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Conferences on the Virtues

By Fr. Bruno Cocuzzi, ocd

 

Number 24

 

The Cardinal Virtue of Justice and

Its Affiliated Virtues

 

 

Here we are with the 24th conference in this series.  Our first was dated October 1990.  In a sense it seems that I just began a short time ago, and in another, that I’ve always been doing it.  You will remember my saying many conferences ago, after I finished the Conferences on Prudence, that I was going to depart from the “order” or sequence in which the material is treated in my textbook.  The reason I gave at that time is that so much space is devoted to the Cardinal virtue of Justice, the next in order after Prudence, that I feared I would be out of office before I finished it.  It appears that my calculation was correct.  The total number of pages devoted to Fortitude and Temperance combined is 134.  The total number of pages devoted to JUSTICE is 711.  Those of you who are mathematicians know that 134/711 is smaller than 12/21.  That is, it took me twelve months to cover 134 pages (I began treating of in the September 1991 conference), so therefore I would never have been able to cover 711 pages on Justice in the 21 months from September 1991 to June 1993!!!

 

To see just where Justice fits into the overall “scheme” of the Cardinal virtues, let me reproduce and expand (quite a bit, it turns out) upon the introduction of my author to the Treatise he entitles:  The Cardinal Virtue of Justice and Its Affiliated Virtues:

 

Besides Prudence, which disposes reason itself rightly to judge and correctly to mandate particular deeds, so that the soul remains “ordered and directed to” an authentic GOOD consistent with and leading to the ultimate GOOD which God our creator desires for us, there are three other Cardinal Virtues and their allied virtues which bring it about that the other powers of the human soul also participate in the GOOD which Reason enjoys through the virtue of Prudence.  Those other powers are the “appetites” of the soul.  These are “drawn” toward those things that each of the three, in its own way, perceives as good.  The “virtues” which “reside” in each of them guarantee that the appetites “reach out and embrace” only those perceived goods which are in accord with the GOOD of Prudence, and that they do so “in the manner” that is consistent with the “mandate” of Prudence.  Obviously, it would be of no profit to the human soul to have its Reason ordered to the ultimate GOOD that can alone fulfill it, while the other three “powers” embrace and adhere to a “perceived good” which in truth is NOT A GOOD and therefore cannot lead the soul to the possession of the ultimate GOOD that alone can make it eternally happy.

 

[As we have already seen in previous conferences] two of those other “powers” of the soul comprise the SENSE APPETITE, and are called, respectively, the Concupiscible and the Irascible Appetites.  It is the former which is “drawn” by “goods” that give delight to the senses.  It is the Cardinal virtue of TEMPERANCE which moderates and restrains this “appetite” to guarantee that it does not go after those delights of sense which do not participate in the GOOD of Prudence.  The latter, the Irascible Appetite, is “drawn” to what it perceives as an “escape” from a threatened harm.  That is, from anything that would cause the sense appetite to experience pain or difficulty.  It is the Cardinal virtue of FORTITUDE which moderates and strengthens the soul so that it is able to endure the pain and difficulty which are required to remain firmly rooted in the GOOD of Prudence, i.e., a “good” that leads to the final, permanent possession of the only GOOD that can make the soul everlastingly happy.

 

The overall effect of the Virtues of Temperance and Fortitude is that a person is “properly ordered” considered in himself alone. That, of course, is a requisite for being finally united to God Himself, our authentic, ultimate GOOD, since what is “disorder” cannot possibly become ONE with God, who is the Supreme and Perfect “Order”.

 

The third “powers” of the soul, (other than Reason) is the WILL (the Rational Appetite).  Even though the Will participates (by obeying the commands of Prudence) in setting a human person “in order in relation to himself” (through the exercise of the virtues of Temperance and Fortitude), its most proper function is to set a person “in order” in regard to other human beings.

 

This should not surprise us, since the Will is the power (or faculty) of the soul by means of which we “love”.  The very notion of “love” requires “another”.  To love in the true, accurate sense means to be “other-centered”.  That is to say, there cannot be “love” where there are not “distinct” persons.  To BE a person means to “stand in a relationship” with some other person.  When a person is “self-centered” it becomes utterly impossible for that person to “love”.  As a matter of fact, “self-centeredness” destroys PERSONHOOD.  A self cannot be “itself” and “another self” at the same time.  One’s “self” is a “person” ONLY WHEN standing in a relationship to “another self”.  To be “self-centered” is to be UNREAL (a non-being), since God, the ultimate, unlimited REALITY (the Supreme Being), is a Trinity of Persons.

 

The expression is often used:  You cannot love others until you first love yourself.  If what I have said above is true, then the underlined expression is false.  Well, actually, it is misleading.  We do not really mean, “love” in the most strict sense when we say, “love yourself”.  We really use it to mean what we mean when we say we love some “thing” or “non-person”.  To say we “love something” really means we esteem it highly.  (Esteem is a function of the intellect).  And intimately connected with the notion of “esteem” – inseparable from it – is the “desire” (which IS a function of love, a function of the Will) that that object remain “unharmed”, or more strictly speaking, that we wish it well.  And this latter is called “benevolence”.  So the statement really should be rephrased:  You cannot have benevolence for another unless you first have benevolence toward yourself.  However, the object of our benevolence when we “love ourselves” IS NOT our PERSON, IT IS our HUMANITY.  Thus, if we do not have a proper esteem for our own “humanity” (not our PERSON), we cannot possibly have esteem for another person’s “humanity”, and thus we couldn’t have the type of “love” for that person that we call benevolence.

 

We “love” our own humanity (not our person) by wanting (wishing, willing) the very best for it, namely, that it attains the destiny for which God created it.  And that is none other that our Intellect be in “possession” of God under the aspect of Truth, that our Will be in “possession” of God under the aspect of GOOD, and that our Imagination be in “possession” of God under the aspect of Beauty.  However, we CAN desire (wish, want, will) the best for ourselves in so far as we are PERSONS considered in the abstract, by AFFIRMING our Personhood, namely, WILLING that we remain in the most proper relationship with every other PERSON, that is, in the most proper relationship with every distinct “other”.  And that is exactly where JUSTICE fits in.  It is the cardinal Virtue which guarantees that our relationships are in “perfect order”. 

 

Having said that, I see that I really meant something else.  Let me explain:  Relationships are “spiritual” entities.  They either “exist” or they “do not exist”.  So when I say that Justice is the virtue that guarantees that my “relationships” are in “perfect order”, I really mean that my deeds (including speech, thoughts and desires) are perfectly in harmony with my existing relationships.

 

Our relationships come into being either “naturally” (without our acting to bring them into being), or by an act of our own volition.  Some are permanent (are indissoluble) and some are temporary (do terminate or can be terminated).  An example of a natural, indissoluble relationship would be that of kinship.  I will always be the biological son and brother of my parents and of my siblings, respectively.  Examples of voluntarily created and indissoluble relationships are those of a sacramental marriage and those forged by the Solemn Vows of religion.  As I think about it, it seems to me that most (if not all) “natural relationships” are permanent (will never go out of existence), and most (but not all) relations created by the human will are dissoluble.

 

Before going further, let me say a few more things about “love”.  We are obliged to have the “love of benevolence” for every human being, really for every other PERSON.  We are “naturally” related to every other human being (and each of them to us) because we are descended from the same First Parents.  We are also “naturally” related to the Divine Persons.  God the Father is our Creator.  And so, “naturally”, the Eternal Word and the Holy Spirit are also our Creators, since They do all things together.

 

However, the Most Holy Trinity was not satisfied with just being related to us as an artisan is related to the articles he fashions.  God, the Trinity of persons, also wanted to be “personally” related to each one of us.  But to do that, He had to create us “Persons.”  (Surely that is why “male and female” he created us!)  Then again, were we not PERSONS, in no way could we be His image and likeness.  Thus He is also “naturally” related to all human beings as their GOD, even though many are not aware of Him, and that was the basis of His COVENANT with His chosen people.

 

But that still was not enough for the Divine Persons of the Holy Trinity.  BY GRACE, God the Father extended to us the invitation to be members of His FAMILY.  He would be our Father by spiritual adoption.  God the Son (Jesus) would be our Brother (by nature and by Grace) and more:  our Saviour and the Spouse of our souls.  God the Holy Spirit would be related to us as Sanctifier, as “generator” of the Life of Grace in us that causes us TO BE God’s children by adoption.

 

Therefore these are more important reasons why we must have the love of benevolence for all human beings:  We owe them “esteem” not only as creatures of God, but also because, if they are not already our brothers and sisters in the family of God by Sanctifying Grace, they have the potential or capacity of being such.

 

There is, however, a different kind of “love” which, for lack of a name, I will call “unitive love”.  This kind of love certainly includes “benevolence”, but goes beyond it.  All of our “natural” relationships are “shared” relationships.  (Even our being an only child means we are the son or daughter of a mother and a father).  But there is some mysterious quality about the human person that requires that it enter into an “exclusive” relationship, that is, one that is shared with only one other.  On the human level, that “only one other” must be a person who in some sense “complements” our specific humanity in such a way that in virtue of this “exclusive relationship” the two terms of the relationship form a “new being”.  This is “other-centered-ness” in the most perfect sense; each term of the relationship is “identified” with the other.

 

This relationship, though, is the creation of the Will, or better, the Wills of the two persons entering into that exclusive relationship.

 

We would not be able to speak of “due order” in our relationships unless there existed a “hierarchy” in our relationships.  That is to say, we “stand in closer relationship to” certain individuals, for one reason or another, than we do to others.  Thus the obligation to “have benevolence” is stronger in regard to some than it is to others.  The relations that bind us to God, a Trinity of persons, is one that is the absolute closest for all of us.  Thus we are obliged to have the highest degree of benevolence for God.  (“Anyone who loves father or mother, wife or children, brother or sister more than Me, is not worthy of Me,” Jesus reminds us).  Thus that divine relationship always takes precedence over every mere human relationship.  Yet an amazing thing is true about loving God with a love of benevolence that surpasses all others; it coincides with the highest “love” we can have for any and all human “others”, even for that “other” person whom we may love with that exclusive “unitive” love mentioned above.  A corollary to that would be:  the highest form of benevolence that can be directed to any and all human “others” is to desire that each of them attain to “unitive love” of God, Who, in virtue of His Divinity, is the only one who “completes us”.  He created us in such a way that we are not our true “selves” until we are completed by Him as Supreme Truth, Supreme Good, and Supreme Beauty.

 

The Virtue of Justice speaks to all of the above.

 

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My author proposes to treat of the subject under six HEADINGS.  They are:  1.  Justice in General, 2. Legal Justice, 3. Commutative Justice, 4. Distributive Justice, 5. The Virtues Annexed to Justice and 6. The Commandments to Do Justice.  I don’t expect to be able to cover all the material the author does, for I will be selective for one reason or another.  Nevertheless, I will include here the subheadings of each of the above in outline form.

 

I.                   Justice in General

 

A.     Justice considered in itself

B.     Rights, the object of Justice

1.       Rights, in General

2.       The Kinds of Rights

3.       The Object of Rights and of Dominion

4.       The Subject of Rights and of Dominion

C.     Injustice and Injury in general

D.     The Division of Justice, that is, Its Integral, Subjective and Potential Parts

 

II.                 Legal Justice

A.     Pursuit of the Common Good

B.     Management of the Common Good

C.     Defense of the Common Good

 

III.              Commutative Justice

A.     Its proper Act:  Restitution in general

B.     Justice and Injustice in Involuntary Exchanges

1.       Internal Goods of Soul and Body

2.       Conjugal Goods

3.       External Goods

4.       Reputation and Honor

C.     Justice and Injustice in Voluntary Exchanges:  Contracts

1.       Contracts in General

2.       Unilateral Contracts

3.       Bilateral, Mutually Binding Contracts

4.       Bilateral, Gratuitous Contracts

5.       Contracts Subject to Chance (Risk)

6.       Subsidiary Contracts

 

IV.              Distributive Justice

 

A.     Judgment:  The Primary and Formal Act of Distributive Justice

B.     Justice and Injustice in the Distribution of Benefits

C.     Justice and Injustice in the Distribution of Responsibilities

D.     Justice and Injustice in Public Judgments.

 

V.                The Virtues Annexed to Justice

 

A.     Religion Considered in Itself

B.     Acts of Religion

C.     Sins Against the Virtue of Religion

D.     Piety and Observance

E.      Truth

F.      The Other Virtues Annexed to Justice:  Gratitude, Vindication, Liberality, Affability, Equity, and Gift of Piety

 

VI.              The Commandments of Justice

 

In a footnote to the above, the author assures us that this outline indicates only the major divisions.  I guess that means that there will be further subdivisions of these here indicated.

 

The introduction to the tract on justice concludes with a brief paragraph entitled, “The Importance of this Treatise”.  He states:

 

A Treatise on Justice stands out above all others, because of both 1.  Its amplitude, since it has to do with the Cardinal virtue which, among all the pure moral virtues, is most important in the field of morality:  upon it almost all of social and moral life depends, for as St. Thomas says, the ten Commandments all have to do with Justice, and 2. Its difficulty, since it considers questions that are very problematic, and nevertheless of great moment, especially in these our times (he wrote prior to 1946), when the means by which we can communicate among ourselves have become more numerous, more intricate and more diversified.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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