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1, a. The results are often . In an interesting passage in an article attacking what he mistakenly considered to be Aquinass theory of natural law, Kai Nielsen discussed this point at some length. cit. Thus the intelligibility includes the meaning with which a word is used, but it also includes whatever increment of meaning the same word would have in the same use if what is denoted by the word were more perfectly known. The theory of law is permanently in danger of falling into the illusion that practical knowledge is merely theoretical knowledge plus force of will. Good is to be done and pursued, and evil is to be avoided. Hence I shall begin by emphasizing the practical character of the principle, and then I shall proceed to clarify its lack of imperative force. 94, a. Reason is doing its own work when it prescribes just as when it affirms or denies. But these references should not be given too much weight, since they refer to the article previously cited in which the distinction is made explicitly. Of course, I must disagree with Nielsens position that decision makes discourse practical. The object of the practical intellect is not merely the actions men perform, but the. In Islam, the 1990 Cairo Declaration on Human Rights declares that all human beings are loved by God, have equal worth, and that no one is superior to another on the basis of religion or deeds. Id. nonconceptual, nonrational knowledge by inclination or connaturality. But it requires something extraordinary, such as philosophic reflection, to make us bring into the focus of distinct attention the principles of which we are conscious whenever we think. In other words, the first principle refers not only to the good which must be done, but also to the nonobligatory good it would be well to do. [8] S.T. At the beginning of his treatise on law, Aquinas refers to his previous discussion of the imperative. Ought requires no special act legitimatizing it; ought rules its own domain by its own authority, an authority legitimate as that of any is. After observing these two respects in which the mistaken interpretation unduly restricts the scope of the first principle of practical reason, we may note also that this principle as Aquinas understands it is not merely a principle of imperative judgments. These inclinations are part of ourselves, and so their objects are human goods. Aquinas identified the following "Universal Human Values": Human Life, Health, Procreation, Wealth, Welfare of Children and Knowledge. This is a directive for action . Previously, however, he had given the principle in the formulation: Good is to be done and evil avoided., But there and in a later passage, where he actually mentions, he seems to be repeating received formulae. No less subversive of human responsibility, which is based on purposiveand, therefore, rationalagency, is the existentialist notion that morally good and morally bad action are equally reasonable, and that a choice of one or the other is equally a matter of arational arbitrariness. To be definite is a condition of being anything, and this condition is fulfilled by whatever a thing happens to be. [26] Super Libros Sententiarum Petri Lombardi (ed. The magic power fluctuated, and the 'Good and Evil Stone' magic treasure he refined himself sensed a trace of evil aura that was approaching the surroundings. A formula of the first judgment of practical reason might be That which is good, is good, desirable, or The good is that which is to be done, the evil is that which is to be avoided., Significant in these formulations are the that which (ce qui) and the double is, for these expressions mark the removal of gerundive force from the principal verb of the sentence. [7] In other religions of the world there are also directives to ensure the poor and other vulnerable members of society are taken care of. From it flows the other more particular principles that regulate ethical justice on the rights and duties of everyone. If the action fits, it is seen to be good; if it does not fit, it is seen to be bad. The mistaken interpretation inevitably falls into circularity; Aquinass real position shows where moral reasoning can begin, for it works from transmoral principles of moral action. Within experience we have tendencies which make themselves felt; they point their way toward appropriate objects. p. but the question was not a commonplace. Only after practical reason thinks does the object of its thought begin to be a reality. [53] Law is not a constraint upon actions which originate elsewhere and which would flourish better if they were not confined by reason. 3, ad 2; q. In the case of practical reason, acting on account of an end is acting for the sake of a goal, for practical reason is an active principle that is conscious and self-determining. 7) First, there is in man an inclination based on the aspect of his nature which he has in common with all substancesthat is, that everything tends according to its own nature to preserve its own being. The first principle of morally good action is the principle of all human action, but bad action fulfills the requirement of the first principle less perfectly than good action does. Aquinass theological approach to natural law primarily presents it as a participation in the eternal law. Only truths of fact are supposed to have any reference to real things, but all truths of fact are thought to be contingent, because it is assumed that all necessity is rational in character. The first article raises the issue: Whether natural law is a habit. Aquinas holds that natural law consists of precepts of reason, which are analogous to propositions of theoretical knowledge. To ask "Why should we do what's good for us?" is useless because we are always trying to do what is good for us. Correct! 93, a. It is true that if natural law refers to all the general practical judgments reason can form, much of natural law can be derived by reasoning. According to Aquinas, our God-give rationality leads us to realise the 5 Primary Precepts that exist in nature. Thus the status Aquinas attributes to the first principle of practical reason is not without significance. For the notion of judgment forming choice see, For a comparison between judgments of prudence and those of conscience see my paper, , Even those interpreters who usually can be trusted tend to fall into the mistake of considering the first principle of practical reason as if it were fundamentally theoretical. However, a full and accessible presentation along these general lines may be found in, Bonum est faciendum et prosequendum, et malum vitandum., La loi naturelle et le droit naturel selon S. Thomas,. The first argument concludes that natural law must contain only a single precept on the grounds that law itself is a precept. 4, c. [27] See Lottin, op. Even excellent recent interpreters of Aquinas tend to compensate for the speculative character they attribute to the first principle of practical reason by introducing an act of our will as a factor in our assent to it. 5)It follows that the first principle of practical reason, is one founded on the intelligibility of goodthat is: Good is what each thing tends toward. [67] Moreover, the basic principle of desire, natural inclination in the appetitive part of the soul, is consequent upon prior apprehension, natural knowledge. John Finnis, a follower of Aquinas, suggests that there are seven basic goods (which include, for example, knowledge and life), that these cannot be measured on a . For Aquinas, right reason is reason judging in accordance with the whole of the natural law. [75] S.T. The intelligibility of good is: Until the object of practical reason is realized, it exists only in reason and in the action toward it that reason directs. [28], So far as I have been able to discover, Aquinas was the first to formulate the primary precept of natural law as he did. To the second argument, that mans lower nature must be represented if the precepts of the law of nature are diversified by the parts of human nature, Aquinas unhesitatingly answers that all parts of human nature are represented in natural law, for the inclination of each part of man belongs to natural law insofar as it falls under a precept of reason; in this respect all the inclinations also fall under the one first principle. But Aquinas does not describe natural law as eternal law passively received in man; he describes it rather as a participation in the eternal law. This interpretation simply ignores the important role we have seen Aquinas assign the inclinations in the formation of natural law. Before intelligence enters, man acts by sense spontaneity and learns by sense experience. [39] The issue is a false one, for there is no question of extending the meaning of good to the amplitude of the transcendentals convertible with being. The very text clearly indicates that Aquinas is concerned with good as the object of practical reason; hence the goods signified by the good of the first principle will be human goods. In the second paragraph of the response Aquinas clarifies the meaning of self-evident. His purpose is not to postulate a peculiar meaning for self-evident in terms of which the basic precepts of natural law might be self-evident although no one in fact knew them. There are two ways of misunderstanding this principle that make nonsense of it. Each of these three answers merely reiterates the response to the main question. For that which primarily falls within ones grasp is being, and the understanding of being is included in absolutely everything that anyone grasps. Third, there is in man an inclination to the good based on the rational aspect of his nature, which is peculiar to himself. This ability has its immediate basis in the multiplicity of ends among various syntheses of which man can choose, together with the ability of human reason to think in terms of end as such. Thus Lottin makes the precept appear as much as possible like a theoretical statement expressing a peculiar aspect of the goodnamely, that it is the sort of thing that demands doing. There his formulation of the principle is specifically moralistic: The upright is to be done and the wrong avoided. Since the Old Law directs to a single end, it is one in this respect; but since many things are necessary or useful to this end, precepts are multiplied by the distinction of matters that require direction. ODonoghue wishes to distinguish this from the first precept of natural law. It directs that good is to be done and pursued, and it allows no alternative within the field of action. [8], Aquinass solution to the question is that there are many precepts of the natural law, but that this multitude is not a disorganized aggregation but an orderly whole. [76] Lottins way of stating the matter is attractive, and he has been followed by others. Our personalities are largely shaped by acculturation in our particular society, but society would never affect us if we had no basic aptitude for living with others. The first precept does not say what we ought to do in contradistinction to what we will do. 2; Summa contra gentiles, 3, c. 2. 5 (1960): 118119, in part has recourse to this kind of argument in his response to Nielsen. ODonoghue wishes to distinguish this from the first precept of natural law. 2, a. They ignore the peculiar character of practical truth and they employ an inadequate notion of self-evidence. 1. The good of which practical reason prescribes the pursuit and performance, then, primarily is the last end, for practical reason cannot direct the possible actions which are its objects without directing them to an end. The good which is the object of pursuit can be the principle of the rational aspects of defective and inadequate efforts, but the good which characterizes morally right acts completely excludes wrong ones. Although Bourke is right in noticing that Nielsens difficulties partly arise from his positivism, I think Bourke is mistaken in supposing that a more adequate metaphysics could bridge the gap between theory and practice. [15] On ratio see Andre Haven, S.J., LIntentionnel selon Saint Thomas (2nd ed., Bruges, Bruxelles, Paris, 1954), 175194. This paper has five parts. See Walter Farrell, O.P., The Natural Moral Law according to St. Thomas and Suarez (Ditchling, 1930), 103155. In one he explains that for practical reason, as for theoretical reason, it is true that false judgments occur. In the next article, Aquinas adds another element to his definition by asking whether law always is ordained to the common good. His response, justly famous for showing that his approach to law is intellectualistic rather than voluntaristic, may be summarized as follows. It is the idea of what should be done to insure the well ordered functioning of whatever community the ruler has care for. 2) Since the mistaken interpretation restricts the meaning of good and evil in the first principle to the value of moral actions, the meaning of these key terms must be clarified in the light of Aquinass theory of final causality. Instead of undertaking a general review of Aquinass entire natural law theory, I shall focus on the first principle of practical reason, which also is the first precept of natural law. supra note 3, at 75, points out that Aquinas will add to the expression law of nature a further worde.g., preceptto express strict obligation. The will necessarily tends to a single ultimate end, but it does not necessarily tend to any definite good as an ultimate end. From mans point of view, the principles of natural law are neither received from without nor posited by his own choice; they are naturally and necessarily known, and a knowledge of God is by no means a condition for forming self-evident principles, unless those principles happen to be ones that especially concern God. [57] In libros ethicorum ad Nichomachum, lib. [2] Bonum est faciendum et prosequendum, et malum vitandum. Summa theologiae (Leonine ed., Rome, 18821948), 1-2, q. The first primary precept is that good is to be pursued and done and evil avoided. To such criticism it is no answer to argue that empiricism makes an unnatural cleavage between facts and values. Law is imagined as a command set over against even those actions performed in obedience to it. Only secondarily does he consider it a moral principle applicable to human good and free action. Why, exactly, does Aquinas treat this principle as a basis for the law and yet maintain that there are many self-evident principles corresponding to the various aspects of mans complex nature? As we have seen, however, Aquinas maintains that there are many self-evident principles included in natural law. J. Robert Oppenheimer. Although Suarez mentions the inclinations, he does so while referring to Aquinas. To begin with, Aquinas specifically denies that the ultimate end of man could consist in morally good action. To know the first principle of practical reason is not to reflect upon the way in which goodness affects action, but to know a good in such a way that in virtue of that very knowledge the known good is ordained toward realization. In some senses of the word good it need not. Still, his work is marked by a misunderstanding of practical reason, so that precept is equated with imperative (p. 95) and will is introduced in the explanation of the transition from theory to practice, (p. 101) Farrell (op. Now since any object of practical reason first must be understood as an object of tendency, practical reasons first step in effecting conformity with itself is to direct the doing of works in pursuit of an end. That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men. For example, to one who understands that angels are incorporeal, it is self-evident that they are not in a place by filling it up, but this is not evident to the uneducated, who do not comprehend this point. at II.7.2. On the one hand, a principle is not Self-evident if it can be derived from some prior principle, which provides a foundation for it. Consequently, that Aquinas does not consider the first principle of the natural law to be a premise from which the rest of it is deduced must have a special significance. [3] For this reason the arguments, which Aquinas sets out at the beginning of the article in order to construct the issue he wants to resolve, do not refer to authorities, as the opening arguments of his articles usually do. It subsumes actions under this imperative, which limits the meaning of good to the good of action. 1. Purma (18521873), 7: bk. Good is to be done and pursued, and evil is to be avoided, together with the other self-evident principles of natural law, are not derived from any statements of fact. If the first principle of practical reason were Do morally good acts, then morally bad acts would fall outside the order of practical reason; if Do morally good acts nevertheless were the first precept of natural law, and morally bad acts fell within the order of practical reason, then there would be a domain of reason outside natural law. 91. For Aquinas, however, natural law includes counsels as well as precepts. 5, for the notion of first principles as instruments which the agent intellect employs in making what follows actually intelligible. Aquinas suggests as a principle: Work in pursuit of the end. Thus the status Aquinas attributes to the first principle of practical reason is not without significance. The mistaken interpretation of Aquinass theory of natural law, with its restrictive understanding of the scope of the first practical principle, suggests that before reason comes upon the scene, that whole broad field of action lies open before man, offering no obstacles to his enjoyment of an endlessly rich and satisfying life, but that cold reason with its abstract precepts successively marks section after section of the field out of bounds, progressively enclosing the submissive subject in an ever-shrinking pen, while those who act at the promptings of uninhibited spontaneity range freely over all the possibilities of life. As Suarez sees it, the inclinations are not principles in accordance with which reason forms the principles of natural law; they are only the matter with which the natural law is concerned. They wish to show that the first principle really is a truth, that it really is self-evident. From mans point of view, the principles of natural law are neither received from without nor posited by his own choice; they are naturally and necessarily known, and a knowledge of God is by no means a condition for forming self-evident principles, unless those principles happen to be ones that especially concern God. Among his formulations are: That which is to be done is to be done, and: The good is an end worth pursuing.. The imperative not only provides rational direction for action, but it also contains motive force derived from an antecedent act of the will bearing upon the object of the action. The natural law, nevertheless, is one because each object of inclination obtains its role in practical reasons legislation only insofar as it is subject to practical reasons way of determining actionby prescribing how ends are to be attained. And, in fact. cit. Aquinass solution to the question is that there are many precepts of the natural law, but that this multitude is not a disorganized aggregation but an orderly whole. My main purpose is not to contribute to the history of natural law, but to clarify Aquinass idea of it for current thinking. In this section I wish to clarify this point, and the lack of prosequendum in the non-Thomistic formula is directly relevant. Precisely because man knows the intelligibility of end and the proportion of his work to end. That god is the source of morality is a commonly held view in Christianity , as well as some other religions. Such a derivation, however, is not at all concerned with the ought; it moves from beginning to end within the realm of is.. a. identical with gluttony. [81] See Quaestio disputata de anima, a. In neither aspect is the end fundamental. The Literary Theory Handbook introduces students to the history and scope of literary theory, showing them how to perform literary analysis, and providing a greater understanding of the historical contexts for different theories.. A new edition of this highly successful text, which includes updated and refined chapters, and new sections on contemporary theories Of course, I must disagree with Nielsens position that decision makes discourse practical. Natural law does not direct man to his supernatural end; in fact, it is precisely because it is inadequate to do so that divine law is needed as a supplement. 92, a. 94, a. The first principle of practical reason is a command: Do good and avoid evil. [68] For the will, this natural knowledge is nothing else than the first principles of practical reason. at q. In the sixth paragraph Aquinas explains how practical reason forms the basic principles of its direction. 1-2, q. [34] Summa contra gentiles 3: chs. Only truths of reason are supposed to be necessary, but their necessity is attributed to meaning which is thought of as a quality inherent in ideas in the mind. Once its real character as a precept is seen, there is less temptation to bolster the practical principle with will, and so to transform it into an imperative, in order to make it relevant to practice. But the practical mind is unlike the theoretical mind in this way, that the intelligibility and truth of practical knowledge do not attain a dimension of reality already lying beyond the data of experience ready to be grasped through them. The mistaken interpretation offers as a principle: In the article next after the one commented upon above, Aquinas asks whether the acts of all the virtues are of the law of nature. The human will naturally is nondetermined precisely to the extent that the precept that good be pursued transcends reasons direction to any of the particular goods that are possible objectives of human action. Hence the basic precepts of practical reason accept the possibilities suggested by experience and direct the objects of reasons consideration toward the fulfillments taking shape in the mind. His response is that since precepts oblige, they are concerned with duties, and duties derive from the requirements of an end. We may say that the will naturally desires happiness, but this is simply to say that man cannot but desire the attainment of that good, whatever it may be, for which he is acting as an ultimate end. Aquinas says that the fundamental principle of the natural law is that good is to be done and evil avoided (ST IaIIae 94, 2). 4, d. 33, q. Because the specific last end is not determined for him by nature, man is able to make the basic Commitment which orients his entire life. 1, sed contra, ad 3; q. The two fullest commentaries on this article that I have found are J. In fact, Aquinas does not mention inclinations in connection with the derived precepts, which are the ones Maritain wants to explain. Aquinas expresses the objective aspect of self-evidence by saying that the predicate of a self-evident principle belongs to the intelligibility of the subject, and he expresses the subjective aspect of self-evidence in the requirement that this intelligibility not be unknown. The seventh and last paragraph of Aquinass response is very rich and interesting, but the details of its content are outside the scope of this paper. But over and above this objection, he insists that normative discourse, insofar as it is practical, simply cannot be derived from a mere consideration of facts. To the second argument, that mans lower nature must be represented if the precepts of the law of nature are diversified by the parts of human nature, Aquinas unhesitatingly answers that all parts of human nature are represented in natural law, for the inclination of each part of man belongs to natural law insofar as it falls under a precept of reason; in this respect all the inclinations also fall under the one first principle. 1, q. The First Principle of Practical Reason: A Commentary on the Summa Theologiae, 1-2, Question 94, Article 2, [Grisez, Germain. If the good of the first principle denoted precisely the object of any single inclination, then the object of another inclination either would not be a human good at all or it would qualify as a human good only insofar as it was subordinate to the object of the one favored inclination. In the fifth paragraph Aquinas enunciates the first principle of practical reason and indicates the way in which other evident precepts of the law of nature are founded on it. supra note 18, at 142150, provides a compact and accurate treatment of the true sense of knowledge by connaturality in Aquinas; however, he unfortunately concludes his discussion by suggesting that the alternative to such knowledge is theoretical.) 4)But just as being is the first thing to fall within the unrestricted grasp of the mind, so good is the first thing to fall within the grasp of practical reasonthat is, reason directed to a workfor every active principle acts on account of an end, and end includes the intelligibility of good. He considers a whole range of nonpsychic realities to be human goods. Obviously no one could ask it who did not hold that natural law consists of precepts, and even those who took this position would not ask about the unity or multiplicity of precepts unless they saw some significance in responding one way or the other. Utilitarianism is an inadequate ethical theory partly because it overly restricts natural inclination, for it assumes that mans sole determinate inclination is in regard to pleasure and pain. By their motion and rest, moved objects participate in the perfection of agents, but a caused order participates in the exemplar of its perfection by form and the consequences of formconsequences such as inclination, reason, and the precepts of practical reason. 5) It follows that the first principle of practical reason, is one founded on the intelligibility of goodthat is: Good is what each thing tends toward. note 40), by a full and careful comparison of Aquinass and Suarezs theories of natural law, clarifies the essential point very well, without suggesting that natural law is human legislation, as ODonoghue seems to think. c. God is to be praised, and Satan is to be condemned. The Summa theologiae famously champions the principle that "good is to be done and pursued, and evil is to be avoided." There is another principle, however, to which, according to Dougherty, "Aquinas gives the most analysis throughout his writings," namely, the principle that "the commandments of God are to be obeyed" (147-148). For Aquinas, there is no nonconceptual intellectual knowledge: De veritate, q. He points out, to begin with, that the first principle of practical reason must be based on the intelligibility of good, by analogy with the primary theoretical principle which is based on the intelligibility of being. If practical reason were simply a conditional theoretical judgment together with verification of the antecedent by an act of appetite, then this position could be defended, but the first act of appetite would lack any rational principle. More than correct principles are required, however, if reason is to reach its appropriate conclusion in action toward the good. . 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