Natural Law I: Can the Natural Law Change? (Abraham, Hosea, Custom and Circumstance) and Whether It Can Be Wiped from the Heart

Orientation #

He picks up at Article 5 of the question on natural law, reading the objections, and near the end announces “Go to Article Six here now.” He refers back to what was said “above” about first and secondary precepts (prev. lecture). The previous class treated aa. 2-3 and opened a. 4 on whether natural law is the same for all.

The class, in order #

1. First objection of a. 5 and a digression on God’s will to save all (“the correction of the natural law”) #

The objection: a gloss (his footnote says Rabanus) on Ecclesiasticus says the written law is given “as regards the correction of the natural law”; what is corrected is changed; therefore natural law changes. He calls the argument “strange” and says the gloss “sounds heretical to me.”

Digression, from his morning reading in the Sentences: does God will everyone to be saved? Thomas takes the negative; the first objection quotes St Paul. Two explanations:

• Damascene: distinguish God’s antecedent will (what He wills considering us simply as human beings with human nature) from His consequent will (taking into account circumstances, our willingness to accept grace).
• Augustine: take it of the consequent will, i.e. God wills everyone who is saved to be saved; or, someone of every class or type of man is saved — professors, workers, farmers, mechanics, “even some politicians.”

A student prefers Augustine as more precise. Berquist prefers Damascene: St Paul “didn’t say he wills everybody who’s saved to be” saved; Augustine “seems a little more stretched.” Thomas does not rank them but in the body of the article follows Damascene.

Aside: the Sentences sometimes cast extra light, being more explicit or approached differently, but follow Lombard’s order rather than the Summa’s (Trinity before the substance of God).

2. The second and third objections (“these are found to be changed by God”) #

Second objection: killing the innocent, adultery and theft are against natural law, yet God changed these — Abraham commanded to kill Isaac (Genesis 22), the Jews commanded to carry off the borrowed vessels of the Egyptians, Hosea commanded to take a fornicating wife (Hosea 1:2 (inferred)). Aside: the taking of Egyptian spoils is used (he thinks) as an image of Christians taking over from the pagans “the glory of Aristotle,” which belongs to us as rightful owners.

Third objection: Isidore, Etymologies, says common possession of all things and one liberty belong to natural law, yet human laws changed these — “this is my property, and get out of here”; and not all men are free.

Aside: “It’s business of the teacher to confuse the issue” (attributed to an old teacher, Cicero).

Sed contra: the Decretals, distinction 5 — natural law is from the beginning of the rational creature, nor is it varied in time, but remains unchangeable.

3. The body of a. 5: change by addition and by subtraction (“something is added to it”) #

1. Natural law can be understood to change by addition — and nothing prevents this; many things useful for human life are added both by divine law and by human laws. He finds this “a strange use of the word ‘change’”: clothes make the man, but putting clothes on is not being changed.
   • Example: that God be worshipped, praised, thanked, is natural law; that it be on Sunday is not — Jews use Saturday, Muslims Friday; that is indifferent, though it may be useful to have one recurring day in seven.
2. By subtraction — something ceasing to be of natural law that before was according to it. Here a distinction:
   • As to the first beginnings, natural law is altogether unchangeable.
   • As to secondary precepts, which are as it were particular conclusions near the first beginnings, it is not changed ut in pluribus (for the most part it always holds), but can be changed in some particular case, in few cases, on account of some special cause impeding observance of such precepts.

Aside on the difficulty of practical philosophy: what treatment is required for a dying man, what is merely suitable — hard to decide. His brother Richard’s colleague at the College of St Thomas: “A priest under thirty years old is not worth going to confession” — no experience. “It is hard to see where exactly some of these lines are drawn.”

4. Replies to the objections of a. 5 (“either because it supplies”) #

• To the first: the written law is said to correct natural law either (a) because it supplies what is lacking in natural law (something more particular, e.g. go to Mass every Sunday), or (b) because in some hearts the law of nature is so corrupted as regards some things that they judge naturally evil things to be good, and such corruption needs correction. Example: people wanting homosexual marriage, saying “I’m born that way, so that’s nature.”
• To the second: by natural death all die, innocent and guilty alike (he works at rendering nocens: nocere = to harm; Augustine somewhere defines evil by harm); this death is induced by divine power on account of original sin — 1 Kings 2:6, God deadens and gives life. Hence without injustice, at God’s command, death may be inflicted on any man. Likewise adultery is intercourse with a wife who is not one’s own but divinely given — so whatever woman one approaches by divine command is not adultery (Hosea). Likewise theft is taking another’s thing; what is taken at the command of God, Lord of the universe, is not taken against the will of that thing’s Lord. And not only in human things: whatever comes about from God in natural things is in some way natural (as was said in the First Part — to be looked at later).
• To the third: something is said to be of natural law in two ways — (i) because nature inclines us to it, e.g. not to injure another; (ii) because nature does not bring in the contrary, as a man is said to be naked by natural law because nature does not give him clothing, art invents it. Common possession and common liberty are of natural law in the second sense; distinction of possessions and servitude are not induced by nature but by human reason as useful.

Boundary case he raises himself: reproducing with one’s sister seems very bad; but Adam and Eve are told to multiply and fill the earth, so their children must. “That’s what God said” — in that circumstance it would be natural. And where did Eve come from? — even closer than a sister. His Hollywood version: the man in the ground survives the blast, everyone vaporised, helps himself to a BMW from the dealer, and the only woman he finds is his sister — then it would seem lawful. “That would make you afraid to study moral theology.”

5. Text from the Sentences: the right hand and the deposit (“ut in pluribus … in paucioribus”) #

In natural things prior to us the same determination is suitable as in naturally just things: they hold ut in pluribus, but in paucioribus they fall short (deficiunt).

• Example: naturally the right hand is more vigorous than the left — true for the most part, yet some turn out ambidextrous, the left as strong and active as the right.
• Parallel: a deposit left with you is to be returned — for the most part to be observed, in a few cases it changes. Note appended: because the reasons of changeable things are unchangeable, whatever is natural to us as pertaining to the very ratio of man is in no way changed — man to be an animal, a man to be a man, a woman a woman (“these crazy things go on nowadays”). But what follows upon nature — dispositions, actions, motions — changes in a few cases. He notes this passage stands in the previous article of the Sentences text, not the parallel one.

6. Text from the De Malo: formally and materially just (“in one way, formally”) #

Just and good things are considered two ways:

1. Formally — always and everywhere the same, because the principles of law in natural reason are not changed.
2. Materially — not the same everywhere and for all, but needing determination by law; and this because of the mutability of human nature and the diverse conditions of men and things according to diversity of places and times. Example given in the text: it is always just that in buying and selling there be an exchange (commutatio) according to equivalence; but how much be given for a measure of grain differs by place and time.

His question: is the equivalent the same everywhere? The Europeans coming to the Indians, who traded gold nuggets for trinkets like a mirror, willingly — is that the equivalent or not? What is rare in one country is given less for. A student supplies a science-fiction parallel: an alien race opening a gateway on a Midwestern tinker’s land, intrigued by the concept of paint, which he dickers against their anti-gravity saddles.

Second example: the age of marriage — in southern climates people marry at twelve or fourteen, which makes sense there; not for us. Climate and maturity make a difference.

7. Variable custom: clothing, nakedness, hair (“it wasn’t that they were being immoral”) #

A long run of examples of materially variable decency:

• John Quincy Adams, sixth president, walked for exercise, took off his clothes at the river and swam; nobody looked twice; today it would be scandalous. (Aside: the bathing suit had not been invented — you cannot swim in your clothes without ruining them.)
• The South Seas; National Geographic looked at as a boy for the women’s breasts; a story of a man bored with his wife’s nakedness who wanted her to put something on for a change. When Columbus and others came to such places, the people were not being immoral, though we would say they should be locked up.
• Students add: the public-breastfeeding protests at state houses — doing it in defiance of custom is one thing, doing it because the child needs feeding another; and Padre Pio, strict about women’s modesty, coming out of the confessional to a woman nursing in church, patting the child on the head and saying “Buon appetito.” Also Fr. Junípero Serra finding Indian women, nearly naked, with a real affinity for clothes — an example of the difference between men and women. A student: “It’s just vanity. It’s not modesty, it’s vanity.”
• Dressing inappropriately to one’s country or age. Men once wore something like a dress; a woman wearing pants. His brother Mark on the portraits of Christ: his hair is long, but the woman’s hair was longer still — so what seems natural is that a woman’s hair be longer than a man’s (the Bible: a woman’s hair is her glory); the exact length depends on time and place. John Quincy Adams’ portrait: long hair.

8. Article 6, objections: can natural law be blotted out of the heart? (“from the heart of man”) #

1. Romans 2 — the Gentiles who do not have the (written) law have the law of justice inscribed in the heart; but guilt blots that out; and the law of justice is natural law.
2. The law of grace is more efficacious than the law of nature; the law of grace is deleted by guilt; therefore much more natural law.
   • Digression: infused virtues are more easily lost than acquired virtues — acquired virtues, got by repeated acts, are not lost by one contrary act, while infused virtues can be lost by one contrary act, though they are higher; there is a certain lack of stability there. Against those who said we don’t need Aristotle’s acquired virtues since we have the infused: without the acquired there would be too much instability in us, so we do need them, though they are less perfect.
3. What is set up by law is introduced as something just; but many things are laid down by human laws against natural law — abortion now, perhaps homosexual marriage, “see what the Supreme Court decides.”

He notes the wording: “from the heart of man” rather than the mind — “It’s interesting.”

Sed contra: Augustine, Confessions book 2 — Thy law is written in men’s hearts, which iniquity does not blot out; but that law is the natural law.

9. The body of a. 6 (“in no way can be deleted … in general”) #

To natural law belong (i) most common precepts, known to all, and (ii) secondary, more particular precepts, as it were conclusions near the beginnings.

1. As to the common beginnings, natural law can in no way be deleted from men’s hearts in general; but it can be deleted in a particular thing to be done, so far as reason is impeded from applying the common principle to that particular, on account of concupiscence (Aristotle treats this) or some other passion, such as anger.
   • Example of passion impeding: Hardy’s Far from the Madding Crowd — the noble man who wants the woman; she runs off with a soldier, who fakes his death by leaving his clothes on the shore; on the day the neighbour is to clinch the marriage the rascal shows up and is shot; the last we see of the man is behind bars. “The guy is obviously doing a foolish thing… but he’s angry.” Asides: Hardy novels are depressing (his brother Mark’s Christian-brother friend had to read many for a paper and got very depressed); in the newer film version the killer uses a rifle — “we need more violence today, get people’s attention.”
   • Second example: the man trying to overcome his drinking problem knows he shouldn’t drink, but when the time comes he is thinking how good it would taste, not that he is subject to this vice. “So you can know something and not apply it.”
2. As to the secondary precepts, natural law can be deleted from men’s hearts — (a) through bad persuasions, just as in speculative matters errors occur about necessary conclusions, or (b) through bad customs and corrupt habits, as among some peoples thefts were not considered wrong, or even vices against nature (“That’s very strong”), as the Apostle says, Romans 1:24 — “we should check that passage.”

Digression on the speculative parallel, from his own practice of deceiving students about the whole being greater than the part: he does not make them think the contrary, but makes them think they don’t know what they do know, because they see no way out of the argument. “It’s one thing to not know it. It’s another thing to think you don’t know it.” As Aristotle says, to know something and to think you know it are not the same; so if you can think you know what you don’t know, you can also think you don’t know what you do know. The reason: you can only mistake an orange for a lemon because they are sometimes hard to separate — and if they are hard to separate, the opposite mistake, taking a lemon for an orange, is possible too. “Distinction is very fundamental.”

Aside: on the Defense of Marriage Act — Congress passed it, the president favoured it, polls agreed; now the polls have reversed, “and who knows what the Supreme Court will come up with.”

His words #

• “beginnings” — principia, the first principles of natural law [ed.: principles].
• “ut in pluribus” — for the most part; what natural and naturally just things hold true in.
• “in paucioribus” / “deficiunt” — in a few cases; they fall short.
• “second precepts” / “secondary precepts” — particular conclusions near the first beginnings.
• “antecedent will” vs. “consequent will” — Damascene’s distinction: what God wills considering human nature simply, vs. considering all circumstances.
• “nocens” / “innocens” — from nocere, to harm; the guilty and the one in whom there is no evil.
• “commutatio … according to equivalence” — the exchange that is always just in buying and selling.
• “formally” vs. “materially” just — the De Malo distinction: the unchanging principles vs. what must be determined by law.
• “concupiscence” — a passion impeding reason’s application of a common principle to a particular act.

Texts #

Read in class

• Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologiae I-II, q. 94, a. 5 (objections, sed contra, body, replies)
• Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologiae I-II, q. 94, a. 6 (objections, sed contra, body)
• Thomas Aquinas, Commentary on the Sentences — passage on ut in pluribus / in paucioribus, the right hand, the deposit (locus not stated)
• Thomas Aquinas, De Malo — just and good things formally and materially (locus not stated)

Mentioned

• Gloss on Ecclesiasticus, attributed by his footnote to Rabanus
• Genesis 22 (Abraham and Isaac); Hosea 1:2 (inferred); 1 Kings 2:6
• Isidore, Etymologies, on common possession and one liberty
• Decretals, distinction 5
• Thomas Aquinas, Commentary on the Sentences, on whether God wills all to be saved
• Romans 2; Romans 1:24; Augustine, Confessions II
• Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics, on knowing and not applying
• Thomas Hardy, Far from the Madding Crowd

His questions #

• Who has the better explanation of “God wills all men to be saved,” Damascene or Augustine? — A student says Augustine, as more precise; he prefers Damascene, Thomas follows Damascene in the body but ranks neither.
• How do you get out of this if you are not going to accept the conclusion that natural law changes? — By distinguishing change by addition (which is admitted) from change by subtraction (impossible in first beginnings, possible in few cases in secondary precepts).
• Is it part of the natural law that you should worship God on Sunday? — No: that God be worshipped is natural law; the day is indifferent, though a recurring day is useful.
• Is it unchangeable in some way and in some way not? — Yes: unchangeable in its first beginnings, changeable in few cases in its secondary precepts.
• If the human race must be repopulated by brother and sister, what would you say? — In those circumstances it would be natural, as God commanded Adam and Eve to multiply.
• Would the equivalent in exchange be the same everywhere? — No; the gold-for-a-mirror trade shows the material determination varies with rarity, place and time.
• What about my deceiving the students about the whole being greater than the part? — They are not made to believe the contrary; they are made to think they don’t know what they do know, since they see no way out of the argument.