Prima Secundae
65. The Eleven Passions and Moral Good and Bad in the Emotions (ST I-II Q.23 a.4 – Q.24 a.1)
Class of 2012-03-29
https://berquistcourse.com/course/theology/11-prima-secundae/065-the-eleven-passions-and-moral-good-and-bad-in-the-emotions/

[0:00] Father, Son, Holy Spirit, Amen. God our Almighty, God, guardian angels, strengthen the lights of our minds, order and illumine our images, and arouse us to consider more correctly. Saint Thomas Aquinas, angelic doctor, pray for us and help us to understand all that you have written. In the name of The Father, Son, Holy Spirit, Amen.

[0:28] That's interesting. If you compare for a second here, the way that the emotions were distinguished, and the way the what acts of reason are distinguished, how different they are, right?

[0:49] You know, in logic, there, for example, we distinguish some of the acts of reason, right? And Thomas will give this distinction of the acts of reason that at least pertain to the looking reason, in both as proemia to logic, right? What is that distinction, right? Well, he distinguishes the first two acts, which are kind of understanding, right, and the third act, which is reasoning, right. But the two acts are kind of understanding, are understanding what something is, and understanding true or false, which Thomas sometimes calls composition and division, following Aristotle, right?

[1:31] Because you put things together in an affirmative statement or separate them in a negative statement. So, understanding what a thing is, understanding the true or false, and then reasoning, right?

[1:47] Those aren't contraries like love and hate, joy and sadness, desire and fuga he calls it here, abominatio, but fuga, you know, aversion, turning away from, him, huh? And like hope and despair, and fear and boldness or audacity, right? And

[2:14] anger, of course, has not really a contrary but a privative, right? Calm down and or something. So, why is the way these acts you might say of the sense appetite, right, which will be repeated in some sense in the will, right, but some differences? So, so different from the way the acts of the reason are distinguished, right? And in particular, why are the acts of the sense appetite seem to be characterized especially by this contrariety, right?

[2:51] Why is that so? It goes back to what we learned there in the sixth book of wisdom, right? That the good and the bad are in things, as Aristotle says, right? And the true and the false, or what? Yeah. And in in a way, or or because we see that there's the same what knowledge of opposites, as both Plato and Aristotle were important to bring out. You know, even Socrates brings this out, right?

[3:29] And Aristotle even more fully. But there's not the same what love of opposites, right? So if the team wins, I have joy if my team wins, let's say. If my team loses, I'm what? They're sad, right? Now, you know. And you just can't put those two together, right? Huh? But if I know what courage is, I know what cowardice is, right? Huh? If I know what justice is, I know what injustice is, right?

[4:02] No problem there for reason, right? So you're not distinguishing the acts of reason by its contraries, so much are you? And if you speak of opposition up there, you might say, okay, well, there's you know knowing and being mistaken, right? Huh? Those are kind of opposites, right? But mistaken, of course, is a defect, right? Huh? Why am I being you know sad when my my little boy or girl is sick or something, right?

[4:27] That's that's not bad sadness, right? Or am I being joyful when when they when they're feeling better or they're you know escaping this illness that they are, right? You see. Um. Because it's going out to the what's in the child out there, right? And you're having joy over the recovery or sadness over the falling sick or something the child. Um.

[4:55] So I'm sad about my sins, you know. I shouldn't be anyway. Joyful being. I was gonna sing in the I know this is new to new Mass. I was kind of noticing recently. this is in the canon of the Mass after the consecration and so on, and you're praying, you know, for the those who have died in the mercy of God, right? Huh? That's kind of beautiful way of saying it, huh?

[5:21] Having died in the justice of God. I was thinking, you know, to make a nice little prayer in the morning, may I die in the mercy of God, right? Huh? And beautiful way it's said, right? Huh?

[5:35] So there's a connection, I think, then between the way in which the emotions are distinguished, and the fact that the object of the emotions is in things, right? The good and the bad, right? What is contrary to the other, right? So that's why we say that an assignment of it is the fact that what if you love virtue you can't love vice right and loving virtue prevents you from loving vice right and loving vice prevents you from loving virtue right but knowing what virtue is helps you to know what vice is right and knowing what vice is helps you to know what virtue is right you know and so it's according not to the difference of the things but the way the mind receives these

[6:23] things huh there's the same knowledge of opposites huh that's one way they they show that reason is immaterial right that opposites you know which in in matter exclude one from the other right huh if I know what you know high blood pressure is you know I also know what blood pressure should be right huh but my body can't be at the same time with normal blood pressure or healthy blood pressure we call it and and you know over yeah okay

[7:00] so one opposite excludes the other in matter right okay my body is hot it can't be cold and it's cold it can't be hot at the same time right but I can know the two of them together right you're not going to

[7:18] read this page here you must be able to see white and white and black at the same time often wondered if they printed the the letters in white and the page black but I could read it with the same thing now

[7:37] this is going to also be found in this last distinction that he talks about here in article article four is where we left at the beginning today huh

[7:49] where there are some passions right that are different in species in the same power that are not contrary to each other right to the fourth then one proceeds thus it seems that there cannot be in some power passions differing in species or kind that are not what contrary to each other huh for the passions of the soul differ by their objects huh but the objects of the passions of the soul are good and what bad by the difference of which the passions have contrariety so that's a contrariety between love and hate and between joy and sadness and so on therefore no passions of the same power are not having contrary to each other different species huh

[8:47] well Thomas has got to understand how love and desire differ right in species. And desire and joy, right? But they're not really contrary, right? And love gives rise to what desire in the absence of the object, and joy in the presence of it, right? So it's not contrary; it's a cause of it, right?

[9:10] Moreover, a difference of species is a difference according to form. But every difference according to form is according to some contrariety, as is said in the tenth book of the metaphysics. That's the book on the one and the many, right? Therefore, the passions and Aristotle's long discussion there of contrariety. Therefore, passions of the same power which are not contrary do not differ in what species.

[9:37] Moreover, every passion of the soul consists either in excess to or recess to the good or to the bad, right? Necessarily, seems that every difference of the passions of the soul is either according to difference of good and bad, right? Like joy and sadness, so on. Or according to the difference of excess and recess, like. Hope and what despair, or boldness, you know, and fear, right? You know, because when you are approaching anything, and the other when you are withdrawing from it, huh?

[10:11] But the first two differences induce contrariety in the passions of the soul. But the third difference is not the diversified species on them, more or less, right? Because they're infinite species of the passion, because that's the infinite species of the passions of the soul. Therefore, there cannot be what passions of the same power of the soul differing in kind that are not what contrary,

[10:41] but against all this, love and joy differ in what species, and are in the what, passible. But nevertheless, they are not contrary to each other. Nay, rather, one is what, yeah, the cause of the other. Therefore, there are some passions of the same power which differ in kind, but are not what contrary, right?

[11:11] So, answer should be said that the passions differ according to the what, activa, which are the objects of the passions of the soul, right? When we talked about love in particular, remember we'll see that again. The first cause of love is what

[11:32] the good, right? Yeah, which is the object, right? And Thomas talks about how an impetitive power is right. The object moves it, right? Okay. So if a guy comes in with a gun, now I'm going to feel some fear, right? Okay. So the object of my fear is what's causing my fear, right? Okay. He comes in with a nice tray of goodies, you know. So the object of my emotion is is what causes it, right?

[12:02] Okay. Comes in with lox and bagels and we turned off. How'd you guess? Okay. So the differences of the activor, right, can be noted in two ways. In one way, according to the species or the nature of the act of things, as fire differs from what water, water, right? Okay.

[12:38] That's why when you say metaphorically, God is what fire and He's water, He's called both, right? This must be said metaphorically, right? Because you can't be both water and what fire. That's kind of way that scripture has it telling us. It's speaking what metaphorically, right? Sometimes scripture

[13:02] is called both what fire and water, right? Fire because it inflames our heart, right? And water because it adapts itself to whatever situation is. Some beautiful things like that.

[13:18] But that must be said metaphorically, right? Can't be both fire and water. In another way, according to a diverse what active power. Now, what does this mean here? It's a beautiful way of showing this.

[13:40] Now he says the diversity of the active or motive power, as regards its what power moving, can be taken in the passions of the soul according to a likeness to the what natural agents, right?

[13:59] So this is a what likeness ratios, right? Now everything moving draws something in some way, right? The thing what. Undergoing it. Yeah, or repels itself, right? Itself. But in drawing something to itself, it does three things in that, right? For first, it gives it a what inclination or aptitude so that it will but tend towards it, just as when a what light body, which is above the what lightness to a generated body, to which it has an inclination or an aptitude to this that it would be what above, huh?

[14:50] Or if it gave heaviness, right, it would have inclination to go down. And then, if the body generated is outside its own place, right, it gives it to move to its place, right. And then third, when it gets there, it gives it to rest, right, in the place when it arrives. So because the body or the same thing would be said for heaviness, right, because it's given heaviness to the body, it has a what aptitude to go down, right, huh?

[15:24] And therefore, if it's not in the lower part, it tends there, right? And then when it gets there, it what rests. Okay, and the same thing can be understood about the cause of repulsion, right? Now this also ties up the fact that the good and the bad is in things, right? Yeah. and that gives it this power. Yeah. Because if I like something or love something, right, huh?

[15:54] But in reality, I don't have it. Then I I want it, right? I seek it, right? And then if I get the thing, really, then I have what? Yeah, I have joy, right? It's the kind of rest.

[16:11] Now he says, in the movers of the desiring part of the soul, the good has a power to draw things, right? And the bad has a power that is repulsive, right? Okay. So the good, first in the desiring power, causes a certain what? Inclination, right? Or an aptitude, or it makes one kind of connatural to the what? Good, huh? Conforms, huh? Somebody's Thomas speaks of love as a kind of conformity of the heart to what?

[16:47] The good, right? Okay. And this pertains then to the first passion there of love, right? To which by contrariety corresponds hate on the side of the bad, right?

[17:07] Okay. Secondly, if the good is not yet had, it gives to it a motion to what? Obtain a good love. Good love, and this pertains to the passion of desire or concupiscence. And on the opposite side, in the part of the bad, to aversion or flight, huh? Or abomination, right? Yeah, I don't know how good a translation abomination is for that, because that could be taken for hate too, right?

[17:40] I don't know. I I should look up what's the etymology of abomination. Oh, I'm making this pun of Obama's name, the Obama pun. Yeah, yeah.

[17:53] Abomination. Abomination. And third, when it has attained the good, right? It gives the what? Desiring power a certain rest in the good obtained, right? And this pertains to pleasure or joy, right? Huh? To which is opposed on the side of the bad, pain or sadness, right?

[18:22] Now, in the so notice, but that's tied up again with the fact that the good is in things, right? And the bad is in things, right? So it's really something out there you want to get. Acts on us that we undergo. Yeah. Or something out there you want to avoid, right? Okay. And then if that real thing out there you actually obtain it, then you have joy, right?

[18:44] And if that bad thing is forced upon you, then you're sad or in pain. This is this is the action to which we react. We have our passion. We have our other motive. These are the active things.

[19:01] So love is in essence the cause both of desire and of what joy, right? But of one in the absence of the object and the other in the presence or possession of the object, right? Likewise, hate is a cause of both what returning away from the object and the sadness or pain when it's forced upon you, right? Okay.

[19:29] So what's the beginning and the end of philosophy? The end is wisdom, right? Okay. So in the proemium to wisdom, there at the beginning of the physics, right? Aristotle shows that one is the beginning of philosophy, and Socrates says this in the theatatus right? Very clear there is no other. That's it. And then, the wisdom itself is the end, right? That's the goal.

[20:11] Now, why do you say that wonder is the beginning of philosophy, and not say that the love of wisdom is beginning of philosophy? Because wonder is what, in in in terms of these, or something like these, right? The will is is like what?

[20:33] Love or desire? Wonder. Yeah, yeah. The man who wonders is desirous to know, right? Huh? Okay. So why does he say that if desire arises from love, why does he say that wonder is beginning of philosophy, and not say the love of wisdom is beginning of philosophy? Because you don't know wisdom yet. What? Because you don't know wisdom yet. Yeah. But you see, you can love something both in the presence and in the absence of it, right?

[21:29] Yeah, at least one to actually pursue wisdom, right? Huh? Okay. But when you get wisdom, do you cease to love it? No. If it's really the wonderful thing that we think it is, then when you get wisdom, you what? Love it even more, right? Huh? Okay.

[21:48] So if he said that love of wisdom is the beginning of philosophy, is distinguished from the end. No, that's something that is there. What? The end, and it's more, right? Right. Is it? So when Thomas talks about love, he's saying that if you get what you love, right?

[22:13] Then you really what? Love it more, unless there's something that is not lovable, right? But I mean, insofar as it's something lovable, then you love it more. You're even more conformed to it, right? In its presence than you were in its what? Absence, right?

[22:36] So the love of wisdom is something that is found in the man who has wisdom, right? But if wonder is a form of desire, you don't desire something unless you love it. Yeah. Yeah. So there has to be love of that to precede it. Yeah, but I think perhaps the reason why he speaks of it is that in the beginning, right? Huh? You don't have wisdom, right?

[23:04] You have to pursue it, right? You pursue it out of what? Wonder, right? And why the love of wisdom is something that's going to, you know, remain all the way through, right? And and be strongest once you have some wisdom. So you can't use it to distinguish. Yeah, the beginning from the end, right? You know, in a sense, it is the beginning, right? Yeah, but it's found more, but it's found more in the end than in the beginning, right?

[23:34] So, okay. It's curious in terms of theological virtues there. Hope is put before charity, right? And what the order of generation, right? And hope is more like what desire, right?

[24:01] You know, but charity in the next world will remain, right? Hope will be gone. Hopeless. We'll be hopeless in the next world, right? You get there.

[24:14] Yeah. For me. I know if those in hell, I suppose they still have despair, right? Yeah. But we don't have hope. Well, that makes me wonder. then. so should it also be written over the gate of heaven? Abandon all hope, of the gate of heaven. No more. Give it up. That's more than hope. will abandon you.

[24:46] Now, in the passions of the irascible, there is presupposed a certain what aptitude or inclination to pursuing a good, right? Or fleeing something bad from the concupiscible, right? Huh? Which absolutely, huh? Regards the good or the bad, right? Huh? And with respect to a good not yet what obtained, there can be hope and what despair. In despair, with respect to the bad not yet dwelling in or forced upon one, there is timor, right?

[25:28] Huh? And what boldness, right? Huh? But with respect to the good obtained, there is not any passion in the irascible huh Because it does now now longer have the notion of something arduous or difficult, right? Right. But a bad thing now lying upon one, there follows the passion of anger, right?

[26:05] Thus, therefore, in the concupiscible there are three conjugations. I'll never remember there of passions, right? Love and hate, desire and what? Flight. Flight or aversion, joy and sadness. Likewise, in the irascible there are three: hope and despair, fear and boldness or audacity, and anger to which no passion is opposed. But there is a privation, right? Thus, all the passions, differing in species, are eleven in number, right?

[26:45] Six in the concupiscible and five in the what? Yeah. So there's an even number in the concupiscible and an odd number in the what? Irascible. Under which all the emotions of the soul are contained. I don't know any place other than Thomas where all these eleven are laid down so clearly. You know, distinction of any place.

[27:14] He does something like this in the in the De Veritate too, but. Now this again is as I said a a beginning for what? Understanding the virtues that are concerned with emotions, right? That moderate virtues, right? So, mildness, right, is a virtue that moderates anger, right? And temperance moderates what? Desire, joy, things of this sort. And then there's what? Courage, right, moderates fear and audacity and so on.

[28:01] Yeah. Okay. And then there's ones like magnanimity, which are concerned with hope, right? So an understanding of the emotions necessary to understand the matter of many of the what virtues that are taken up in the Nicomachean Ethics, right? So in the third book, Nicomachean Ethics, you take up what? Courage and temperance, right? And the lesser ones in book four, they're concerned with emotions too, for the most part.

[28:31] And then not the book five to get to justice is in the will, huh? So. But it's also a beginning for understanding what? Rhetoric, right? That part of rhetoric that is concerned with what? Yeah, with the moving us by our emotions, right? Okay. And then it's necessary for understanding the what? Poetics, right, not only for representation of people under emotion, right? But for what?

[29:08] For the effect that has on us, huh? Yeah, for the emotional effect of tragedy and comedy and so on, right? Okay. And I suppose it's necessary for what biography, right? I'm just reading now another biography of George Washington, right? And I don't know if you've seen this one by Ron Chernow. It's a very thorough one, as far as I can see, you know. And because I've read Washington Irving's biography and other biographies, but this brings out a lot of things that you don't kind of know too much about him.

[29:39] I guess they've been gathering, you know, every bit of reference to him, you know, in volume after volume now, you know. So, so they're kind of working his life, you know, and so on. And when he comes out. It's kind of interesting, is you know, this control that he had of his emotions, but the way they would burst out at times, you know, and. The, I was reading again the account there, you know, the fight with the British there and in New York, you know, and where the soldiers, the American raw soldiers, you know, just just fled, you know, and so on, and he was trying to stop them, you know, he's out there, the story like that, he just, you know, erupting, you know, how

[30:24] can I fight a war of these, you know, and so on, you know, and and he was just kind of paralyzed out there, you know, and and fortunately his, some of his assistants went out there turned him around from under him, you know, because the British were coming up, you know, he could have been, you know, you see, always had like a death wish, you know, so you get a little bit of the emotional aspect of him, but he kept, you know, pretty, you know, had awful lot of self control, you didn't, but I mean, there was, you know, real emotions underneath the man, so it's kind of interesting, you know, you reading that and you studying the passions here, huh?

[31:01] That's like Julius Caesar when he was, I think it was in his fifties, and the troops weren't fleeing, but they were frightened, and he, he, in his fifties, he was on the front line, and he encouraged them, they all charged, and that went, that, Dr. Carroll talks about that. It was really amazing, man, his presence and his influence. Yeah, this is what he would do too, you know, Washington, you know, amazing.

[31:28] Yeah, you look at Dolly Forage now, oh my God, awful condition to be in, odds. He was just keeping them, you know, by moving around the camp all the time, you know, and encouraging them, you know, to survive. It was terrible, really terrible conditions.

[31:44] Okay, now we're up to question twenty-four about the good and the bad and the passions of the soul, right? Then we're not to consider about good and bad concerning the passions of the soul, and about this four things are asked: first, whether the good and bad that is moral, right, can be found, is able to be found in the passions of the soul, right?

[32:16] Secondly, whether every passion of the soul is bad morally, right? So this is to the influence of the Stoics, right? Third, whether every passion adds or diminishes from the goodness or badness of the what? Act, huh?

[32:39] So they ran away in battle because they were so afraid. That diminished my guilt. Depends. Yeah. Circumstances. Because sometimes you know, they they have to take into account. This is the first battle I've been in, you know. Green or orange? Yeah, yeah. Or maybe it was. The hundredth battle, because they say that the the dread of battle increases with as a soldier ages, because he's seen so many.

[33:11] He says, "There's the bullet out there, just waiting for me. Got my name on it." Example with Churchill, I mean not Churchill, the Washington, you know. There's so many examples of him being missed, you know, by the enemy, and. Through the hat, through the shirt, yeah, and some of them were trying to get him, you know. It's like you know Douglas MacArthur too, you know, he first went down to Mexico there, you know, and got shot through the head, you know, everything dead.

[33:42] Someone's like says, "You're blessed now, you're you're you're safe for the rest of your life, you know." And MacArthur's saying they haven't made the bullet yet, and it's going to kill me, you know.

[33:52] It's kind of amazing, you know, the kind of risks that that especially Washington took, you know, but also MacArthur did, you know. Can you always tell the story, you know, you know, where the enemy strafed, you know, MacArthur's place, there he was, and the officer was in the outer office, and he comes right in to see if MacArthur's okay, you know," and you know, MacArthur says, "Yes."

[34:15] That's my foot on, you know. I mean, it's kind of marvelous. Yeah, when you're rushing in there, you know, yeah, what can I do for you? The fun harder. There's also another story just about this. Just this soldier tells a story. He was captured by the Japanese. They were leading them down, you know, wherever, and this airplane comes in one of his own, comes and strafes him.

[34:47] All the Japanese went to cover, and an American just standing up. They're all ashamed when he goes. No, my son is in Kuwait. There, you know, and there's some other military men, and they stop and get a little meal someplace, you know, and of course they're all bullet holes inside the place, you know, because the Iraqis, before they left Kuwait, you know, they shot the place, you know, so he was telling telling the Americans about it.

[35:18] And fourth, whether some passion is good or bad from its very what kind? Yeah, species. Well, as a little boy, you know, you'd have you know, anger is one of the capital sins or something, you know, huh? That's kind of you know needs a little clarification there, you know, because even our Lord is angry sometimes, right? The hardness of their hearts.

[35:52] To the first, then one proceeds thus: it seems that no passion of the soul, no emotion, is either good or bad, morally speaking, right now.

[36:06] For good and bad, morally speaking, moral good or bad, is something private to man. For mores are properly said to be human, as the great Ambrose himself says, right? One of the great doctors in the Western Church, upon what the Gospel of Saint Luke.

[36:30] But the passions, the emotions, are not private to man, but they're also common to the other what animals, right? Therefore, no passion of the soul is either good or bad morally. What speaking?

[36:49] More, the good or bad of man is to be in accordance with reason, or to be outside of reason, right? As Dionysius himself says in the fourth chapter of the Divine Names.

[37:07] But the passions, the emotions of the soul, are not in reason, but in the sense-desiring power. Therefore, they do not belong or pertain to the good or bad of man, which is the moral good.

[37:25] More of even the philosopher says in the second book of the Ethics that by the passions we are neither praised nor what blamed, right? But according to moral goods and evils, we are praised and what blamed, huh?

[37:45] You're praiseworthy or blameworthy, right? Therefore, the passions are not good or bad morally. But again, this is what Augustine says in the fourteenth book about the City of God, speaking there about the passions of the soul.

[38:04] Those things are bad if bad is the what love, good if good, right? Well, Thomas says we have to see a distinction to begin with, right? I answer it should be said, Thomas says, that the passions of the soul, the emotions, are able to be considered in two ways. In one way, by themselves, right.

[38:36] In another way, according as they are in some way subject to the command of reason and the what, the will, huh? Are the emotions of the newborn baby are they all subject to the command of his reason and his will?

[38:56] Haven't met one yet. Maybe our Lord. But his reason was somewhat more developed. If, therefore, they are considered by themselves, right, just in so far as they are motions of the desiring power that is without reason, right, so not a rational sense of being opposed to reason, but just not reason. Thus, there is not in them either good or bad, morally speaking, right, moral good or bad, which all depend both upon what reason, right, either being in accordance with reason or not.

[39:44] If, however, they are considered according as they are subject to the command of reason and of the will, thus there is in them a moral good and moral bad. Now, Thomas, an interesting argument, right? Propinquior, they are nearer, right? Nearer is the sense-desiring power to reason and the will than the exterior members, like my feet or my hands, right? Whose motion and acts, nevertheless, are good or bad, what, morally, right?

[40:27] Someone just got someone just got sentenced to life there for strangling some woman, okay? Strangling them with your hands, I guess. Not with your feet, I guess. Okay. And so, if if that act of the hand is is morally what reprehensible, isn't it possible that the emotions, right, are even closer to reason, right, than the will, than my hands?

[40:57] Unde multo magis, much more, right? The passions themselves, according as they are what voluntary in some way, are able to be called good or bad, what morally, right?

[41:16] Now, they are said to be voluntary either from that the fact that they are commanded by the will, right, or from that that they are not what prohibited by the will. Okay.

[41:34] If the sense appetites are closer to reason, then why don't we have better control over them than we do over the external members? Same. Yeah, but it's interesting because I think you know Aristotle would probably say that you have a kind of tyrannical rule over your hands, right? But you have a more a political rule over your emotions, right? You know the famous thing there where he says, "Should you rule the should reason rule the emotions as a master rules the slave?

[42:10] " There's nothing to say about what he does, right? Or should you rule them in the way that a father rules his what son, right? The son has something to say about what he should do, right? Where he should go to college, or he should he should where he should eat, and so on, right? What he should do, right? And so the emotions, in that sense, don't obey automatically the way the hands do, right?

[42:35] They're nearer to reason, so why does the nearness to reason make them more subject to reason than the will? It seems they're not. Well, it's because I suppose because that they have they're moved by the what their objects, right, in a way that is independent. Right. Yeah. They have their own objects. Yeah. And I know I think it's Saint Alphonsus, I forget where, one of the spiritual authors, he says.

[43:03] As we get older, we can kind of, or maybe Father Hardon says this too. As we get older, we can kind of conceal our reactions to things, but they're still going on inside us. And that's not a real sign of maturity, is that you don't do that. Yeah. That's that's what our Lord says. It's one thing to say don't kill, another thing to don't be angry at your brother.

[43:22] Yeah. Because you can not kill him, but hate his guts. Think of ten different ways you can strangle him. That's that's worse than if you were, I think, just to go out and strangle. If you can kill him a hundred times. Inside. Inside. Which is worse than just once outside. Aristotle talks about music there in the book of politics, huh? And he's talking about music, you know, being not only relaxation that sort of thing, you know, but also that it can be a part of moral education, right?

[43:54] And it's kind of you know kind of a bridge there between reason and and the emotions there, huh? Because it's something that's appealing to the senses, right? And therefore, if you listen to the right kind of music, your emotions are what moved in harmony with the music, right? And if music, like like Osterley says, right, in the book in the article there towards an evaluation of music, the music of the Baroque period, right, and Mozart, the classical period, represents the emotions in a state in harmony with reason, right?

[44:32] So when your emotions are moved in harmony with the music of of the Baroque or Mozart, then your emotions are moved what in a kind of reasonable way, right? And this is a kind of disposition for what? Reason For yeah yeah. When Aristotle defines tragedy, he puts in the definition of tragedy that it's a catharsis, right? Of pity and fear and so on, right? And so catharsis there is a term borrowed from what medicine, right?

[45:09] And a catharsis in medicine is removing some harmful substance from your your body, right? Huh. So if you swallow poison, something like that, right? You know, that you might in some cases, you know, they might induce vomiting or something of this sort, right? That's kind of a purge, right? Huh. Okay. But when you when you know hit by a snake or something like that and they bleed you, right?

[45:33] That's kind of catharsis, right? Huh. So the catharsis of the emotion is removing some disorder from the emotions, huh? Remember a friend of mine being in some some angry with his brother, you know, huh? And uh, Shakespeare is what As you like it was showing, right? We have this conflict of brothers, right? Huh. You know. And so I took him to see this, right? And see him to, you know, make him more gentle, you know, towards his brother that he'd been angry with, right, huh?

[46:10] You know. So the the good fiction there, right, huh? Moves the emotions, and then what? Reasonable way, right? But bad music, and and bad fiction, you know, moves the emotions in a way that is what? Bad, yeah, pornographic stuff and so on, right? I remember when my cousin Donald was in the navy, and they still had the down Newport there. You know, they still had the navy base there, and so on.

[46:38] And this is rock and roll, this crazy stuff is coming out, and getting kind of thing. And they get so excited down there that they're throwing these, you know, collapsible chairs, you know. Chairs, yeah. I say, my God, what those things Yeah, yeah. You know, real, real wild. Well, this is not the effect of listening to Mozart or Handel. Doesn't dispose you to pick up a chair and throw it with this rock and roll.

[47:01] What else do you do when you hear this kind of stuff? You know, huh? Yeah. one of the horn players or something? Smashes his horn after the show.

[47:12] My brother Mark said one time, you know, he's talking about this. The only thing I can think of doing with that music is fornicating. He says, you know, what else? You just just you know just perverse, you know. So Aristotle is very strong there in the in of course Plato was too in the in the dialogues in the Republic and so on about the importance of music in what education.

[47:32] I I don't have a copy of it, but Father Boulay had a collection from you know the church fathers and people like this talking about the importance of music, you know, and kind of you know expanding what Aristotle says there in the politics and so on. So this is totally neglected in education, of course. It's it's the opposite is cultivated. Yeah, yeah. I mean, even the Catholic grade schools, you know.

[47:58] I mean, what's your favorite band? That's about that's about the contact they have, you know. That's kind of steering they have, you know. Of course, my son Paul says, "Man, yeah, he doesn't know any bands."

[48:11] Oh, I tell you what happened when I went. This is way back when in the eighties, and they didn't even, I mean, cassette tapes were about in advance and, they didn't have CDs yet. And I remember going into a record store when they had record stores, and I went in there and I was looking for Gregorian chant, and there was some teenager at the counter up there, and and I walked in, I'm looking around, looking, I can't find anything, so I went up to him and I said, "Do you have any Gregorian chant?"

[48:38] And this blank, what is total blank? And he said, "Name some of the groups." I said, "Okay, monks of Solesmes? I don't think we have any of that. Name some of the groups. Now, when I was working in the package store, you know, and. actually, come in and you have Grateful Dead on them, right? Well, I mean, I didn't know there was a band known as Grateful Dead, right?

[49:07] Oh, I thought it was just a sick slogan they have I think glad it would be out of my misery. That's why I can think of this. So you said a death wish or something? a death wish Yeah, no, I didn't know what the hell. I didn't know a band was named Grateful Dead. So, and of course, you know, and the people you know follow them around for all the concerts.

[49:29] They're called Deadheads, right? Yeah, says a lot. Yeah, I know, I just. I don't know. I don't know what to do. Maybe someone had masses said, "for them, and they were grateful?"

[49:51] Someone told this story as a part of a prayer request. But apparently, some son was mad at his parents, so he's going to the house and he's pounding on the door. And he has like a flashlight or something he's pounding on the door and he's yelling and screaming and he misses he knocks himself in the head

[50:11] and his parents had to come out you know call the ambulance or something. Get this guy away Good example of the emotions. Okay, so replying now to the objections. The first, therefore, should be said that these passions, considered by themselves, right, are common to men and to the other what animals, right? But according as they are what commanded by reason, they are proper to what man, right?

[50:50] I played Mozart a lot for our cat, but he didn't seem to take any interest in it. I tried to pretend that he would like it, but I don't think I was being fanciful there, right? You were generous. But then if I got up and went in the kitchen and got a little, we had a sandwich meat there, you know, a little wrap of paper there, the cat be right next to me, you know.

[51:08] How did? I try to be as quiet as I can. you know, get a little sandwich meat. Our cat's favorite music. The can opener for a tuna can. Just there. It got very sensitive ears, right? When I was little we had a cat and the cat would kind of stay in the garage there, right? And then in the morning, you know, you come to the back door of the house there, and you open the door and cat run up from the garage, you know, couldn't wait he's going to be fed.

[51:36] We tried to see if we could just open the doors as quietly and slowly and staying the cat would always hear it and zoom right up there.

[51:47] So. Now to the second one about them being rational. To the second, it should be said that the lower desiring powers, right, the sense appetite, are said to be rational in some way, according as they what partake in some way of reason, as is said in the first book of the ethics, right? Now, I always say, you know, if you want to

[52:15] get kind of a vivid sense of what it means for the emotions to partake of reason? Listen to the music of Mozart right now. He really, really has that, right? It's kind of an amazing thing to see, right? And

[52:35] and certain kinds of music would just irritate you. after doing a little bit of philosophy or something like that, you know. When you're kind of relaxing after that Mozart music, ah, just seems to fit the mood of the man who's been thinking rationally, you know. And some of the stuff just just kind of.

[52:53] I told you the story of Father Boulay there being in a restaurant there and the guy's performing and. He set up money to have them stop.

[53:02] It was a good just a way to insult them, They just stopped. So if you want, to get his meal, I'll listen to this junk, because he like good music, of course.

[53:15] Sometimes I guess we're too shy to do what we should do. You know. The third about praise and blame now should be seen that the philosopher says that we are not praised or blamed according to passions absolutely considered right, huh? Okay, so we just say no. Should you blame a man or praise him for being angry? Well, it depends upon what he's angry about and how much he's angry, right?

[53:46] You know, was appropriate, right? Okay. If you're using my kids for target practice, you know that might be reasonable to get a little bit angry about that. Okay. Guys, telling me about the neighbor's kid came over and there was a flowering plant there in the pot, right? Kid, you know, like the guy, and he pushed the thing off and broke it. Oh, right! Pow! Yeah. Just like that It requires a little bit of anger there.

[54:40] But this does not take away or remove that they can be what praiseworthy or what. Blameable. Yeah. According as they are ordered by what reason or not, hence

[54:55] he he adds that they are not praised or what blamed, who simply fears or is angry, but qui aliqualiter, right? In some way, that is either according to reason or what outside of reason, huh? Okay. And that reminded me of sometimes you can do violence to somebody and not be angry. There's a story I heard about Leonardo da Vinci. He was just a little boy sitting next to his grandfather.

[55:29] His grandfather had something very important to tell him. He wanted to remember. So he just sitting there, mind his own business. And suddenly he went, "Wham!" He knocked the kid by ten feet. And then the kid comes back like, "What? What did I do?" He said, "I want you to remember this." The rest of his life, he remembered that. whatever it was, I don't know. Great mnemonic device.

[55:52] I said with Padre Pio that when he threw people on the confessional, he had kind of external signs of anger. sometimes, but he, wasn't. he wasn't upset. he just kind of showed a little, you know, Put the fear of God. in. It's a good thing.