MORALITY. — By morality is meant the quality of human actions by which they are morally good or bad. A fundamental and necessary presupposition of the morality of an act is without doubt freedom (v.). Any act whatsoever performed, for example, under the irresistible constraint of violence, is not only not a moral act, but is not even a human act (v.).
However, while freedom is a necessary condition, it does not seem to constitute the essence of morality, as some would hold (an opinion attributed to Scotus: 1266–1308). Nor does it seem acceptable to adopt the view of Pufendorf (1632–94), who sees the essence of morality in the imputability of the act itself, or that of Suárez (1548–1617), who locates it in an extrinsic denomination of the act.
The essence of morality (which constitutes, as it were, the genus that is divided, as species, into goodness and malice) seems to consist in the relation that the human act has to its rule; that is, to the eternal law of God, which is the supreme or remote rule, and to right reason, which is the proximate rule (this is the teaching of the Thomists).
It follows, against every moral positivism, that a good human act is one that conforms to rational nature, aids it in attaining its ultimate end, and thus corresponds to the order established by God. A bad act, on the other hand, is one that does not conform to rational nature, that is, is contrary to the order of right reason.
The first and fundamental norm of morality, as has been said, is the eternal law, insofar as it is considered as the divine intellect (ratio divina) that conceives the natural order to be observed by creatures, that is, the essential relations of creatures both in relation to God and among themselves, not insofar as it is the will of God that commands the preservation of the established order and forbids its violation. In this second aspect, the eternal law is the foundation of every moral obligation, which gives rise to morality, but is not to be confused with II. This explains how there are actions that are, by their very nature, good or bad, independently of any extrinsic precept, of any human or divine will. The divine ratio, in conceiving the natural order, cannot but take into account the rational creature as it is. This also explains why the opinion of those (Ockham, Gerson, Descartes, etc.) who assert that the free will of God could have established a morality different from that which now exists must be rejected. Considered in man—not in the individual, but in all men (so as to be a common rule for all and to have a universal character)—the objective and ultimate norm, in the created order, of morality is simply the law.
Some diversity in the exposition of these concepts exists among Catholic authors. Some take as the norm of morality the ordering of things to their ultimate end (Th. Bouquillon, J. Mausbach, J. Donat, J. Gredt); others the rational human nature, considered in its entirety (Wittmann, O. Lottin, E. Elter); others right reason (L. Lehu, and many Thomists); others finally the essential order of things (M. Liberatore). If one disregards the last opinion, now abandoned, the different positions are not so contrasting as to be irreconcilable. In the end, human nature is nothing other than the essence given by God to man insofar as it is the principle of operation in relation to the ultimate end. Therefore, every act that accords with human nature is thereby ordered to the end, and conversely every act conformed to the end corresponds to human nature (cf. I. E. Van Roey, *De virtute charitatis*, Malines 1929, pp. 16–17). Good and evil are thus determined by conformity or lack of conformity both to rational nature and to reason and the ultimate end; all these concepts ultimately resolve into the same thing. The subjective norm of morality is conscience, which consists in the final practical judgment that determines in particular whether an act is lawful or unlawful.
As for the extension of morality, two specific questions arise: 1) whether, besides good and bad acts, there also exist indifferent acts, that is, neither good nor bad; 2) whether in the human act, in which one can distinguish the internal act of the commanding will and the external act (in relation to the will) of the internal or external faculty that executes the command of the will, morality is to be placed entirely in the internal act or whether some element of morality is also given by the external act.
It seems more logical to exclude in concreto the existence of indifferent acts, and to limit formal morality to the internal act alone, to which the external act, by perfecting it, adds in the same order the material element. The conformity or lack of conformity of the act to the norm of morality is the objective principle or criterion of morality in general. In the specific case, this conformity or lack of conformity is discerned through the connection that the elements in which the human act is realized have with the norm of morality. The human act therefore derives its morality primarily from the object, which is why it is called objective morality. Indeed, the act of the will is a certain movement of the will itself tending toward the object. But whatever is the term of the movement, such is the movement itself. Hence the action of the will (good or bad) is such as is the object or term of it (good or bad).
The human act also derives its morality from the circumstances of person, thing, place, means, end, manner, and time. The most important circumstance is the end, that is, that for which the will is moved to do something (v. SOURCES OF MORALITY).
Alongside objective morality there is also subjective morality, that is, the personal morality of one who, though not having a bad end, is induced to act by a false persuasion of acting well or at least of not acting badly in what is objectively bad. If the agent is in perfect good faith, although he materially performs a bad action, he does not formally sin as long as he perseveres, without a grave contrary doubt, in his good faith. It can happen that, through a complex of causes, this false persuasion spreads widely and shapes the customs of entire social strata, among whom certain actions, intrinsically reprehensible, are regarded as honest or at least not bad, for example, certain displays of immoral press.
Morality can also be intrinsic, when it springs from the very essence of the moral object (for example, the love of God is an intrinsically good act; hatred of God, blasphemy are intrinsically bad acts), or extrinsic, when the goodness or malice of the act derives solely from positive law (for example, eating meat on Friday is a bad action, insofar as there exists an ecclesiastical law that forbids it). There therefore exist actions that are good or bad because they are commanded or forbidden (extrinsic morality), but there also exist others that are commanded or forbidden because they are good or bad (intrinsic morality).