Summa Theologiae Moralis, vol. I: De Principiis

89. The causes which more greatly impede the free act, and in this way the human act, are of two kinds: some are those which proximately diminish or remove it, and these are only two: 1) one sole actual principle, namely the passions or movements of the sensitive appetite, for the movements or acts of reason and will concur in constituting the human act; 2) the other habitual principle, namely habits (and habitual dispositions) with the connected custom, and these can also be found in reason and will. Moreover 3) there are other causes which more remotely influence the free act, insofar as from them passions or habits or habitual dispositions can arise, such as bodily constitution, heredity, education, drunkenness and imperfect hypnosis, and many pathological states or nervous diseases.

S. Th. I-II, q. 9, a. 2, and 10, a. 3; q. 22 and 23, and 24, a. 3, ad 1; q. 73, a. 6; q. 77, a. 6 and 7; q. 78 a. 2 and 4.

90. Passion is a movement of the appetitive power arising from the imagination of a sensible good or evil, with a certain change in the body; or an act of the sensitive appetite pursuing a sensible good or shunning a sensible evil, with the imagination directing, and with a certain bodily alteration¹. It is said:

1. movement or act, as a kind of genus; 2) of the sensitive appetite, so that its subject may be indicated; 3) pursuing good or shunning evil, so that the twofold object and the proximate genus may be indicated; 4) with the imagination directing i.e., by sensible representation through a certain sensitive faculty, so that the principle of passion may be noted, which indicates good and evil; 5) with a certain bodily change, so that the effect may be indicated by which passion is distinguished both from the movements of the will, which occur without bodily alteration, and from sensible cognition, which occurs with only an intentional alteration, without a physical alteration.

Passion comprises a twofold element: material, which is the very transmutation of the body; formal on the part of the appetite, which is an act of the soul, without which it would be only a bodily passion, by which the body alone would suffer: thus in anger the material element is the kindling of blood around the heart, the formal element is the appetite for vengeance. For passion is from the soul as from an effective principle, from the organism as from a subject (I, q. 20, a. 1, ad 2).

91. The Scholastics, following Aristotle, teach that there are eleven principal passions, to which all can be reduced². For passion is the act of the sensitive appetite. But this is twofold: concupiscible and irascible. For in man, as in animals, there is not only an inclination to pursue what is sensible and suitable and to flee what is unsuitable, but also an inclination to resist what is contrary and hindering. Hence there is a twofold inclination: the concupiscible inclination concerning good and sensible evil absolutely taken as such, namely concerning the delightful and the painful, and the irascible inclination concerning sensible good and evil as being arduous and difficult.

Now there are six passions in the concupiscible faculty: if the appetite is borne toward good or evil simply, abstracting from whether it is present or absent, there is 1) love of good, and 2) hatred of evil; — if the appetite is borne toward good or evil as absent, there is 3) desire or concupiscence of good, and 4) flight from evil; — if the appetite is borne toward good or evil as present, there is 5) delight in good, and 6) sadness over evil.

There are five passions of the irascible appetite, which is borne toward the difficult good and evil: if it is borne toward the difficult good, this will be either with a view to the possible, and then there is 1) hope, or the impossible, and there is 2) despair; — if it flees the difficult evil, that is either possible to repel, and there is 3) audacity, or impossible, and there is 4) fear; — or finally it is engaged with the present evil that must be avenged, and there is 5) anger, to which no passion is opposed.

The passions of the concupiscible faculty differ in species, and 1) according to the contrariety of good and evil, because they are borne toward opposite objects (e.g., love and hatred), and 2) according to a different active power or a different degree in the process of the appetitive movement toward the same object (e.g., love, desire, and delight). Cf. q. 23, a. 1 and 4. The passions of the irascible faculty differ, and 1) according to the contrariety of the object (e.g., hope and fear), and 2) also according to a contrary movement, namely, according to approach and withdrawal from the same object (e.g., hope and despair, daring and fear). Cf. a. 2. Anger has no contrary (a. 3)³.

92. Passion is divided in relation to free will or to a human act: it is either antecedent, which precedes the deliberation of reason and the free consent of the will and causes it or entices it to the act: then something is done from passion; — or consequent, which follows the free consent of the will and proceeds from it: then something is done with passion. This is a) by overflow when the will is borne vehemently and intensely toward the object; for such vehemence naturally excites passion in the sensitive appetite: this is voluntary in cause only; b) by direct excitation when the will studiously excites or fosters passion so that it may pursue the object more ardently and intensely, e.g., love to tend more intensely toward something, hope to more easily obtain victory, anger to more easily take vengeance, concupiscence to pursue more intensely, fear to yield at once: this is voluntary in itself.

The will is not moved directly by an antecedent passion of the sensitive appetite, but indirectly and mediately, namely, through the object of the intellect. When a passion is aroused, a man is affected in a certain way and is changed into some disposition, whereby it comes about that the intellect apprehends as suitable and good what it would not have so apprehended in the absence of the passion, just as to the angry or lustful man there appears good what does not appear so to the calm man (James 1:14). Such a change happens to occur in two ways: 1° sometimes, but more rarely, reason is totally bound, so that a man has no use of reason, as happens in those who, because of vehement anger or lust, become furious or insane, through some bodily disturbance: for in these there is no use of reason, nor consequently of the will; 2° more often reason is not totally absorbed by passion, but remains as to some free judgment of reason, and then also the motion of the will remains free, which does not of necessity tend to that to which passion inclines. And although reason is clouded by passion, yet there remains as to something a free judgment of reason, and according to this a man can either totally repel the passion, or at least hold himself so as not to follow the passion (q. 9, a. 2, and q. 10, a. 3).

93. Principles. I. Antecedent passion diminishes the free, and consequently goodness or sin, because it diminishes the indifference of judgment and clouds reason, insofar as it shows the object so that it appears highly delightful and suitable, or highly inconvenient or unsuitable, and more so than it is. Indeed, sometimes, if it is very vehement, it removes the cognition and deliberation of reason, and hence not only the free but also the properly so-called voluntary. Hence the principle: What is done from passion is less free.

II. Consequent passion in no way diminishes the voluntary nor the free, nor consequently goodness or sin, because it is the effect of the free will; but a) it is a sign of a greater voluntary, if it proceeds from the will through redundancy; b) if however it is directly excited by the will, it even simply increases the voluntary (extensively and intensively), because it makes one also through passion and more intensely pursue good or evil and freely will it, and consequently increases goodness or sin: for the more one, according to St. Thomas, q. 77, a. 6, with a greater inclination freely wills to pursue something, the more perfectly he does good or evil. Hence the principle: What is deliberately done with passion is not less free but more voluntary. 94. Observations. — 1° The general doctrine on passion is briefly expressed in can. 2206: « Passion, if it has been voluntarily and deliberately excited or nurtured, rather increases imputability; otherwise it diminishes it more or less according to the varying intensity of the passion; and it altogether removes it, if it precedes and impedes all deliberation of mind and consent of will ». 2° It can happen that consequent passion diminishes deliberation and freedom with respect to the act following from it, insofar as the agent proceeds further than he had previously determined, and kills, e.g., the one he had intended to wound. But with respect to that new act or further effect it will be antecedent, and the principles on antecedent passion are to be applied to it.

S. Th. I, q. 83, a. 1, ad 5; I-II, q. 78, a. 2 et 4.

95. A habit is a firm and permanent disposition acquired by the repetition of acts, whereby one readily and promptly breaks forth into similar acts, and it can be defined as: a facility and promptness acquired by repeated acts for performing similar acts. Custom is the very repetition of acts, or the usual manner of acting; whence properly it is distinguished from an acquired habit and is related to it as cause to effect; indeed, also as effect to cause: for custom is the cause of acquiring and strengthening a habit; but with a habit already acquired, it is itself the cause why the custom is continued. In the present question, however, moralists more often use one interchangeably for the other.

Custom can be contracted inadvertently and therefore be undeliberate and involuntary; or it can be contracted knowingly and freely and therefore be voluntary and deliberate. Moreover, once the habit has been contracted, after the subject of it becomes aware, either he effectively retracts it, i.e., with the firm purpose of employing fitting remedies for eradicating it, in which case the habit is actually involuntary, although perhaps it was antecedently voluntarily and freely acquired: — or he freely accepts and preserves it, or does not retract it but neglects to eradicate it, in which case it is actually voluntary and free, although perhaps it was antecedently involuntary or undeliberate.

96. Principles. I. An undeliberate and involuntary habit flows in the same manner as antecedent concupiscence; hence it increases the voluntary as regards inclination, but diminishes it as regards the free.

Noted: 1) if someone solely from such a habit and therefore performs the act entirely inadvertently, this will be non-voluntary and in no way deliberate, and hence neither good nor evil; 2) a deliberate habit, or one freely admitted, if it is effectively retracted, i.e. not by mere displeasure but by a firm resolve to work towards its eradication, becomes actually involuntary; whence the acts following solely from it are involuntary and not imputable, just as the cause itself or the habit; 3) if the habitual person afterwards neglects to apply effective remedies in due time, the habit (from that negligence) again becomes indirectly voluntary and free, and hence the acts following from it will be voluntary and free and imputable.

II. Deliberate and voluntary habit 1) always increases the voluntary as regards inclination; — 2) if, which is rarer, it removes all actual attention and deliberation in subsequent acts, it diminishes the free and consequently the goodness or sin, because it removes the voluntary and free in itself and only leaves the voluntary and free in its cause, if the habit was deliberately acquired, or the indirect voluntary and free, if it was indeliberately acquired, but freely neglected to be removed; — 3) if, however, which is more frequent, it leaves sufficient attention here and now, it does not remove the free in itself but diminishes it to some extent, because ordinarily it clouds the intellect and its actual deliberation, and diminishes indifference; yet this diminution of freedom is perfectly compensated in its cause, because man freely contracted the habit and preserves it, and thus freely wills that very diminution of deliberation and freedom, which shows the will choosing intensely and confirmed in good or in evil. Hence simply the voluntary and the goodness or sin are increased. Whence St. Thomas says that he who sins from habit, i.e., not from inadvertence or passion, but by sole free will uses his habit, sins from sheer malice. Whence two principles:

1. What is done advertently from an involuntary habit, or inadvertently from a voluntary habit, is in some respect more voluntary, but less free.

2. What is done advertently from voluntary habit is not less free, but simply more voluntary.

3. Observation. — A good habit diminishes freedom toward evil; this, however, is an imperfection of the will; whence a good habit perfects the will more.

98. A bodily constitution, which can depend greatly on heredity, and undergoes change through education, can be numbered first among the causes, which more remotely influence the child.

1. Bodily temperament (temperament) is the complex of those inclinations which belong to each one from his own organism and constitute his special character; since, however, such innate dispositions can in some way be changed by one's own efforts, education, and external circumstances, character is called the complex of innate inclinations insofar as they have been changed by one's own will and the instruction of others and have acquired some firmness. Whence St. Thomas (c. Gent. II, 63): "The soul rules the body and resists the passions which follow the temperament: for from the temperament some are more apt than others to lusts or anger; yet they abstain more from them, because of something restraining, as is evident in the continent." Temperament therefore diminishes the exercise of free will, but does not take it away; as has been said of the passions and habits of which it is the cause. This, moreover, is established by one's own and others' experience.

2. The complexion of the body depends greatly on heredity, by which tendencies are transmitted from parents to children, tendencies that depend more on the organism, and indeed not only physical defects or corporeal or sensory qualities, but also mental aptitudes, and even moral tendencies, such as inclinations to anger, drunkenness, vices of the flesh, suicide, so that in most regions examples are cited of families in which certain virtues or vices have been transmitted through many generations.

Indeed, although a certain kind of madness may sometimes be transmitted from vicious parents which entirely removes liberty, nevertheless the ordinary use of reason and liberty remains. Against modern determinists contending that by the law of heredity the liberty of children is destroyed, into whom propensities are transmitted without their consent, it must be held that hereditary propensities diminish free choice, insofar as reason is obscured by them and the force of the will is in some way weakened, as we have said concerning the passions and habits to which hereditary inclinations can give rise and therefore be assimilated. Nor does there exist only an influence of the body on the soul, but also, in turn, an influence of the soul on the body is given.

3) Natural propensities that arise from constitution or heredity, and are strengthened by character, are greatly increased and diminished by education. Education influences free choice in three ways: by inculcating principles, whether good or bad, which easily turn into prejudices, or by omitting to inculcate good principles; — by presenting examples through which the intellect is indirectly led little by little to approve what is done by many, or even the will is directly drawn to consent; — finally, by exciting passions and directing them toward good or evil (e.g., by counsels or the reading of books). Now as regards inculcated principles, what we have said about ignorance is to be applied, which does not always render an act simply involuntary, if that ignorance itself is consequent; as regards examples and excited passions, what has been handed down about passions holds, which generally do not remove but diminish liberty.

99. Another cause are pathological states or diseases of the mind, which are so called, not because the soul itself or the spiritual faculties can be diseased in themselves, but because, on account of badly affected organs, specifically the centers of the brain, and on account of the organic sensitive powers, they are hindered in their action transiently or permanently. Some are merely functional, without lesion of the organ, and are called psychic; others organic, with lesion of the organ, are called physio-psychological. They are distinguished¹:

A. Psychosae, which habitually disturb the use of reason, at least in determinate matter, so that the sick are not conscious of their own abnormal state. Thus:

1) Dementia, which is a growing weakness and dullness of the mind.

2) Phrenesis, of which various species are counted. In it, the sick put forth false judgments which are incurable at the root, because they are deceived by perpetual or temporary hallucinations or have disturbed associations of imagination, so that their psychic life can be equated with the life of those dreaming.

Hence in delirium, even if it be monomania or hallucination confined to a single subject, they are not free; through the intervals of delirium nothing of itself impedes freedom.

B. Psychasthenia, which hinders practical judgment and the will, but in such a way that the weak are conscious of their abnormal state and psychic debility. And indeed:

1) Obsession so occupies the mind that the obsessed person is bound to think or do certain things. It sufficiently disturbs practical judgment, so that, if it is vehement, room is often left only for slight guilt, and scarcely can grave sin occur in such cases. But besides perpetual obsessions, there are others which arise only in certain circumstances; hence outside the state of obsession the infirm are held by the precept 98 SUMMA THEOLOGIAE MORALIS

On fleeing the occasions of morbid excitation to committing dishonorable acts, and if they freely do violence to these, they are guilty. Reduced to obsession are phobias, fixed ideas, more intense scruples².

2. Impulses of the blind or invincible propensities can be in a morbid state, whether they immediately obtain a non-deliberated act, or they overcome futile resistance so that the act is nonetheless elicited. Hence some are merely mechanical or motivative, which often are without affect, as for example in an idiot; — others are psycho-mechanical or even merely psychic, which occur with a more distinct perception and stronger affect, and often leave partial freedom.

All suppose the suggestible person, for his passive docility depends on the intensity of a certain phantasm which quite easily produces an insuperable impulse. Thus some are known to be prone to lies, others to internal blasphemies, others to suicide or homicide, others to thefts, drunkennesses, or fires, according as they suffer from cleptomania, dipsomania, pyromania; with whom, however, are not to be confounded those who are thieves, drunkards, liars, etc. from habit: for these indeed are not abnormal, but sinners from malice.

It is not easy to discern whether impulses are truly irresistible, but from all the circumstances it must be judged whether freedom is only diminished or taken away. The latter can easily be supposed a) if the action cannot be explained by natural concupiscence, b) if after the evil action the mind has remained calm and content, c) if something is done which one would otherwise altogether abhor; — yet freedom is not always taken away. Hence what we said above about violence, about fear, and about concupiscence can be applied.

3. Abulia renders the will impotent for willing and for effectively commanding what is desired, whether it remains idle, or as if unwilling, is compelled to do or leave certain things against its own practical judgments. In the 1° case, the sick person is often excused from certain positive duties, because freedom is at least sufficiently diminished; in the 2° case, what was said about impulses holds.

Abulia, however, is sometimes not universal, but is limited to certain acts or particular times. Moreover, it can be voluntary and free in its cause, when someone knowingly and freely induced this state, e.g., by constantly abdicating the will without sufficient reason.

C. Psychoneuroses or disorders of the nervous system itself:

1. Neurasthenia is a pathological state consisting in habitual fatigue of the nervous system from an organic or psychic cause; in which the nerves appear weakened and exhausted, so that the agent, although self-possessed, labors under the greatest inconstancy, and is much depressed physically and morally. Hence liberty is diminished, though not taken away. Therefore the infirm can quite easily be excused when, yielding to weariness, they neglect certain positive precepts, especially merely ecclesiastical ones, as too great a burden. If, however, out of sadness, they seek base pleasures to which the disease itself does not impel them, of themselves they are to be judged to sin.

2. Hysteria, although there is dispute about its cause, also carries with it a disordering and disturbance of the nervous system, but much more serious than neurasthenia, which consists in a great morbid suggestibility, from which sensibility is diminished or temporarily extinguished in certain parts of the body (anesthesia), while in others it is rendered much more intense (hyperesthesia); there also arise bodily movements more or less disordered, as well as vivid hallucinations or vehement passions which are highly unstable, and greatly impede the free exercise of the will, as well as right judgment and the moral sense. Wherefore hysterics easily deceive themselves and others. Hence in practice, only from the circumstances, and from the declaration of the hysterics themselves, can it be known how much freedom remains in them. Nevertheless, hysterical agitation (crise, accès de grande hystérie) cannot be reconciled with full responsibility and grave guilt.

3. Epilepsy is still more serious, that hidden or concealed form which drives one to commit various strange, shameful, and atrocious deeds: to inflicting injury, blasphemies, shameful conversations, striking, homicide, etc.; not indeed constantly, but with longer intervals interposed, so that the sick person retains no memory of all these things. The agitation or epileptic crisis cannot certainly be reconciled with full responsibility and grave guilt. But outside the times of frenzy the mind is sound and perfectly free; unless at times a transient psychic disturbance should supervene.

All the aforesaid disturbances, even if they affect the affection or the will, seem to draw their origin from the clouding or diminution of intellectual cognition³.

In general overview, therefore, as far as pathological states are concerned, "cases in which imputability remains whole, or in which it is entirely removed, are to be considered as exceptions. For generally imputability neither remains untouched, nor is entirely removed, but is diminished.

This proposition concerns acts that proceed from abnormality, and does not concern acts that are placed outside the influence of the abnormality — e.g., concerning other matters or in lucid intervals —; ... moreover, it concerns actual imputability, and it intends to prejudge nothing about indirect imputability or imputability in cause, both with respect to the abnormality itself and with respect to the effects of the abnormality. This imputability, however, cannot be neglected.

Even in practice — e.g., in direction — although one must proceed gently, this imputability is not to be too much diminished by excuses...

With regard to care, after examining the condition of those suffering from abnormalities, the role of the priest, the physician, friends and family, and the collaboration of all of them must be determined. With regard to this collaboration, care must be taken lest the trust of the sick person in one of the named persons harm the trust which the infirm ought to have especially toward the priest and the physician. On the contrary, it is to be desired that, e.g., friends in whom the sick person confides should work, insofar as it can be done, so that trust in the physician and the priest always increases.

Care must also be taken that there be no contrary « remedies » (counsels, suggestions, etc.), so that their action would mutually weaken one another or in practice have no efficacy. Therefore, by questioning the physician or the family or prudently the sick person himself, the priest should learn, insofar as it is possible, what the physician has thought and decided. Also, friends and family may have suitable indications. Thus all, in a positive and optimal manner, can work together for healing⁴. ».

100. The third cause is hypnotic sleep. This a) in the perfect or deep state greatly diminishes the exercise of liberty, indeed, so long as it lasts, almost removes it, unless perhaps as regards matters to which the person is wholly opposed; — b) in the imperfect state of lighter sleep, liberty is diminished; — c) as regards suggestions, however, to be fulfilled afterward in the waking state, the matter is debated: for the Nancy school contends that the hypnotized person, even in this case, cannot morally resist the suggestion, while the Paris school asserts that liberty is not entirely removed but only diminished.

In practice, therefore, the hypnotized person must be diligently and cautiously questioned, so that, from his own testimony, it may be discerned whether and to what extent he was in some degree free in performing the action. Nevertheless, actions perpetrated in hypnosis can be free in their cause, when he freely abdicated his will and consented to the hypnotic sleep, foreseeing that such actions would be suggested, or exposing himself to this danger.