THE THOMIST A SPECULATIVE QUARTERLY REVIEW OF THEOLOGY AND PHILOSOPHY EDITORS: THE DoMINICAN FATHERS oF THE PRoVINCE OF ST. JosEPH Publishers: The Thomist Press, Washington 17, D. C. VoL. XXV JULY, 1962 No.8 VALUE, PRICE, AND ST. THOMAS "WHEN lntrodootion He shall appear, we shall be like to Him; and we shall see Him as He is." 1 With this citation from the First Epistle of St. John, St. Thomas climaxes his discussion in the Summa Theologiae of man's last end. " Final and perfect happiness," Aquinas concludes, " can consist in nothing else than the vision of the Divine Essence." 2 St. Thomas is a philosopher with great confidence in the rational powers of man, and he does not hesita.te to place man on a pinnacle above all material creation. 3 Even as a theologian he does not hesitate to verify from revelation man's preeminence over material creation. For he quotes the Psalmist as saying, " Thou hast subjected all things under his feet." 4 But as a theologian he cannot stop there. For man is not his own end, and so his own happiness, his own good, 1 John 3, 2. • Sumnna Thoologiae I-ll, 8, 8. " Ibid. I, 98, 6. 'Pa. 8, 8 cit. in Sumnna Tkeol. I-ll, 2, 10. 1 825 826 ERNEST BARTELL ultimately cannot consist in his natural domination and enjoyment of the creatures whom he excels.5 Revelation teaches us that man's natural excellence stems from his creation in the image of the Triune God, who by nature is true and good in Himself. Moreover, through God's creative generosity, man participates in the kind of activity that characterizes God Himself. But for this very reason man will never achieve his own fulflllment until that image with its powers and acts of knowing and loving is adequately realized in intimate vision and union with Him who is true and good.6 Meanwhile, despite the weight of sin that man inherits and enlarges, the image of God in him has already acquired some of the brilliance and strength to which it is ultimately destined. For a created share of the very life of his Creator is already present and operative in man through the redemptive grace of Christ. Consequently, commensurate with this state in which man finds himself as created, redeemed and elevated by God, he must live a life that is ordered and structured to his ultimate happiness. St. Thomas points out that in so doing man will already achieve a partial, although imperfect, happiness in this life.7 The ordering and structuring of this life is to be accomplished through a life of virtue, for " happiness," says St. Thomas, " is the reward of virtue." 8 The words of St. John, " You shall be blessed if you do them," 9 provide Aquinas with theological verification of this enlargement on the teaching of Aristotle. Although man's body is not necessary for the happiness of the Beatific Vision/ 0 its well-being is necessary in this life for an unhampered life of virtue according to St. Thomas in a paraphrase of Aristotle. 11 And indeed he finds in the words of • Ibid. I-ll, 1, 2. 8 Ibid. I-ll, 8, 8. 7 Ibid. 1-11, 4, 6. 8 Ibid. I-ll, 4, 6, sed CO'I/,tra. • John 18, 17. 10 Su'IT/IIna Tkeol. I-ll, 4, 6. 11 Ibid. I-ll, 4, 6. VALUE, PRICE, AND ST. THOMAS Isaia the theological evidence that bodies of the blessed will someday share in their eternal happiness.12 Clearly then, what St. Thomas terms external goods, like material wealth, are by no means necessary for perfect happiness in the vision of God that the blessed in heaven enjoy. After all, the vision of God is accomplished with no need for the body and its limited senses. The saints in heaven at this moment enjoy a spiritual intimacy with God that is unhampered by the limitations of material go-betweens, and hence by the need for material sustenance.18 Even after bodies and souls are reunited on the last day, there will be no need for external goods to sustain a body that has been miracuiously spiritualized.u. And yet external goods, even wealth, do play a positive role in man's happiness; if not in the ultimate enjoyment of it, at least in the attainment of it through the imperfect happiness of a virtuous life in this world.15 For material goods are tools· that fashion man's physical well-being and so serve his life of virtue, both active and contemplative. Economic activity thus :findsits true meaning for St. Thomas in serving the life of grace, and so economic realities, e. g., values, trade and profits, however distinct they are as natural realities in themselves, achieve their true meaning ultimately only in the context of their ordered relationship to the ultimate end of the persons they serve. And so it is the purpose of this essay to comment on the notions of economic value in the thought of St. Thomas, . especially as found in his CommentaT1}on the Ethics of Aristotle and in his Summa Theologiae. The, Problem of Economic Values When Tertullian spoke of commercial trade, it was in terms of avarice; when St. Jerome spoke of it, it was in terms of fraud, while for St. Augustine it was what turned men's minds away Is. 46, 14 cit. in Summa Tkeol. I-II, 4, 6, sed contra. Swmma Tkeol. I-II, 4, 5. u Ibid. I-II, 4, 7c. 1 a Ibid. 11 18 828 ERNEST BARTELL from true rest. 16 By the fifth century, however, St. Leo the Great could say that trade was neither good nor evil in itself. 17 At the height of the commercial revival that began about the time of the Crusades and continued to grow through the thirteenth century, St. Thomas took a more optimistic stand. In fact, he quotes the Golden Rule from the Gospel of St. Matthew as a preface to his justification of trade for a profit in the Summa} 8 It is true that at the level of society he continued to extol the importance of self-sufficiency: The more dignified a thing is, the more self-sufficient it is.... A city therefore which has an abundance of food from its own territory is more dignified than one which is provisioned through trade. 19 Nevertheless, trade had become so necessary to life that even " the perfect city will make a moderate use of merchants." 20 Certainly the principle of economic exchange was acknowledged by Aquinas in his earliest writings; 21 and it is fully acceptable by the time of the Commentary on the Politics of Aristotle: . . . commerce is sought in the city-state in order to exchange the things necessary for the good life. Exchange of this kind is desiJ;able for a complete sufficiency of life.22 Finally, in the Summa we are given a general description of exchange as a situation in which " something is paid to an individual on account of something of his that has been received." 23 But this situation is "seen chiefly in selling and buying, where the notion of exchange is found primarily." 24 16 George O'Brien, An Essay on Medieval Economic Teaching (London: Longmans, Green, 1920), pp. 145-6. 17 Epistola ad Rusticum cit. in O'Brien, op. cit., p. 146. Summa Tkeol. IT-II, 77, 1 sed contra. De Regimine Principum II, 8. Cf. In Etkicorom V, 11. •• Ibid. 21 8 Sent. d. 88, q. 8, a. 4, qla. 5, ad 2. •• In Politicorom VII, 4. •• Summa Tkeol. II-II, 61, 2. "'Ibid. 18 19 VALUE, PRICE, AND ST. THOMAS The principle of economic exchange then can be summed up a little further on when St. Thomas concludes, " buying and selling seem to be established for the common advantage of both parties, one of whom requires that which belongs to the other and vice versa." 25 But anything established for common usefulness should not be more of a burden to one party than to another. In economic exchange this means that an equality of value must be preserved between the things traded. But what is the measure of that value? · The value (quantitas rerum) of a thing that comes into human use is measured by the price given for it. . . . Therefore if either the price exceed the amount of the thing's value, or conversely, the thing exceed the price, there is no longer the equality of justice.26 And the determinants of that price which truly measures value? St. Thomas gives no explicit treatment of the answer, perhaps assuming the answer to be obvious to his medieval readers. 27 The assumption is unwarranted, however, in the case of many of his more ·modern readers. At one extreme some have heralded St. Thomas as an exponent of an objective cost theory of price determination, apparently basing their arguments on some comments of his in the Commentary on the Ethics of Aristotle concerning the importance of labor and other expenses in the determination of price. 28 Some have gone so •• Ibid. IT-II, 77, 1. •• Ibid. 27 Cf. O'Brien, op. cit., p. 131. •• Selma Hagenauer, Das "justum pretiU1n" bei Thomas Aquinas, ein Beitrag zur Geschichte der objektiven Werttheorie (Stuttgart: Kohlhammer, 1931), pp. 1316, cit. in John W. Baldwin, "The Medieval Theories of the Just Price; Romanists, Canonists, and Theologians in the Twelfth and Thirteenth Centuries," Transactions of the American Philosophical Society, new series, Vol. 49, pp. 4, 75. Some claim that the medieval Church itself commonly taught that value was an absolute, something independent and separate from price or from value in use and exchange. See James W. Thompson, An Economic and Social History of the Middle Ages (New York: Century, 1928), pp. 697-8; Lewis W. Haney, History of Economic Thought (New York: Century, 1928), p. 10; R. H. Tawney, Religion and the Rise of Capitalism, A Historical Study (New York: Harcourt, Brace, 1926), p. 40;· Amintore Fanfani, Catholicism, Protestantism and Capitalism (New York: Sheed and Ward, 1935), p. l!l2. 880 ERNEST BARTELL far as to ascribe to St. Thomas and the other· scholastics a rudimentary labor theory of value: " The last of the Schoolmen was Karl Marx." 29 On the other hand, others have seen in Aquinas' distinction between price and value, quoted above, the justification of a competitive market in the pattern of the classical liberal model, where subjective elem((nts of demand are predominant in the determination of price{ The distinction he seems to make between price and value is not a distinction between price and some value that is not a price, but a distinction between the price paid in an individual tTansaction and the price that consists in the public's evaluation of the commodity ... which can only mean normal competitive price or value in the sense of normal competitive price ...• 80 Others extend this interpretation of St. Thomas to include any " current price," excluding only " prices determined artificially through private monopolistic practices such as forestalling, engrossing and regrating." 81 Still others restrict the Thomistic subjective estimation of the price that justly measures value to " the considered judgment of the best-informed members of the community." 82 A Notion of Value However, before anything conclusive can he said about the determinants of price according to St. Thomas, some attention: must he paid to a notion of value consistent with Thomistic thought. St. Augustine, who perhaps originated the distinctively Christian notion of just price,88 offers some elementary . notions of value. Objectively speaking, •• Tawney, op. cit., p. 86. 80 Joseph Alois Schumpeter, HistO'I'JI uf Economic A1llll11ais (New York: Oxford University Press, 1954), p. 98. . 81 Baldwin, op. cit., pp. 75-80. Cf. John T. Noonan, Jr., The Scholastic A1llllyais of UII'UT1J (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1957), pp. 85 :If. 82 O'Brien, op. cit., pp. 116-7, 180.. 38 De Trinitate, XIIT, 8: " Scio ipse hominem quum venalis codex ei fuisset oblatus, pretiique ejus ignarum ideo quiddam, exiguum poscentem cerneret venditorem, justum ·pretium, quod multo amplius erat nee opinanti dedisse." Cit. in O'Brien, op. cit., p. 105. VALUE, PRICE, AND ST. THOMAS 331 . . . among those beings which exist, and which are not of God the Creator's essence, those which have life are ranked above those which have none; those that have the power of generation, or even of desiring, above those which lack this faculty. And among things that have life, the sentient are higher.... And, among the sentient, the intelligent are above those that have not intelligence. . . . These are the gradations according to the order of nature .... 84' On the other hand, ... according to the utility each man finds in a thing, there are various standards of value, so that it comes to pass that we prefer some things that have no sensation to some sentient beings. . . . Who, e. g., would not rather have bread in his house t\lan mice, gold than fleas? 811 For St. Thomas too, when something is valued there is implied both an object of value and a subject to make the evaluation, plus a relation between the two. 86 The subject who makes an evaluation cannot for St. Thomas be the direct cause of value, since no agent is the direct cause of the esse of an effect, but only of a change, a fieri, in something that owes its esse to its creator. 87 True, a mere existent is not value, but insofar as it actually exists, there is established the ratio of the good, the backbone of value. 38 "Every existent insofar as it is an existent is good." 89 " ¥d whereas truth is principally in the mind, good exists " in things themselves," 40 so value above all must be objective. Of course, to the extent that every existent is good it has the character of end, according to St. Thomas. "Nevertheless, this character pertains to every existent," he says, " and it adds •• St. Augustine, City of G_od (New York: Modem Library), Book XI, c. 16, p. 860. •• Ibid. •• Summa Contra Gentiles ill, 10: "Voluntas vero movetur ex iudicio virtutis apprehensivae, quae indicat hoc esse bonum vel malum." •• Summa Theol. I, 104, 1: "Aliquod agens est causa sui efl'ectus secundum fieri tantum, et non directe secundum esse eius." 88 Contra Gentiles I, 87: "Esse igitur actu boni rationem constituit." •• Summa Theol. I, 5, 8. Cf. I, 17, 4 ad !il; 1-11, 18, I; 1-11, IS, 8 ad 3. •o Ibid. I-II, !il!il, !il. ERNEST BARTELL nothing to the being of the existent." Thus, " unmistakably, there is static value in the mere existent from the beginning because the existent is a possible aim of action." 42 On the other hand, the existent under a functional aspect of the good can ultimately take on the character of end only relative to a subject, an agent with intellectual and appetitive " Functional value powers to apprehend and seek the needs something in addition to ens, and in addition to this as desirable; to ens as desirable, functional value ·adds the element of being desired."" For, whatever is good "is good movement of insofar as it is desirable, and is the term of the appetite." 45 Appetite thus expresses a need whose satisfaction is the role of the good as end; and it is in the meeting of agent and object that functional value is found. 46 A new pair of shoes already exists and is good independently of its prospective users. When it is brought to their attention, however, there is established a basic relation that identifies its Value, as a functional aspect function and its " use value." of the good, takes on " a new special relation," the relation of end, although this relation adds nothing real to the object. Thus " value is in the object primarily, but also in the mind or agent." 49 Any real change that follows upon this valuerelation must obviously be a change in the valuer, not in the object valued. New shoes will be no better or worse after their value is expressed, but their value will nevertheless reflect the needs of persons who use shoes (or who would spend elsewhere the labor and materials that it takes to make them) .50 More- the "De Veritate XXII, I ad 9; cf. Summa Theol. I, 5, 2 ad I, ad 2; I, 5, 4; IT-IT, 28, 7. "Leo R. Ward, C. S.C., Philosophy of Value, An Essay in Constructive Criticism (New York: Macmillan, I980), p. I59. ' 8 Summa Theol. I-IT, I, 2. Cf. I, 6, I ad 2; l-IT, I ad 2. .. Ward, loc. cit. •• Summa Theol. I, 5, 6. Cf. I, I6, I; l-IT, 12, 2. '" Ibid. I, 44, 4. •T Cf. De Malo XITI, 4 ad I5. ' 8 Ward, op. cit., p. I74. '"Ibid. p. I76. •• On the subject of trade St. Thomas distinguishes between use value and exchange value, but both imply the value-relation. See infra p. 848 fl. VALUE, PRICE, AND ST. THOMAS 888 over, for a thing to be desired as valuable it is not necessary that the object actually be good, but only that it be apprehended as a good.51 The end may be the good or only an apparent good.52 A new pair of shoes may be very attractive, and still tum out to be stiff and uncomfortable. Obviously however, for the value-relation of a useful good to be a true one, the rational agent must both apprehend the end for what it really is in and perceive the object of value in its ordered proportion to that end. 58 Only then is the need expressed by the appetite made objective, and the valuerelation freely determined. Value for St. Thomas then is above all objective, as objective as the existent: The judgment of the goodness of anything does not depend upon its order to any particular thing, but rather upon what it is in itself, and on its order to the whole universe, wherein every part has its own perfectly ordered place .... 5 " Value is as universal as good itself, with all its analogical properties of sameness and difference. But the value judgment of the good certainly does not preclude, but rather requires the relations of subject to object, of need to good, of agent to end. " Thus it is unmistakable that the theory of St. Thomas, rightly or wrongly, regards value as first in the object and derivatively but improperly in the desire of the object. . . ." 55 Value and Economic Goods Unlike the creatures below him, man has the power to produce deliberate acts of free choice toward an object which is end and good.56 It is in the accomplishment of the end that man fulfills a desire for perfection and to that extent achieves 61 Summa Tkeol. I-ll, 8, 1: "Ad hoc igitur quod voluntas in aliquid tendat, non requiritur quod sit bonum in rei veritate, sed quod apprehendatur in ratione boni." •• Ibid. Cf. 1-11, 84, i. •• Ibid. 1-11, 6, i; I, 59, 1. •• Ibid. I, 49, 8. •• Ward, op. cit., p. 178. •• Summa Tkeol. 1-11, 1, arts. 1-8. 884 ERNEST BARTELL happiness. 57 However, for St. Thomas there is not an infinity of ends to be attained, 58 but there is nonetheless a hierarchy of ends, and hence of goods and of values. 59 The highest good is of course the universal good, which can only be God, who is Good Himself. 60 God alone "has that complete self-sufficiency which is promised by wealth." 61 Creatures are good only by participation, and so none of the created particular goods can be the end to which all the others are ordered. " Therefore that good which is the end of the whole universe must be a good outside the universe." 62 For man it is happiness that possesses the highest value; and perfect hapinness consists in nothing other than the perfect good, which totally satisfies the appetite. 63 The object of man's appetite, however, is precisely the universal good, which "is not to be found in any creature, but in God alone." 64 Happiness in contemplation and enjoyment of God is thus man's last end, and man must necessarily desire all that he desires for this last end. 65 This does not mean, of course, that one must. always be thinking of his last end every time that he desires something or does something. 66 In fact, Aristotle claimed that attention to the universal or separated good is altogether useless to the exercise of the arts and sciences, and St. Thomas .in his Commentary does not disagree: No doctor or soldier becomes more efficient because he has meditated on the idea of a separated good . . . so one concludes that knowledge of the universal and separated good is unnecessary either for the acquisition of the sciences Ol" for their exercise. 87 Ibid. 1-11, 1, 6. Ibid., 1-11, I, 4. •• In Etk. I, 9; Summa Tkeol. 1-11, 12, i; l-11, il, I ad i; 11-11, !!3, 7; 11-11, 58, 10 ad 2; 11-11, 64, I. 6 °Contra GentilBB I, 41, 2; Summa Tkeol. I, lOS, i; 11-11, 117, 6. 61 Summa Tkeol. I, 26, 4. 6 " Ibid. I, lOS, 2; Cf. Contra Gentiles ill, 17, 6; Summa Tkeol. 1-11, i, 8. •• Ibid. I-ll, 2, 8. 6 • Ibid. Cf. 11-11, 26, s. 66 Ibid. 1-11, I, 6; Cf. In Etk. I, 9; Contra Gentiles ill, 17, 6; S7, 1. 66 Ibid. I-II, I, 6 ad s. 67 In Etk. I, S. GV 68 VALUE, PRICE, AND ST. THOMAS 335 It is sufficient that we make an intention with respect to the last end, for this " remains in every desire directed to any object whatever, even though one's thoughts be not actually directed to the last end." 68 It is this supernatural happiness of individual persons, begun with their life of virtue as members of the Mystical Body of Christ on earth, that is likewise the ultimate common good and end of human society. 69 But because even now man has a social nature, we can speak of a temporal common good, social ends to be achieved by common action in this life. At the level of the temporal human goods to which man devotes his attention, the temporal common good of society surpassses the private good of the individual and so should be reckoned as a higher value. 70 But this remains true only as long as they are of the same genus. For " it may happen that the private good is better generically." 71 In short, the temporal public welfare is subordinated to the supernatural end of persons, much as the temporal is subordinate to the spiritual in man's own nature. Clearly then, the temporal end to be attained by society in the pursuit of the common good is by no means an ultimate, self-sufficient one. For, The same judgment is to be formed about the end of society as a whole as about the end of one man. If, therefore, the ultimate end of man were some good that existed in himself, then the ultimate end of the multitude to be governed would likewise be for the multitude to acquire such good, and persevere in its possession.... If that ultimate end were an abundance of wealth, the man who knew economics would be ruler of the community .... 72 Man is a social animal because he is not self-sufficient in the necessities of human life.78 Therefore society exists to satisfy •• Summa Theol. I-II, 1, 6 ad 8. •• Ibid. ill, 8, arts. !!-8. 70 Ibid. II-II, 117, 6; Cf. Suppl. 40, 6; I-II, 88, 1 ad 5; II-II, 58, 7 ad !!; Contra Gentiles ill, 17, 6; De Regimine I, 1. 71 Ibid. 11-II, 15!!, 4 ad 8. St. Thomas offers the example of virginity consecrated to God as preferable to carnal fertility. 70 De Regimine I, 15. 78 Contra Gentiles III, 1!!9, 5; In Pol. III, 5; Summa Theol. I-II, 81, I. 886 ERNEST BARTELL human needs, not vice versa. · Social values and their determinants are to be reckoned important in man's hierarchy of values, but they are not an ultimate. For, " it is clear," says Aquinas, " that the end of the community gathered together is to live virtuously ... virtuous life is the end for which men gather together." 7 i But even the virtuous life is something temporal, transitory, and inhering in man himself. It is not the extrinsic, universal Good, who is man's last end. Rather, " through virtuous living man is further ordained to a higher end, which consists in the enjoyment of God." 75 But society exists for persons. Consequently, concludes St. Thomas, since society must have the same end as the individual, it is not the ultimate end of an assembled community to live virtuously, but through virtuous living to attain to the possession of God.76 The temporal goods of persons, including the good of the body, are, subordinate to the good of the soul and its spiritual activities. 77 Furthermore, "the good of the body surpasses those goods that consist in external things." 78 For, "just as the body is ordained to the soul as its end, so are external goods ordained to the body itself." 79 Obviously, "soundness of body is needed for the perfection of contemplation." 80 . A reasonable person would prefer his health to new shoes any time. Nevertheless, St. Thomas offers four reasons why even this most basic of personal goods is not to be regarded as a highest or ultimate value: The fact that man's highest good does not lie in goods of the body, such as health, beauty and strength is clearly evident. . . . For u De Regimine I, 15. '"Ibid. •• Ibid. Cf. 8 Sent d. 85, q. 4, a. 1 ad 2. "Contra GentilflB III, 141, 6. Cf. Jacques Leclercq, Christianity and Money (London: Burns and Oates, 1959), pp. 67 :If. '"Summa Theol. II-11, 117, 6. •• Ibid. 1-11, 2, 5 ad 1. •• Contra Gentil68 m, 87, 7. VALUE, PRICE, AND ST. THOMAS 887 these things are possessed in common by both good and bad men; they are also unstable; moreover, they are not subject to the will. •.. Moreover, many animals better endowed than men, as far as goods of the body go.... 81 As far as the external goods like wealth and honor go, these are " relative goods " by comparison with the " intrinsic " goods of man like " health, strength, ... science, virtue and so forth." 82 Consequently, in commenting on these divisions made by Aristotle, St. Thomas concludes: The dignity of man considered absolutely should not be determined according to the dignity of these goods, but according to the dignity of the absolute goods.88 External goods, like material. wealth, thus are to be ranked rather low in St. Thomas' scale of values. 8 ' They can by no means be considered as man's last end. 85 Man's last end, after all, consists in an intuitive spiritual union with God, while external goods are material additions to man's bodily existence. Man's highest value consists in a happiness that is unending and unchangeable, while external goods are subject to all the vagaries of day-to-day life.86 "External goods come under the head of things useful for an end," Aquinas says. 87 Although they are only useful instruments, they have real value relative to the higher ends of the persons who use them, since " the intention of the principal agent and that of the instrument are directed to the same thing." 88 The force that impels these more or less inert instruments into the orbit of 81 Ibid. ill, S!l, 1 ad 4. ""In Pol. V, 2. ""Ibid. •• Contra Gentiles lll, 141, 6: "Cum enim bona exterior&ad interiora ordinentur, corpus autem ad animam; in tantum exteriora et corporalia bona sunt homini bona in quantum ad bonum rationis proficiunt." •• Ibid. ill, SO, 1. Cf. In Pol. iV, 10; Su111/TTUI, Theol. ll-11, 126, 1; 1-11, 108, 4; 1-11, 2, 1. •• Su111/TTUI, Theol., I-ll, 4, 7. •• Ibid., ll-11, 118, 1. Cf. Contra Gentiles ill, SO, 1-2; Swmma Theol. 11-11, 118, !!; 11-11, 126, 1 ad s. •• Contra Gentiles ill, 24, 1; 22, 8. 888 ERNEST BARTELL man's supernatural end is the power of virtue, especially the virtues proper to the use of material goods, namely, temperance, prudence, justice, liberality and munificence. And the criterion or measure of the relative value of these instrumental goods is above all human need, not only for Aristotle, but throughout the writings of St. Thomas. 89 In commenting on Aristotle's discussion of commerce, St. Thomas approvingly cites the Philosopher's words "that human need embraces everything as a kind of measure." 90 Later, in discussing the corporal works of mercy, Aquinas points out the extent of our material needs when he notes that bodily need, as for food, clothing and occurs both in this life and even afterwards in the need for burial. Furthermore, there are bodily needs that are common to the very existence of life plus additional unique needs that come up in the lives of individual persons. 91 Moreover, the need for material goods extends to the household, the state and the whole society, as Aristotle points out. 92 Nevertheless, there are limitations, for Aristotle adds: the wealth that makes up the goods necessary for life are finite.... No craft has infinite tools . . . neither in quantity nor in size. . . . Therefore wealth ... is not infinite, but rather has some limit.98 In the Summa St. Thomas clarifies this necessary limitation of wealth still further. 94 But first there is a distinction to be made in the meaning of wealth itself: For wealth is twofold, namely natural and artificial. Natural. wealth is that which serves man as a remedy for his natural wants, •• In Eth. I, 1; IV, 5; In Pol. I, 7; De Regimine IV, i; Summa Theul. IT-IT, 77, 2 adS; 77, 4o. •• In Eth. V, 9. " 1 Ibid. n-n, u1, 6 ad 2. Cf. also s2, 2. •• In Pol. I, 6. . ""Ibid. Cf. I-ll, !t, 1 adS. •• Swmltoo Theol. I-ll, !t, 1 ad !t. Cf. ll-ll, 118, 1. VALUE, PRICE, AND ST. THOMAS 889 such as food, drink, clothing, transportation, housing and the like; while artificial wealth is that which is not a direct help to nature, e. g., money, but is invented by the art of man.95 After pointing out that man's happiness cannot consist in natural wealth, Aquinas places money lowest in his scale of values, since artificial wealth ''is not sought save for the sake man would not seek it except that, of natural wealth, by its means, he procures for himself the necessaries of life." 96 Money is simply and solely a means to higher ends. But unlike the desire for natural wealth, which is not infinite, " the desire for artificial wealth is infinite, for it is the servant of disordered concupiscence .... " 91 The miser is simply the person who seeks money as his last end. 98 The reasonable desire for natural wealth is not infinite because it provides for our natural sustenance " according to a certain measure." 99 This measure is not necessarily an absolute quantity, but rather a relative mean based on a rule of reason. 100 So it sometimes happens that what is excessivein relation to the quantity of an external thing may be moderate in relation to the rule of reason . . . this rule measures not only the size of a thing that is used, but also the circumstances of the person, and his intention, the fitness of place and time and such other things that are necessary in acts of virtue.101 Thus in his approach to material wealth, St. Thomas certainly shuns any extreme of destitution. In fact, he acknowl-: edges the harmful psychological effects of forced poverty. on the virtuous life when he. writes in the Summa: 85 Ibid. I-II, I. •• Ibid. I-II, 1 ad IY Ibid. Cf. In Pol. II, 9: .. Primo enim homini qui nihil habet videtur sufficiens quod habeat duos obolos; quos cum acquisiverit vel ex haereditate paterna accepit, semper videtur quod indigeat pluribus,_et hoc usque in infinitum." 88 Ibid. I-II, 16, 8. . •• Ibid. I-11, 1 ad 100 lfa Etk. V, 1; In Pol. V, 6. 101 Contra Gtmtilu m, lSi, 7. 840 ERNEST BARTELL not infrequently the fear of want that results from the experience of want hinders those who have acquired money from using it up by acting with liberality.102 Moreover," when the poor and the needy see that they do not have the things that others have, they envy them." 108 But when people " have enough goods they are not envious." 104 As a matter of fact, there is a relative absence of texts extolling the merits of poverty in St. Thomas' writings, despite the fact that monasticism had reached a high degree of development by his time. 105 Undoubtedly the monastic poverty which he himself practiced, although obviously a means of personal perfection, remained a matter of Christian counsel, not of natural or divine law. Instead, St. Thomas sees real value in the acquisition and use of material goods.106 He of course realizes the danger that men's passions bring to the use of external goods like power and wealth. 107 " It is difficult," he concludes, " to safeguard charity amid riches." 108 And so the use of material goods must be moderate, for their value via the criterion of human need is strictly subordinate to the virtuous life, which in itself is subordinate to man's supernatural end. Nevertheless, this moderation is not an absolute, but apparently allows for progress conditioned by the contingencies of time and place.109 Economics studies the allocation of available, relatively scarce material resources among possible alternative uses.110 Summa Theol. 11-II, 117, 4 ad 1. In Pol. IV, 10. 10 ' Ibid. 105 Leclercq, op. cit., p. 57. 108 Summa Theol. II-II, 188, 7: " ... necesse est enim hominem aliqualiter sollicitari de acquirendis vel conservandis exterioribus rebus. Sed si res exteriores non quaerantur vel habeantur nisi in modica quantitate, quantum sufficiunt ad simplicem victum, talis sollicitudo non multum impedit hominem. Unde nee perfectioni repugnat Christianae vitae." 101 In Pol. II, 9; Cf. In Pol. II, 8; IV, 10. 108 Summa Theol. II-II, 186, 8 ad 4. 100 Leclercq, op. cit., p. 65. 110 Bernard W. Dempsy, S. J., "Prudence, Providence and Economic Decision," Thought, XXXV, Spring, 1960, 16. Cf. Geo. J. Stigler, The Theory of Price (New York: Macmillan, 195le), pp. 8-4. 10 " 108 VALUE, PRICE, AND ST. THOMAS 841 Consistent with his hierarchy of values, there may have been in St. Thomas less emphasis on the scarcity of resources than in later economic thought, chiefly because of his reliance on Divine Providence. 111 Reliance upon the Providence of God to provide the necessities of life stems from the very nature of God, as we know Him, and from the very meaning of providence. For God Himself is absolute, unlimited good out of whose generosity springs all the good that is in creatures. The good of creatures, however, includes their order toward an end, "and especially their last end, which is divine goodness." 112 But because the order itself is good, it too has its origin in God. Divine Providence, on the other hand, " is nothing less than the type of the order of things toward an end," 118 This type or plan preexists in the infinite wisdom of that God who is also good and the Creator and end of all good. Thus it is reasonable to rely on the goodness of God to supply the necessities of human life in aCf'ordance with His divine plan for all creation. M DTality and Economic Activity Nevertheless, for St. Thomas as for all economists there is a deliberate human choice among alternatives to be made in every economic decision, and this choice presupposes an understood standard, a goal, an order of values.m For St. Thomas every deliberate act is a moral act, good or bad, depending upon its reasonableness with respect to the goal that is intended, and upon particular here-and-now circumstances. 115 According 111 Quodlibeta Vll, 7, 17: "Diversificatio hominum in diversis officiis contingit primo ex divina providentia, quae ita hominum status· distribuit, ut nihil unquil.m deese inveniatur de necessariis ad vitam." Cf. De Regimine Ill 11; In Pol. I, 8; scarcity see Dempsey, op. cit., pp. 19-22. For a different emphasis on Stigler, op. cit., p. 1: "The central element of the economic problem is scarcity." 112 Summa Theol. I, 22, 1. 113 Ibid. I, 22, 2. m Stigler, op. cit., p. 8; Cf. George H. Speltz, The ImpOTtance of Rural Life AccOTding to the Philosophy of St. Thomas Aquinas (Washington: The Catholic University of America Press, 1945), p. 76. 115 Summa Theol. I-II, 18, 9. ERNEST BARTELL as human acts are directed to special ends, to particular goods, they will be ordered by special virtues. 116 "Man's active life consists in the use of bodily goods," says Aquinas, " and hence the active life is directed by the virtues through which we make a right use of these goods." 117 It is the virtue of temperance that is to guide the use of external goods according to the rule of human need.118 " Temperance uses moderately " any material good that is not an outright hindrance to "health and sound condition of body," says St. Thomas, " according to the demands of place and time, and in keeping with those among whom one dwells." 119 He sums up the application of temperance to the rule of reasonable moderation when he concludes: . . . temperance regards need according to .the requirements of life, and this depends not only on the well-being of the body, but also on the fitness (convenientiam) of external goods, such as wealth and .station in life, and more still on the requirements of good conduct (convenientiam honestatis)· 120 The economic decision is a decision of direction, of reasonable governance over material resources in accord with their value in fulfilling the human needs dictated by the hierarchy of goals or ends of human life. Temperance is the virtue that governs one's overall attitude toward material wealth, but for St. Thomas it is prudence that is the virtue of reasoned ordering and governance for man, 121 not unlike the providence of God Himself: It belongs to prudence . . . to direct other things toward an end ... as for instance a man is said to be prudent, who orders well his acts towards the end of life.... 122 Ibid., II-II, 109, 2; cf. II-II, 81, 1; 114, 1; 187, 1. Contra Gentiles I, 92, 7. 118 Summa Theol., 11-ll, 141, 6: "Temperantia accipit necessitatem huius vitae sicut regulam delectabilium quibus utuntur: ut scilicet tantum eis utatur quantum · necessitas huius vitae requirit." 110 Ibid. 11-II, 141, 6 ad 2. uo Ibid. 11-11, 141, 6 ad 8. 121 Ibid. 11-11, 50, 1. 122 Ibid. I, 22. 1. ·cf. II-II, 4.7. 10. 118 117 VALUE, PRICE, AND ST. THOMAS 848 In the providence of God, of course, there is no ordering toward an end outside Himself, since He Himself is the end of aU that is.128 Prudence for Aquinas is principally an intellectual virtue, for it must basically recognize objectively the ends to be achieved by various human actions, or in other words, it must make evaluations. 124 But value as we have seen involves a relation between the human appetite and the good, and so the prudential evaluation will in some way be a practical moral one too, since its matter includes a right ordering of the human will or appetite to those ends to be achieved here and now.125 The prudent man must not only decide that a certain quality shoe at a certain price would satisfy his needs, but his decision must follow through to an effective willingness to accept here and now this bargain on this pair of shoes. Because prudence must direct a person to an immediate, practical concrete choice or action, it draws into its proper scope many other human virtues. " Memory, understanding and foresight, as also caution and docility and the like, are not virtues distinct from prudence, but are related to it as integral parts." 126 Even shrewdness plays a valid role in prudence, one which St. Thomas oddly enough likens to that of docility. 127 Since prudence concerns the voluntary direction of means toward ends, it must have a reference to that common good which is the one supernatural end of all human life.128 There is moreover a whole hierarchy of temporal social goods related to one another in their ordering to the highest common good, but distinct enough as ends of action to warrant a hierarchy of distinct species of prudence. Thus St. Thomas speaks not only of individual prudence, but of political and domestic or economic prudence according to the objects of their acts. 129 '""Ibid. ,., Ibid. II-II, 47, 1; I-II, 57, 4; 1-11, 58, s ad 1. m Ibid. 1-11, 61, 1. 106 Ibid. 1-11, 57, 6 ad 4. Cf. 11-11, 48, 1. , .. Ibid. II-11, 49, 4. 108 Ibid. 1-11, 1, 6. 129 Ibid. II-11, 47, 1i. 844 ERNEST BARTELL True prudence then, even when considered in its subordinate and subjective parts will be perfect when it is direCted" to the common end of all human life," and imperfect, but still true prudence when it is directed to some particular good end apart from the common end, as " when a man devises fitting ways of conducting business ... he is called a prudent business-man." 130 The fully prudent man thus should regard not only private goods or individual values, but also the common good of the whole society. 131 After all, the person who seeks the common good of men is thereby seeking his own good for at least two reasons: First, because the individual good is impossible without the common good of the family, state or kingdom.... Secondly, because, since man is a part of the home and the civil society, he must consider what is good for him by being prudent about the good of many .132 What St. Thomas calls " economic " prudence is one species or subjective part of prudence, one that stands midway between the prudence of the single individual and that of the whole society. 133 It is that brand of prudence which "is directed to the common good of the household." 134 The household for St. Thomas was a basic social unit of production and consumption, a unit that exists logically and perhaps historically prior to the market division and exchange of labor and property. 135 The functional household, e. g., an agrarian manor under the direction of a prudent householder, provides a relatively easy framework for placing and evaluating basic economic needs and their satisfaction in the whole structured finality of human life.136 Ibid. II-II, 47, IS. Cf. I-II, 57, 4 ad S. Ibid. II-II, 50, I ad 1. Cf. II-II, 50, 4; I, 22, 1;, II-II, 47, 10; II-II, 47, 11. 13 " Ibid. II-II, 47, 10 ad 2. 188 In Eth. VI, 7; Summa Theol. II-II, 47, 11; 50, S. 18 ' Summa Theol. II-II, 47, 11. Cf. Dempsey, op. cit., p. 27. 135 In Pol. I, 7. 186 In Pol. I, 1: St. Thomas comments here on Aristotle's functional description of the household under the governance of the oeconomus, a governance constituted by two relationships: the generation of offspring and the everyday activities that pertain 180 181 VALUE, PRICE, AND ST. THOMAS 845· Perhaps it is not too far-fetched to compare the household examples in the thought of St. Thomas to the Robinson Crusoe models of classical economics. The immediate task of the prudent householder is the distribution of material goods as needed for living well or virtuously. 131 His economic task is not one of actual production, ·which belongs to the arts and crafts, but rather one of allocation of the goods which exist for his nourisment. 138 Morality and Economic Knowledge The economic decision is thus a voluntary moral act and so the branch of human knowledge that studies economic acts will be a branch of moral science.139 Moral science studies not the rational techniques of manufacturing proper to the mechanical arts, but rather it considers voluntary human acts as they are ordered to one another and to an end. 140 Moreover, for St. Thomas some knowledge is completely speculative, some completely practical and some is partly speculative and partly practical. Knowledge is partly speculative and partly practical when it is possible to consider speculatively some knowledge, e. g., moral knowledge, that is ordered to a practical end. 141 This may well have been what St. Thomas had in mind more than a decade earlier when he wrote that economics " is a speculative habit, that is, reflective and practical." 142 At that time he divided economic knowledge to the general welfare of the household, e. g., providing for food, heat and shelter. Cf. In Etk. I, 1; Speltz, op. cit., p. 6: "It was comparatively easy in the agrarian way of life advocated by Aristotle and Aquinas for the people to retain a true evaluation of bodily goods as opposed to external goolis, the former having a fixed relation to the needs of the various households. They were educated to a true sense of value through the prevailing practice of the institutions of the time." Cf. Henri Pirenne, Economic and Social History of EuTope (New York: Harcourt, Brace, 1956), p. 64. 187 In Pol. I, 8. 188Ibid. 189 In Etk. I, 1. uo Ibid. " 1 Swmnna Xkeol. I, 14, 16. "" S Sent. d. SS, q. S. a. 1, qla. 4. 346 ERNEST BARTELL " into paternal economics, when it is appropriate for the head of the household, and into economics absolutely so-called." 143 Economics then will be morally normative and will have the same place in the hierarchy of human knowledge that economic ends have in the hierarchy of ends of human acts," since the end is to practical matters what the principle is to speculative matters." 144 Thus in his Commentary on the Politics of Aristotle, St. Thomas takes note of the classical division between the liberal and the servile sciences. On one hand, some science is free or liberal " because through this kind of knowledge man is intellectually disposed to his proper end." 145 On the other hand, ... that knowledgewhich disposes man relative to the good of the body itself and to external goods is called servile, since it is related to man's good in so far as it should serve him in a mechanical way.... Likewise, among the servile pursuits the more servile one is the one in which the intellect or reason is more depressed into practical matters, and niatters more remote from man as man. For example, the kind of knowledge that is ordered to external goods is more servile than that which is ordered to the good of the body.... 146 Economic knowledge is not specifically mentioned. Insofar as it is ordered to external goods, it is certainly servile knowledge, but insofar as it presupposes a scale of proper ends or values of human life, it has a relation to liberal knowledge. Economic knowledge properly used would seem to be included in that servile knowledge whose " purpose is the advancement of one's own virtue." 147 " Such knowledge is neither wicked or illiberal." 148 In sum, " the disciplines that are ordered to occupations, or activities, or external work " are necessary but are not absolute goods in themselves, just as the external goods which are the object of economic decisions are necessary, but ua Ibid. "'Summa Tkeol. II-II, 1 '" In Pol. VIII, I. 1 .a Ibid. 147 Ibid. us Ibid. 7 ad i. Cf. In Etk. I, I. VALUE, PRICE, AND ST. THOMAS 847 strictly goods.149 In his Commentary on the Ethics of Aristotle St. Thomas applies these principles when he notes that Aristotle requires political science to use economic science for its own higher end, the common good of society .150 Knowledge of variable and contingent matters, e. g., concrete prudential economic choices, cannot approach the certitude of science, because they are known only as singular data of sense knowledge, according to Aristotle. 151 Nevertheless, St. Thomas points out later in the Summa that " there are some sciences of contingent matters, such as moral sciences." 152 Even contingent things must have in them something necessary and hence universal according to the metaphysics of St. Thomas/ 53 Furthermore, it is the intellect alone, not the senses, that has the universal for its object. And so St. Thomas concludes that even contingent matters are known indirectly by the intellect, and whatever universal and necessary principles govern them are known only by the intellect. Otherwise, the very operation of prudence itself would be frustrated, since it requires the application of universal norms, e. g., in medio stat virtus, to the contingent circumtances of particular situations. Hence, when we consider the things that are the subject matter of science, some· sciences, such as the moral sciences, are of contingent matters. 15 "' St. Thomas, however, does not wholly deny Aristotle's point about the lack of certitude in contingent matters, for elsewhere in the Summa he quotes Aristotle on the same subject and· himself concludes: Consequently, in contingent matters such as natural and human things, it is enough for a thing to be certain if it is true in the greater number of instances (ut in pluribus) , although it may be lacking sometimes in a few cases.155 150 Swmma Theol. I, 86, 8. Ibid. 158 Ibid. ••• In Eth. I, !a. 154 Ibid. 151 In Eth. VI, 6. m Ibid., 1-11, 96, 1 ad 8; cf. In Eth. V, 16: "De quibusdam non est possibile quod 1 '" dicatur aliquid verum in universali, sicut de contingentibus; de quibus etsi aliquid sit vemm ut in pluribus, ut in paucioribus tamen deficit." 848 ERNEST BARTELL Value and Economic Exchange The scope of economics expands as its subject matter expands beyond the economic activities of the household. Because man is a social animal, because he is not self-sufficient, even within the society of the household, trade is necessary along with a separation of production from consumption. St. Thomas, as we have seen, acknowledges the legitimate existence of exchange. However, the moral dangers connected with trade may have influenced his judgment that the activities of traders, although legitimate and necessary, were more remote from the exchange proper to the necessities of life than were the activities of the householder, the oeconomus strictly so-called.156 It is perhaps no historical coincidence either that St. Thomas' most complete ex professo treatment of buying and selling is included under the more general topic of fraud in one of the questions of the Secunda Secundae dealing with sins against the virtue of justice. Nevertheless, exchange is sufficiently basic to be considered by St. Thomas one of the two fundamental uses of material goods. In his Commentary on the Politics he explains Aristotle's conception of this twofold use: FiJ:st he says that ... we should accept the principle that there is a twofold use of everything. These two uses agree in the fact that each of them is essential (secundum se) and not accidental (per accidens) . They differ, however, because one of them is the personal (proprius) use of something, the other is not personal, but common (communis) .157 To illustrate the twofold use of things, St. Thomas then employs the familiar example of shoes that can be used both as wearing apparel and as a medium of exchange. Again he stresses the fact that, although the exchange use is not the proprius usus, it is nonetheless an usus per se and not secundum accidens, because the person who exchanges shoes does so 166 Ibid. II-II, 77, 4. Cf. II-II, 56, 2 ad 2: "Praecipue autem solet fraus exerceri et dolus in emptione et venditione." 107 In Pol. I, 7. VALUE, PRICE, AND ST. THOMAS 849 " according to their value." At about the same time or a little St. Thomas uses this same Aristotelian distinction, additionally qualifying the propri:us usus as " principal " and the usus communis as" secondary." 158 Thus, besides distinguishing between value considered in itself and the economic value in man's uses of material goods, it is reasonable to distinguish between the use value and the exchange value of economic goods themselves.159 These values are not unrelated, however, for all participate in the objectivity of good itself and trace their ultimate origin and end to the same good. The values are as analogically related as the goods they express. Since the time of St. Thomas, of course, history has seen the business firm, the labor union and industry replace the domestic productive plant, as social institutions lying midway between the individual and the whole of civil society and subject to economic prudence. 160 This modern organization built around exchange has institutionalized even more emphatically the twofold use and value, i. e., personal and common, of material goods. If the institution of exchange does not finally create value as such, it does express economic value in terms of monetary price. The precious metals may very well possess useful value in themselves/61 but in as early a writing as the Commentary on the Sentences, St. Thomas states that money itself lacks such usefulness. Rather, "it is the measure of the usefulness of other things." 162 De Malo 18, 4 ad 15. Oswald von Nell-Breunig, S. J., " The Concept of a Just Price," Review of Social Economy, Vill (1950), 111-5. A. Sandoz, "La Notion de juste prix," Revue Tkomiste, XXIII (1989), new series, 286. 180 Dempsey, op. cit., p. Cf. John F. Cronin, S. S., Social Principles aruJ, Economic Life (Milwaukee: Bruce, 1959), pp. 178-80 for position of labor unions. 181 Summa Theol. II-II, 77, ad 1. 18 • S Sent. d. 87, q. 1, a. 6: " ... aliae res ex seipsis habent aliquam utilitatem, pecunia autem non, sed est mensura utilitatis aliarum rerum ... Et ideo pecuniae usus non habet mensuram utilitatis ex ipsa pecunia sed ex rebus quae per pecuniam mensurantur secundum industriam ejus qui pecuniam ad res transmutat." 168 168 850 ERNEST BARTELL Later, in the Commentary on the Ethics of Aristotle, St. Thomas summarizes the role of money as a means of exchange and a standard of value: First Aristotle says that, to equalize the products of the various crafts so that they can be exchanged, all of those that can be exchanged should be somehow comparable to one another, so that we may know which of them is worth more and which less. Money ... was invented for this purpose, because through it the prices of these goods are measured. Thus ... [money] becomes a kind of medium whereby everything is valued .... 168 Monetary price will thus express value in exchange. The true price for St. Thomas, because it accurately expresses should be consistent with the whole hierarchy of ends which economic goods serve: individual material needs, common or social needs, the virtuous life and ultimately the man's own supernatural end. It is this scale of values that economic prudence should bring to the market, for every economic decision presupposes some order of values.165 The need for exchange implies also the division of labor and property, which, along with the notion of exchange, are by no means foreign to the economic thought of St. Thomas. As Aristotle showed, exchange and the division of property went hand in hand: The first exchange began in the things that nature provides for the necessities of human life, because some men had an abundance of these things, while others were short on them. . . . As a more extensive community grew up . . . some people were separated, in many different goods as well. Therefore, since these goods had been divided, it was necessary that exchange arise .... 166 The division of goods as embodied in the institution of private property does not of itself create value, any more than exchange itself does; but it does clarify and emphasize it, and In Etk. V, 9. Cf. Summa Tkeol. II-II, 78, 1. Summa Tkeol. II-II, 77, I. 165 John R. Hicks, Value and Capital (Oxford, Clarendon Press, 1950), p. 55. 168 In. Pol. I, 7. Cf. Summa Tkeol. I-II, 105, 168 1 "' VALUE, PRICE, AND ST. THOMAS 351 in this sense contributes to the satisfaction of human need. For value implies a relation with the appetite, and private property certainly institutionalizes this value-relation. As Aquinas comments, "Aristotle says that he can scarcely express how pleasant it is to count something as one's own property." 167 Of course, a certain amount of attention is required in caring for one's possessions. But St. Thomas is satisfied as long as virtue is kept the rule of need: So long as external things are sought or possessed only in a small quantity and as much as is required for ordinary livelihood, such care does not greatly hinder one; and consequently is not inconsistent with the perfection of Christian life.168 Man is so much more likely to appreciate and care properly for what is his own, that St. Thomas concludes that private ownership is " necessary to human life." 169 Economic prudence, however, always has regard for the common good, and prudential decisions about property and private ownership are no exception: With regard to possessions, it is a very good thing, says Aristotle (II Pol. 2) , that the things possessed should be distinct, but that the use thereof should be partly common, and partly granted to others by the will of the possessors.170 The virtuous man who owns property will recognize in it the opportunity for practicing the virtues of liberality and munificence.171 "According to the proverb ... the things that belong to friends are common to them." 172 Moreover, in extreme need," all things are common property, so that in my opinion there would be no sin in taking another's property." 178 Although not contrary'to naturallaw,m private Ibid. II, 4. Summa Theol. II-II, 188, 7. 169 Ibid. II-II, 66, 170 Ibid. I-II, 105, Cf. II-II, 5 ad 171 Ibid. II-II, qq. II7, 184. Cf. Contra Gentilea ill, 184, 7. 17 " In Pol. IT, 4. 173 Summa Theol. II-II, 66, 7. m Ibid. II-II, 66, ad I. Cf. I-II, 94, 5 ad 8. 187 18 " 35fl ERNEST BARTELL property is, after all, a human addition to it, to the natural order of things, and so must remain subordinate to natural law. H usefulness in the satisfaction of the needs of man's nature is what leads to the human institution of property, then that institution must always be subject to the overriding demands of human nature, to the common end and need that is the origin of the institution itself. Obviously, however, before an individual can determine that all things are common property, he must make a prudential comparison of his individual need to the needs of mankind being served under the institution of private property. In addition, St. Thomas does not fail to point out that private ownership is a hindrance to persons striving for religious perfection. Even the care that one takes of a moderate amount of wealth pertains to the love of self in temporal affairs; whereas religious perfection pertains to charity and the lo,ve of God to the exclusion of self.175 Like the division of property, the division of labor does not of itself create value, but it leads to increased output and efficiency.176 In a discussion of manual labor in one of the Quodlibeta St. Thomas offers two reasons for specialization. The first is the familiar inability of the individual to perform all the functions necessary for human social life.177 Here to9 economic prudence looks to the common good, for Aquinas uses as an analogy the orderly functioning of the Mystical Body of Christ in the diversity of its members. The second reason suggests a natural value-relation: A second reason arises from natural causes because as a result of these, there are in different men different inclinations to different jobs, and even to different ways of life.178 Ibid. IT"n, 188, 7. Ibid. IT-IT, 40, " Diversa autem a diversis melius et expeditius aguntur quam ab uno ... Et quaedam negotia sunt adeo sibi repugnantia ut convenienter simul exerceri non possint." 177 Quodlibeta vn, 7, 17. 178 Ibid. 17 " 178 VALUE, PRICE, AND ST. THOMAS 353 Morality and Economic Exchange With the institution of exchange and tp.e division of property and labor that accompany it temperance and prudence are no longer the only virtues that underlie the economic decision. For exchange adds to the economic decision the notion of dealing with another. And justice is the virtue whose proper subject matter " consists in those things that belong to our dealings with others." 179 The object of justice consists in rendering that which is due to another according to some equivalence or equality. 180 Thus economics remains normative after its subject matter is expanded to include exchange among persons. There is what St. Thomas calls an " economic justice " proper to the household, but this pertains to the relations between husband and wife.181 The justice that most immediately applies to market exchange is the commutative justice that " consists in mutual giving and receiving, as in buying and selling and other kinds of exchange." 182 Basically, commutative justice " is concerned with the mutual dealings of two persons." 188 Using Aristotle's terminology in the Commentary on the Ethics, St. Thomas calls it " a species of particular justice which consists in the rectitude of justice in exchanges, since in these exchanges something is transferred by one person to another." 18 ' There is, however, another kind of particular justice, called distributive justice, which " consists in the distribution of some common goods which are to be divided among those who associate by civil agreement." 185 The distribution of any external good falls under this kind of particular justice. " It may be honor, or money ... it may be labor, expenses and the like." 186 Whereas in commutative justice there is an exchange between Summa Theol. II-II, 58, I. Cf. II-II, 57, 4; 58, 2; 61, I. Ibid. I-II, 60, 8 ad I. Cf. II-II, 58, 2; 1-11, 114, 1. 181 In Eth. V, 11. 182 Summa Theol. I, 21, 1. Cf. In Etk. V, 4. 188 Ibid. II-II, 61, I. 18 ' In Etk. V, 4. 18• Ibid. 186 Ibid. 179 180 354 ERNEST BARTELL individuals, in distributive justice there is a transfer of some external good from a society or group of individuals. 187 Commutative justice seeks an equality of thing to thing 188 between individuals who are considered only in relation to one another. 189 But distributive justice seeks equality between person and person with respect to some external good insofar as those persons are related as parts of a whole society or group. 190 Examples used in the Commentary on the Ethics indicate that for Aristotle and perhaps for St. Thomas distributive justice was operative, not only between a state and its citizens, but in the distribution of external goods by any society. 191 St. Thomas appears to concur in his earlier Commentary on the Sentences of Peter Lombard, where both commutative and distributive justice are linked together by one general end, the transfer of the necessities of life.192 However, by the time the Summa Theologiae was written some seventeen years later, St. Thomas restricted the emphasis in distributive justice to the relationship between the individual and the civil society, between ruled and ruler. 193 Although at one time moral theologians applied norms of distributive justice to the determination of wages and corporate dividends, modern moralists restrict the emphasis in distributive justice to the relations between the civil government and its citizens.194 St. Thomas himself Ibid. In Eth. V, 8; II II, 61, 189 Summa Theol. II-II, 61, 1. 190 Ibid. II-II, 61, 1 & 191 In Eth. V, 4: " .•. ex hoc fiunt pugnae et accusationes quasi sit iustitia praetermissa; quia vel aequalies non recipiunt aequalia in distributione bonorum communium, vel non aequalibus dantur aequa: puta si inaequaliter laborantibus dantur inaequalia." In Eth. V, 6: " Dicit ergo primo quod iustum supradictum semper est distributivum communium bonorum ... Puta in negotiationibus, quanto aliquis plus posuit in societatem, tanto maiorem partem accipit. Et in civitatibus quanto aliquis servivit communitati, tanto plus accipit de bonis communibus." 199 IV Sent. d. 17, q. 1, a. I, qla. I: "Uno enim modo est specialis virtus aequalitatem constituens in commutationibus et distributionibus communicabilium bonorum quae sunt necessaria in vita." 193 Summa Theol. II-II, 6I, I, I. 194 Cronin, op. cit., pp. Cf. H. Noldin, S. J. and A. Schmitt, S. J., Summa Theologiae Moralis (Oeuiponte: Feliauus Rauch, I957), II, 1•• 188 VALUE, PRICE, AND ST. THOMAS 355 as early as the Ccnnmenta'T'Jjon the Sentences used the example of wages due to a laborer in a vineyard as an example of commutative rather than distributive justice. 195 Besides these two forms of particular justice, Aristotle defined the general virtue called legal justice, which includes in its subject matter all the virtues. 196 Legal justice differs however from general virtue because it adds to general virtue the essential note of ad alterum, the" relation to another" that defines justice of any kind. In this case the " other " is not another individual butthe happiness of the community of men embraced in the common good.197 St. Thomas points out that the name of legal justice can thus be given to every virtue in so far as the latter is directed to the common good.198 " Speaking in this way," concludes Aquinas, " legal justice is essentially the same as all virtue, but differs therefrom logically." 199 Aristotle relates legal justice to the good of the civil society or city-state, and · St. Thomas concurs. 200 Later thoughts,· including modern papal teaching, have expanded the application of legal justice to all of society under the title of social justice. 201 The social injustice that has been the modern concern would thus seem to be a special vice corresponding to the injustice which St. Thomas finds opposed to legal justice. " This is essentially a special vice," he say," insofar as it regards a special object, namely the common good which it contemns." 202 Since justice of any kind involves the transfer of what is due to another according to some " equality," 208 there is implied a m Sent. d. 88, q. 8, a. 4, qla. 5 ad 2. In Eth. V, 2. 1 " Ibid. Cf. 4 Sent. d. 17, q. 1, a. 1, qla 1; In Eth. V, 8; Sum'TI/4 Theol. 1-11, 60, ' 8 ad 2; 11-11 58, 5; 11-11, 59, 1. 198 Swmnna Theol. 11-11, 58, 6; Cf. 1-11, 61, 5 ad 4. 199 Ibid. Cf. 8um'TII4 Theol. I-11, 60, 8 ad 2. " 00 In Eth. 2. 801 Cronin, op. cit., pp. 62-65; 78-76; Dempsey, op. cit., pp.- 81-82. Cf. Sum'TI/4 Theol. 1-11, 100, 5: "Ad pro:ximos autem aliquis bene se habet ..• generaliter...• Generaliter autem quantum ad omnes, ut nulli nocumentum inferatur." 195 198 soa Swmnna TheoZ. 11-11, 59, 1. 808 Ibid. 11-11, 58, 1 and 2. 856 ERNEST BARTELL relation and equation of values presupposing a given standard of values. Acts of justice are external human acts related to another / 04 and so the equality that justice demands can be measured by an almost mathematical ratio or proportion, which Aristotle in the Metaphysics calls a mean. In the case of justice the mean looks not merely to the condition of persons as does the mean in other virtues. 205 Rather, the mean of justice equalizes as well the external things that are the matter of acts of justice. 206 In commutative justice the two parties are treated as equals, so there is simply a strict equality to be maintained between thing and thing. For Aristotle and St. Thomas this equality can be expressed by an arithmetic mean or progression which simply equalizes two quantities. 207 "No consideration is given to the diverse condition (proportio) of persons." 208 In distributive justice, however, the mean is established by a four-term geometric proportion, so that goods are divided in the same ratio that divides the persons who are to share the goods. In the example used in St. Thomas' Commentary, Socrates receives two pounds for having worked two days, while Plato receives one pound for a single day's work.209 A kind of geometric proportion in addition to the arithmetic mean of commutative justice is applied to economic exchange value by Aristotle and by St. Thomas in the Commentary on the Ethics: ... we should use a proportion to establish an equality of things insofar as the action of one craftsman is greater than the action of another; as building a house is greater than making a knife. So if the builder exchanges his action for the action of the craftsman, there would not be an equality of the thing given and received; namely, of the house and the knife. 210 ••• Ibid. II-II, 58, 8; 58, 9 corp and ad 2. ••• Ibid. II-II, 58, 10. ••• Ibid. II-IT, 58, 9 ad 2; 58, 10. ••• In Etk. V, 6. Cf. Summa Tkeol. II-ll, 58, 10 sed contra. •• 8 Ibid. ••• Ibid. V, 5. 210 Ibid. V, 8. VALUE, PRICE, AND ST. THOMAS 857. Unless a value-relation like the one schematically outlined in this proportion is expressed in market prices, exchange itself will be threatened and the just price that St. Thomas describes later in the Sumnia will be impossible.211 Some recent commentators contend that Aristotle intended the application of the principle of proportionality in exchange to constitute actually another category of justice known as reciprocal justice and rendered in the medieval Latin translations of Aristotle as contrapassum. 212 According to these theories, there is a direct analogy to be made between Aristotle's divisions of justice and the three mathematical proportions known to Pythagorean mathematical theory. The means of commutative and distributive justice would correspond respectively to· the arithmetic and geometric proportions, while reciprocal justice would correspond to a harmonic mean of Archytas that embodies a principle of reciprocation already known to Pythagorean philosophy. 218 In sum, Aristotle probably solved the determination of exchange value in the framework of a twofold mathematical scheme.214 First of all there is established a geometric proportion of ratios that compare relative want or need satisfaction of goods to persons, e. g., of goods to their makers and to their customers. In this way the skill of one person in satisfying human needs with his own product, e. g., the builder and his building, can be related to the product of another man's skill, e. g., the craftsman's knife. And so the basis for a bargain between the two goods can be established in relation to their respective satisfaction of human needs. Then the actual bargain value struck in exchange is expressed by the arithmetic mean that cqrrects or equalizes the individuals' own estimations of the relative values of the goods. Both St. Albert the Great and St. Thomas in their Commen" 11 Summa Theol. 11-11, 77, 1. m Josef Soudek, "Aristotle's Theory of Exchange: An Inquiry into the Origin of Economic Analysis," Proceedings of the American Philosophical Society, 96, Feb. 1952, 45-75. Cf. Baldwin, op. cit., pp. 11, 62. " 13 Ibid. pp. 58-8. •u Ibid. pp. 58-64. 358 ERNEST BARTELL taries on the Ethics of Aristotle, and St. Thomas in his Summa Theologiae explicitly acknowledge only two kinds of particular justice, distributive and commutative. 215 However, St. Thomas in the Summa acknowledges the principle of just reciprocation, of contrapassum, as a principle of commutative justice operative in voluntary economic exchange in order to establish equality in the exchange of things that are of unequal value in themselves. Contrapassum, as a determinant of monetary price, establishes the necessary equality of value for a .just price by taking into consideration the condition of persons " according to a proportionate measure." 218 Economic Value and Market Price It is thus possible, at least in theory, for a normal market price to meet the standards of the just price of St. Thomas. Human need, as Aristotle and St. Thomas saw it in light of higher spiritual needs, provides the foundation for the utility or want satisfaction of material goods. It is this " subjective " element made objective by the natural necessity for exchange that is the basis for a theory of demand that must dominate in the determination of normal· market price. 217 And it is the principles of commutative justice that provide the moral norms for relating in terms of monetary price the respective values of goods through the prudential economic decisions of those who constitute or influence the market itself. Moreover, a theory which holds that normal market price can be the just price squares well with the statements of St. Thomas in the Summa on deviations from the just price. First of all, he states that a merchant may not raise his price 216 St. Albert the Great, Ethica, V, 2, 9 in Opera O'IMiia 7: 855. St. Thomas AquinDll, In Eth. V; 8; Summa Theol. ll-ll, 61, 1. 818 Summa Theol. ll-ll, 61, 4: " ... etiam nee in commutationibus voluntariis semper esset aequalis passio si aliquis daret rem suam, accipiens rem alterius: quia forte res alterius est multo maior quam sua.-Et ideo oportet secundum quandam proportionatam commensurationem adaequare pWISionem actioni in commutationibus: ad quod inventa sunt numismata. Et sic contrapWISUin est commutativum justum." 217 Cf. Hicks, op. cit., chaps. I and IT. VALUE, PRICE, AND ST. THOMAS 359 to one customer, just because the product would be of exceptional utility to this particular buyer, and he would be willing to pay extra for it: For the utility which accrues to the other party [the buyer] does not proceed from the seller, but from the condition of the buyer; and no one should sell to another what is not his own.218 The moral principle that a seller is not free to profit from the subjective condition of a single buyer seems to implicitly assume a . notion of utility like that behind any normal theory of demand. Moreover, there can be implied further in such a moral judgment a standard for comparing the subjective value of a good to a single individual with the just price itself. The most obvious standard of comparison for a moral judgment would seem to be the normal market price, for, assuming virtuous inclinations, it reflects the subjective evaluations of all buyers in relation to available quantities and alternatives. Secondly, given his views on the lack of certitude in our knowledge of contingent matters, it is consistent with market price that St. Thomas allows for small fluctuations in the just price due to error. 219 He attributes the error to the fact that the just price cannot always be determined exactly (punctaliter) , but consists more in a kind of estimation (quadam estimatione) .220 A comparison such as this again seems to be most readily validated in the context of normal market price. Moreover, St. Thomas allows for fluctuations in the just price of the kind that are normally associated with the demand · determinants of the normal market price, e. g., variations in time and place/ 21 as well as the important part that scarcity plays in the determination of price. 222 St. Thomas even justifies the withholding of information by a seller about a future increase in supply in order to uphold present demand and seeure 218 Summa Tkeol. ll-ll, 77, I. ••• Ibid. n-n, 77, 1 ad 1. ••o Ibid . ... Ibid. n-n, 77, 4 ad 2. """ In Pol. I, 9: " Alia istorum [animalium] in aliis regionibus abundant; ut scilicet emant in loco ubi abundant, et vendant in loco ubi sunt cara." 860 ERNEST BARTELL a higher price in the present market. 228 He justifies a moderate profit of the seller on the grounds that a merchant's activities are ordered to supplying the necessities of life to the needy, to households and to the commonwealth. 224 Economic Value and Law The place of law in the determination of exchange value cannot be overlooked. In fact, some have held that the market price itself participates in the nature of law. 225 For St. Thomas law is an ordinance of practical reason ordered to the common good, a rule or measure of acts whereby men are led to perform some acts and restrained in the performance of others. 226 Because law is a principle of reasonable human acts, the common good as the proper end of law is structured like common good as the end of virtuous activity. 227 Consequently, law has first of all a relationship to happiness. This relationship extends both to the common good that is man's ultimate happiness, which St. Thomas knows from revelation to be the beatific vision, as well as to the general welfare of society with reference to the virtuous life which is the temporal beginning of man's eternal happiness through the life of grace. And law itself is of more than one kind. There is an eternal law in the very divine reason that providentially governs the entire universe. 228 There is a natural law whereby the rational creature participates in this eternallaw. 229 There is finally human law whereby human reason exercises this participation under divine providence through its own reasonable determinations in particular matters proper to human sociallife. 280 Thus law, even human positive law, has a relation to morality ••• Summa· Tkeol. ll-11, 77, 8 ad 4. Market manipulations were not unknown to St. Thomas; cf. In Pol. I, 9, where with tongue in cheek he tells an anecdote about the philosopher, Thales Milesius, who once used his knowledge of philosophy to comer the market in olives! ••• Ibid. II-ll, 77, 4. ••• Summa Theol. I-II, 90, 1 and 2. ••• Ibid. I-ll, 91, 1. ••• Sandoz, op. cit., pp. 289-91. ••• Ibid. I-ll, 91, 2. ••o Ibid. I-ll, 91, 8. "" 1 Ibid. I-ll, 90, 2. Vd. supra pp. 842-848. VALUE, PRICE, AND ST. THOMAS 361 in its direction of human acts to end, ultimately to their common end in the divine goodness. But human law is not to be identified with morality on two counts. First, its end is the general welfare of a society of many persons, " the majority of whom are not perfect in virtue." 281 And so it cannot be expected to repress all the vices which truly virtuous people avoid, but only those whose prohibition is necessary to maintain human society. Furthermore, human law can prescribe acts proper to all the virtues, since every virtue can be referred to the common good of society. But only those acts can be prescribed which can be ordered to this .common good.282 St. Thomas notes further on in the Summa that man's social life pertains to justice, whose proper function is the direction of a community. And so he concludes: Therefore human law makes precepts only about acts of justice, and if it commands acts of other virtues, this is only in so far as they assume the nature of justice. 283 Moreover, in light of the necessary lack of certitude which St. Thomas finds in our knowledge of contingent matters, due to an intrinsic lack of intelligibility in them, it seems reasonable to conclude to a place in his thought for authority in the contingent and variable area of economic exchange involving the usus communis and exchange value of goods. After all, the most perfect knowledge possible of variable and contingent matters, like the whole world of economic exchange, will not scientifically or demonstrably narrow alternative possibilities for achieving common ends to a single necessary choice.284 In fact, in terms of a common end to be achieved, increased knowledge may often increase the number of alternatives available to attain a common end. Reliance upon the automatic working of the market is one alternative available for achieving in part the ••• Ibid. I-IT, 96, !!. ••• Ibid. I-IT, 96, 8. ••• Ibid. I-IT, 100, !!. ••• Yves R. Simon, "Common Good and Common Action," The Review of Politics, !!2, No. 2 (April, 1960), 216-218. 862 ERNEST BARTELL temporal common good. But it need not be the sole and unanimous one, even assuming virtuous inclinations on the part of all. Hence, without infringing on the natural law itself, a place may be naturally assigned to the determining role of authority. 235 There seems to be, nonetheless, a scarcity of texts in the writings of St. Thomas concerning positive legal regulation of markets, prices and other economic affairs. Once in the Summa he comments upon the principle of laesio enormis, a principle as old as Roman law and one used by canonists of the Middle Ages.236 The principle of laesio enormis provided for legally enforced restitution to the injured party of a contract