question 39.
Reasons to consider every sorrow an evil (the last freakin' nine articles maybe?) but here he gives three.
1. "all sorrow is evil, of its very nature." Thus it seems what is evil of nature would be evil in every case (semper et ubique).
2. What all men shun... is bad. Even virtuous shun. (the prudent man doesn't aim for pleasure but aims at avoiding sorrow)
3. Bodily evil = object and cuase of bodily pain - constitutes a "bodily evil". Spiritual evil - object and cause of spiritual sorrow - constitutes an "evil of the soul"
Context of SED interesting - "when doing evil" rejoicing is bad. Supposing there's evil sorrow for it would be "good" (bona).
Reply - distinguishes betw. something unconditionally and as presupposing some factor (ex suppositione alterius).
Simpliciter and per se - is "quoddam malum" - because the appetite of man is istressed (anxiari) about a present evil has the ratio of being something bad - because it prevents the rest of the appetite in good.
And on another supposition - AS SHAME (VERECUNDIA) IS SAID OT BE GOOD - on the supposition that something shameful has been commited as was said (GET CITATION - SENTENCES)
So therefore, supposing something to be saddening or painful, it pertains to good that someone should be saddened or grieve concerning present evil.
For if he weren't saddened or pained it would be because he didn't sense or regard it as something repugnant, and either case is clearly a bad thing. And therefore it pertains to boneitatem that, supposing the presence of evil sadness or pain would follow. (cites augustine nad good remaining in nature).
But since moral discussions are concerning individuals and their operations, that which is on some supposition voluntary is judged voluntary, as is said in the Ethics and we have seen ( I-II 6.6)
1. The Nyssene is concerned with the evil that causes sadness, not on the part of the one "sensing" and "repudiating" evil.
And from this EVERYONE FLEES SADNESS INASMUCH AS THEY FLEE EVIL; BUT THEY DO NOT FLEE THE SENSING AND REFUTING OF EVIL.
Very important.
And so it must be said concerning bodily pain, for the sensing and refusal of bodily evil attests to the goodness of nature. (2nd and 3rd clear)
CAN SADNESS (TRISTITIA) BE A BONUM HONESTUM?
1. Seems not - what leads a man to hell seems "at odds" with the real good. (I like their understated English : ) cites Augustine - who thought it looked as though Jacob feared "giving way to excessive sorrow which would lead him, not to the repose of the blessed, but to the hell of sinners."
2. St. Paul says to do "what each has decided in his heart, not with sorrow or under comupsion."
3. Seems to show a will contrary to the divine ordination - to whose providence eveyrthing is subject.
Reply - can lead to eternal life - ergo can be virtuous. Matthew 5.5: Blessed are those who mourn.
Insofar as good, can be morally good (solid principle). Cites parallel cases of physical pain and interior sorrow - physical pain shows goodness of nature since senses sense and nature takes refuge from the harmful which causes pain. IN the interior - sadness - the cognitio mali is sometimes due to a right judgment of reason rectum judicium rationis, and hte refusal of evil is through a will well disposed (in) detesting evil (per voluntatem bene dispositam detestantem malum). Now every honest good proceeds from these two things, namely from rectitude of reason and the will. Whence it i snaifest that sadness can have the ratio of the honest good.
Okay - this is something I clung to very strongly. But I have to remember it comes at the END of sorrow being something quite bad and contrary to life, impeding activity - someting that has to be opposed and mitigated by "redundancy" - something which when uncontrolled doesn't have the ratio of hte bonum honestum - at least speaking simpliciter because the damage it is doing is more primary.
1. all passions of the soul ought to be regulated by reason, which is the root of the bonum honestum.
2. Just as sorrow over something bad comes from a recta will and reason, which detest evil, so sadness concerning the good comes from a perverse reason and will, which detest the good. Therefore that kind of sorrow impedes praise or merit due to moral goodness, eg. someone who gives alms with sadness.
3. Distinction between God "willing" and "permitting" - e.g. sins. A will that is opposed to sin existing in oneslef or in another, is not out of harmony with the will of God.
Neither does he insist that it is necessary for rightness of the will to will/embrace (velit) penal bad things, but simply that one does not rebel (contranitatur) against hte order of divine justice (see I-II 19,10)
Can sorrow be instrumentally good?
WAIT A MINUTE. I DON'T REALLY HAVE TO DO MORAL GOOD AND EVIL IN THE PASSIONS YET - I'M WORKING AT THEM CONCEPTULALY FOR THE FIRST PART - I'LL SNEAK UP THE MORAL STUFF IN LATER. oh well I might as well finish them.
Art. 3 - Can it be a USEFUL good? (utile)
possibly not - goes against life, all that jazz
1. Ecc. "Sorrow kills many, there is no use in it."
2. Arist: "Choose something without sorrow, rather than the same thing with sorrow."
3. "Everything exists for its operation." But "sadness impedes operation" (Book cites Ethics X, 5. 1175b17)
Sed -Wise man doesn't seek usesles sthings - Eccl - hear to the wise wher there is sadness,a nd the heart of the stupid where there is mirth (laetitia).
REply - 2fold appetitive mvmt arises from present evil. One - appetite contrary to present evil - and on this part sadness has no use - what is present cannot not be present.
b) The motion rising up in the appetite to flee and to repel the saddening evil. and in this regard, sorry has utiltiy, if it be concerning something which is to be avoided. (can? be avoided - quod est fugiendum).
2 reasons to avoid something - a) on its own account, from the contrariety it has to good - e.g. sin (thus sorrow for uin is useful to help man flee sin - Paul "I rejoice, not because you are sad, but because you are saddened to repentance.")
Another way something is to be avoided, not because bad in itself, but as the occasion of evil, because love makes a person to cling to it excessively by love, or bcause it precipitates him towards something bad, as is clear with temporal gods. And on this account, sadness for temporal goods can be useful. Eccl - "Better to go to the house of weeping than to the house of feasting - in that one the end of all men will be kept in mind."
HERE'S THE REFLEXIVITY AGAIN - sorrow is useful for any avoiding that needs to be done, because it doubles the motive (causa) for avoiding it. Something bad is to be avoided on its own account, and all flee sorrow sorrow on its own account, since all desire the good, et delectationem de bono. (We all desire not only the good - but also pleasure concerning the good. Little psychological one-up on Aristotle). And so delight for the good makes us seek the good more avidl - so sadness for the bad makes us avoid evil more vehemently.
1. That authority can be understood concerning immoderate sadness - WHICH ABSORBS THE SOUL (animum absorbet). (absorb - devour, engulf, submerge, dry up) - the English "absorb" can have very positive connotations - "Oh, I was absorbed in thinking" - absorbere - sorbere means "drink up". "suck up".
2. Whatever is choice (eligibile) (in the sense of"choice meat") becomes less choice on account of sorrow, and thus fleeing is encouraged (fugiendum redditur magis fugiendum) on account of sadness.
3. If one has sadness concerning an operation, it impedes operation, but sadness concerning the cessation of operation makes one to work more avidly.
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FINALLY
Is Physical pain ("dolor corporis") the greatest evil?
1. Seems sadness (tristita) is the greatest evil, because "the best is opposed to the worst" (Arist) but delectation is the best, since it pertains to felicity.
2. Beatutide is the "summum bonum" of man (..) consists in man "has what he wills, and wills nothing of evil." But sorrow woulod be having something contrary to one's will.
3. Aug - we're composed of body and soul - our supreme good would be the greatest good of the superior part and our "supreme evil" the worst evil of the lower part (identifies them as "wisdom" and "worst pain").
Sed Contra - Worse than punishment is fault. (See I. 48.6) But sororw pertains tot he punishment of sin - as the enjoyment of changing things is the bad of guilt. (Reminds me of Augustine here - not often he uses this kind of sentence). Oh. He's preparing to quote augustine.
REply basically NO SORROW OR PAIN can be the WORST - because it means either that something is really bad causing the pain, or something that is apparently bad but actually good. If it concerns something truly bad - can't be worst -because what would be worse would be not to judge bad what is really bad.
And sadness or pain about what is apparently evil but truly good can't be the worst since it would be worse to be separated in every way from the true good.
1. Delight and sadness have two things in common - a "true judgment concerning good and evil" and a "right (debitum) order of the will approving good and refusing evil".
And so it is clear that in every pain or sadness there is something good, the removal of which would make it worse.
But there is not something evil in everyu pleasure, through the removal of which it can be better. Thus there can be a pleasure that can be the supreme good, but no sorrow that can be the worst good of man.
2. The fact that the will opposes evil is something good - can't be the worst then, since it has some "permixtio" of good.
3. Reply to Objection 3. That which harms the better thing is worse than that which harms the worse. Now a thing is called evil "because it harms," as Augustine says (Enchiridion xii). Therefore that which is an evil to the soul is a greater evil than that which is an evil to the body. Therefore this argument does not prove: nor does Augustine give it as his own, but as taken from another [Cornelius Celsus].
Okay, my brain is temporarily stunned.
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