Virtues and Vices › How They All Relate

How They All Relate

Each virtue with its family, the vices on either side of it, and how the capital vices feed the rest. The arrangement is ours and follows St. Thomas; every reference opens the passage.

Each Virtue and Its Family

The Theological Virtues

Faith

The gift: Understanding and the Gift of Knowledge
Vices opposed: Unbelief, Heresy, Apostasy, Doubt in Matters of Faith, Credulity, Denial and Dissimulation of Faith, Blasphemy, Sin Against the Holy Ghost, Blindness of Mind and Dulness of Sense

Hope

The gift: Fear
Vices opposed: Despair, Presumption

Charity

The gift: Wisdom
Vices opposed: Hatred, Sins Against Charity Toward Oneself, Discord, Contention, Strife, Schism, War and Sedition, Scandal, Cooperation in Another's Sin, Folly
Capital vices against it: Envy, Sloth

The Cardinal Virtues

Prudence

Integral Parts: memory, understanding, docility, shrewdness, reasoning, foresight, circumspection, caution
Subjective Parts: the prudence whereby a man rules himself, regnative prudence, political prudence, domestic prudence, military
Potential Parts: good counsel, synesis, gnome
The gift: Counsel
Vices opposed: Imprudence in General, Precipitation, Inconsideration, Inconstancy, Negligence, Prudence of the Flesh, Craftiness, Guile and Fraud, Excessive Solicitude

Justice

Integral Parts: to do good, to avoid the opposite evil
Subjective Parts: legal justice, commutative justice, distributive justice
Potential Parts: religion, penance, piety, observance, obedience, truth, gratitude, revenge, liberality, affability, epikeia
The gift: Piety
Vices opposed: Injustice in General, Respect of Persons, Theft and Robbery, Unjust Damage, Cooperating in Another’s Injustice, Killing the Innocent, Killing and Mutilating Oneself, Killing a Criminal or an Aggressor, The Duel, Abortion, Contumely, Detraction and Calumny, Whispering, Derision, Cursing, Rash Judgment and Suspicion, Violating a Secret, Cheating and Usury, Sins of Accuser, Accused, Witness and Advocate, Superstition, Undue Worship of the True God, Idolatry, Divination, Vain Observance and Magic, Hypnotism and Spiritism, Tempting God, Perjury, Taking God's Name in Vain, Sacrilege, Simony, Disobedience, Ingratitude, Vengeance Without Measure, Lying, Mental Restriction and Amphibology, Simulation and Hypocrisy, Boasting and Irony, Flattery and Quarreling, Prodigality
Capital vices against it: Covetousness (against liberality)

Fortitude

Integral and Potential Parts: confidence, magnificence, patience, perseverance
The gift: Fortitude
Vices opposed: Timidity, Fearlessness, Daring, Presumption, Ambition, Pusillanimity, Meanness and Waste, Impatience and Insensibility, Effeminacy and Pertinacity
Capital vices against it: Vainglory (against magnanimity)

Temperance

Integral Parts: shamefacedness, honesty
Subjective Parts: abstinence, sobriety, chastity, purity
Potential Parts: continence, meekness, mildness, humility, studiousness, modesty, games, outward apparel
The gift: Fear
Vices opposed: Insensibility, Intemperance, Drunkenness, Excessive Abstinence and Sobriety, Incontinence, Lack of Anger, Cruelty and Excessive Leniency, Excessive Self-Abjection, Curiosity, Vices of Bearing, Play and Dress
Capital vices against it: Pride (against humility), Anger (against meekness), Gluttony (against abstinence), Lust (against chastity)

The names of the parts are St. Thomas's where he gives one. Each virtue's page shows how the manuals name and number them.

Excess and Defect

Virtue	St. Thomas	Prümmer	Merkelbach	Noldin	Wouters
Prudence	Excess: excessive solicitude Defect: imprudence	Excess: Prudence of the flesh, craftiness, Excessive solicitude Defect: imprudence	Excess: False prudence Defect: imprudence	Excess: a certain false appearance and likeness of prudence Defect: Inconsideration	Excess: Vices by excess Defect: imprudence
Religion	Excess: superstition	Excess: superstitions Defect: irreligion	Excess: superstition Defect: Irreligiosity	Excess: superstition Defect: irreligiosity	Excess: superstitious observance Defect: irreligiosity
Obedience	Excess: obeys either whom he ought not, or in matters wherein he ought not to obey Defect:	Excess: servility or indiscreet obedience Defect: disobedience	—	—	—
Truth	Excess: boasting Defect: irony	Excess: violation of a secret Defect: lying	Excess: violation of a secret Defect: Lie	—	—
Gratitude	Excess: to show gratitude for things for which gratitude is not due, or sooner than it is due Defect: ingratitude	—	Excess: recompense of a benefit Defect: ingratitude	—	—
Vindication	Excess: cruelty or brutality Defect: remiss	Excess: cruelty or savagery Defect: excessive leniency in punishing	Excess: cruelty or savagery Defect: too remiss in punishing	—	—
Liberality	Excess: prodigality Defect: covetousness	Excess: prodigality Defect: avarice	Excess: Prodigality Defect: Avarice	Defect: Avarice	Excess: prodigality Defect: avarice
Affability	Excess: flattery	Excess: flattery Defect: moroseness or contentiousness	Excess: adulation or flattery Defect: moroseness or contentiousness	—	Excess: flattery Defect: contentiousness
Fortitude	Excess: timidity, daring Defect: fearlessness	—	Excess: fearlessness and daring rashness Defect: timidity	Excess: timidity and rashness Defect: fearlessness and cowardice	—
Magnanimity	Excess: presumption Defect: pusillanimity	Excess: presumption, ambition, and vainglory Defect: pusillanimity	Excess: presumption, ambition, and vainglory Defect: pusillanimity	Excess: presumption, ambition, and vain glory Defect: pusillanimity	Excess: presumption Defect: pusillanimity
Magnificence	Excess: wastefulness Defect: meanness	Excess: inordinate sumptuousness Defect: parvificence	—	Excess: excessive profusion Defect: smallness in doing	Excess: consumption Defect: parvificence
Patience	Excess: excessive sorrow Defect:	Excess: impatience Defect: insensibility or hardness	Excess: hardness Defect: impatience	—	Excess: insensibility Defect: impatience
Perseverance	Excess: pertinacity Defect: effeminacy	Excess: pertinacity Defect: softness or inconstancy	Excess: obstinacy Defect: softness of soul	—	Excess: pertinacity Defect: softness
Temperance	Excess: intemperance Defect: insensibility	—	Excess: intemperance Defect: insensibility or stupor	Excess: intemperance Defect: insensibility	Excess: insensibility Defect: intemperance
Abstinence	Excess: gluttony Defect: to refuse nature its necessary support	—	—	—	Excess: excessive abstinence Defect: gluttony strictly so called, or surfeiting
Sobriety	Excess: drunkenness Defect: to abstain from wine to the extent of molesting nature grievously	—	—	—	Excess: excessive sobriety Defect: drunkenness
Meekness	Excess: vice of anger Defect: lack of anger	Excess: anger Defect: sluggishness	Excess: lack of anger Defect: irascibility	Excess: irascibility Defect: lenity or excessive indulgence	Excess: irascibility Defect: sluggishness
Clemency	Excess: cruelty	Excess: excessive mildness Defect: cruelty	—	Excess: cruelty Defect: excessive lenity	Excess: cruelty Defect: excessive leniency
Humility	Excess: pride Defect: pusillanimity	Excess: inordinate self-abjection Defect: pride	Excess: Inordinate abasement Defect: pride	Excess: Pride	Excess: pride Defect: excessive self-abjection
Studiousness	Excess: curiosity Defect: neglect of study	Excess: curiosity Defect: negligence	Excess: Curiosity Defect: Negligence	—	Excess: curiosity Defect: negligence
Modesty of Conduct	—	—	Excess: affectation Defect: rusticity of manners	—	Excess: affectation Defect: rusticity
Eutrapely	Excess: excessive play Defect: boorish or rude	—	—	—	Excess: scurrility Defect: moroseness
Modesty of Attire	Excess: excessive attention to dress Defect: a man's neglect to give the requisite study or trouble	Excess: sought with excessive care Defect: does not employ due diligence in adornment	—	—	Excess: luxury Defect: negligence

A dash means only that the author does not label the vices of that virtue by excess and defect. The same material is set out on one sheet on the charts.

What the Capital Vices Feed

A capital vice is the source of others. The daughters here are St. Thomas's. Where a daughter has its own entry, the link opens it, so the line runs from the capital vice to a sin against another virtue.

Capital vice	Against	Its daughters
Pride	humility	“the queen and mother of all the vices” II-II, q. 162, a. 8
Vainglory	magnanimity	boasting, love of novelties, hypocrisy, obstinacy, discord, contention, disobedience
Envy	charity	tale-bearing, detraction, joy at another's misfortune, grief at another's prosperity, hatred
Anger	meekness	indignation, swelling of the mind, clamor, blasphemy, contumely, quarrels
Sloth	charity	despair, faint-heartedness, sluggishness about the commandments, spite, malice, wandering after unlawful things
Covetousness	liberality	insensibility to mercy, restlessness, violence, falsehood, perjury, fraud, treachery
Gluttony	abstinence	dullness of sense in the understanding, unseemly joy, loquaciousness, scurrility, uncleanness
Lust	chastity	blindness of mind, rashness, thoughtlessness, inconstancy, self-love, hatred of God, love of this world, despair of a future world

One capital vice also leads to another: “envy from vainglory, anger from envy, acedia from anger, and from acedia avarice, gluttony, and lust.” (Merkelbach, n. 514, after St. Gregory.)

All of this is drawn out on the charts.

The Virtues in General

What a Virtue Is

St. Thomas	“Human virtue is a habit perfecting man in view of his doing good deeds.”	I-II, q. 58, a. 3
Prümmer	“Virtue, therefore, is a permanent habit disposing man so that in his acts he follows reason or faith.”	Tract VI
Merkelbach	“designates the perfection of an operative power or a completed power”	I, n. 576
Noldin	“a habit perfecting a power for operating well”	n. 254
Wouters	“a certain perfection of a power”	n. 334

Habits

St. Thomas	“habit is a disposition of a subject which is in a state of potentiality either to form or to operation”	I-II, q. 50, a. 1
Prümmer	“a stable quality by which some being is perfected”	n. 438
Merkelbach	“the quality or mode by which a thing has itself in this or that way”	I, n. 559
Noldin	“operative, which inheres in the powers of the soul and perfects them for acting”	n. 254
Wouters	“a certain disposition acquired from multiplied similar acts, by which someone easily proceeds to similar acts”	n. 44

Where a Virtue Resides

St. Thomas	“It can be proved in three ways that virtue belongs to a power of the soul.”	I-II, q. 56, a. 1
Merkelbach	“Virtues are in the powers of the soul.”	I, n. 582
Wouters	“which powers of the soul can be perfected by virtues”	n. 338

How the Virtues Are Divided

St. Thomas	“in man there are but two principles of human actions, viz. the intellect or reason and the appetite”	I-II, q. 58, a. 3
Prümmer	“Acquired virtues are called those which man obtains for himself by his own acts.”	n. 456
Merkelbach	“By reason of the subject or power in which they principally inhere, into intellectual virtues, which are in the intellect, and moral (or appetitive) virtues, which are in the appetite.”	I, n. 587
Noldin	“virtues are divided into intellectual virtues, which perfect the intellect for knowing the true, and appetitive (moral) virtues, which perfect the will for pursuing the good”	n. 255
Wouters	“By reason of origin, into infused and acquired.”	n. 336

The Theological Virtues

St. Thomas	“because their object is God, inasmuch as they direct us aright to God”	I-II, q. 62, a. 1
Noldin	“those whose motive, or formal object, is God or some divine perfection”	n. 29
Wouters	“both because they have God as object”	n. 352

The Cardinal Virtues

St. Thomas	“we find that there are four cardinal virtues”	I-II, q. 61, a. 2
Merkelbach	“as principal virtues on which the others are founded”	I, n. 597
Noldin	“four which are called cardinal or principal”	n. 259
Wouters	“Four cardinal virtues are enumerated: prudence, justice, fortitude, and temperance.”	n. 369
Prümmer	“we know that the cardinal virtues are four”	n. 458

The Three Kinds of Parts

Noldin	“to each cardinal virtue there pertain three classes of moral virtues”	n. 260
Prümmer	“The parts of prudence, not otherwise than of any other cardinal virtue, are of three kinds”	n. 631

The Mean

The mean is the reason a moral virtue can have a vice on either side of it. The theological virtues are not bound in the same way.

St. Thomas	“the mean of virtue depends on conformity with virtue's rule or measure”	I-II, q. 64, a. 4
Prümmer	“Acquired moral virtue consists in a mean”	n. 462
Merkelbach	“Moral virtue is in the mean”	I, n. 600
Noldin	“The mean of virtue is called the measure by which excess and defect are excluded from it”	n. 256
Wouters	“the mean of virtue is the conformity of the act of virtue with its rule”	n. 347
Noldin	Of the theological virtues: “it is impossible to sin against them by excess”	n. 256

How the Virtues Are Connected

St. Thomas	“if we take moral virtues in this way, we must say that they are connected”	I-II, q. 65, a. 1
Prümmer	“Acquired moral virtues are so connected”	n. 465
Merkelbach	“Perfect moral virtues are connected”	I, n. 605
Merkelbach	“Imperfect moral virtues are not connected.”	I, n. 604
Noldin	“when charity has been lost, hope and faith remain”	n. 257
Wouters	“Acquired virtues in a perfect state are so connected among themselves that one cannot exist without the others.”	n. 348

Prudence and Charity Over the Others

St. Thomas	“Moral virtue cannot be without prudence”	I-II, q. 58, a. 4
Prümmer	“prudence and the other virtues depend on one another”	n. 466
Noldin	“it directs all the other virtues and is the leader of all”	n. 261
Wouters	“the perfection of acquired virtues, as moral, depends on perfect prudence”	n. 348
St. Thomas	“charity is called the form of the virtues”	II-II, q. 23, a. 8
Wouters	“Formed is said of that virtue which is joined to charity and informed by it.”	n. 336
St. Thomas	“faith precedes hope, and hope charity”	I-II, q. 62, a. 4

Which Virtue Is Greatest

St. Thomas	“justice is the most excellent of all the moral virtues”	I-II, q. 66, a. 4
Prümmer	“But simply the highest degree among all virtues is obtained by charity”	n. 467
Merkelbach	“According to species, theological virtues are more perfect than the others.”	I, n. 652
Noldin	“their greater or lesser perfection cannot be determined absolutely”	n. 261
Wouters	“Theological virtues surpass moral virtues in dignity”	n. 349

Infused and Acquired

St. Thomas	“God bestows on us the theological virtues”	I-II, q. 63, a. 3
Prümmer	“the most common opinion of theologians holds that, in addition, all the moral virtues and the gifts of the Holy Spirit are infused”	n. 472
Merkelbach	“Supernatural operative habits are infused into us by God.”	I, n. 618
Noldin	“Supernatural virtues are habits infused by God, by which man can connaturally exercise supernatural acts.”	n. 28
Wouters	“Scotus and the Scotists deny that there are supernatural moral virtues”	n. 368

How Virtues Grow, Fail and Last

Prümmer	“Infused virtues are intrinsically increased whenever sanctifying grace is increased.”	n. 475
Prümmer	“All infused virtues are lost (except the virtues of faith and hope) through mortal sin.”	n. 476
Wouters	“Virtues, whether acquired or infused, are not immutable, but can either be increased, diminished, or destroyed”	Section IV
Prümmer	“Moral virtues endure after this life as to their formal element, but not as to their material element.”	n. 471
Merkelbach	“In the blessed there remain those virtues which include no imperfection repugnant to their state.”	I, n. 612
St. Thomas	“Cicero held that the cardinal virtues do not remain after this life”	I-II, q. 67, a. 1

The Gifts, Beatitudes and Fruits

St. Thomas	“they are Divine virtues, perfecting man as moved by God”	I-II, q. 68, a. 1
Prümmer	“supernatural habits accompanying sanctifying grace, by which the powers of the soul are made well disposed to receive the illuminations or motions of the Holy Spirit”	n. 445
Merkelbach	“supernatural habits by which we are disposed to obeying promptly the motion or inspiration of the Holy Spirit Himself”	I, n. 630
Noldin	“seven gifts of the Holy Spirit are conferred upon the just man”	n. 32
Wouters	“infused habits by which man is made promptly movable by the Holy Spirit according to a special impulse, above the rule of reason”	n. 469
St. Thomas	“virtuous deeds are called fruits”	I-II, q. 70, a. 1
St. Thomas	“More is required for a beatitude than for a fruit”	I-II, q. 70, a. 2
Wouters	“their special acts, which theologians have been accustomed to indicate by the name either of beatitudes or of fruits”	Scholion

Remedies Against Sin in General

Merkelbach	“according to diverse causes diverse opportune remedies are to be assigned”	Pastoral, Ar II
Merkelbach	“frequent prayer, frequent reception of the sacraments of Penance and Eucharist, especially confession to be instituted immediately after a fall, the imposition of a previously determined penance after a relapse, devout consideration of the last things and recollection of the divine presence, serious daily examination of conscience with an exploration of the causes of sin and the formation of sincere contrition and purpose, the choice of a prudent confessor and frequent recourse to his counsels, flight from evil associates and other occasions of sinning, practice of mortification, custody of the senses”	Pastoral, Ar II
Merkelbach	“acts of charity toward God frequently repeated, works of mercy, devotion toward the Holy Eucharist, the Blessed Virgin Mary, the Sacred Heart of Jesus”	Pastoral, Ar II
Merkelbach	“sweet temptations are conquered more safely by flight”	Pastoral, Q. III
St. Thomas	“fasting is useful as atoning for and preventing sin, and as raising the mind to spiritual things”	II-II, q. 147, a. 3
Prümmer	Against grave temptations: “Frequent use of the sacraments and sacramentals, by which actual graces are conferred for conquering temptations.”	n. 389
Prümmer	Against grave temptations: “Consultation made with a good spiritual director.”	n. 389
St. Alphonsus	“The first, the principal, and I may say the only, and absolutely necessary means for conquering temptations, is to have recourse to God by prayer.”	True Spouse, ch. XIII
St. Alphonsus	“The second means of conquering temptations is to humble yourself, and to distrust your own strength.”	True Spouse, ch. XIII
St. Alphonsus	“The third means of overcoming temptations is, to make them known to your spiritual Father.”	True Spouse, ch. XIII
St. Alphonsus	“The fourth means, which is a very important one, of relieving one’s self from temptations is to avoid the occasions of them.”	True Spouse, ch. XIII
St. Alphonsus	“we must conquer some temptations by contrary acts”	True Spouse, ch. XIII
McHugh-Callan	“prayer is a universal remedy”	n. 2761

How Each Author Arranges Them

St. Thomas	By the virtues. Faith, hope and charity, then prudence, justice, fortitude and temperance. Each virtue comes with its parts, its gift, its opposed vices and its precepts.	II-II, qq. 1-170
Prümmer	By the virtues, following St. Thomas. A tract on the virtues in general, then one tract for each of the seven, with the opposed vices inside it.	Tracts VI-XIII
Merkelbach	By the virtues, following St. Thomas. A treatise on habits and virtues in general, then one treatise for each of the seven.	Vols. I-II
Noldin	By the precepts. The virtues in general are brief. The theological virtues are treated as precepts, and the rest under the Decalogue, so the vices are found under the commandment they break. The sixth and ninth have a separate treatise.	Vol. II
Wouters	Twice over. Book I defines the virtues and their parts. Book II takes up their cultivation and the sins against them, the theological virtues first and then the moral virtues under the precepts of the Decalogue.	Books I-II