Moral Theology. Charles J. Callan
hates Balbus, and first calumniates him, thus giving scandal, and then kills him, thus making himself liable before the law.
94. The Morality of the Act That Is Indirectly Willed.—An act is said to be willed indirectly, or in its cause, when it is foreseen as the result of another act which alone is directly intended (see 35 sqq.). According to the different moral character of the acts, there are four cases in which the act is willed indirectly:
(a) when both the act directly willed and the resultant act are bad. Examples: Titus is heartily opposed to quarreling and blasphemy; but he makes himself drunk to forget his troubles, foreseeing that he will quarrel and blaspheme while in that state. Balbus has a real dislike for uncharitable thoughts; but he chooses the company of a notorious scandalmonger in order to be amused, knowing that thoughts against charity will be caused by listening to him;
(b) when the act directly willed is bad and the resultant act is good. Example: Caius is very miserly when sober, but liberal when intoxicated; to vary the monotony of his life, he decides to become intoxicated, but grieves at the thought of the money he may give away to some deserving charity before he returns to his senses. Sempronius decides on an act of injustice with sorrow over the unbidden thoughts of remorse or repentance that will follow his act;
(c) when both acts are good. Example: Out of charity Titus makes up his mind to visit a pious relative who is ill; and he foresees that thoughts of improving his own conduct—a thing not pleasing to him—will be occasioned by this visit;
(d) when the act directly willed is good and the resultant act is bad. Examples: Balbus takes a drug prescribed for his health, although he foresees it will make him unable to go to church. Caius gives alms to the poor, intending only an act of charity, but he knows that thoughts of vainglory will arise.
95. The act indirectly willed sometimes gives, sometimes does not give, a new morality. (a) Thus, if it is good, it adds no internal goodness, since the will only permits, without intending the good act. Example: Caius, who does not intend, but regretfully permits his act of charity which he foresees, does not desire the act of charity. (b) If it is bad, the act indirectly willed adds a bad act of the will, if the will desires evil by permitting what it has no right to permit. Example: Titus who does not prevent, when he should, what will lead to blasphemy on his part, implicitly desires the act of blasphemy.
96. The Morality of the Consequences of an Act.—Man's life receives its moral character, not only from his internal and external acts which are done in the present and from those which he knows will result from them in the future, but also from the influence his acts exercise now and afterwards upon his fellowman. It is this influence upon others that we now speak of as the consequences of an act. According to the case, the consequences sometimes add, sometimes do not add, to the morality of an act. The good men do lives after them, and also the evil. There are various kinds of consequences:
(a) foreseen consequences, which, if intended, add to the morality of an act, since it is clear that one who wishes the many good or evil results of his act is better or worse in intention than another who has no such wish. Thus, one who knows that many will be edified or scandalized by his conduct, and wills the result, is better or worse than if he had no such will about those consequences;
(b) unforeseen consequences, which, if they follow naturally and usually from an act, make the act in itself better or Worse according to their character. Thus, the teaching of Christian doctrine is good as conveying a knowledge of truth, but it is made better on account of the spiritual benefit of others that naturally results from it. Similarly, the teaching of evil is made worse on account of the evil consequences it usually produces;
(c) unforeseen consequences, which, if they follow only accidentally and rarely from an act, do not affect its morality, since an act must be judged by what belongs to its nature, not by what is merely occasioned by it. Thus, the fact that an alms is used by the recipient as a means to intemperance does not detract from the goodness of the almsgiving done for the sake of charity. Likewise, the fact that an injury is used by the sufferer as an occasion for spiritual profit does not lessen the wickedness of the injurious act.
97. Imputability.—Just as an act may be an act done by man (i.e., higher than the operations of brutes) and yet not be human (i.e., not performed in the manner that is proper to man as man; e.g., an act of reasoning or of decision during a dream, see 23 sqq.), so an act may be moral (i.e., in conformity or disagreement with the standards of right) and yet not imputable as good or bad to the agent (e.g., a prayer or imprecation said by an infant, or the drunkenness of one who did not realize the power of a liquor).
98. Imputability is that property of an act by which it belongs to its agent, not only in its physical nature as something of himself or as an effect produced by him or in its human quality of subjection to his will, but in its moral character of goodness or badness. From contact with the moral object, the agent takes as his own something of the brightness or defilement of that object, and so becomes chargeable himself with goodness or badness.
99. The conditions for the imputability of an act are:
(a) the act must be human—i.e., it must be performed knowingly and willingly (see 23 sqq.). One is not chargeable with the quality of the act, if not responsible for its very substance. Example: Titus suffers such intense pain that he does not know what he is saying, and he blasphemes. The morality of blasphemy is not unknown to him, but his present act is not voluntary, and hence is not imputable;
(b) the morality of the act must be known, or be something that should be known, at least in a general way, to the agent; for no one is responsible for what he is wholly ignorant of through no fault of his own. Example: Titus, Caius, Balbus and Sempronius rob the orchard of their neighbor. Titus in good faith thinks he is doing an act of virtue, because the owner owes money to his companions. Caius thinks that some kind of sin is being committed, but he does not know whether it is theft, or gluttony, or what. Balbus thinks that only a venial sin of stealing is being perpetrated. Sempronius, the youngest of the crowd, looks on the whole affair as a part of the day's sport. All committed theft, and the act is wrong; but Titus and Sempronius were not guilty of sin, since they were in good faith. Caius and Balbus committed sin, the species and degree depending on the knowledge they had or should have had (see 588 sqq.);
(c) the morality of the act must be willed. If the act is good, the goodness must be intended, since a person should not get credit for what he does not wish. Example: Titus does not believe in virtue, and Caius is opposed to helping the poor; but both give an alms to a beggar, the former in order to get rid of the beggar, the latter in order to get rid of some old clothes. Hence, neither wishes or receives credit for the charity done. If the act is bad, the badness is sufficiently intended by the performance of what one knows is forbidden and wrong. The will chooses contact with the evil object, and thus implicitly with the evil of the object. Example: Balbus protests that he does not wish to harm anyone, and then proceeds to calumniate his neighbors. His disavowal of sinful intent does not make him any the less responsible for his calumny.
100. Imputability may be conceived as making one responsible for the moral quality of an act in three ways: (a) generically, if one should get the credit or diseredit of goodness or badness only; (b) specifically as to kind, if one gets the credit or discredit of a particular category of goodness or badness; (c) specifically as to degree, if one gets the credit or discredit of higher or lower grades of the same virtue or vice, or if one is made guilty of mortal or venial sin. These points will be discussed in the articles on the virtues and vices (see 186 sqq.).
101. Goodness is imputable as follows:
(a) As regards internal acts, a person is credited with all the goodness of the object, end, and circumstances, in so far as it is known and willed by him. Example: Titus purposes to pray in a penitential posture, in order to obtain the virtue of humility. Hence, he has the credit of worship, mortification and humility through his holy desire. If he thought of the penitential posture, not as a moral circumstance, or if he regretted it, he would have the act, but not the credit of mortification;
(b) As regards external acts, a person is credited with the greater readiness or intensity or duration which, through it, his will gives to what is good. Example: If Titus prays in