ARTICLE 4

(20) Virtue is all the more necessary in the lower appetites because of the defects suffered by these powers as a result of original sin. The acquiring of natural virtues and the exercise of supernatural virtues, as regulative and perfective of the sensitive appetites, occupy a prominent role in Christian asceticism. St. Thomas treats the matter of mortification when he discusses the morality of the passions, the seven capital sins and their results, and, in particular, when he speaks of the virtues which have for their subject the inferior appetites. Spiritual writers have developed this doctrine at length, with particular emphasis on the difference between the condition of redeemed human nature and that of nature in the state of original justice. Thus, Father Leen: "In the state of original justice the subordination of sense to reason and reason to God could be maintained without any internal conflict. The maintenance of this right order in redeemed man even when his efforts are aided by grace, involves a severe struggle. The internal conflict remains even after original sin has been taken away. It is because of this that mortification is rigidly necessary. Without it then this internal conflict cannot issue in success for reason and faith."

             However, in the present context, St. Thomas is concerned solely with establishing the fact that the sense appetites are subjects of virtue, and in presenting the psychological and moral bases for this fact. The conflict between sense and spirit, and the consequent need of virtues in the sense appetites, is indicated in the Summa: "Just as human flesh has not of itself the good of virtue, but is made the instrument of a virtuous act, to the extent that, being moved by reason, 'we yield our members to serve justice.' (Rom. 6/19); so also the irascible and concupiscible powers have not, of themselves, the good of virtue, but rather the infection of the 'fomes.' But insofar as they are made to conform to reason, the good of virtue is engendered in them."--I-II, 56, 4 ad 2.

             (21) "Every power in which something of reason, which makes man to be man, is found, is a principle of human action. Wherefore, since in the irascible and concupiscible powers, which are parts of the same appetite, there is something of reason participatively, inasmuch as they can obey reason--which is not true of the powers of the nutritive part--there must be in the irascible and concupiscible powers certain virtues, as in a subject, whereby these powers are given a facility in obeying reason. This facility consists in repressing the passions, so that they do not disturb reason.

             "Thus, in the man who suffers more vehement passions, but is not carried away by them, there is indeed a habit in his reason which restrains him from being led away; but there is no habit in those powers in which the passions reside. This is the case with the continent man. Hence the continent or abstinent man is not perfectly virtuous, but the temperate or meek man, in whom not only is the superior part so perfect that it cannot be enticed, but the inferior is also moderated, so that vehement passions do not even arise.

             "And so, in whatever power there is a passion with which a virtue is concerned, that power is the subject of virtue; as temperance is in the concupiscible, and fortitude and meekness in the irascible powers."--In III Sent. d. 33, q. 2, a. 4 Sol 2 ad qu 2.

             (22) "The inferior appetites, namely, the irascible and concupiscible, require habits, and hence they are perfected by moral virtues. For it does not exceed human nature that their acts be moderated, but it does exceed the force (vim) of the aforesaid powers. Hence something of a superior power, namely, reason, must be impressed upon them; and this seal of reason on the inferior powers formally constitutes the moral virtues."--De Veritate, q. 24, a. 4 ad 9.