end the rectitude of a human act must be taken. And thus the Angelic Doctor, 1. 2. q. 5. a. 7, says: “The rectitude of the will..... is nothing else than the due order of the will to the ultimate end.” Finally, “the goodness,” says the Holy Doctor, “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.” 1. 2. q. 19. a. 9. Cf. also ibid. a. 10. Therefore it is sufficiently and more than sufficiently established that the morality generally of human acts, and their moral goodness and malice, according to the primary and fundamental concept, is to be placed in the relation of the same acts to the end of human life, in a relation of fittingness or unfittingness. “But the will of some man willing some particular good is not right unless he refers it to the common good as to an end, since even the natural appetite of any part is ordered to the common good of the whole. But from the end is taken, as it were, the formal reason for willing that which is ordered to the end; whence, in order that someone by a right will should will some particular good, it is necessary that that particular good be willed materially, but that the divine common good be willed formally.” 1. 2. q. 19. a. 10.

14. Man, proceeding from God, ought ultimately to tend to God. Having in himself several higher and lower faculties, he himself ought so to act that the higher dominate the lower, and that reason and will not be subjected to the senses. Moreover, living in human society, he ought peacefully to make use of association with men. But as those things which are from God are ordered, so God, creating all things for His glory, necessarily commands that order be observed and forbids it to be violated. The prescription of observing and not violating this order, or law, and the consequent obligation, proximately and formally constitutes the morality of human acts. But men, by observing this order prescribed by God, attain their end from God; by violating it, wandering far from their end, they are repelled by the same God lest they attain the end. Therefore men are bound to observe this prescribed order not only by the mere necessity of the end, but also by the necessity of obeying God commanding, in which morality and moral obligation properly consist proximately and formally. For morality properly imports conformity or deformity with the proper rule of morals, which indeed is the reason and will of God, or the eternal law of God; nor can it be any other. For since human reason and will depend on God in their being and operation, the norm directing human acts to God Himself, the ultimate end of man, ought to be the very reason and will of God, and no other. And from this there follows and clearly appears moral obligation, which consists in this, that man cannot transgress the law of God without offending God.

15. But that, from the same Angelic Doctor, that morality, and moral goodness and malice, must proximately and formally be taken from the eternal law, is thus clear from 1. 2. q. 19. a. 4, where he at the same time shows how that morality, goodness, and moral malice also proceeds from reason: “It must be said,” he says, “that in all ordered causes, the effect depends more on the first cause than on the second cause, because the second cause does not act except in the power of the first cause. But that human reason is the rule of the human will, from which its goodness is measured, it has from the eternal law, which is divine reason. Whence it is said in Ps. 4: Many say: Who shows us good things? The light of Thy countenance, O Lord, has been signed upon us; as though he were saying: the light of reason which is in us can show us good things and regulate our will only insofar as it is the light of Thy countenance, i.e. derived from Thy countenance. Whence it is manifest that the goodness of the human will depends much more on the eternal law than on human reason.” The same is clear from a. 9: “That which is first in each genus is the measure and account of all things which are of that genus. But each thing is right and good insofar as it attains to its proper measure. Therefore, in order that the will of man be good, it is required that it be conformed to the divine will.”

16. Therefore the first rule and measure of the good human will is the divine will. Indeed the human will, in order that it be right, is not bound to be conformed to the divine will in the material thing willed, or in the very thing itself that is willed, unless the will of God becomes known by precept or prohibition. For a thing willed by God under the aspect of the common good, to which God attends as universal provider, is good; yet under the aspect of a particular good, to which man ought to attend, and to which God wills that he attend, it can be evil. Whence Augustine, in Enchir. C. 101. n. 26, says: “Sometimes with a good will a man wills something which God does not will.... As if a good son should wish his father to live, whom God with a good will wills to die.” But the will of God commanding or prohibiting obliges man to will and do what is commanded, and to be unwilling and not do what is prohibited. Therefore then the human will is bound to be conformed to the divine will in the thing willed, or in the material thing willed. Now although the human will is not always bound to be conformed in the material thing willed to the divine will, in order that it be right, nevertheless it is always bound to be conformed to the divine will in the formal thing willed, or in the reason for willing; and therefore it ought to will whatever it wills on account of the common and divine good as the ultimate end. For the formal thing willed by the divine will, or its motive and ultimate reason for willing, is the common and divine good, or the common good of the whole universe, insofar as it is ultimately ordered to God Himself and His glory: for the Lord has made all things for Himself. But by seeking the honorable good, virtually and implicitly the will seeks the divine good, since the ends of all things are finally ordered and directed to the ultimate end.

17. These are the words of the Angelic Doctor in the cited q. 19. a. 10: “The good of the whole universe is that which is apprehended by God, who is the maker and governor of the universe. Whence whatever He wills, He wills under the aspect of the common good, which is His goodness, which is the good of the whole universe... But the will of some man willing some particular good is not right unless he refer it to the common good as to an end, since even the natural appetite of any part is ordered to the common good of the whole. But from the end is taken, as it were, the formal reason for willing that which is ordered to the end. Whence, in order that someone by a right will should will some particular good, it is necessary that that particular good be willed materially, but that the divine common good be willed formally. Therefore the human will is bound to be conformed to the divine will in the thing willed formally; for it is bound to will the divine and common good, but not materially.... For the apprehension of the creature according to its nature is of some particular good proportioned to its nature. But it happens that something is good according to a particular reason which is not good according to the universal reason, or conversely. And hence it happens that some will is good in willing something considered according to a particular reason, which nevertheless God does not will according to the universal reason, and conversely..... But what the divine thing willed is according to the common reason we can know; for we know that God, whatever He wills, wills under the aspect of good. And therefore whoever wills something under any aspect whatever of good has a will conformed to the divine will as to the reason of the thing willed. But in particular we do not know what God wills; and as to this we are not bound to conform our will to the divine will.” But the divine will can become known to us in three ways, namely by revelation, by precept, by operation. For by the very fact that God reveals, commands, or works something, it is manifest that He wills that very thing. And hence it is clear that morality proximately consists in the conformity or deformity of our will with the divine will and law, but remotely in the conformity or deformity of our actions with the ultimate end.

18. And this is also proved from the very account of the eternal law, from which morality certainly must be taken proximately. For “law imports order to the end actively, namely insofar as through it certain things are ordered to the end; but not passively, that is, as though the law itself were ordered to the end, except accidentally in a governor whose end is outside himself, to which it is also necessary that his law be ordered. But the end of divine government is God Himself; nor is His law something other than Himself; whence the eternal law is not ordered to another end.” St. Thomas, 1. 2. q. 91. a. 1 ad 3.

19. The established doctrine is confirmed from the necessity which the Angelic Doctor asserts for a positive divine law besides the eternal and natural law, 1. 2. q. 91. a. 4. Through this natural law man is directed only to the ultimate natural end. For through the natural law the eternal law is participated according to the proportion of the capacity of human nature. And therefore a divinely given law is superadded, through which the eternal law is participated in a higher mode, so that in a higher mode man may be directed to the ultimate supernatural end. For “through law man is directed to his proper acts in order to the ultimate end. And if indeed man were ordered only to an end which did not exceed the proportion of man’s natural faculty, it would not be necessary that man have something directive on the part of reason beyond the natural law and the humanly posited law which is derived from it. But because man is ordered to the end of eternal beatitude, which exceeds the proportion of the natural faculty of man, therefore it was necessary that beyond natural and human law he also be directed to his end by a divinely given law.” But as man through nature itself is ordered to God, so also man through law is ordered to God. St. Thomas, Contra Gentiles, l. 3, c. 128, paragraph beginning Item.

19. Since the eternal law is unknown to us according as it is in the divine mind, but nevertheless becomes known to us through natural reason, hence reason itself also is the rule and norm of human acts, and indeed the proximate one, as proposing immediately to the will good or evil according to the eternal law. But this proximate rule is subjective, merely proposing the object; law is the proximate objective rule, constituting rectitude, whose foundation is the very nature of things, which is entirely independent of human reason. Human reason merely knows, applies, and proposes order; it does not constitute it. Suarez, in 1. 2. Tr. 3. D. 2. S. 2. n. 12. For indeed the end of things and the order of means to the end is not effected by human reason, but, constituted from nature itself, is apprehended and manifested by human reason; hence, since reason is man’s proper nature, which is ordered to truth, that which is repugnant to right reason is called by the Angelic Doctor contrary to nature, not because it is repugnant to reason as though reason itself were constitutive of the natural order, but because it is repugnant to reason manifesting rectitude, which right reason is the nature of man. St. Thomas, Quaestiones de Malo, q. 14. a. 2 ad 8: “And therefore that which is contrary to the order of reason is properly contrary to the nature of man insofar as he is man; but that which is according to reason is according to the nature of man insofar as he is man.” St. Thomas, 1. 2. q. 71. a. 2. If reason did not propose that which is right in itself, but made it, then this rectitude of acting would depend on the judgment of reason, and nothing fixed and certain any longer would be in the moral goodness or malice of human actions. In those matters which by nature itself are not defined and ordered, human reason can indeed constitute order, which happens in positive laws; nevertheless nothing contrary to the nature of things and the eternal law of God can rightly be done against it. Therefore reason apprehends the rectitude of things and proposes that it is to be observed. And thus St. Thomas, 1. 2. q. 18. a. 5, says: “Certain acts are called human or moral according as they are from reason.” And q. 19. a. 1 ad 3: “It must be said that the good is represented by reason to the will as an object; and, insofar as it falls under the order of reason, it pertains to the genus of morals and causes moral goodness in the act of the will. For reason is the principle of human and moral acts.”

20. But it belongs to right reason to order all things to the due end. Moreover this ordering is one by which man is well disposed immediately in relation to the end itself, which the theological virtues provide; another by which he is well disposed mediately to the aforesaid end, namely is well disposed in relation to those things by which he is directed to that end, which the moral virtues provide. St. Thomas, De Virtutibus in communi, a. 12; 1. 2. q. 61. a. 2. But since right reason apprehends and proposes nothing except the order of things constituted and prescribed by God, hence “it belongs to the same reason that vice and sin are contrary to the order of human reason and that they are contrary to the eternal law of God.” St. Thomas, 1. 2. q. 71. a. 2 ad 4.

21. What is said of the eternal law must be understood of any other law, since any law is an ordering of reason constituting the order and rectitude of human acts to the end; nor indeed are all human acts either commanded or prohibited by the eternal law itself. Whence many human acts are commanded or prohibited only by positive law; and thus they are constituted proximately and formally in the character of a necessary means to the end. And the eternal law itself commands that laws of this sort are to be obeyed. Moreover, all laws, “insofar as they participate in right reason, are so far derived from the eternal law.” St. Thomas, 1. 2. q. 93. a. 3. For they are derived from it as from an exemplary cause, because all laws, in order that they be just, ought to be conformed to the eternal law; as from an efficient cause, because all legislative power is from God; as from a more universal law, approving and commanding that, on account of the common good, other determinate laws be made according to the diversity of persons, places, times, and other circumstances. St. Thomas, in the cited place, ad 2 and ad 3.

22. The remote and fundamental norm of morality, namely the ultimate end of man, embraces all human acts; otherwise it would no longer be the remote and fundamental rule of morality. The reason is clear, because all human acts are means to the end of the whole of human life. Nevertheless not all have the same relation to this end, as is already clear from what has been said: for some are ordered of themselves, namely by their intrinsic nature ordered to this end, whether immediately or mediately, as, for example, the 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 of themselves repugnant, or by their intrinsic nature discordant with the common end of human life, whether again immediately or mediately, 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 with the order of reason, therefore they are then prohibited by the natural law. Finally, there are other acts which of themselves, or by their intrinsic nature, are not necessarily connected with the aforesaid end and consequently with the order of reason, as, for example, conversing with a friend, going 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 of his own accord wishes to place them, he certainly ought to exercise them in such a way, by the very necessity of attaining the end, that he not withdraw from the end, but always tend to the end, since for this reason nature itself has given man the faculty of acting freely, that through free action he may lead himself to the end. Whence by the very fact that an act, namely an act in the concrete, is not repugnant to the end, it is already consonant with the end at least in some way and morally good. St. Thomas, 2 Dist. 40. q. 1. a. 5. And hence again it is clear what the order and rectitude of reason signify, 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 the Angelic Doctor calls moral good that which agrees with the order of reason, and likewise honorable good that which agrees with the rectitude of reason, 1. 2. q. 18. a. 8, q. 39. a. 2.

23. Likewise the proximate and formal rule, namely law, also embraces all human acts: since it commands some and prohibits others; but those which it neither commands nor prohibits, but permits either positively or negatively, are to be performed, by that same commanding law, in such a way that they are not repugnant to the order and rectitude of reason; and thus acts of this sort are by that very fact morally good, since if in performing them the order of reason is observed, they are already fitting to reason and morally good and honorable.

24. If the fundamental rule is compared with the proximate objective and subjective rule, it is clear that in truth the end, by the very fact that it is the foundation of the morality or rectitude of the act ordered and directed to it, is not properly a rule, but is merely the end or term of that act, whose order to the aforesaid end or term ought to be measured according to some rule, which indeed is law and human reason; and if law is compared to human reason, the former is the remote rule, the latter the proximate rule. “It must be said,” says St. Thomas, q. 21. a. 1, “that evil is broader than sin, just as good is broader than right. For any privation of good in anything whatever constitutes the character of evil; but sin properly consists in an act which is done for some end, when it does not have the due order to that end. But due order is measured according to some rule, which rule, indeed, in those things which act according to nature, is the very power of nature, which inclines to such an end. Therefore, when an act proceeds from natural power according to a natural inclination to the end, then rectitude is preserved in the act, because the mean does not depart from the extremes, namely the act from the order of the active principle to the end; but when some act recedes from such rectitude, then the account of sin enters in. But in those things which are done through the will, the proximate rule is human reason, while the supreme rule is the eternal law. 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 that every voluntary act is evil by this, that it recedes from the order of reason and of the eternal law. Whence it follows that a human act, from the fact that it is good or evil, has the character either of rectitude or of sin.... It must be said that the end is twofold, namely ultimate and proximate. But in a sin of nature an act indeed falls short of the ultimate end, which is the perfection of the generated thing; but it does not fall short of every proximate end, for nature works by forming something. Similarly, in a sin of the will there is always a defect from the ultimate intended end, because no evil act of the will is orderable to beatitude, which is the ultimate end, although it does not fall short of some proximate end which the will intends and attains. Whence, even when the very intention of this end is ordered to the ultimate end, in the very intention of an end of this sort the account of rectitude and sin can be found.”

25. From the nature of morality explained, it is easily deduced that it is altogether honorable to act for the sake of an end, in hope of remuneration or from fear of punishments; since every human action, in order that it be morally good, ought to tend to man’s ultimate end and lead man to it. Reward and punishment, which are proposed by God Himself the Lawgiver, so that He may move men to obey His law and thus attain eternal happiness, are most apt means for attaining the end; and therefore it is not against the right order of reason, but, on the contrary, it is according to right reason to act from the motive of the aforesaid hope or from fear of the aforesaid punishments. For he who acts from the aforesaid motive wills nothing except the true good of man and flees evil, since eternal happiness is the greatest good of man, and eternal damnation is the greatest evil. — Nor indeed would there be disorder in such an operation from the fact that then man would order God to himself. For when the good for the sake of acquiring which man acts is some particular good, entirely secondary and wholly accidental to himself, then certainly the end for the sake of which, or for the sake of attaining which, the will acts is secondary; and the end for whom, or the subject and person for whom that good is loved and sought, takes on the more principal character of end, because his perfection simply is intended more. But when that good for the sake of acquiring which man acts, or which he loves for himself, is the greatest and highest good with respect to him for whom it is loved, as God is with respect to man, then that good is also principal in the account of end, because it is simply the ultimate end and cannot rightly be ordered to another as to an end. Therefore, when man loves this good for himself, he does not order it to himself as to an end, but rather loves to be joined to that good as to his good and ultimate end; and therefore he does not order God to himself, but rather himself to God as to the ultimate end, namely he orders himself to God not as a means, but as a subject which can attain an end of this sort.

26. From the declared nature of morality, and its origin or source, it further follows that not every human act takes its rectitude or perversity from positive law. For antecedently to every law certain acts are naturally right, others naturally perverse. “This,” says St. Thomas, Contra Gentiles, l. 3, c. 129, “the natural order requires, that lower things be subject to higher things. Therefore those things which are commanded by divine law are in themselves naturally right.” And altogether from this reason it is that man by natural reason itself breaks forth into natural moral principles of his own operations. These principles indeed concern those things which are naturally fitting to man and right in themselves, and not only because they have been constituted by law. St. Thomas, in the cited place. This natural rectitude is from the very nature of man, and therefore is most truly natural. “Of whatever things,” says St. Thomas in the cited place, “there is a determinate nature, there must be determinate operations which agree with that nature; for the proper operation of each thing follows its own nature. But it is clear that man’s nature is determinate. Therefore there must be some operations fitting to man in themselves.” Hence it is easy to determine many things which naturally fit man, both in order to himself, and in order to exterior things, and in order to other men, and in order to God, which are right in themselves. St. Thomas continues in the cited place: “According to the natural order the body of man is for the sake of the soul, and the lower powers of the soul are for the sake of reason, just as also in other things matter is for the sake of form, and instruments for the sake of the principal agent. But from that which is ordered to another, help ought to come to it, not some impediment. Therefore it is naturally right that the body and lower powers of the soul be so cared for by man that from this the act of reason and the good of reason itself be least impeded, and rather helped. But if it should happen otherwise, it will be naturally a sin. Therefore drunkennesses and feastings, and the disordered use of venereal things, through which the act of reason is impeded and is subjected to passions, which do not permit the free judgment of reason to exist, are naturally evil.... Moreover man naturally has this, that he uses lower things for the necessity of his life. But there is some determinate measure according to which the use of the aforesaid things is fitting to human life; and if this measure is passed over, it becomes harmful to man, as appears in the disordered taking of foods. Therefore some human acts are naturally fitting, and some naturally unfitting.... But it is natural to man that he be social. This is shown from the fact that one man alone does not suffice for all things which are necessary for human life. Therefore those things without which human society cannot be preserved are naturally fitting to man. Of this sort are preserving for each one what is his own and abstaining from injuries. Therefore there are some things in human acts naturally right.... Finally, those things by which each one tends to his own natural end naturally fit him; but those which stand contrariwise are naturally unfitting. Man is naturally ordered to God as to an end. Therefore those things by which man is led into the knowledge and love of God are naturally right; but those which are contrary are naturally evil for man. Therefore it is clear that good and evil in human acts are not only according to the positing of law, but according to the natural order. Hence it is that in Ps. 18:10 it is said that the judgments of God are true and justified in themselves. But by this is excluded the position of those saying that just and right things are according to law posited”; namely, in human acts there are some things right according to nature, and not only as if posited by law, as is had in the title of the chapter.

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.

31. The same St. Thomas says these things in the cited q. 20. a. 4: “It must be said that if we speak of the goodness of the exterior act which it has from the goodness of the end, then the exterior act adds nothing to goodness, unless it happen that the will itself according to itself becomes better in good things, or worse in evil things. And this indeed seems able to happen in three ways: in one way according to number, as when someone wills to do something with a good end or an evil one, and then indeed does not do it, but afterward wills and does it; the act of the will is doubled, and thus there is made a double good or a double evil. In another way as to extension: as when someone wills to do something with a good end or an evil one, and desists because of some impediment; but another continues the movement of the will until he completes the work. It is manifest that a will of this sort is more lasting in good or evil, and according to this it is worse or better. Thirdly, according to intensity; for there are certain exterior acts which, insofar as they are pleasurable or painful, are apt to intensify or lessen the will. But it is clear that the more intensely the will tends to good or evil, the better or worse it is. But if we speak of the goodness of the exterior act which it has according to matter and due circumstances, thus it is compared to the will as term and end, and in this way it adds to the goodness or malice of the will, because every inclination or movement is perfected in this, that it obtains the end or attains the term. Whence the will is not perfect unless it is such that it acts when there is opportunity. But if possibility is lacking, while the will exists as perfect, so that it would act if it could, the defect of perfection which is from the exterior act is simply involuntary. But the involuntary, just as it does not merit punishment or reward in doing good or evil, so also does not take away anything from reward or from punishment if a man involuntarily simply fails in doing good or evil.” Here the question concerns the goodness and malice of acts with respect to essential reward or punishment, for the exterior act adds to accidental reward, as the same Angelic Doctor says, 2 Dist. 40. a. 3. Cf. 1. 2. q. 13. a. 5 ad 1.

32. And in the same q. 20. a. 5, the Angelic Doctor, speaking of a following event, “whether an event of this sort adds something of goodness or malice to the exterior act,” responds: “It must be said that the following event is either forethought (namely foreseen and intended, either directly or indirectly, q. 73. a. 8 ad 1), or it is not. If it is forethought, it is manifest that it adds to goodness or malice. For when someone, thinking that many evils can follow from his work, nevertheless does not on this account leave it off, from this his will appears more disordered. But if the following event is not forethought, then a distinction must be made, because if it follows of itself from such an act, and as in most cases, according to this the following event adds to the goodness or malice of the act. For it is manifest that an act is better from its genus from which more goods can follow; and worse, from which more evils are apt to follow. But if it follows accidentally and as in fewer cases, then the following event does not add to the goodness or malice of the act. For judgment is not given concerning a thing according to that which is accidental, but only according to that which is of itself.” An effect following accidentally does not add goodness and malice to the interior act unless it is intended, or unless it is at least in some way foreseen and one can and ought to prevent it. An effect alone following of itself, even if it is not intended or foreseen, adds goodness and malice to the interior act, or rather is a sign of its perfection, because what follows an act of itself is virtually and implicitly willed.

33. The question is also raised: whether the same exterior act can be good and evil? — “It must be said that nothing prevents something from being one according as it is in one genus, and being 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 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 several according to the genus of morals, if the will of the one walking 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 nevertheless, if it is one by unity of nature and not by unity of morals, it can be good and evil.” St. Thomas, 1. 2. q. 20. a. 6.

34. But concerning the passions in particular it is asked: “Whether moral good and evil can be found in the passions of the soul? — It must be said that the passions of the soul can be considered in two ways: in one way, according to themselves; in another way, according as they are subject to the command of reason and will. Therefore, if they are considered according to themselves, namely insofar as they are certain movements of the irrational appetite, thus there is not in them moral good or evil, which depends on reason, as was said above, q. 19. a. 3. But if they are considered according as they are subject to the command of reason and will, thus there is in them moral good or evil. For the sensitive appetite is nearer to reason itself and to the will than are the exterior members, whose movements and acts nevertheless are morally good or evil according as they are voluntary. Whence much more the passions themselves, according as they are voluntary, can be called morally good or evil. But they are called voluntary either from the fact that they are commanded by the will, or from the fact that they are not prohibited by the will,” St. Thomas, 1. 2. q. 24. a. 1, namely when they can and ought to be prohibited. Therefore it is not necessary that the passions always decline from the order of natural reason. Insofar as they are beyond the order of reason, they incline to sin; insofar as they are ordered by reason, they pertain to virtue, St. Thomas, ibid. a. 2. Hence the same Angelic Doctor says in article 3: “If by passions we simply name all movements of the sensitive appetite (and not only disordered movements), thus it pertains to the perfection of the human good that even the passions themselves be moderated by reason. For since man’s good consists in reason as in a root, that good will be more perfect the more it can be derived to the many things which fit man. Whence no one doubts that it pertains to the perfection of moral good that the acts of the exterior members be directed by the rule of reason. Whence, since the sensitive appetite can obey reason, as was said above, q. 17. a. 7, it pertains to the perfection of the moral or human good that even the passions themselves of the soul be regulated by reason. Therefore, just as it is better that man both will the good and do it by an exterior act, so also it pertains to the perfection of moral good that man be moved to good not only according to the will, but also according to the sensitive appetite, according to what is said in Ps. 83:8, My heart and my flesh have exulted in the living God, so that we take heart for the intellective appetite, but flesh for the sensitive appetite.” Therefore, just as exterior acts, so the passions can be considered in two ways: in one way according as they are in the genus of nature, and thus moral good or evil does not pertain to the species of the act or passion; in another way according as they are referred to the genus of morals, namely insofar as they participate something of the voluntary and of the judgment of reason, and in this way moral good and evil pertains to the species of the act or passion. Now, just as it has been said concerning exterior acts that they are good or evil according to themselves from the object, and that they are good or evil from the end, so it must be said concerning the passions. And as exterior acts are good or evil or indifferent from the object, because they bear before themselves something consonant with reason or discordant from it, or holding itself neutrally, as to pray to God and to help the poor man, theft and adultery, to walk and to speak: so in like manner some passions are consonant with reason, and some discordant, and some neutral, as mercy and shame, which is fear of a base thing; envy, which is sadness over another’s good; anger, which can be an appetite for ordered or disordered vengeance. Likewise, as exterior acts are morally good or evil from the end of the will, so also are the passions, as when someone from the judgment of reason chooses to be affected by some passion, so that, with the sensitive appetite cooperating, he may operate more promptly well or badly. And thus passion adds to the moral goodness or malice of the act. St. Thomas, 1. 2. q. 24. a. 4; a. 3 ad 1. — Cf. the little work De Essentia boni malique moralis of Augustus Ferretti, who wrote excellently concerning the essence of morality against modern errors.

"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.

"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 resolution 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.

"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.

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.

Order of speaking. - First we shall treat a few common points of manifest utility: obligation and the secondary forms of laws; then we shall treat of ecclesiastical law and then of civil law.

— The true causality of human law. Besides those things which natural law has either itself determined, or at least sanctions after they have been constituted by the voluntary assent of men, there are many other things which can in various ways be ordered to the common good, or which at least, if they are commended by manifest utility, because of the opposed utilities of private persons, will of themselves obtain no consensus except the one which human power has commanded. Therefore the Author and wise provider of nature has conferred upon public authority or the human Legislator the power of defining and urging these things. He, therefore, does not merely give place to some conditioned natural right, but by his will becomes the true cause, and indeed the principal cause, of the law whose scope, severity, and firmness are subject to his will. Yet the very force of efficaciously commanding or obliging in the Prince is present from divine Law, whether positive, when it is a question of the Church, or natural, when it is a question of civil Society. The communication of power through positive divine law was made by the words by which Christ, after recalling that all power had been given to Him, sent His apostles as the Father had sent Him, with the power of binding and loosing. But the communication through the law of nature is demonstrated in the divine will which, willing human society, does not allow the same to be destitute of necessary means.

Therefore, by authority communicated through divine law, human law is the truly principal cause of moral obligation.

— Connatural efficacy of law. He who establishes law or precepts on account of the common good does not urge a particular debt to himself, but efficaciously wills those things which are required by the common good. But the common good, since it coalesces from many elements, requires acts of many virtues, indeed of all virtues, those, for example, by which rights are observed and due services are rendered to parents and Superiors. Therefore, that his governance may be efficacious, the legislator can make those acts necessary according to themselves, or, if they were already due, confirm their necessity by a new title. He effects this when he establishes law, or when he commands from jurisdiction. And so a thing prescribed from jurisdiction takes on the necessity of the virtues to which it belongs, so that violation of the law is opposed to these various virtues. Cf. for example Cajetan, on 2, 2, q. 88 art. 5, where he excellently shows what difference there is between an obligation from law and one which is contracted from a vow.

Because the legislator can command below, yet not beyond, the capacity of the matter, two things must be weighed by us: what matter is capable of grave obligation; what is prudently thought to be the mind of the legislator.

— 1. Matter capable of grave obligation. The observance of positive law, as such, does not denote that immediate relation to the end of man which we detect in the observance of natural law.

Obligation comes because of an end distinct from that which is at once natural and essential; and therefore it draws its necessity not from the essence of the subject to which the law is prescribed, but from that end. Here, however, divine law must carefully be distinguished from human law.

For when it is a question of positive divine law by which we are raised to the supernatural order, the end of the law is man's very higher ultimate end, by which the merely natural end is, as it were, absorbed. Wherefore, when it is imputable, contrariety voluntarily opposed to the order of that higher end has greater gravity than contrariety which would have been repugnant to the merely natural order: for it contains aversion from a more excellent good, contempt of a greater benefit.

But the end of human law is always secondary. It denotes the complement of the primary order by which man is directed through divine law to his ultimate end. Moreover, that end can be discerned and estimated by human reason.

The same thing can be proposed in this other way. Because every other obligation is rooted and founded in the power of natural law, human law obliges conscience insofar as its observance or violation touches the essential order constituted by natural law. Thus, in the private relation between father and son, the violation of a paternal precept will be grave insofar as the father is at once gravely and reasonably unwilling that his precept be violated, and thus the order of piety toward him is truly disturbed. And in the public relation between legislator and subject, violation of law or precept will be thought grave insofar as it is notably opposed to the common good which is intended by the law, or insofar as the community, which acts through the legislator and whose good is intended, must be judged gravely and reasonably unwilling.

To form a prudent judgment concerning the gravity of the matter, two things, as we have already insinuated, must be considered: the object of the law or precept ¹, and the proportion of the prescribed means in order to that object. From the end and the intermediate precept, says Suarez, "having been viewed by prudent judgment, the gravity of the matter is to be gathered" (Suarez, Leg., l. 3, c. 25, n. 7; cf. Lehmkuhl, I, 240).

Concerning that prudent judgment, these things must further be noted. a) Considered separately from the end, the matter can be very slight, while, conjoined with the end, it is shown to be grave. Thus, under grave obligation, a very small amount of water is to be mixed with the wine by the sacrificing Priest, because that smallest quantity is necessary and suffices for the symbolic representation of the Incarnation in the rites of the Mass. b) Because of the diversity of the end, the same thing can be grave when it is prescribed by the Church, light when by civil power (Lehmkuhl, I, 240), or even imposed from the dominative power of parents. Thus, the omission of one Mass is grave if it is opposed to the precept of the Church, but not if it contradicts civil law or the command of parents. c) There are many acts which, considered separately, are not gravely harmful to the common good; but they would become such if they were done by many. It gravely concerns the commonwealth that that danger be averted. Wherefore the human legislator can forbid these things to individuals under grave obligation. Thus, that one citizen withdraw himself from military service or not pay taxes has of itself slight importance. That many withdraw themselves would gravely harm. These things, therefore, can be forbidden under grave obligation.

Presumption favors the legislator if he urges the precept under grave obligation (Suarez, Leg., l. 3, c. 25, n. 4).

¹ Object must be taken broadly, insofar as, besides matter, it comprises circumstances and especially the end of the law, especially the proximate or intrinsic end, through which the virtue to which the prescribed thing pertains is shown. Cf. what was said concerning moral specification.

— The mind of the legislator concerning obligation. That we may prudently solve the other question, namely when the legislator is judged to command according to the capacity of the matter, when to diminish the obligation or even to establish a merely penal law, ecclesiastical law must be wholly separated from civil law. It is already understood of itself that in a society which exists on account of a spiritual good and often cannot use external coercion, moral laws ought to be far more numerous than in a temporal society, which is accustomed to be physically armed. To this today is added the practical atheism of many public administrations. Wherefore:

1. Concerning ecclesiastical law these things must be held:

a) Unless there is a contrary sign, an ecclesiastical law prescribing or forbidding imposes an obligation of conscience, and one congruent with the matter;

A clause attenuating the obligation or even reducing the law to a penal one is customarily appended to modern constitutions of religious. The received opinion also of approved authors has attenuated the force of many rubrics, for example those which are to be observed outside Mass;

b) Signs of declared grave obligation are: alpha) Words which have great force: "we command, we interdict, in virtue of holy obedience, or by force of vow or oath, or we gravely mandate" ¹. The word "I command" is also adapted to light matter. beta) The persuasion of experts and the usage of the timorous, who estimate the matter in this way. gamma) Now, when it is a question of a universal law of the Church, the threat of a penalty either latae or even ferendae sententiae. For from c. 2218 § 2, we gather that the threat of a penalty is not made in the Code unless the Legislator has the matter of itself as grave and has willed to impose it as grave. For that canon declares immune from any penalty one who in the external forum has shaken off grave imputability from himself. Therefore, under this respect, the various divisions of penalties which were proposed before the Code can now be omitted.

2. Concerning civil law, controversies being omitted, these things seem able to be said prudently. The power of binding conscience is in no way lacking even to an ethnic or little-pious legislator. But more easily, because of the faculty of coercion, he can be content with an imposed penalty. And modern legislators, especially Parliaments, are accustomed to be little solicitous about guilt before God. Moreover, many subjects, even from among those who are reputed civilly honorable, utterly put aside this obligation of conscience; but it seems little consonant with equity that some should be pressed by a stronger burden of law than others. Again, however, the common good itself demands that certain laws be efficacious in conscience. Such are laws which more define the rights of private persons, for example the regulation of inheritance and the modes of acquiring goods; or which, in a matter where the legislator is competent, utterly extinguish certain obligations. Does not the common good require that the sentence of a judge be able of itself to be observed in conscience; that the same person of himself be owner before God and before law; that a "dualism" by which one answers otherwise in conscience and otherwise in the external forum be avoided in patrimonial questions? Moreover, law at the same time indicates what it is expedient or necessary to do for the common good. Wherefore circumstances can impose a moral necessity of doing what the law, even if of itself penal, has prescribed. Nor can an added penalty remove guilt which can be in an action from the object, from circumstances, from the end, and from the manner. Homicide remains morally evil, although it is punished by a most grave civil penalty: no one will doubt this. And attention must also be given to the declaration which can be contained even in civil law. Let us suppose that an edict is promulgated by public power by which certain acts of treason are noted and therefore punished with a most grave penalty. Can those acts, with attention to the most grave penalty of the external forum, be done without guilt of conscience? By no means. For besides the penal sanction, an edict of this sort contains an authentic declaration concerning the quality of certain acts. And treason itself is forbidden by the law of nature.

These things having been set down, these brief conclusions concerning the obligation of civil law can be proposed:

a) Today, according to a probable opinion, only those civil laws immediately oblige conscience which, because of the necessity of the common good, must have such force. This more often happens in laws which decree concerning rights than in those which directly prescribe or forbid something under penalty;

b) Nevertheless a law must be held as moral and not merely penal which by common estimation or by the judgment of several learned men is thought immediately to bind conscience. Cf. Lehmkuhl, I, 312. For custom is the best interpreter of laws; nor can it be denied that, after the immense war which will keep the name of "the great war," souls, from the perceived necessity of the common matter, incline more toward urging the obligation of conscience;

c) The gravity of an added penalty, especially of a fine, can sometimes, but not always, be an indication of a penal law, as if it should seem excessive for the guilty person at the same time to incur sin and such a penalty. This will especially happen when, as in merely fiscal laws, a pecuniary penalty formally compensates for the prestation owed;

d) More often than many think, circumstances bring it about that a law which is of itself penal must be observed in conscience. Thus, in time of war, it is by no means lawful for a duly enlisted soldier to desert the line of battle. Thus, when, to prevent or repel the scarcity of goods or their excessive price, citizens are ordered either to bring foodstuffs into common stock, or to be content with a moderated price, common necessity will easily impose these things in conscience;

e) What is said concerning the accidental obligation of religious rules from scandal, from subjective disorder of appetite, etc., must be transferred here also, proportion being preserved;

f) Yet we ought not urge civil laws, for example fiscal laws, beyond the way in which upright men are accustomed to observe them. But at the same time such observance must be inculcated upon all.

Moreover, the question will recur concerning various laws, and in the civil matter, it is especially moved concerning laws of taxes, hunting, fishing, and exterior police.

Finally, he who has violated a law from formal contempt of the legislator or of authority as such will have sinned gravely by that contempt itself: something else would have to be said if the thing prescribed is merely contemned because it is esteemed little or because it has not been rightly prescribed (Ballerini-Palmieri, Opus theol., I, tr. 3, De Legibus, n. 303).

¹ Thus Busembaum, De Legibus, dub. IV, apud St. Alphonsus or Ballerini-Palmieri.

— What can be prescribed. 1. From the very notion of law it is gathered that the human legislator can prescribe all and only that which it is expedient to prescribe for the common good of the society over which he is placed. And matter reserved to the ordering of the power which rules a higher society must be excepted, such as pontifical authority is with respect to episcopal or diocesan authority, and ecclesiastical power toward civil authority.

2. Merely internal acts are excluded. For human law, since it is a common precept, affects individuals insofar as they are part of a visible society and therefore communicate socially with one another. Wherefore that power is necessarily of the external forum. Legislative power for the internal forum cannot be conceived unless as vicarious of God and to be exercised in the name of God: but no trace of such power is detected either directly from revelation or indirectly from the usage of the Church ¹. But internal acts, that is, acts which are completed in internal powers, do not pertain to social communication: through them we do not communicate with others. Therefore, whether it is a question of civil society or even of the Church, interior acts directly and according to themselves cannot be the object of human law. Thus St. Thomas, who applies this to any precept whatsoever of a Superior, using this reason, that man can neither bear judgment concerning another's internal acts nor efficaciously exact penalties ². And indeed, legislative, judicial, and coercive power are parts of one integral jurisdictional power, which therefore of itself is contained by the same limits.

Suarez, Leg., l. 4, c. 12-13; Lugo, De Fide, d. 23, n. 6, 10; St. Alphonsus, l. 7, n. 34; d'Annibale, I, 200, also hold this. Yet there are not lacking today those who think that the power of prescribing internal acts must be conceded to the Church. Thus Ballerini-Palmieri, Op. th., I, n. 390 ff.; Bouquillon, n. 110, whom Lehmkuhl, I, 221-224, favors.

Nevertheless:

a) Hidden acts are not excluded from human jurisdiction: they are hidden by accident;

b) By human power mixed acts can be commanded, which are composed of an exterior act and an interior act required either that the act be human, or that the act be juridically valid, or that it have the prescribed species. For unless you wish to erect a futile human power, it must be able to reach those things which integrate the exterior act. Thus he who is ordered to take an oath or administer a sacrament must have the intention of swearing or administering. He who is obligated to an act of divine worship, for example to reciting the breviary, violates the human law itself if he has not conceived the intention essential to prayer. The worthy reception of the sacraments can also be prescribed by the Church;

c) An act which is capable of both modes, interior and exterior, falls under human precept by reason of the exterior mode which can be enjoined. Yet of itself it will be enough that the subject by an interior act do what he is ordered to perform. Thus a religious Superior, the Pope, can prescribe the application of Mass, since they can exact that the application be conceived by voice or in writing. But even an application made internally satisfies the law of itself;

d) The Church can attach a certain favor, for example an indulgence, to the condition of an interior act. Yet she is accustomed to exact some exterior act. Cf. concerning indulgences;

e) When a dogma is defined or an infallible moral declaration is promulgated, divine law itself imposes interior assent. But excommunication for merely internal heresy is not incurred. Cf. Lugo, De Fide, d. 23, n. 6, 10;

f) For the good of individuals, the Church has been endowed with a certain judicial and dispensative power of the internal forum, to be exercised in the name of God. While she uses that power, by absolution and dispensation, she absolves or remits even internal sins and internal vows. And in the same forum, where the cause is conducted between God and man, internal acts also can be prescribed.

Furthermore - this is the practical force of that opinion - what the Church cannot prescribe, she cannot fortify with a censure latae sententiae, or, if perhaps it becomes known, sanction by a judicial sentence.

Therefore those differ less from the doctrine handed down above who, with the approved authorities cited by Ballerini-Palmieri, I, 390 ff., distinguish directive force from coercive force, and attribute to ecclesiastical power only directive force over merely internal acts. Yet they use a little-effective argumentation. When they appeal to the end of ecclesiastical power, which is the spiritual good of souls, it is easily answered that, if it is a question of social power or of the external forum, the end is the spiritual good of souls to be procured through an apt social cooperation, but not through the direction of individual persons: this pertains to the internal forum, where human power is not legislative. Nor are the words of Christ to be pressed: "Whatever thou shalt bind," etc. For these must be accommodated to the nature of the thing, to the mission of the Church, and to the traditional sense; otherwise a direct power in temporal matters also would have to be acknowledged to the Church.

¹ Suarez, Leg., l. 4, c. 12, n. 10.

² 1, 2, q. 91 art. 4; q. 96 art. 5.

— In canon 10 this rule is laid down: "Laws regard future things, not past things, unless provision is made in them concerning past things by name."

But a few things must be added concerning the application of the rule and concerning the exceptions by which it is circumscribed.

1. Concerning the application of the rule:

a) The application is clear when it is a question of a law merely prescribing or prohibiting. Acts done before were licit, and cannot constitute anyone guilty;

b) With respect to a penal law, the act of itself must be estimated by the law which was then in force. But derogation from this rule in favor of the accused is customary. Cf. immediately below;

c) The application is more difficult to a law which invalidates acts, makes persons incapable, or exacts conditions for the valid or licit celebration of an act. How is an acquired right to be defined, from which, in these cases, there must be no derogation? The discord of opinions concerning this matter is astonishing. From the principle handed down above, n. 173, acts remain valid if the conditions of capacity and form which were required when the act was done have been fulfilled. Yet concerning a revocable and easily repeatable act, such as a testament, the matter is controverted, so that one must act cautiously in this matter.

As regards the legal effects of an act, the effects produced up to the new law subsist; that is plain. But from the moment of the new law, the efficacy of a valid act will of itself have to be estimated from the new law. Suppose a law which changes the portion concerning which a testator is permitted to dispose freely, or introduces a new cause why agreements can be rescinded. That law will also rule prior agreements and testaments concerning an inheritance not yet devolved when the law is promulgated. The status of persons (insofar as it is defined by age and origin) is of itself ruled by the new law. Wherefore an adolescent who was fifteen years old when the Code began to be in force previously could validly take a wife. But from the Code being in force he will not be able to do this until he has completed the sixteenth year of age. Yet the marriage which, as is plain, he contracted before the Code when fourteen years old subsists. A minor does not retain under the new law (c. 93, § 2) a domicile which he had acquired under the former law.

Concerning the effects of agreements, this particular thing must be observed, that the parties, through the legitimate way of agreements, acquired for themselves rights which of themselves must remain untouched under the new law. Wherefore, even under the new law, the effects of agreements must be estimated from the law under which they were made.

2. Concerning the exceptions to the rule:

a) The procedural order (or order of judging) which is established by a new law is applied to cases born before the new law. For the new mode is presumed to be more perfect, and therefore is thought to be such that its use of itself is more useful to justice and to the litigating parties ¹;

b) Because the accused is to be favored, can. 2219, § 2 establishes this rule: "Although a later penal law obrogates a prior one, nevertheless, if the delict, when the later law was made, had already been committed, the law more favorable to the accused must be applied; but if the later law removes the law or only the penalty, this ceases at once, unless it is a question of censures already contracted."

N.B. Many things in this matter remain doubtful and controverted, concerning which cf. juridical treatises. We add only this one thing: since a later law is presumed to be more perfect than the preceding one, in doubt one should rather answer in favor of it.

¹ Yet a moderation is tolerated, for example, in causes of beatification by way of non-cult, which were begun before the more severe new law.

141. Preliminary Note. Having considered human acts, it is necessary to treat of the norms of their morality. The norm of the morality of human acts is the eternal law and its application in a rational creature, namely, conscience,¹ or in other words: The supreme norm according to which all human acts must be directed is the eternal law ordained by God. For God is our ultimate end, and in conjunction with Him consists our beatitude, toward which all human acts must tend.² By force of His supreme dominion God has prescribed to us the way by which we can come to Him and to our beatitude. The laws given by Him indicate this way. Not all laws indeed have been given immediately and directly by God, but some are imposed upon us only indirectly and mediately (namely, through a legitimate created authority). But all laws, as many as are just, must necessarily be derived in some way from the eternal law.³ Hence it follows that we cannot attain our ultimate beatitude except by obeying just laws, whether divine or human. - The proximate (subjective) norm of our actions is our conscience or the dictate of right reason; and this norm indeed must agree with and be subordinated to the laws given by God. All human acts are to be regulated from these two norms; if they agree with them, they are morally good; but if they disagree, they are morally evil, or sins. Therefore fittingly after the treatise on human acts there is subjoined the treatise on the norms of morality, and indeed first on the supreme and objective norm, namely, on the eternal law and the other laws deduced from it; and then on the proximate and subjective norm, that is, on conscience.⁴ The whole treatise on laws, which is equally necessary in Moral Theology and in Ecclesiastical Law, we divide into three chapters:

1. On the notion and divisions of law in general;

2. On law given by God, or on divine law;

3. On human law.

¹ Cf. above n. 108.

² Cf. above n. 24.

³ S. theol. I-II, q. 93, a. 3.

⁴ In the work Philosophia moralis et socialis (I, n. 341), the distinguished L. Lehu well proves that according to logical order the treatise on laws is to be placed before the treatise on conscience.

120. Object of the Question.

The distinction between moral good and evil having been supposed, it is now to be asked concerning the reason, criteria, and foundations of this distinction, and concerning the fundamental principle. To this we shall speak 1) of the intrinsic difference between moral good and evil; 2) of the subjective criterion or norm according to which morality can be determined; 3) of the objective criterion and ultimate foundation of morality; 4) of the errors to be noted and refuted in this matter; 5) of the cognitive faculty of morality, for the question is connected with the preceding ones.

St. Thomas, I-II, q. 19, a. 3 and 4; q. 21, a. 1; q. 71, a. 6; q. 72, a. 4 and 8; q. 74, a. 7; q. 86, a. 1 and 2; q. 63, a. 2; De Malo, q. 2, a. 4; q. 16, a. 2.

124. Thesis I. The nearer and intrinsic norm of morality is right practical human reason.

It is explained: it is said to be: 1) reason, and not only conscience, which is the rule of the subjective morality of human acts, while here it is a question especially of the norm of objective morality: for conscience is particular reason, by which a determinate person judges concerning the morality of such an act in particular and applies the law to a determinate concrete case; here, however, universal reason is considered more, which judges concerning the morality of acts in the universal and enunciates law, and is by essence common, and is in all men;

2. right, that is, judging conformably to the eternal law, from which it flows as from the source and rule of every good; for, as St. Thomas says, II Sent. d. 24, q. 3, a. 3, ad 3: "Corrupt reason is not reason, just as a false syllogism properly is not a syllogism, and therefore the rule of human acts is not any reason whatever, but right reason," which alone is able fittingly to order to the end and as it ought;

3. it is the nearer norm, rather than the proximate norm: for the latter is conscience, which applies the law to the concrete act, and thus is the wholly proximate and immediate rule of acting; and with respect to it, universal reason or law is already a more remote rule; and nevertheless this is a near rule with respect to the supreme and ultimate rule, which is the eternal law of God himself;

4. and intrinsic: for reason is intrinsic to man, while the eternal law of God is extrinsic to him.

The thesis is proved 1) by facts: a moral action must be called good, like any being, when it attains its end or at least tends rightly and ordinately to its proper end. But it belongs to man's practical reason to detect what our ultimate end is, and what means are necessary or useful for attaining this end. Therefore human reason is the norm of the goodness or malice of human acts.

The minor is proved:

a) Generally, by experience;

b) Especially from the difference between rational and irrational nature (I-II, q. 91, a. 2): for it is established that man rules himself and orders his acts to the end; since therefore order is according to a rule, there had to be inserted into man a rule by which he might rule himself and be able to order his acts: and this is nothing other than reason.

c) For just as speculative reason is born to know the true, so practical reason is able to perceive the good (under the aspect of the true), that is, the ordered relation of acts to the ultimate end; for example, it dictates that blasphemy is evil as contrary to God, the ultimate end, and that intemperance is a sin because men abuse for the pleasure of the senses those things which are ordered to their preservation.

Briefly: the judgment of practical reason has as its object the agreement and disagreement of an act with the end. But the goodness of an action resides in the relation of agreement and subordination to the ultimate end of rational nature; malice, in the relation of disagreement. Therefore the judgment of practical reason showing this relation is the subjective criterion manifesting it, and thus the norm of goodness and malice.

2. By reason taken from St. Thomas, I-II, q. 90, a. 1: in each genus that which is the principle is the measure and rule of that genus. Reason is the first principle of human acts, because to it belongs ordering to the end, which is the first principle in things to be done. Therefore the rule and measure of human acts is reason.

125. Thesis II. The supreme and extrinsic norm and the ultimate rule of morality is the reason of God or the eternal law itself.

It is said to be: 1) the supreme norm, because morality depends more upon that rule than upon the near rule. For an effect depends more upon the first cause than upon the second cause, since the second cause does not act except in the power of the first cause; hence that human reason is the rule of morality, it has from the eternal law. Therefore morality depends more upon the eternal law than upon human reason (q. 19, a. 4);

2. ultimate: namely, the nearer norm is founded ultimately in the remote and fundamental norm or eternal law. Hence human reason is called the near, subordinate, and regulated norm of morality; the eternal law is called the ultimate and supreme and regulating norm (q. 71, a. 6; q. 21, a. 1);

3. it is eternal law, that is, divine reason insofar as it conceives the ordination of all actions and orders them to the ultimate end, the will of God insofar as it necessarily wills this ordination to be observed by man, and the reason of God insofar as it commands this ordination and imposes it upon us.

It is proved: 1) human reason is true or false according as it is conformed to truth or not: for it is cognitive, not productive, of truth.

But the measure of all truth is the reason of God, which is the first truth and productive of every other truth.

Therefore human reason is a true rule according as it is conformed to the reason of God (q. 19, a. 4).

2. In human acts good and evil are said from order to the ultimate end. But the ultimate end is constituted and intended by the author of nature. Therefore the supreme ordination of human acts is from God; and acts are good or evil according to the ordination of God.

3. Hence the third proposition of the Syllabus was condemned: "Human reason, with no regard at all had to God, is the only arbiter of the true and the false, of good and evil."

They object: We do not know the eternal law; therefore it is not a rule. - Resp. It becomes known from creatures and especially from the knowledge of human nature, for all things have from the eternal law that they are ordered and moved to their own end and to the end of the whole universe: "Although the eternal law is unknown to us according as it is in the divine mind, nevertheless it becomes known to us in some way either through natural reason, which is derived from it (and is known to be derived) as its proper image, or through some superadded revelation" (q. 19, a. 4, ad 3).

126. Corollary.

Human reason is the secondary and near, proper or homogeneous, and immanent rule; the eternal law is the primary and supreme, heterogeneous, and transcendent norm (q. 19, a. 4, ad 2; q. 21, a. 1; q. 71, a. 6).

It is necessary to ask not only about the subjective criterion of morality, or about the norm by which it is discerned, but also about the objective criterion and foundation of the intrinsic distinction between good and evil, or about the ontological principle from which the rule of morality has its origin and force, and upon which right reason rests in order to judge what is good or evil.

127. Thesis. The proximate objective foundation of morality, or of the rule of reason, is human nature with its end and essential relations; the ultimate foundation, or that of the eternal law, is the divine essence itself.

Many more recent authors say that rational human nature itself as such in itself is the proximate norm of morality; or even human nature considered completely with all its essential relations, namely, as rational (and not only sensitive), as social, and as created; indeed some add that it is the fundamental norm or foundation of the eternal law itself and of the will of God. But all these confuse the norm with its objective foundation. On the contrary, others deny that morality depends upon the ultimate end to which human nature nevertheless is ordered, or even upon the essential order of things. But one must say:

1. Thus Vasquez, Suarez, Lessius, Laymann, Lugo, Frins, Schiffini, Costa Rosetti, De Bie, Elter. Liberatore says: the norm is the essential order of things. Tanquerey, who used to say that the norm is reason, in the latest editions unhappily changed his opinion, and now establishes the norm to be human nature. On the contrary, Cathrein, who had formerly taught that it is human nature, later said that it is reason, but under the name of reason he understood conscience. Fr. Lehu in the work Philosophia moralis et socialis treats the whole question excellently; likewise very recently in the writing La raison regle de moralite d'apres S. Thomas.

1. Thus Vasquez and Frins.

2. Suarez, Frins, Cathrein.

3. Cathrein.

1. Rational human nature as such, or even considered completely with its relations, is not the formal rule and measure or criterion which distinguishes morality (and even if someone wished to call it a rule, at least it would not be the proximate rule), but the objective foundation according to which reason discerns what is good or evil: for from this the object or act is discerned as good or evil, because it has a relation of agreement or disagreement with rational nature. Hence the near norm and subjective criterion of morality is only the practical judgment of reason.

And therefore St. Thomas distinguishes between physical good and moral good, between works of nature and works of the will, and says that nature is the rule of natural works, reason the rule of acts of the will.

4. I-II, q. 21, a. 1; q. 77, a. 3; Q. D. De Malo 2, a. 4.

For reason is right from conformity to the eternal law. The eternal law becomes known from creatures, and especially from human nature. Therefore human nature stands as a medium between the eternal law and reason, and in this sense it is said to be, but it is not, a rule, except fundamentally, that is, the foundation of the rule of reason.

2. Consequently also the ultimate end of man, to which rational nature itself is naturally ordered, and the essential order of things or objective order arising from the necessary relations of the human agent to various beings, for the same reason can be called the objective foundation of morality. They are the rule fundamentally, or the foundation of the rule of reason.

5. I-II, q. 21, a. 2, ad 2; q. 77, a. 8; q. 109, a. 8; Q. D. De Pot. 3, a. 6, ad 12.

DISSERTATION III. ON HUMAN LAW St. Thomas, q. 95.

That some promulgation of law is required in order that it oblige, we said above in treating of law in common. It is now asked what kind is required for human law. And the question can be raised both concerning laws simply so called, and concerning revocatory laws of laws and privileges. Whence let there be

§ I. — On the promulgation of human law simply so called.

I say 1°: From the nature of the thing, positive law set aside, that promulgation of human law is required and suffices by which it can morally come to the knowledge of subjects; because promulgation of law is necessary for this reason, that it become known to subjects. Therefore, from the nature of the thing, that is required and suffices by which it can morally and in a human way come to the knowledge of subjects, if not simultaneously, at least successively.

I say 2°: Positive law being considered, the imperial law must be promulgated in each province, or in their metropolis, in order that it oblige in them. So it is commonly held.

It is proved from Novella 66 of Justinian on newly made constitutions [Novellarum constitutions], where the emperor decrees that his laws then at last oblige in the provinces when they have been promulgated in their metropoles.

The same seems to be said of kingdoms and provinces which use Caesarean law, on account of the cited Novella.

But as to other kingdoms and provinces, we must stand by the terms of the first conclusion, or hunt out from the circumstances what may be the intention of the legislator, unless usage has determined something special.

I say 3°: It seems more probable that pontifical laws establishing new right and inducing a new obligation must be promulgated in each province or diocese at least virtually, in order that they oblige in them; unless the Pontiff express the contrary.

It is proved 1º. In those things in which canonical law decrees nothing, we must stand by civil law. But civil law requires, as we said, the promulgation of a law in each province in order that it oblige in them, and canonical law decrees nothing on this matter. Therefore. — The major is proved from canonical law itself, cap. Intelleximus, Decretal. lib. V, tit. 32, De novi operis enuntiatione, where it is said: « As laws do not disdain to imitate the sacred canons, so the institutions of the sacred canons are aided by the constitutions of princes. »

It is proved 2º. Promulgation of law is required for this reason, that it can become known to subjects. But this will be obtained only with the greatest difficulty and after a very long time in the most vast empire of the Church extended even to the farthest parts of the world, if it be promulgated only at Rome; but easily and within a short time, if it be promulgated in each province. Therefore the will of the Pontiffs is thus presumed in law, when they do not express the contrary.

It is proved 3° from inconveniences. If a law promulgated only at Rome obliged everywhere, grave incon-

^{1 1} In Gaul, promulgation is made by the king or by the supreme magistrate of the republic through a decree which ought to be inserted into the authentic collection of laws, which is called Bulletin des lois. On the first day after promulgation, the law obliges in the prefecture in which the seat of government is, and in the other prefectures one day is added for every ten myriameters, unless the prefects are bidden by the supreme authority, for urgent cause, to accelerate the promulgation.

venientias would follow. For it would follow that, if it were an irritating law, say of marriage in the fifth degree of consanguinity, all marriages contracted in that degree by the ignorant would be invalid. But if it were a law only forbidding or commanding, say a fast, deformity and confusion would be introduced among the inhabitants of the same province or city, and occasion would be given to scruples and anxieties; for those who learned something of the Roman promulgation would be bound to fast, and while the greater part was ignorant, the few who learned it could observe the law neither easily nor fittingly, and thence scruples and anxieties. Therefore we say with foundation that the Sovereign Pontiffs, whose rule is sweet and benign, and to whom power is given for edification and not for destruction, do not will their laws to oblige in provinces before they are promulgated in them, unless they declare that they intend otherwise.

It is confirmed. The common opinion is that even a pontifical law not received by usage does not oblige, chiefly for this reason, that the mind of the legislator is presumed to be that it not oblige in this case. But it is far more consonant with equity and reason to presume that he does not intend his law to oblige because it is not sufficiently promulgated, than because, although promulgated, it is not received. Therefore. Finally, the Sovereign Pontiffs know that many of their laws are not observed in many provinces through defect of promulgation. For this reason the bull of the Cenacle does not oblige in Gaul; clandestine marriages in certain places in which the Tridentine [decree] was not promulgated are still valid; and so many other things. Likewise they know that our opinion is handed down by many, and yet they are silent. Therefore it is a sign that this is their mind, that their own laws do not oblige in those provinces in which they have not been promulgated.

I said 1° in the conclusion: « Pontifical laws establishing new right and inducing a new obligation; » because, if a pontifical law only declares ancient right, whether natural, divine, or human sufficiently promulgated, it suffices, as far as the force of promulgation goes, that it be promulgated at Rome, in order that it oblige everywhere those who in any way whatsoever learn of that promulgation. Whence dogmatic laws declaring something to pertain to the faith, condemning propositions or books containing errors against faith or morals, do not need to be promulgated in each province in order that they oblige in them, but it suffices that it be known in any way whatsoever that they were so declared by the Church or the holy See; the reason is, because they are not so much laws as declarations of laws already promulgated. But by the very fact that anyone in any way whatsoever learns — whether by promulgation, by divulgation, or by his own study — that something is contrary to right, whether natural, divine, or even promulgated human law, he is bound to avoid it. Therefore especially if he knows, through divulgation, of the solemn pontifical definition so deciding and declaring, at least as far as the force of promulgation and knowledge goes.

I said 2º: « Unless the Pontiff express the contrary; » because, if the Sovereign Pontiff declared that he willed his law promulgated at Rome to oblige everywhere for some urgent cause, say because he knew that the promulgation of his law, exceedingly useful to the Church, would be unjustly impeded by malevolent men, or because the matter admits no delay, etc., we concede that then it would oblige everywhere; because, although ordered reason for introducing a law with fruit and effect and without inconveniences requires promulgation in each province, nevertheless per accidens and on account of necessity less can suffice; and if any inconvenience arise thence, it can be neglected and compensated by the fruit and effect of the law, which would have been wanting had it been bound to be promulgated in each province. Nor is it entirely similar in the case of the emperor, who perhaps, even setting positive law aside, could not do this, because he holds his authority originatively from the people, who according to some are not reckoned to have conferred upon him the power of enacting laws without their being promulgated in his provinces. But the Pontiff holds his authority immediately from Christ, and therefore independent of the nod and modification of peoples, but to be exercised as he shall judge more useful for the good of the Christian commonwealth.

You will say: There are many laws inserted into the body of canonical law, as decretals and others, which were promulgated only at Rome. Yet they oblige everywhere. Therefore.

I answer. 1°. I retort the argument. There are many laws which do not oblige everywhere, through defect of promulgation in each province, as appears from the proofs of the conclusion. Therefore.

I answer. 2°. I distinguish the major. Those which were promulgated formally only at Rome, I concede; virtually, I deny. For by the very fact that they are inserted by the authority and command of the Sovereign Pontiffs into the body of the law and read publicly in the schools, they are reckoned virtually and more than virtually, and therefore sufficiently, promulgated. The same I say of a law promulgated only at Rome which should be received and held in use by the faithful; for practice and usage would hold the place of promulgation: and thus the bull of the Cenacle obtained its force in many provinces.

As to what is commonly said, « That the Pope has feet of lead and not of feathers, » which some understand, because he is not bound to run through each province in order to promulgate his laws in them, I reply that the Pope has no need of feathered feet for running through all provinces for the sake of promulgating his laws, since everywhere he has legates, nuncios, bishops, to whom he can commit this office. [The opposite opinion, which seems true to us, is common.

For elucidating the question, a distinction must be made between the promulgation of a law and its divulgation. Promulgation is the act by which a superior intimates to the community, in the manner which he judges fitting and opportune, his will of commanding or forbidding something. By this act he properly constitutes his law, because promulgation, as has been proved, pertains to the essence of law. Divulgation, however, is the diffusion by which the law, now enacted, reaches the ears and consciences of the individual subjects. Divulgation indeed is required in order that subjects be bound to observe the law, but not in order that the law obtain its intrinsic virtue of obliging. Whence through promulgation the law has first act, and through divulgation it arrives at second act. Promulgation is made by the legislator himself, who thus manifests his will and exercises his office, unless it seem expedient to him that the law be intimated by the Ordinaries of places, who are not properly promulgators, but organs and heralds of the legislator. But when these superiors of their own motion publish a law passed by the supreme authority, they do not promulgate it, but divulge it; and this authentic divulgation makes the law undoubted. Divulgation made through ordinary channels likewise confers second act upon the law, provided its existence becomes certain. Whence

I say with Cardinal Gotti, de Legib., q. 6, dub. 4, § 1, n. 6: « If by his law the Pontiff expresses nothing to the contrary, as soon as a pontifical law is promulgated at Rome, without any other solemn promulgation of provinces and cities the Ordinaries are bound to take care that it be observed in their dioceses, and for this reason the pontifical mandate is wont to be directed to them. But even if it were not directed to them, they would be bound, when it came to their knowledge, to procure its observance. »

It is proved: 1° It suffices that pontifical laws be promulgated at Rome in order that all whom they concern be obliged, if it be lawful for the supreme Pontiff to will this, if he wills it, and if usages and custom consonant with law so bear it. But these three things are established. Therefore. — Proof of the minor. 1° It is certain that not only is promulgation absolutely necessary in order that true law be constituted and obtain the virtue of obliging, but also that the mode of promulgation is left to the judgment of the legislator, provided he manifest his will certainly to his subjects. Therefore it is lawful for the supreme Pontiff to will that the law which he promulgates only at Rome oblige all whom it concerns. 2º The will of the supreme Pontiff must be understood from the tenor of the documents by which he promulgates laws. But two clauses are commonly used when papal bulls are affixed at Rome in the accustomed places. The first is: « But that the present letters may more easily come to the notice of all, and no one can allege ignorance of them, we will that they be affixed and published at the doors, etc., and thus published, arrest and affect all and each whom they concern, just as if they had been personally intimated to each of them. » The other says: « But we will that to transumpts of the present letters, even printed ones, subscribed by the hand of some public notary and fortified with the seal of a person constituted in ecclesiastical dignity, exactly the same observance be shown everywhere, both in judgment and outside it, as if they had been exhibited or shown to each one. » If it happen that these clauses be changed as to words, they always exhibit the same sense, and from these the will of the legislator appears without ambiguity. Therefore. 3° Upon such promulgation being made, all causes which are brought to the Roman court are judged and terminated according to these laws: whence the right [jus] is established. Elsewhere today nowhere is it doubted that pontifical laws oblige once they have been published at Rome in the customary manner and affixed in the accustomed places. Therefore. And herein fact accords with law; for in cap. Ad hoec, de postulat. praelat., Decretal. lib. I, tit. 5, c. 1, it is read: « Nor let it be necessary, when a constitution is solemnly issued or publicly promulgated, to impress its knowledge upon the ears of individuals by special mandate or letters; but it suffices only that he be held to its observance who knows it to have been solemnly issued or publicly promulgated. »

2° That cannot be admitted which would take away the law's strength, weaken the supreme authority, and impede the unity of governance. But if pontifical laws concerning the universal Church could not suffice by being promulgated at Rome, this threefold inconvenience would follow; for 1º the law would in no way avail in places where it was not promulgated by the bishops for whatever cause; 2° the exercise of supreme authority could easily be impeded by the Ordinaries of places, whenever it pleased them to hold themselves negatively toward its commands; 3° thence in many things, and even in matters of greatest moment, often not without grave detriment to the public good, varieties of discipline would suffer in neighboring regions. Therefore.

You will object: That must be held which the Church teaches by facts. But the Church teaches by facts that laws do not oblige unless they have been promulgated in the diverse provinces. Therefore. — Proof of the minor. 1° The Apostles sent the decree issued in the Council of Jerusalem to the brethren who were at Antioch, and Syria, and Cilicia, through Judas and Silas, chief men among the brethren, Act., XV, 22 et 23. 2º The Fourth Lateran Council, under Innocent III, decreed that the constitution which it had issued against physicians who do not persuade the sick to summon a priest would have its force only « after it has been published by the prelates of the places. » 3º The Council of Trent, irritating clandestine marriages, sess. XXIV, de reform. matrim., cap. 1, « decrees that a decree of this kind begin to have its force in each parish after thirty days, to be counted from the day of the first publication made in the same parish. » Therefore.

I answer. I deny the minor. Not only could the alleged texts be adduced in proof, they clearly show on the contrary that, when the Roman Pontiffs or ecumenical councils will some law not to oblige before it has been published in the diverse regions of the world, they expressly declare this, because in this they derogate from the general rule. To be noted, in confirmation of this rule, is that the said councils commit to the Ordinaries of places, not the promulgation of the law, which is made by the legislator himself, but its publication; so that the law, which by the very fact of promulgation obtained its obligatory force and its first act, is suspended as to execution until it obtain second act through publication.

You will ask how bishops ought to promulgate their laws.

I answer. The doctrine expounded above regards laws of whatever kind. On the promulgation of synodal statutes Benedictus XIV says, de Synodo dioec., lib. XIII, cap. 4: « The manner in which this promulgation is to be made is not specifically defined by law. Wherefore Suarez rightly asserts, lib. IV de Legib., c. 5, n. 8, that laws passed by bishops are sufficiently promulgated if either they are read publicly in the cathedral church, or they are announced by the voice of a herald in the square of the city to bystanders, or written they are affixed in a public place designated for this purpose. Nay more, if synodal statutes regard not the people but only the clergy of the diocese, they do not need a publication distinct from that which is made in the very synod, to which the principal part of the same clergy is present; since Innocent III, in cap. Ad haec, de postulat. praelat., says disjunctively that the bond of the law extends over all « when it is solemnly issued, or publicly » promulgated. » Now no law is more solemnly issued than that which is made in the assembly of the principal part of those upon whom it bears. » As to laws passed outside the synod, it is lawful for the bishop to choose the mode of promulgation which seems to him more apt and fitting, that the knowledge of the law reach all his subjects, given the circumstances of the times.]

On revocatory laws.

A distinction must be made between a revocatory law of an onerous law, whereby indeed something is commanded or forbidden, or by which someone is rendered unfit or a penalty decreed, and a revocatory law of a privilege or grace. Also the revocation of a privilege or grace is either made publicly by common law, or privately by messenger or by letter. According to these distinctions I lay down the three following conclusions.

I say 1°: For the valid revocation of an onerous law, promulgation is not required, but it suffices that it be externally manifested; not however if it be conceived only in the mind.

It is proved. Law binds no one except by the will of the legislator, from which it has the virtue of obliging. Therefore, when the legislator wills and declares that his law no longer binds, its obligation ceases; and this the more, since it is something favorable from which injury is done to none nor damage inflicted, and therefore to be extended.

Nor does it matter that laws must be promulgated, as was said. For that is true only of true laws, not of revocations of laws, which are not true laws, but destructions of laws; for less is required to destroy a law than to establish it, because evil and destruction arise from any defect whatsoever, good and constitution from an integral cause.

I said: « Not however if it be conceived only in the mind; » because, as men are sensible, so they are governed by sensible actions and signs, not by the interior concepts of the soul alone. Therefore a revocation conceived only in the mind does not avail.

I say 2º: When the revocation of a privilege or grace is made through a common law to be promulgated, it seems more probable to me that, speaking per se and regularly, promulgation in the metropolis of each province is required and suffices; so that, this promulgation being posited, the privilege be revoked and acts done be null, although done by those ignorant of it.

It is proved. Although a merely revocatory law of a privilege is not a true law, but an abrogation of a private law, yet since it conduces to forming morals, and men ought to act according to it, so that, if they act against it and use unknowingly a revoked privilege, they incur grave inconveniences, it is required and suffices that it be so promulgated that it can easily and conveniently come to the knowledge of subjects; for this is altogether congruous with reason, and thus it is presumed in law of the mind of an equitable legislator. But if it be promulgated only in the court, either of the Pope or of a prince, it will come with difficulty to the knowledge of subjects; easily, if it be promulgated in the metropolis of each province¹. Therefore. ¹ To this end was the reply given above, when we laid down that it suffices, in order that any law whatever obtain its effect, that it be promulgated in the place where it is observed. …

I said: « Speaking per se and regularly; » because, if the legislator declares the contrary for a just cause, or custom obtains otherwise, we must stand by either.

I say 3°: When the revocation of a privilege or indulgence granted to some person, place or thing, likewise of delegated jurisdiction or of some other faculty and grace, is not made through a common law to be promulgated, but privately by messenger or letter, it does not obtain its force, or attain its effect, before it become known to the privileged one; because otherwise gravest inconveniences would follow, many contracts would be null to the detriment of others, many absolutions would be void, many marriages invalidly consummated, etc. So commonly the authors whom Sylvius and Loth. cite in great number and follow. Nay, some hold not improbably that casual knowledge does not suffice, but that it must be made by letter or messenger destined for this purpose: and this, if I mistake not, from the presumed will of the legislator.

DISSERTATION IV

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.

37. Human acts are those of which a man is master, which he has the power of doing or not doing as he pleases. (No. 2. See also Ment. Phil., Nos. 194-199.) True, we are physically free to perform certain acts or to omit them — to do one thing or its contrary, to choose this act rather than some other; but are we also morally free in regard to all such acts? Is it right for me on all occasions to do whatever my inclination prompts me to do? My reason plainly answers, No: it is evident even to a child that some actions are good in themselves, morally good, and others bad in themselves, morally bad. The good acts our reason commends and approves; these we call right. Evil acts, on the contrary, our reason disapproves and blames; these we call wrong. The ideas of right and wrong, like those of truth and falsity, substance and accident, cause and effect are "primary ideas" which are common to all men; hence, they are trustworthy ideas — that is, the distinction existing in the mind between right and wrong corresponds to a distinction existing objectively in human acts. (See Logic, Nos. 119, 120.)

38. But though all men distinguish between right and wrong, it does not follow that all theorizers acknowledge the distinction. It often stands in the way of their false speculations. Such writers, for instance as Huxley, Spencer and the Agnostics and Positivists generally, admit no true liberty in man, and therefore they cannot consistently treat of human acts as such: there are no human acts with them, for there are no acts which a man has the power to do or not to do. The same holds true for all Materialists, who teach that nothing exists but matter — acting, of course, by necessary laws. Pantheists likewise, admitting no real distinction between man and God, cannot speak of human acts as such, and cannot therefore correctly explain the difference between moral right and moral wrong. Nevertheless, all these false theorizers employ the terms "right" and "wrong" — the distinction being too widely accepted to be ignored. They are forced, however, by the exigencies of their theories to misinterpret the meaning of these words. Without stopping to refute their false and demoralizing interpretations singly, we shall briefly explain the obvious, certain and common-sense distinctions between moral right and moral wrong.

39. The reason why our intellect approves certain acts, calls them morally good and pronounces them worthy of praise, precisely as free acts, is because it perceives that they are rightly directed to their true end, suitable to and worthy of a rational agent, conformable to the exigencies of things, and therefore that they ought to be done by man: man ought to do what is conformable to his rational nature and conducive to his perfection.

Our intellect disapproves of other acts, calls them morally bad or evil and pronounces them to be, inasmuch as they are free acts, deserving of blame, because it perceives they are directed away from their true end, are unbecoming and unsuitable to a rational agent, at variance with the exigencies of things, and therefore not to be done by man: man ought not to do that which is unworthy of a rational being, and which, instead of perfecting, debases him.

40. The radical notion conveyed by the term "good" is "suitableness to an appetite or desire." Using the word, then, in its radical meaning, we say something is good for a being which that being desires — i. e., which is the object of its appetites. And the good is the object of the being's appetites because it tends in some manner to the perfection of the being; for the wise Creator has made all things such that they tend to what promotes their perfection. Hence we call that a physical good which contributes to perfect a being physically — as, for example, food for the animal nature. We call whatever benefits the intellect, e. g., truth and science, an intellectual good. So, too, that which perfects a free being, as such, we call a moral good.

41. A free being perfects itself by drawing near to its ultimate end, its supreme good, which is God. Consequently, those acts are morally good for man which bring him nearer to God, the ultimate end of his existence; and those are morally bad which lead him away from God.

42. Since there are some human acts, like blasphemy, that are of themselves bad at all times, and others, like reverence for God, that are of themselves always good, the quality of goodness or badness must be something intrinsic to the acts and must depend upon their accord with or disagreement from the permanent natural order of things. It is clear that this order, with respect to human acts, corresponds to the relations which man, as a creature, possesses necessarily towards God; as a social entity, towards his fellow-men; and towards himself as a being endowed with various faculties, sensitive and spiritual. These relations in turn are founded on the essences of things; hence, the difference between the two classes of acts is an essential difference. Now the essences of things are modelled by the Creator upon perfections known to the Divine Intellect as existing in the Divine Essence; therefore the morality or immorality of a human act is determined ultimately by the intellect and not by the free will of God. As God can not contradict Himself, He can not make an intrinsically moral act immoral, nor remove the immorality of an act intrinsically immoral.

43. Some human acts are so disorderly as to turn a man entirely away from the pursuit of his true last end; for, in place of God as the ultimate object of desire, these acts substitute explicitly or implicitly something altogether incompatible with the love of God. There are other human acts, which, though impeding the soul's tendency towards its true ultimate end, do not become an obstacle to the attainment of that end. In this difference lies the distinction between mortal and venial sin.

44. Once the true meaning of morality is grasped, it is easy to detect the errors of certain false theories which have been fabricated to explain the power residing in all men of distinguishing between good and evil.

1. Some philosophers attribute this power to instinct. But instinct, in the accurate meaning of the word, is a blind impulse of nature, which prompts the animal to conduct itself in a determined manner, and thus to perform complex acts, without understanding their further purpose, for the good of the individual and of the species. Moral good and moral evil, on the contrary, are apprehended intellectually — that is, by a cognitive faculty which can reflect and draw inferences; hence, in distinguishing between good and evil, we do not act blindly, but intelligently.

2. Some speak of a moral sense. If by a moral sense an organic faculty or the action of an organic faculty is meant, the use of the term is erroneous and misleading; because material organism, which is required for every organic action, cannot possibly grasp the abstract immaterial relations contained in the idea of moral good or evil. If, however, the term is employed to denote a certain perfection of the intellectual powers, a quickness and keenness of mind in detecting and judging the morality or immorality of human acts, it is used correctly.

3. Others maintain with Herbert Spencer¹ that this power of distinguishing between good and evil rests upon the power of distinguishing between what is useful and what is hurtful to men generally in the present life. Whatever tends to the temporal good of mankind generally is morally good, they say, and whatever generally does injury is morally evil. Now, it is true that moral good is ultimately useful to mankind even on earth, and moral evil is ultimately injurious. But moral good is not good because it is useful; on the contrary, it is useful because it is good, i. e., because it tends to make man more perfect, and hence better fitted to attain his last end. Moreover, it is a part of the universal harmony which God has established in His creation, that the moral good of the individual be either immediately or ultimately beneficial to the many. In this sense, honesty is truly the best policy.

¹ I believe that the experiences of utility organized and consolidated through all past generations of the human race have been producing corresponding modifications, which, by continued transmission and accumulation, have become in us certain faculties of moral intuition, certain emotions corresponding to right and wrong conduct, which have no apparent basis in the individual experiences of utility. (Spencer's Letter to Mill.)

4. In the theories of Hobbes, Paley, Mandeville, and the older English Utilitarians, regard to personal advantage on earth is the only motive of human action: that is morally good which brings me pleasure; the "moral good" is the "useful to me personally."

5. Finally, some in theory and very many in practice hold that the norma or rule of right and wrong lies in the opinion of men. That is right, they declare, which the majority of men approve. "Vox populi, vox Dei " — "The voice of the people is the voice of God." But on many topics the opinions of men are changeful and often false. When, moreover, all men agree in calling a certain act good or evil, they do so because they see that in itself it is good or evil; but it is not good or evil because they call it so.

45. It may be asked whether every human act is either good or evil. We must make a distinction.

1. An act considered in the abstract, i. e., apart from all circumstances, may be specifically neither good nor evil. For instance, walking, riding, reading, etc., are acts that in themselves do not imply a tendency to our last end or a departure from it. All such are called indifferent acts: specifically, they are neither good nor bad.

2. But every moral act considered individually, i. e., as done in such and such circumstances of time, place and persons, is necessarily either good or bad. For, since we distinguish a good from a bad act by its conformity with fixed principles known to reason, it follows that when reason approves, the act is right; when it disapproves, the act is wrong. Now, in every individual human act, reason approves the act as a fit object for a deliberate choice, or disapproves it as an unfit object for such choice; therefore, every individual or concrete human act is either right or wrong.

The truth of this principle is made clearer in the next article.