A Part of Fortitude
Patience
“to safeguard the good of reason against sorrow, lest reason give way to sorrow: and this patience does” St. Thomas
St. Thomas treats it at II-II, q. 136. Set against impatience. Its place on the Fortitude page.
Each line is one thing said. Authors named first use those words. Those after “in nearly the same words” say the same thing differently; point at a name to see their words.
What It Is
| St. Thomas: “to safeguard the good of reason against sorrow, lest reason give way to sorrow: and this patience does” | St. Thomas II-II, q. 136, a. 1In nearly the same words: Marc n. 406 |
| St. Augustine, whom St. Thomas follows: “A man's patience it is whereby he bears evil with an equal mind” | St. Thomas II-II, q. 136, a. 1In nearly the same words: Bontempi On patience, n. 3 |
| The manuals: “a virtue by which someone so endures present evils (especially those inflicted by others) that he is not inordinately saddened by them” | Prümmer II, n. 633In nearly the same words: Merkelbach II, n. 923; Tanquerey n. 1070; Wouters n. 426; McHugh-Callan n. 2453 |
| Cicero's definition: “Patience is the voluntary and prolonged endurance of arduous and difficult things for the sake of honorableness or utility.” | Prümmer II, n. 633In nearly the same words: Bontempi On patience, n. 3 |
| St. Gregory's: “True patience is to endure the evils of others with equanimity, and to be moved by no grief of soul against him who inflicts evils.” | Bontempi On patience, n. 1 |
What It Is Not
| Not the Stoic's apathy: “Therefore this is not insensibility, or apathy, of which the Stoics boasted, and which in reality is a vice.” | Tanquerey n. 1070In nearly the same words: Merkelbach II, n. 923 |
| It feels, and rules what it feels: “The patient man feels pain in the body and sadness in the soul, but moderates both” | Tanquerey n. 1070In nearly the same words: Merkelbach II, n. 923 |
| Not patience for show: “Some persons are patient in order to make themselves admired.” | Spirago PATIENCE |
| Not the forbidding of every complaint: “It is, however, allowable to complain on account of severe physical or mental suffering, so long as we submit to the will of God.” | Spirago PATIENCE |
Its Matter
| Sorrow at present evils: “The proximate matter of patience is present sadnesses rightly to be tolerated” | Prümmer II, n. 633In nearly the same words: Wouters n. 427 |
| Every kind of evil: “patience regulates sadness caused by evils of whatever nature, such as sickness, bereavements, loss of money, persecution” | McHugh-Callan n. 2453 |
| Why sorrow needs a virtue: “For inordinate sadness is a great evil and an impediment to many goods.” | Prümmer II, n. 634In nearly the same words: Merkelbach II, n. 923 |
| Yet not all sorrow is evil: “Sadness is indeed sometimes salutary, if it is assumed moderately and for a short time on account of the absence of spiritual goods or the presence of spiritual evils (especially sins)” | Prümmer II, n. 634In nearly the same words: Spirago PATIENCE |
Where It Belongs
| A part of fortitude: “Patience is a quasi-potential part of fortitude, because it is annexed thereto as secondary to principal virtue.” | St. Thomas II-II, q. 136, a. 4In nearly the same words: Bontempi On patience, n. 11 |
| Integral, or potential: “If patience concerns the moderation of sadness arising from the imminence of death, it is an integral part of fortitude; but if the sadness arises from lesser evils, then it is only a potential part of this virtue.” | Prümmer II, n. 633In nearly the same words: McHugh-Callan n. 2454 |
| Its seat: “It is in the concupiscible appetite, because it is concerned with sadness, but it imitates the mode of fortitude” | Merkelbach II, n. 923In nearly the same words: Prümmer II, n. 633 |
| Longanimity, its kin: “Hence longanimity has more in common with magnanimity than with patience.” | St. Thomas II-II, q. 136, a. 5 |
| “Accordingly longanimity and constancy are both comprised under patience” | St. Thomas II-II, q. 136, a. 5In nearly the same words: Merkelbach II, n. 927; McHugh-Callan n. 2453 |
| How it differs from temperance: “although temperance also regulates sadness, the sadness with which it deals is caused by lack of pleasures” | McHugh-Callan n. 2453 |
Its Excellence
| Not the greatest: “Therefore patience is not the greatest of the virtues” | St. Thomas II-II, q. 136, a. 2In nearly the same words: Merkelbach II, n. 924; Bontempi On patience, n. 14 |
| Below fortitude and temperance: “it is also less than fortitude and temperance, which preserve from the greatest impediments to goodness” | McHugh-Callan n. 2454 |
| Yet the root and guardian of the virtues: “patience is said to be the root and guardian of all virtues, not as though directly causing and conserving them, but only by removing what prohibits” | Merkelbach II, n. 924In nearly the same words: Spirago PATIENCE; McHugh-Callan n. 2454 |
| It makes a man possess his soul: “In your patience you shall possess your souls” | Prümmer II, n. 634In nearly the same words: Spirago PATIENCE |
| A martyrdom without the sword: “St. Gregory the Great declares that by unwavering patience the crown of martyrdom may be acquired without the sword.” | Spirago PATIENCE |
Its Degrees
| Three degrees: “The first degree of this virtue is to tolerate afflictions without murmuring; the second, without lamentation and complaints before others; the third, with joy” | Prümmer II, n. 634In nearly the same words: Merkelbach II, n. 923; Bontempi On patience, n. 10 |
| McHugh-Callan's three: “the lowest is equanimity, which offends God neither in thought, word nor deed even though sorely tried” | McHugh-Callan n. 2454 |
| “a higher degree is submission, which prefers adversity to prosperity” | McHugh-Callan n. 2454 |
| “the highest degree is joyful resignation, which smiles at grief and rejoices in tribulation” | McHugh-Callan n. 2454 |
| Its summit: “like the apostles, who "went rejoicing from the presence of the council, because they were accounted worthy to suffer reproach for the name of Jesus."” | Tanquerey n. 1070 |
How It Is Gained
| From charity, through grace: “Hence it is evident that patience, as a virtue, is caused by charity” | St. Thomas II-II, q. 136, a. 3In nearly the same words: Bontempi On patience, n. 16 |
| By considering, after Billuart: “1. the patience and longanimity of God tolerating sinners; 2. the patience of Christ in His life and death; 3. the patience of the saints; 4. the fruits of patience in each life” | Prümmer II, n. 636In nearly the same words: Merkelbach II, n. 925 |
| Above all, the Passion: “Think upon the Passion of Christ.” | Spirago PATIENCE |
| By small things: “St. Teresa says that if we bear slight things patiently, we shall acquire courage and strength to bear great things.” | Spirago PATIENCE |
| With oneself too: “We must have as much patience with ourselves as with our fellow-men.” | Spirago PATIENCE |
| And by fearing what impatience costs: “Beware of losing merit by impatience” | Spirago PATIENCEIn nearly the same words: Prümmer II, n. 636 |
The Vices Opposed
| Impatience: “By defect, impatience, by which someone grieves too much, and from grief withdraws from the good” | Merkelbach II, n. 926In nearly the same words: Wouters n. 428; Tanquerey n. 1070 |
| Hardness, or insensibility: “By excess, hardness, when someone is in no way touched or saddened by any evils, whether his own or another's” | Merkelbach II, n. 926In nearly the same words: Wouters n. 428 |
| Or, measured by sorrow, stolidity by defect and impatience by excess: “The sin of deficiency in sorrow is stolidity” | McHugh-Callan n. 2455 |
| Or none but impatience: “Yet no vice opposed to patience by defect is commonly assigned, because the more lightly adversities are borne, the more it is held worthy of praise.” | Bontempi On the vices opposed to patience, n. 3 |
| Their gravity: “Of themselves they are venial, but mortal by reason of the effect or by reason of scandal” | Merkelbach II, n. 926In nearly the same words: Tanquerey n. 1070 |
See also Fortitude and the virtues against the capital vices.