The Divine Lamp

Note: What follows is the continuation of St Thomas More’s wonderful work. I have provided in italics what I hope are useful introductory and guidance notes, along with references to scripture and authors the Saint may be referring to. To view other posts in this series click on the heading “Dialogue of Comfort” listed in the Categories Box at the left.

After an introductory dialogue, treated of in my last five posts, St Thomas More begins giving his reflections and advice concerning comfort in tribulation. He begins by noting that even men who were wise according to nature saw that natural goods were fleeting, and not a solid basis for such comfort. Indeed, they are often sources of tribulation (first paragraph). In the second paragraph More makes it clear that man’s ultimate comfort is his last or final end,-God, and the Beatific Vision. Nonetheless, because God is operative even in nature, use can be made of the old moral philosophers, provided care is taken (third&fourth paragraphs)

1.  First shall you, good cousin, understand this: The natural wise men
of this world, the old moral philosophers, laboured much in this
matter. And many natural reasons have they written by which they
might encourage men to set little by such goods–or such hurts,
either–the going and coming of which are the matter and cause of
tribulation. Such are the goods of fortune, riches, favour,
friends, fame, worldly honour, and such other things: or of the
body, as beauty, strength, agility, liveliness, and health. These
things, as you know, coming to us, are matter of worldly wealth.
And, taken from us by fortune or by force or the fear of losing
them, they are matter of adversity and tribulation. For tribulation
seemeth generally to signify nothing else but some kind of grief,
either pain of the body or heaviness of the mind. Now that the body
should not feel what it feeleth, all the wit in the world cannot
bring that about. But that the mind should not be grieved either
with the pain that the body feeleth or with occasions of heaviness
offered and given unto the soul itself, this thing the philosophers
laboured very much about. And many goodly sayings have they toward
strength and comfort against tribulation, exciting men to the full
contempt of all worldly loss and the despising of sickness and all
bodily grief, painful death and all.

2.  Howbeit, indeed, for anything that ever I read in them, I never
could yet find that those natural reasons were ever able to give
sufficient comfort of themselves. For they never stretch so far but
that they leave untouched, for lack of necessary knowledge, that
special point which not only is the chief comfort of all but
without which also all other comforts are nothing. And that point
is to refer the final end of their comfort unto God, and to repute
and take for the special cause of comfort that by the patient
sufferance of their tribulation they shall attain his favour and
for their pain receive reward at his hand in heaven. And for lack
of knowledge of this end, they did, as they needs must, leave
untouched also the very special means without which we can never
attain to this comfort, which is the gracious aid and help of God
to move, stir, and guide us forward in the referring of all our
ghostly comfort–yea, and our worldly comfort too–all unto that
heavenly end. And therefore, as I say, for the lack of these
things, all their comforting counsels are very far insufficient.

Concerning all of this, see the Summa Theologica Ia-IIae, Q. 2, Art. 1-8

3.  Howbeit, though they be far unable to cure our disease of
themselves and therefore are not sufficient to be taken for our
physicians, some good drugs have they yet in their shops. They may
therefore be suffered to dwell among our apothecaries, if their
medicines be made not of their own brains but after the bills (ingredients) made
by the great physician God, prescribing the medicines himself and
correcting the faults of their erroneous recipes. For unless we
take this way with them, they shall not fail to do as many bold
blind apothecaries do who, either for lucre or out of a foolish
pride, give sick folk medicines of their own devising. For
therewith do they kill up in corners many such simple folk as they
find so foolish as to put their lives in the hands of such ignorant
and unlearned Blind Bayards (a bayard is a Bay Horse.  More is
Alluding to a famous English proverb which appears in a number
of forms, such as “jumping like a Blind Bayard“).

4.  We shall therefore neither fully receive these philosophers’
reasons in this matter, nor yet utterly refuse them. But, using
them in such order as may beseem them, we shall fetch the principal
and effectual medicines against these diseases of tribulation from
that high, great, and excellent physician without whom we could
never be healed of our very deadly disease of damnation. For our
necessity in that regard, the Spirit of God spiritually speaketh of
himself to us, and biddeth us give him the honour of all our
health. And therein he thus saith unto us: “Honour thou the
physician, for him hath the high God ordained for thy necessity” (see Sirach 38:1).
Therefore let us pray that high physician, our blessed Saviour
Christ, whose holy manhood God ordained for our necessity, to cure
our deadly wounds with the medicine made of the most wholesome
blood of his own blessed body (More may be alluding to St Ignatius
of Antioch, Epistle to the Ephesians chapter 20.) And let us pray that, as he cured
our mortal malady by this incomparable medicine (see John 6:53-58), it may please him
to send us and put in our minds at this time such medicines as may
so comfort and strengthen us in his grace against the sickness and
sorrows of tribulation, that our deadly enemy the devil (1 Pet 5:8) may never
have the power, by his poisoned dart of murmur, grudge, and
impatience, to turn our short sickness of worldly tribulation into
the endless everlasting death of infernal damnation. 

“Poisoned dart” may be an allusion to Ephesians 6:16, where St Paul says the shield of
faith quenches the fiery darts of the devil.  I come to this conclusion because in the next
section of the Dialogue, Anthony lays down that faith is the only sufficient
basis for dealing with the subject in question.

Please Vote For This Post On Pickafig

Note: To read the first post on this subject go HERE.

Please Vote For This Post On Pickafig.

6. The Sovereign People and its Representatives. To understand properly the Thomistic view on the seat of authority or of government in the State, we must distinguish as he does between two questions: (a) where is the seat of sovereignty in any case, (b) what is the most perfect form of government?

(a) At the outset, and in every state, sovereignty belongs to the collectivity, i.e., the sum total of individuals. The people are the State. This is logical, for the only realities in society are the individuals, and apart from them the State is nothing, and moreover, government has as its object the well-being of all (see # 2, 5). The doctrine of the sovereignty of the people is thus no modern invention.

But the collectivity or sum total of individuals is too complicated, too chaotic, to exercise power itself. In its turn, therefore, the collectivity delegates it usually, but not necessarily, to a monarch. For in theory one could choose instead an aristocratic or a republican form of government: “To ordain something for the common good belongs either to the whole community, or to someone taking the place of the community.” (Summ Theol. Ia Iae. q. 90, art. 3) Thus power is transmitted by successive delegation from God to the people, and from the people to the ruler. The people hold it by a natural title which nothing can destroy, the king holds it by the will of the people, and this may change. There is, accordingly, at the ase of the p[eople’s delegation to the king a contract, rudimentary or implicit in less perfect forms of society, explicit in States which have arrived at a high degree3e of organization. This will of the people, which can make itself known in many different ways, legitimatizes the exercise of power. Monarchy, in the opinion of Thomas, has the advantage of not scattering power and force. But he adds that circumstances must decide which is the best form of government at a particular moment in the political life of a nation. This gives his theory all the elasticity which could be desired.

(b) Still, he himself shows a very marked preference for a composite form; which he considers to be the most perfect realization of delegated authority. It is a mixed system of government, in which sovereignty belongs to the people, with the intervention of an elective monarchy, and an oligarchy which modifies the monarch’s exercise of power. “The best regime will be realized in that city or state, in which one alone commands all the others by reason of his virtue, where some subordinate rulers command according to their merit, but where nevertheless power belongs to all, either because all are eligible as rulers, or simply because all are electors. Now this is the case in a government which consists of a happy combination of royalty, inasmuch as there is only one head, or aristocracy inasmuch as many collaborate in the work of government, according to their virtue, and of democracy or popular power inasmuch as the rulers may be chosen from among the people, and it belongs to the people to elect their rulers.” (Summ Theol. Ia Iae. q. 97, art. 1) Aquinas affirms such political principles as universal suffrage, the right of the lowest of men to e raised to power, the appreciation of personal value and virtue, the domination of reason in those who govern or an ‘enlightened government,’ an elective system giving the means of choosing those most worthy, and the necessity of the political education of the people.

7. The duties of the Sovereign, and the Legislative Power. In the De Regimine Principum, of Thomas Aquinas, the ruler is charged with a threefold duty: he must establish the well-being of the whole, conserve it, and improve it (Lib. I, cap 15). First he must establish the common weal by preserving peace among the citizens (sometimes peace is referred to as convenientia voluntatum,agreement of wills), by encouraging the citizens to lead a moral life, and providing a sufficient abundance of the material things which are necessary to it. Teh public weal once established, the next duty is to conserve it. This is accomplished by assuring the appointment of sufficient and capable agents of administration, by repressing disorder, by encouraging morality, through a system of rewards and punishments, and by protecting the state against the attacks of external enemies. Finally the government is charged with a third mission, which is vague, more elastic: to rectify abuses, to make up for defects, to work for progress.

The means par excellence by which a Government is enabled to fulfill its threefold task is the power of making laws, i.e., of commanding. The Thomistic theory of human or positive law, in its double form of jus gentium, law of the nations, common to all states, is closely connected with the theory of law in general. For the civil law is, and can only be, a derivation from natural law, and in consequence it ultimately comes from the eternal law (13:2). Here once again the individual is protected against the State, for “in the measure that positive law is in disagreement with the natural law, it is no longer a law, but a corruption of law” (Summa Theol. Ia IIae, q. 95, art. 2). In this way the arbitrary element is banished as “a rational injunction, made in view of the common good, and promulgated by the one having charge of the community” (Summa Theol. Ia IIae, q. 90, art 4). Positive law adapts to concrete circumstances the immediate prescriptions of the natural law, which in their abstract form belong to the law of nations. For instance, the law of nations enjoins that malefactors are to be punished. Positive law determines whether the punishment is to be by fine, imprisonment, ect. Positive law is therefore at once fixed and variable. It changes with the circumstances, and it belongs to a government to modify it if necessary, always on condition that it bears in mind that every modification of a law lessens its force and majesty.

8. Social Justice and the Commonwealth. The common good is the result of good government and the reign of social justice. Thomas’ views on social justice and solidarity are worthy of note. To understand them we must ear in mind what we have said of the notion of right and of justice (14:3).

A compensation is due to each individual for whatever benefit accrues from his acts, and right is simply the requirement that this equal adjustment be made. To render to each one his due is to do justice. When the act benefits an entire community, social justice arises.

Hence social justice demands two elements :(a) that the actions of the individual citizen or of the several members of a group be conducted in such a way that the community, i.e., all its members, shall be benefited thereby; (b) that, in return, the individual should receive from the community an adequate compensation.

Social justice thus understood rest upon a solemn affirmation of solidarity and mutual assistance. Every human action, inasmuch as it is performed in a community, has its reaction upon that community, and benefits or harms it more or less, in some way (Summa Theol. Ia IIae, q. 58, art. 5. Cf. art. 6). The soldier who fights, the laborer who works, and the scholar who studies are engaged in social activities which, being such, do good to the whole community. Even the outbursts of individual passions admit of being referred to social justice, and “can be regulated with a view to the common good,” (Summa Theol. Ia IIae, q. 58, art 9, ad.3) since these outbursts intensify action, and every action has its echo in society.

Who ensures this convergence of individual activities? An individual citizen is obviously without the qualifications necessary for this task. It therefore belongs to the ruler to orient all good acts towards the common good of all. He is the custos justi, the justum animatum,-the guardian of right, the living embodiment of justice (Summa Theol. Ia IIae, q. 58, art. 1, ad 5). He is the architectonic chief architectonice). Just as the master builder of the cathedral supervises the stonecutters, the carpenters, the sculptors, the painters, so that they may be ready at the proper time and place, so the master builder of social justice oversees all the diverse social activities and takes account of their relative importance in the community. It belongs to the ruler to see that the soldier fights, the scholar studies, the laborer works, ect., in such a way that all their activities may be directed to the realization of the harmony of the body politic. He must think out the best way of ensuring mutual assistance in order that everything may be of profit to all. His intervention will above all regulate all external actions: such as diligence in work, temperance, meekness. But if necessary he will also occupy himself with actions which belong to the “internal forum” (Summa Theol. Ia IIae, q. 58, art. 9).

How is the ruler to carry out this high humanitarian mission? He can only do so by way of commandment. For, he possesses the virtue of justice as commanding per modum imperantis et dirigentis, while the citizens share in it only as obeying per modum executionis (Summa Theol. Ia IIae, q. 58, art. 1, ad 5). At first sight this looks like an intolerable and autocratic notion, a worship of the state, which is bound to destroy individual autonomy. But these fears are groundless. The theory contains within itself the correctives for those abuses to which it seems to open the door, for the realization of the common good is the one and only motive which can render legitimate the intervention of the ruler. And this common good “is no other than the good of each one of the members of the collectivity” (Summa Theol. Ia IIae, q. 58, art. 9). An arbitrary intervention on the part of the ruler which would be destructive of individual good-and thus of liberty-would be contrary to the common good, and as a consequence to social justice.

The doctrine of social justice constitutes in the Thomistic system and ideal which governments must never forget, and which they must realize to the fullest measure consonant with the actual conditions of a good civilization.

As to the compensation to the individual, which is owed by the community for services done, it is again the ruler who should decide as to the demands of social justice, although Thomas Aquinas does not insist upon this second aspect of the question.-Maurice De Wulf

Please vote for this post on Pickafig.

Note: Due to the length of the entry under this heading, it will be posted in two parts.

1. The fundamental principle of group life. Man is intended by nature to form a society. The group life is necessary, for if left to himself in an isolated state, an individual would be deprived of the materials, the intellectual guidance, and moral support necessary for the attainment of happiness. The group life is necessary precisely and only because of this insufficiency of the individual for his own needs.

In this way, then, we justify the fundamental principle of life in society, which we may enunciate as follows: The collectivity exists for the sake of the individual, and not the individual for the sake of the collectivity.” Similarly, the well-being of a group will not differ in kind from that of the individuals which compose it.

The principle is a general one, and applies to domestic groups, political (village, city, state), religious (parish, abbey, diocese, Christendom), and economic ones (e.g., trade union or guild). It is based upon general ethics, which emphasizes the value of human personality, and this moral individualism, itself one of the most striking achievements of the civilization of the Middle Ages, is in turn linked to metaphysics, which recognizes no other existent, substantial reality than the individual, in the particular sphere in question.

2. The unity of the group and the inalienable rights of its members. The collectivity therefore is not a substance as such, as is taught by some contemporary philosophers, and the very notion of ‘a collective person’ is contradictory (10:1). Its unity is not the internal unity which belongs to a natural substance, and which ensures coherence within it, but rather an external unity. Each member of a group retains his value as a person, but his activities are united or rather co-ordinated with those of others. This is especially true of the State, “which comprises many persons, whose varied activities combine to produce its well-being.” (Summa Theol., Ia-IIae, q. 96, art. 1)

The unity of a social group or of the State is a “unity of functions” exercised by the different members. The only difference between natural groups (such as the family or the State) and artificial ones (such as a club or a political party) is that the working in common is necessary in the first case and not in the second.

Since the group exists for the sake of the members, it goes without saying that it cannot take away or modify those inalienable rights which are expressions of the personality, i.e., which belong to the individual as possessing a rational nature. Whether he be slave or free, rich or poor, ruler or ruled, an individual has “the right to preserve his life, to marry and to bring up children, to develop his intelligence, to be instructed, to hold to the truth, to live in the Society.” (Summa Theol., Ia-IIae, 1. 94, art. 2). These are some of the perogatives of the individual which appear in the thirteenth-century Declaration of the Rights of Man.

Among the various natural groups, scholastic philosophers paid most attention to the family and the State.

3. The Family. The family, which forms the cell of the social organism, comprises the husband, wife, children, and servants. The father is the head of this group, and derives his authority from God (15:4). Although the wife belongs in a sense to the husband (she is said to be part of the husband), her independence relative to her husband is greater than that of children relative to their father, or servants to their masters The subordination of a child to his father is complete, as is that of a serf to his master.

From this it follows that there will be stricter relations of ‘justice’ between husband and wife than between father and children, masters and serfs, for, as we have seen above, justice requires a distinction (ad alterum) between persons. But always the individual rights of human beings remain. As for the serfs, the thirteenth century was not prepared to give them complete enfranchisement, but still their condition was altogether different from the slavery of antiquity and the early Middle Ages. Moreover, both canonical and civil legislation were constantly bettering their condition.

4. Origin of authority in the State. Whether great or small, a State consists of a group of families under the authority or power of one or several persons. Whence comes this sovereignty, i.e., the power of a man to command and rule his fellows? Schoolmen reply that all power comes from God, and explain this as follows: The whole universe is regulated by the plan of Divine Providence, the eternal law of all reality (lex aeterna). Each individual thing contributes, by attaining to its own end, to the realization of this divine plan and the object of the whole. In consequence, man will play his part in the cosmic order ordained by God for the Universe precisely by achieving the destiny which belongs to him as a rational being and thus ensuring his happiness (12:1-2). Now, since the group life was instituted in order to help individuals to attain their ends, the governing authority which forms a necessary element of a society (ratio gubernationis) must be a way of realizing the divine plan, and ultimately come from God also. “Since the eternal law is the reason or explanation of government in the chief ruler, the reason for governing rulers must also be derived from the eternal law.” (Summa Theol., Ia IIae, q. 95, art. 3) Rulers are therefore divine delegates. The theory is a general one, and applies to every kind of authority. In the case of the State, it does not matter by what means this divine power is transmitted, or in whom it is found. These are points for separate consideration.

5. Government is an officium or duty. The raison d’etre of government determines its nature: it is utilitarian, and officium, ‘office’ or duty. The princes of the earth are instituted by God not in order that they may seek their own profit, but in order that they may ensure the common well-being. Even in the case of the papal theocracy, the idea of officium is always found with that power, and the Pope describes himself as the servus servorum Dei, servant of the servants of God. Hence all treatises written for the use of princes and future monarchs condemn the capricious, selfish, arbitrary or tyrannical exercise of power.

Thomas builds up a whole system of guarantees in order to save the State from a government so completely opposed to its nature. (De Regimine Principum, lib. I, cap. 6) The guarantees are preventative in the first place:let the people carefully inquire concerning the candidate for power when choosing their ruler. Similar guarantees will exist throughout the monarch’s reign, for his power will be controlled and countered by the intervention of other factors, as we shall shortly see. There are likewise repressive guarantees: resistance to unjust commands of a tyrant is not only permitted, but even enjoined. Thomas expressly condemns tyrannicide: one must go to any length in order to put up with an unjust ruler, but if the regime becomes quite unsupportable, then one must have recourse to that power of deposing the monarch which is the corollary of the right to choose one. This doctrine holds good whatever be the nature of government,-monarchy, aristocracy, or democracy. This brings us to the question of the depository of power.-Maurice De Wulf

Note: What follows are notes from Bishop Macevilly’s EXPOSITION OF THE EPISTLES OF ST PAUL. Text in THIS COLOR represent my additions (if any). For more detailed note than those provided by the Bishop, see my “Notes On 1 Thessalonians” listed under this blogs title. The blue colored links to biblical texts will cause a pop-up box to appear with the cited text according to the Douay-Rheims translation, you merely have to place your mouse on them. The box does allow you to access other translations, including the NAB and the RSV (This feature isn’t working at the present time. At the time the Bishop wrote, providing a paraphrase to the text was quite common among expositors of the Bible. Such paraphrases sometimes introduce elements of Pauline theology into a text which may only be implied, or were only developed in latter letters. Modern paraphrase Bilbes generally attempt something different, and the two should not be confused. The Bishop’s paraphrase is in Boldface.

Please Vote For This Post On Pickafig

Read 1 Thessalonians 1:4-10 here

Notes:

1 Thess 1:4

4. We give thanks to God, knowing your election by God to grace and to his Church here, and to glory hereafter, should you persevere.

The reason why he gives God thanks is, because he knows, from what he says (verse 5), that they are predestined by God; and as this decree, predestining them, together with the spiritual graces bestowed on them in consequence, whereby they were enabled to perform good works (verse 3), were all gratuitous gifts of God, He should, therefore, be thanked for them, and the glory of them referred to Him.

1 Thess 1:5

5. Because our preaching of the gospel among you was not confined to mere words, but was sanctioned by miracles, by the plentiful and abundant diffusion of the gifts of the Holy Ghost, and by a multitude of other motives, calculated to convince you of the truth of the doctrine preached, as you yourself know what manner of me we have been among you, having in view your conversion to the faith.

The reasons from which their election was inferred by the Apostle are these, viz., the miracles (”but in power also”); the gifts of the Holy Ghost (”and in the Holy Ghost”); such as tongues, prophecy, &c., which accompanied the preaching of the gospel among them, as well as the multitude of other motives, calculated to produce conviction in their minds, “and in much fullness.” This “fullness,” which may refer either to the strong interior conviction of the truth of the gospel; or, as we have understood it, to the additional motives for producing this conviction, may have been founded on the Apostle’s own conduct, his disinterestedness, his heroism in exposing himself to danger without any hope of temporal compensation, &c. All this, joined to the sanction lent by God himself, was calculated to produce the most firm conviction of the truth of the gospel preached. This conjecture is rendered very probable by the following words-”as you know what manner of men,” &c., which show, that, in the preceding, he was referring to his own conduct among them.

1 Thess 1:6

6. (Nor was this exhibition of zeal on our part without success); for, you became faithful imitators of me and of the Lord. You received the gospel, though attended with much suffering and persecution to you, with the joy of the Holy Ghost.

They were imitators of our Blessed Lord and of St Paul, because our Lord preached his gospel, and submitted to insults and persecutions with joy and gladness, for the salvation of his people; and so did the Apostle.

1 Thess 1:7

7. So that you have become a model, in this respect, to all the faithful, not only of Macedonia, but also of Achaia.

They were a model to their own countrymen; and to those in Achaia, where St Paul then was.

1 Thess 1:8

8. For, from you the word of the Lord has been proclaimed, not only in Macedonia and Achaia, but also in every place with which you are in communication, has the rumor of your faith in God been spread, so that it is unnecessary for me to say anything regarding it.

The words “spread abroad,” not only mean that the fame of their faith was rumored abroad, but also that it sounded forth in such a way as to serve as an example for imitation with all men, both believers and unbelievers. For, though he preached at Philippi before he preached at Thessalonica; still, his preaching in the latter place was more noted and more successful. “In every place,” must be understood of those places only with which Thessalonica was in communication, owing to its extensive relations of commerce.

1 Thess 1:9

9. For all to whom we converse regarding you, anticipate us in speaking of our advent amongst you, and of the success that attended us, and of your conversion from worshipping inanimate and senseless idols to serve and adore the living and true God.

“To serve the living and true God:” unlike the inanimate blocks you heretofore adored, and “true God,” unlike the false gods of the Pagans, either men ranked among the gods, or demons. Omnes dii gentium daemonia “For all the gods of the Gentiles are demons” (Psalm 96:5 OR, Psalm 95:5, depending on the translation)

1 Thess 1:10

10. And to expect from heaven his Son Jesus (whom he raised from the dead), and by whom we have been delivered from the wrath to come.

10. “Whom he raised from the dead.” This being an act of power, is, by appropriation, ascribed to God the Father. The Apostle refers here to their faith in the second coming of God to judge the world. And although the dead who have long since slept in the Lord will accompany him from heaven; still, they may be said to be expecting him on earth, as their bodies are there. “Who hath delivered us from the wrath to come.” From this the Apostle wishes them to infer, that those thus favored beyond the unbelievers, who remain subject to eternal death, should persevere in this state of security, to which God has gratuitously called them.

It was the consdieration of these sublime characteristics of the ideas that led to Plato and after him St Augustine and St Thomas to conclude that the ideas reside in God as their source and principle.

From this opinion Malebranche deduced his system that man, as well as every other finite intelligence, sees all that he does see in God. This system was afterwards defended from the imputations against its theological orthodoxy by Cardinal Gerdil.

We do not entirely accept this system, for reasons too long to enter upon here, but we recognize in it a foundation of truth, and we say in general that the differences between our system and that of Malebranche lies in fundamentals bu in details.

God odes not disappoint the desire of those men who, in an upright and humble spirit, search carefully, in order that they may partake of and delight in His eternal wisdom.  He imparts to them abundance of light to see into those sublime reasons according to which He disposes events.  If He keeps the profoundest depths of His counsels veiled in part from them, this is only that they may have opportunities of showing their Faith in Him, and enriching themselves more and more with the high merit of a perfect submission to His adorable decrees.

From all that we have said thus far it is clear that we may appropriately distinguish two ways in which it is possible for man to rid himself of all perplexities or doubts in regard to Divine Providence, that of Faith, and that of Reason.

The first is broad, very simple, and open to all.  A religious man, assured by his own reason, but at the same time strengthened in that assurance by the power which a firm Faith infuses into him, holds that He Who governs the universe is an Infinite Being, all-wise, all-powerful, all-just, all-good.  Hence, in all accidents, in all trying encounters, he tranquilly reposes in that Being.  Nothing disturbs him, nothing comes to him as a surprise.  No matter how painful, no matter how far beyond his comprehension, all that happens is ever, in his intimate conviction, a Divine Work; and this simple truth is more than enough for him.  All possible objections vanish before this one word: THERE IS A GOD. -Blessed Antonio Rosmini Serbati

1. Conscience. The obligation to act in a particular way in a particular instance affects the will through the intermediary of an act of knowledge. This is evident from the data of psychology and ethics. I ought to know the moral law not only as expressed in more or less general principles by means of general judgments of the practical reason, but also as applying or not applying to the particular case before me. The act by which the reason applies a universal principle of morality to a particular case is the judgment of conscience. The practical reason says: “you must be honest in business and give to each his due.” Conscience says: “You must return to your customer the sum of a hundred dollars, above the price of the article sold to him, which he gave you by error.”

A law which is not known cannot bind us, and we are never bound to act otherwise than our conscience tells us, even if its judgment happens to be erroneous. “We must say, unconditionally, that any act of the will which goes astray from reason, whether that reason be correct or false, is evil.” In applying his principle in this way, Aquinas shows his breadth of view, and-let us remark incidentally-demonstrates the tolerance of the thinkers of the thirteenth century in religious matters. For if anyone thought in good faith that he would do wrong in becoming a Christian, he would do wrong in believing in Christ, although the Christian Faith is in itself good, and necessary for salvation. For the same reason, a doubtful or ‘probable’ conscience does not bind or at any rate binds to a less degree. Obligation is a function of knowledge.

But we must add something further to this thomistic doctrine. It must not be supposed that every act of willing evil, under the impression that it is good, is morally upright, for a man has a positive duty to instruct himself concerning his moral obligations, seek light on doubtful points, and weigh probabilities (see 13:2). Error, doubt, hesitation become blameworthy if they are voluntary. Still, it remains true that anything which diminishes our clear vision of what we ought to do, such as prejudices, education, heredity, organic disease or weakness, fear anger, and other passions, defects or evil tendencies in the will, emotions, ect. (7:5), reduces the moral character of an act, and likewise responsibility.

2. Responsibility and sanctions. Moral acts, whether obligatory or not, are imputable to the individual, in so far as they are freely performed. As Aristotle puts it, a man is the father of his acts as he is the father of his children.

responsibility, relative to oneself or to others, involves merit and demerit. These are regarded by the Schoolmen as the natural consequences of the use of liberty. If an act freely willed, moral or immoral, had nothing to do with merit or demerit, and if ultimately we could not fall back upon a system of sanctions (i.e., rewards and punishments) which need to be completed in a future life,-not only would the good cease to be rewarded and evil punished, but liberty itself would no longer have a sufficient reason. What would be the use of liberty, if its proper or improper employment were without effect upon our final happiness?

3. Moral Virtues. Prudence and Justice. The performing of acts morally good engenders moral virtue: it impresses upon the higher part of our being a lasting bent which inclines us to act well in all the circumstances of our life. Moral virtue is the result of moral conduct in the past, and the source of similar conduct in the future. The moral virtues are prudence, justice, fortitude, temperance (see 8:3).

At the base of the moral life is prudence, the recta ratio agibilium-”right reasoning concerning things to be done”-which determines what acts should be performed in particular circumstances. Certain primary and very simple judgments which are present in every mind (such as, for instance, “it is necessary to live in society”) originate a tendency or inclination to act in accordance with them (for instance, a general tendency to do all that is necessary for life in society). Then comes a series of practical judgments which, considering all the circumstances (consilium, counsel), determine our choice. This in turn the will decides to follow (imperium). A prudent man is one who by the frequency of such judgments sees and decides rapidly and without hesitation what is to be done in a particular case. Prudence therefore belongs both to knowing and to acting, and exemplifies the intimate compenetration of knowledge and will in the unity of consciousness. Situated at the threshold of the moral life, prudence impregnates all the other virtues which guide us in our actions, especially justice, fortitude, and temperance.

To understand the meaning of justice we must begin y considering the notion of right (jus). Right presupposes the living together of many human beings in a community. Since I have a personal end to attain, my acts are naturally means which serve for my own perfection. If the directly benefit others, then these others owe me compensation, and right, jus, consists precisely in this requirement of equity. “Right, or that which is just, is some work related to another according to some kind of equity.”

Justice, the virtue par excellence of life in society, is the psychological and moral state of a man who wills “firmly and permanently to render to each one his due.” It accordingly supposes a plurality of distinct persons, capable of bringing about this equity by means of their actions. “Since it belongs to justice to regulate human actions, this equity which is called for by justice must be between different persons, capable of action.” This is indeed called for y the individualism which runs through the Metaphysics and Moral Philosophy of Thomas. He never loses an opportunity of stressing the value or personality.

Now, it is easy to see that the ‘other than self,’ for whose benefit justice exists, may signify an individual, or the community, and we thus obtain the division of justice into particular and social. For instance to give to a shopkeeper the price of an article purchased is to perform an act of private or particular justice.

In the present chapter only particular justice is in question. Since right-that which is due to others-rests upon an objective equality, it is independent of our passions and affections. The same is true of the virtue of justice. On the other hand, fortitude, which regulates boldness and fear, temperance, which bridles our appetites, and other virtues, are directly related to our passions and our inner dispositions.

We can say that Thomas Aquinas retains for the group of moral virtues the Aristotelian notion “in medio virtus” on condition that the means here is determined y reason, and differs in the case of different virtues. For instance, not to eat when one ought to, or to eat more than we ought, is not to observe the limits of temperance dictated by reason. Where the virtues are concerned, we must keep close to reason.

The moral philosophy of Thomas Aquinas is in close dependence upon his Metaphysics. The moral value of personality, the end of man, the notion of moral goodness, the moral richness of a human act, are all established in a way conformable with the great principles of pluralism, of universal finality, and of the goodness of being.

3.  Principal characteristics of ideas.

but if ideas, or, in other words, the ideal and possible objects, are not furnished by the senses, whence then do they come?

Let us begin by examining the essential characteristics of ideas.  These are principally two-namely universality and necessity.

An ideal object or one that is merely possible, is always universal, in this sense, that taken by itself it enables us to know the nature of all the indefinite number of individuals in which it is or may be realized.  Take, for example, the idea of man.  The idea of man is the same as the ideal man.  Whatever be the number of human individuals in whom this idea may be realized there is always the same nature of man; that nature is one, the individuals are many.

Now what does the idea of man, or the ideal man express and make us know?  The nature of man, if he had the power of creation, would be able by this alone to produce as many human individuals as he pleased.  In the same way this one idea is sufficient to enable us to discern all men who may ever come into existence.  So also a sculptor who had conceived the idea of a stature, would be able to reproduce it in marble as many times as he pleased, without the idea being ever exhausted.  The ideal stature would remain one and always the same, standing before the mind as the exemplar; the material copies would be many, all formed and made known by means of this same idea.  This is what is meant by the universality of ideas, by which they are categorically  distinguished from the real objects which are always particular, and from the sensations which are also particular.

The characteristic of necessity is equally evident, because the ideas being possible objects, it is clear that what is possible can never have been otherwise than possible, and hence it is such, necessarily.  The possible is that which involves no contradiction;every object, therefore, which involves no contradiction is necessarily possible.  Now all finite and real beings considered in their reality are contingent only and not necessary, in contradiction to possible beings.  For we may think of any finite or real being whatsoever as existing or not existing, whereas we can not think of the possible  object ceasing to be possible, that is to say, becoming not possible.  For example, man in his possibility is necessary, for you cannot make man an impossible being; on the contrary, a real man is always a contingent being, because he may or may not be.

Universality, therefore, and necessity are the two principal characteristics of the ideas.  These include two others-namely, infinity and eternity.

An infinity is necessarily involved in ideas, by reason of their universality.  No real and limited being is universal.  For reason of its very limits it is determined within itself and incommunicable to any other being.  Hence ideas do not belong to the class of real limited beings.

Ideas are also eternal, because they are necessary; for that which is necessary, and that which always is and always was  is eternal.

2. Ideas are not nothing.  They have a mode of existence proper to themselves.

We have seen that the objects of our cognitions are essentially distinct from ourselves, who are the subjects of the cognitions.  This distinction of the object from the subject of cognition is proper to all objects whatever, whether they are only possible (ideas) or are also subsistent (things).  But not only are all such objects distinct from the cognizing subject, they are also independent of it.  By this observation a new light is thrown on the nature of ideas, for they compel us to conclude by the logic of facts:

1st. That ideas are not nothing.
2nd. That they are not ourselves or any modification of ourselves.
3rd.  That they have a mode of existence of their own, entirely different from that of real or subsistent things.

This mode of existence belonging to the ideal objects or ideas is such that it does not fall under our bodily sense, and hence it is that it has entirely escaped the observation of many philosophers, who began their philosophical investigations with a foregone conclusion, or assumption that whatever did not fall under our senses was nothing.  Yet it is a fact that though the possible objects truly exist they do not fall under sense, and hence that we can in no way account for them by recurring to corporeal sense only; which is a fresh and self-evident confutation of sensism. 

1. Distinction Between Subject and Object.

It is clear, then, from what we have already said that the object known is a thing entirely different from the subject or knower.  the subject that knows is a person, the object, as such, is impersonal.   Sometimes however we may say that in a certain sense the object known is a subject that knows, when, for instance, the object of thought is man; sometimes also the subject that knows is itself the object known, as when we think of ourselves.  But the subject that knows can never,, as such, e confounded or mixed up with the object known.   Always and in every case the subject and the object retain their respective natures, each remaining perfectly distinct from the other, so distinct that if it were otherwise our knowledge itself would be extinguished.  The distinction between subject and object is therefore an essential characteristic of cognition.

The question, therefore, is reduced to this: Whence does our understanding obtain its object?

Human cognitions are divided into two classes, intuitions and affirmations.

Intuitional knowledge or cognition is that which regards the  things, as considered in themselves, the things in their possibility.  Things considered in themselves as possible to subsist or not to subsist are the ideas.

Cognition obtained by means of affirmation or judgments is that knowledge which we acquire by affirming or judging that a thing subsists or does not subsist.

From this description the following consequences spring:

1. That the cognitions by intuition necessarily precede those of affirmation, for we can not affirm that a thing subsists or does not subsist unless we first know the thing itself as possible to subsist; for example, I can not say that a tree or a man subsists unless I first know what a tree or a man is.  Now to know what a thing is comes to the same as to know the thing in its possibility, for I may know what a tree is, and yet not know that this tree as yet subsists.

That the objects as known all belong to intuitional knowledge, because affirmation is limited to affirming or denying the subsistence of the object as known by intuition.  Affirmation, therefore, does not furnish any new object to the mind, but only pronounces the subsistence of the object already known.  Intuition, therefore, places us in possession of possible objects, and these we call ideas.  Affirmation does not furnish us with new possible objects, or new ideas, but produces persuasions in respect of the objects which we know already.   There are, therefore, cognitions which terminate in ideas, and cognitions which terminate in persuasions.  By the first we know the possible world, by the second the real and subsistent world.  Hence there are two categories of things-things possible and the things subsistent, in other words ideas and things.