A Thesis
Submitted to the Faculty Of the School of Philosophy of
Laval University in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy
by
Sister Julia Marie O'Brien, S.C,
directed by
Quebec
(NOTE: This text has been converted to html format by computer OCR; a significant number of errors remain.)
PREFACE
Man's obligations as a social being have always been of interest to him. He has always wanted to understand the proper reasons and Justification for these obligations. During the twentieth century there has been an increase in this natural interest because of man's concern for self-fulfillment and for the individual rights, threatened or undermined by political domination.
Therefore, relying on the presupposition that the common good of society is greater in itself and greater for each of us than our own proper good, we are attempting in this thesis to determine which of these goods is to be loved more, and whether society or the self must be loved more.
Let us, however, state briefly this doctrine of the priority of the common good.1 We distinguish the common good of persons from their proper good. The latter is a good which is proper to one person to the exclusion of another. For instance, my eyes are mine, my toothbrush of private use. Now, the personal or private good of my own is to another person an alien good so long as that good belongs to me. The house of my neighbor is to me an alien
good« But a common good is the good of many persons. It is not the good of this person to the exclusion of another person, but rather many share in the same good. For Instance, peace in society which consists in the tranquillity of order, or a wise and practicable constitution, is a good which all the citizens enjoy. Even a home is a kind of common good for all the members of the family.
All of which does not mean that common good is opposed to proper good. This can be shown from the example of the geometer who knows that the sum of the angles of any triangle is equal to two right angles.. To know this is a good. The knowledge of this truth is proper to the person who knows it, and proper to any one person who sees it. But the truth known is not proper to one person to the exclusion of the other person; it is a truth which is possessed in common; it is the same truth which is known by this person and by that. We may note, in passing, that no material good can be perfectly possessed in common in the manner of spiritual goods, no matter how much they may approach the latter.
Now, why is the common good of a given order better than a proper one in the same order? Merely because it extends to more people? This could not be the proper reason, but only a sign of it. If the perfection of a society, its common good, cannot be achieved by the single person, is it
\
not because it Is too lofty to be attained and possessed by the individual? If, as the tyrant does, he appropriated the common good as a proper one, would he not be unjust?
But» one might say, this is not because the good of society is too great to be possessed by one, but because It was actually achieved by cooperation of the many who, as a consequence, have their right to share in it. Nevertheless it is plain that the good of civil society can no more be possessed by the single person thai it can be achieved, as is seen from the fact that appropriation by the tyrant immediately destroys political society* On the other- hand, the good citizen wants this good to be possessed by the many. St, Augustine and St, Thomas quote the words of Valerius Maximus on the early Roman citizens« they preferred to be poor in a wealthy republic thai to be rich in a poor one. Now this is surely a sign that the common good should not be appropriated by the individual person because it is superior to what the person can possess as a proper
' I
good.
And this leads us to a good which, though not possessed in common, can still be a common good. Suppose only one person knew a certain truth in geometry, would this truth cease to be a common good? Indeed it would if this truth could
IIa Ilae, q.47, a,10, c.
not possibly be known by another person; it would then be a proper good of this geometer. But if this truth is such that, whether actually known by many or not, it can be attained by many} if, by its very nature it cannot be exhausted by one, then it also has the nature of common good. It is in this sense that the objective good of supernatural beatitude, God, as He is in Himself, is a common good. For, even had He created and elevated only a single soul, this perfection could never have been attained by that soul as a proper good, for such appropriation could be true only if there existed between God and the soul a perfect commensurabillty such as that of God to Himself.
Hence, when we say that with respect to his ultimate good the person never transcends the nature of part, we mean that whatever good the person can attain to as a proper good, this good could never have more than the nature of part when compared to the divine good. It is because of this that the person himself receives the denomination of part.
The subordinate problem concerning the order of our loves for these goods requires first an analysis of love in general and of the kinds of love, especially of dilection or rational love, both as love of concupiscence and as love of benevolence. The meaning of self-love will be determined
by the definitions end classifications, as well as by the nature of self In the term "self-love." The meaning of society, as used in this study, will also be defined in order to arrivé at a correct notion regarding the kind of love that we have for society.
The chapter following these precisions will present some principles according to which we can decide whether self or society is more to be loved. The order of the love of benevolence as accepted in the Aristotelian-Thomistic tradition is an essential part of the background for the problem *
In the third chapter an attempt is made to solve the problem regarding the place of society in our love by considering the natural love of the part for the whole»
In Chapter Four the good of the individual and the good of humanity are seen from God's viewpoint insofar as the creature may presume to know it. This assumption of a Divine viewpoint is without the sacrifice of objectivity since things really are the way God sees them, and unless
they could be seen as He sees them, they could not be
3
quite seen as they are.
3, la, q.14, a.8, ad 3; a.13, c. and ad 3; a.14, c.; a.16, ad 2; q.16, a,5, c.
This is followed by a study of conflicting or apparently conflicting ©pinions, bearing directly or indirectly upon the que et ion of man's relationship with society,
The final chapter is a summary and co-ordination of the conclusions reached, with the intention of understanding the proper attitude of each individual toward himself and society.
/
TABLE OF CONTENTS
Page
CHAPTER
I* ANALYSIS OF TERMS» ....... I
II. PRELIMINARI PRINCIPLES.....10
III. THE PERSON AND THE COMMON
IV* PURPOSE AND MULTIPLICITY IN
Saint Thomas and the
Teachings of the Church. . . 60
Modern Opinions. . . . . » . . 79
VI. CONCLUSION ... . . . .... . 99
BIBLIOGRAPHY . ............ . 102
vili
CHAPTER I /
ANALYSIS OF TERMS
Before we can compare our love for self with our love for society» we must see what love is and what kind of love we have for each of these two objects.
There have been many descriptive definitions of love,
1 2 such as "a unitive force," "complacency in good," "principle of movement toward the good,"3 and "affective union."4
While these definitions do not tell us essentially what love
is in all its latitude, they do bring out some aspects in
harmony with the notion of love as a tendency or inclination
toward the good,5
Love is both a generic and a specific term. As a generic tern, it embraces, in its widest extension, natural love, sense love, and rational love. Human love includes the love which is a passion, dilection, charity, and friendship, ? There is also a division of love into love of concupiscence and love of benevolence. That these divisions do not exclude one another will be evident.
The first, division includes natural love, sense love, and rational love. By "natural love" we here mean simply the inclination which is found even in non-sentient beings toward a goal of which they have no cognition, as when a
9
tree tends toward nourishment. When Saint Thomas distinguishes between the natural love of man's last end and the love of choice which follows this, natural is used in a
similar sense, inasmuch as his love may be either an inclinalo
tion of the will as a nature, or of the will as free,
The good tended toward in sense love is related essentially to the appetite of the senses whereas in rational love., the goodness of the object, whether material or spiritual, is also perceived in its proper formality as good
11
by the intellect of man. *
This division into natural, sense, and rational love,
is made from the viewpoint of knowledge, and its members
are not all really distinct from those of the next group:
love, dilection, and charity. Love, in this classification,
is the passion common to all sentient beings; however, the
12
tern is extended to apply also to dilection and charity, Dilection is love with free judgment and choice, an act of the will, identified in man with the rational choice of the foregoing division. J Charity, etymologically indicating an evaluation of its object as precious (*carumff) is a love for the sake of the love of God, caused by Divine grace, and differing also from dilection because charity adds quickness and joy, and because the rational
choice made in natural dilection may be of a good that is 15
only apparent, Kore fundamentally still, charity in man
differ» from dilection because charity io a participation
in the Divine charity infused into the hearts of men, who,
are thereby inclined to the end appointed by God, whereas
in dilection we choose the object of our love,16
Human love may also be divided into love of friendship
or benevolence and love of concupiscence. The former is
the love by which I wish a person well; the latter is the
desire for whatever contributes to that person's well-being.
Love of benevolence is love in a more essential sense than
1 è
love of concupiscence. p The latter may nevertheless be directed toward a person as well as toward inanimate objects as when a man loves another man because the latter contri-butes to hi» pleasure òr profit. Since this desire for possession, this love of concupiscence, is always for the sake of some rational creature, it is clear that it is preceded by love of benevolence. Benevolence, therefore, is the first act of any love. However, benevolence is not wholly identical with love of benevolence, since it stay be
but a passing act of the will, without connoting the union
20
which must exist in love.
Self-love may be found in every kind of love we have so far referred to. Saint Thomas, however, following Aristotle, points out that self-love, in its most proper sense, is a love of one's nobler self, hence a rational love; while the spontaneous love of self which results in the desire for one's external and physical comfort, a sense love, though more common among men, is not love of the true
self. Neither a rational love for self nor a sense love for self is necessarily opposed to a natural self-love,
Likewise,self-love may he a love of passion, of dilection, and of charity, the first, as we have seen, is identical with sense loves the second, with rational love; and
charity, too, whose proper object is God, extends to the
22
self, a rational creature ordained to union with God,
The love we call friendship supposes a mutual relationship between persons, a love which must, strictly speaking, be distinguished from self-love. It remains true, however,
as Aristotle and Saint Thomas point out, that self-love is
* 23
nevertheless the archetype, as it were, of friendship, J
23-* la Ilae, q.29, a.4, c.s "And it happens that some men account themselves as being principally that which they are in their material and sensitive nature: therefore they love themselves according to what they take themselves to be, while they hate that which they really are, by desiring what is contrary to reason," In IX Ethicorum, lect.8, n. 1864: "The goods which many men desire—money, etc., pertain to the Irrational part of the soul, the passions, and so those who desire them inordinately, love the irrational part of themselves," In III Sent., d.28, q.l, a.6, ad 5»
22. IIa Ilae, q.25, a.4, c.: "Secondly, we may speak of charity in respect of its specific nature, namely as denoting man's friendship with God in the first place, and, consequently, with the things of God, among which things is man himself who has charity. Hence, among these other things which he loves out of charity because they pertain to God, he loves also himself out of charity." In III Sent., d.28, q.l, a.6; De Carit., q.l, a.4, ad 2.
23. Ha Ilae, q.25, a.4, c.j In III Sent., d.23, q.l, a.6; Aristotle, Ethica Nichomachea IX, Oxford ed., 1925, chap.4, 1166aj In IX Ethicoram, lect.4, n.1012.
Obviously, love of self is a love of benevolence accompanied, as is all love of benevolence,14 by a love of concupiscence, that is by a desire for those things which contribute to our well-being.
Since thé self-love we intend to compare with lové of society is_ the one we have called true self-love, it is a rational or intellectual love, though it does not exclude natural and sense love} it is a dilection, a prototype of friendship, and capable of elevation to charity.
Our next concern is to discover what kind of being society is, in order that we may see whether love for it is possible, and if so, what kind of love that is.
Society may be defined as an association of individuals
25
for a common purpose. The purpose for which these individuals associate must be a truly common one, if the association is to be a society, properly so called. If many individuals join together in order to more effectively attain
their own private ends by mutual help, as when neighbors assist each other in harvesting or in building, suçh a juncture cannot be called a society. If they are collaborating, not for a good that is really Common, but that each
in turn may gai») the assistance of the others, the good
26
achieved is in each case a private one.
Father Gredt says that some modern masters of jurisprudence call society, this .."moral* person, a real being; others, pure fiction. He himself inclines to the opinion
that formally society is an ens rationis with a foundation
27
in reality, but that its material parts are real. This misconception on the part of Father Gredt arises from the opinion that every real being must of necessity bé in a predicament, an unum per se.
One modem author speaks of societies as being impersonal and ontologically inferior to human beings, since the
latter are real substances, to whom alone we can attribute
1 2ê such values as generosity, etc. On the other hand, an
editorial in the Catholic World laments that institutions must nowadays be bolstered up by persons, and insists that "impersonal" is not synonymous with ?lifeless" or "abstract," and that "there are entities other than persons which are living and co nerétte.* ^ Another modern student of this problem admits that societies are not abstract and separated from the individuals who compose them.
These contrary theses seem to have warm adherents and opponents. An article in a collection published for the six-hundredth anniversary of the cannonization of Saint Thomas quotes one author as calling society a "pure fiction," and a Paris sociological publication as maintaining on the contrary that society is a real being, as superior to the individuals as organic cells are to the chemical elements which compose them. The writer of the article himself steers a middle course. He insists that beings are more perfect as they are more perfectly one, and that since it is only unity of order which constitutes the social being, it is an imperfect being. He concedes, however, that our inability
29. Gustave Thibon, "Nova et Vetera—Primacy of the Person," Catholic World, Vol.165, (July, 1947), p.365.
30. H. E. Langan, The Philosophy of Personalism and Its Educational Applications, a dissertation, Catholic University of America, 1935, p.54* to form an image which corresponds to society is no sufficient reason for denying its existence as a real "moral
person*"
While we can agree with the above author that an unum
per se is more perfectly a being, we cannot agree that it
is necessarily a more perfect being. A created substance
is not called good except by the accidental good which per-32
fects it. Any devil, in his absolute being, is more perfectly one than any human saint in heaven.
We can concede to these adversaries of the reality of society that it is a moral whole possessing unity in operation rather than unity of being, that it is composed of subsisting rational beings who preserve their integrity in
31. Et. Hugueny, "L'Etat et L*Individu," Melanges Thomistes. Le Saulchoìr, Kain, Belgique, 1923, p.341-p.348.
32. la, q.6, a.3, ad 1: "One does not include the idea of perfection, but only of indivision, which belongs to everything according to its own essence. Now the essences of simple things are undivided both actually and potentially, but thè essences of compound things are undivided only actually; and therefore everything must be one essentially, but not good essentially, as was'shown above." Ia, q.6, ' a.3, ad 3; la Ilae» a.4, e.; Q.D. de Veritate» q.21, a.5, c. and q.22, a.l, ad 7» C. De Köninck, De la Primauté1
du Bien Commun, q.56; Karl Krëilkamp, The Metaphysical Founda tions of Thomistic Jurisprudence, thesis, Catholic University of America, Washington, D.C,, 1939, p.75î "Besides the unity of parts and powers of an individual—the undividedness of a substantial entity—there is the unity that organizes these separate existents into a higher (if not substantial) whole, the unity of order."
maWMMMMlliaMMII«^ -------------------------------------~i.~~~.~~~~ ---".---------
that unioni and that its subsistence and specific operations are not separable from those of its members. None of these fact s î however, make society inferior to the substantial wholes which compose it*
Modem writers have pointed out three typical mistakes that have been made in our notion of society; that of considering it as a mere collection of individuals,-^ that of thinking of it as a unit apart from and foreign to its members, 2k and that of identifying it with any particular
35
form of political organization.
Though the intrinsic formality which specifies society is ô unity of order which involves relationship, society is not a mere relationship existing among human beings, Neither is society a mere aggregate of persons; rather, it is a whole, unified in virtue of some one good, the good being a real good of real persons,
33« Sister Mary «Joan of Arc Wolfe, "Social atìà Moral Relevants of Psychological and Philosophical concepts of Personality and Individuality." New Scholasticism. Vol«18, (October, 1944), p.373*
34, Charles De Köninck, De la Primauté du Bien Commun,
35. Ibid., p.75î Louis J. A. Mercier, "Primacy of God*s OrderTHTew Scholasticism, Vol.20, (April, 1946), p.162,
B^àlity is not to be confused with substantiality» Accidents too are real, and there are relationships which are real, not to speak of artifacts, which are not, as such, in a predicament» Society cannot be simply an ens rationiaî its constituent parts are real human beings, and the relationships which make societies formally distinct from the mere aggregate of human beings are real relationships, real ends, real loves, real racial affinities, etc.
Society is a reality, for surely an army marching into enemy territory is real as an army. Hone who have heard the tramp of invading feet, or who have seen the devastation left in the wake of hostile forces, attribute these effects either to so many thousand individuals acting separately or to an abstract bond which unites them. Whatever the type of unity in the society here considered, the effects produced are the effects produced by the whole, which has purposes and functions apart from those of its members considered individually and separately, and these effects are certainly effects of a real order, ■ f
The physical reality of society is an important consideration in defining love of society. One cannot love an ens rationis. especially in the sense of wishing well to it, and there is no doubt that love of benevolence for societies is possible. Experience confirms this statement. One has
only to think, among a multitude of examples, of a religious order with a strong "esprit de corps" to be convinced that the love of benevolence felt by its members is directed toward the society«.and not alone toward the members composing it and considered separately. . Actually they are considered not only for their own individual goods, but they are also viewed as concerned with the good which is the society's principle of unity.
This love of society is a rational love, a dilection. Though we have insisted that society is a concrete reality, composed of rational beings, and therefore capable of being loved with a love of benevolence, it is not, as such, a sensible reality, and so does not necessarily comport the emotional appeal which would cause the love that is a passion.
Moreover, friendship requires a certain equality between lover and beloved, and this would preclude our speaking of
"3Ä
a friendship for society.
We conclude then that love of self and love of society must first be compared on the rational level. Consideration will be given in a later chapter to the charity that lifts
36. Ha Ilae, q.25, a.3, c.î Aristotle, Ethics. VIII, chap.3 II56 FjT"VlTT7 chap.6, 1153 a. ——
both these loves to the supernatural plane»
Since love is an appetite for the good, it is necessary to make the following distinctions of the good in order to fix precisely what is the object of our love in self-love and in the love for society. There is first the transcendental good which is convertible with being, the good that every being is merely because it is.^ Then there is the good which divides being. In regard to this good, Saint Thomas says that a being is not called an absolute good simply by reason of its absolute being, for a person may be truly a person without being a good person» To be good in this sense, a being must be perfected by reason of its proper
ordination to its end and by reason of the superadded acci-
30
dental determinations which make it good absolutely, A finite being is not necessarily as it should be. So long as Socrates is not a virtuous man, he is not a good man, he is not as he should be. Now the question arises: who is the self that Socrates naturally loves and must love? Is
3S. De Verit.. q.21, a.5, c. ; q.22, a.l, ad 7s H. . .
Secundum esse substantiale non dicitur aliquid bonum simpli-citer et absolute, nisi superaddantur perfectiones aliae debitae; . . ."; la, q.6, a.3, ad 3*. "The goodness of a creature is not its very essence, but something superadded; . it is either its existence, or some added perfection, or the order to its end." IIa Ilae, q.5&, a.2, c.
It a self which prescinds from its being as it should be? And the same may be asked of society? And it seems that the answer must be in the affirmative) inasmuch as we seem already to love Socrates when we wish him well. How could we love the common good for society, if we did not already love society? In other words, there seems to be a good in the person, whether physical or moral, which is loved prior to his being good absolutely, and this prior good is quite Inalienable.
Nevertheless, the self we love does not mean the self considered as good merely in the first sense of good, transcendental good. No person can be loved just for the good that he is by reason of his absolute being. Even a devil is good in this sense. No person confinned in evil can be
3Q
the proper object of an ordinate love. 2 If the sinful man
is to be loved, it is not because he remains fundamentally
good in an absolute way, but merely because of the good of
40
which he remains capable. In other words, the absolute
good Is always the reason why a person is lovable, and why we wish him good,
i 1 , r
Self-love teiera, then, to a love for that self which is or may be an absolute good by reason of certain added perfections, This does not mean that m can love ourselves only if we are morally good. Yet self-love can be, good only inasmuch as, even in sin, one loves the self as capable of the absolute good.
These same distinctions apply equally to our love for society. That society is a being does not constitute the good for which we love it. A society may be more or less perfect, and our love varies accordingly, because we first love that good which perfects society and makes it to be good absolutely,. Although the common good of society, inasmuch as it is wished to society, does take on the formality of a concupiscible good, it is nevertheless, at the same time, that by reason of which society is a good society, either actually or potentially.
Another difficulty concerning the nature of good may possibly arise from the definition of love as a tendency toward the good. To call a being good because it is appetirle may make it seem that the goodness of an object consists in the actual relationship to an appetite. It is not the same thing, however, to say that it is being good which makes an objects lovable, and that It is being loved which makes ah object good» The goodness is the foundation for the appetibility, and an intrinsic good; it is not merely a relationship of suitability for another. ^ In other words, lest we fall into a relativist conception of good, we must point out that the order men have followed in the love of self and of society is not necessarily the proper
order of the good of each, _________________________________
Since love is an inclination toward a good, the principal act of which is benevolence, and since the love with which we are concerned begins on the rational level, it follows that there are three aspects from which to consider love in any comparison. Briefly, we may consider the love itself, or a knowledge of the good which is its object, or the good which is wished for that object. In the following chapter we shall first see whether the objectively more perfect good must be loved more. We shall also study the different ways in which love may be said to be greater or less, and the reasons for this diversity.
41, J. of St. Thomas, Curs, theol., Solesmes ed., T.I, disp.6, a.l, nn.12, 14, 27, 31, pp.520-526, (In lam, q.5-q.6); Cursus philosophicus. Reiser ed., T.II, PhTXT Mat. I, q.13, a.l, p.274.
CHAPTER XX
PRELIMINARY PRINCIPLES
From a definition of terms we proceed to a study of what must be known about the love of benevolence in order to decide whether we must love ourselves or society more» It is clear that love of benevolence is not just the esteem of virtue.1 For example, if a person has two friends whom he loves with the love of benevolence, there is in each of his friends some quality which accounts for the origin of his love. Let us suppose that it is on account of their generosity that he loves them. Obviously, the generosity itself is not the object of his love; it is the men whom he esteems because of this virtue who are the objects of his love.
This love is likewise no more to be identified with
its effect (benevolence) than it is with its cause (es-.2
teem) , Love is a tendency, an attraction, a "pondus." Still since benevolence is the first act of love and the act by which love chiefly manifests itself, we can judge
1; la Ilae, q.27, a.2, c. and ad 2.
2. IIa Ilae, q.27, a.2, c.; ad 1; ad 2; In IX Eth.,
lect.5, nTTS22.
the greatness of our love by the benevolence in which it %
issues. At first glance it would seem* then, that if man is reasonable in his love, his benevolence is greater for the man whose virtue is greater.
Before we can decide whether or not this is the case, we must first see that there are two ways in which the act of benevolence itself may be greater or less.*1. It may be divided according to the perfection of the good wished or according to the intensity with which it is wished. If we consider the example of the two friends who are loved because of their generosity, we see not only that we may wish a greater good for one than for the other, but that, even when the same good is wished for both, e.g., health or success, it is willed more intensely for one than for the other.
3. IIa Ilae. q.27, a.2, ad 1: "The Philosopher, by thus defining to love [viz. to wish a person wellj, does not describe it fully, but mentions only that part of its definition in which the act of love is chiefly manifested,"
4. Ia, q.2Q, a.3, c,: "Since to love a thing is to will it good, in a twofold way anything may be loved more, or less. In one way on the part Of the act of the will itself, which is more or less intense. . . .In another way on the part of the good itself that a person wills for the beloved. In this way we are said to love that one more than another, for whom we will a greater good, though our will is not more intense." IIa Ilae. q.26, a.6, ad lj Contra Gentes » I, c.91.
The general principle is that the perfection of thé good wished is measured by the goodness of the person we
love, while the intensity of our benevolence depends upon
5
his nearness to us* Thé picture is seldom so neat as this, however* Kot only is there a distinction between knowledge of good, and love for the good, but experience also shows a divergence. We may not only love the less generous friend with a more intense benevolence, but we sometimes wish for him a greater good. How this discrepancy between knowledge of a person* s virtue and our benevolence toward him must be rationally accounted for if we are to speak of rational love. There must be some justification in reason when we have a greater rational love of benevolence for an inferior good.
5. IIa Ilae. q.26, a.7» c.: "Accordingly love takes its species from its object, but its intensity is due to the lover. How the object of charity's love is Sod, and man is the lover. Therefore the specific diversity of the love which is in accordance with charity, as regards the love of our neighbor, depends on his relation to God, . ... On the other hand, the intensity of love is measured with regard to the man who loves, and accordingly man loves those who are more closely united to him, with more intense affection as to the good he wishes for them, than he loves those who are better as to the greater good he wishes for them," In III Sent,, d.31, q»2, a.3, n.135.
6, J, of St. Thomas, Curs, theol.. Vivès ed., T.f (In lam Ilae, q,13) disp.6, a.2, n»9, p«559î "Sit ergo unica conclusioî simpliciter, et absolute potest voluntas eligere minus bonum, aut aequale; sed ad hoc necessario requiritur, quod concurrat novum motivum, vel judicium, aut própositio intellectus, ita ut magis emineat aliqua ratio, vel motivum ut moveat ad unum prae alio."
The nature of love Itself, which consists in union, does not demand that the objective goodness of a being must be the same as its goodness for us. It is quite possible to find a reasonable explanation in personal experience, kinship, etc., for this difference. Perhaps we have been personally the recipient of the kindness of the less generous friend. For the present it is merely requisite to see that a rational love must have a rational cause.
The expression, "rational love," at least in a broad sense, may also be used when our love cannot be so reasonably accounted for. It is so defined simply because the knowledge of the good as an end arises in human reason. It need not be directed by right reason, for rational love may have as its opposites either non-rational or irrational. For example, the love of moral power is always rational in the sense that such a power is not a sensible good, but the love of that power might easily be irrational in the manner of loving. Our concern in this thesis will be with rational love in the strict sense, a love which has its cause in right reason, because of the very nature of the objects compared, namely self and society. It is difficult to see that either society or the time self could be loved in the irrational manner just referred to.
Man tends In love toward the good, real or apparent» Before we can apply the preceding distinctions to the love of self and the love of society, we must first see whether or no there is a determined objective order of goodness»
Of fundamental importance is the fact that God is at least implicitly always the primary object of our love,? for not only is God at the apex of all good; He is the source
of all good. Ko being except God is good by his own es-&
sence. The fact that goodness is defined as perfection which is désirable Indicates that it has the aspect of an end.9 This makes it clear that the objective order of the goodness of creatures is due, in the last analysis, to their relationship to the final end.
7. la Ilae. q.2, a.Ö, c.: "Hence it is evident that naught can lull man's will save the universal good. This is to be found, not in any creature, but in God alone} because every creature has goodness by participation." IIa Ilae» q.26, a.3, c.
God is the primary object of our love even from a point of view that does not especially concern us here, that of the love of concupiscence, for man's happiness is attained by the possession of God. (Ia, q»60, a.5,s c.)
$* la, q.6, a,3, c.j ad 2; ad 3»
9* la, q,5« a.l, c.; a.4, c.I la Ilae, q.10, a.4, c.j IIa Ilae. q.19, a.l, c.; q.23, a,7* c.: De Verit.. q.21, a.l, c.j ad 1; ad 4: M. • «Sed finem consequitur res secundum totum esse suum, et in hoc consistebat ratio boni."
The ultimate extrinsic good by which every creature is 1Q
perfected is God, Who is directed to no other being as an end and Who is Himself the final end of all creatures. However, the intrinsic good of the creatures imitates the perfection of that end in varying degrees, test we be inclined to think that, if the creature is not good by its own essence, it cannot really be loved, we must remember that the goodness of the creature, communicated to it by God, is intrinsic to it, and because of this, the creature itself is lovable. If the created good can have the nature of final cause, it derives its attractive power from the goodness of God, and is a reflection of that goodness. This does not prevent the creature1s good from being inherent and from being sought simply and formally for the good that it itself
Before we make any application of this principle that all objects óf love except God depend for their objective goodness upon Him, we shall first see if this eminent goodness of God necessitates that our love for Him be supreme in all the ways discussed at the beginning of this chapter. This is necessary to enable us to decide how essential a role objective goodness plays in determining the order of our love.
As we have seen, finite goods exist only because God's
creative act brings forth from nothingness these imperfect
reflections of His own infinite goodness. From Him alone,
creatures, animate and inanimate, draw whatever goodness
they possess. Therefore, no matter what good creatures
may tend toward, they tend toward it only insofar as it is
12
a participation in the infinitely perfect.
But it is by the faculties of intellect and will that man's capacity for loving is distinguished from that of non-rational creation. It is in this psychological aspect of
human love that we are interested, that we may see whether man surrenders his human faculties in ready acknowledgment of his complète dependence on God,
It is this intellectual knowlédge and love that will give us the distinctions already considered between knowing, loving, and wishing well. We see first that there is no question regarding the intellectual acceptance of God, as the object most worthy of love, once He is known as the supreme Good.
Furthermore, in a state of integrity, man's will would keep pace with that cognition and, with the utmost intensity of which it would be capable, would wish God the most com-plete fulfillment of His Will, that God be God. ■ Man's benevolence cannot be a desire for something lacking to God, but he can take joy in God's possession of the greatest possible good.
However, as the sad history of mankind has shown, it is possible to turn will and intellect to the contemplation of inferior goods and to the preference for them. The substitution of a merely apparent good for a genuine good, because the former is one's own proper good, is always possible,
but the possibility of such an irrational love does not alter
\
our consideration of the love befitting man's intellectual nature.
Although according to the natural love that is common to them all, the creatures always implicitly love God first, nevertheless the explicit knowledge of God does not imply that He is loved first in the temporal order,^ The youthful intellect may turn to the consideration of many goods. Moreover, the primal fall has made it more difficult for man to seek the greater good,'^
If man fails in some respects to give God the place in love to which His goodness entitles Him, it is quite possible, of course, that all men will not in practice evaluate self and society in the way that this study will indicate as theoretically right.
To aid in that évaluation, however, we shall see the
order in which the goodness of the creatures naturally
follows upon the Divine good* inasmuch as the relative
goodness of the absolute being of a creature consists in
l/s
its nearness to God, intellectual creatures stand next among the individuals constituting the universe» We cannot attain the quod quid est, of the angelic world by merely rational knowledgeî hence we shall limit our scrutiny to human beings. Although God's purpose in the whole of His creation is His own glory, nevertheless, in God's providence man himself really matters,This makes his position in material creation unique, for non-rational individuals exist only for the good of the species, and have for their purpose to serve man either explicitly or implicitly.
We have considered the objective goodness of human beings, their nearness to God, This brings us to the second term of the distinction with which this chapter opened, benevolence. Since, from the objective point -of view, the good we wish a being is in proportion to its good, and since spiritual values transcend the merely material, and the good of grace transcends any natural good, it follows that
Iß
we wish all men the same good, eternal beatitude.
Now despite the two facts that we will all men the same supreme good and that love is judged greater or less by the good willed, we cannot presume that we have the same degree of love for all men, Individuals differ both in nearness to God and in nearness to us. Among these human beings whom we are considering next in the order of our love, we must first of all consider the self, for the one who loves is always a self. Our. self is of course, of all created individuals, the nearest to us.
Therefore, because of the very nature of love, which consists in union, the intensity of man's love varies according to the nearness of its object to himself. He wishes all
men the same basic good, but he wishes it with greater in-
19
tensity for himself and those near to him, 7
Here below, moreover, since growth in nearness to God
1$ possible » a man may will glory for himself and those
near to him without at the same time willing a greater de»
gree of glory for one whose more outstanding merit he may
acknowledge, but who is too remote, However, in Heaven,
conforming with the Divine Will, he will explicitly rejoice
in the greater glory of those nearer to God, although he will
still place himself before other creatures in the intensity
of his will,3
Saint Thomas insists that we cannot love another crea-*
ture as we love ourselves» The latter love is a necessity
of nature. The one who loves has, himself, a share in the
divine good, whereas his neighbor is a partner with him in 21
that sharing.
This intensity, due to the identity of the one who loves and the one who is loved, together with the fact that we must
wish all men eternal beatitude. Indicates the God-given plan , by which we must judge all our love. It does not depend on any creature in an absolute sense}: it depends on the creature's relationship, not only with God, but with the one 22
who loves, -
Self-analysis reveals the part that nearness to ourselves plays even in our most unselfish loves. This does not mean that our well-wishing cannot be pure benevolence, but it does show why, in willing the good of those,we love, we at least concomitantly Will our own joy in their good, whether we bring ourselves consciously into consideration or not.
This priority of love based on closeness to the one who loves does not lower God's preeminence, even in the intensity of our love. As the cause of our entire nature and existence, as the whole to which we compare as a part, not as partaking of His essence, but as owing our whole being to His causality, which implies that we owe our goodness to
22 • Ha- Ilae. q,26, a.6, c.j "The reason is that, since the principle of love is God, and the person who loves, it must needs be that the affection of love increases in proportion to the one or the other of those principles." IIa Ilae, q.26, a.9, c.
His essential goodness. He is closer to us than we are to ourselves.4^
This does-not make our love for God merely a love of concupiscence. It is true that the part cannot exist ex* cept in relation to the whole, but that does not constitute its proper reason for Toving the whole. For to love the whole in such a sense would be to love it for the sake of the.part alone. Me love God for His own sake and not for the sake of our sharing in Him. The latter is the object of hope, whereas the former is the object of charity,
While the love for God is not the subject of this study, it is necessary for us to understand the nature of that love, the only absolute one, if we are to understand all other loves, which are relative.
Saint Thomas's order of love is summed up in the following tablet
ORDER OF CHARITY ON EARTH
1, God
2, Self
3, Relatives, friends, etc,
4, Others _________
5, One's own body IN HEAVEN
DEGREE OF BEATITUDE WILLED INTENSITY OF WILL
|
1, |
God |
1* |
God |
|
2. |
Better people |
2, |
Self |
|
3. |
Self |
3. |
Better people |
|
4i |
Other people |
4. |
Other people |
|
5. |
One's own body |
5« |
One's own body: |
So much for human individuals. Does the pattern change when we replace our neighbor by society?
It seems clear that if I must love myself more than my
neighbor, the case c&n be no different for two or three or
26
any number of neighbors, as set off from myself, i Mere arithmetical repetition cannot alter the matter essentially* From the principles we have considered in this chapter, we would judge that society can have no claim to any priority over self in our love, unless it can be seen to have a greater objective good or a greater nearness to the one who loves. Actually, as we have seen, this greater good consists in nearness to God, but even an unbeliever could weigh objective goodness in some manner. Therefore, the next chapter will attempt to study the objective goodness of society and of self, prescinding from their nearness to God. An adequate solution requires that we consider also the nearness of society to the one who loves since it is upon, this nearness that the intensity of love depends.
We have seen that the love with which we are concerned is caused by an intellectual knowledge of the good, and that it manifest itself by benevolence. We have seen two ways in which benev.olencè, and therefore the love which it manifests,
26. Charles De Köninck, In Defence of Saint Thomas, Quebec, 1945, p.ÖÖ.
can be greater or less, We have seen that God, the Highest Good, is to be loved the most, and in what order his creatures are to be loved. With this background, we can approach the study of our love for society and for self from the point of view of knowledge of the good of each and from the point of view of the good willed for each. In the latter we shall consider both the perfection of the good and the intensity with which it is wished, remembering that the relative magnitude of our loves may be judged primarily, though not entirely, by the greatness of the good we wish for the object loved, We shall try to see how the principles according to which Saint Thomas has determined the order of love for Individuals may be applied to self and society.
CHAPTER III
THE PERSON ANS THE COMMON GOOD
If we apply the principles laid down in the preceding chapter, we see that to answer the question as to whether I must love myself or society more, I must first discover whether the good of society or my own personal good is higher.
We have seen that the good of any reality is that" which perfects it as an end, a final cause. Now the final cause which is more universal is higher,1 inasmuch as it is a more perfect reflection of the ultimate final cause, the Divine Common Good, from which all created goods derive their own causality.
Now the good of any whole is a more universal good, since the part as part depends for its goodness as part upon the good of the whole. The walls of a"house, considered as
IS 1 Eth., lect.2, n,30: "Unde et bonum, quod habet rationem causae finalis, tanto potius est quanto ad plura se extendit. Et ideo si idem bonum est uni homini et toti civi-tatij multo videtur majus et perfectlus susclpere, idest procurare et salvare illud quod est bonum totius civitatis, quam id quod est bonum unius hominis. Pertinet quidam ad amorem, qui debet esse inter homines, quod homo conservet bonum etiam uni soli homini. Sed multo melius et divinius est, quod hoc exhibeatur toti genti et civitatibus."
such, have fco good apart from the good of the house. From the fact that the good of the whole is more universal it follows that it must be a better good than the good of a
part,5 Therefore, the good of any society, which good as
well as society itself has the nature of a whole, is higher than the proper good of any member as such.^
Clearly then, the good of society is to be preferred to my own private good, when the latter is in the same order. My own supernatural, spiritual good is to be preferred to the natural, material good of society.*6 Of course, the good of society is, in a sense, mjr good, inasmuch as I can
sham in thai* good,^ In fact, my private good is not a
genuine good, unless it is somehow in conformity with, or
ordered to the cçrason good, or indeed to the ultimate common
7
good that is God,
We migh£ Immediately and unquestionably assume the good of society to be greater than the good of self, from the fact that society includes the self as a part, that it is greater than the individual who is only a part, as it were. So that a society of good persons is a greater good than any one of its members taken separately, However, membership in a society must be defined by the good, the common good of that society. Now the common good of a society is not necessarily the highest good its members are capable of. In other words, the capacity of an individual member may extend beyond the
•I» 'I li.....................
6. IIa Ilae, q,6l, a,l, ad 2: "Even as part and whole are somewhat the same, so too that which pertains to the whole, pertains somewhat to the part also; so that when the goods of the community are distributed among a number of individuals each one receives that which, in a way, is his own,"
7* la Ilae. q.19, a.10, c.j q.92, a.l, ad 3? IIa Ilae, q.23, a,7, c,: "Man's secondary and, as it were, particular good may be twofoldî one is truly good, because considered in itself it can be directed to the principal 'good which is the last end,"
3Ö
good of this or that society. Hence, in the same individual we may find different formalities, subordinated one to the other, according as one relates him to a higher good than the other. Now, if we compare the perfection of the individual, as belonging to a higher order, to the perfection
that is his°in relation to the good of a lower order, the 1
individual may be called more perfect than the lower society to which he also belongs. Hence, not only is the good of the family subordinated to the good of the state, and the good of the individual member of the family subordinated to his good as a citizen, but the good of the family as such is subordinated to the good of the citizen.
These qualifications concerning the good of the part and the good of the whole must be taken into consideration in a discussion of self-love and the love of society. The self considered in relation to the common good is more perfect than the self considered in relation to a private good
«jw
of the same order. This holds true of neighbor who is |
better in his capacity for the common good than in the good ||
'l'i
which is his own. From this it is plain that the self, as ordered to God, the highest common good, is more perfect
Ö. Charles De Köninck, De la Primaute du Bien Commun, p.69.
than all other persons taken together, so long as we consider them with respect to a created common good. But from this it does not follow that the person of the self is above all other persons. For the other persons too are capable of that supreme common good, and in that order, one is superior to another, although here below we cannot love anyone of them more intensely than ourselves. However, when we consider the ensemble of created persons as ordered to the supernatural end, then every individual person is inferior to that ensemble inasmuch as its members are ordered in varying degrees to that highest perfection.
Perhaps we should not overlook, the fact that a society, composed of individuals, who are at the same time related to a good that is above the good proper to this society— whether that greater good is a personal one or a common one-such a society gains in perfection from such members. For instance, the family gains in perfection, as a family from, the fact that it lives in a political community.
In other words, as we have already intimated in defining society, we must be on our guard against sn ill too abstract conception of a given society. The father of a family is not a complete being as a father of a family; he is also a citizen, as \tfell as a member of the Church. Although this action of his is attributed to his paternal authority, and that action to his right as a citizen, the person is always indivisibly the same, and we can never prescind from this. When a soldier is sent into battle, he is not merely risking his life as a soldier, but also his life as a man, as a father, a citizen, a person.^ What ever the conanon good of a particular society may be, it is always composed of people, and not of particular subsisting formalities.
This last consideration, that society.is composed of persons and not just of formalities, is essential in order to show the possibility of any love of benevolence for it, A love of benevolence can be extended only to persons, to beings endowed with intellect and will, and not to this or that quality or formality considered apart from the person. Rot even the relationship which binds men together in the most perfect society could be the object of benevolence.
In order to decide how we should love ourselves, we must not only determine what our highest good is, but we must also determine whether rational love must always be greater for that higher good. If the latter answer is affirmative, it will show that we must love any given society more than ourselves as members of that society, and that even when we consider ourselves as ordained to a common good that transcends any natural society, we . must love. ourselves as having the nature of parts rather than as wholes.
But to return to the question of whether we must love more that good which we know to be higher, it is plain from the observations of the preceding chapters that this is not always so. Benevolence, the principal act of love, is certainly greater when love is greater, but it cannot be said that benevolence and love are always greater for a' good which is known to be a better good. And so the question remains as to whether or no one may acknowledge that the good of society is a higher good and still not love it more. Reflection on our experience might help us to see whether the reasons for this disparity between our knowledge of the good of various persons and our love for them would be applicable also to our knowledge and love of self and of society.
Kot only is the intensity of our love based on the nearness to the one we love-, but we do not actually will a greate
good fco a person known to be better, if the latter is too remote for us to experience his goodness. Kinship, claims of gratitude, personal experience, emotional appeal, all of these may cause us to will a good to someone we love without willing a proportionately higher good for someone who is better.
In the same way, some of these factors may prevent
society from taking the place in our love to which it is
entitled by its objective good, a good that our intellect
accepts as higher than our own private goods. Very probably
our recognition of the good of society is far from complete.
Society, as such, may be too involved or extensive for us
11
to actually experience its good, —a psychological factor rather than a metaphysical one, but none the less real.
Love is chiefly judged greater or less by the perfection of the good we will for the one we love. Now, while a spiritual good, such as the possession of some knowledge, remains objectively the same, whéther it is willed for one or for many, it is clear that, from a purely quantitative point of view, we cannot avoid willing a greater material good for all the members of a society that we love than we will for any one of them. But this benevolence extends to
proper goods willed for all the members of a society, and
it is no manifestation of the greatness of our love for
society as such.
The common good, Saint Thomas expressly points out, is
not a mere collection of proper goods, and the reason is
that the nature of whole is essentially different from the 12
nature of part. The reason why some are led to believe otherwise is that, while they recognize on the one hand
that the common good is greater than the proper, they, on the other hand, interpret this "greater" in a purely quantitative sense. Now it is true that in this latter sense
the collection constitutes a greater good than any of its constituents, but this is not.what is intended by the expression "common good," as is plain from what has already been
said on its distinction from the proper good. The difference is one of quality, not of quantity. In the same way a society is not perfect merely in proportion to the number of its constituents—although it would be true to say that
the perfection of such a society requires at least such1or 13
such a number —nor in proportion to the individual goods
MasmmÊimiBWiimiiiimÊ^Mmmiam
the members strive for, but in proportion to the common good it pursues. The mere addition of units does not lead to a whole in the proper sense of this word, for by whole we mean essentially that to which nothing is lacking.1^" Now, the possibility of always adding another member to a mere collection makes the whole unattainable. Applied to the good, this means that the common good is as a limit towards which the growing number of private goods converges, but which is never
reached. _ .
' i If we acknowledge the good of each of two persons, if
we love each of them, if our wills extend in well-wishing to each of them, we may, from a purely quantitative viewpoint, say that we esteem both of them taken together more highly than one, that we love both more than one, that the good we wish for both is greater than thè good we wish for one. But when Saint Thomas says that anything which is of another, e.g., a part, naturally prefers the good of that of which it is, e.g., the whole,^ he is not merely doing
addition. The part of which he speaks is what it is because
of the whole; its primary function is to be a part, and so naturally it loves the whole to which it belongs more than it loves itself.
The illustrations here used by Saint Thomas tend to
remove any doubt that love for society must be greater than the love for any member, even oneself. In pointing out that
a virtuous citizen exposes himself to danger of death for the whole state, he does not rely explicitly on man's obligations to his Creator to account for this preference; he says that reason is here imitating nature, and that anything whose being it is to be part of another, as the hand of the
body, naturally prefers the good of the whole. There are many who think that man is a part of society only because
of his temporal requirements as an individual, but here Saint Thomas uses citizen and state to illustrate part and
whole. He says further that every creature, by its nature,
is a natural part of the universe, and hence loves the latter
16
more than itself. When he says that each individual naturally loves the good of the species more than its own individual good, since the good of the species is better than
the good of the individual, he indicates no exceptions.
The principle that the whole is closer to its part than the part is to itself leads us to a consideration of the
intensity of our benevolence for self and for society, for nearness to the one who loves is, as we have seen, the reason why a love of benevolence is greater in intensity. We
saw in the preceding chapter that man's relationships to God,
as effect to cause and as part to whole, are given as a __________
/
reason for a natural love of God that is more intense than his love for himself. May we in any sense say also that society is closer to the individual than he is to himself? Now while man does not depend so fundamentally on all
the various societies to which he belongs, still it is clear
that his very existence and maintenance is due to the society
10
called the family; it is clear that his physical and spiritual well-being, his moral and intellectual development, is
largely an effect of the political society of which he is a part.^9 Man does not depend, however, on any of these societies for all that he is and has, and so would not, for this
reason, necessarily have a more intense love of benevolence for them than he has for himself.
It may be well to point out what has already been at least implied, that the sacrifice of one's own greatest good for the greatest good of society is actually impossible. Neither of these is to be attained by sacrificing the other. Since an individual's sacrifice of his material goods for
the good of the society to which he belongs only enhances--------
hiis spiritual good, the possibility of increasing the good
of a society which contains him as a part, by sacrificing his own genuine good, is self-contradictory and cannot even be conceived of. Likewise the notion of lessening the genuine good of society without simultaneously lessening one's own is self-contradictory. Because society's good is better
than my own good as an individual, the latter good is better
20
than it would be if I were not a part of society. I can, of course, conceive of sacrificing my own good for the good of all other members of society or vice versa, although In regard to the highest good, even this is out of the question. Salvation is not secured for others by sacrificing it for
oneself.
So, it must be borne in mind that the good of society is our own greater good, though this does not mean that our love for society is primarily a love of concupiscence,7 It is true that there is no good in the hand apart from the body, but it is true also that the hand loses its own being to save that of the body; it does not save the body for the sake of the hand. In sub-rational creation the good of the whole returns to the part so that the part may better serve the whole, but when we say that the individual good is inferior to the good of society, we do not mean that the individual is merely a means for the perfection of society. My own good is an end, but as the next chapter will show, it
is an end which in turn serves a higher end, extrinsic to
22
myself and society.
Apropos of the question as to whether the goodness of self and of society are of necessity the determining factors in the order of rational love, we have the statement of
Saint Thomas that ©ach thing is loved according to its meas-
23
ure of goodness, * . It is a deordination, then, when the will tends toward the good because it is mine, rather than because it is good, but it is not clear that we could always perceive it to be a deordination, if we did not consider God,
The very goodness of the object is derived from the divine good, and the degree of that goodness is the degree of its proximity to God. Hence, good can actually have no meaning, as it can have no existence, apart from a relation to God, the Divine Good. However, it does not seem necessary to
consider expressly God1s preeminent goodness in order to see that we must love more than ourselves any whole of
which we are parts.
The following chapter will consider not merely the order our love'must follow to preserve its rational character, but the order our love must follow inasmuch as we owe our being to a Creator and fit into the plan designed by Him.
\
CHAPTER IV PURPOSE OF MULTIPLICITY IK CREATION
The preceding chapter has shown that because the individual is related to society as a part to a whole, he naturally loves the common good of society more than his own proper good.
Now, in the light of God*s designs, we shall try to see more deeply into the reasons why we should love the whole of
creation more than ourselves, and more particularly, why we should love, within the whole of creation, the whole of that
rational creation which is to some extent capable of understanding the Divine plan, of cooperating with it, and, ultimately of sharing in God*s own life.
Now, we do not really know the nature of a thing unless we know its final cause. So to understand my relationship to the whole of which I am a part, I must ask why did God make this universe and why did He make each of the multitude of individuals who. compose it. This may help us to view in proper perspective and to understand to what extent man has the nature of part and why it must be so.
The only good for which God can act in the one eternal act identified with His essence is His own good, an infinite
good which cannot, be enriched, which can only be diffused and shared.8 Without creatures, God*s beatitude is perfect and complete, but in His goodness, He willed creatures who might contribute to His extrinsic glory by sharing that beatitude.
No creature can approach to an adequate mirroring of the Divinity. Therefore, since God wished His glory reflected in creation, He provided finite multiplicity and variety and-
degrees of perfection, that the whole might approach a little nearer to infinite perfection than any one created individual, no matter what splendor of created radiance might be
2
bestowed upon the latter.
Any object is good to the extent to which it fulfills its purpose. The purpose of creation is the glory of God;
the whole of rational and irrational creation, by its variety and harmony and degrees of perfection manifests God1s good-ness more perfectly, adds more to God1s extrinsic glory, than does any part, however perfect in itself.
Within the whole, mankind was created to glorify God directly by a rational and voluntary service, and to be aided therein by sub-human creation, which gives God an indirect glory by its remote and imperfect reflection of His beauty and power, and by its utility for man.^
It becomes apparent now that the whole ordered human family, the members of which, made in the "image" of God, have nevertheless varying and harmonious degrees of perfection in that resemblance, proclaims the glory of God more
i
perfectly than any one member alone can. Since that is the purpose for which man is made, his supreme good lies in the fact that he has an end transcending, and transcending infinitely, his own private end, that of contributing
to the accidental and extrinsic glory of God by his union 4
with Him.
The fact that we are here concerned with a love of benevolence makes it necessary for us not only to distin-, guish rational creation from the whole created order which contains it, but also to make a further distinction within rational creation itself. We do love the whole created order more than the whole of rational creation, insofar as it contributes more to God's glory, but we cannot love the whole created order with a love of benevolence, In the same way we cannot actually have a love of benevolence even for the whole of rational creation but only for those who are ordered to God or are at least capable of such ordination. We cannot wish well to the damned. The love for that rational whole which embraces even those confirmed in evil is greater than the love for that part which is Capable of beatitude, only in the sense that it has a greater good as a whole, because of the very presence of individual evil
ç
that God somehow turns to the good«
The good of the whole, which we have been considering, as well as the good of any part, may be extrinsic or in** trinaie« The latter is always for the sake of the former, How the ultimate extrinsic good of all beings is God, but the individuals are also ordered to subordinate wholes, and of these, one may be ordered to-another, As we have__ seen, inanimate creatures exist to serve men; the good of the latter constitutes the extrinsic good of the former* The good of civil society is an extrinsic good for the citizen and the family. In man too, the intrinsic good of virtue is ordered to his ultimate extrinsic good, God, So the intrinsic good of the whole universe, the order of its parts, is ordered to the extrinsic good, God.
When we consider the individual with respect to the intrinsic good of the whole, the latter is better than the individual; and the same holds when we consider him with
respect to the extrinsic good« However, when we compare the individual as related to God, the extrinsic good, with the intrinsic good of the whole, then the individual is better than the whole.^
If we apply these considerations to the society considered in Chapter III, we see more strongly confirmed the principle that the part naturally loves the good of the whole
more than, its own good. My good contributes to the intrinsic
f' ■
good of society, and both are ordered to an infinitely perfect extrinsic good. Now since the intrinsic good of society is closer to this extrinsic good, God, we see exemplified
the truth of Aristotle's general statement that the common
7
good is more divine than the proper.
This concept of the creative purpose has shown the good of the individual self and of the whole to which he belongs in a new light, Yet, admitting that this rational whole is more lovable, does it follow that a man must love it more? Because the man whoëe love follows a rational order loves God more than himself, must he also love more than himself that which glorifies God more? And, in this case, is his love for this latter merely a love of concupiscence?
The answer to the first question must be affirmative.
If we genuinely love God more than ourselves, we must with
Ù
the same natural love prefer whatever is nearer to Him, We must prefer His glory to our own, and we have seen that the whole of mankind adds more to God*s extrinsic and accidental glory than the individual does.
Nor does this love appear to be only a love of concupiscence for humanity, following a love of benevolence for— God, a mere willing that mankind should give God glory. Rather the fact is that, since we love God the most, we acknowledge the good which is closer to God in perfection as a greater good for us, Our love is caused by the intrinsic good of mankind, which is more perfect than our own proper intrinsic good. Nevertheless, the good of mankind which we thus esteem, and to which we subordinate our own intrinsic good as individuals, derives its perfection from its greater nearness to the extrinsic good which is God,
It does, however, seem feasible to speak of a love of concupiscence for the whole of mankind, both because we love God and because we love ourselves with a love of friendship. On the one hand, humanity is for the sake of the glory of God Whom we love, and on the other hand, it enables us to
ö, IIa Ilae, q.25, a.l, ad lj q.26, a.9, c.
give God greater glory by our participation in it, than we could give Him in isolation. In other words, while our essential love for the human ensemble is a love of well-wishing* we may also love it for the sake of its contribution to God* s glory, and for the sake of the help it gives lis to glorify Him*
Analögous situations among individuals may help to illustrate the nature of our love for the whole of rational creation as nearer to God than any individual. When I love my friend11 s friend merely because of that friendship, it is a love of benevolence that I extend. So even if I loved humanity simply because God loved it, I would love it with ■ a love of benevolence. It appears inevitable that, if I love God with a greater love of benevolence than I love myself, I must also love with a greater love of benevolence that which He loves more and that which glorifies Him more.
A principle that is of importance in a consideration of the greatness of love both from the point of view of the perfection of the good willed and from the point of view of the intensity with which it is willed is that anything whose whole being it is to be of another naturally prefers that other to itself. Now we saw in the preceding chapter that
though society is a whole of which the individual is a part, and though the very nature of man ordinarily make the perfection of his human good dependent on- society, still the in* dividual person could not be said to owe his whole being and nature to society* This is undeniably true, but it does seem that this consideration of God*s creative design has given us a more profound reason for considering the human ensemble, the whole, as a cause of which we, the parts, are effects in a sense somewhat comparable to that in which a
house may be said to be the cause of its walls.____If in GodTs
creative purpose the whole of creation, and therefore, the whole of rational creation is for His glory, the parts owe their existence to the whole. God willed humanity to give Him glory. Had He not so willed the human race, we individual members would not have been created.^ There remains, of course, the difference that the whole of humanity is not an intrinsically determined whole, that our nature as part is not primarily dependent on the need for other parts.
Moreover, it is not the same thing to say that God directly willed the human race and to say that individual human beings do not matter. One is not bound to choose between the two following alternatives. First, God planned humanity for His own greater glory, and I am just a part of
it, one of the ways in which this nature is realised* Sec* ond, God planned you and me and all the other individuals to give Him glory and gain happiness by our free conformity, and humanity is but the accidental whole which results therefrom, These two positions are in part complementary* Since the Divine Intellect is quite infinite and knows in one act all the universe, each individual of any species, surely
the Divine Will can love simultaneously the whole human race .
10
and every single person which goes into its making. Scripture says, "He has called us each by name,", but it is an
)
antìiropromorphisia to assume that God's love of the individual and His interest in him make of humanity a mere random unity.
To accept the foregoing statements requires us to accept a previous statement, namely that society is not inferior to the persons who compose it, merely because the unity characteristic of society is not a substantial unity. Analogously, whatever we might decide the final indivisible
10.- Ia, q.14, a.6, c.; a.11, c.| q. 19, a,2, ad 4i "As the divine intellect is one, as seeing the many only in the one, in the same way the divine will.is one and simple, as willing the many only through the one, that is, through"its own goodness." De Fot., q.3. a.16, ad 15? De Vèrit.. q;3, a.2,'c.; In III Sent., d.39, q.2, a.2j J. of St. Thomas,-Ours, theol.. Solesmes ed., T.I, (In lam, q.14), disp.lo, a.2, n.41, p.348.
particle in the world of nature to be* it could easily be seen as inferior to the accidental whole of which it is a part, lb fact,, there is a Sense in which the Very unity of society is a more perfect unity than that of the individual part, as the human person here on earth has & more perfect unity than has the soul of" the departed in Heaven, even though the soul is simple and the person composite*
The unity of any part, by the very fact.of its being a________________
part has something imperfect and incomplete about it. Mot only is the good of a brick less perfect than the good of the house, but the very unity of the brick is inferior to that of the house. The house is in some sense more one than the brick, because of the latterie need to be complemented by other beings in fulfilling its end*
All analogies are defective but possibly the often used comparison of mankind to an orchestra will reveal the dependence of self on the whole without denj'ing the fact that the self does have an end and an integrity of its own. The whole orchestra is ordered to an extrinsic end, but there is also an intrinsic order to vjhich each player contributes as a part. To the director of that orchestra, each player, no matter- how highly he may prize him for his own talent, is nevertheless for the sake of the orchestra as well.
Society does not stand, in such an understanding, as a barrier between man and his God, Each man has a direct and immediate relationship with his Creator, $ho willed him for his own sake and consequently Who loves him directly and from all eternity, . But if there is no deordinatlon in the Divine act, the willing of the individual man for himself has God for an ultimate end,13"
Certainly the individual player would not consider the orchestra as an interference with his ordination to an extrinsic end, He is capable of achieving that end more effectively and more fully, by his participation in the harmony of the whole, than he could by his solitary effort. So also man sees his greatest glory achieved in his participation in God's ultimate design,
Man's love for that which is nearer to God, as exceeding his love for that which is near himself, is thus seen as a natural love. Even if he had been the only human being created by God, a man would love himself naturally more for his ordination to God than for himself.
t
H* Contra Gentes. III* e,112: "When we assert that intellectual substances are directed by divine providence for their own sake, we do not mean-that they are not also referred to. God and for the perfection of the universe."
Considering human nature as God actually created .it, and as a consequence of the fall» man, unaided by grace, is incapable of this selfless love* Thanks to.this supernatural aid he loves God both naturally and supernaturally* In other words, even the naturally selfless love Is not the peak of love, for God has raised man to participate even in His own Divine life*
. Wow on this supernatural level to which-sanctifying---------
grace restores man, difficulties about the love of self and of society dissolve* We need not trouble ourselves to inquire whether the individual man owes his being to the whole of mankind or vice versa, in order to decide, by a comparison of the intrinsic goodof each, which is to be loved more* Charity has God for its object as well as its end; it is an
indirect'love of that which God loves, simply because He 12
loves it* What God loves and in the order He loves, so do we for love of Him* >
A comparison of the love between individual human beings may seem at first glance to nullify the judgment that I love more than myself the whole which God loves more than myself. For in individual human relationships, I do not love more than myself the one whom my friend loves more* ivhile this
is true, we must not overlook that I cannot love the friend more than myself« To this rule there are only two exceptions, namely the very human nature of the Second Person of the Blessed Trinity, and His holy Mother which are to be loved more than myself»^
It might then be asked why I do- not always apply this method of judging love. Why cannot I conclude from my pre» ference for Christ and His Mother to a preference, for other individuals more beloved by Christ and His Mother than I am, if I am inferring my own preference for the whole of rational creation from God's preference for it? One answer is that the good of this whole is by/its Very nature unalterably nearer to God than my good, whereas I cannot know the order of sanctity by which souls are dear to Christ and to Mary, until eternity shall reveal it.
We must keep in mind that we have been speaking of an order not only of charity but of natural love. The preceding chapter has shown us that the citizen naturally prefers the intrinsic good of the political society, to which he belongs, above his own. We have tried to see in the present chapter how a created rational whole, capable of ordination to God,
13. J. of St. Thomas, Curs, theol.> Vives ed., T.VII, (In Ilam Ilae, q.23-q,.45), p.402.
»
is» because of its multiplicity and grades of perfection» nearer to Hiatf the transcendent extrinsic good, than my one person is* Since this person naturally loves God more than he loves himself,- he naturally loves this created Whole more than himself » It is true» however,, that individuals do not always indicate by their actions,- that they are motivated by a natural preference of this kind» However»; throughout the course of ages, societyhasshovman understanding---------
that the common good is to be preferred to the individual good,' that the latter, if needs be j must be' sacrificed for the former. Subjects have always been expected to risk their lives for the good of the city or the realm, even to
risk their lives for the individual who most nearly em-
lit
bodies the common good in his own person, the ruler, fhe phraseology in which the commendati on of heroes, both ancient and modern, is worded, indicates that what has been found s praiseworthy is not only their courage and foresight in self-defense, etc., but their willingness to subordinate their own welfare to the welfare of all. Today, conscription, and legislation touching the very things of which twentieth century democracy is most jealous, e,g,, freedom of the press, speech, bargaining, etc., are indications that society
H. De Garlt.« q.l, a,4, ad 2j a.9, ad 15,
regards it; as natural that its members love the common good above the private good, v
What individual men—rational beings, it is true, but impelled by strong sense appetites, victims of environment -and hereditary tendencies, spiritually dulled and weakened by original sin^-have actually done or failed to do is a different question from the one that we.have tried to answer. This is not a statistical study of how many men have reached the heights of which their nature is capable, '
To support the proposition that a study of the nature of self-love and of love for society need not be an a posteriori study, we shall see that our understanding of the natural love for God need not be based on the preferences of the majority. We have the authoritative word of Saint Thomas that man by his unimpaired nature loves God more than himself} yet we have, for example, as eminent a saint as Saiht Bernard doubting that any man has ever loved God without consideration of Him as the object of his own beatitude.3*^ We have seen that even Unfällen man, as he came from the creative hand of God, required his Maker's help to do the very thing for which he ivas by nature made.
Certainly it seems reasonable that, with the, antecedent help of God, the man who naturally loves God with an intensity and a benevolence surpassing his love for himself$ would naturally prefer to himself that created object which is unalterably closer to God and a greater source of glory to Him, the human ensemble. Moreover, charity whose proper object and motive is God, does not alter the order of our natural dilection for self and for society.
CHAPTER V
CONFLICTING OPINIONS
We have shewn in the two preceding chapters in what sense the individual person loves the whole to which he belongs ®orë than he loves himself as a part of it. There-* fore, considering the intrinsic good of society and of himself, the citizen naturally has a greater love of benevolence for the society of which he is a member than for himself. Moreover, both by natural dilection and by charity, every person who realizes that his own intrinsic good could never under any circumstances have been other than the good of a part, prefers to his own good, the good which is nearer to God,
Despite the apparently inevitable character of these conclusions, there are passages in Saint Thomas which at least appear to be at variance with them, and there are considerable differences of opinion between authors who claim his authority. In the latter case the difficulty is perhaps on the whole nothing more than a difference o^f emphasis or in the Use of the same term with different meanings, but in some instances, we are apparently faced with opposing theories
This chapter will have two divisions. In the first part we shall consider sorae statements which are beyond discussion,
such as those of the Supreme Pontiffs and of Saint Thomas, In this same section a few passages from Saint Thomas's classic commentators will be introduced. In the second part we shall deal with a wide variety of authors and ideas, most ly contemporary, in an attempt to combine, classify, and if necessary, refute their theories. Actually this section too, will be widely devoted to a study of certain Thomistic principles, but these latter are taken up here for two reasons: first because it is not so much the statement of Saint Thomas which seems to offer us some difficulty, as the contemporary interpretation that is made of ifcj secondly, if we are to consider the opinions of contemporary authors which are in opposition to this thesis, it seems more reasonable to consider here those Thomistic principles upon which they rely,
SAINT THOMAS AND TEACHINGS OF THE CHURCH
First to be considered are the passages in which Saint Thomas speaks of the order of love. For instance, he says, "Hence it is in the order of love that a man should love himself more than all else after God."1 Why, if man is, in any respect, to love society more than himself, does not
Ilae, q.26, a.3, ad 3.
Saint Thomas say so* and why does he expressly désignât® another object of love as next to God?
It Is true that wherever Saint Thomas treats of the
2 ' order of charity, he mentions God, self, and neighbor,
without designating any special place for society* But such a list is concerned with individual persons for whom an order of love can be simply stated, without distinctions
regarding the aspects or ordinations under which we must_______
consider them. Moreover, it does not really omit the society which includes both self and neighbor. Mention is made first of the only absolute direct object of charity, then of that being whose good affects even the order of charity, in order to show that all other loves are related to these two. Moreover, we cannot expect a passage to say more than its author obviously intends. Perhaps such a list should be interpreted to mean only that among the beloved objects enumerated, that is their proper order. To maintain that it ,1s an exhaustive list leaves us with the problem of explaining the omission of Christ in His hurnan nature and of the Blessed Virgin Mary, as preceding self,
Moreover, Saint Thomas says, in regard to the order of charity, "Therefore in charity that ought to be more loved
De Carit., q.l, a,9, c.; In III Sent.. d.3Ö, a.7, n.óó.
which is most loved by Him [via• by God 3 • But among all created tilings it is the good of the universe in which all things are comprised that is most beloved by God."^ It is true that this surpassing love of the good of the universe can be reduced to the love of God, but so also can the love of charity for self and for neighbor.^ We have seen that of the universe, whose good is most to be loved by man, as it is by God, only the rational part can receive a love of benevolence
There may seem to be some difficulty when Saint Thomas uses the fact that charity perfects nature without destroy-ing it, in order to prove a natural preference for God,
3* De Carlt., q.l, a.7, obj.5* "Ergo oportet magis ex' caritate diligi quod ab eo[seil, a Deo]maxime diligitur. Sed inter omnia creata maxime diligitur a Deo bonum universi, in quo omnia coraprehenduntur."
4* De Carit.. q.l, a.7, c.î "Unde diligendus est ex cari-tat-e Deus ut radix beatitudini sì quilibet autem homo debet seipsum ex caritate diligere, ut particlpet beatitudinemj proximum autem ut socium in participatione beatitudinisj . . ,Secundo vero modo, prout scilicet dicuntur diligi ilia bona quae volumus aliis, diligi possunt ex caritate omnia bona, inquantum sunt quaedam bona eorum qui possunt habere beatitudine«!. Ornnes enim creaturae stmt homini via ad ten-dendum in beatitudinemj et iterum omnes creaturae ordinantur' ad gloriam Dei, inquantum in eis divina bonitas manifestatur. Nunc igitur omnia ex caritate diligere possumus, ordinando tarnen ea in ilia quae beatitudinem habent, vel habere possunt . "(
5» De Carlt., q.l, a.7, ad 5; Ha Ilae, q.25, a.3, c.
ó. Ia, q.60, a.5, c.
and elsewhere says that, although in natural dilection that is more loved which is more like the one loving, nevertheless in the dilection of charity, that is more loved which is more one with God, In other words, he seems to say in one place that eharity does not alter nature, and elsewhere that there is a different standard for the love of grace and the love of nature. However, the difference does not show that charity has destroyed nature; it merely indicates that in love________
of charity, God is loved as He is in Himself, and in love of natural dilection, as principle and good of our nature. Furthermore, we might find another difficulty in the principle that in.the dilection of charity that is more loved which is more one with God whereas the love of benev-
9
olence arises when one regards the beloved as another self. This latter statement that all love originates in the consideration of the object as another self does not make love selfish. It does not mean that we love others only for
ourselves, but that the place which self holds of necessity in our affection, is accorded to others voluntarily*
Sylvester Ferrara*s statement that the end and perfection of the human soul is that through knowledge and love it transcends the whole order of creatures2*0 is not opposed to the conclusions of the preceding chapter* It simply means that the human soul as directly ordered to God, the extrinsic end of the whole universe, transcendsthe intrinsic good of the whole of creation, which is the order of its parts. The commentator does not mean that thè proper good of the human soul excels the good of the universe even inasmuch as the latter contains other persons considered as
ordered to that same transcendent good, for it is this parli
ticipation which God primarily intends. This of course refers to created good, but the created good of all the persons intended by God is better than that of any single one of them. Ferrara's commentary goes on to explain that
the perfection of the universe requires some creatures re-
f
serabling God even in their operations, though no creature' can perfectly represent the Divine Goodness. He shows repeatedly, however, that this greater resemblance cannot be
interpreted to exalt the intrinsic good of the rational
creature above the intrinsic good of the universe of which
he is a part, à universe whose good is the greatest of
12
created goods, willed especially by God.
Saint Thomas's position is clears all the parts are ordered to the perfection of the whole, although the intellectual natures, having a greater nearness to the whole than any other natures, are the noblest parts of the universe, willed also for themselves as finis cui, whereas the lower creatures are both for the sake of human individuals and for the perfection of the universe.^
We shall next attempt to see that our notion of the love of self and of society conforms to the authoritative Church teachings. It is in no spirit of controversy that we venture to believe that etren passages taken from papal Encyclicals need to be read in the light of the author»s intention and of their context.
It is true that Pope Pius XII says plainly that society
is designed by the Creator as a means for the development
and perfection of man, H thus echoing the words of his pre*
decessor that society is a natural means for man"s end, and
that it {society} is for man and not vice versa, because
by mutual collaboration, earthly happiness is attained,
natural gifts developed, and the divine perfections more
15
perfectly reflected for man's recognition,----------However, we------
have already observed that the individual as ordered to a higher common good is superior to the common good of a lower order. Hence the good of civil society,1 alt hough it is a bonum honestum. is not the ultimate good, but rather a means—noti however, a mere bonum utile—to the good of its members as related to a higher end. Pope Pius ZI says that socialism is wrong in affirming'that living in a community was instituted merely for the sake of the personal
16
and temporal advantages which it brings; its end is not the temporal proper good of the individual,
Wmm
Such statements ai, "Only man, the human person-, and
not society in any form is endowed with reason and a morally
free will,"^ would seem to preclude society* s being the
object of a love of benevolence, since we can have such a
love only for beings with reason and will« But Pope Leo
id
XIII speaks of society as possessed of virtue, and says
also that society hot less than individuals owes gratitude
19
to God Who- gave it being,- etc* -- Surely a being, the chief good of which is virtue, and which owes gratitude, must in some way possess intellect and will* But of course there is no intellect and will in society over and above the intellect and will of the governing and of the governed. Is not the obvious solution that Pope Leo*s society is the concrete being defined in Chapter II, and that of Pope Pius XI is the formality which specifies society, the relationship itself which binds men together in solidarity?
Another difficulty may arise from the following statement of John of Saint Thomas, since we have given as a rea-
son for our love of the greater good the fact that nearer to God and more loved by Him:
. • .Nulla morali necessitate aut debito obli-gatur [Deus J ad eligendum id quod melius et perfectius est secundum se, etiam hoc intuitu ut inde résultat major gloria Bei. . . »Etiam in ordine ad gloriam suara pro ut tenet se ex parte creaturarum. . .j sed potest eligere id quod minus est.9
It is true that God is free to produce a more or less
perfect universe, but whatever its degree of perfection,
21
He loves the whole more than any of its parts* It is as true to say that an object is good because God loves
It is
it, as it 19 ft* mf that} God loves it because It is good» The very goodness whièh He loves He has bestowed upon it* *
God* a love for Himself i$ a necessary love and so, though He is free to refrain from producing the created 0b-ject which of itself would contribute more to His glory, nevertheless He produces each' creature for Hi $ ówh glory, and loves each created being in accordance with its nearness
22* q.20, à.2, c,i J* of St. ThomasCurs, theol»*
Sòlesmes ed«, T,III, disp.24, a.4> n»3, p.38 (Xa lam. q.19)I "Antecedens negari non potestJ nam: creatura^ nabent esse et boni tat em parti cipatam a Deoj ergosunt ob ject um amabile« quia bontua et appetibile idem sunt, et sunt cognita© et intellectae a Deoj ergo per ipsum velie divinum, ut actus immanéns est, attingi et amari possunt*" Ibid., T.III, disp.24, a.4» n.llì LB. Thom&J ponit differentiam inter nostram voluntatera et divinam, quod nostra supponit bonitatem quam amet, divina participât et causat (et videri potest hic, q.20, a.4)» Idque manifeste constatj. quia bonitas creaturae et esse illius, quod amati est bonum non ex se, sed-ex participatione} amor autem Dei est amor ex se, non ex participât io ne ob* jecti; ergo bonitas creaturae non est diffusiva sui in Deum, sed diffusa ex Deó, nee ejus amorem antecedens sed *ab ipso participatione.*" to Himself, the necessary object of His love.2^ Ood doe# noi actually love the better person whom He might, but will not create, but the person whom H© does create He loves freely in bestowing upon it the good which is lovable* There can be no possibility of God not loving the better thing more, because the very reason why it is better is that God loves it more and wills for it a greater good,
Ho matter how far beyond our capacity is this study of
the mind and will of God, the plan directing our own love is simply and unequivocally stated* "In this respect the better & thing „-Is, and the more like to God, the more it is to be loved*
23* Ibid.. T.III, disp,24, a*3» n,3., p.77î ergo omnes
res ereatae ita comparentur ad ipsam bonitatem, quae est finis supremus, quod sine ipsis haberi potest et stare ilia bonltas (cum sit omnino independens a creaturls), non amantur secundum necessarium habltudinem ad ipsam, r Ergo ex vi illius non necessario amantur. Deus autem non amat aliquid, nisi ex fine et propter finem, qui est sua bonitas: alias non ordinate nec perfecteamaret, si non ex fine amaret. Ergo, respectu eorum quae sunt ad talem finem, non habet necessarium amorem, sed liberum^ licet respectu suae bonltatis necessarium amorem habeat, . . ."
24. Ia, q.2Q, a.4, c.
25* Ha Ilae* q.26, a.9, c. Cf. Saint Thomas, De Regimine Principum. Il, p.9,
MODERN OPINIONS
W© shall proceed to an examination of some modern positions, These äre somewhat difficult to classify be* «ause they dovetail so much» for example, the consideration of the person as an absolute, and the individual as a part of a whole, is sometimes correlated with the consideration of_ thespiritualgoodasneGessarilyproperj^ ©ration of these points develops into a discussion of society as a means to the proper good of the individual* Sometimes it is difficult to see which these conceptions give rise to the others, but many believe that a certain notion of person is a basic one from which other ideas stem, Therefore, it seems reasonable, in terms of contemporary discussions* to begin with the Thomlstlc principle used to furnish the ostensible foundation for the cleavage between person and individual which has v/on such vogue among
oc
modern Thomists,
Saint Thomas says that the nature of part is contrary
26
to the nature of person* And yet we have Indicated that it is only as a part* as ordered to a transcendent Common Good* that the individual person may love himself more than
It is true that a person is not a part because he is
a person, for the divine Persons are most truly persons,
27
yetin no sens e are they _p_ar_t_s,___________________However,-. it-is also true-
that when Saint Thomas opposes the nature of part to the
nature of person, he is speaking of a part of an unum per
se* a part which does not have complete subsistence, and
20
not of a part of a whole which has only unity of order.
This is evident in the context which is used to prove that
the soul, being a part of a human being, cannot be called a 29
person.
In other words, a person is not necessarily a part because he is a person, but being a person does not prevent
him from being a part» whether of society, of the universe, ór as ordered, to God« Moreover, the human person who is a part is so* essentially, because of what he is in his entirety* Sot behaust hs is a person* but being-as he is, a finite person,- soul and body together» the human com*
posite, he cannot be other than as a part in relation to
/
the ultimate common good* Even as a member of political ^ciety,.i^ a-part, thòughhé'ls
not a part of this whole according to all that he is and does»
It has been pointed out that if personality precluded being a part in every sense of the word, it would be impos- . sible for a person to be a person and at the same time to be a part, even when his being a part is due to his "individuality,»10
We have seen that had a single man been alone in creation, even then he would retain the nature of part.**1 The opposition to this theory cannot be glossed over with a mere reference to emphasis. Thus one author says that man is.
more a whole than a part,11 although he admits that, absolutely speaking, man is part or individual more than person and before being person, and that the intellëetual substance is loved and willed for the order of the universe of crea** tion before being loved and willed for itself. However, he hastens to reverse this priority in the supernatural order,12
When individuals are of the same species, they may be called _pàrts
but a suppositum of a rational nature, that is, endowed with intellect and will," In other words, a being may be an individual without being a person, without having the dignity of a -person. However, in view of what has been said, this does not so clearly justify the assertion that the individual is for society and society is for the person.3^" It is true that all individuals of the same species are, in ohe proper sense, parts of a whole, the species, and that it is only because the individual under discussion is a person, possessing a spiritual nature and an eternal destiny, that he matters for his own sake, that the good of the whole returns to bim and benefits him, that he cannot really sacrifice his own greatest good for the good of society. It is equally true, however, that the created person has the nature of part because he is a finite person.
It is because the individuals who make up society are persons, a fact which none can deny,^^ that one should love Society with a love of benevolence. Granted that it is in society that these per sons.,.find, their- fullestdevelopment,— this does not mean that the proper good of these persons is the ultimate end of society,
Some authors merely wish to maintain what is admitted, namely that the persons who are parts of society are themselves subsisting entities.-^ However, others hold that only the individual person is real and ha s a real function in the history of the world. This is plainly contrary to
Saint Thomas*s teaching! "Nevertheless, the whole itself [i,e* civil society J does have an operation which is not the operation of any one. of its parts, but an operation of the whole,, as when the whole army is in battle,
The above point has already been discussed in the first chapter.* In view of the fact that armies, missionary societies, trading companies, research or exploratory organizations, and similar groups have played unquestionably import_
tant historical roles, their historical reality cannot reasonably be denied*
Because the state is a temporal society which is mortal, whereas the person is immortal, some draw the conclusion
that the individual is for society, and society is for the 40
person* But the person will still be an individual in the achievement of his eternal destinyj his participation in the ordered gradation of nearness to God and union with Him will endure as long as the person himself*
Those who defend the applications made of the distinction between person and individual maintain of course that
the distinction ia not intended as a separation,^ This is doubtless true but the fact remains that the individual as • a person seems to be exalted to a sort óf "whole to whole" relationship with God, as if the lesser whole did not have the nature of part when compared to the greater.
There are many statements which it seems impossible for a Thomist philosopher to even attempt to justify in an absolute-way.-Gertainlythei^ of—
claiming man*s independence of his Creator, whatever may be their idea of his relationship to the order established by that Creator, but some passages, taken literally, at least lean in that direction, for they deny man an aim or purpose beyond himself.^2
Other authors claim that the reason why man is a member of society is that he is material. They go so far as to base his rights upon the fact that he is a person, but his duties upon the fact that he is a social being,^ This would
seem to imply that the spiritual activities of mail bar him from society, and that his person, as such, carries with it •no obligations to society.
It is true enough, however, that although man is a part
r
of political society, he is not part of this society according to all that he is.^ Man's immersion in the whole universe, as fulfilling God's creative purpose, is not so all embracing that Jie_ does, jiot .have--idirect rela- — tionships with his God. Yet even here the created person still has the nature of part, in the sense we have already defined,
We have used the relationship between the creature and the Creator to show that the rational creature loves the whole of creation for God's sake more than he loves himself. It is the same relationship, however, which rescues man from being confined to an inferior good. Yet it is mainly with respect to the ultimate extrinsic and incomparably perfect end that man's person has the nature of part, and it is also
because of this respect that he is not completely subordi»
The fprfstatement ■ >iiat ' man, is not part of politi*
cal society according to all that he is must not be inter«*
preted to.mean that man1s participation in society is some*
thing completely extrinsic to his nature. We have already
seen that man is by his very nature dependent on the actual
temporal soeietyinwhichh^hlmselfforthefull--
development of the human perfections which will be his
throughout eternity. The often used analogy of the courier,
who, while the whole of him is engaged in covering thé course,
is nevertheless so engaged only according to his neuro»mus-
46
cular machinery,* may be appropriate to show that the intrinsic good of society is not the individual^ ultimate end. However, this analogy seems to make his being a part an unimportant aspect of his activities in every order.
Then there is Saint Thomas*s statement which has been turned against the primacy of the common good, and consequently against our love of self as ordered to that common gcödt namely that the single intellectual creature is more
Maritain, Rights of Man, p.15 ; Person and Common
vmmmmmsmSÈÈÈ
like God «intensively11 and "collectively," while the universe is more like Him only "extensively" and "diffusively*1
As
one author has indicated the more intensive likeness is not
absolutely a more perfect likeness,—any part of any whole
comes closer in this sense to the simplicity of God*
Therefore, it is what is realized in creation composite et multipliciter which imitates most perfectly what is in God simpliciter et unite» Hence to deem secondary the perfection which
___in creation is a ccomplished by way of composition and multiplicity, is to deny value to that which most perfectly.imitates what is in Qod simpliciter et imite.^5
Moreover, the notion cannot stand that the greater intrinsic
perfection of the whole is obtained simply by repetition and
multiplication. Saint Thomas speaks of a "more complete" 49
likeness^ and not just a more extensive likeness. Modern
/
authors already quoted have Biade it clear that the divine goodness is imitated more closely by the harmonious whole than by any "theoretically best mirroring in one single finite being."13
The idea that mah is made for God and for eternal life before being part of a human community14 might possibly be misleading. It telescopes the two aspects of God1 s creai»
tìve purpoae:._fen- was-made for God as - ordained" to
with Him which constitutes his beatitude, and he was made for God, as are all creatures, to give glory to God, The proper order requires that, if God makes creatures, He must make them for Himself, We cannot overlook the fact that God»s goodness is best manifested by the various grades of perfection within creation and within the narrower limits of rational creation. Authors already cited have pointed out that the human race Itself is a direct object of the will of God and not merely a random happening.15 (
Even it by human community we understand the state, the "before" dees not of course refer to a priority of time.
As regard« a priority of nature, certainly it is more im«
i
portant to be a citizen of the heavenly kingdom than of any earthly one, but the fact remains that man ordinarily needs the earthly society for the development of certain perfections that prepare towards those which unite him with God"
for eternal life.-■-; ~~ r
Hot every reference to the common good that we meet in modern discussions of the relationship of the individual to society can be understood in the sense in which the exprès« Sion has been used in this thesis and in the presuppositions upon which it is based. Even when the common good is menr tioned as the final cause of society, the context frequently indicates that the community is one of predication only, Moreover, in references to what might be interpreted as an extrinsic good for society the "disinterested", common good is limited to the perfection of the human species.'16
Another statement, that society cannot command anything contrary tó the individual^ welfare,^ is true, but its
truth does not depend on the subordination of the good of society to the good of the individual. Any possible individual sacrifice would but promote the individuals genuine and highest welfare. Moreover, as we have seen earlier, the good of the whole cannot, by its very nature, be opposed to the good of the part.
We face another hindrance to the idea that.man*s love Ibr society isa- love natwalïy ~~duë~ from part to whole when we read, . .If man were a natural part of the city, then such inclination would be natural to him,"17 This is used in support of the idea that man is a part because of something other than his personality, something extrinsic to his nature as a person.5^ The implication that man is not a natural part of the city might be disturbing if it were not for several factors: first, theaialagous use of the word, "natural," which here means originating in nature, and not merely in accord with man*s nature} second, that man*s nature as a part is not essentially dependent on his being a part of a definite political organization; and third, that Thomistic philosophy traditionally refers to man as a
natural part of the universe, ' -who therefore naturally
loves it more than himself, as every single thing loves the
good of its whole or its species more than its own,-*^
Saint Thomas*s statement that what is loved according to
charity Is "the highest good and not the common good*-^ raay
be presented as an objection to the idea that the self is
to be loved more as ordered to the common good than because
.......of._its_intrlnsic -go0d,- -But rf tà^ examined
in its context we see that the common good here referred to
is a good that is common only by way of predication* Saint
Thomas had offered the objection that charity would not be a
special virtue if its object were the good, since that is
the general object of all virtuesj but in his response, he
shows that it is not the good which is common to all the
virtues that is the object of charity. It is in this manner
that we must understand the common good to which Saint Thomas
was referring when he said that it was not the object of 00
charity, Moreoever, we also have Saint Thomas's words
574 Cajetan, In lam, q,60, a,5, n,5,
53. la, q.óO, a,5, ad 1.
59. De Cariti.. q.l, a.5, ad 4.
60. Charles De Köninck, In Defence of Saint Thomas, pp.36, 37.
that a man ought out of charity to love God Who is the common good of all more than he loves himself precisely because God has the nature of common good, ^
A statement that might be derived from the preceding text concerning the highest good, if it were taken in isolation, is that the beatitude of the intellectual creature is
not God as the common good, but God in the transcendence of
02
His own _ rays-ter y.----If- tì-i-i-s--expression-means that bwäuse
God is loved by charity as He is in Himself, He is not at the same time to be loved as a good which exceeds the created person's capacity for a personal, proper good, it is unacceptable, To say that we are ordered as parts of a whole to the greatest of all goods—since the formal beatitude of the person depends upon the objective beatitude which is,
lâ lîââi q.109, a,3, c. î "Now it is manifest that the good of the part is for the good of the whole j hence everything, by its natural appetite and love, loves its own proper good on account of the common good of the whole universe, which is God, . , .But in the state of corrupt nature man falls short of this in the appetite of his rational will» which, unless it is cured by God's grace, follows its private good, on account of the corruption of nature." IIa Ilae. q.26, a.3, c. ~~
62. Jacques Maritain, Person and Common Good, p.13.
essentially, one that is communicable to many^3—is not, however, the same thing as to say that the beatitude of any one person depends, in the very fruition, on the actual exist enee or beatitude of others.
The individual person's direct relationship with God is frequently referred to, but we have already seen that this direct relationship is not in opposition to the principles h^ , it is not in opposition to the
fact that religion has a social aspect.^ To insist that man has the nature of part does not imply a barrier between God and the Individual man. Why must either society or the universe be considered as "interposed" between man and his God?^5 The orchestra member does not consider the orchestra as an obstacle to the attainment of his own extrinsic end} an army is not interposed between the soldier and victory} a devoted son does not consider the family as coming between himself and the mother he loves.
( 63. Charles De Köninck, De la Primauté du Bien Commun, pp.25, 55î In Defence of Saint Thomas. p. 41: "It can surely be only • because it is impossible to love God as He is in Himself•without loving Him in His communicability to others." Ibid.. p.71
64. Frank Sheed, Theology and Sanity, p.247.
65. Thomas Eschmann, "In Defense of Jacques Maritain," Modern Schoolman. Vol.22, (1945) p.192.
A moral theory that possibly presents an objection
to the conclusion that we must prefer the good of society
to our own private good is the theory that the impulse to
our own good is, in the order of nature, more fundamental
fifi
than the desire of the good of the race. "More fundamental," however, must then be accepted in the sense of • necessary and prior in time. Moreover, the conclusion
........itselfj that......the good-of -the-race-cannot be" ow"finärTnci,
is true; yet it is true only because the race has the same extrinsic final cause that we have, and not because our good is more fundamental in the sense of being a more ultimate cause.
A minor difficulty of a somewhat different nature presents itself in the notion that love varies with the closeness we feel towards the one we love.^? Must I feel society as closer to myself than I am, in order to love it more? More than that, must I feel God's nearness in order to give Him the place He deserves in the order of charity? Then love of God is to be found only in mystical experience. Our quarrel is with the term "felt" which seems to rule out
66. Michael Cronin, Science of Ethics. New York, Benziger Brothers, Second Ed., 1920, Vol.1, p.357.
67. M. C. D'Arcy, Kind and Heart of Love. New York, 1947, p.191.
both God and society as high in the order of love, unless of course the word is to be taken as synonymous with known or understood.,
There remains for consideration out of a welter of contemporary opinions the persistently troublesome notion that we have referred to in earlier sections of this thesis, namely that a community cannot be real, since it cannot give the glory to God that a Saint can give. —Eyen if giving glory to God were accepted as the criterion in this matter, surely a community of many such persons would give more glory to God. True, such a community would definitely have supernatural aspects, but it was accepted at the out» set of this thesis that the supernatural good of one was better than thè natural good of many. The important point here is that inferiority does not necessarily connote unreality. We have already seen that there is strong, even if not extensive, current opposition to the tendency to
consider persons as the only natural beings of importance
69
in the universe. Moreover, there is sometimes vigorously
6&. Dietrich von Hildebrand, "World Crisis and Human Personality," Thought, Vol.16 (1941) p.461. Cf. Etienne Gilson, The Spirit of Medieval Philosophy, p.15Ö: ". . .It is individuals that are truly real."
69, Gustave Thibon, "Nova et Vetera—Primacy of the Person," Catholic World. Vol.165, (July, 1947) p.365.
expressed opposition to the idea that only persons can be 70
There are many other relevant or partially relevant theories that need to be interpreted or refuted, but the foregoing ones seem typical. So unrelated are some of these and so intricately connected are others, that it is difficult to draw any very precise conclusion concerning ,all of them. If, apart from the teachings of the Encyclicals and— of Saint Thomas which we have used in support of our position, there are here or there in these same writings apparent omissions or implications which have been interpreted
as contrary to it, such an interpretation would entail that
\
' the greater natural and supernatural love is for what we have called the part. Moreover the glorification of the person as an end, the minimizing of the importance of membership in society, the pious desire to bind a man directly to his God, these or similar principles among modern writers,
70, Thomas J. Iiiggins, S.J., Man as Man, Milwaukee, 1950, Pt553; "Some people have said that it is impossible to love an abstraction. The impossibility fades before the cold fact that men do—even by dying for it," Of, J, of St, Thomas, Curs, theol,, Solesmes ed,, T, III, (In lam, q.19), disp.24, a.ó, n.43» P.123: "Ut sic potest diligi res in universali et vage, sine aliqua determinatione individui cum ordine tarnen ad individuationem.Tf
can also be explained or denied without sacrificing either the greater natural dilection for society, or the greater dilection and charity for the whole of humanity as ordered to God, '■' 1
■a
CHAPTER VI
CONCLUSION .
We have considered love in itself and in its various kinds« We have seen that in a consideration of the relationship between our love for ourselves and our love for society, love is a benevolent inclination of the will toward a good known by the intellect« The objects are respectivelythe one wiiö loves, in his true nature—wherein his spiritual goods transcend the material ones—and society, the concrete whole to which he belongs.
We have particularly studied the love of benevolence in order to see in what ways it can be greater or less. We have seen that because of man's utter dependence on God, it is natural that his greatest love should be directed to Him, that love is always directed toward God at least in the sense that the very lovabllity of any object is but a participation in the Divine goodness. So the perfection of the good willed in rational love is dependent on the nearness of the object to God, although the intensity is measured by its nearness to ourselves.
Then, we have considered what a rational attitude would be on the part of a human being for the society of which he is a part. An application of the principle that
xoo
the common good of the whole is superior to the good of the part made it apparent that an individual person must acknowledge his own good to be inferior to the good of society, except insofar as he is ordered to a good of a higher order. Moreover while man may not always and in every way expressly love each higher good more than a lower one, we have seen that Saint Thomas leaves no room for doubt that, not only is the good of the whole better
than the good of the part, but that the part naturally
\
loves the good of the.whole more than its own good.
In Chapter IV we tried to see a further reason for this preference of the part for the whole in the light of God's creative purpose. Since no individual can approach an adequate reflection of the divine good which God willed' to manifest in creation, we see that, because of the multitude and variety of creatures, the intrinsic good of the universe, the order of its parts, is nearer and consequently dearer to God than the intrinsic good of any individual. Since man is reasonable only when he loves God most, so he is reasonable only when he loves in the second place that which is the highest of created goods and the nearest to God, the whole of creation. But within that whole of creation, only the whole of rational creation capable of possessing God can be loved with a love of benevolence.
It is evident, then, that man cannot escape being a part. In other words, the only way in which I can rationally love myself more than society is to love myself as ordered to a common good which transcends the common good of society, the extrinsic Common good, to which the whole of rational creation is also ordered.
Finally we were able to see that these theories harmonized with the teachings of those whose authority is_
unquestionable, and we were able to reconcile, or at least account for diversities, real or verbal, among contemporary writers. No matter how great the intrinsic dignity conceded to man, a rational love for himself, whether natural or supernatural, is primarily due to his ordination to God, the extrinsic Common Good, to Whom society also is expressly to be ordered.
BIBLIOGRAPH!
PRIMARY SOURCES
Aquinas, Saint Thomas:
Commentarla
In Decern Libros Ethicórum Aristotelis ad Nichômachum Expositio. furin: Marietti, 1934.
ill Metaphysicam Aristotelis. Turin: Marietti,
1935,:
In Octo Libros Physicorum Aristotelis. Rome: —-Le onine ed, -, Ï&S4.--"
Scriptum Super Libros Sententiarum Magistri Petri Lombardi. Paris: Mandonnet-Moos, 1929-15337
Opuscula
Dei Ente et Essentia. Translated by George B. Leckie. New York: D. Appleton-Century Co., 1937.
M Regimine Princlpum. Translated by Gerald B. Phelan.New York: Sheed and Ward, 193Ö,
Quaestiones Disputatae. Turin: Marietti, 7th ed..
Summa Contra Gentes. Rome: Leonine ed., 1920-1930.
Dominican translation. New York: Benziger Bros.,
I92Ö-I929.
Summa Theologica. Rome: Leonine ed., 1896-1906.
Domiriican translation. New York: Benziger Bros.. 1947*
Aristotle:
Ethica Nichomachea. Works of Aristotle. Translated
under editorship of W. D. Ross. Oxford: Clarendon Press. Vol. IX, 1925.
Metaphysica. Ibid. Vol. VIII, 2nd ed., 192Ö.
Politica. Ibid. Vol. X, Revised ed., 1946.
Five Great Encyclicals. (Leo XIII, The Condition of Labor; Piux XÏ1Christian Education of Youth. Christian Marriage. Reconstructing the Social Order. Aetheistic Communism). New York: Paulist Press, 1939.
Leo XIII. The Great Encyclioal Letters of Pope Leo XIII. (The Christian Constitution of States). New York : Benziger Bros., 1903*
Pius XII:
Summi PontificatuS. The Function of the State in the Modern World. Official translation. Washington, d. C.î The National Catholic Welfare Council, 1939.
Mystic! Corporis. Official translation. Washington, ÏÏÏ C.î The National Catholic Welfare Council, 1943.
other works relating to the subject
Brauer, Theodore. Thomistic Principles in a Catholic School. St. Louis: B. Herder Book Co., 1943• ~
Buckley, Joseph, S.M., Man's Last End. St. Louis: B. Herder Book Co., 1949.
Cajetan, Thomas de Vio Cardinalis. Commentarla in Summam Theologicam. Rome: Leonine ed., 1896-1906.
D'Arcy, M.C,, S.J., The Mind and Heart of Love, Lion and Unicorn. New Yorkî Henry Holt anïï^ïo., 1947»
De Köninck, Charles;
De la Primaute du Bien Commun contre les personnalistes— Le Principe de l'Ordre Kouveâu. Montréal: Edition Fides; Quebec: Ed. de l'Université Laval, 1943.
In Defence of Saint Thomas. Quebec: Ed. de l'Université Laval ,"T945. .
Ferrariensis, Sylvester. Commentarla in Summam Contra Gentiles. Rome: Leonine ed., 1920-1930.
Garrigou-Lagrange, Reginald, O.P., The Love of God and the Cross of Jesus. Vol. I. Translation--SÎster Jeanne karie. St. Louis: B. Herder Book Co., 1947.
Gredt, Josepho. Elementa Philosophlae Aristotelico-
Thomisticae. Vol. Ill Friburgi Brisgoviae, 7th ed., J^ff,
Higgins, Thomas J., S.J». Man As Man. Milwaukee: Bruce Publishing Co., 1950.
John of Saint Thomas:
Cursus Philosoph!eus. Vói. II. Reiser ed. Turin: Marietti, 1930-1937.
Cursus Theologicus Thomisticus. Tomes I, II, III. Paris: Solesmes ed., 1931-1937. Tomes IV, V, VI, VII. Paris: Vivevs ed., 1Ö04-1ÖÖ6.
Kreilkamp, Karl# Metaphysical Foundation of Thomistic
Jurisprudence. Thesis. Washington, D. C*: Catholic University of America Press, 1939«
Langan, Herbert, The Philosophy of Personalisa and Its
Educational Application. Thesis. Washington, D. C.: Catholic University of America, 1936.
Larochelle, Joseph. La Solidarité ;Humaine Selon L* Enseignement Des"*Derniers Souveraines Pontifes. Thesis. Quebec: Laval University, 1948.
Maritain, Jacques:
Freedom and the Modern World. Translation by Richard Ô^Sullivan. Hew York: Charles Scribner's Sons, 1936.
The Person and the Common Good. Translation by John Fitzgerald. Mew York: Charles Scribner's Sons, 1947. .
Ransoming the Time. Translation by Harry Lorèn Binsse, New York: cHarles Scribner's Sons, 1947.
The Rights of Man and the Natural Law, Translation by-
Doris C. Anson. New York; Charles Scribner's Sons, 1947.
Scholasticism and Politics. New York; Macmillan Company
WW,
Mouroux, Jean. The Meaning of Man. Translation by A.F.C. Downes. New York; She eel and Ward, 194Ö.
O'Connor, William R. The Eternal Quest. New-York: Longmans, Green and Co., 19^7•
Sertillanges, A. D. L'Amour Chretien. 3rd. ed. Paris:
Garibaldi, Libraire Le coffre, 1919 ._;__
Sheed, Frank. Theology and Sanity. New York: Sheed and Ward 1946.
ARTICLES
Eschmann, Thomas. "In Defense of Jacques Maritain," Modern Schoolman. Vol. 22 (1945), pp.lÖ3-20Ö. ~
Hugueny, Etienne, "L'État et L'Individu," Melanges Thomistes. Kain, Belgique: Le Saulchoir, 1923, pp.341-360.
McCormick, John F. "The Individual and the State," Philosophy of the State, (Charles A. Hart, editor), Baltimore: Watkins Printing Company, 1940, pp.10-21.
Mercier, Louis J. A. "Thé'Primacy of God's Order," New Scholasticism. Vol. 20 (1946), pp.157-175.
Meyer, Frederick A., S.J. "The Limit of the Analogical Predication of the Organic Unity of Society," Proceedings of the American Catholic Philosophical Association. VolT~Ï4 (1938), pp.157-163: ! ~~
Parson, Wilfrid, S.J. "Philosophy and Order in Politics," Proceedings of the American Catholic Philosophical Association,'"ToTT"'l7 (1941), pp.45-52.
Thlbon, Gustave. "Primacy of the Person," Catholic World. (Selected for "Nova et Vetera," from What Ails Mankind.) Vol. 165 (1947), pp.365-366,
Von Hildebrand, Dietrich. "The World Crisis and Human Personality," Thought. Vol. 16 (I94I), pp.457-472.
Ward, Leo R., C.S.C. "St, ThomasT Defense of Man," Proceedings Of the American Catholic Philosophical Association, Vol. 2ÏÏT1945), pp.31-38.
Wesseling, Theodore, O.S.B. "Person and Society," Dublin Review, Vol. 20Ö (1941), pp.209-224.
fi
r*
a
1 24, In God's love alone there is no composition of love of benevolence and of concupiscence. His love is immanent and simple, inasmuch as the good toward which He inclines is His own essence, In our love for God, to Whom we can wish no additional intrinsic good, there is love of concupiscence in the sense that there is complacency in the good which He is Himself, and a desire for secondary goods of honor, etc, (la, q.20, a,l, ad 3; J, of St, Thomas, Curs, theol., Solesmes ed., T. III, In lam, q,20-q,21, disp.26, a.l, nn.ll, 12,13, pp.204, 2^5.)
25. Webster's Mew Collegiate Dictionary, p.803.
2 39. IIa Ilae, q.25, a.11, c. and ad 2.
40. IIa Ilae, q.25, a.6, c.; "According to his nature, which he has from God, he has a capacity for happiness on the fellowship of which charity is based, . . .Wherefore
we ought to love sinners out of charity, in respect of their nature. . . .For it is our duty to hate in the sinner his being a sinner, and to love in him, his being a man capable of bliss; and this is to love him truly, out of charity, for God's sake."
3 IIa Ilae, q.26, a»7, c.j q.26, a.13, c.i "In the first way a man will love better men more than himself, and those who are less good, less than himself? because, by reason of the perfect conformity of the human to the Divine will, each of the blessed will desire everyone to have what is due to him according to Divine justice." De Carit., q.l, a.7, c.» j q.l, a»9, c.
4 3. In III Sent., d.29, a,3, n.37j la, q.60, a,5, e.; ad lì "But where one is the whole causé of the existence ana goodness of the other, that one is naturally more loved than self; because, as we said above, each part naturally loves the whole more than itself: and each individual naturally loves the good of the species more than its own individual good. Now God is not only thè good of one species, but is absolutely
the universal good; hence èverythlng in its own way naturally loves God more than itself."
24. la, q.60, a.5, ad 2; IIa Ilae, q.17, a.l, c.; q.26, a.3, c.; acT"2; ad 3* "That a man wishes to enjoy God pertains
to that love of God which is love of concupiscence. Now we love God with the love of friendship more than with the love of concupiscence, because the Divine good is greater in itself, than our share of good in enjoying Him."
25, IIa Ilae, q.26, a,7j c,j q.26, a,13» c.; De Carit.. q.l, a77, c.; q.l, a,9, c.
Our wills must be conformed to God's, here as well as hereafter, in willing a greater degree of beatitude to whomsoever He wills it, but since we do not know the order He has willed, it is possible for us, in this life, to will virtue and beatitude for ourselves and those near to us without actually and simultaneously willing a higher degree of both for some better person.
5 3. Ia Ilae. q.21, a.3, c.j q.9Q, a.2, c.j IIa Ilae. q*$Ö, a.5, c.j q.ol, a.l, c.j q.5#, a.9, ad 3: "The common good is the end of each individual member of a community, just as the good of the whole is the end of each part." Ibid.» q,5&, a.7, ad 2t "The common good of the realm and the particular good of the individual differ not. only in respect of the many and the few, but also under a formal aspect. For the aspect of the common good differs from the aspect
6 5* la Ilae, q.113, a.9, äd 2; IIa Ilae, q.152, a,4, c.j ad 3: "The common good takes precedence of the private good, if it be of the same genus: but it may be that the private good is. better generically."
7 IIa Ilae, q.26, a.3, c, and ad 2: "The part does indeed love the good of the whole, as becomes a part, hot however so as to refer the good of the whole to itself, but rather itself to the good of the whole»11 Ca jet an, In II am Ilae, q.26, a.3, n.3.
8 In II Sent.. d.l, q.2, a.3, Sol.: "Differenter tamen homo dicitur finis, et divina bonitas: quia ex parte agentis divina bonitas est finis rerum, sicut ultimum intentum ab agente: sed natura humana non est intenta a Deo quasi movens voluntatem ejus, sed sicut ad cujus utilitatem est ordinatus effectus ejus." Cajetan, In lam, q.44, a.4, n.7; Ferrara,
In Contra Gentes, I, c.Öl, n.ïT"
9 J. of St. Thomas, Cursus theol., T.III, Solesmes ed., (In lam, q.19) disp.24, a.7, n.16, p.132. Cf. Ibid.. disp.24, a.7, n.14, pp.131,132.
21« In I Sent., d.44, q.l, a.2j J. of St. Thomas, Cursus theol., T.III, Solesmes Ed., (In lam, q.19) disp.24, a.4, n.4, p.ÖÖj disp.24, a.7, nn.4,15, p.132; Ferrara, In Contra Gentes, I, c.65, n.4*
10 Charles De Köninck, Defence of Saint Thomas, pp.17,67
11 Jacques Maritain, The Eights of Man and the Natural Law New York, 1947, p»4,
12 33 • Jacques Maritain, Person and the Common Good, p.7, note 7
13 Frank Sheed. Theology and Sanity, p.110. Cf. Charles De Köninck, De la Primaute' dû Bien Commun-, p. 64} A. D, Sertillanges, L*Amour* Chrétien. Paris. 1919, Third Ed., p. 11.
14 Jacques Maritain, Scholasticism and Politics..p,75.
15 Jean Mouroux, The.Meaning of Man, p.l23j Theodore ' Wesseling, "Person and Society," Dublin Review, Vol,20Ö, (1941) p.223. Cf. A.D. Sertillanges, L*Amour Chrétien, p.111? "C'est collectivement d*une certain facon, que "Di eu nous cree, en ce que són idee de l'homme, dont chacun de nous réalise un aspect. .
16 53." Sister M. J. Wolfe, Problem of Solldarism. pp.16, 54, 69/ 70, ~~~—--- .
17 Ia, q.60, a.5i c.
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