HE THOMI T A SPECULATIVE QUARTERLY REVIEW OF THEOLOGY AND PHILOSOPHY THE DoMINICAN FATHERS oF THE PROVINCE oF ST. JosEPH EDITORS: Publishers: VoL. XVI The Thomist Press, Washington 17, D. C. OCTOBER, 1953 No.4 l\fORAL PHILOSOPHY IN THE CATHOLIC COLLEGE* F ATHER DILLON: The subject we are going to discuss is the role of moral philosophy in the curriculum of the Catholic college. Because of the general nature of the problem, we are going to treat it by way of a dialogue where the various questions that arise can be considered in order. For the purpose of discussion I am going to maintain that a course in moral theology in a Catholic college eliminates the need of having a separate course in moral philosophy. Dr. *This article is based on a discussion held at a meeting of the North Central Regional Conference of the American Catholic Philosophical Association at the St. Paul Seminary, St. Paul, Minnesota. The article follows substantially the discussion as it took place at the time; there has been some condensation of the matter presented, and some of the questions raised from the fiom have been combined or rephrased. The authors have left the article in dialogue form for two reasons: 1) the topic lends itself readily to this manner of presentation; £) the authors thought that others, in seeing this method tried out, might wish to make use of it at other conference meetings. 449 450 DAVID A. DILLON AND JOHN A. OESTERLE Oesterle will take the position that a course in moral philosophy should be given in a Catholic college along with a course in moral theology. We are taking these positions for the purpose of the discussion; actually we are in agreement on aU the fundamental points. We think, however, that in presenting the topic by the method of question and answer, we shall be able to bring out the general issue more fully and may dispose others to raise questions which they think should be faced. A word now about the problem itself. While we shall consider several questions in the course of the discussion, it should be kept in mind that most of what we shall say will come under two general headings. First, what is the nature of moral philosophy? In discussing this question, we shall have to face an allied problem: what is the relation of moral philosophy to moral theology? Second, what :reason is there for a course in moral philosophy in the curriculum of a Catholic college? This question is raised with the assumption that Catholic colleges already have a course in moral theology. I should add here that we are discussing the ideal situation, that :i.s, a curriculum in which adequate provision and time could be made for both moral theology and moral philosophy. Whether such a plan obtains in fact in particular circumstances or not will not alter the solution of the problem in any case. In order that in the course of the discussion we may both be quite dear on what we mean by moral philosophy and moral theology, I think that we can do no better than begin with definitions. What do you mean, Professor Oesterle, by moral philosophy? Dr. Oesterle: By moral philosophy, I mean that science which considers human actions as ordered to each other and to an end. This is how St. Thomas :refers to moral philosophy at the beginning of his commentary on Aristotle's Ethics. 1 I think that we should notice at once that moral philosophy is broader than ethics. Moral philosophy can be divided into three parts, a division, no doubt, familiar to all. The first part 1 1 Ethic., c. 1, lect. 1, nn. MORAL PHILOSOPHY IN THE CATHOLIC COLLEGE 451 of moral philosophy, ethics, considers the actions of the individual human being as ordered to an end. The second part, originally called economics, considers the human actions of many as ordered to the end of family life. The third part, called politics, considers the human actions of many as ordered to the end of civil or political life. Let us notice that this division follows from the definition of moral philosophy as a science which considers human actions as ordered to each other and to an end, and since there are three distinct ends of human actions, there are three parts of moral philosophy. I think that it is appropriate now to ask for the meaning of moral theology. Fr. D: Let me begin by saying that moral theology is not a specific kind of theology different from another specific kind called dogmatic theology. Theology is one science. All conclusions at which theology arrives are attained under the same formal object, virtual revelation. By "moral theology," then, I mean those parts of theology which by reason of their matter are practical. In other words, moral theology considers God as supernatural end, and man as ordered to that end-not in a general way, but as God is attainable in the Beatific Vision. In all of theology God is the principal and formal subject, Whom we consider either in Himself or as He is cause. In the moral part of theology, we consider the matters that have regard to God as final cause toward which all human acts are are ordered, e. g., the ultimate end of man, virtue, practical parts of the tract on the Sacraments, grace, law, eto. Now most of the questions which a moral theologian would put to the moral philosopher would center about the following general question. Since the coming of Christian revelation, which provides us with all that is necessary to arrive· at an ultimate end, what advantage-in fact, what need or use-is there for a science of human conduct based on reason alone? However, since this general question implicitly contains several questions, let me take them up singly. The first question which arises concerns the kinds of knowl- 452 DAVID A. DILLON AND JOHN A. OESTERLE edge moral philosophy and moral theology are, as well as the certitude attained by each. Moral philosophy, as we all admit, proceeds by the light of reason and arrives at a knowledge and certitude obtainable by reason alone. Whatever certitude moral philosophy may attain is only human certitude. And because it is human, it is fallible. Moral theology, on the other hand, has all the advantages of moral philosophy without the limitations. Moral theology is also a science proceeding by reason, but it has, in addition, the light of revelation. Moral theology, in fact, is frequently defined as a science based at once on reason and :revelation. This notion of moral theology seems to indicate a knowledge which has not only a higher light, but possesses a greater certitude than moral philosophy, which must proceed by reason alone. Briefly, then, my point is that moral philosophy proceeds by reason alone, whereas moral theology proceeds by :reason and revelation. Dr. 0: I am not sure that I understand what you mean when you say that " theology proceeds by reason and revelation." I have heard this explanation given before, but I am not sure what it really tells us about moral theology. I think it contains an ambiguity. Just what does it mean to say that moral theology proceeds by reason? The word reason can be used in several senses. You can take reason to mean the mere potency or power of reason. But this meaning of reason tells us nothing distinctive about moral theology-or about moral philosophy, for that matter. The word in this meaning simply designates a power we have as human beings. In another sense, reason can be taken to mean the reasoning process, by which we proceed in a discursive, probative manner. If this is what you mean by reason when you say, "moral theology proceeds by reason and revelation," you have nothing here that distinguishes moral theology from moral philosophy. Reason in this meaning is common to aU science. There is, however, a third sense of reason, namely, as it means " proceeding in the light of natural reason." But in this meaning of the term, reason belongs to moral philosophy MORAL PHILOSOPHY IN THE CATHOLIC COLLEGE 453 and not to moral theology. And it is precisely in this sense that we distinguish the one from the other: moral philosophy proceeds in the light of natural reason; moral theology proceeds in the light of revelation. Now it is this sense, the only sense of reason which matters for our discussion, that you cannot use when you say that moral theology proceeds by reason and revelation. Fr. D: Your clarification of terms is, I think, a help to our problem. Nevertheless, it seems to lead to another question, namely, a question concerning the matter which the two sciences treat. From the definitions given of moral philosophy and moral theology, and from the treatment SL Thomas gives in the Ethics of Aristotle and in the Secunda Pars of the Summa Theologiae, it is evident that both moral philosophy and moral theology more or less treat the same matter. As a matter of fact, if you page through the Ethics and the Secunda Pars, you cannot help but be struck by the similarity of treatment of the ultimate end of man, human acts, virtue, vice, etc. Now, given such similarity of matter, is there any point to having moral philosophy? Is there any need of moral philosophy when the matter is covered in moral theology? Dr. 0: I should like to reply to this point by saying, frankly, that I do not think it is much of an argument. The argument can be turned just as easily the other way. If, as you say, the matter is the same in both, you could just as easily eliminate moral theology on the ground that the same matter is covered in moral philosophy. In other words, it seems to me that the argument from the matter of a science proves nothing either way. It ignores completely any formal differences between sciences. With the same argument, you could destroy the distinction between theology and metaphysics, since they have the same matter. In I do not think that there is any point to such an argument. Fr. D: I am interested in hearing you put the matter this way because, in conceding that there is no real difference of matter in the two sciences, you avoid what is important about 454 DAVID A. DILLON AND JOHN A. OESTERLE this argument. Let me state it this way. The real point of the argument lies in the contrast between St. Thomas the theologian and St. Thomas the commentator on Aristotle's Ethic&. You must be aware of the opinion common today that St. Thomas' commentary on the Ethic& is necessarily deficient and cannot be considered as a true and complete moral science. St. Thomas and the theologians of his time received and commented on the Ethics of Aristotle as historical data, containing, indeed, many relevant truths, but inadequate as a complete science of human conduct. According to this opinion, St. Thomas, in his commentary, restricts himself to the role of the faithful commentator, explaining and manifesting Aristotle's doctrine, but not intending then to set forth his own personal doctrine nor attempting, by way of a commentary, to create a system of what could be called Thomistic ethics. Hence, we cannot use this commentary without great care. We must realize in using it, that St. Thomas is speaking merely as a commentator, satisfied simply to bring out the teaching of Aristotle. Because of the necessary limitation of a purely natural ethics, such as Aristotle's, it would be wrong for us to conclude that a commentary by St. Thomas should be accepted as a true and complete treatment of the science of human conduct. And it would be unfair, furthermore, to St. Thomas the theologian or philosopher to ascribe to him personally what he sets forth only as a commentator on Aristotle. Dr. 0: You seem to be implying that there is a difference between St. Thomas the commentator and St. Thomas the teacher of doctrine. It seems to me, rather, that it is unfair to St. Thomas to imply that what he teaches doctrinally is opposed to what he sets forth as a commentator. Let us consider a significant point or two in this respect. St. Thomas often refers to Aristotle as "the Philosopher." What does he mean by this? Does he intend this name to be merely a polite designation or does he call him this because he :regards Aristotle as pre-eminent among philosophers? I think that it is quite evident from St. Thomas' own writings that he MORAL PHILOSOPHY IN THE CATHOLIC COLLEGE 455 means it in this latter sense. This seems clear also from the very way in which St. Thomas uses the philosophy of Aristotle. He uses it as the primary source of true philosophy, as his constant references indicate. He is not interested in Aristotle in some personal sense, but in the completely objective sense that in Aristotle the fundamental doctrine of philosophy is laid out and best formulated. Now, what is the sense in which we must understand St. Thomas to be a commentator on Aristotle? As commentator, does he merely repeat uncritically what Aristotle is saying? Is it not more in accord with the facts to say that St. Thomas is setting forth and explaining the doctrine of a recognized master? Anyone who is familiar with the commentaries of St. Thomas knows that he does more than merely report what Aristotle is saying. Nor is it true to say that St. Thomas is interested in Aristotle as an historical figure. His interest in Aristotle is strictly philosophicaL To suppose that St. Thomas is merely repeating Aristotle while reserving his own opinionwhatever that may mean-seems to me to be a very novel and curious view. Such a view is the one that stands in need of proof. The facts, rather, bear out the view that, if one wishes to speak of the philosophy of St. Thomas, one finds it primarily in his commentaries on Aristotle. It is worth noting, I think, that the notion of a commentator as one setting forth, explaining, and developing the doctrine of a recognized master has always been the accepted one throughout the scholastic doctrine. St. Thomas himself is a good example of this. He is a commentator on Sacred Scripture. No one would hold that St. Thomas, when commenting on Sacred Scripture, was reserving private or personal views. As a commentator and teacher in philosophy, he intends simply to set forth the truth. He is critical in the best sense of the term, that is, besides explaining Aristotle, he gives further reasons when he sees the need for them, .and when he has reason to depart in some way from Aristotle, he clearly indicates that he is doing so.2 2 A familiar instance occurs in the passage in Aristotle on the proof for the 456 DAVID A. DILLON AND .JOHN A. OESTERLE Question: I should like to oppose the argument based on St. Thomas's quoting Aristotle as "the Philosopher." In the first place, this is a nickname taken over by St. Thomas from Arabian philosophers and used throughout the Middle Ages even by those philosophers who disagreed with Aristotle. Hence, if you reason in this way, you should conclude that because St. Thomas quotes Averroes as "the Commentator," he must accept A verroes' opinion and interpretation of Aristotle, whi_ch is definitely not true. I question, then, the validity of this argument. Secondly, I suggest that as regards the distinction between St. Thomas as a philosopher and St. Thomas as interpreting Aristotle's doctrine, no general :rule can be set a priori. Each case must be judged on its own merits and according to coherence with the :rest of the Thomistic doctrine. Dr. 0: I do not see how we can regard St. Thomas' calling Aristotle "the Philosopher" primarily a verbal matter or a historical matter. The point I wish to emphasize is that St. Thomas is teaching the same doctrine as Aristotle is teaching. There is no other reason why he is writing a commentary. St. Thomas himself was a teacher. A teacher looks for scientific treatment of the subject he teaches. He then seeks to manifest it for his students. It is in this way that St. Thomas regards Aristotle's Ethics as, indeed, he deals with all of Aristotle's works. Merely proposing Aristotle's writings for their historical interest would be to waste his students' time if they were supposed to be learning ethics. The mere fact that St. Thomas takes Aristotle's Ethics as the text to comment upon in order to teach ethics to his students shows that he intends to manifest and teach ethics. This was, in fact, the customary way of teaching in the Middle Ages, There is nothing in St. Thomas' cometernity of time, in the Xll Metaphy8ics, c. 6 (Commentary of St. Thomas, lect. 5, nn. il496-Q499). Aristotle appears there to be holding the eternity of time. "Ex hoc igitur processu manifestum est quod Aristoteles hie firmiter opinatus est et credidit necessarium fore, quod motus sit sempiternus et similiter tempus." St. Thomas goes to some length to show that, regardless of whether Aristotle intended to offer a demonstration argument, a proof for the eternity of time can never be demonstrative. St. Thomas argues this point on grounds of reason alone. MORAL PHILOSOPHY IN Tim CATHOLIC COLLEGE 457 mentary to suggest that he supposes the ethics of Aristotle is different from his own; there cannot be two sciences of ethics. It is quite foreign to the spirit of both Aristotle and St. Thomas to suppose that there is literally an "Aristotelian" ethics and a " Thomistic " ethics. They are both simply interested in developing the science of ethics. Question: But can you ignore the historical meaning of the term "the Philosopher?" Is St. Thomas using the name in any way essentially different from other scholars of his time? Dr. 0: The fact that there is also a historical meaning to " the Philosopher " as applied to Aristotle only manifests the preeminent position of Aristotle even for those who disagree with him. Now it seems to me that even a superficial reading of St. Thomas' commentaries on Aristotle shows that St. Thomas is not primarily interested in Aristotle as a historical figure. Likewise, even a superficial reading of the commentaries shows that St. Thomas was not merely presenting Aristotle's "opinions," but, rather, that he was presenting what he considered to be philosophical truth so far as it is attainable. With respect to the designation of A verroes as " the Commentator," St. Thomas recognized this title for what it literally meant and treated him accordingly. But by the very fact that A verroes was also a commentator, St. Thomas could depart from him when the truth of doctrine so required. It is the philosopher who is the recognized master, not the commentator. I should like to make one more observation here. There seems to be a growing tendency to belittle the importance of Aristotle both as a philosopher and in his relation to St. Thomas. We are supposed to believe, it would seem, that Aristotle was unaware of the most basic principles and truths in philosophy, especially in Metaphysics, even to the point of not knowing the formal object of Metaphysics or that act is limited by potency. Such a position also makes a point of opposing St. Thomas to Aristotle on these central truths. Now, one need not be forced into the opposing extreme of uncritically idolizing Aristotle in 458 DAVID A. DILLON AND JOHN A. OESTERLE holding that such views cannot be maintained in the face of Aristotle's own writings. Nor need one, in denying essential opposition between Aristotle and St. Thomas on fundamental points, overlook the reliance of St. Thomas on philosophers other than Aristotle. But if there is one thing that is unmistakably clear from St. Thomas' extensive writings, it is his unequivocal acceptance of Aristotle as the best teacher and guide in philosophy. One simply does not add to the glory of St. Thomas by opposing him to Aristotle. Thomists, in the good sense of the term, will follow the lead of St. Thomas in laying hold of the basic truths of philosophy in the teaching of Aristotle. Fr. D: I think that in general the point you make is well taken. It does seem difficult, as you point out, to imagine St. Thomas writing a commentary on a doctrine, yet all the while not agreeing with his own commentary. However, what you have been saying raises another problem. I have noticed that in your references to moral philosophy you have been speaking of moral philosophy as if it were a complete and independent science of human conduct. You seem to be assuming that no change has occurred in moral science since the time of Aristotle, as if the Gospel had not intervened in the meantime and the science of human morality had not undergone a revolutionary development under the influence of Christian revelation. Now, if moral philosophy is to have a place in the curriculum of a Catholic college, it must have existence as an independent science of human conduct. The objection I now put to you is that it does not seem possible to establish this independence of moral philosophy. Let me explain a little further. Moral philosophy, if it is to be called a true moral science, must be subalternated to moral theology, since the natural end is subalternated to the supernatural end. If we were discussing a problem of purely speculative science, we might readily admit that the appearance of Christian revelation would have caused no essential change. However, in the matter of moral MORAL PHILOSOPHY IN THE CATHOLIC COLLEGE 4.59 science, we are faced with an entirely different object and consideration. The object is human or voluntary action; this object demands a consideration not only of nature and definition, but also of end. Since the end is the principle in practical science, ethics does not consider man purely in his essential nature, but also with regard to his ultimate end. The knowledge of man in relation to his true and real ultimate end cannot be adequately considered by purely natural ethics, since man has not been ordered by his Creator to a natural end. Natural ethics will never be able to form a true science of human conduct since it pretends to order man to an end that does not in fact exist. Briefly, then, my point against moral philosophy as a science reduces to the following: moral philosophy lacks a knowledge of that true ultimate end toward which man de facto is ordered. Lacking this, it cannot do what a moral science should do, namely, order man to his true end. Dr. 0: I agree that we now begin to face the real problem of moral philosophy as a science and its role in the curriculum of a Catholic college. The important question at issue is that of the subalternation of moral philosophy, that is, whether moral philosophy is an independent science or whether it must be dependent in some way upon moral theology. Subaltemation is a technical term in philosophy. I think we should distinguish at once the three meanings in which the term is used. In one meaning we can speak of subalte:rnation of one science to another in terms of the end. We distinguish a higher end from a lower end insofar as the higher end is a more universal good. Such subalternation is one of dependence in terms of control and directions. The less universal good is thus subalternated to the more universal good. It is in this way that we speak of the subalternation of military· science to political science, because the political common good is higher than ·the military common good. This meaning of subalternation is a loose meaning, because the notion of subalternation properly implies a dependence of one science upon another with respect to manifesting truth. For this reason, and also because we are 460 DAVID A. DILLON AND JOHN A. OESTERLE not· here concerned with a difference between a more universal good and a less universal good, this meaning of subalternation cannot apply in the case we are considering. Secondly, one science can be subalternated to another in terms of the subject it considers. This occurs when the subject of the subaltemated science adds some extrinsic and accidental difference to the subject of the evidence to which it is subalternated. The case of music or harmony is a familiar instance of this kind of subalternation. We add to the notion of number in mathematics the extrinsic and accidental difference of sound, and so obtain the complex subject which harmony treats, numbered vibration. In this way, harmony is subalternated to mathematics. But this kind of subalternation cannot apply in the case we are considering, since the subject of moral philosophy is not complex; it does not have something accidental added to its subject. There is, thirdly, subalternation in terms of the principles of a science. This occurs when the subalternated science depends upon a superior science for the evidence of its own principles. Now it might seem that this kind of subalternation would apply in the case we are considering. But let us notice, first of all, that the subalternated science has to lack per se evident principles in its own domain, and must, therefore, depend essentially upon a higher science for the evidence of its own pr,nciples. This is certainly not the case in moral philosophy. Let us notice, secondly, that in a practical science the end serves as the principle of the science. But it is precisely in terms of ends that moral philosophy and moral theology differ. Moral theology considers an ultimate end known in the light of revelation, a supernatural end. Moral philosophy, as both Aristotle and St. Thomas teach, considers an ultimate end known in the light of natural reason, a natural end. In terms of these diverse ends, each science is constituted independently in its own order. Question: But are you not begging the question in stating the matter this way? The question at issue is whether two such independent ends exist? MORAL PHILOSOPHY IN THE CATHOLIC COLLEGE 461 Dr. 0: Let me answer that question, at least partially for now, by saying that there are certainly two independent ends in the sense that moral theology has its own end and so has moral philosophy. The ultimate end of man that can be known in the light of reason alone is the one that is discussed in moral philosophy. This end is not, and cannot be, subalternated to any further end known by reason. There is simply no other ultimate end which reason alone can know. To suppose that the end known by reason in moral philosophy is subalternated to the end known by revelation in moral theology is to attribute the evidence for the principles of moral philosophy to revelation. No one could hold such a position. l!'urthermore, the principles of moral theology are inevident to human reason, based as they are on revealed truths. They could not, therefore, give evidence for the principles of moral philosophy. However, the statement that human reason knows an end ultimate in the natural order in no way denies that there could be a more ultimate end in a higher order. Human reason alone does not affirm or deny this; it simply cannot know. But it can be said that moral philosophy is imperfect compared to moral theology, and perhaps it is this that is meant when the independence of moral philosophy as a science is called into question. Nevertheless, this comparison with moral theology does not impair the legitimacy of moral philosophy as a natural science, nor does it imply its subalternation as a science to moral theology. It seems to me that this introduction of subalternation into the question of the status of moral philosophy as a science has only served to confuse the matter. If I am not mistaken, the confusion on this matter once led some theologians to subalternate moral theology to moral philosophy! I shall moderately embarrass Fr. Dillon by asking him whether such a peculiar situation ever happened in the history of theology. Fr. D: I have to admit that this curious theory was held by some sixteenth century theologians and, it might be added, some notion of it, if not its terminology, has found its way into 462 DAVID A. DILLON AND JOHN A, OESTERLE manuals of theology, These theologians noticed that while many theological demonstrations contained two revealed premises, other demonstrations were deduced from one premise of faith and from one known by the natural light of reason. They thought that theological demonstrations of this latter kind constituted a distinct species of theology because of the natural truth of one of the premises. This kind of theology, they said, was subalteJrnated to the natural science from which the natural truth was taken. For example, if the conclusion was about moral matters, the science was subalternated to natural moral science. Question: I should like to return to this question of the meaning of subalternation. I would agree to the kinds of alternation so far mentioned. However, is it not possible to speak of still another meaning of subalternation, namely, one referring to the disposition of the agent? The distinction earlier made with regard to the notion of direction seems quite important for our general pJroblem. Don't we have to draw a distinction between the way moral science directs man to an end and the way prudence directs man to an end? Dr. 0: The point of my answer was to take subalternation in the accepted and only possible senses it has in terms of science, and show that in none of these is moral philosophy subalternated to moral theology. However, if we put the question in terms of what the true ultimate end of man is, rather than of science, I agree that we have to make a distinction that is often ignored or confused. It is one thing to speak of the ultimate end insofar as end is considered in science. It is quite another to speak of an ultimate end to which you1· actions or my actions are ordered. Now the end that science considers specifies the science and gives the illumination for drawing conclusions in that science. It is in this way that we determine any practical science. ever, end in the sense of an end toward which our actions are directed and ordered does not fall under science as such. Actions as directed to an end fall under the virtue of prudence. MORAL PHILOSOPHY IN THE CATHOLIC COLLEGE 468 It is certainly true to say, then, that in the order of action man should act only for a supernatural end as his ultimate end. In fact, were he to act for any other end as ultimate, such an end would be opposed to the supernatural end and, for that reason, wrong. Yet this point in no way denies the fact that where there is an ultimate end knowable by reason, such an end can specify a science, for the end :is to practical science as the formal object is to speculative science. Fr. D: I also agree that the distinction between end of the science and end of the agent is an important distinction. However, I do not think that you have answered fully the question raised. How does the notion of direction apply to this distinction? Would you clarify the difference between the way moral science directs a man to an end and the way prudence directs man's actions to an end? Dr. 0: I should like to begin answering this by locating moral philosophy as knowledge and by distinguishing it from speculative knowledge, on the one hand, and from purely practical knowledge, on the other. Take the three ways in which any knowledge is characterized: the object, the mode, and the end. If you are dealing with a non-operable object in a speculative mode, and with an end that is speculative, you have a purely speculative science, for example, metaphysics. · However, you can deal with an operable object in a speculative mode and for a speculative end. For example, the object can be a house, which is clearly an operable object, but your knowledge of it may be restricted to defining it for the sake of understanding it. This kind of knowledge is sometimes called radically practical knowledge. These two instances are clearly in the speculative order. You can also consider an operable object in a practical mode even though the end remains speculative. This kind of knowledge is called formally practical knowledge. It is here that moral philosophy is found because, in moral philosophy, you are dealing with an operable object in a practical mode with the end remaining speculative. There is still the case where 464 DAVID A. DILLON AND JOHN A. OESTERLE you can have an operable object treated in a practical mode and for a practical end. This last case is completely practical knowledge and is found in prudence. It is particularly these last two cases we must distinguish from each other. In moral philosophy, the knowledge is of movements and operations that can be applied, and where the end concerned is the end of science. In prudence, in completely practical knowledge, the knowledge is of movements and operations that you actually intend to apply, and where the end concerned is the end of the agent. Let us notice, then, that both moral philosophy and prudence have principles that direct execution, but which are realized differently. Moral philosophy directs man remotely to the ultimate end, whereas prudence directs man proximately to the ultimate end. Let us notice, too, that moral philosophy retains a speculative note. The truth of moral philosophy is still speculative, the truth of knowing things universally, e. g., how virtues are obtained, how virtues have a mean, etc. The completely practical knowledge of prudence concerns practical truth, which consists in ordering actions in accordance with a rectified appetite. The measure of truth in the completely practical order is the w,ell-ordered man. A sign of the legitimacy of this distinction between principles as directing in moral philosophy and principles as directing in prudence is found in the example of the man who knows moral philosophy well but is still a bad man in his action. He can know the speculative truth of moral philosophy but still perform evil actions. His will is not rectified in his actions. Question: How is it possible for a person who does not know the true ultimate end to have formally practical knowledge that is still true? Dr. 0: He could have true formally practical knowledge in the order of reason. Question: Is it knowledge of the happiness that man is ordered to? Dr. 0: It is not of the happiness that man is actually ordered MORAL PHILOSOPHY IN THE CATHOLIC COLLEGE 465 to; it is knowledge of happiness that reason by itself can establish. This is what Aristotle and St. Thomas are talking about in the Ethics. Question: But then this knowledge has no value for concrete action as such? Dr. 0: Yes and no. The answer to this rests on the distinction between end or happiness so far as it can be known in the order of natural reason, and end as known in a higher order, the order of revelation. These ends are not opposed, but subordinated. Even with regard to a supernatural end, what we know by reason alone of human action is of value and is even necessary. Question: Would you say, then, that it is possible to have two perfect moral sciences, moral philosophy and moral theology, but only one perfect virtue of action, prudence, and that this perfect virtue is supernatural prudence? Then could you not also say that you can consider an end ultimate in the order of reason, but that as far as actions are concerned, everything must fall under the supernatural end.? Fr. D: Would you agree to that statement of the position? Dr. 0: Yes. In terms of science, moral philosophy is distinct from moral theology, a distinction arising from diverse ends. But in terms of the agent, there is actually only one ultimate end toward which he is ordered, the supernatural end, requiring the infused virtue of prudence as the proportionate means. Fr. D: There is another point to clear up here. We agree that man is ordered to a supernatural, not a natural, end. However, you say that moral science or moral philosophy directs man remotely. Precisely in what does this direction consist? Dr. 0: My point originally was to insist that moral philosophy does direct man in his actions, but that this direction was remote and not proximate. It is remote because moral philosophy, being formally practical knowledge, considers truth, a truth that is speculative only. Now it is evident that such speculative consideration, e. g., of the notion of the virtues, of 2 466 DAVID A. DILLON AND JOHN A. OESTERLE their distinction, of what the mean in each virtue consists, etc., does direct us in our action. However, it is remote in the sense that such knowledge does not direct any concrete action. Question: I should like to return to the question of prudence as a virtue. If there are two moral sciences, moral philosophy and moral theology, what happens when we consider prudence in the natural order? Your own statements seem to be implying that there is no natural prudence because it would have to order actions to a natural ultimate end, and there is no ultimate end in fact in the natural order. Dr. 0: As far as moral philosophy is concerned, you can consider natural prudence, that is, you can define it, state its mean, its subjective and integral parts, etc. However, as to having and exercising a virtue, the natural virtue of prudence, given a supernatural end, is only a disposition. The true and perfect virtue must be supernatural because there is only one actual end of action, the supernatural one. Fr. D: There is another important point that must be taken into consideration before we can accept the value of a natural ethics such as Aristotle's. This point concerns not simply the ultimate end, but also the agent who is being ordered to that end. Granted that one can know an end that is ultimate as far as reason is concerned, it is nevertheless true that the man known by purely natural ethics is not the man whom we are actually ordering to any end. Man, as we know (and let it be emphasized, by revelation) , is in the fallen and redeemed state of natme, a fact that Aristotle did not and could not know by reason alone. Hence, while the Ethics of Aristotle might be valid for man in the state of pure nature, such a man actually does not exist. I do not mean to deny the many valuable and useful truths in the Ethics of Aristotle; nevertheless, they are truths that depend on the sole consideration of human nature as such, and not as it is in the fallen state. Now, a complete moral science must take into account not or;ly the essence under discussion, but also the state; not only human nature as such, but also sin and grace. The Ethics MORAL PHILOSOPHY IN THE CATHOLIC COLLEGE 467 of Aristotle considers the object, human nature, but lacks knowledge of the true existential conditions in which man actually finds himself: fallen and redeemed nature. Even if ethics can consider an end known by reason, it nevertheless remains true that ethics is not a speculative, but a practical science; it orders man to real, not to hypothetical conduct. It could not be a real science of human conduct unless it could consider man in a state where actual conditions were realized. But actually the conditions of the state of pure nature are entirely hypothetical. Consequently, natural ethics cannot be a truly practical science of conduct. To summarize, then, an adequate science of ethics will have to take account of human nature not only in its essence, but also in the existential conditions in which human nature is actually found. Moral theology does this; ethics does not, and cannot. Dr. 0: Let me first ask a question. On what did Aristotle base his Ethics? Since ethics is a practical science, and since Aristotle certainly knows what a practical science is, he could only be basing his Ethics on experience. As all who are familiar with his text know, Aristotle constantly appeals to experience, to the facts of the matter, and to men as they are in the concrete order. Consequently, Aristotle could only know fallen man, man as he actually is, not that Aristotle knew man formally as fallen, but that what he observed about men in experience necessarily is true of fallen man. The facts of experience would be the same for Aristotle and for a moral theologian even though only the moral theologian would have the formal reason for those facts, facts revealing a certain disorder in man's actions. As a matter of fact, I cannot understand how anyone could think that Aristotle would be considering anyone else than fallen man. The only possible way in which one might be led to think that Aristotle was not considering fallen man is if one thought that ethics were a speculative science. Presumably, one might then suppose that ethics is simply deduced from the definition of man, as though it were possible to deduce 468 DAVID A. DILLON AND JOHN A. OESTERLE man's actions from the very general knowledge we have of man's nature. But, of course, this is not the way Aristotle regards ethics. Both Aristotle and St. Thomas teach that ethics is a practical science in the sense of what we call formally practical knowledge. For Aristotle, then, his Ethics, being a practical science, does take account of men existing concretely. Fr. D: Do I understand you to say that Aristotle in some way recognized that man was in a fallen state? Dr. 0: The man that Aristotle observed was certainly in the fallen state, and Aristotle also observed the fact of disorder in man. Furthermore, he was also aware of a certain proximate reason for this, namely that men follow their senses. Obviously, however, he could not know the proper reason for man's disorder, original sin. He did not, as I said before, know man under the formality of fallen nature, which has meaning only with regard to the supernatural end, known only through revelation. Question: It seems that Plato, too, recognized this-the example of the charioteer and the horses. Does that not indicate that Plato, as well, knew that there was something wrong in man's nature? He also could not know the reason for it, but he was aware of the fact that there was a disturbance of some kind. Dr. 0: Yes, I think Plato, as well as Aristotle, was aware of a certain disorder in man. Fr. D: There remains, I think, a final question. Is it necessary that both moral theology and moral philosophy be taught in a Catholic college? I am going to presume that moral theology certainly should be taught, and I am going to take from your former remarks the admission that moral philosophy is an imperfect science. Dr. 0: I should interject here that it is imperfect only as compared to moral theology. Fr. D: Now if in the curriculum of a Catholic college there exists already a course in moral theology, is there any advantage in requiring or including a course in moral philosophy? MORAL PHILOSOPHY IN THE CATHOLIC COLLEGE 469 Given the fact that moral science proceeding from revelation is quite adequate for directing man in his actions, can we not say that moral philosophy has only the value of letting the student see some parts of ancient philosophy? Dr. 0: I would maintain that moral philosophy has a distinct place in the curriculum. We have to take account of the fact that the natural light of reason and the supernatural light of revelation, being generically different, are in diverse orders. There are things we know through one that we do know through the others. Revealed knowledge does not eliminate the need of acquiring natural knowledge. There are things that we have to find out according to reason, and the knowledge in moral philosophy is no exception to this rule. In fact-and this is my first reason for having moral philosophy in the curriculum of a Catholic college-there are things we have to know in moral philosophy before we can study moral theology properly as a science. It can be said without exaggeration that a moral theologian who does not know his ethics is not properly a moral theologian. Furthermore, let us consider what we mean when we say that moral theology judges and approves moral philosophy. Moral theology can certainly exercise this sapiential function. But in order for the moral theologian to be able to judge and pass upon the truth of moral philosophy, he must know the truths of moral philosophy, and know them in the light of reason. No one can judge or approve what he does not know. Hence, the moral theologian must know moral philosophy as a philosopher, both to be a moral theologian and to exercise the sapiential relation of moral theology to moral philosophy. There is still another reason that we can give for having moral philosophy in the curriculum. It is an extrinsic reason, but an important one, I think, both for the priest and the layman. A knowledge of moral philosophy is of great use in talking to those outside the Faith who do not have the benefit of revealed knowledge. Through moral philosophy, we are able to talk reasonably with them; we can manifest to them the 470 DAVID A. DILLON AND JOHN A. OESTERLE truths of the natural moral order. In this way, we can eliminate some of the objections they have against natural moral truths, and such a discussion with them, on grounds of reason alone, may serve to dispose them toward the Faith. • Question: Could you give me an instance of one thing that is treated in moral philosophy which a moral theologian has to know first of all as a moral philosopher? Dr. 0: Take, as an example, the notion of virtue. The virtues we know about through revelation are infused virtues. But first the theologian must know what virtue itself is, what its relation is to the voluntary, to the passions, and in what the mean of virtue consists, etc. All these things we must acquire as natural knowledge. Question: Couldn't one get that knowledge in theology, for example, in the Secunda Pars of the Summa Theologiae? Dr. 0: You might get it in a course in moral theology, but if so, you are considering matter that belongs properly to moral philosophy and should have been studied there. When this matter does appear in moral theology, as it does in the Secunda Pars, it is there to be judged and approved in the light of moral But, to understand truths about virtues, the passions, the voluntary, free will, human acts and their circumstances, we must know these and similar things by reason. Moral theology does not reveal the definition of virtue or what a human act is. Consider how the moral theologian proceeds. As Fr. Dillon has mentioned, most demonstrations have as premises, one revealed truth and one known by reason. Revelation itself does not need natural knowledge but the theologian needs natural knowledge, if he is to bring out of revelation the truths virtually contained in it. Furthermore, the premise known by reason must be understood by the theologian in the science in which it is found. There is, for example, no definition nor division of the passions in the Gospels. To summarize, then, there are at least two basic reasons for MORAL PHILOSOPHY IN THE CATHOLIC COLLEGE 471 having moral philosophy in a Catholic college. The first reason is for the benefit of the moral theologian, who must have this knowledge to know and teach moral theology, The second reason is that moral philosophy is needed for the moral theology course, or its equivalent, that is required in all Catholic leges. On the college level, students should be expected to have a rational basis for the important truths of the Faith which they hold, perhaps especially, in these times, in moral matters. Moral Philosophy accomplishes this important function for the college studenL DAVID A. DILLON The Saint Paul Seminary, Saint Paul, Minnesota. JoHN A. OESTERLE College of St. Thomas, St. Paul, Minnesota. THE MEANING OF EXISTENTIALISM There is no sanity in those whom anything in creation displeases. St. Augustine, Confessions. But, friends, let me open my whole heart to you: if there were gods in existence, how could I endure not to be a god. Nietzsche, Zarathustra. T I. HE purpose of this essay is to discuss briefly and tentatively, though in a strictly philosophical way, some principles and distinctions drawn from the thought of St. Thomas Aquinas which provide a perspective for the proper appreciation of the importance of Existentialism. Existentialism is a name which covers a multitude of intellectual sins, and is often assumed by cheap revivals of the perennial errors and sophisms, absolute scepticism, nominalism and the like. It has become more a speculative fashion than a distinct philosophical movement. Then again, even from the most sincere and responsible exponents of Existentialism, it is difficult to arrive at any clear definition of its meaning; for, so they say themselves, if it is taken as a formal philosophical doctrine, if it is universalised or systematised in any way, it loses its whole raison d'etre. How to define the essence of a philosophical movement which denies in fact that there are any essences to be defined or that the process of definition itself is of any value! Apart from this, there are radical differences between all the best known Existentialists. For Kierkegaard, Christianity is the centre of any true" Existentialism," as it is also for Gabriel Marcel. But for Sartre, and it would seem also for Heidegger, atheism is an integral part of an " Existential " philosophy. Then again, each of the 472 THE MEANING OF EXISTENTIALISM 473 main contemporary Existentialists has shown himself anxious to dissociate himself from the others. Sartre, for example, has criticized Heidegger severely; Jaspers has announced his opposition to them both, and Marcel maintains a wholly independent position. In spite of all this we can propose a loose kind of definition of Existentialism which will serve as a preliminary definition for our enquiry here. The essence of Existentialism, we may say, lies in its insistence upon the primacy of subjectivity. First, in the speculative order, the order of thought, this primacy of subjectivity means the rejection of all "systematic" thought-of the abstract and the necessary and the universalfor the sake of the individual and singular and unique and ineffable experience of the subject. The lived experience of the subject is the only valid criterion of truth. So Jaspers says, "I cannot verify anything save through my personal being, and I have no other rule than this personal being itself." Or, as Gabriel Marcel puts it in a striking epigram, "We do not study problems of philosophy, we are those problems." Or again Kierkegaard, " Does not the vanity of our age come from the fact that, with all its knowledge, lost in the objectivism of its theories, it forgets those two little things which are so simple, the meaning of existence and the meaning of inwardness? " Secondly, in the practical or moral order, the order of moral action and choice, this "primacy of subjectivity" means the rejection of any a priori morality and the affirmation of the complete freedom, the complete gratuitousness of the liberty of the subject. It affirms man's capacity to determine his destiny, to "make" himself what he is. (In this sense, but in this sense only, he "makes," as Sartre says, his nature or "essence'.'; and in this sense again his" essence," or what he is, is posterior to his "existence.") Further, it affirms man's responsibility for his moral action, face to face with moral situations which are never the same but which demand always a new and unique moral choice. "Preparation for becoming attentive to Christianity," so Kierkegaard says in his Post- 474 MAX. CHARLESWORTH script, " does not consist in reading books or in making smveys of world history, but in deeper immersion in existence." How does this radical subjectivism escape the absurdity of absolute scepticism and solipsism? How shall we understand a statement such as Marcel's," To think, to formulate, to judge, is always in the last :resort to betray?" What value has the Existentialist method? These are questions this essay will be concerned to answer. For the moment all that needs to be remarked is that there is, so I believe, an element of truth in Existentialism which deserves to be saved and restored into the scheme of Christian wisdom. I believe that the Existentialist movement does represent good and genuine philosophical intentions, from which the Christian philosopher can learn valuable lessons, but that it has not the philosophical means, the conceptual equipment, to formulate those intentions adequately. The Existentialists have, so to speak, bitten off more than they can chew. Maritain remarks, apropos of the novels of Marcel Proust, that it would take a man of the moral integrity of a St. Augustine to treat the subject-matter of those novels as it ought to be treated (both artistically and morally). Similarly, in the case of Existentialism, it needs, so I think, a philosophy of the speculative strength and subtlety of Thomism to realise what I have called its philosophical intentions. Only in that way will its true meaning be mad.e explicit and only in that way will it be able to preserve and develop its true value. n. There are two ways of approaching a philosophical doctrine. One way, which may be called "a posteriori," consists in a detailed collation and consideration of texts. 1 Here, however, I plan to approach Existentialism in an "a priori" way, that is, by showing what it must necessarily mean-from the 1 The best objective account of the different Existentialist doctrines is that given by Regis Jolivet in his book Les Doctrines Existentialistes, De Kierkegaard a J.-P. Sartre. See especially pp. 73, 74 for a summary of the main Existentialist themes, and also the very penetrating remarks in the conclusion to the book. THE MEANING OF EXISTENTIALISM 475 very ex1genc1es of reality and of thought-if it is to mean anything at all. (This is Aristotle's method in the Metaphysics when he deals with the history of his philosophical predecessors). Let us attempt, then, to delineate, in this so-called a priori way, the conditions of human existence-those conditions which arise from the very fact that a determinate thing, man, is in existence, in the world and in history-conditions which constitute what the Existentialists call " the fundamental human situation." 2 In this way, as I have said, we will penetrate to the heart of Existentialism by showing what it must and can only mean. The first condition of human existence, an exigency arising from the fact of man being an existent or a thing exercising being, is his creatureliness or contingency. This means that man is distinguished, along with the rest of creation above him (the angels) and below him (irrational and inanimate creatures), from the Pure Actuality, the pure self-sufficiency and necessary existence which is God. While man exists, he does not necessarily exist. This man Charlesworth actually exists; he is in being; he exercises the act of existence; he is not nothing. But he can not-exist; he is capable of not being; he need not necessarily have been. "I am He Who Is; you are one who is not," said God to St. Catherine of Siena. If, then, man is not his own cause of being, not his own raison d' etre, he must depend for his existence upon a necessary existent, which, as the Scholastic philosophers say, is God. These two notions, non-necessity and dependency, are implicit in the idea of contingency. • We use these terms, "conditions " and " situation " in much the same sense as Sartre. " What is common to all men," he says, " is not a nature but a condition, that is to say, an ensemble of limits and constraints: the necessity of dying, ol working in order to live, of existing in a world inhabited by other men. And this condition is at bottom only the fundamental human situation or, if one prefers, the ensemble of abstract characteristics common to all situations." Refiexions sur la question Juive, p. 76. We may inquire here in parenthesis, whether the notion of "nature," which Sartre is so concerned to get rid of, does not re-enter his argument and philosophy by the back door! For what is a " nature " except precisely " the ensemble of abstract characteristics common to all situations "? 476 MAX. CHARLESWORTH Man shares this condition of contingency with the rest of creation, and, when he contemplates himself and the existents around him in the world, he comes to have a sense of the gratuitousness of being. I, this rose and my Juliet, we exist, yes, but we need not necessarily be. The stories and the poetry of mankind are filled with this sentiment, half-way between joy and sorrow-joy at the being and the goodness of things, and sorrow at their change and passing. " Yea man, like grass are his days; the wind passes by and he is gone," says the Psalmist. But, as we noted before, at the same time as he experiences .his own contingency, man experiences his dependency upon Another, upon God. The recognition of this dependency gives rise to the fundamental human attitude of worship or " !atria " or "religion," using that word in its strict scholastic sense, that is, as a species of justice, a satisfaction to God for His creation of us and in recognition of our dependency upon Him. The Existentialists have described this primary condition of contingency very completely. Heidegger especially has shown in a most dramatic way how this intuition of being and contingency, the sense of the existent being posited between nothingness and nothingness, gives rise to a sentiment of" anguish" (Angst) and is the beginning of all philosophy. "Anguish reveals Nothing," he says in his essay What is Metaphysics, and Nothing is the primary philosophical concept. Thus, in the same essay he says that the fundamental question of metaphysics is, " Why is there any Being at all. Why not far rather Nothing?" 3 Again, his analysis of "death," in his work Being and Time, shows the contingency of man's existence in a most radical and brutal form. " As soon as a man is born," he says," he is old enough to die." Man's being is a being-forthe-end (Sein-zum-Ende). Man is a being destined of his very essence and constitution towards death (Sein-zum-Tode). Heidegger even speaks of the " necessity of the non-necessity of existence," so as to emphasize the absolute contingency of all human existence. • What is Metaphysics, pp. 886, 880. (W. Brock's translation). Account of Being and Time, p. 58. See also An THE MEANING OF EXISTENTIALISM 4'77 In much the same way Sartre makes the " etre-en-soi " subject to an absolute contingency, a contingency deprived of its foundation in the Necessary Being of God and, therefore, as Sartre willingly admits, irrational and absurd. 4 lli. The second condition of human existence arises from the fact that man is a corporeal creature, one whose specific form is received and limited in matter. Man is a part of the material world and of the biological species. He is, as the Thomists say, individuated by matter, and therefore an "individual." Although each man is a pe1·son, that is to say, a rational and free existent subsisting as a whole complete in itself and with a destiny unshareable with any other, he is not a person in the sense that God is a person nor in the sense that the angelic creature is a person. St. Thomas says, What makes Socrates a man can be communicated to many; whereas what makes him this particular man is only communicable to one. Therefore, if Socrates were a man by what makes him to be this particular man, as there cannot be many Socrates, so there could not be many men. This belongs to God alone, for God himself is his own nature. 5 Man is thus distinguished from the divine personality in that his nature and personality are distinct, whereas God's personality and nature are identical; and he is distinguished from the angelic creature in that he is an individual person, one among many other individuals in the species and in the world. To sum up, man is a person because he subsists independently and exclusively and because he possesses a rational nature and is free. At the same time he is not a self-sufficient person, that is to say, not his own final end-for God alone. at the highest degree of personality, is self-sufficient and His own end. No:r, further, does any man exhaust the whole perfection of the species man, as the angelic creature does in its species. Man • L'Etre et le Neant, p. 34. 5 Summa Theologiae, I, q. 11, a. 3. 478 MAX. CHARLESWORTH is at once individual and person, at one a " part " of the universe and of the species and subject to their material laws, and a self-subsistent whole having a unique destiny above and beyond the species and the material world. " Let us then take our compass," says Pascal in his Pensees, " we are something, and we are not everything." These observations are of the utmost importance for an adequate analysis of the human situation. For instance, it is true that each man, insofar as he is an individun,l, is exclusive of other individuals. By virtue of his materiality he is separated and divided from other men and has, to a certain extent, to maintain himself against them. This is the source of that experience which everyone suffers from time to time and which is exactly described in Seneca's aphorism, "Every time I go among men I return the lesser man." But, then, man is not merely an individual; he is a person and can transcend his individual exclusiveness and isolation through love. He can enter into communion through the transcendental values of truth and goodness and beauty with other persons and with God; the Supreme Person. In fact, we can say in Karl Jaspers' very fine words, " What I am, I can become only with the other. . . . The act of opening myself to the other is at the same time, for the I, the act of realising itself as a person." We can conclude by saying that just as contingency conditions man's being or existence, so individuality conditions man's personality. The second metaphysical condition, then, which constitutes the human situation is the condition of individuality. " For what is man in nature," says Pascal, who, in many ways, is a precursor of the Existentialists, " a Nothing in comparison with the Infinite, an All in comparison with the Nothing; a mean between nothing and everything." All the contemporary Existentialists have dwelt on this condition of individuality. Thus they point to the repression of the independence and uniqueness of the person by the biological and social collectivity. So Jaspers says; " Society, insofar as it is organisation, appears as an anonymous mass and the levelling THE MEANING OF EXISTENTIALISM 479 and usury of personality." So, too, Heidegger, in Being and Time, sees collective life as the primary form of " inauthentic existence." The impersonal "one" (Das Man) continually oppresses the personal "I"; the "I" is continually submitted to the necessity of subordinating itself to others in the common obligations of daily life and even in ideas. However, seen from another point of view, Heidegger, and Sartre too, seem to conceive the " I " or the person in the 'manner of a pure " individual." For them the human ego is closed in upon itself and is incapable of all real communion with other existents. The " Dasein," says Heidegger, is in a constant state of fear arising from its being " in the world," among other men and menaced by them. (We are reminded of Thomas Hobbes' Leviathan and the" state of warre" which exists among men, in that each self-seeking individual is in conflict with the others). For Sartre, the human existent is a pure individual exclusive of all others by its very constitution. . . . " ' The other ' constantly menaces my existence; he continually objectifies my proper subjectivity .... " "To be seen (by the other)," Sartre says in L'Etre et le Neant, "constitutes me as a being without defence for a liberty which is not mine. It is in this sense that we can consider ourselves as slaves. In the measure in which I am dependent on the liberty of the other, which is henceforth the condition of my being, my transcendence is denied; I become a means towards ends which I know nothing of; I am in danger." IV. Those two conditions of contingency and individuality are, as we have said, ontological or metaphysical conditions, exigencies that arise from the very metaphysical constitution of the human existent. They are conditions or limitations of the human situation certainly, but they are not, strictly speaking, imperfections, not deprivations of some ontological good due to man by virtue of the metaphysical necessities of his existence. But now we have to take account of another kind of con- 480 MAX. CHARLESWORTH clition which affects man's existence. And this condition is not only a limitation but an imperfection, a radical deprivation of the good due to man as man, a condition which vitiates and frustrates his desire to achieve the good proper to his nature. The effect of this condition is to imprison man in his own subjectivity, to enclose the ego in upon itself and to frustrate it from transcending itself either through knowledge or love. To put this in another way, man can only transcend himself, or realise all the ontological potentialities and energies and desires within him, or become what he ought to be, by the contemplation of absolute truths which do not depend upon him for their truth, and by the disinterested love of absolute goods which do not depend upon him for their value. But at the same time that man experiences an attraction to these absolutes, he also experiences a contradictory attraction towards solipsism; that is to say, instead of serving these absolute goods man tends to make them serve him. He makes them subject to his own egocentricity. He attempts to make them dependent upon him, in the sense that only what he thinks is true and what he wills is good. Caught between these two attractions the ego is divided and alienated from itself and is subjected to a kind of spiritual schizophrenia; the actual 66 de facto " self (what I actually am) is separated from the real or "de iure" self (what I ought to be). So, as St. Paul expresses it," Praiseworthy intentions are always ready to hand, but I cannot find any way to the performance of them: it is not the good my will prefers, but the evil my will disapproves that I find myself doing." Or, as the poet T. S. Eliot says, "Between the intention and the act there falls a shadow." The fact of this frustration and division within the very heart of man cannot be demonstrated scientifically or philosophically, that is, in terms of the ontological exigencies and necessities of human existence (as we have seen the conditions of contingency and individuality can be so demonstrated) . Therefore, although as a state it is universal or general to aU men, it is not what we have called a metaphysical condition of THE MEANING OF EXISTENTIALISM 481 human existence, but rather what can be called an existential condition, that is to say, a condition arising from the state of actual historical existence in which man is placed, 6 Nevertheless, while it cannot be demonstrated or explained in terms of natural causes, this existential frustration of which we have been speaking is a fact which really affects human existence to its depths and radically conditions the human situation, Every man who looks within himself without hypocrisy recognises that he is in a state of division and moral deprivation, and, confronted with this fact, experiences a profound sense of "anguish" o:r "despair!' The testimony, too, of all those concerned with the mystery of man, the great observers of mankind, like Virgil, Socrates, Confucius, SL Augustine, Dante, Shakespeare, Goethe, Dostoevsky, Nietzsche, aU points to the fact that man is implicated in "some great aboriginal calamity," as Newman puts it, It is hardly surprising that the Existentialists have dwelt upon this condition with special emphasis. " To exist," says Kierkegaa:rd, " is necessarily to suffer despair anguish!' In his work Being and Time, Heidegger denies that any analyses of the human situation can give us any evidence of the fact of "original sin." In a sense, as we have seen, he is right, in that we cannot know or demonstrate the cause of the fact of " origi• This existential state is not explicable in terms of the intrinsic metaphysical constitution of man. Nor, far less, is it explicable in terms of extrinsic causes, economic or social. In fact, those social philosophies such as Rousseau's "Social Contract" and Marx's theory of economic determinism, which attempt to prove that the evil that men do is due to extrinsic social and economic causes, themselves presuppose that man is already in a state of disorder which affects his very metaphysical condition as a man. Thus, the whole Marxian process of class differentiation and conflict depends for its initiation upon the fact that at the beginning of history one man committed the "original sin" of "exploitation." (See especially the beginning of Marx's Capital, and also Lenin's State and Revoltttion). Similarly with Rousseau's original "theft" which gave rise to private property and the whole structure of social organization. (See the Social Contract and Essay on Equality.) The usage of the word "existential" in the text is to some extent arbitrary. The distinction between metaphysical and existential conditions corresponds roughly to Heidegger's distinction between the " ontological " and " ontic," or between the "existential" and the "existentiel." 3 482 MAX. CHARLESWORTH nal sin" in terms of the metaphysical necessities of man's existence. Nevertheless, we can know that man is in such a state, and Heidegger's own notion of "anguish," which is a fundamental condition of the " Dasein " or individual human existent, implies that man is in a " fallen " and frustrated state. So also the condition of the " Dasein " which Heidegger terms " guilt " has the same implication. One of his commentators notes, Its basic ontological meaning is found to be a "deficiency," a lack of something which ought to be and can be the ground of a " nullity" (Nichtigkeit). That the Dasein is "guilty" (schuldig) does not result from one special fault or wrong done, but reversely, such fault is possible only on the basis of an original Being-guilty of the Dasein. 7 v. As we pointed out before, this condition of human existence which we have been attempting to describe is not only a limitation of the human situation but a deprivation or imperfection. And the question which has now to be asked is this: what is the relation between this existential condition and the metaphysical conditions which we delineated before? Does this existential state contradict and nullify man's metaphysical situation? Can he escape from the conflict and frustration which affects his very being? Or is man in a state of irrevocable "absurdity," as Sartre pretends? Or again, can he escape from this existential dilemma only by denying all the natural energies of man as " corrupt " and escaping into " Faith," a supernatural order radically discontinuous with the whole order of nature? This seems to be the position of Kierkegaard, and it is summarized in Sartre' s words, " Something has happened to man; something historical; the Fall and the Redemption. Christianity as a historical religion is opposed to all metaphysics." It is impossible, as we have said, to explain through natural • Werner Brock, An Account of Being and Time, p. 8!!. See also Heidegger's notion of " verfallen," which Brock describes as " the potentiality of the Dasein of falling a prey to the things in the world and of becoming alienated to its own authentic possibilities, intentions and endeavours." Loc. cit., p. THE MEANING OF EXISTENTIALISM 483 causes this existential state in which man finds himself. In fact, the only explanation that can be given of it is in terms of the Christian theological doctrine of " original sin," the doctrine of the " Fall," according to which the whole of mankind is involved in the consequences of the First Parents' sin of pride. Now I believe that it is through an examination of this doctrine of" original sin" that we will be able to show how man's metaphysical condition is reconciled with his existential state, and thus in turn be able to discover at once the central error of Existentialism and, on the other hand, its real meaning and intention. The father of Existentialism, Kierkegaard, as we know, was profoundly influenced by the Lutheran doctrine of original sin, and though he did not carry this doctrine to its ultimate conclusion in rejecting the entire metaphysical order as we call it, the whole order of nature, of " natural reason " and all its works-philosophy, science, natural morality and the whole political sphere-this influence, present in the origins of Existentialism, has been continued and developed, though on a secular level, in the thought of contemporary Existentialists. Both because of the very nature of the question, and because of the historical development of Existentialism, we need to understand the doctrine of " original sin " in order to discern the true meaning or intention of the Existentialist movement. VI. And here I would like to cite some texts from St. Thomas' Summa Theologiae which bear directly upon this whole question. In the first text St. Thomas is considering whether original sin corrupts the good of human nature. He replies, The good of human nature is threefold: first, the principles of which human nature is constituted and the properties that flow from them, such as the powers of the soul, etc. Secondly, man has from nature an inclination to virtue which is a good of nature, and third, the gift or grace of ' original justice.' As to the first good of human nature, St. Thomas demonstrates 484 MAX. CHARLESWORTH that it was neither destroyed nor diminished by the Fall, for, as he points out with admirable simplicity, Sin cannot take away from man the fact that he is a rational being, for then he would no longer be capable of sin. Therefore, it is impossible for the good of nature to be destroyed entirely. Man would cease to be man if his nature or essence were corrupted in its very intrinsic constitution: a self-evident solution which the theologians of the Reformation, because of their implicit nominalistic philosophy, were unable to appreciate. Secondly, with respect to the good of" original justice," which consisted in the special gift of sanctifying grace to man, and in the perfect subjugation, in the "state of innocence," of the lower powers, the senses and passions, to reason-" God supplying by grace that which nature lacked for this purpose"St. Thomas teaches that man, as a result of sin, forfeited this gift of grace altogether. But the second good of human nature, the inclination or disposition to virtue or to good acts, although not destroyed entirely, was diminished. Human acts produce an inclination to like acts. Now from the very fact that a thing becomes inclined to one of two contraries its inclination to the other contrary is necessarily diminished. Wherefore, as sin is opposed to virtue, from the very fact that a man sins, there results a diminution of the good of nature which is the inclination to virtue. As St. Thomas explains, this diminution or incompetence of fallen nature means that man is unable to achieve the whole good proportionate to the capacity of his nature in its integrity. Man's nature may be looked at in two ways: first, in its integrity, as it was in our First Parents before sin; secondly, as it is corrupted in us after the sin of our First Parents. Now in both states human nature needs the help of God as First Mover, to do or to will any good whatsoever. But, in the state of integrity, as regards the sufficiency of operative power, man, by his natural endowments, could wish and do the good proportionate to his nature, such as the good of acquired virtue; but not surpassing good; such as the good of infused virtue. But in the state of corrupt nature, man falls short of what he could do by his nature, so that he is unable THE MEANING OF EXISTENTIALISM 485 to fulfill it by his natural powers. Yet, because human nature is not altogether corrupted by sin so as to be deprived of every natural good, even in the state of corrupted nature it can, by virtue of its natural endowments, work some particular good, such as to build dwellings, plant vineyards and the like, yet it cannot do all the good natural to it so as to fall short in nothing; just as the sick man can of himself make movements yet he cannot move himself perfectly with the movements of one in health, unless by the help of medicine he be cured. And thus in the state of perfect nature, man needs a gratuitous strength superadded to natural strength for one reason, namely, in order to do and to wish supernatural good; but in the state of corrupted nature he needs it for two reasons, namely, in order to be healed, and furthermore, in order to carry out works of supernatural virtue which are meritorious. Beyond this, in both states man needs the divine help, that he may be moved to act H all the implications of this analysis are understood, we may see, then, how what we have called the metaphysical conditions of the human situation (conditions pertaining to the order of" nature in its integrity," insofar as these metaphysical conditions, constituting properly what the theologians call " the state of pure nature," are the obediential foundation for the "state of nature in its integrity," that is, as perfected by the preternatural gifts) and the existential conditions (those pertaining to the order of " corrupted nature ") of the human situation are at once distinguished and reconciled. And we may also see that the only true philosophy of man, the only true humanism comprehending the actual situation which man is in, is a Christian humanism or " existentialism." For, in order to achieve all the good possible to his nature "per se," in order to overcome the conflict between his metaphysical self and his existential self, man needs the aid of God's grace. The order of Divine Revelation and Grace is not a kind of superstructure accidental to the order of nature or discontinuous with it; on the contrary, for human nature to achieve its full perfection even merely as human nature it needs to be 8 Summa Theologiae, I, q. 85, aa. l, !i!, 3; q. 82, aa. !i!, 4; q. 83, a. 4; I-II, q. 109, a. 2. 486 MAX. CHARLESWORTH subordinated to the restorative influence of supernatural grace. To use the words of P. Ricoeur in his study of the philosophy of Karl Jaspers, " An integral philosophy in the world and before God is possible only on the basis of a specific conciliation which is the essence of religion, that is, on the basis of a personal relation with God, disrupted by sin, reconstructed by pardon, and hidden in the heart of prayer." vn. In the light of this discussion we may( discern, on the one hand, where the fundamental confusion of Existentialism lies, and, on the other hand, wherein consists its true meaning and value. Undoubtedly, as we were at pains to show before, man is radically conditioned by his existential state; he really exists in a state of deprivation and conflict and frustration. But, while in such a state, his metaphysical capacities and energies still remain, else he would cease to be a man. As St. Thomas says, "Sin cannot take away from man the fact that he is a rational creature, for then he would no longer be capable of sin. Therefore, it is impossible for the good of nature to be destroyed entirely." Therefore, although man is not composed of two persons, a " metaphysical " person and an " existential " person-for only the individual person in this actual concrete state exists-neverthless we have to distinguish between his metaphysical state, constituted by the exigencies of his nature as such, and his existential state, constituted by the effects of the "Fall" within him. That is to say, we must distinguish between the metaphysical conditions or limitations of the human situation, contingency and individuality, and the existential condition or impt;rfection which we have described. For, if we confuse these two kinds of conditions, man's limitations come to he viewed as imperfections or deprivations, that is to say, the limitations of contingency and individuality are seen as imperfections or deprivations of the good due to man as man, and vice-versa, man's imperfection becomes a metaphysical condition of his situation, so that the human existent, THE :&HANING OF EXISTENTIALISM 487 of its very being, is constituted in a state of frustration or " absurdity " as Sartre calls it. Further, if man's metaphysical limitations of contingency and individuality come to be conceived as imperfections, then this implies, in the first place, that the attribute of "Pure Act" or "Aseity" (as the Thomists call the absolute self-sufficiency of God) is in some way due to the human existent by virtue of its very metaphysical constitution, but is again in some way arbitrarily denied to it. Moreover, with respect to the limitation of individuality, it would mean that man had some metaphysical right not to be an individual, that the perfection of the angelic nature were due to man and that he had a right to rebel against the limitations placed on his knowledge and action by virtue of his corporeal nature, by virtue of being" individualised" by matter. Thus, if an attitude such as that of" anguish" or "despair," which, as we saw, was valid and appropriate before man's existential condition-his " fallen " or " corrupted " state-if such an attitude is taken up before man's metaphysical situation, then this implies that we have a right to protest, Prometheanwise, against our very creation, our dependence upon God and our place in the universe. Man's metaphysical condition is made to bear the blame, so to speak, for his existential state. God is made responsible for the " Fall " and its effects. Man is created by God in sin, in a state of contradiction from which he can never escape. Now it is, so I believe, this same confusion between the metaphysical and existential condition of the human situation which lies at the centre of Existentialism. Thus, for instance, Sartre explicitly identifies the metaphysical condition of man's individuality with " original sin." " Original sin," he writes in L' Etre et Le N eant, " is my being posited in a world where there are other people." And he says the same in his now famous aphorism from Huit Clos, ... "L'Enfer, c'est les autres" "Hell is other people." Again, for Sartre, "aseity," the self-sufficient necessity of God, is in some way due to the 488 MAX. CHARLESWORTH human existent and the very notion of God becomes meaningless. So, as he says in one of his plays, " If God exists, then I do not exist; if I exist, then God does not exist": an echo of Nietzche' s famous blasphemy, " If there were gods in existence, how could I endure not to be a god." Similarly, as we have already seen, Heidegger envisages " anguish " as a state arising from the very metaphysical exigencies of the "Dasein "; it is evoked by the solitude, the " existential solipsism " of the " Dasein " or individual human existent in a world full of fear and menace. Again, in his work What is Metaphysics, " anguish," appropriate, as we have seen, before man's existential state, is seen to be evoked by the experience of the contingency of being. There is also something of this confusion in Kierkegaard's doctrine of "despair"-" To exist is necessarily to suffer despair and anguish." 9 Perhaps also the Existentialists' rejection of all " abstractive " thought (knowledge through a universal concept) has its basis in the fact that man's individuality and corporeality is seen as a defect, thus implying in turn that the intuitive mode of knowledge appropriate to a spiritual person, such as the angelic creature, is due to man in some way. 10 In fact, this confusion between the metaphysical and existential conditions of the human situation is a direct result of 9 Although for Kierkegaard man can transcend this state. He distinguishes between two kinds of "despair." First, there is what we may call an "existential" despair This is an attitude which is a means of salvation-it snatches a man from 'nimself, insofar as he is finite, and leads him to recognize his need of an absolute beyond himself; it makes him see his own insufficiency and so leads him to God. But there is also what we may call a "metaphysical " despair, a demoniacal and blasphemous despair, which encloses man in his misery and insufficiency and becomes an attitude against God. See Kierkegaard, Either/Or. 10 A remarkable and extreme form of this confusion can be found in Alexander Yelchaninov's Fragment of a Diary. (See A Treasury of Russian Spirituality, edited by Fedotov.) "A subject of my constant reflections and observation: the psychology of sin--or, to be more correct-the psychic mechanism of fallen man: instead of intuition, rational processes; instead of a fusion with objects, five blind senses (truly " external "); instead of the grasping of a whole, analysis. Primitive men with primitive instincts, although incapable of analysis and logic, are much closer to the image of Eden. How sinful an operation we perform upon children, developing in them all the traits of the fallen soul." THE MEANING 0!<' EXISTENTIALISM 489 the special method of inquiry or analysis which the Existentialists use. Most of the contemporary Existentialists have been profoundly influenced by the method of Husserl's philosophy of" phenomenology." Jolivet explains this philosophical method as follows: Two principles are implied in this point de depart: a negative principle, consisting in the rejection of everything which is not apodictically justified, that is to say, justified in such a way that the contrary would be absolutely inconceivable; a positive principle consisting in making appeal to an immediate intuition of things (i.e. of "phenomena") such that this intuition and it alone can be the primary source of all certitude. 11 This method rejects all metaphysical " presuppositions," and an pretentious of universalising or systematising, and concentrates upon a purely subjective or "phenomenological" analysis of the human situation. As Marcel says in his book The Mystery of Being, "the phenomenological method consists in accepting our everyday experience and asking ourselves what implications we can draw from it." The only valid means of knowledge is that of pure introspection and its conclusions are only valid for the singular individual and particular existent who is the object of that introspection. Thus, of its very nature, the Existentialist method lacks any criterion to distinguish between what belongs to the ontological constitution of man, that is to say, what belongs in a necessary or " de iure " way to him and what belongs " existentially " or in a " de facto " way to him. Jolivet makes this point very clear, No empiricism, even existential, can furnish the means of effecting the transition from fact to right, from accident to essence. . . . Bound, by definition, to the description of existence, the experiences or notions that the Existentialist doctrines give us cannot be universalised without abuse. These are only facts and nothing more, and these facts can be in conflict with each other ... without us having, existentially speaking, any means of choosing between them. . . . A radical nominalism is here at work obstructing every attempt to pass to the universal. 12 11 12 Jolivet, Les Doctrines Existentialistes. lbid., pp. 836-7. Regarding Beidegger's analysis of the "Dasein," Jolivet points 400 MAX. CHARI..ESWORTH When I look within myself I find a confusion of contradictory tendencies and desires. I must evaluate them and decide between them if I am to act at all. But how to decide and how to evaluate which are essential and which accidental, which good and which bad, which are" authentic," to use Heidegger's terms, and which lead the individual to "inauthenticity? " In fact, if this method of the Existentialists is taken to its logical conclusion, it ends in the absurdity of solipsism, according to which I can know nothing save the fact of my own existence and my subjective states. Vlll. On the other hand, error depends upon the truth to give it plausibility and we can appreciate something of the good inten·tions of the Existentialists in that they have adopted this purely subjective method of analysis in reaction against the excessively rationalistic influence of certain philosophical systems. For, if the error of the Existentialists consists in merging the metaphysical order into the existential order, the opposite error is to deny the existential order for the sake of the metaphysical order. The " system-philosophy " of the 18th and 19th centuries, the a priori ethics of Kant and Hegel, the social systems and Utopias of Saint-Simon, Condillac, Comte and the scientific positivism of the present age, all ignore the existential situation which man is in, and attempt to construct a purely abstract philosophy of man. As a result they are concerned only with a "homo possibilis," a man who might have been, but not man as he is, actually and existentially. Kant's a priori ethical system, for example, leaves the existential order out of account altogether; it legislates for man in a "'state of pure nature," as the theologians call it. Thus Kant says in his Foundation of a out how Heidegger continually passes from the "ontic" or " existentiel " order (i.e. the order of singular concrete being) to the " ontological " or " existential " order (i.e. the order of being in general) . Les Doctrines Existentialistes, Ch. II. This is to say, in our terms, that Heidegger confuses the existential conditions of the human situation with its metaphysical conditions. THE MEANING OF EXISTENTIALISM 491 M etaphymc of Morals, " AU moral concepts are completely a priori and have their source and their basis in the reason, and these concepts cannot be abstracted by any empirical and therefore contingent knowledge." It is against such systems and such views of the human situation that the Existentialists have revolted, and rightly so. Gabriel Marcel's personal testimony is typical. He writes, I rebelled at a very early period against the fashion of a kind of idealism which exaggerated the part of construction in sensible perception, to the point of appearing to judge as insignificant and to relegate to the sphere of non-being aU the concrete and unpredictable detail which does not only constitute the decoration or ornament of experience, but gives it its savour of reality. 13 And, though the Existentialists go to the opposite extreme in their reaction against these over-rationalistic philosophies, nevertheless their insistence upon the reality and importance of what we have called the existential conditions of the human situation and their researches into that existential state are of the utmost value for the constitution of an adequate and true philosophy of man. Further, seen in this light, the " phenomenology " or subjective analysis which the Existentialist philosophers hold to be the only valid form of knowledge, has a certain real value. For, though we can know by formally philosophical means (that is to say, by necessary and universal knowledge) what man's nature or metaphysical constitution is and the moral potentialities of that nature, nevertheless such knowledge is not sufficient to constitute a true moral philosophy or philosophy of man. For moral philosophy is a practical science, its knowledge is for the sake of directing man in his moral action. But that action takes place in the concrete here and now, by this individual person in the actual circumstances in which he is placed. Thus while a formal philosophical inquiry into the nature of man is necessary for the constitution of an adequate moral philosophy, it is not sufficient but needs to be completed 13 " Regard en Ar:riere." (Existentialisme Chretien, pp. 808-9). 492 MAX. CHARLESWORTH by an inquiry into the actual existential state in which man is placed. Thus St. Thomas speaks of the " practical syllogism," whose major premise is a dictate founded upon man's metaphysical nature (i. e. that which he shares universally with other men) , and whose conclusion is a dictate commanding this or that particular act to be done here and now, valid only for this individual man. Now, for that passage from the apprehension of a universal and necessary dictate of the moral law to a particular and free moral decision and act there must be interposed a minor premise concerned with a statement of fact, either particular or general. " Every man ought to love his parents" (a dictate of the universal moral law derived from the metaphysical necessities of man's nature): But this man is my father (a statement of fact): Therefore I must love this man (individual decision and choice). It is here in the minor premise of the " practical syllogism " that the existential conditions of the human situation must be taken into consideration. As we saw before, every man shares, so far as he is a man, in the effects of the " Fall " or, in other words, is affected equally by the deprivation and frustration of this existential state which we have described,· so that there is thus a certain universality or, more properly speaking, generality about this state. Nevertheless, however generalised this condition may be, it is not a metaphysical condition and it remains upon the level of fact or upon the level of the minor premise of the " practical syllogism," subordinate to the major premise or the dictate drawn from the metaphysical exigencies of man's nature. To illustrate this we may take a simple example from the social order. Every man ought to work in a way befitting him as a rational being, that is, every man ought to have control or ownership of the means of production. (Discovered from an analysis of the capacities of man's nature as a rational animal i. e. it is because man has the power of reason that he can ordain means to ends, or engage in " work ") . But it has been found by the general practical experience of THE MEANING OF EXISTENTIALISM 498 mankind that " private property," that is, one man to one means of production or piece of " property," is the most practicable way of man exercising his moral right to work and ownership-having regard to the actual concrete condition· in which men exist in common. 14 Therefore particular and specific laws for the institution of " private property " should be enacted. Now, on the level of fact, based on man's existential state, we have to rely upon a kind of experimental, subjective, nonphilosophical and non-systematic inquiry, which is precisely the kind of inquiry which the Existentialists use; Marcel, for instance, speaks of his philosophy as a " superior empiricism " which is primarily concerned with " that exigency of the individual and concrete which I bear in myself." And it is on this level that the observations of the Existentialists are of value. In the same way as the great observers of mankind, Dostoevsky, Pascal, Goethe, St. Augustine, etc., 15 who proceed by way of intuition or " connaturality " with the human heart, they afford us the most precious light on the human situation and provide us with a body of knowledge which is compleu Cf. the pragmatic reasons which Aristotle gives in favor of "private property" in his Politics; reasons which St. Thomas adopts in his discussion on property in his Summa Theologiae. This is the sphere of what St. Thomas calls tile "Ius Gentium" (in his Treatise on "Law" in tile Summa Theologiae) in contradistinction to "Natural Law" on the one hand and to the "Ius Civile" or "Civil Law" on tile other. The "Natural Law" determines the ends of man's moral action, (discovered from tile determines tile general means exigencies of man's nature). The "Ius to one of those moral ends, nan1ely, the social common good, (means discovered from the generalized experience of mankind). The "Ius Civile" determines the specific and particular means to achieve the social good with regard to special social circumstances. It is in this way that I believe St. Thomas' notion of "Ius Gentium" ought to be viewed. Many of the difficulties of the "Treatise on Law," which has Olways been a happy hunting ground for St. Thomas' exegetes, are resolved if it is remembered that it occurs within the general framework and context of tile " Treatise on Human Acts " in the Summa, and if it is interpreted in terms of St. Thomas' discussion of " prudence." 16 Karl JasPers says that tile novels of Dostoevsky constitute an authentic philosophical work. In the same way, many of tile Existentialists have chosen to expound their philosophy in the form of autobiographies or novels or diaries or plays. 494 MAX. CHARLESWORTH mentary to that metaphysical knowledge of man which an Aristotle or a St. Thomas gives us in his psychological and ethical treatises. Seen in this way the findings of the Existentialists are of value and can, I believe, be integrated into an authentic philosophy of man, a truly Christian humanism. Moreover, it is only in this way, being set within the perspectives of Christian wisdom and subordinated to an adequate formal philosophy of man such as Thomism provides, that Existentialism will escape the errors of subjectivism and solipsism which are, so to speak, congenital to it, and preserve and develop its own true intention. So long as the Existentialists keep to their own proper sphere-the delineation of the existential conditions of the human situation-their conclusions are valid and valuable. But if they confuse the existential and metaphysical orders and deny the need for a formal metaphysical knowledge of man then they fall into the philosophical absurdities we have already described. IX. We may conclude and sum up by considering a question which is often asked about Existentialism, namely, whether it is, of its very nature, atheistic. As we have said, if the existential order is confused with the metaphysical order, then the human situation comes to be seen as one of radical contradiction and « absurdity." We demand a reason for our existence, but there is no reason. But, we protest, surely that is absurd and unthinkable? Exactly so, says Jean-Paul Sartre; man is conceived in contradiction and absurdity; his life and the whole of creation is intrinsically irrational! Now, two contrary attitudes may be taken up before this state of existential "absurdity" in which man is placed. The first attitude is that of those who reject in toto the metaphysical order, the order of nature, precisely because of its very absurdity. Human nature and the objective world is essentially irrational and evil, therefore, away with it, root THE MEANING OF EXISTENTIALISM 495 and branch! AU the metaphysical desires and energies of the human heart must be denied and eradicated. The only solution and hope lies in the supernatural order, the realm of grace which is radically discontinuous with the whole order of nature. This is the theological position of Lutheranism and Calvinism, and it is, as we have already noted, the philosophical position of Kierkegaard and, though less explicitly, of MarceJ.16 Thus, according to this point of view, an authentic analysis of the human situation would lead one necessarily to theism and an acceptance of the supernatural order-though at the cost of rejecting the metaphysical order, or order of nature, and all its works. The second position consists in accepting the " absurdity " of man's estate and using this same absurdity to deny the possibility of the existence of God and the whole order of Revelation and grace. Faced with the evil and ontological contradictoriness of existence how can we believe that a personal and provident God exists? Man's condition is one of absurdity and must be accepted as such; he must live the contradiction. This is the position of Sartre and, so far as one can make out, of Heidegger, though the latter has himself denied any implication of atheismo Is Existentialism, then, necessarily atheistic? Undoubtedly Sartrean Existentialism is atheistic, and necessarily so. But the real question is whether Existentialism is atheistic by virtue of its very intrinsic meaning or "intention"? To this we can reply that it is not, as such, necessarily atheistic, for, through a reconciliation of the existential and metaphysical conditions of the human situation, such as we have sketched out from St. Thomas' thought, Existentialism could be an authentically theistic and " Christian " philosoto the influence of Revelation while respecting the capacities of "nature " at the same time. 16 " The ideal conditions of verification . . . are not applicable to this spiritual realm (of faith) which transcends them and is only accessible to a personal discovery. The objective control does not decide either for or against this unverifiable absolute which is unknown to it." Journal Mitaphysique, p. 30. 496 MAXo CHARLESWORTH In fact, as we said before, a true Existentialism, a philosophy which would take account of all the capacities and desires and energies of man, and of his existential state, must acknowledge not only the facts of man's creation and dependency upon God, but equally the facts of sin and grace-and therefore must end in acceptance of a supernatural orde:ro MAXo CHARLESWORTH University of M elbou.me Melbourne, Australia THE DISINTERESTED LOVE OF GOD ACCORDING TO ST. THOMAS AND SOME OF HIS MODERN INTERPRETERS (Continued) I N considering the love of God in man, one must remember the specific nature of the moral order, as distinguished from the merely physical. There is a danger of resting the " physical theory " of love on an " implicit monism of nature and of the natural appetite." 120 There can be no question of a supposed identification of moral with metaphysical finality, or of an imagined failure by St. Thomas to distinguish sufficiently the moral from the physical realm, or of a total integration of the rational appetite with the universal determinism of nature. 121 This is not to say, however, that the moral order will be cut off from the natural order; that the former is not based upon the latter. The human will rests on the basis of a natural appetite; but it is its own master, and determines its own actions. Yet this very power of self-determination, of liberty depends on the primary natural ordination to an ultimate end. This end is pursued in the manner appropriate to a spiritual being, by reason and the rational in a truly moral activity. 120 Louis-B. Geiger, 0. P., Le Probleme de l'amour chez Saint Thomas d'Aquin, "Conference Albert-le-Grand, 195:2" (Montreal, 1952). Unfortunately, this important and excellent work was not in print at the time of the preparation of the first of my articles. As it is the most important book on this subject since that of Pere Rousselot, comments on it will be made below in the appropriate sections. 121 Jean Rohmer, La Finalite Momle chez les Theologiens de Saint Augustin a Dum Scot (Paris, 1939), p. 112; cf. pp. no If. 497 498 DOM GREGORY STEVENS I. THE HUMAN WILL A. The Will as a Faculty and as an Inclination Man loves God by his will. It is advisable, then, to consider the teaching of St. Thomas on the nature and activity of the will in order fully to understand the question of love. We shall consider first the will and its objects, and then the principal act of the will, which is love. By the word "will" (voluntas), St. Thomas means either the intrinsic principle, the power or faculty from which proceeds the appetitive act, or else that act itself, considered either: a) generically, to include all acts, or b) specifically, to designate that act which is directed to the end. 122 Considering the will as a faculty, .we note that St. Thomas often compares the intellect and will in their respective relations to their objects. 128 The intellect is, primarily, a faculty which assimilates to itself its object; in other words, the intellect is perfect when the object understood is present secundum esse intentionale, to the mind and assimilated to it. The will, on the other hand, goes out towards the external object, and tends to assimilate itself to it. 124 The operation of the cognitive faculty is perfected in the mind itself, though it is the extramental object that is known. 125 The intellect is thus a passive faculty to whose act the object is compared as to its principle and formal cause, while the will is an active faculty, to whose act the object is compared as to its term or end, and which thus spontaneously is proportioned to and tends towards its object. 126 But since there are no purely active or passive faculSumma Theol., I-II, q. 8, a. 2; q. 12, a. 1, ad 4. Cf. the list of texts in Roland-Gosselin, "Le Desir de Bonheur et l'Existence de Dieu," Rev. des Sc. Phil. et TMol., XIII (1924), 168, n. I. 19 • " Hoc autem distat inter appetitum et intellectum, quia cognitum est secundum quod cognitum est, in cognoscente; appetitus autem est, secundum quod appetens inclinatur in ipsam rem appetitam "--Summa Theol., I, q. 16, a. 1; cf. I-II, q. 18, , a. 5, ad 1. 196 De Verit., q. 10, a. 9, ad 7; cf. q. 4, a, 2, ad 8; and V.-M. Kuiper, O.P., "Le • Realisme' de Hegel," in Rev. des Sc. Phil. et Theol. (1981), especially pp. 288-241. :ho Summa Theol., I, q. 77, a. 8; vide. Alex. Horvath, 0. P., De Voluntate (Rome, 1980), p. 5, n. 1. 190 1 -23 THE DISINTERESTED LOVE OF GOD 499 ties, the will is considered as a passive faculty insofar as it is moved by its object as presented by the intellect. Nevertheless, the will spontaneously accepts this determination, and adapts itself to its object by its own inclination. 121 The act of the will is directed to an object by reason of a previous adaptation, proportion, or convenientia; yet, the will is not perfect merely by such an adaptation, but by an inclination, an effect bearing directly on the particular object. This object is at once the term of the inclination and already included in the previous tendency of the will. This act or inclination, of course, is not to be understood in either a material way, or in such a sense as to see the will as determined to any particular object as such. The act of the will is an operation originating in the selfdetermination of the faculty, in the adaptation of the faculty to its object, and is not the result of a purely extrinsic agency as in the case of the forced act (violentum). The will itself, as the principle of such an act, may be termed a power or faculty determined and proportioned to its object, so that the tendency or inclination to the object may be seen as the will itself (inclinatio ut potentia) formally determined as a principle of action in regard to something other than itself. 128 As a result of this proportion to the object outside itself (id quod attingitur), the faculty is that by which the object is attained; it is the object "ut quo" or, in other words, it is the formal object " quo." The will then, seen as an inclination, as the formal object" quo," may be considered as having a" pre-established harmony" with its external object, analogical to that of the intellect. 129 In the will is to be found a certain a priori condition: the 127 Summa Theol., I-II, q. 18, a. 2, ad 3; de Verit., q. 16, a. l, ad 18; J. M. Ramirez, 0. P., De Hominis Beatitudine, I (Madrid, 1942), 259, n. 588: "Sic ergo proprium et formale obiectum potentiae passivae comparatur ad actum eius ut principium et causa movens, hoc est, ut obiectum formale motivum, quod per se primo est obiectum formale quo seu obiectum formalissimum." Cf. A. Marc, S. J., Psychologic Reflexive, II (Paris, 1949),' 83 ff. 128 Horvath, op. cit., p. 8. 120 Summa Theol., l, q. 88, a. 1, ad 8. 500 GREGORY STEVENS formal object "quo" or the aspect under which the faculty attains its material objects. 130 An a priori condition may be defined as a logically preexistent (prioritas logica) determination in regard to the possibility of operation of a certain faculty: that is, a predetermination by which the faculty is enabled to operate with regard to certain objects. On this determination depends the proportion between the faculty and any particular object. Insofar as the faculty itself is before its acts (agere sequitur esse), this determination is said to be psychologically " a priori." It is common Thomistic teaching that the faculties are distinguished according to their formal, not their material, objects. The formal object is that in virtue of which (sub cuius ratione) all material things are referred to the faculty. 131 This distinction according to the formal object cannot be the result of the physical action of the material objects on a purely passive faculty, but rather is due to a previous and permanent condition in the faculty itsel£.132 The faculties are determined with regard to their formal objects, and as a result of this predetermination, they are in "first act" (actus primus). This " first act " is that a priori condition which renders possible the operation of the faculty on particular objects. This determination cannot be wholly a posteriori, the result of the contingent multiple action of the material objects, but must be a priori, based on a determination of selectivity by which the faculty is directed to particular objects under some special aspect. 183 180 Vide J. Marechal, S. J., Le Point de Depart de la Metaphysique, Cahier V, "Le Thomisme devant Ia Philosophie Critique," ed.; Brussels-Paris, 1949), pp. U5. 181 Summa Theol., I, q. 1, a. 3; a. 7; q. 59, a. 4. 180 " ••• une condition prealable et permanente, presidant, du sein de la puissance meme, a toute 'passion ' subie du dehors: triant les objects presentes, reglant leur acceuil, mesurant leur assimilation." Marechal, op. cit., p. 153. 188 The " objectttm formale quo," then, of the faculty will be a priori both logically and psychologically to the operation of the faculty in regard to particular objects: logically, in relation to the singular objects which are thereby given a co=on unity, and psychologically, as a form (natural not acquired) of a natural tendency. A "formal " a priori condition, which would de-form the objects and exclude objectivity, is excluded. Yet, the material objects are in a state of potentiality with THE DISINTERESTED LOVE OF GOD 501 From the point of view of the material objects, this formal object " quo " sets the conditions under which the faculty may operate in their regard- determining thus, in the case of the will, a degree of appetibility. On the other hand, from the point of view of the will, this formal object determines a certain mode of appetition, by setting the general conditions (in communi) of its possible objects. 134 Thus, the material objects of the will are fundamentally good, in virtue of their ontological goodness, but are brought into a new relation, are given a new "esse relativum" by the relation of the will to them. 135 The good is materially or fundamentally desirable or appetible, but it is not formally so unless considered in relation to the will, constituting the "esse obiectivum" of the good. 136 regard to the unity of the formal object "quo"; and conversely, the formal object is the faculty itself in relation to the further determination to be received from the particular objects in the single acts (actu8 secundi) of the faculty. This formal object of the will, not the result of the action of the material objects, can and ought to be called " a priori." By this " a priori " we do not attribute a full autonomy to the will in regard to the objects, which, if they are made formally good or appetible by their relation to the will, are themselves, fundamentally good. The very existence in the will of such a pre-ordination is dependent ultimately on the objective order of the ontological good. The will cannot be seen as an "actus" in regard to the universality of the good. (Cf. Summa Theol., I, q. 79, a. 2) It is from God that such a determination must come; what is emphasized here is that this a priori determination is truly " un acte nature!, non un :residu d'actes seconds "- (Marechal, op. cit., p. 155) . ••• Marechal, op. cit., pp. 156-157; " Inde est, quod illud, ad quod ordinatur (voluntas), est in principio agendi sic coaptato, continetur in eo (sive secundum potentiam, sive secundum virtutem), est quasi virtualis et subiectiva (ex parte subiecti et suppositi) representatio eius, ad quod ordinatur." Horvath, op. cit., p. 9; cf. pp. 16-17. 135 Alex. Horvath, 0. P., Synthesis Theologiae Fundamentalis (Budapest, 1947), pp. 124-125. 136 Thus appetibility formally is consequent upon the notion of ontological goodness; if appetibility be taken as referring to the basis of desirability, then it is essentially the "ratio boni" in the first mode of " per se" predication. The good does not mean something absolute merely, but something absolute with an added relation (cu1n respectu), and this relation or proportion to the will is predicated of the good formally in the second mode of "per se" predication. V d. Ferrariensis, in I Contra Gent., c. 37, n. IV; and Cajetan in Summa Theol., I, q. 5, a. l, n. VIVII ... " illud quod dicitur de aliquo in secundo modo dicendi per se, non dauditur in ratione illius subiecti, sed e converso. . . . Sed appetibile dicitur de bono in secundo modo dicendi per se. . . . Si sumatur ly appetibile formaliter, tunc bonum 502 DOM GREGORY STEVENS The will, as an appetitive principle of seeking or possessing its object, has as its formal object the good, and it itself is properly termed the" bonum quo." This general characteristic of the appetitive faculty is found distinguished in the different grades of beings. The human will is thus distinguished from the divine will as being the faculty of a contingent being; and from the angelic will as being in some way restricted by matter. Unlike the sense appetite, the human will is not wholly limited by matter, and is truly an immaterial faculty. To say merely that the human will is the " bonum quo " is not a sufficient determination, for this is common to all appetitive faculties, tending to the actual "consecutio rei bonae." The ,human will is the appetitive faculty of the human person, so that the " finis cui " of the will is not only the good proper to the will as such, but also the good of the person. 137 The will is the appetitive principle of the good and perfection of the entire person, and is the faculty by which man seeks his perfection and happiness. Under this aspect, the will is termed the " beatitudo qua " of the person, by an a priori determination which is part of its very nature. 188 By this is meant that the will by a necessity of its nature wills the good and perfection of the person, and cannot will the contrary. 139 dicitur habere rationem eius non ut intrinsecam, sed ut passionem. Si vero sumatur fundamentaliter, tunc bonum dicitur habere rationem appetibilis intrinsece: quoniam propria ratio boni est fundamentum et causa propria appetibilitatis, sicut color visibilitatis." Cf. n. Vlli. Also: "Bonum dici potest dupliciter: uno modo materialiter pro eo quod est bonum; alio modo, formaliter secundum rationem Doni. Bonum autem, in quantum huiusmodi, est obiectum appetitivae virtutis--" Summa Theol., II-II, q. 47, a. 4; cf. I, q. a. 8; q. 88, a. 8; l-II, q. 9, a. 1; II Cont. Gent., c. IV Cont. Gent., c. 19. 131 De Verit., a. 8, ad 5; Summa Theol., I, q. 80, a. 1, ad 8; 1-11, q. 10, a. 1, ad 1; Cajetan, in 1-Il, q. 8, a. 4, n. V " ... voluntas cum sit appetitus animalis, qui datus est a natura animalibus primo propter totum suppositum, et non propter seipsum appetitum . . . non summe vult actu elicito perfectionem suam . . . sed suppositi. ... " Cf. in 1-11, q. 10, q. 1, n. IV. 138 Horvath, de Voluntate, pp. lt may be noted that for the will to seek the good of another, there is need of further determination, of "habitWI," which is not needed to seek the proper good of the individual-cf. Summa Theol., a. c; 111 Cont. Gent:, c. 109: "Quaelibet voluntas .... " I-II, q. 56, a. 6; q. Quaelibet voluntas naturaliter vult illud quod est proprium volentis bonum, THE DISINTERESTED LOVE OF GOD 503 There is no question here of making the subjective good for the person the ultimate object of the will: such a position is expressly rejected by St. Thomas. 140 What is stated is that there will always be a relation of " convenientia " between the good of the person and the external object of the will's act. 141 The human will is also an immaterial faculty, and as such is a universal inclination to the good, limited in its scope only by its own composition of act and potency, and by the soul's union with the body. 142 Considered passively, the will is an infinitely receptive faculty; actively, the will has an infinite capacity (not actual, but potential) to determine itself to act with regard to any object contained in its formal object. The will is thus predetermined to the good " in communi," but it is limited to a certain degree of immateriality. Thus there is an adequate object of the human will-the " bonum universale insofar as the will is considered absolutely as being immaterial, and a proper object corresponding to its own degree of immateriality. The will acts with regard to those objects presented by the intellect. Since the proper object of the intellect is the "ratio entis participati," the will's proper object is the "ratio boni participati," in which God is included as the final, exemplary and efficient cause. 143 nee potest contrarium huius velle "--Ill Cont. Gent., c. 109. The will is directed to what is "conveniens "-Summa Theol., I, q. 6f.l, a. 2, c. The will by necessity wills beatitude--Summa Theol., I, q. 19, a. 3; q. 41, a. 2, ad 3; q. 60, a. 2; l Cont. Gent., c. so. "n est sur qu'en tout amour l'homme, au grc de S. Thomas, ne laisse pas de poursuivre son bonheur," Th. Deman, 0. P., in Bull. Th 0 m., VI, p. 424. 140 Summa Theol., I-II, q. 2, a. 7, and ad 2. 141 It may be noted that in his earlier works St. Thomas defined the good as a "perfectivum"-(de Verit., q. 21, a. 1, etc.), whereas in the Summa Theol. (e.g., I, q. 5, aa. l and 3) the good is the "perfectum." It still remains that the object of the will must contribute to the perfection of the person, even though this does not mean that the good is merely a " perfectivum,'" as we shall see below. The disinterested character of the love of God is not hereby adversely affected: "Faudra-t-il verser dans I' amour pur pour trouver l'amour desinteresse? "-Deman, loc. cit. 142 Summa Theol., I-II, q. 10, a. 1, ad 3. ua For the object of the will in St. Thomas, see the following texts: a) as the "universalis ratio boni "-Summa Theol., I, q. 59, a. 1; cf. Cajetan in h. 1., a. 2, n. VI; b) "bonum secundum rationem communem boni "-I, q. 59, a. 4; q. 82, a 5; 504 GREGORY STEVENS Furthermore, the will is a faculty of a rational person. It is universally true that every passage from potency to act demands an end, 144 so that, if one considers an agent as such (reduplicative), the concept of" end" enters into the definition of " agent." 145 The end as such must be pre-contained in the agent as the " ratio agendi," 146 not only with regard to actual operation (actus secundus) but also in the natural determination of the operative faculty. Without an ordering to an end, action would be impossible, and this ordination is the work of intelligence. 147 Man's will is a rational appetite, having a determination in "actu primo" with regard to operating in view of an end. In virtue of this adaptation to the "ratio finis in communi " the will itself is termed the " finis quo." ,The will is thus inclined to seek the good and the well-being of the person in an orderly way (ordinate) by subordinating means to ends, and to seek the end in and for itsel£.148 L.-B. Geiger, 0. P., in his excellent study of this question c) "bonum et finis in communi "-I, q. 82, a. 4; d) "bonum in communi, in quo nihil particulare"-I, q. 82, a. 2, ad 2; I-II, q. 10, a. 1, ad 8; de Verit., q. 22, a. 6, ad 5. On the meaning of the "ratio boni participati," vide Horvath, de Voluntate, pp. 25-26, and note 1, and the same author's La Sintesi Scientijica di S. Tomaso d'Aquino, pp. 122-128, 161, 847, 878-879; and Tractat'UII Philosophici AristotelicoThomistici, Vol. I, "Quaestiones ad Logicam et ad Cognitionem Humanam Referibiles" (Budapest, 1949), pp. 79-80, 159. (Hereafter, this latter is referred to as Horvath, Logica). 1 .. Ill Cont. Gent., c. 27; cf. Ferrariensis, in II Cont. Gent., c. 82. 146 On the " analytical " character of the axiom: " omne agens agit propter finem," vide Ramirez, op. cit., I, pp. 211-216. 146 Marechal, op. cit., p. 864; de V erit., q. 22, a. 12; Ramirez, op. cit., I, p. 271 ff. where it is pointed out that the things to which a faculty is ordained must be " intra eas (potentias), quia ratio specificativa est ordo transcendentalis unius ad alterum, et iste ordo est intrinsecus eis utpote de earum essentia." (n. 579) 107 II Sent., d. 88, q. 8; cf. Ramirez, op. cit., I, p. 289, n. 471 and pp. 240 fi. 148 There is an order in the will's appetitions resulting from its predetermination to the "ratio finis" (vide Horvath, de Voluntate, pp. 8, 15, 21-22), since the will has the task of ordering and disposing its acts, being a " participation " of reason (" aliqualiter rationem participat--" III Sent., d. 85, q. 1, a. 1, sol. 4; cf. C. Fabro, La Nozione Metafisica di Partecipazione secondo S. Tommaso d'Aquino (2 ed.; Turin, 1950), pp. 291 f) . It is because the principle of the act of the rational will is the intellect that the will desires the good (the end) in and for itself. XII Metaphya., lect. 7, n. 2522; I Cont. Gent., c. 44; Summa Theol., I-ll, q. 4, a. !!, ad!!. THE DISINTERESTED LOVE OF GOD 505 (cf. note 120), adds in this connection that" it is the objective character of intellectual love that renders possible a love of the good of God in Himself and for Himself." 149 The human will depends wholly on the guidance of reason-it is a rational will; and its act of spiritual love will depend on the nature of human knowledge, so that it is specified by a cognitive act, which is itself "objective": the human reason can and does know and discern what is truly good-the act of love based on it will also be " objective." 150 Thus it is because the intellect knows and judges truly of the nature of the good that the will can love the good as such, in itself. Love is to be seen as a response to the good of the object, and will be in accord with the hierarchy of goods in its intensity and character-when following the order of right reason. A disinterested love is not obtained merely by suppressing "interest," by not considering the relation of the object to the subject. 151 • This "objective" character of the will, its " realism," 152 stresses the fact that the will's object is the good, loved in and for itself. Yet this alone does not answer the problem of a disinterested love of God above all. When we stated that the will's ultimate formal object is the " ratio finis," this was to show that there is an ordering in the will's activity, in the nature of the rational will as such, corresponding to the hierarchy of goods and ends in the real universe. Geiger has noted this in emphasizing the "order of truth in love." 153 The "objective" character of the will is the condition for a disinterested love; the moral legitimacy of such a love depends on its being directed to the true order of goods. 154 What Geiger has considered more precisely under the aspect of the rational direction of the will, we have Geiger, op. cit., p. 33, n. 10; cf. pp. 83 ff. Geiger, op. cit., pp. 76-79, and n. 41; vd. p. 66, n. 33. 151 Geiger, op. cit., pp. 70, 72, 73, n. 41. This same idea is found in an article of A. Forest: "Le realisme de la volonte," Revue Thom., XLVI (1946), especially pp. 467-469, 472. "L'objet de Ia volonte est formellement moins le bonheur que la valeur," p. 469. us Cf. below-note 158. 168 Geiger, op. cit., pp. 81 ff., 97, 104, 106. Cf. above-note 148. 15 • Geiger, op. cit., pp. 85-88. 149 150 506 DOTh[ GREGORY STEVENS seen in the " predetermination " of the rational will itself to the ''ratio finis"; there is a difference of viewpoint, but not disagreement of doctrine. From the point of view of the formal object " quo," the human will as an appetitive faculty is termed the " bonum quo," as the faculty of the person it is called the " beatitudo qua," and as a rational appetite it is named the " finis quo." There is a hierarchy in these notions: first of all, the will has as its object the "ratio boni "; but if this is compared to the person's striving for happiness, this "ratio boni" becomes determinable or " material " so that the good is not sought except it be ordained to the welfare of the entire person. Thus the personal good becomes the "formal" object. If, however, the rationality of the will and finality are considered, the " end " becomes formal, whereas the good of the person is material. Finality so orders the will's appetitions that what is good in itself, the end, is preferred to the goods by participation (means) and the good of the person becomes not the ultimate determinant, but rather determinable. other words, the end is sought in and for itself, not in subjection to the personal good, so that this latter becomes the material, not the formal, object of the wilL Thus, the ultimate object of the will, its most formal determination is to the end (ratio finis) just as, in the objective order, the end is the ultimate formal" ratio" of the good. 155 B. Applications It has been seen that if the will be considered precisely as an 155 Horvath, di'J Voluntate, Appendix, pp. 10-ll; Salmanticenses, Cursus Theologicus (Lyons, 1679), T. III, Tract X, "de Voluntario," disp. II, dub. V, par. I, n. 97; Ramirez, op. cit., I, p. 181-" Licet ergo, vohmtas sit de fine et de mediis, formaliter tamen, hoc est, per se primo, est de solo fine, non de mediis. Ratio igitur formalis obiecti voluntatis, quod est bonum, est finis; quia finis est bonum per se, id est primo et principaliter. Unde oculatissime S. Thomas dixit quod 'obiectum voluntatis est finis et bonum' (I-II, q. l, a. 1), utrumque ponens, prius tamen finem quam bonum, quia finis est ratio formalis quae boni simpliciter dicti. . . . Itaque obiectum proprium et formale voluntatis est bonum ut finis, seu reduplicative in quantum finis." Cf. Summa Theol., I, q. 5, a. 4, ad 3; I-II, q. 72, a. 3; q. 73, a. 6. THE DISINTERESTED LOVE OF GOD 507 appetitive faculty, abstraction is made from the good of the person, and the object of the will is simply the good. Under this aspect, it is possible to have an absolutely pure, disinterested love with no admixture of self-interest. But the will, by its very nature, is the faculty seeking the good and happiness of the entire person (inclinatio suppositt'), and thus the object of the will is desired insofar as it is related to the good of the person. The will, as the " beatitudo qua," exercises a formal selectivity of the material objects, relating them to the perfection of the subject, so that an absolutely " pure " love is impossible. This is the fundamental reason for having rejected the notion that " personal love " is the source of disinterested love, as was thought by de Regnon, Descoqs, and D' Arcy. In addition, the human will belongs to an imperfect creature, naturally tending to its own perfection. Thus, we disagreed with Anders Nygren who insisted that man's love for God be wholly without self-interest. The mere fact of .man's total dependence on God, as well as the will's determination to the person's good, precludes a totally disinterested love. The will's seeking or inclination to the good of the person, however, was seen not to be its ultimate formal determination. While the will cannot operate with regard to anything not seen as beneficial to the person, this motive of self-interest is not, therefore, the formal cause of all the will's acts. In other words, self-interest is not the motive that finally constitutes objects in the " esse obiectivum boni," for this motive does not have the power to render all goods objects for the wilJ.l56 This may also be seen from another point of view. The will, as an immaterial faculty is predetermined only with regard to the " ratio communis " of the good, not to any particular good, 166 The inclination " ad beatitudinem non comprehendit actu inclinationes vel volitiones particubres, sed tantum in potentia, proindeque influxus eius ad illas causandas non est formalis, sed materialis tantum, non se habet per modum motivi (ultimi) formalis, sed est motivum materiale-" Horvath, de Voluntate, p. 58. The same is found in Su·mma Theol., I, q. 60, a. 5, ad 2; cf. 11-ll, q. 27, a. S; III Cont. Gent., c. 109; Ill Sent., d. 89, a. 4. 508 DOM GREGORY STEVENS and so cannot be the ultimate motive of the will m such a way as to make that faculty formally egoistic. 151 The ultimate formal object of the will is the end, the" ratio finis." The end is willed in and for itself, and not formally because it contributes to the well-being of the person. Thus, the will's love can be in a real sense disinterested-not totally so, as Nygren and Descoqs would demand, but truly nonegoistic and unselfish. It is the end that is the object of a pure love, and this precisely because the ultimate determination of the will is to the "ratio finis." Furthermore, the understanding of any particular volition, including the love of God, demands a consideration of the order of finality. The order of the good is the order proper to the will, and in this order, it is the principle of finality that is the ultimate determinant. We must look to the hierarchy of ends to determine why God is loved by man more than sel£.158 IT. LoVE As a preparation for discussing the love of God, it will not be out of place to state the Thomistic doctrine on love, the first and principal act of the will. We can do no better than to follow the excellent study of the Thomistic doctrine on love by H.-D. Simonin, 0. P. 159 157 Horvath, de Voluntate, pp. 49-50. Geiger too speaks of an "objective, true " love which centers on the true good of the person (op. cit., pp. 89-90; on this see also: Dietrich von Hildebrand, Christian Ethic.y (New York, 1958), pp. 84-71, 79-95, and chap. 29). Geiger sees the self as one of the legitimate objects of a true love of " benevolence," but in no way the ultimate object of this love. As we shall see, he considers the problem of self-interest and disinterested love in other wayssee below. 158 Roland-Gosselin, 0. P., seems to feel that an emphasis on the "realism" of the will (its tendency to actual good objects outside self) provides an answer to the self-interested seeking of the will. Of itself, this "realism" seems to be insufficient, and must be supplemented by other considerations, especially as to the formal motives of the will. (Roland-Gosselin, art. cit., p. 165, and note) This is a somewhat different use of the term "realism " than that of A. Forest (above, n. 151). 159 "Autour de Ia Solution Thomiste du probleme de I'Amour," in Archives d'Historie Doctrinale et Litterarie du Moyen Age, VI (1981), 174-276. THE DISINTERESTED LOVE OF GOD 509 Love is a union of affections (secundum affectum), and formally consists in this affective union, by which is established the identification of the lover's good with that of the beloved object, thus loved as his own proper good. 160 The will is modified, determined with regard to the object not in a merely passive way, but so that this change or modification is itself an initial tendency (intentio) towards the object. 161 The object is present to the will of the lover as the term of a movement is present to a moving thing at the beginning of its motion-" by the attraction it exercises, and the direction it impresses." 162 The great Thomistic commentators, Cajetan, Ferrariensis, and John of St. Thomas have evolved different theories to explain the exact nature of this influence of the object. It is the teaching of the last that is outlined below. The will is passive in the order of specification, in accord with the general doctrine of the specification of acts by their respective objects. The influence of the object in the order of exercise presents a more difficult problem, concerning the nature of special mode of causality proper to final cause. The causality of the object in its proper existence is no different from that of the same object as presented by the 16 ° Cf., SUJnma Theol., I-II, q. 28, a. 1, ad 2; IV Cont. Gent., c. 19. Roland-Gosselin, art. cit., p. 164: "Mais proportion n'est pas ici simple ressernblance. Nous sommes dans l'ordre dynamique. La convenance qui s'etablit est deja mouvement." And vide M. Coconnier, 0. P., "La Charite d'apres S. Thomas d'Aquin," 3rd article, "L'Amour," in Revue Thomiste, XIV (1907), 10, 15-16. This dynamic tendency is termed "proportio," "connaturalitas," "convenientia," by St. Thomas, who used a rich and varied terminology to describe love. The following summary may be given: Love as an act of the will can be considered from the point of view of the object's influence on the will, and thus it is named an "immutatio," and "prima immutatio " for love is the first of all acts of the will. From the standpoint of the will itself, love is an "intentio," or tendency to the object, for love is not merely a static "informatio" of the volitive faculty by the object, but a dynamic act, a movement, and even in the very first union of will and object, there is already a motion towards the object on the part of the will. The nature of the change undergone by the faculty, and effected by the object, is called " coaptatio," if considered ontologically (also "connaturalitas," and " convenientia ") or "' com placentia " if desired psychologically: vide Simonin, art. c-it., p. 194. 160 Roland-Gosselin, art. cit., p. 164, based on IV Cont. Gent., c. 19. 161 510 DO]d GREGORY STEVENS intellect, for the intellectual representation is nothing but the "conditio sine qua non" of the object's influence.163 The object apprehended moves in the order of final causality, not by a physical motion, but by an attraction which is termed a " metaphorical motion" by John of St. Thomas/ 64 Thus, the object specifies the will in the order of formal causality, and in this, the will is passive. The object moves the will to act (to love), not by a physical efficiency, but by the special "attraction" proper to the order of final causes. The will adapts itself and actively tends towards the object in the order of efficient causality, alild in this the will is seen primarily as an active faculty. It is the act of the will in regard to the end that is primarily the act of love, just as it is the proper effect of the end to awaken and cause love/ 65 St. Thomas gives three causes of love: the good, knowledge, and similitude. 166 It is clear that good is a cause of love, for the good " quod habet rationem finis " is the proper order of the will. Knowledge is a cause of love as being a necessary condition to the exercise of the causality of the good object on the will, " ignoti nulla cupido." Similitude, says St. Thomas is " properly speaking, the cause of love." 167 It is as a universal cause of love that similitude is proposed, not just as the cause of the love between equals, because there is no indication in the text that any limitation is to be made. 168 What is meant here Ramirez, op. cit., I, p. 196, n. 844, and the whole section, pp. 186-199. Simonin, art. cit., pp. John of St. Thomas, in I-ll, q. 1, a. 1, n. VI; Cursus Philosophicus, Phil. Nat., I, q. XIll, a. II. 185 De Verit., q. a. Cf. de Verit., q. 28, a. 1, ad 8; de Malo, q. 6, a. unic., 163 164 circa med. 166 Summa Theol., I-II, q. 187 Ibid., a. 8. aa. 1-8. 168 " Omne quod appetit aliquid, appetit illud in quantum habet aliquam similitudinem cum ispso--" de Verit., q. a. 1, ad 8; vd. IV Cun.t. Gent., c. 19, especially" ex hoc oritur inclinalio naturalis quod res naturalis habet affinitatem et convenientiam secundum formam." It is the possession of a form which sets up relations of affinity and thus of similitude. Vd. also: " Similitudo est principium amandi "Summa Theol., I, q. 27, a. 4, ad Q; "Similit'!l.do est radix amoris "-I-II, q. 99, a. ·• Amor ex similitudine causatur "-Ill Sent., d. q. a. ad 4; "Est autem veritas quaestionis quod simile per se loquendo est amabile "-In VIII Ethic., lect. 1, n. 1545. This latter deals specifically with the love between human beings. THE DISINTERESTED .LOVE OF GOD 511 by similitude is not the intentional likeness at the basis of knowledge, but a similitude "secundum esse naturae." 169 No special likeness is referred to, except that there is to be in some way or other a" common form." 170 The" form" can refer to any type of similarity, in the real order of being. Thus we deal here not with the order of finality strictly, but with the order of being/ 71 and in this order, similitude is the cause of love. It is a real union (not an "intentional" one) based on the common possession of either the same specific form, the same interests, goals, desires-a similitude of act to act, of act to potency, or a similitude of proportions. It is precisely the "union of similitude" which causes love,172 for similitude is a "certain form of unity." 173 It may be objected that similitude is the cause of love between equals, but not between God and man, on the basis of De Div. Nom., c. 4, lect. 9 (ed. Marietti, n. 406) where St. Thomas seems to limit to the love of equals the causality of similitude. In this text, however, we need not take "similitudo" except in the restricted sense of a strict likeness, a real equality (of act to act), as is indicated in the text itself. Similitude is not limited to the relationship between equals, for there is a similitude between parts and whole, between God and man: " contingit aliqua dici similia dupliciter: 1) vel ex eo quod participant unam formam, sicut duo albi albedinem (this is the type found in De Div. Nom., c. 4, lect. 9) vel ex eo quod unum habet quod participative habet formam, imitatur illud quod essentialiter habet. Et talis similitudo . . . potest esse creaturae ad Deum . . ." I Sent., d. 48, q. 1, a. 1, sol. cf. II Sent., d. 16, q. 1, a. 1, ad 8, and the discussion ff. As a similitude is given between God of these texts in Fabro, op. cit., pp. and man, there is no difficulty in seeing similitude as the basis of man's love for God: vide Cajetan, in I-II, q. a. 8, especially n. II, 8; Simonin, art. cit., ch. III; J. Le Grand, S. J., L'Univers et l'komme dans la Pkilosopkie de Saint Thomas, I (Brussells-Paris, 1946), 88. 169 De Verit., q. a. 1, ad 8. 170 Su11!ma Tkeol., I-II, q. a. 8; ci. Simonin, op. cit., pp. who extends the qualification of the " quasi kabentes unam formam " so that the " quasi " refers not only to " unam " but also to " formam." 171 Ibid., p. 254. 172 Ibid., p. 11d. Summa Tkeol., I-II, q. 28, a. 1, ad 173 In loan. c. 15, lect. 4 (ed. Marietti, 1952), n. 2086. ·what is said by Rousselot about unity being the cause of love must be completed by the notion of similitude. Instead of unity alone as the cause of love, it is the "unio similitudinis" of which we must speak. The two notions are not to be separated: similitude is not so much as " espece de multitude " as Rousselot thought, as it is an " unitas quaedam " (On similitude and unity: Le Grand, op. cit., I, Simonin, "La Lumiere de I' amour," in Vie Spirituelle, Suppl., XLVI (1986), It may be noted that 512 DOM GREGORY STEVENS We may mention at this point the division of love into the " love of friendship or benevolence " and the " love of concupiscence." There is often confusion in this matter, for it is not always seen that the latter does not mean, strictly, the love of self, for St. Thomas. 174' The love of self is really a form of the love of " friendship or benevolence " not of that of " concupiscence." 175 St. Thomas has treated of this matter twice In the in the treatise on the Passions (Prima Secundae). Fourth Article of the Twenty-Sixth Question love is defined as " wishing a good to someone-velle bonum alicui," so that love is directed to two objects: the good which is willed, and the person to or for whom it is willed, whether that person be the self or another. The basis for distinction is the difference between substance and accident (or what is seen as an accident). Thus we speak of a subject of love (the lover), an object of love (the "bonum"), and an end (the view of the end, which is always a person. 176 The love of " concupiscence " is directed to the " good " while the love of " friendship " is directed to the person, or end. In the Third Article of Question Twenty-Seven, the two forms of love are distinguished on the basis of similitude. In the love of " concupiscence " the will is directed to an accidental good desired as a perfection for the person, and this good is related to the person (the end) as potency to act. In some perhaps would want to prove man's love for God solely on the basis of his dependence in being upon God. It would be better to say that this dependence explains not only man's similitude to God and his love for God, but absolutely everything. This universal dependence should, then, be supplemented by a more particular cause when we come to explain some such particular aspect of the creature as his love for the Creator. 174 P. Philippe, 0. P., Le Role de l'Amitie dans la Vie Chretienne selon S. Thoma11 d'Aquin (Rome, 1938), p. 8, remarque 3. 175 Roland-Gosselin, art. cit., p. 166; cf. Summa Theol., I, q. 69, a. 3; I-II, q. 26, · a. 4; q. 28, a. l. 176 This same basis of distinction is found also in: Summa Theol., I, q. 69, a. 3; II-II, q. £3, a. 1; II Sent., d. 3, pars Q, q. 3; III, d. Q!J, a. 3; IV, d. 49, q. 1, a. 2, qla. 1, ad 3; de Virtut. in comm., q. 4, a. 3; de Div. Nom., c. 4, lect. !J-10; de Perf. Vitae Spir., c. 13; Cajetan, in I-II, q. 26, a. 4, and John of St. Thomas: in eodem loco. THE DISINTERESTED LOVE OF GOD 518 the love of " benevolence " the object of love has an actual and not merely a potential similitude to the subject in virtue of which the other is loved on the same basis as is the self. It is the same distinction which was given in Question TwentySix, Article Four-the one based on the formal order of similitude, the other on the order of finality. There is no question of two acts of love, but only of two objects of the act of love, 117 so that we are dealing with a distinction of loved objects, not of separate acts of love. 178 Several special points may be noted: first: since there is no question of conciliating two different acts of love, the problem to be discussed is why God is loved more than self, both being loved with the love of " friendship or benevolence." Second: in the case of the natural love for God, the " good " wished to God would be His own perfection (a delight or" complacentia" in this perfection) , and the realization of His providence, as well as a referring of one's own happiness to God, the Ultimate End and Perfect Good. Third: the " good " loved with the love of " concupiscence " can never be the final object of love since this " good " is loved in view of an end; it is only the object of the love of "benevolence" that can be the final object of man's love.179 However, we love our formal beatitude with a love of " concupiscence " as it is an accident, although this is the " maxime concupitum." Man loves self with a love of " benevolence " but he is limited, so that the object of his self-love cannot be the "maxime amatum." 180 177 Summa Theol., I, q. 87, a. 2, ad 2 and ad 8; I-II, q. 2, a. 7, ad 2; cf., I, q. 20, a. I, ad 8; I Cont. Gent., c. 91; de Carit., a. 7. 178 Cajetan, in I-II, q. 26, a. 4. When St. Thomas says in the "amor concupiscentiae" that "amana proprie amat seip.•um" (Summa Theol., I-II, q. 26, a. 4; q. 27, a. 8) we may make the following amendment in accord with his general position and say: " amans proprie amat seipsum vel alium, in quantum habet eum ut unum sibi" (Le Grand, op. cit., I, 84, n. 2) . For a fuller discussion of this question, vide J,.-B. Gillon, 0. P., "Genese psychologique de la theorie thomiste de l'amour," in Revue Thomiste, XLVI (194(;), 822-829, cf. also Roland-Gosselin, art. cit., pp. J65-I66; Philippe, op. cit., pp. 8-11; Simonin, "Autour de l'histoire ... " pp. 262-266. 170 IV Sent., d. 49, q. I, a. 2, sol. I, ad 8; Ill Sent., d. 29, a. 4; Ramirez, op. cit., II, n. 808. 180 " Hi duo amores non sunt eiusdem generis, quia amor non dividitur in amorem 5 514 DOM GREGOBY STEVENS Fr. Geiger, in his solution to the problem of self-love, has stressed the act of spiritual love as being itself the perfection of the individual. The object of the will is the good; the act of the will in regard to the good is itself our good; so that, insofar as it is an act, the love of God above all is our perfection, while insofar as it is a spiritual love (objective and true as the absolute response to an absolute good) / 81 it is disinterested. 182 As said above, there is no question of a supposed reconciliation of two equal forms of love, of two equal objects of the same love: God and self, seen in some way, if only psychologically, as being on the same plane. Greiger points out that our perfection is an act, not a thing/ 88 and this an immanent act perfecting the will (and thus the person willing). As seen above, our formal (subjective) beatitude, or perfection is an act by which we attain our material (objective) beatitude; yet this act is a thing (res quaedam). As such, as a thing, however, and also as being an accident, and not a person, or a substantial good, it can only be the object of a love of " concupiscence,'' and not in any way the object of a love of benevolence. These two forms of love are not really mutually comparable, as they are not Analogously, there is no comparison concupiscentiae et in amorem amicitiae sicut genus in species, sed sicut analogum in analogata, eo modo quo ens dividitur in substantiam et accidens "-Ramirez, op. cit., II, 222, n. 806. These two forms of love are not comparable on the same level; cf., above, note 177. 181 Geiger, op. cit., pp. 75, 91. 182 Geiger, op. cit., pp. 192 ff., 105; vide, pp. 90 ff., 117-ll9. Cf. A. Forest, art. cit., p. 469-" Sans doute, !'amour cherche une recompense, mais il Ia trouve dans son objet meme. Habet praemium sed id quod amatur." 189 Op. cit., p. 106. 18 ' Summa Theol., I, q. 87, a. 2, ad!! and ad 8; I-ll, q. 2, a. 7, ad 2. Ramirez, op. cit., II, 221-225-where a full discussion of this question is to be found. Note that Geiger (pp. 115-116) refers to the pure love of charity for itself-this love is one of "concupiscence "-technically, as is evident from a further reading of the passage be quotes-Snmma Theol., II-II, q. 85, 2. cf. L.-B. Gillon, 0. P., "Genese de Ia theorie thomiste de !'amour," Revue Thomiate, XLVI (1946).. Comme forme mentale, Ia charite est ordonnee au sujet, a Ia volonte oil elle puise en quelque sorte son esse entitativum, sujet qu'elle perfectionne dans un ordre qui depasse absolument ses facultes naturelles. En ce sens il est exact de dire que j'aime Dieu pour moi-meme, puisque charite, essentiellement specifiee par Dieu et a. THE DISINTERESTED LOVE OF GOD 515 between the seeking for perfection (as an act) and the love for God; for, the first is a love of" concupiscence" while the second is a love of benevolence. These precisions may be added to what Fr. Geiger has said. There still remains the fact that man's relation in love to God is that of a "perfectibile" to a "perfectum" and "perfectivum "; and it must be shown why the will loves God more than self - both God and self being the objects, as persons, of a love of benevolence. This is done by the considerations given above on the nature of the rational will, and by those to be given below on the part-whole principle. Since St. Thomas has assigned the causes of love to the order of finality and to that of similitude, it is to these that we are to look in order to understand why the love of God above self is natural to man. lll. THE NATURAL LoVE oF GoD A. Examination of Texts this section we shall discuss the general and fundamental principles by which St. Thomas seeks to prove that it is natural for man, and for all creatures, to love God above all else. The review of various modern interpretations (Part I of this article) par !'union a Dieu, n'est intelligible comme forme mentale qu'en relation a un sujet qu'elle enrichit et informe. Mais si on considere Ia charite, dans sa tenda;nce specifique vers son objet, dans le mouvement de croissance vitale vers le infini qui !'attire, il devient alors tout a fait inintelligible de dire que j'aime Dieu pour moi dans le sens d'une subordination d'objet a objet, d'un moyen a sa fin ... pp. 328-329. This applies analogously whether speaking of charity or love as a habitu.s, as in Gillon, or as the act of such a habitus. Gillon states that charity as a habitus can be considered in its object, or precisely as a spiritual quality. If one wishes this quality for self, there is no subordination to self of the object of charity, but 1ather a subordination of self to the object, whose possession the subject desires (p. 328). When it is said that one loves God for one's self, the love of God is considered as the habitus and only in this way (p. 329). This is very similar to Geiger's position. Yet, one must not fail to consider that the object of charity is such that the possession of it will be good for the subject. This in no way means that the object is good merely because desired, merely because perfecting the subject, nor that the good is loved as a mere means to the subject's perfection. The object is good in itself and is loved as such; yet being good, it perfects the subject who possess it. The good is primarily a "pe;rfectttm in se," but it is also, and for the same reasons a "perfectivum" (cf. Louis Lachance, 0. P., Le Concept de Droit aelon Aristote et S. Thomas (Ottawa, 1948), pp. 46-47). 516 DOM GREGORY STEVENS of St. Thomas' teaching led us to see the principle of the " part and the whole " as the key-stone of this doctrine, The present task is to examine this principle in the texts of SL Thomas, and then to comment on it in the light of what has been seen of Thomistic doctrine on the will, and its object, and on the nature of love. TExT I Ill Sent., d. 29, a. 3 (ediL Mandonnet-Moos, p. 929)' 1253-1255/ 85 HI, Everyone, however, wishes that good above aU to be conserved which is more pleasing to himself ... however, this is his (own) good .... The good of the lover, however, is found more truly where it is the more perfect. And, therefore, because any part is imperfect in itself, having its perfection in its whole, it follows that by a natural love the part tends more to the conservation of the whole than of itself. Thus the animal naturally exposes its arm for the defense of the head on which depends the well-being of the whole. Thus, too, individual men expose themselves to death for the conserving of the community of which they are a part. . . . Because, universal then, our good is found perfectly in God, as in the and perfect cause of all good, the good which is in Him is more pleasing than that which is in ourselves. It follows that God is naturaHy loved with a love of fl'iendship by man mol'e than self. 185 The dates given after each text quoted are based on the chronological table of Angelo Waltz, 0. P., in San Tommw;o d'Aquino (Rome, 1945), p. 239, which, while not the best list, is sufficient here. We may mention here two theological arguments, given by St. Thomas, by way of introduction. The first (Summa Theol., I, q. 60, a. 5, sed contra) is that all moral precepts of the Decalogue are also precepts of the natural law. Thus in the very law of man's nature there is an ordination to the sovereign love for God. The second argument (ibid., in fine corp. and Ill Sent., d. 27, a. 3; d. £9, a. 3; Summa Theol., I-II, q. 109, a. 3, sed contra) is that nature in itself, abstracting from the present fallen condition of man, cannot be perverse but it would be such were it naturally inclined to love self above God; therefore, the natural inclination is not to a love of self more than God. Another aspect of this is seen by considering the axiom-" gratia perficit naturam non destruit." By grace, however, and charity, man loves God more than self, and thus, nature must in some way tend in the same direction-the same order of ends, of objects of love are found in nature as are found in charity. Mention may also be made of the first text in which S. Thomas discusses the present problem (II Sent., d. 3, q. 4) though no full doctrine is given, and it is merely stated that man is to love God "propter se" and not for merely personal benefit. He says also (ad I!) that the nature of man is not egoistic (non in se curva), just as the will's intention does not stop at its own good. The first full treatment is that given as Text I. THE DISINTERESTED 517 I ..OVE OF GOD The argumentation is as follows: Everyone tends more strongly to that object more perfectly realizing his own good, The part finds its good more perfectly in the whole than self, thus the part loves the good of the whole more strongly than its own limited good, Man's good is found more perfectly in God, the cause of all good, than in self; therefore, God is loved more than selt The following proportions are set up: the good of the part is to the good of the whole as an imperfect good to the more perfect; then, the good of man is to the good of God as the imperfect to the more perfect good. It is not expressly stated that God is the " \vhole," but only that He is the cause of all good, The middle term of the argument can be either " good of the whole " or the " whole (good) ," so that God can be either the " whole," the totality of good, or the good (extrinsic) of the whole, The text is not too dear on this point as SL Thomas has not as yet fully developed his terminology, II Librum Dionysii Expo8itio, c, 4, 1ecL 9 (ed, Marietti-Pera, n, 406), 1261-1264, Since we love anything insofar as it is our own good, there will be that many forms of love as there are ways for something to be the good of another, This occurs in four ways , , , another (fourth) way, indeed, insofar as, conversely, the whole is the good of the part: the part is not perfect unless in the whole, whence the part loves the whole and exposes itself spontaneously for the safety of the whole. For what is higher in the order of being is compared to what is lower as whole to part, inasmuch as the higher possesses perfectly and totally that which the lower has imperfectly and partially, and inasmuch as the highest contains in itself many inferiors , .. (n. 409 . , , God contains all things, them in being, . , ,) TEXT III Ibid,, c, lect. 10 (ed. Marietti, nn, 431-432), .. , that substantial good towards which love is directed can be found to be three-fold: first, so that that (substantial) good is more perfect than the lover himself, and thus, the lover is compared to that good as part to whole, because those things which are found 518 DOM GREGORY STEVENS in their totality in perfect beings are found partially in imperfect beings ... n. 482. So thus when the affection of the lover is directed to a beloved object higher in being, whose possession the lover himself is, the lover orders his own good to (this) beloved.... Although these texts do not mention the love of God explicitly, they are applicable to our problem because of the use of the principle of the part and whole in relation to love. The argument is similar to that of Text I: the good of the part, imperfect in itself, finds its perfect good in the whole, and loves the whole above self. The new note here is that the " higher " is explicitly named the " whole." Evidently there is no reference to a material whole, for, when it is stated that " the highest contains in itself many inferiors," the " containing " is not that of a physical whole, but of a metaphysical totality containing the good of the lower in a more perfect way. We are dealing with the "tatum ante partes," 186 so that if God is the " highest," and thus the " whole " it is in the sense that "God contains all creatures in a simple way, and not quantitatively." 187 If God is the whole, and man the part, we have to do with a relation of participating to participated. 188 TExT IV Q. D. De Spe, a. I, ad 9 (or, De Virtut. in Comm., q. 4, a. I, ad 9) (ed. Marietti-Odetto, I949, p. 806), U69-U78. To love God can be understood in two ways. First, insofar as the divine good is the principle and end of all natural being; and thus not only rational beings love God, but also brute animals and inanimate things, insofar as they can love, because for each part, the good of the whole is more lovable than the proper good. . . . This minor text is of interest because of the statement that 186 " Totum autem hie non aceipitur secundum quod ex partibus componitur, sic enim Deitati congn,Iere non posset, utpote Eius simplicitati repugnans, sed prout secundum Platonicos totalitas quaedam dicitur ante partes, quae est ante totalitatem quae est ex partibus; , . . Et in hunc modum tota rerum universitas, quae est sicut toturn ex partibus, praeexistit ... in ipsa Deitate; ... ipsa Deitas dicatur tota. quasi praehabens in se universa." De Div. Nom., c. 2, lect. 1 (ed. Marietti, n. US). 187 II Cont. Gent., c; 46. 188 Cf. Le Grand, op. cit., passim, especially I, !i!66-!i!76. THE DISINTERESTED LOVE OF GOD 519 God is loved as the" principle (source) and end of all natural being," which recalls the Neo-Platonic and Dionysian doctrine of the " return " of the effect to the cause. Since God is called the source and end of all creatures, it would seem that this text considers the universe of all creatures as the " whole " and not God directly. TExT V De Perfectione Vitae Spiritualis, c. 13, (Opuscula Omnia, t. IV, pp. 223-224, ed Mandonnet), 1269 . . . . It is to be borne in mind that the common good is to be preferred to the proper good according to right reason: whence it is that any part is ordained, by a sort of natural instinct, to the good of the whole. The sign of this is that one exposes one's hand to a blow, in order to save the heart or the head on which the life of the whole man depends. However, in the aforesaid community, in which all men are united in the goal of beatitude, each man is considered as a part, the common good of the whole is God himself in whom the beatitude of all consists. Thus it is that according to right reason and the instinct of nature, each man orders himself to God just as the part is ordered to the good of the whole. . . . TExT VI Qtwdl. I, a. 8 (q. 4, a. 3) (ed. Marietti-Spiazzi, 1949, pp. 8-9) ' 1269-1272. We see, however, that every part works for the good of the whole by a certain natural inclination as is evident when someone exposes his hand to the sword for the safety of the head, on which depends the welfare of the entire body. Whence it is natural that each part, in its own way, loves the whole more than itself. ... It is clear, however, that God is the common good of the entire universe and of all of its parts. Whence every creature, in its own way, naturally loves God more than self: insensible things naturally, brute animals by sense, rational creatures by an intellectual love which is called " dilectio." In the first of these texts, all men form a community insofar as they all tend together to a common end, beatitude. They form a " totum ordinis," directed to God, the good of the whole community. The" whole" is quite clearly the community of all men, of which man is, strictly speaking, a part. God is the "common good of the whole," and, it seems clear, not himself DOM GREGORY STEVENS the " whole," but rather the end, the extrinsic good of the whole. The idea of God being himself the totality of good is not excluded but this aspect of the principle of the part and whole is not explicitly mentioned here. In the second of the texts, the same interpretation of the principle seems to be given. God is the common good of the universe, with each creature tending more to the good of the whole than to the limited good of self. Yet it is to be bered that God is the common good of the whole and of each of its parts, and in this sense, he is a " totum participatum." In this text there are two parallel sentences: "Whence it is natural that each part, in its own way, loves the whole more than self ... (and) Whence every creature, in its own way, naturally loves God more than self." In the second sentence, we see that " God " takes the place of the " whole " of the first sentence. This alone is not definite proof that St. Thomas thought only of God as the " whole," but shows that both interpretations of " whole " are mingled in his thought. TEXT VII Summa Theologiae, I, q. 60, a. 5 In the natural order, everything, because by all that it is (hoc ipsum quod est) naturally pertains to another, is principally and more strongly inclined to that to which it pertains than to itself. And this inclination is made dear from things which are moved to action naturally: since whatever is naturally moved to action in a certain way is so moved by a natural capacity (quia unumquodque sicut agitur naturaliteT, oWn proper mode. Thus, there is a love of inanimate beings (this is the " am or natural is " when taken " cum praecisione "-de V erit., q. a. 5, ad 6) , the sense love of animals, and the "amor intellectivus" of intellectual beings. This latter would be the love of the " voluntas ut natura, seu amor necessarius," though still it may be an act, though a necessary one. Natural love can also be distinguished from "free" love (a properly moral act, depending on free choice) . This free love can be called " natural " in the sense of being "according to nature," 1·easonable, and thus " connatural." On this matter: Ferrariensis, in Ill Cont. Gent., c. 51, n. 2; S. Thomas, Summa Theol., I, q. 60, a. l; 1 Cont. Gent., c. 72; III, c. On the love of God as ''connatural" to man-Cajetan, in I-II, q. 109, a. S. On the implicit love of God "ex necessitate" and the explicit, free act of love-de Verit., q. 2!!!, a. 2; and Sertillanges (note 218, above). On the different forms of love, cf. also: Geiger, Le Probleme de l'Amour, pp. 44-46. 534 GREGORY STEVENS The Love of God as an Explicit Act of the WilL R It is a more difficult problem to determine whether or not the will loves God directly and explicitly" The solution will depend on the condition of the will in regard to the ultimate end, in relation to God" The teaching of St" Thomas is clear on charity, the love of God in the supernatural order as well as on the possibility of a natural and explicit act of love for God in the state of integral nature" 222 The objections to this latter made by Mouroux and de Lubac have been examined, and the reader is again referred to the articles of Fr" Gagne bet, 0" P., for a full treatment of this question. 223 Such an act of love in the state of integral nature would be a free moral act produced without grace or any supernatural aid, and directed to God the author of nature. The act would be natural both from the point of view of efficient causality and from that of formal causality. Furthermore, it would be natural as being based on a natural likeness or similitude to God, and not on the participation in the intimate life of the Trinity granted in sanctifying grace. 224 It would be guided, moreover, by a natural knowledge of God, the creator, and of self, as a limited, participated being directed to God as to its ultimate end. This act of love for God would be a free moral act. Sto Thomas states that it would be " according to right reason " (Text V-above), thus indicating the moral character of the act for "right reason" is the norm of morality. It is also a free act, and at the same time a natural act, for these two qualities are not opposed, as de Lubac believes. 225 The explicit act of love for God is possible only to rational creatures according to St. Thomas, and he makes no distinction between God considered as the object of supernatural or of natural beatitude. 226 But God is not a necessary object of the will in the natural order, 221 and thus, if God is loved explicitly and not ••• Summa Theol., I-II, q. l09, a. 3. Cf. Part I of this article. a. S. ••• Vide Summa Theol., II-ll, q. 223 ••• Vide Part I. ••• De Verit., q. 22, a. !!.!. 227 Summa Theol., I, q. 82, a. THE DISLNTERESTED LOVE OF GOD 585 by necessity, such an act of love will be free and moraP 28 Furthermore, whatever is the object of a natural tendency can become the object of a conscious act; 229 but we know God naturally and tend to Him in virtue of the principle of the part and the whole in the natural order. Therefore, He can be the object of an explicit love. 230 To determine more exactly the possibility of this explicit act it will be necessary to mention the states of nature, giving the different conditions under which the will operates. A state of nature is defined as " that stable condition in which human nature stands with :regard to its ultimate end." 231 The principle of the state is the end, determined by God, to which man is directed; the intrinsic cause of the state of nature is the disposition of the human nature and its faculties in :relation to this end. 232 Human nature of itself is not determined to any concrete good or ultimate end, just as the will is determined only to the good or the end " in communi." Nature and its faculties being indetermined, a state of nature must be considered as a superadded determination of the nature by God to a certain definite end. 233 St. Thomas never mentions a state of "pure nature" because of the indetermination of such a state. 234 He speaks of only two states: that of integral nature, and that of corrupted nature. 235 In the latter, the Angelic Doctor states that an Vide the citations to Gagnebet, Part I. Summa Theol., I-II, q. 30, a. 3, ad 1. 230 Other texts are given by Gagne bet, art. cit., II (Revue Thomiste, 1949), 44, n. 3. "" 1 Y.-E. Masson," Etats de Nature," in Diet. de Theol. Cath., XI, col. 37. 232 " Formaliter status naturae consistit in habitudine, in modo se habendi vel etiam in relatione ad praedictum (ultimum) finem." Horvath, de Voluntate, p. 59; J.-.B. Kors, 0. P., "La Justice Primiti1!e et le nche Originel (Paris, 1930), pp. 228 220 118-119. 283 " Un etat n'est possible que par une determination surajoutee." Kors, op. cit., p. 119. 234 Kors, op. cit., pp. 119-120, 136: Masson, art. cit., col. 87; Horvath, de V oluntate, " (pura natura) indeterminate et negative se habet ad omnes fines ultimos "-pp. 59-60. ••• The five " states " usually mentioned in manuals consider the " state " in a broader sense, as a more or less stable condition: Horvath, de Voluntate, p. 54; 586 DOM GIUJGORY STEVENS explicit act of love for God is impossible without supernatural grace. 236 It remains, then, to consider that state of integral nature according to St. Thomas, and to mention the questions raised by later Scholastics with regard to the condition of "pure nature," keeping in mind that this latter problem was never considered by St. Thomas. It is the clear teaching of St. Thomas that an explicit act of love for God is fully within human capabilities in the state of integral nature. 237 This state is not in reality distinguished from original justice, which consists in the direction of integral human nature to a supernatural end. 288 This integrity of nature is materially the subordination of the body to the soul, of sense to reason, and formally the subjection of the reason and will to God.239 Grace is needed to ensure the permanence of this state. 240 Grace, however, is but the efficient not the formal cause of " integral nature." In this state, the explicit act of a sovereign love for God is possible without any supernatural assistance, but only with the general "concursus." 241 The determination of man to a definite concrete end is the principle of this state of nature, and provides the will with the superadded determination needed to make possible the explicit love of God, as a free moral act. Later Scholastics in their discussions of" pure nature" have raised a final problem as to the possibility of an explicit, sovereign love for God in this " condition " of man. The question is of no great importance, but is mentioned only for the sake of completeness. There is by no means general agreement among Thomists. 242 The precise question discussed was cf. V. Zubizarretta, Theologia Dogmatico-Scholastica, II (Bilbao, 1988), 500; On our question, vide Summa Theol., I-II, q. 109, a. 8. ••• Summa Theol., I-II, q. 109, a. 8. ••• Ibid. ••• Kors, op. cit., p. 186. ••• Horvath, de Voluntate, p. 59; Kors, op. cit., pp. 187, 141, 146; cf. Summa Theol., I-II, q. 82, a. 8; Comp Tn.eol., c. 191; c. 197. uo Kors, op. cit., pp. 187, 146. 041 Summa Theol., I-II, q. 109, a. 8, and ad lum; cf. ibid., a. 2. "'" In favor of the possibility, the following may be cited: Didacus Alvarez, THE DISINTERESTED LOVE OF GOD 587 whether it would be possible to have in this condition of nature an affective, efficacious love for God, by which man would be ready to do the will of God completely. 243 For such an act the determination of the reason and will to God would have to be the work of the person, for no help is given to the nature. 244 It may be doubted that such an act is possible, given the indetermination of the wilJ.245 We could admit, of course, an implicit love for God, and possibly also the " imperfect, inefficacious " complaisance in God of which some o£ the authors speak/ 46 but no more than this seems possible to" pure nature." 0. P ., De A uxiliis divinae gratiae et hum ani arbitrii viribus et libertate (Rome, 1610), XV, d. 51, n. 19, p. 370); Thomas de Lemos, 0. P., Panoplia gratiae (Biterris, 1676), T. HI, P. II, Tract II, cap. 20 nn. 289-291); Joannes Gonzalez de Albelda, 0. P., Commentaria et disputatil!neli in I partem D. Thomae (Naples, 1687), d. 77, sec. HI, n. 22); Ioannes Bapt. Gonet, 0. P., Clypeus Theologiae Thomisticae (Paris, 1876), Vol. IV, Tract. VIII, art. IV, par. CXCI, 2um, p. 648. In a note, he refers only to an " actus inefficax " and thus his position on the affirmative side of this question is doubtful); L. V. Gotti, 0. P., Theologia Scholastico-Dogrnatica iuxta mentem D. Thomae Aquinatis (Bologna, 1730), T. IX, Tract. de Div. Gratia, q. I, dub. VI, par. Ill, n. X, pp. 45 f.-only an opinion is indicated, and Gotti does not take a real stand on this matter); Salmanticenses, Cursus Theologicus iuxta miram D. Thom.ae ... Doctrinam (Lyons, Hl79), T. V, Tract. XIV, q. CIX, d. II, de Necess. Gratiae, dub. HI, par. III, n. 99 f., pp. 133 ff); D. Bafiez, 0. P., Comrnentarios lneditos a la Prima Secundae de Santo T01nas, III (Salamanca), 78-79, nn. 14-15, but Bafiez mentions only an implicit love included "in isto 11ffectu persequendi bonum honestum." In direct and explicit opposition are: Petrus de Godoy, 0. P., Disputationes Theologicae in Summarn Theologicam, in I-II (Cama, 1672), in q. 109, a. 8; Fran. de Araujo, 0. P., Commentaria in Summam S. Thornae, in I-H (Salamanca, 1631>), in q. 109, a. 3, dub. II; Franc. de Zumel, OBMV de Mere., ln Primarn Secundae Commentaria (1594), T. II, in q. 109, a. 3. """ Zubizarretta, op. cit., III, 25, gives lhe following division: The love of God may be imperfect and inefficacious, a mere complaisance, a "velleitas," or it may be perfect, efficacious, and absolute, a "velle" or ., voluntas." The latter has an affective form (" propositum Deo placendi in omnibus"), and an effective form (in which the will moves the faculties to the observance of the Divine Law). As S. Thomas deals with the latter in Summa Theol., [-H, q. 109, a. 4, he treats of the affective efficacious love in a. :!. The same divisions are given in most of the authors mentioned above. 2 " Kors, op. cit., p. ] 19. ••• Horvath, de Voluntate, p. 60. ••• Gotti, Gonet-vide note 242, above. Note that the "pura naturalia" of St. Thomas (Quodl. I, a. 8 or q. 4, a. ll) is not the "pure nature" of later Scholastics, but the state of integral nature. 538 DOM GREGORY STEVENS C. The Natural Love of God as a Form of Friendship. A final, and minor point to be discussed is whether or not this natural love for God in man, which is admittedly a "love of friendship or benevolence," is itself based on a natural friendship with God, analogous to that true friendship which for St. Thomas characterizes the supernatural love of charity. The answer to this question can be given only after determining what is meant by the "communicatio " which is the basis of friendship, 247 and whether true friendship is an exclusive quality of supernatural charity. Without presuming to settle the difficulties of interpreting the term, " communicatio," this general statement may be made: The " communicatio in forma," the formal metaphysical similitude 248 and the active community of life, " convivere et conversatio," 249 are not mutually exclusive any more than good and similitude as the causes of love. In the natural order there is a certain " formal communication " or similitu<;le between God and man, but not one, of course, by which the creature gains a formal, though analogical assimilation to God which is proper to sanctifying grace. There is also a natural " convivere," the union of ends, so that just as the end of creation is God's glory so is that the end of the creature's actions. But this is not the common possession of the eternal beatitude proper to God. A true union of friendship with God is given only in charity, which may thus be defined in this sense if friendship be taken strictly and properly as either the possession of a common form, or as a true " convivere." It is only by charity that man shares the life proper to God. ••• Summa Theol., II-II, q. !l3, a. 1. "'" Ioseph Keller, 0. P., "De Virtute Charitatis ut amicitia quaedam divina," in Xenia Thomistica, II (Rome, 1925), 233-279; cf. R. Egenter, Gottesfreundschaft, Die Lehre der Gottesfreundschaft in der Scholastik und Mystik des 12. und 13. Jahrhunderts (Augsburg, 1928), pp. 55-63 cf. the reviews by P. Simonin, in Bulletin Thomiste, VII, 72-79. ••• M. Th. Coconnier, 0. P., "La Charite d'apres saint Thomas d'Aquin,'" in Revue Thomiste, XII (1905), 641-660; XIII (1906), 5-30; XIV (1907), 1-17. THE DISINTERESTED LOVE OF GOD 589 Thus it may be said that there is no true, strict natural friendship of man to God, but only an improper form of friendship, based on the communication of natural good. 250 To conclude: The love of God which is natural to man, as distinct from supernatural, is an act elicited from a natural principle without grace, directed to God, the author of nature, based on a natural similitude to God and a communication of natural goods, and guided by a natural knowledge of God. God is for a man a "connatural" object of the will in virtue of the principle of the part and the whole, by which man tends more to God than to self. This love of God, as implicit and pertaining to the " voluntas ut natura " is invariable in all states of nature, and is preserved even in the act of sin; as a free moral act, by which God is loved explicitly, it is, in the doctrine of St. Thomas, possible to integral nature, impossible to fallen nature. In the condition of" pure nature" the possibility of such a free act is, at least doubtful. Finally, this love of God in the natural order may be called a form of friendship with God only in a broad sense. GENERAL CoNcLUSION To explain the principle on which St. Thomas relied to prove why the creature loves God more than self-the principle of the part and the whole-Rousselot, and with him many modern interpreters of St. Thomas, emphasized the doctrine of participation, so that the whole of which man is a part, is God Himself. This has been seen as the metaphysical basis of the Thomistic doctrine, but it has been pointed out that the Angelic Doctor, dealing with the real and concrete order of love, also considered the whole of the universe, directed to God, the ultimate end and the common good. It is this notion of the common good 26 ° Keller, op. cit., p. 864 (cf. p. 252). In this sense, St. Thomas spoke of an "amicitia naturalis " with God based on the communication of natural goods (in l ad Cor., c. 13, lect. 4); the opinion of John of St. Thomas that there is true, strict, natural friendship with God seems somewhat exaggerated VIII, art. I, arguing against (In II-II, q. disp. 540 DOM GREGORY STEVENS which synthetically presents what has been termed the" metaphysical " and the " cosmological " aspects of the part and whole principle. The first renders reason for the love of God on the basis of the similitude between man and his creator, while the latter stresses the concrete order of finality, the order proper to love. Both orders are united in the conception of God as the common good of all creatures, of the entire universe. He is the " bonum separatum " or the end of the universe, but, at the same time, the common good shared and participated in by all creatures, so that they tend naturally to love God above self. The love of God is the first and strongest love of the creature, and from it derives the love of self, which latter does not affect the "purity" of the love of God adversely, for it can be only the material, not the formal, motive of the human will, directed ultimately to the "ratio finis." The relation of God to man's happiness is necessary as a material cause of love without which it would be impossible for man to love God, but this relation does not formally and ultimately determine the love of man for God who is truly loved " for himself." Yet a wholly pure love, as advocated in the " personal " love stressed by de Regnon and Descoqs, in the "existential" love of D'Arcy, and in the "Agape" in Nygren, is not possible to man. It has been asserted that the love of God on the purely natural level can be, and is for St. Thomas, a true, moral free act against the contrary opinions of Mouroux and de Lubac. This is certainly true in the state of integral nature, while being impossible to fallen nature, and doubtful for " pure nature." What, then, is the light thrown on the original questionthe opposition between the " physical " and " ecstatic " conceptions of the love of God? The teaching of St. Thomas offers a sound doctrinal explanation of man's sovereign love for God in such a way as to make clear that this love is the strongest human love, yet one by which man necessarily perfects himself. To deny the necessary relation of God to man's happiness, even in ascetic doctrine, and to seek to base the spiritual doctrine of love for God on the positive rejection and disregard of THE DISINTERESTED LOVE OF GOD 541 personal happiness, is to build on an untrue foundation. Selfsacrifice and self-contempt are needed primarily because of the fact of sin and its undeniable consequences. However, this fact need not make us forget what is truly the proper order which is not destroyed by sin. Man is bidden to seek his own perfection, and also to fight the consequences of sin in his nature, but above all he is to direct himself in love to God, ordering himself, his own good and all that he is to God. The " heart and mind " of love are to be united not separated, for no sound notion of love can be had except on the basis of sound speculative principles. St. Thomas has shown that the principle and basis of love is not the personal " Ego," but God, the universal and common good. From this first determination must come all particular determinations of the will in regard to particular objects. Only when the will is united to the Good, which is God, can one hope to have a firm basis for the moral life. The doctrine of St. Thomas on this question, is a masterful exposition of the work of the Creator and of the moral order. The solution to this problem also throws light on the fundamental moral attitude of St. Thomas. The " physical " theory of love seems to be based on a eudemonistic ethic, while the " ecstatic" theory appears to rest on a deontological background. The two opposing points of view are not fused but surpassed by St. Thomas here, as in his general moral theory. The very synthesis and subordination of these conceptions in the Thomistic teaching shows that the Angelic Doctor went beyond the conflicting systems to formulate a doctrine which answers the difficulties of both. DoM GREGORY STEVENS, St. Anselm's Priory WMhington, D. C. 0. S. B. THE COGITATIVE POWER A. Etymology The term "cogitative" is a co:rp.pound of two terms. One is co. Co is a form of cum and means "with, together with." The other is agitare. It signifies" to move constantly." Agitare itself is an intensive form of agere, which means " to drive." Etymologica1ly, then, the cogitative power may be defined either through agere or through agitare. If it is defined through its remote root, agere, it is a power that drives things together with one another. If it is defined through its proximate root, agitare, it is a power that constantly moves things together with one another. Both these definitions imply motion-to drive, to move constantly. Now, all motion is ordered to a term. Consequently, the cogitative power may more fully be defined as a power which drives, or constantly moves, things together with one another, in order to make one out of many. B. Nominal Definition St. Thomas presents three significations of the term "cogitation," thus suggesting that there are three cogitative powers. The three significations of the term are. cogitation in the general sense, in the more proper sense, and in the most proper sense. In the general sen. position tends, therefore, to create another position which may be classified as the Authority for Freedom school. This distinctive resolution receives a theological coloring in Nels Ferre's essay on authority and freedom: " Our thesis is that absolute authority inheres only in the will of God. . . . The will of God ... is always for the fullest possible measure of practicable freedom, and is finally for the perfect freedom of every creature." (p. 491) And again in the same essay: " ... authority is for the sake of the fullest possible freedom in fellowship." (p. 501) Professor Patterson sets the same proposition in a political context: " The individual's satisfaction in his freedom, even to make mistakes, is one of the ends the state should promote. (p. 229) The relation of political liberalism to personalism is made strikingly manifest by P. Ernest Johnson: "The claim of persons to exemption from coercion-except as the wellbeing of the community requires it-is an ethical ultimate, because personality is an ultimate." (p. 545) In the breezy anthropomorphic theology of Edgar S. Brightman even God is a personalist: " ... purpose of God-perhaps his basic intrinsic purpose-is the development of respect for persons. All value exists in, of, and for persons." (p. 476) Professor Dorsey touches upon this radical subordination of authority to personal freedom over and over again: " ... authority, in the sense of a hierarchical body of norms, is necessary to cooperative action, and therefore to freedom." 1 BOOK REVIEWS 567 (p. 821) "Force serves justice, only as it is used to secure the social articulation of some authority which defines the measures of freedom, status, and estate appropriate to each man." (p. 826) In the field of Psychiatry the primacy of freedom appears as an unchallengeable postulate. Thus, according to Dr. Kubie, patterns of abnormality become " ... slave labor ... a form of universal slavery .... To the psychoanalyst, the ultimate freedom is the fifth freedom: the freedom to know what goes on inside us. . . . This then is the purpose of the fifth freedom, the freedom from tyranny of the unconscious compulsions and unconscious fears." (p. 891) Freedom is presented as a postulate and an end in art as well, and any form of control or interference or censorship is necessarily reprobated. " In other words it (censorship) follows the line taken by totalitarian governments. As such, it not only cuts at the root of the artist's potential contribution to civilization, but ultimately at the basis of democracy itself." (William G. Constable, p. 883) But it is not only with respect to external interference that freedom becomes an absolute for the artist. He. is said to be free even in regard to the matter of his art. " His responsibility is to the materials only," says Kenneth Burke (p. 366), and yet the imagination is not therefore limited. " Is something in order? The poet may it wholly disordered. He may imagine it upside down, out, and backwards. In such imaginings, he can be scrupulously responding to the resources of the materials themselves, concerned with the ultimate stretching of a terminology." (p. 368) This" resourcefulness of symbols," moreover," is not in itself either morally good or bad. It just is." (p. 367) Nor should one think that this " free exploration of a medium " is just another form of human activity. It is "to love perfection and to be autonomous." (ibid.) In short, the limits matter are sundered by imagination, and in the process absolute freedom and perfection are attained. The surest disproof of this mad anarchy of " free exercising " rests in the effete and mannered prose of Mr. Burke himself and in the naive application of his non-antithetical method to " the Marxist calculus." He defines himself and not man when he speaks of " the symbol-using species, home dialecticus." (p. 378) Besides the school of Authority vs. Freedom and Authority for Freedom we can discern the school entitled Authority with Freedom. Indeed there is scarcely a single study in this collection which does not give witness to the thesis that freedom and authority must be " reconciled," or " synthesized," or" compromised," or" balanced," or that one must limit the other. As George Langrod puts it: "There is no question of a fundamental inevitable conflict between freedom and authority." (p. 162) "It is evident (and at heart everybody realizes it) that there can be no liberty without authority and no authority without liberty." (ibid.) Stewart Cole, commenting on Dr. Johnson's paper, insits that" democracy ... will necessarily 568 BOOK REVIEWS have to strike a mediatorial balance between the claims of individualism and collectivism, freedom and responsibility, rights and obligations, in the multiple types of interrelationships of its people" (p. 551), and Roy Wood Sellars speaks of " order and discipline within a redefined freedom." (p. 553) Charles W. Hendell cites the dictum of Robert K. Carr: " In no small degree the history of human progress is told in the story of the varying success man has enjoyed in reconciling liberty with authority, authority with liberty." (p. 517) In the same way the constant constitutional problem, according to Father Hartnett, consists in "balancing these two essential elements in our political system." (p. 687) To Nels Ferre " Sovereignty and liberty are symbiotic terms; they belong together within the nature of reality" (p. 493) , and he speaks elsewhere of a " dynamic synthesis of freedom and security." (p. 501) Father LaFarge calls it "synthesizing the two poles of conduct" (p. 644), and Dr. Allers insists that " this mutual exclusiveness does not exist," but that " the two terms are correlated to each other so as to make each of them . . . dependent on the other." (p. 555) It is, in fact, this dependence existing at the root of a suggested opposition that makes freedom and authority, in Dr. Aller's view," dialectical " terms, for " relation entailing interdependence and contradiction is called dialectical." (ibid.) Nor is he alone in this opinion. Many of the authors who tend to ally themselves with the Authority with Freedom school have noted that the very formula " freedom and Authority " is essentially procedural or dialectical, a methodology rather than an ontological reality. Thus George Langrod points out that the supposed " inevitable conflict " between freedom and authority is " a misunderstanding . . . resulting fatally from transposing a method. . . . It seems sometimes, indeed, more efficacious, from the methodological point of view, to present this totality of social questions under this contradictory form ... to conceive these phenomena in the frame of a contradiction, of an antagonism as the basis of reasoning. Then one searches for a compromise between these extreme notions .... " (p. 162) Advancing along the same lines Mortimer Kadish distinguishes the " procedural concept of freedom aud authority" from the " substantive notion of truth." (p. 668) Superficially, this insight into the dialectical nature of the freedom: authority dichotomy would appear to weaken the importance of this discussion and to confine it within merely logical dimensions. But in truth, it is a fruitful concept, adding depth and meaning to the whole problem precisely because it makes it less of a " real " problem. The insight is a correct one. The projected antithesis of freedom and authority is chiefly logical, dialectical, procedural. In reality they are two aspects of the same moral process-man's progress towards his own perfection. .Freedom is the reasoned and rell.SOnable choice of goods or means: authority is a valid BOOK REVIEWS 569 efficacious principle guiding the choice of goods. " Guiding " choice means both directing choice and, when necessary, coercing choice. This close functional correlevance of freedom and authority becomes strikingly evident whenever one of the contributors attempts to define the two terms. According to Dr. Allers," ... freedom is that endowment of human nature which renders possible the pursuit of the good "; and " ... authority is established that a good may be realized, or, if real, preserved." (p. 570) Professor Brightman, who is not always so dear nor always so consistent, is forced to the same conclusion. " Freedom is a power to choose from among attainable values. Authority is defined as a power which prescribes that values are to be attained, or how they are to be attained, or both." (p. 474) Note what has happened here. When the concept of " the good " or " values " has intervened, and when both freedom and authority are judged according to their order to the good, then not only does opposition between the two terms disappear, but their correlation is seen to be not merely possible but necessary. The finest insights of the contributors to Freedom and Authority in Our Time are ranged around this notion of an intervening term which makes the other two terms intelligible and mutually efficacious. In Dorothy Lee's remarkable essay on freedom and authority as integral to primitive cultures we find the freedom :authority tension relieved in these cultures because of the importance of "role" or "function," or what certain sociologists would call "<:tatus." Meaningful function exists in the place of the artificial juridical counterpoint of freedom and authority, and the individual is stabilized in satisfying communal good. Role as given is the product of " guidance, knowledge, wisdom," more paternal than political. (p. 337) Role as accepted means "satisfying conduct," (ibid.) "a clear function which holds meaning and value." (p. 336) " Role guides, motivates, frees. . . . In obeying this authority, the individual does not forfeit freedom, but rather acts freely in the performance of his established function." (p. 341) In other authors the intervening principal is stated to be "concern for the common good," (p. 493) "the highest good of society, the common weal," (p. 666) "the common good ... on the basis of a common rational acceptance of an ohjective morality." (p. 613) Barna Horvath, though quick to find a difficulty in this solution because of the " divergent visions of the common good," favors us with an excellent summary of Dr. Allers position: " ... freedom, as well as authority, are only instrumental to the common good. The common good is not freedom, and yet it is the objective order of value justifying all freedom and all limitation of freedom, ultimately delegating all authority." (p. 573) For the common good substitute law, the reasoned command ordering all things to the common good, and again the " false antinomy between freedom and organization vanishes because " authority and freedom are in right relation- 570 BOOK REVIEWS ship when they are seen to entail definite rights of action according to law." (p. 538) The necessity of a third term relating freedom and authority-whether that term be " the good," " values," " the common good," " justice," or "law "-is not at all surprising when we consider that one of our original. terms, freedom, is essentially privative. Freedom is understandable only as freedom from something andjor freedom for something. Authority, too, being a validated determining principle of conduct, especially in the sense of public conduct, is intelligible only in the light of the conduct it directs, and the common end toward which the conduct is directed. To give content then to the dialectical antinomy of freedom and authority there is required an ethics dominated by the notion of "good" or "value." Only then does the usefulness and pertinence of the dialectic become evident. Indeed, there are only two philosophical. positions which could support a continued artificial juxtaposition of the two dialectical terms in order to secure a "compromise" or "synthesis" or "reconciliation." One would be the attempt to work out an ethics essentially Hegelian in character in which one would be constantly concerned to effect a synthesis of the Individual and Society, the Person and the Common Good, and, of course, Freedom and Authority: the other position would import an implicit apotheosis of the juridicaL For it is the imperfection of positive law and positive authority that makes the tensions of freedom and authoriity so insistent. An. exterior command directing an individual to a common end and given to subjects more or less indisposed to obey, does indeed generate not only logical antinomies but real. antagonisms, antagonisms calling for or reconciliation. Yet t.his is something proper to positive law; it is not something common to all law. In natural law· an antithetical situation could be created only by the grossest ignorance, or by an anti-natural revolt of the passions against reason. An antagonism in the New Law between freedom and authority, even a reconcilable antagonism, is inconceivable, ruled out by the sweetness and :;:ureness of grace. Even in human positive law antithesis, though understandable, is not necessary, for it springs from ignorance, abritrary rule, indifference to the common good, and a certain moral immaturity. This "reconciliation" technique, in addition to its worship of the juridical, seems to presuppose also a voluntarist notion of law and authority. If authority is arbitrary by definition, and if law is a sheer exercise in eocrcive will rather than reasoned and reasonable direction, then authority and freedom are necessarily antithetical, and peace and order are achieved only by a series of temporary reconciliations. Yet, even granting the usefulness of the synthetic, freedom-with-authority solution of the problem, the reader of these essays still faces the confusion resulting from the diverse, and often erroneous, philosophical. premises of those who are attempting to resolve the two terms. Thus when the so--called BOOK REVIEWS 571 " synthesis " or " compromise " or " balance " of freedom and authority is at.tempted according to " the presuppositions of neo-liberalism and of experiential gradualist socialism," which are " moral, rationalistic and largely secular," (p. 192) such a projected solution will obviously differ in degrees and even in kind from, for example, that proposed under the theistic humanism of Louis Mercier. (p. 607 and seq.) Similarly, the absolute primacy and finality of human freedom which is implicit in the statement that " freedom is justifiably limited only by freedom " must of necessity spring from a different concept of man and society than that controlling the notion that liberty is " a relative and subsidiary good ,, (p. 666) and "not at all an absolute value of an almost religious nature." (p. 163) This philosophical diversity is strikingly manifest in the discussions on the nature and function of law and in the defense of the value and the universality of empiricism. For example, Professor Frankel is at great pains to repudiate the assertion that " our present troubles are the logical consequences of empiricism," (p. 426) and he does so by repeating " the empiricist assertion that transcendent truth is unattainable " (p. 427) and by appealing to "an alternative ideal of authority, which can be defined without reference to metaphysics or theology." (p. 422) This position receives confirmation in the legal philosophy of Dr. Negley of Duke who speaks of " the very dubious and certainly outworn concept of natural 1aw," (p. 2U) giving this proposition the status of historicist infallibility by the following ex cathedra observation: " That the law cannot derive its essential imperative quality from either divine or moral sources has been clear in the practice of American and English jurisprudence for a hundred years or more .... " (p. 239) Professor Cohen, a relativist cohort of Dr. Negley, unwittingly points out the full import of this dismal negation of morals when he concludes: " ... law must. primarily remain what Hobbes long ago suggested-an instrument of force for settling what otherwise would be open to dispute." (p. 221) Thus does legal positivism issue in undisguised voluntarism, for when one makes " the application of scientific method to the field of ethics " and finds inevitably that " no amount of such systematization and harmonization of our basic values will yield any absolute moral rules," (p. 219) what is left except the recourse to pure will? Re-enter the problem of freedom. Liberalism, Positivism, Voluntarism are one thing; the key to their identity is the notion of absolute freedom. This means freedom as to means and ends alike. So we read under a kind of hypnotic calm the simple proposition that thunders the end of all moral science and makes organized moral life the dialectical plaything of the clever and the mighty: " Ultimate ends are matters not determined by reason; they are matters of choice." (ibid.) Yet even with the full chorus supporting this motif, voices are still to be heard echoing the ancient 572. BOOK REVIEWS measures: " There cannot exist any independence of man in regard to the laws which goverll both nature and society." (Allers, p. 568) In view of the diversity and heterodoxy of opinion in these papers we might wonder whether it is possible to found a cultural and social unity upon the freedom :authority resolutions here suggested. Such attempts are not lacking in this symposium. Yet the mind approaches them warily because almost without exception they savor of that " unity built on lay culture and secularized humanism " so clearly reprobated by Pius XII. From the Humanistic Absolutism of Roy Wood Sellars, " a new evolutionary naturalism, stressing levels and emergence . . . and finding a basis for self-existence or aseity ... in the modern concept of energy" (p. 197) to the Democratic Manifesto of Professor Dorsey which would " give to every man the opportunity, within the of cooperative behavior, to choose or form his own interpretation of man's needs, impulses, and environment, and to associate freely with others . . . in accordance with . . . that interpretation," (p. 888) we face a doggedly naturalistic unity founded on matter, energy or "freely interpreted" human desires. Even the attempt of theologians at the conference to commit themselves to a spiritual unity and a spiritual reconciliation of freedom and authority results in nothing better than the mystagogic Hegelian. unity preached by Edgar S. Brightman: " Social life is a moving imbalance, or dialectical process of freedom and authority: or, the,istically speaking, of autonomy and theonomy, of man's self-assertion (be it search for truth or rebellion against its restraints) and God's purposive guidance." (p. 476) Unity, therefore, consists in the reconciliation of opposites, a dynamic synthesis, for ". . . the dialectic of history ... should move on to a fuller actual reconciliation of autonomy and theonomy." (p. 477) For the gratification of empiricists who might scoff at the introduction of " transcendent " or " theonomous " principles, Dr. Brightman is quick to imply that his theology is truly scientific, i.e. problematical or hypothetical. " The existing social conflicts can be solved by social behavior as if there were a just God of love supreme." (p. 478, italics his) Moreover, we need not fear that his theology will be dogmatic or intolerant. Scientism breeds Tolerantism. " The view here presented presupposes that theists will respect atheists .... " (ibid.) Other contributors add to this a certain amount of unexercised tolerance of Marxism (the acid test for dogmatic Tolerantism), with reference to the unfortunate" blunt Us-against-Them alignment," the rights of" principled dissenters," aud the understandable "moral impasse" of Alger ·Hiss. The empiricists, too, have their day in constructing a socio-cultural system on the basis of empiricist tenets. Consistently with their premises they suggest a social unity essentially negative and protestant in character, dominated by a vigorous opposition to any genuine principle of unity. Dr Negley, for example, after "dethroning the absolute of absolute sever- BOOK REVIEWS 578 eignty " and after concluding that " the essential correlation between moral conviction and legal imperative is a myth," (p. 249) proceeds to enthrone " the factual premises " or " verified experience " as the only principle of intelligibility and of order. (p. 250) No longer is the end a principle of unity, nor is truth, nor good, nor value. The only unity possible, the only unit.y desirable, is a unity of method. " Formal agreement on first principles is not even essential to practical agreement" (Frankel, p. 428); what is essential is the "acceptance of a common method," (ibid.) which consists in nothing else than a continual challenging of one's own ends. Yet somehow, mysteriously, out of this destructive methodology unity is born, "the social cohesion ... of a pluralistic society offering a variety of values ... rather than a unitary scheme of fixed and final ends." (p. 429) What extraordinary claims for a humble, earth-bound philosophy always so " responsive to experience "! The divergent Many begets the One, and not by chance but necessarily and uniquely. "The major point I wish to make is that an empirical and relativistic philosophy provides the only way in which men with diverse backgrounds and differing interests can find a common ground for rational agreement." (p. 420) In the search for cultural community the Catholic theologian, embarrassed by his enforced presence at the rites of humanist absolutism, can only suggest a devitalized unity in which, in the words of Father Weigel, "the truth that is normative for all is that common deposit which is spontaneously shared by all." (p. 665) Yet even this compromise solution of a " commonly accepted truth " is subjected to the ultimate emasculation at the hands of one who seems to feel that this innocuous resolution conceals long-range " Roman " strategy: " ... for religion legitimately to be heard, it must speak the common language of the court of reason and be tested by authentic democratic processes." (p. 667) Yet one should not marvel at the use of a dogmatic referendum to keep religious truth " open to common verification," (ibid.) for the Professor Ferre explains elsewhere that "democracy is divinely ordained"! (p. 500) One of the great disappointments of the papers on freedom .and authority is their failure to include an adequate discussion of the analogy of freedom. There are isolated references to the distinction between " freedom from " and " freedom for" and, of course, the very application of the freedom : authority antinomy to the fields of Law, Politics, Religion, Edocation, the Arts, Psychiatry, etc., implies that freedom is an analogical term. Yet Dr. Langrod is the only one to point out " the danger presented inevitably by unilateral concepts of freedom." (p. 165) Yet there is no ex professo treatment oi this significant question and the result is that the authors either tend to give their remarks a purely legal or juridical connotation, or they wander inadvisedly from the legal to the moral to the religious without identifying their change of locale. 574 BOOK REVIEWS Yet there can be found in these papers a great potential contribution to an understanding of the analogy of freedom, and it lies in the many references to a more profound type of freedom which can be called " interior " or " spiritual " freedom. The revelation that there is another dimension to freedom thus gives oblique testimony to the analogical character of the definition of freedom. The inner freedom so identified may mean only the psychological basis of freedom: " ... freedom should be considered before anything else as a state of mind, or under its psychological aspect." (p. 159) It might mean that "freedom from the tyranny of unconscious compulsions and unconscious fears " (p. 391) which is the specific aim of the work of the psychiatrist. Yet thP. inner freedom envisaged by several . of the authors obviously means more than that. It is more, too, than the puritannical inner freedom of Kant who reconciled freedom and authority " by making freedom an abstraction, a postulated inner state of mind." It is nothing less than Christian freedom which they have in (p. mind when they speak of " the freedom of the children of God " (p. and the freedom " to be able to choose the good against an inner bent to evil." (p. 545) What can this be except freedom from sin and freedom for God through grace? Only the Catholic theologian is truly at home among these realities: "The response to that authority (of God) is not a compliance to a mere external compulsion, but is the very breath of that inner life by which the creature ascends to fellowship and union with the Creator." (p. 645) Yet, even outside the Catholic Church ancient memories of this freedom through grace are still residual in our culture so that one can still indulge in a vague nostalgia for " a holy community " in which " we live no longer by law but by love," and where " morals are no longer the compulsion or even the constraint of the right," for in such a community " man becomes a free soul willingly and gladly accepting right relations." (p. 503) It is at this point that the tragic inadequacy of these papers becomes evident. And it is at this point also that Father O'Connell's study on Christian Liberty becomes truly significant, indeed necessary. For in it we find the real dimensions of liberty analyzed, defined and deepened by a skillful and sensitive theological mind. Within the narrow compass of 137 pages and three finely wrought chapters he compresses a treatise on liberty which gives us the guiding principles for a genuine theology of freedom. How refreshing it is to find an immediate attempt to define freedom " of all the loose terms in the world the most indefinite " (citing Edmund Burke, p. 8) , and an immediate appeal to the analogy ·of freedom, to " the need of the broadest possible viewpoint in studying the nature ... of freedom " in order to avoid the " defect of . . . isolating one type or aspect of freedom and attributing to it the universality of the genus." (p. 9) BOOK REVIEWS 575 The detailed elaboration of the analogy of freedom which follows is, indeed, the only possible way that this "most indefinite term," this "primitive" term, can yield up the insights which men need to break the freedom :authority tensions which they feel or conceive. And since the theologian can and ought to begin his discussion of the kinds of liberty with uncreated liberty, we have the great advantage of a primary insight into divine liberty, thus gaining a commanding view of all created liberty. " God's liberty is a perfection of His will. It consists in a supreme independence of all things apart from Himself, a complete immunity from subjection or necessity of any kind, except the essential necessity of knowing and loving Himself in an eternal and unchanging act that is identical with His nature." (p. H) It is this definition which gives to any subsequent definitions of freedom at any level a unique stability and significance. }'or in it we find the material cause or subject of freedomthe wiH, the formal cause negatively taken-immunity from subjection, and the final cause-the necessity stemming from the order to the ultimate end. The tyrannical reign of false definitions of freedom is invariable inspired and supported by a failure to observe that all freedom is begotten of necessity. It is only because one must do some one great thing that one is free to do or not to do many lesser things. This is the paradox of freedom which Father LaFarge discerned in the life of R.upert Mayer S. J. who " derived intellectual conviction and the inner strength of will to reject an anti-human authoritarianism, in virtue of his uncomplicated acceptance of an absolute spiritual authority .... " (Freedom and Authority, p. 643) Yet it is a paradox the source of which is revealed by a true definition of freedom, a definition which will apply to both created and uncreated liberty. Even in God liberty is founded upon necessity, the moral necessity to love Himself above aU things. Pursued with uncompromising vigor through the various analogates, this great primal truth illuminates the entire problem of freedom and authority. n is both a principle of extension and a principle of limitation, for it gives human activity an immense range short of the absolute, yet leaves man happily and safely bound with respect to his ultimate end. " Immutability in the final possession of the last end is no hindrance to all exercise of liberty, for the act of election is the proper act of the free will, and election is not concerned with a choice of ends." (p. ll3) So simply and so clearly can we exercise the blasphemous dictum that " ultimate ends are matters of choice." Yet the mind which is willing to reason analogically must be prepared to sift and weigh and measure the manifold. It must be prepared to make distinctions, to isolat(' " freedom of choice," " freedom from sin by grace," the terminal freedom in glory-" freedom from unhappiness of punishment or corruption," " freedom for man as an individual," " freedom for man as a member of society," "civil liberty," "political liberty," "economic 576 BOOK REVIEWS liberty," "the liberty of the state," the "freedom of the Church," and that freedom so easily forgotten and so easily violated-" the freedom of the family." Finally, under the guidance of Father O'Connell, and following St.. Thomas and his commentators, we must be ready to make that judicious distinction between " freedom from coaction " and " freedom from necessity," and to discern in the latter "three aspects: freedom of contradiction, of specification, and of contrariety." (p. 14) How profitable to men and how fatal to false ideas of freedom would be a knowledge of " freedom of contrariety "! That is the freedom which "is had when the will is at liberty, physically, though nt't morally, to choose evil as well as good." (p. 15) According to St. Thomas it is not true liberty at all but "a sign of liberty," "something which pertains to the defect of liberty," or, as the author puts it, it " is a defect found in the liberty of those creatures who are imperfect by reason of not being finally confirmed in good." (ibid) Again we return to the notion of moral necessity as the primal factor controlling, defining, limiting, expanding moral freedom. The most distinctive contribution that Father O'Chnnell makes to the analysis of human freedom is found in his excellent discussion of the Aristotelian notion of libertyo For it is there that he achieves a significant reconciliation. He finds in this brief definition-causa sui-that very concept which is so dear to the modems, freedom as perfection, freedom freedom as independence of action in the orders of efficient as and final causalityo Such a definition is, of course, analogous and takes on added meaning as we follow it through the various types of freedomo Applied to divine freedom it means " the divine aseity supreme independence of all causation in the order of efficient and final causality!' (p. 24) But this is infinite self-possession. What engenders that finite power of causation which spells out freedom for man? " In men, the actualizing of spiritual powers by good habits (the intellectual, moral, and especially the theological virtues) by increasing causal power in intellect and will, enlarges the self-possession and self-mastery which are identical with human freedom!' (p. 25) The true cause of freedom is virtueo Only the virtuous man is self-caused, self-mastered, self-possessed. Just as in Freedom and Authority we found that the finest insights on the relation of freedom and authority derived from an identification of the missing term "good" or "value," so in Christian Liberty the revelation of virtue as the cause of freedom breaks the intellectual impasse stemming from the privative character of the term " freedom." The first effect of this perception is that we are able to dispose at once of the troublesome objects of "freedom of contrariety": ". error, which means intellectual imperfection, and sin, which means deficiency in the will, are excluded from any place in real freedom. . . . Per se, therefore, error and sin, the evils of intellect and will, are devoid of reality, and obstacles to causality and the 0 0 • •• BOOK REVIEWS 577 freedom which flows from causality" " " :• (p" fl5) On the positive side, moreover, one can affirm. with perfect conviction: "Only perfections, therefore, can contribute to the essential inner freedom of intellectual creatures; only development in the orders of truth and goodness can make the creature increasingly causa sui:' (p" It is difficult to exaggerate the significance of this great truth-the concept of virtue as the cause of freedom, the concept of the free man as the virtuous man. The Thomist instinctively shudders at the thought of trying to establish an ethics and a politics, much less a moral theology, upon the essentially privative and indeterminate notion of freedom" Yet we live in an intellectual world which has done just that. Shall we repudiate this libertarian vision entirely or shall we refashion and redirect it? Surely there can be no choice except to discover what is good and true in this fragile metaphysics of freedom, then to bring it within the saving radius of traditional philosophy and theology. The remedy in this case is to give content and stability to a moral science based on freedom by marking out the unmistakable causal relationship existing between freedom and virtue. Nor should one fear that one is mitigating the positive, ordered, good-dominated moral science of St. Thomas when one points out " that his whole moral and ascetical doctrine in the Second Part of the Summa Theologica might serve as a textbook for true liberty!' (p. 83) Rather one increases the relevance of that science and gives to all Thomists a muchneeded hope that somehow, with the help of God, they will be able to bridge the tenifying abyss that separates them from the contemporary intellectual world" The single, fruitful insight that virtue is the cause of freedom dominates the remainder of Father O'Connell's work on human freedom. Whether outlining the essence, the degrees, or the extent of Christian liberty, or tracing the causes of that liberty, or discussing the important contemporary problem of Democracy and Christian Liberty, the author is merely working out the virtualities of that primal truth. Thus " the essential Christian freedom is " " " the interior perfecting of the human soul, mind and will by habitual grace and its accompanying virtues and gifts:' (p. £6) " Habitual grace . . " is the esse of spiritual liberty" " " . It is charity above all which gives the soul the agere of Christian freedom:' (p. 30) Moreover, the entire panoply of rights and liberties, natural and Christian" freedom from compulsion," " freedom of conscience," " f1:eedom to profess one's own faith," " freedom to receive a Christian education," " the freedom of the family," "the freedom of the State," "civil and economic freedom" are all related to that original inner freedom which is the effect of grace" Even those precious exterior freedoms so fervently eulogized in our day should be considered as " an outward realization of Christian freedom," .(p" 33) for " this liberty of grace must be externalized in the visible and 9 578 BOOK REVIEWS earthly life of the Christian." (p. 82) '" Not that Christians must necessarily have more external rights and freedoms than non-Christians, but rather that Christians have more reason for the same rights," so that " the natural freedoms thus baptized may rightly be called Christian." (p. 84) Economic freedom, for example, is " elevated by dedication to a supernatural end." (p. 88, footnote) " So also the natural right to the use of private possessions is deserving of the name Christian when the right is exercised for Christian aims." (ibid) "The freedoms of both the family and the State become Christian when they serve Christian purposes." (p. 40} For although "the Christian religion was not created to bring men the temporal blessings of civil and political freedom, but a spiritual emancipation . . . the overflow of that deliverance from the bondage of sin by Christian doctrine and discipline must normally result in a true exteriorization of Christian freedom in civil and political life." (ibid) Rightly considered, this treatment of the extension of Christian liberty might be entitled " the order of liberties." That which is first in the order is " the liberty of grace," the inner freedom of the baptized soul. The cause of that freedom, and the principle of the order, is grace and the infused virtues. Now we ought to note that in the context of" Christian" freedom virtue means supernatural virtue. These virtues " have the character of formal causes as well as efficient causality in relation to Christian freedom." (p. 42) But the virtue which is the cause of Christian freedom is itself caused. Christ Himself is the formal extrinsic cause, the "Exemplar of our liberty," as well as its meritorious and instrumental cause. Moreover, He continues His liberating, salvific work through the Catholic Church which becomes, therefore, a unique cause of freedom. In investigating the causes of freedom we should also note that virtue, and thus freedom, are the effect of law, especially of the New Law, "the ingrafted word," that "life imbedded in the soul" which overthrows the dominion of sin and " bestows freedom upon the soul by giving it a voluntariness in the pursuit of what is right." (p. 76) Yet all these principles of liberty are derived from a still higher principle: " All the created principles of this true liberty are products of the uncreated liberty and love of the Holy Spirit: the Sacred Humanity of Christ; the Church; revelation, including both the Old and New Law; grace and the infused virtues and gifts; and the glory of the elect." (p. 44) Now such a boldy theological approach to the problem of human freedom is so vastly different from that elaborated in Freedom and Authority that one is tempted to conclude that the author is here dealing with a specialized field, a lofty though nonetheless restricted field, without relevance to contemporary problems of freedom and authority, which are political, academic, artistic, etc., t.hat is to say, problems in the natural order. The author of Christian Liberty would not have it so. With a rigorous adherence BOOK REVIEWS 579 to principle, with a firm grasp of Thomistic theology and with an admirable familiarity with papal pronouncements on the subject, Father O'Connell builds up a powerful case for the position that full Christian liberty is an absolute desideratum for men and for society, and that the lesser freedoms receive their true meaning and their only sure safeguard in Christian freedom. First of all, " the supernal;ural life of the soul gives men a supernatural self-dominion, in which the concept of the free man as causa sui is perfectly verified." (p. 26) But does that mean that the concept is not perfectly verified in any freedom short of Christian freedom? It means that and something more, for consider the converse of the above proposition: " Without the Holy Spirit. there can be no liberty in creation except the perverse liberty of sin. Without God the undeveloped potentiality of created liberty tends to nothingness." (p. 44) This is religion with a vengeance but it speaks no more vigorously than did Pius XU in his Christmas message of 1943: "Christ alone, Who has rescued us from the sad slavery of sin, can point out the way to a noble, controlled liberty supported by genuine righteousness and a moral sense." (p. 45) This implies that a recognition of " His authority in civil affairs . . . and a recognition of His dominion over the exterior and secular life of men, public as well as private, is essential to man's temporal welfare and true liberty in society." (p. 48) This means, also, that without the Church and without the faith men will not be truly free. " Where Christianity flourishes, ireedom ftowers ftlso in the social order; where Christianity ·decays, freedom dies also." (p. 54) Moreover, "it is not only individual spiritual freedom which rests on this supernatural wisdom, but the natural freedom of society as well." (p. 57) What a far cry this is not only from the humanist absolutism of those outside the Church but also from the separatist dualism of certain Catholic thinkers with their concept of the " lay " state and the purely natural dynamism of civil society! The authentic, traditional, truly theological position could nowhere be more dearly illumined than by the profound and powerful principle which governs the relationship of the natural and supernatural at every level: " The doctrine of the Church that ' grace perfects nature and does not destroy it,' has as its corollary the truth that nature is imperfect without grace." (p. 86) To the modern mind this is indeed a hard saying, for it brings to nought many a projected entente which would make the natural order, especially in its civil configurations and with a deferential bow to the inviolability of conscience, the only source of human unity. In the eyes of the partisan& of separatism and an " open " secularism even grace would destroy this enviable and hard-won harmony! The author is not afraid to apply such an either ;'or doctrine in all its rigor to the question of civil relationships. He himself summarizes his chapter on Democracy and Christian Liberty as " an effort to demonstrate 580 BOOK REVIEWS that .without the aid of Christian liberty external freedoms tend to harm both the individual and society; that their good use depends upon Christian faith and charity; that abuse and loss of these freedoms is inevitable without Christianity." (p. 93) This is a simple thesis but it has powerful, and often tragic, implications. It implies first of all that " democracy needs Christianity, and needs it more t.han other forms of government." (p. 94) It implies a theory of Church-State relationship far different from that which is having a brief sophil:jticated vogue in this country. It imports, too, the supreme need for wisdom, virtue and integrity in civil leaders, and for a people of high intellectual and moral calibre. And finally, the dependence of democracy upon Christianity would demand the outlawing of " an amoral educational system. . . ." (p. 109) Such a positive, indeed militant, approach to the issue of religion in education is nothing more than another application to the political and social order of " the principle that grace perfects nature, and the correlative principle that nature is very imperfect without grace." (p. 93) Those who are slow to accept the implications of a patently theological resolution of the problem of freedom ought to consider that when they eschew theology and divine law they abandon the only real possibility for an adequate reconciliation of freedom and authority, or freedom and law. Yet one ought to point out that in this context theology generically considered is not enough. Only Thomistic theology, with its strong insistence upon the fact that law is " primarily a product of reason," can provide the intellectual tools for a resolution which will not be artificial and strained. " The Thomistic concept of law as a direction to a good by the reason of the superior is the only theory of law which can be reconciled with true freedom." (p. 62) "Law implies liberty of choice by which law is fulfilled, law acting as the guide and the guard of freedom, directing it toward good, and protecting it from evil choices. . . . Law and liberty ... are complementary, not antithetical. For the essence of liberty is obedience to law, and the essence of law is the guidance of liberty." (p. 63) Yet the author is not content to reply upon the good, and the reasoned order to the good, as the principle of resolution. He identifies a more proximate principle--the relation of both law and freedom to virtue. " The reconciliation, if it may be so termed, between true liberty and the demands of law is through the mediation of virtue, i. e. fixed dispositions of character from which will flow voluntariness in the fulfillment of law." (p. 65) All law admits of this inner reconciliation. All virtue mediates it. Yet "the New Law of Christ is the only source of full liberty for mankind," (p. 66) and " the liberating virtues par excellence are the infused theological virtues, charity above all." (p. 83) This is the refrain that runs like a deep-toned Gregorian theme through the entire book-God, the New Law, Christ, Christian liberty, grace per- BOOK REVIEWS 581 fecting nature, nature lost without grace. Accept it and you share an authentic theological vision of reality, and you share a hope that man and society can be saved. Deny it, mitigate it, and you are reduced to an endless fending of concepts, a stoical balancing of interests or compromising of tensions, in which man, in imitation of the gospel according to Hegel, places his hope in a reconciler and not a Redeemer. " The solution of the problem of human freedom must always be a supernatural, Christian, and revealed solution. The substance of that solution is that the tension between law and liberty, between the demands of authority and the desire for autonomy, is relieved supernaturally by a union of law and liberty in the infused 'Law of liberty.' ... There is no other solution, no via media between the supernatural order, wherein the conflict between law and liberty is solved, and the natural ordm·, wherein it can never be solved completely.'' (p. 85) Father O'Connell's thesis seems to require, therefore, a conscious tending toward a " theological " culture on the part of modern democracies. But have we not been so tending, in spite of the widespread profession of a " humanist secular faith "? Is not the humanist creed itself a perverse, bunted, homocentric theology? "The absolutisms of modern times are the reductio ad absurdum of the original folly of spurning the supernatural order and Christ's mediatorship between God and men." (p. H!O) Man has been faced with a choice which, in spite of his " secular " protestations, is essentially a theological one. On the one hand he has been asked to accept the atomistic theology of Liberalism " which deifies the individual, who thus becomes for himself the measure of all truth and his own summum bonum." (p. 116)) On the other hand, the masses have been bludgeoned or seduced into accepting the monolithic theology of Totalitarianism, sudden or gradualist, which "becames in actuality a diabolical parody of the divine plan for the liberation of man, a well-plotted travesty of the ' absolute order of beings and end.'" (p. 119) There is no slaking this modern thirst for the absolute. Christ has entered human history, aPd the gifts of God are without repentance. But the tragedy consists in this, that the " humanist secular faith " by a process of pseudotheological inbreeding has rendered itself immune to the directives of Christian theology. Yet it is a tragedy with ironic undertones because the hidden influence of Christian inspiration remains to disturb the secular mind with intimations of grace and to add another dimension to its confusion. One who reads Freedom and Authority aJ1d Christian Liberty together will find in the former a textbook of the and in the latter a guidebook for rendering the confusion itself twice confounded. Father O'Connell is a Thomist who is willing to accept the germinal implications of Thomistic principles, especially with regard to the universal causality and regency of the supernatural last end. He writes with a theologian's 582 BOOK REVIEWS accuracy but with a poet's verve, allowing his prose to catch the full sweep and fire of a thesis which set in the language of the schools could have been impressive but unimaginably dull. He did not present a paper at the star-studded Conference on Science, Philosophy and Religion but each chapter of his little book is immeasurably more significant than anything that appears in Freedom and Authority. Christian Liberty is, indeed. a penetrating, though unintentional, commentary on that recent symposium of modern thought, for it draws the elaborate hypotheses and syntheses of Freedom and Authority into the clear upper air where supernatural wisdom is allowed to illumine reality. It gives witness to the fact that there is truly an "imbalance," a tension, in human affairs, a te.11sion heightened by the almost fanatical resistance of nature to supernature. "We ourselves groan within ourselves, waiting for the adoption of the sons of God . . . even unto now." There is a dialectic in history, too, the dialectic of the Cross, reconcilians ima summis. DoMINIC RovER, O.P. 1'ale University New Haven, Conn. In This Name: the Doctrine of the Trinity in Contemporary Theology. By CLAUDE WELCH. New York: Scribner, 1952. Pp. 326 with index. $3.50. The author, professor of theology in Yale Divinity School, in his preface calls attention to the fact that the doctrine of the Trinity, after a long period of neglect in Liberal Protestant theological circles, is once again coming to the forefront of discussion. Consequently he feels it opportune to " bring together into a single focus the widely divergent lines of thought represented in the contemporary theological scene." Beginning with a sketch of Protestant nineteenth and early twentiethcentury theology on the Trinity, the author proceeds to expose and criticize the Trinitarian views of a large and representative number of modern Protestant theologians, ranging from those who reject or who at least doubt the importance of the doctrine, like Baillie, McGift'ert, Macintosh, Tennant, etc., to those who accord it an important role in their theological system, e. g. Hodgson, Lowry, Brunner, Thornton, Barth, etc. Since, of the latter group, Barth is pre-eminent in his desire to re-instate the Trinity at the apex of the Christian system and relate all other doctrines to this central belief, the lion's share of the discussion deservedly centers about him. In addition, Dr. Welch devotes a few pages to the Trinitarianism of Protestant Fundamentalists, with which he couples (not entirely unjustly) the Trinitarianism of the Catholic Church. BOOK REVIEWS The book, however, is not merely reportorial. The extensive discussion and criticism of contemporary Trinitarianism are actually an introduction to the author's own lengthy attempt at a " systematic reformulation " and " reconstruction " of the dogma. Nicene theologians will scarcely applaud the result. None of them, be he Catholic, Orthodox or Protestant, could read Dr. Welch's solution without considering it a startlingly unsystematic destruction of the dogma. Indeed, Dr. Welch, in my judgment, can claim the distinction (rare by now) of having formulated a new Trinitarian heresy, since he teaches that God is one divine person in three eternally (and therefore, presumably, really) distinct modes of existence. Neque confundentes personas, neque substantiam separantes: the ancient heresiarchs were content to disobey either one or the other member of this injunction; Dr. Welch manages simultaneously to disavow them both. He feels compelled to cease believing that there are three persons in God becauf the Catholic view by its insistence on apostolic succession, the handing down of authority from Christ through the im- 588 BOOK REVIEWS position of hands. But it also sides wilh the Reformation, for instance in the way it has, in its liturgy, carefully preserved whatever is compatible with the Reformation and rejected whatever is incompatible with it. Though Anglicanism. according to Fr. van de Pol, is not simply a weak compromise, it does try to avoid a definite choice between Rome and the Reformation. This places Anglicanism in a sort of strategic position in relation to the ecumenical movement, as Anglicans themselves claim. The fact remains, however, that Anglicanism, too, is faced with the dilemma, Catholic Clmrch or Reformation, and will some day have to make a definite decision one way or the other. In a chapter on what he calls " psychological obstacles" to unity among Christians, Fr. van de Pol treats of prejudices, differences in mentality (e. g. feeling versus reason, scriptural approach versus scholastic approach), differences in manner of praying and preaching and in liturgy. A chapter on "The Church and the World'' deals with the differences between the Catholic attitude and the Reformed attitude toward " the world," toward humanism, toward non-Christians, toward social and political life. This leads to a trenchant discussion of Catholic " isolationism " in respect to non-Catholics in general. Fr. van de Pol argues for "open-air Catholicism" in place of "hothouse Catholicism," and quotes another writer to the effect that instead of taking it for granted that a Catholic who ventures into a non-Catholic milieu will lose his faith, it should be assumed that in such circumstances the non-Catholic milieu is in greater danger of losing its unbelief. The final two chapters present a summary of the Ecumenical Movement -one of the best summaries available in English-and an evaluation of that movement. While admitting the difficulties and weaknesses of the Ecumenical Movement, Fr. van de Pol takes an enthusiastic view of it. He believes it has already accomplished much good and that it holds promise of accomplishing a great deal moreo A particular benefit has been the discovery and admission, by the Ecumenical Movement and its main organ, The World Council of Churches, that the "fundamental problem lying at the root of all theological and dogmatical questions is no other than that of the nature, purpose, and authority of the Church," (p. 227) and that "the nature of the Church demands a visible unity." (p. 229) :Fr. van de Pol also tries to clarify the reasons for the attitude of reserve adopted by the Chmch towa.rd the Movement and the World Council, an attitude so easily misunderstood by non-Catholics. He shows how the Church's present non-participation, aside from being dictated by an obligation not to compromise the truth, is in fact even to the advantage of the Council and its work, since any active and official participation by the Catholic Church would under present circumstances be sure to lead to clashes which would only hamper the action of the Council. He does, BOOK REVIEWS 589 however; recommend unofficial participation by expert Catholic observers at the conferences of the Council. And it may be noted that while the Church did not allow such observers at the meeting in Amsterdam in 1948, observer!> were sent to the meeting in Lund in August, 1952 (which was after the appearance of Fr. van de Pol's book). The Christian Dilemma can, in general, be weel recommended. Probably the greatest usefulness of the book, for most Catholic readers, will Le found in the very enlightening insight it gives into the entire Protestant way of thinking and manner of praying and preaching and even of conversing nbout religion. The author's ability to provide such an insight is no doubt due, not only to his experience, but also to his profound spirit of charity and sympathy, clearly manifested in his book. The evidence of this spirit also ·furnishes special reason to hope that the book will be found appealing to Protestant readers and serve to give them a better appreciation of the Catholic outlook. By way of comparison with Fr. Karl Adam's One and Holy and Fr. Charles Boyer's One Shepherd it might be noted that these two books make easier reading and provide a good basic picture of the Christian unity question, sufficient for the less intense student of the matter, but Fr. van de Pol's book provides a much fuller, and partly different though not disagreeing, picture and one not to be found in any other work available at present. To the above recommendation we would append one question and two or three minor objections. The question is whether the distinction between word-revelation and reality-revelation is the most advisable way of stating the cardinal difference between Catholic Church and Reformation. There is no doubt in our mind about the substantial validity of the distinction in itself. And we readily agree that it is an interesting and enlightening distinction. But the question is whether, for the purpose of effecting progress toward Christian unity by clarification of the issues at stake, the best way to state the cardinal issue is in the distinction between wordrevelation and reality revelation. It seems to us that the preferable way to formulate the crucial point of disagreement is in the traditional distinction between visible and invisible church, in the question whether or not Christ established a single visible Church for all men. The difference between this formulation and Fr. van de Pol's is, assuredly, a difference of emphasis and terminology, by no means an essential difference. Fr. van de Pol, as we have explained, considers the visible-or-invisible church controversy as part of the larger difference of word-revelation versus reality-revelation. But where there is a question of the best manner of pin-pointing a discussion, emphasis and terminology are part of the question. It might well be argued that Fr. van de Pol's presentation of the realityrevelation of the Catholic Church is better calculated to attract the 590 BOOK REVIEWS Proteftant to the Catholic faith than the narrower and somewhat worn argument about a visible church. But that depends largely on the acceptance by the P1·otestant of the validity of the word-versus-reality distinction as applied respectively to Protestantism and Catholicism. And it is reasonable to suppose that Protestants will not so readily accept that distinction. Such a wording of the issue, no matter how well explained, does sound strongly weighted in favor of the Catholic position. And in fact this phrasing of the problem was especially singled out for criticism by Protestants after the publication of the original Dutch edition of the book, so that in the present English edition it has been thought necessary to add an appendix giving further explanation of the distinction of word-revelation and reality-revelation. Would it not be better to state the focal point of controversy in a way at least more readily acceptable to both sides? And Protestants, Reformed Protestants, do admit that their position in regard to the Church is that Christ instituted only an invisible Church, not a visible one. Does not this formulation of the central point at issue provide a better basis of discussion for the additional reason that it is more concrete, more specific, and therefore more easily debated? Among other points to which one might find some objection is the author's treatment of the Reformed doctrine of salvation by faith alone. Fr. van de Pol attempts here as elsewhere, and commendably, to find as much agreement as possible between the Reformed and the Catholic doctrine and to clear away merely imaginary disagreement. But it seems hardly correct to say that " the Catholic Church has misunderstood the Reformation on the teaching of ' sola fide.' " (p. 39) Fr. van de Pol is perfectly right in pointing out that " Catholics " have often misrepresented the Reformed doctrine on this score, for instance by talking repeatedly as though the Reformers have all held that there is no reason or motive whatsoever for performing good works. The vast majority of· followers of the Reformation have taught that good works are the fruit, even the necessary fruit, of faith and are to be done for the glory of God and the good of one's neighbor; and this was taught by Luther himself. .But to say that the " Catholic Church " has misunderstood the Reformed teaching sounds a little too much like attributing the error to the official teaching of the Church. Very possibly the statement was not meant that way, but it it at least open to misunderstanding. Statements on page 43 spe.ak as though acts of hope, charity and obedience are presupposed to faith, whereas in reality, of course, it is the other way around. In at least one or two places the Separated Eastern Christians are spoken of as " Schismatics," contrary to the practice of Rome which in its official documents now always uses other terms less likely to give offense. Finally, we doubt that many liturgical experts would subscribe to the view that in the Mass " not one word is superfluous, and the simple actions 591 BOOK REVIEWS constitute a totality of which not one element could be spared " and that " through an agelong process of refinement and simplification the form has become perfect, and one could not imagine how it could be made better, either more concise or more extensive." (p. 150) But these criticisms are obviously not such as should deter a prospective reader from reading the book, any more than they deter a reviewer from recommending the book. REv. Mt. St. Mary's of the West . Norwood, Ohio THoMAS PATER BRIEF NOTICES Unless They Be Sent. By AuGUSTINE RocK, 0. P. Dubuque: Brown Co., J.953. Pp. 214 with index. $3.50. Wm. C This very valuable contribution is not concerned directly with the art of preaching but with an analysis of the theology of the preaching office. The author states this in the preface and indicates that he relies mainly on the writings of St. Thomas Aquinas, St. Bonaventure and St. Albert the Great. This is a wise selection of authorities since these giants were not only experts in Scripture, Patrology and Theology but also skilled as teachers and preachers. That fact gives them a power of discrimination and practicality which the author is quick to grasp and to put at the service of the reader. The Introduction to this volume correlates preaching with teaching, prophecy, miracles and the active and contemplative life. Subsequent chapters analyze the work of preaching from the viewpoints of the four causes. Each chapter is a gem of completeness and accuracy from the historical angle. The notes to each chapter are pertinent and authoritative. There is a splendid index and the bibliography is a real contribution. It is difficult to select from the wealth of material in this volume that which is most important. The basic content of preaching does not change since it is the word of God. The method of presentation is bound to change because of many factors that even the great Patristic and medieval theologians and preachers emphasize. New problems of thought and action arise and must be met. New forms of unbelief have to be answered. New developments in learning have to be used. Changing levels of religious, political and social life have to be considered. The writer does well in showing how his selected authorities among the saintly preachers were aware of the need of integrating these static and dynamic elements of successful preaching. This is a real service to the achievement of a more efficient Catholic pulpit today. Equally commanding in the selection of material by Dr. Rock is the evidence from the Fathers of the need of both piety and learning in the preacher. This, too, is inspirational for the creation of good preaching today. St. Thomas, especially, emphasizes the need of these endowments in the preacher and both the history of heresy and the history of preaching reveal the fatality of failure to integrate both of these. Incidental ·to this fact is the emphasis which these great preaching theologians placed on aii appeal to both the intellects and the God-given emotions of audiences. This volume is wise in giving their testimony on this truth so needed in pulpits guidance. 592 BRIEF NOTICES 598 This scholarly volume is not intended to serve as a text in either the field of homiletics or the field of preaching. As a theological and historical background for these areas Unless They Be Sent is indispensable and Dr. Rock has made us his debtors. The Metaphysical and Psychological Principles of Love. By MICHAEL J. FARAON, 0. P. Dubuque: Wm. C. Brown Co., Pp. 113. $3.00. The Wisdom of Love. By RAYMOND R. McGINNIS. Rome: Officium Libri Catholici, 1951. Pp. 161. The background for Fr. Faraon's presentation of the Thomistic doctrine on love is the importance of this subject in existentialist philosophy. The author realizes the anti-intellectualist outlook of existentialism, and stresses the importance for these modern philosophers of the affective states and of love, not only in themselves and in the phenomenological description and analysis of them, but especially in their epistemological aspect as sources for the knowledge of the real world. The discussion of the nature of love, then, is not a mere historical study; it must not be the unproductive analysis of a medieval doctrine without value for the solution of problems confronting philosophers to-day; rather, the metaphysical and psychological study of the Thomistic teaching on love is seen to be capable of making a valuable contribution to modern philosophical problems and research. With this in mind Fr. Faraon sets out to give a summary of the Thomistic doctrine on this matter. He first discusses the metaphysical background on which a profitable discussion of love must be based, and includes a of the nature and types of appetite, seeing that for the "Doctor communis" love and appetite are terms used analogically, and which must thus be viewed not only under a general consideration but distinctly and precisely as manifested by creatures on the different levels of being. It is shown that it is necessary to have a proper concept especially of human love in its metaphysical and psychological aspects, for it is with human love that the existentialists are concerned. Proper emphasis is thus placed on the rational or intellectual character of human affection and love. Chapters IV and V deal with the nature and causes of love. Love is a union of the affections, an affective union between lover and beloved: a good summary of the Thomistic description and metaphysical analysis of this union is given. The root cause of love is a union of similitude, or of similarity, and the author's discussion of this delicate point, involving the different theories of the great commentators of St. Thomas, is based on the classic study made by H.-D Simonin, 0. P. The clarity with which this question is exposed wiU be of real benefit to students of Thomistic phi- 10 594 BRIEF NOTICES losophy anxious to understand the ultimate basis of love. The final chapter concerns itself with the purpose of love, the union of lover and beloved. The difference between this union and that which constitutes the essence of love is well discussed on the basis of the doctrine of St. Thomas in the Twenty-Eighth Question of the Prima Secundae. Special attention is given to the rather difficult problem of affective knowledge, cognition gained in and through love. This section is worthy of special note, for this problem is rarely explained, and is, of course, of importance in dealing with the questions raised by the existentialists in this regard. The thesis of Fr. McGinnis covers much the same ground as that of Fr. Faraon and is another summary of the Thomistic doctrine of love. Some attention is given to the matter of the love of self, and the unacceptable theories of Hobbes, La Rouchefoucauld and Freud are discussed. The section, however, is too brief and superficial to offer a real criticism of these men. In his solution to the problem of the disinterested love of God, the author relies on that proposed by Father Garrigou-Lagrange, 0. P., which, to this reviewer, seems one of the less valuable of the many proposed solutions not touching the basic problems involved. Special attention is given, in dealing with the effects of love, to an analysis of the presence of the beloved to the lover. A satisfactory and complete bibliography is given. The Psychology of Religion. By L. W. GRENBTED. New York: Oxford University Press, 1952. Pp. 181 with index. $3.00. Canon Grensted, as former professor of the philosophy of the Christian Religion and fellow of the British Psychological Society, is amply qualified to write this brief introduction to the psychology of religion; he was the Bampton Lecturer in 1980, publishing his lectures under the title of Psychology and God. The P.•ychology of Religion is devoted to the study of religion from the psychological point of view; it straightforward and careful, and, insofar as its subject allows, simply written. At the outset the author admits great difficulties in arriving at those be included under the name of religion; notions, universally satisfying, likewise he must make deliberate choices from the wide variety of psychological opinions. An indication, however, of how sensibly Canon Grensted proceeds is gathered from his own words: " But the truth of the primary assumption of the real existence of that all-inclusive and supreme Other to which we give the name of God is a matter not for the psychologist but for the metaphysician, or perhaps for the saint. The psychologist can do no more than examine our response to the ultimate reality, so far as that response can be seen and recorded. Our beliefs and worship, and for that matter our sins, lie open to his inspection. God does not." (p. 16) BRIEF NOTICES 595 The psychologist has two methods of approach: direct observation of the actual behaviour of individuals (easy to record but difficult to interpret) and the information that the individual supplies him of his own subjective states. Dramatic convy, 1953. Pp. 455 with index. $4.50. Barter, E. G. Relativity and Reality. New York: Philosophical Library, 1953. Pp. 142. $4.7'5. Boyle, George. Father Tompkins of Nova Scotia. New York: Kenedy, 1953. Pp. 234. $3.00. Brady, 0. P. Dominic. An Analytical Study of Counseling Theory and Practice 1oith Recommendations for the Philosophy of Counseling. Washington: The Catholic University of America Press, 1953. Pp. 128. $1.50. Capelle, Wilhelm. Geschicte der Philosophic, I. Berlin: Walter de Gruyter & Co., 1953. Pp. 133 with index. 2.40 DM. Caponigri, A. R. Time and Idea. Chicago: Regnery, 1953. Pp. 234 with index. $3.00. Chaix-Ruy, .Jules. Les Dimensions de l'Etre et du Temps. Lyons: E. Vitte, 1953. Pp. 314. Fr. 1200. De Wulf, Maurice. Philosophy and Civilization in the Middle Ages. New York: Dover Publications, 1953. Pp. 322 with index. $1.50. Paper. Dictionnaire de Theologie Catholique. Tables Generales. Fasc. I, AaronArbitrage, 1951. Fasc. H, Arbitrage-Cajetan, 1953. Paris: Librairie Letomr.ey et Ane. · Dorey, O.P., Sr. Mary Jean. Shepherd's Tartan. New York: Sheed & Ward, 1953. Pp. 188. $!it.50. Doronzo, 0. M. I., Emmanuel. De Poenitentia, IV. Milwaukee: Bruce, 1953. Pp. 1208 with index. $19.00. Eberdt, M. L. & Schnepp. G. J. lndustrig,lism and the Popes. New York: Kenedy, 1953. Pp. 265 with index. $3.50. Fagothey, S. J., Austin. Right and Reason. St. Louis: C. V. Mosby. Pp. 583 with index. $5.75. Ferm, Vergilius. (ed.) Puritan Sage. New York: Library Publishers, 1953. Pp. 267. $7.50. Ford, S. J., John, C. The New Eucharistic Legislation. New York: Kenedy, 1953. Pp. 135. $1.50. Garciadiego, S. J., Alejandro. Katholike Ekklesia. Mexico: Bueno Prensa, 1953. Pp. 213 with index. 599 600 BOOKS RECEIVED Gilson, Etienne. Les lvi etarnorplwses de la Cite de Dieu. J_,ouvain: Publications Universitaires de Louvain, 1953. Pp. 300. $2.20. Hall, Everett W. What is Value ?. New York: Humanities Press, 1953. Pp. 268 with index. $5.00. Hassett, S. J., J. D., Mitchell, §. J., R. A., Monan, S. J., J. D. The Philosophy of Human Knowing. Westminster: Newman, 1953. Pp. 181 with index. $3.00. Heald, Mark W. A Free Society: An Evaluation of Contemporary Democracy. New York: Philosophical Library, 1953. Pp. 558 with index. $4.75. James, Father Bruno Scott. St. Bernard of Clairvaux. Chicago: Regnery, 1935. l'p. 288. $3.50. Jessop, T. E. (ed.) The Wm·ks of George Berkeley. Vol. V, pp. 244. VoL VI, pp. 263. Edinburgh: T. Nelson & Sons Ltd., 1953. Jung, C. G. Two Essays on Analytical Psychology. Collected Works, Vol. llll. New York: Pantheon, 1953. Pp. 238 with index. $3.75. --. Ps]fclwlogy and .4lcherny. Collected Works, Vol. XII. New York: Pantheon, 1953. l'p. 586 with index. $5.00. Kane, 0. I'., Wm. H., Ashley, 0. P., Benedict, Corcoran, 0. P., J.D., Nogar, 0. P., R. J. Science in Synthesis. River Forest, IlL: Albertus Magnus Lyceum for Natural Science, 1953. Pp. 289 with index. $3.50. Kecskemeti, PauL Meaning, Communication and Value. Chicago: Chicago University Press, 1953. 357 with index. $8.50. Klubertanz, S. J., George I'. The Philosophy of Human Nature. New York: Appleton-Century-Crofts, 1953. Pp. with index. $3.50. Lechner, C.PP.S., Robert. The Aesthetic Experience. Chicago: Regnery, 1953. Pp. 152. $3.00. Lieberman, Chaim. The Christianity of Sholem Asch. New York: Philosophical Library, 1953. Pp. 276. $3.00. Lu Zanne, Celina. Heritage of Buddha. New York: Philosophical Library, 1953. Pp. 290. $3.75. Lynam, Rev. Gerald J. The Good Political Ruler Accordingly to St. Thomas Aquinas. Washington: The Catholic University of America Press, 1953. Pp. 49. Mates, Benson. Stoic Logic. University of California Publications in Philosophy, Vol. 26. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1953. Pp. 148 with indexes. $2.25. Mauriac, Letters on Art and Literature. New York: Philosophical Library, 1953. Pp. ll20. $3.00. Meland, -.Bernard E. Higher Ed,ucation and the Human Spirit. Chicago: Un!Sfrsity of Chicago Press, 1953. Pp. 213 with index. $4.00. BOOKS RECEIVED Morin, F. Alfred. The Serpent and the Satellite. New York: Philosophical Library, 1953. Pp. 465 with index. $4.75. Muirhead, J. H. (ed.) Contemporary British Philosophy. New York: Macmillan, 1953. Pp. 365 with index. $6.00. Murphy, 0. P., Richard T. A. A Commentary on the Psalms of the Little Office of the B. V. M. Somerset, Ohio: Rosary Press, 19M3. Pp. 107. $U!5 Paper. Cloth. Nisbet, Robert A. The Quest for Community. New York: Oxford University Press, 1953. Pp. 312 with index. $5.00. O'Donnell, C. M., Thomas. The Priest of Today. New York: McMullen, 1953. Pp. 348 with index. $3.50. Palmer, E. H. Scheeben's Doctrine of Divine Adoption. Kampen: J. H. Kok, 1953. Pp. 213. Parker, Pierson. The Gospel Before Mark. Chicago: Chicago University Press, 1953. Pp. 275 with index. $6.50. Poelman, Abbe Roger. How to Read the Bible. New York: Kenedy, 1953. Pp. 125. $1.50. Pontifex, Dom Mark, Trethowan, Dom Illtyd. The Meaning of Existence. New York: Longmans, 1953. Pp. 186. $2.75. Raison, Jacob S. (ed. by Herman Hailperin) Gentile Reactions to Jewish Ideals. New York: Philosophical Library, 1!)53. Pp. 899Z with index. $7.50. Renard, S. Henri. The Philosophy of Morality, Milwaukee: Bruce, 1953. Pp. 9Z66 with index. $2.75. Retif, S. J., Andre. Foi au Christ. Paris: Editions du Cerf, l9Ml. Pp. 183. Roemer, Lawrence. Brownson on Democracy and the Trend Toward Socialism. New York: Philosophical Library, 1953. Pp. 189 with index. $3.75. Smbine, Paul E. A.toms, Men and God. New York: Philosophical Library, 1953. Pp. 236 with index. $3.75. S. Thomae Aquinatis. Catena Aurea in Quatuor Evangelia. Tom. I, pp. 572. Tom. II, pp. 598 with index. Turin: Marietti, 1953. Salmon, Elizabeth G. The Good in Existential Metaphysics. The Aquinas Lecture 1959Z. Milwaukee: Marquette University Press, 1953. Pp. 93. $2.00. Sciacca, Michele-Frederica. La Philosophic Italienne Contemporaine. Lyons: Emmanuel Vitte, 1953. Pp. 303. ][<'r. 1500. Simec, 0. S. F., Sr. M. Sophie. Philosophical Bases for Human Dignity and Change in Thornistic and American Non-Thomistic Philosophy. Washington: The Catholic University of America Press, 1953. Pp. 602 BOOKS RECEIVED Spargo, Sr. Emma Jane Marie. The Category of the Aesthetic in the Philosophy of St. Bonaventure. St. Bonaventure, N. Y.: The Institute, 1953. .Pp. 178 with index. Speir, J. M. Christianity and Existentialism. Phillidelphia: Presbyterian and Reformed Publishing Co., 1958. Pp. 159. $8.00. Symons, Thomas. (ed.) Regularis Concordia. New York: Oxford University Press, 1958. Pp. 136 with index. $3.50. Taylor, F. Sherwood. Man and Matter. New York: McMullen, 1953. Pp. 238. $3.50. Toulmin, Stephen, The Philosophy of Science. New York: Longmans, 1953. Pp. 176 with index. $1.80 Texted. $2.40 Traded. Weaver, Richard M. The Ethics of Rhetoric. Chicago: Regnery, 1953. Pp. 284 with index. $3.50. Webering, 0.1<'. M., Damascene. Theory of Demonstration According to William Ockham. St. Bonaventure, N. Y.: The Franciscan Institute, 1953. Pp. 197 with index. Weiswurm, C. M. M., Alcuin. The Nature of Human Knou•ledge According to St. Gregory of Nyssa. Washington: The Catholic University of America Press, 1953. Pp. 257 with index. Wild, John. Modern Enemies and the Theory of Natural Law. with index. $5.50. Chicago: Chicago University Press, 1953. Pp. Vacas, 0. P .. Felix. Maternidad Divina de Maria. Manila: Universidad deSanto Tomas, 1958. Pp. 142. Vivante, Leone. Elementi di Una Filosofia della Potenzialita. Florence: Vallechi Editore, 1953. Pp. 112. INDICES OF VOLUJ.\IE XVI (1953) INDEX OF AUTHORS BRENNAN, R. E. Review of Counseling in Catholic Life and Education, by C. A. Curran CHARLESWORTH, MAx. The Meaning of Existentialism CHROUST, /;.. H. The Philosophy of Law of the Epicureans 82, CuNNINGHAM, R. L. Review of Aristotle's Metaphysics, by R. Hope DELETTER, P. Venial Sin and its Final Goal DENISSOFF, E. Review ofDescartes and the Modern Mind, by A. G. Balz DILLON, D. A. and OESTERLE, J. A. Moral Philosophy in the Catholic College FLYNN, T.V. The Cogitative Power GERHARD, W. A. Natural Science and the Imagination GREENSTOCK, D. L. Exemplar Causality and the Supernatural Order KANE, W. H. ReYiew of Philosophy of Nature, by J. Maritain . ---. Review of Philosophic Problems of Nuclear Science, by W. Heisenberg McCoY, C. N. R. Note on the Problem of the Origin of Political Authority . MAGRATH, 0. St. Thomas' Theory of Original Sin MuLLANEY, J. V. Review of Natural Theology, by G. Smith O'CoNNOR, W. R. Natural Appetite OESTERLE, J. A. Review of Intentional Logic, by H. B. Veatch ---,and DILLON, D. A. Moral Philosophy in the Catholic College PATER, T. Review of The Christian Dilemma: Catholic ChurchReformation, by W. H. van de Pol RovER, D. Review of Freedom and Authority in Our Time, ed. by Bryson, Finkelstein, Maciver, and Christian Freedom, by D. A. O'Connell . SALMON, E. G. Review of Philosophical Studies tn Honor of The Very Reverend Ignatius Smith, 0. P., ed. by J. K. Ryan STEVENS, G. Review of Psychiatry and Catholicism, by J. H. Vandervelt and R. P. Odenwald ---. The Disinterested Love of God 807, VoLL, U. Review of Theology and Education, by T. C. Donlan WALLACE, A. Review of St. Thomas and the Existence of God. Three Interpretations, by W. Bryar . WALSH, J. J. Review of In This Name: the Doctrine of the Trinity in Contemporary Theology, by C. Welch 60S PAGE 288 472 217 SQ 282 449 542 190 1 127 4fl:5 71 161 122 861 413 '.t49 585 565 119 279 497 411 269 582 604 INDICES OF VOLUME XVI {1958) WHEELER, M. C. Actual Grace according to St. Thomas WRIGHT, T. B. Review of Reality and Judgment according to St. Thomas, by P. Hoenen . PAGE 884 181 INDEX OF ARTICLES Actual,-- Grace according to St. Thomas. M. C. WHEELER Appetite, Natural--. W. R. O'CoNNOR . Authority, Note on the Problem of the Origin of Political--. C. N. R. McCoy Catholic, Moral Philosophy in the -- College. D. A. DILLON and J. A. OESTERLE Causality, Exemplar-- and the Supernatural Order. D. L. GREENSTOCK . Cogitative, The-- Power. T.V. FLYNN College, Moral Philosophy in the Catholic--. D. A. DILLON and J. A. OESTERLE Disinterested, The-- Love of God. G. STEVENS 807, Epicureans, The Philosophy of Law of the --. A. H. CHROUST 82, Exemplar, -- Causality and the Supernatural Order. D. L. GREENSTOCK Existentialism, The Meaning of --. MAX. CHARLESWORTH Final, Venial Sin and its-- Goal. P. DELETTER Goal, Venial Sin and its Final --. P. DELETTER 807, God, The Disinterested Love of --. G. STEVENS Grace, Actual -- according to St. Thomas. M. C. WHEELER Imagination, Natural Science and the --. W. A. GERHARD Law, The Philosophy of-- of the Epicureans. A. H. CHROUST 82, 807, Love, The Disinterested-.- of God. G. STEVENS Meaning, The -- of Existentialism. MAx. CHARLESWORTH Moral,-- Philosophy in the Catholic College. D. A. DILLON and J. A. OESTERLE Natural, -- Science and the Imagination. W. A. GERHARD --,--Appetite. W. R. O'CoNNOR Order, Exemplar Causality and the Supernatural --. D. L. GREENSTOCK Origin, Note on the Problem of the-- of Political Authority. C. N. R. McCoY Original, St. Thomas' Theory of -- Sin. 0. MAGRATH Philosophy, The-- of,Law of the Epicureans. A. H. CHROUST 82, --,Moral-- in the Catholic College. D. A. DILLON and J. A. OESTERLE . Political, Note on the Problem of the Origin of-- Authority. C. N. R. McCoY 884 861 71 449 1 542 449 497 217 1 472 82 82 497 884 190 217 497 472 449 190 861 1 71 161 217 449 71 INDICES OF VOLUME XVI (1953) 605 PAGE Power, The Cogitative--. T.V. FLYNN . Problem, Note on the-- of the Origin of Political Authority. C. N. R. McCoy Science, Natural -- and the Imagination. W. A. GERHARD Sin, St. Thomas' Theory of Original --. 0. MAGRATH ---, Venial -- and its Final Goal. P. DELE'I'TER . Supernatural, Exemplar Causality and the -- Order. D. L. GREENSTOCK Theory, St. Thomas'-- of Original Sin. 0. MAGRATH Thomas, Actual Grace according to St.--. M. C. WHEELER Thomas', St. -- Theory of Original Sin. 0. MAGRATH Venial, -- Sin and its Final Goal. P. DELETTER 542 71 190 161 32 1 161 334 161 32 INDEX OF BOOK REVIEWS BALZ, A. G. Descartes and the Modern Mind. (E. Denissoff) BRYAR, W. St. Thomas and the Existence of God. Three Interpretations. (A. Wallace) . BRYSON, FINKELSTEIN, MAciVER, McKEoN, ed. Freedom and Authority. (D. Rover) CuRRAN, C. A. Counseling in Catholic Life and Education. (R. E. Brennan) DoNLAN, T. C. Theology and Education. (U. VoU) HEISENBERG, W. Philosophic Problems of Nuclear Science. (W. H. l(ane) HoENEN, P. Reality and Judgment according to St. Thomas. (T. B. Wright) HoPE, R. tr. Aristotle's Metaphysics. (R. L. Cunningham) MARITAIN, J. Philosophy of Nature. (W. H. Kane) O'CoNNELL, D. A. Christian Liberty. (D. Rover) 0DENWALD, R. P. (and Vandervelt, J. H.). Psychiatry and Catlwlicism. (G. Stevens) . RYAN, J. K. ed. Philosophical Studies in Honor of The Very Reverend Ignatius Smith, O.P. (E. Salmon) SMITH, G. Natural Theology. (J. V. Mullaney). VAN DE PoL, W. H. The Christian Dilemma: Catholic ChurchReformation. (T. Pater) VANDERVELT, J. H. (and 0DENWALD, R. P.). Psychiatry and Catholicism. (G. Stevens) . VEATCH, H. B. Intentional Logic. (J. A. Oesterle) WELCH, C. In This Name: the Doctrine of the Trinity in Contemporary Theology. (J. J. Walsh) END Ollt VoLUME XVI 282 269 565 288 411 425 131 429 127 565 Q79 H9 122 585 Q79 413 582