Intemperance

INTEMPERANCE. - From Lat. intemperantia, immoderation, in a generic sense it is the vice opposed to temperance considered as a general virtue and indicates the lack of moderation in human acts. In a proper sense, as the vice opposed by excess to temperance (v.) in the strict sense, it is the disordered craving — that is, exceeding in quantity, manner, time or otherwise the limits willed by reason — for the pleasures connected with the acts necessary for the preservation of the individual and of the human species. Its object is therefore principally sensual pleasures and those of touch and of the palate. It consequently comprises the following vices: gluttony, drunkenness whether from alcohol or from drugs, lust, anger, cruelty, pride, curiosity, immodesty and the like.

In general the sins of intemperance are less grave than the spiritual sins, but more infamous because they reduce man to the level of the brute, nor do they reveal in themselves that minimum of intellectual light which appears in the latter. The first remedy is to avoid the occasions and, in certain fields, as in that of lust, even to think of the objects craved; the second, mortification in all its forms, which renders the will vigilant and strong to overcome the allurements of the senses.

Giuseppe Pistoni