The Vices Against Commutative Justice

The Vices against Commutative Justice.—These vices can be classified under two general heads: (a) the vices committed in involuntary commutations (see 1748), which include deeds against the person (such as homicide, mutilation, imprisonment) and against property (such as theft and rapine), and unjust words, whether spoken during judicial process (by judges, advocates, witnesses, etc.), or outside of judicial process (such as contumely, detraction, etc); (b) vices committed in voluntary commutations (see 1748), which include fraud and usury.

Usefulness. - Very grave questions now remain for us to investigate concerning the multiple objects and forms of injuries, concerning their various gravity, and concerning the obligation of restoring what belongs to another which often follows. Since this is said to be the chief part of the tractate on Justice, its usefulness need not be proclaimed. But logically it is placed after the exposition in which we have summarily declared the various rights and their sources, and through that exposition it is more easily and more fully perceived by the intellect.

Order of Treatment. - The title will contain four chapters. In the first we shall treat the general notions concerning injury and restitution; in the second, concerning the principal injurious action; in the third, concerning unjust cooperation; in the fourth, concerning the circumstances and excuses of restitution. The occasion will be at hand for us to propose several things which have usually been handed down in distinct treatises on the various precepts of the Decalogue. Our arrangement seems to assist synthetic notions not a little.

S. Th. II-II, q. 59, a. 1.

241. By reason of object, injustice properly so called is divided into various moral species, according to the diverse species of justice, and according to the rights diverse in species to which it is opposed. And indeed: 1° there is illegal or general injustice, which injures legal right or the common good; and 2° particular injustice, which injures a particular right and is subdivided into a) injustice concerning distributions, which is the violation of distributive justice and is called acceptance of persons, and b) injustice concerning commutations, which is the violation of commutative justice and more properly and strictly is called injury.

Each one is a special vice, that is, specifically distinct from others, because it regards an object distinct in species, a diverse right.

242. Illegal injustice regards the common good, which it contemns and against which it acts intentionally. If someone without this intention injures the common good, so that he may satisfy his appetite, it is not a vice distinct in species, but is a general condition of every sin, because every sin harms the common good. But if someone sins, not only so that he may satisfy his appetite, but from contempt of the common good and from the intention of acting against it, thus it is a special vice of injustice because it has a special object specifically distinct from all others. And although, as to its essence, it is essentially a special vice, nevertheless it is causally general, as to intention, virtue, and command, because in every sin a man can act from contempt of the common good, and through contempt of the common good he can be led to every sin. "Just as it pertains to the proper account of legal justice to attend to the due of the precept, so it pertains to the proper account of transgression to attend to contempt of the precept," q. 79, a. 2.

243. Particular injustice regards inequality toward another in things, while a man wills to have more of goods, for example, of riches and honors, and less of evils, for example, of labors and damages, than he ought, for example, by selling more dearly, buying more cheaply: thus injustice has special matter and is a particular vice, opposed to particular justice.

Particular injustice, especially commutative injustice, is divided into several diverse species, according to the various goods diverse in species and the rights to which it is opposed and which it injures, such as internal goods of soul or body, goods of marriage, external goods, goods of reputation and honor; — and according to the diverse unjust modes by which those things are injured and which are more or less against the will and right of another: thus, for example, robbery is distinguished from theft and from fraudulence.

244. Diverse injustices are graver, some than others, according to the species of good and right which is injured, and of harm which is inflicted on another, which are greater, some than others; — and in the same species, according to the greater or lesser quality and quantity of the harm brought and of the damage caused, whether to a private person or to society.

IX. QUESTION IV. What are the vices opposed to justice? ANSWER. Justice is here taken, not for sanctifying grace, by which a man is called just, nor for the general justice set in the complex of all the virtues; but for that peculiar moral virtue which inclines the will to render to each what is his, as we have already said. Now the other virtues are wont to have two contrary vices: the one by excess, the other by defect. To justice there is opposed defect only, inasmuch as a man does not render what he owes. Excess in rendering more than is owed conflicts with the other virtues, but not with justice, unless harm be inflicted upon another.

X. The vice opposed to justice is injustice, which, like justice, is divided into various species. For one is legal injustice, which relaxes the laws; another is opposed to distributive justice, namely respect of persons; and to commutative justice are opposed thefts, homicides, rapines, contumelies, calumnies, false accusations, the impostures of advocates, the unjust judgments of judges, and the like. Injustice is in its own kind a mortal sin; from smallness of matter, or by reason of indeliberation, it is a venial fault.

In as many ways as Justice is called so, as related quaest. 1., in so many ways is the opposite Injustice called, according to the rule of opposites, in Aristotle 5. Ethic. cap. 1.

Therefore injustice first signifies all iniquity, as it is taken in prima Ioan. 3. and Valentia notes quaest. 3. punct. 1. This therefore is opposed to general justice, which makes holy. Of this in Psalm. 91. All the sons of iniquity shall be scattered: Immediately he sets the antithesis The just shall flourish like the palm tree. This injustice embraces all sins, whether from suggestion, or from one's own will, or from habit, whatever they may be of heart, of mouth, and of deed; as S. Doct. observes ad eum Psal. and just as every declination from evil, and pursuit of good, is justice, as is said Psalm. 33. Decline from evil, and do good, etc. The eyes of the Lord are upon the Just, so every pursuit of evil, and flight from the good due, is injustice, as S. Doct. warns serm. 18. Hexaëmeronis.

S. Doct. brings forward there another injustice, which is an imperfection in the virtues. Such is that of those who often fall: A just man falls seven times a day. Proverb. 24. On the contrary, some just men are perfect, who fall more rarely, of whom Proverb. 12. Whatever befall the just man, it shall not grieve him. And cap. 28. The just man, bold as a lion, shall be without fear. The Church teaches this perfection of justice Eccles. 4. Fight for justice even unto death, and Matth. 5. Blessed are they who hunger and thirst for justice. Behold S. Doctor.

Therefore he places justice in three things Psalm. 33. In the declination from evil; the election of good; and the progress in good, as S. Doct. notes in the place cited above, and ad Psal. 110.

But PRE-EMINENTLY general Injustice is any transgression of the Laws, just as he is just who observes the law: Such is said to be Simeon, Lucae 2. A just man. And Zacharias with Elisabeth: They were both just, walking in all the commandments and justifications of the Lord without blame. And Noë Genes. 6. Just in his generations; namely, in all the commandments of God, as is said Psal. 118. I was directed to all thy commandments; I have hated every unjust way. For whoever shall keep the whole Law, but offend in one, is become guilty of all, as is said Iacobi 2. and S. Doct. pursues it in cap. 1. Lucae.

But more PROPERLY Injustice is the vice and sin opposed to legal justice, which is the virtue directing to the common good: D. Thom. calls this art. 1. illegal, which is a special sin, if it is committed out of contempt for the common good, and out of a settled intention of acting against it, as D. Thom. teaches loc. cit. Sotus lib. 3. de Iustitia, quaest. 3. art. 1. ad 1. Valentia quaest. 3. punct. 1. Otherwise it will not be a sin distinct from those which are committed against those virtues whose acts are to be exercised under the command of legal justice; but it will be the common condition of sins of this kind, and as it were a common sin, as Sotus and Valentia call it, and as I said in disputat. 22. quaest. 1.

But MOST PROPERLY it signifies the particular vice and sin opposed to the equality due of one to another, which particular Justice safeguards. Now this injustice is mortal in its genus, as D. Thom. teaches art. 4. although it can be venial on account of the smallness of the matter, or on account of the imperfection of an act not sufficiently deliberate, or not sufficiently voluntary, as on account of lightly culpable ignorance, as D. Thom. teaches in the cited article and more fully D. Bonavent. in speculo animae, cap. 2.

But Injustice of this kind is DIVIDED into various subordinate species, namely first into Injustice against distributive Justice, and Injustice against Commutative. Then into various species of injustice against Commutative according to the very diverse ways in which one can offend against it, which S. Doct. enumerates and explains in the place cited, and which I enumerated with Aristotle quaest. 1. and shall explain in their proper places.