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The Corruption of the Papal Court and the Roots of Modern Liberalism

by Ludwig von Pastor

Ludwig von Pastor’s History of the Popes from the Close of the Middle Ages is a great gem of recent Catholic scholarship.  Spanning forty volumes and five centuries, Pastor’s history traces the Papacy from the Babylonian Captivity at Avignon, through the Conciliarist crises of the mid 15th century, the Reformation, the Counter-Reformation, and beyond, up to the outbreak of the French Revolution.  For his work, Pastor was given free use of the Vatican Secret Archives, and was commended by both Leo XIII and Pius XI.

The excerpt below is taken from the first volume of the series, which discusses the Avignon Popes and the Great Schism.  Our readers will find it interesting for the light it throws on the relationship between the Franciscan Order of Friars Minor, the corruption of the Papal Court at Avignon, and the emergence of a school of political and religious thought identical in essence to the liberalism which still plagues the Church today.

Financial Difficulties at Avignon

The financial difficulties from which the Popes had suffered in the thirteenth century became much more serious after they had taken up their abode on French soil. On the one hand, the income they had drawn from Italy failed; and on the other, the tributary powers became much more irregular in the fulfillment of their obligations, because they feared that the greater part of the subsidies they paid would fall into the hands of France.

The Papal financiers adopted most questionable means of covering deficits. From the time of John XXII. especially, the hurtful system of Annates, Reservations, and Expectancies, came into play, and a multitude of abuses were its consequence. Alvaro Pelayo, the most devoted, perhaps even over-zealous, defender of the Papal power in the fourteenth century, justly considers the employment of this system, liable to excite the cupidity of the clergy, as one of the wounds which then afflicted the Church. His testimony is all the more worthy of consideration, because, as an official of many years’ standing in the Court, he describes the state of things at Avignon from his own most intimate knowledge. In his celebrated book, On the Lamentation of the Church, he says : “Whenever I entered the chambers of the ecclesiastics of the Papal Court, I found brokers and clergy, engaged in weighing and reckoning the money which lay in heaps before them.”

This system of taxation and its consequent abuses soon aroused passionate resentment. Dante, “consumed with zeal for the House of God,” expressed, in burning words, his deep indignation against the cupidity and nepotism of the Popes, always, however, carefully distinguishing between Pope and Papacy, person and office.

Conflict between the Empire and the Church

It was not long, however, before an opposition arose which made no such distinctions, and attacked not only the abuses which had crept in, but the Ecclesiastical authority Itself. The Avignon system of finance, which contributed more than has been generally supposed to the undermining of the Papal authority, greatly facilitated the attacks of this party.

From what has been said it will be clearly seen that the long-continued sojourn of the Popes in France, occasioned as it was by the confusion of Italian affairs, was an important turning-point in the history of the Papacy and of the Church. The course of development which had been going on for many centuries, was thereby almost abruptly interrupted, and a completely new state of things substituted for it. No one who has any idea of the nature and the necessity of historical continuity, can fail to perceive the danger of this transference of the centre of ecclesiastical unity to southern France. The Papal power and the general interests of the Church, which at that time required quiet progress and in many ways thorough reform, must inevitably in the long run be severely shaken.

To make matters worse, the conflict between the Empire and the Church now broke out with unexpected violence. The most prominent antagonists of the Papacy, both ecclesiastical and political, gathered around Louis of Bavaria, offering him their assistance against John XXII. At the head of the ecclesiastical opposition appeared the popular and influential order of the Friars Minor [the Franciscans], who at this very moment were at daggers drawn with the Pope.

The Friars Minor and John XXII.

The special occasion of this quarrel was a difference between them and him, regarding the meaning of evangelical poverty; and the great popularity of the Order made their hostility all the more formidable. The Minorites, who were irritated to the utmost against the Pope, succeeded in gaining great influence over Louis of Bavaria, an influence which is clearly traceable in the appeal published by him in 1324, at Sachenhausen, near Frankfort.

In this remarkable document, amongst the many serious charges brought against “John XXII., who calls himself Pope,” is that of heresy, and it is asserted that he exalts himself against the evangelical doctrines of perfect poverty, and thus against Christ, the Blessed Virgin, and the company of the Apostles, who all approved it by their lives. After a passionate dogmatic exposition of the poverty of Christ and a shower of reproaches, comes the appeal to the Council, to a future legitimate Pope, to Holy Mother Church, to the Apostolic See, and to everyone in general to whom an appeal could be made.

This document, in which political and religious questions were mingled together, was sedulously disseminated in Germany and Italy. It must have greatly embittered the whole contest. A religious conflict was now added to the political one. Louis, a simple soldier, was unable to measure its consequences and powerless to control its progress. It grew more and more passionate and violent. The Minorites no longer confined themselves to the province of theology, in which the conflict between them and the Pope had at first arisen, but also took part in the political question. Led on by their theological antagonism, they proceeded to build up a political system resting on theories which threatened to disturb all existing ideas of law, and to shake the position of the Papacy to its verv foundations.

Subversive Doctrines of Occam, Marsiglio, and Jean de Jandun

The special importance of the action of the Minorites consists in the assertion and maintenance of these principles, which indeed did not at once come prominently forward, for the writings of the Englishman, William Occam, in which they are chiefly propounded, collectively date from a period subsequent to the Diet of Rhense. There can, however, be no doubt that the views which Occam afterwards expressed in his principal work, the Dialogus, had already at an earlier period exercised great influence.

According to the theory of Occam, who was deeply imbued with the political ideas of the ancients, the Emperor has a right to depose the Pope should he fall into heresy. Both General Councils and Popes may err, Holy Scripture and the beliefs held by the Church at all times and in all places, can alone be taken as the unalterable rule of Faith and Morals. The Primacy and Hierarchical Institutions in general are not necessary or essential to the subsistence of the Church; and the forms of the ecclesiastical, as of the political, constitution ought to vary with the varying needs of the time.

With the Minorites two other men soon came to the front, who may be considered as the spokesmen of the definite political opposition to the Papacy. It was probably in the summer of the year 1326 that the Professors of the University of Paris, Marsiglio of Padua and Jean de Jandun, made their appearance at the Royal Court of Nuremberg. The “Defender of Peace” (Defensor Pacis), the celebrated joint work of these two most important literary antagonists of the Popes of their day, is of so remarkable a character that we must not omit to give a further account of its subversive propositions. This work, which is full of violent invectives against John XXII., “the great dragon and the old serpent,” asserts the unconditional sovereignty of the people. The legislative power which is exercised through their elected representatives, belongs to them, also the appointment of the executive through their delegates. The ruler is merely the instrument of the legislature. He is subject to the law, from which no individual is exempt. If the ruler exceeds his authority, the people are justified in depriving him of his power, and deposing him. The jurisdiction of the civil power extends even to the determination of the number of men to be employed in every trade or profession. Individual liberty has no more place in Marsiglio’s state than it had in Sparta.

Still more radical, if possible, are the views regarding the doctrine and government of the Church put forth in this work. The sole foundation of faith and of the Church is Holy Scripture, which does not derive its authority from, her, but, on the contrary, confers on her that which she possesses. The only true interpretation of Scripture is not that of the Church, but that of the most intelligent people, so that the University of Paris may very well be superior to the Court of Rome. Questions concerning faith are to be decided, not by the Pope, but by a General Council.

This General Council is supreme over the whole Church, and is to be summoned by the State. It is to be composed not only of the clergy, but also of laymen elected by the people. As regards their office, all priests are equal; according to Divine right, no one of them is higher than another. The whole question of Church government is one of expediency, not of the faith necessary to salvation. The Primacy of the Pope is not founded on Scripture, nor on Divine right. His authority therefore can only, according to Marsiglio, be derived from a General Council and from the legislature of the State; and for the election of a Pope the authority of the Council requires confirmation from the State.

The office of the Pope is, with the College appointed for him by the Council or by the State, to signify to the State authority the necessity of summoning a Council, to preside at the Council, to draw up its decisions, to impart them to the different Churches, and to provide for their execution. The Pope represents the executive power, while the legislative power in its widest extent appertains to the Council. But a far higher and more influential position belongs to the Emperor in Marsiglio’s Church; the convocation and direction of the Council is his affair; he can punish priests and bishops, and even the Pope.

Ecclesiastics are subject to the temporal tribunals for transgressions of the law, the Pope himself is not exempt from penal justice, far less can he be permitted to judge his ecclesiastics, for this is the concern of the State. The property of the Church enjoys no immunity from taxation; the number of ecclesiastics in a country is to be limited by the pleasure of the State; the patronage of all benefices belongs to the State, and may be exercised either by Princes, or by the majority of the members of the parish to which an ecclesiastic is to be appointed. The parish has not only the right of election and appointment, but also the control of the official duties of the priest, and the ultimate power of dismissal. Exclusion from the Christian community, in so far as temporal and worldly interests are connected with it, requires its consent.

Like Calvin in later days, Marsiglio regards all the judicial and legislative power of the Church as inherent in the people, and delegated by them to the clergy. The community and the State are everything; the Church is put completely in the back-ground ; she has no legislature, no judicial power, and no property.

The goods of the Church belong to the individuals who have devoted them to ecclesiastical uses, and then to the State. The State is to decide regarding sale and purchase, and to consider whether these goods are sufficient to provide for the needs of the clergy and of the poor. The State has also power, should it be necessary for the public good, to deprive the Church of her superfluities and limit her to what is necessary, and the State has the right to effect this secularization, notwithstanding the opposition of the Priests.

But never, Marsiglio teaches, is power over temporal goods to be conceded to the Roman Bishop, because experience has shown that he uses it in a manner dangerous to the public peace Like Valla and Macchiavelli, in later times, Marsiglio assumes the air of an Italian patriot, when he attributes all the troubles of Italy to the Popes. This is a palpable sophistry, for that reproach was in no way applicable to Marsiglio’s days. Italy was then under the sway of her most distinguished monarch, King Robert of Anjou, whom the Popes had protected to the best of their power, and Louis of Bavaria’s expedition to Rome was certainly neither their wish nor their work. On the contrary, at a later period, Pope John XXII. issued a Bull with the object of separating Italy from Germany, and thereby destroying the influence of the ” Ultramontanes,” or non-Italians in Italy.

In face of these outrageous attacks and this blank denial of the Divine institution of the Primacy and the Hierarchy, there were never wanting brave champions of the Apostolic See and of the doctrine of the Church. Most of them, unfortunately, were led by excess of zeal to formulate absurd and preposterous propositions. Agostino Trionfo, an Italian, and Alvaro Pelayo, a Spaniard, have, in this matter, gained a melancholy renown. As one extreme leads to another, in their opposition to the Caesaro-papacy of Marsiglio, they exalted the Pope into a kind of demigod, with absolute authority over the whole world. Evidently, exaggerations of this kind were not calculated to counteract the attacks of political skepticism in regard to the authority of the Holy See.

Envenomed Struggle between Church and State

The theory put forward in the Defensor Pacis, regarding the omnipotence of the State and the consequent annihilation of all individual and ecclesiastical liberty, far surpassed all preceding attacks on the position and constitution of the Church in audacity, novelty, and acrimony. Practically this doctrine, which was copied from the ancients, meant the overthrow of all existing institutions and the separation of Church and State. Many passages of the work go far beyond the subsequent utterances of Wyclif and Huss, or even those of Luther and Calvin, whose forerunner Marsiglio may be considered. The great French Revolution was a partial realization of his schemes, and, in these days, a powerful party is working for the accomplishment of the rest. Huss has been styled “the Precursor” of the Revolution, but the author of the Defensor Pacis might yet more justly claim the title.

Louis of Bavaria accepted the dedication of the book which brought these doctrines before the world and promulgated political principles of so questionable a character, but a still greater triumph was in store for Marsiglio. In union with the anti-papal Minorites and the Italian Ghibellines, he succeeded in inducing Louis to go to Rome and to engage in the Revolutionary proceedings of the year 1328. The collation of the Imperial Crown by the Roman people, their deposition of the Pope and election of an anti-Pope in the person of the Minorite, Pietro da Corvara, were the practical results of the teaching of the Defensor Pacis.

Some of the Emperors of the House of Hohenstaufen had been men of stronger characters than Louis was, yet none had ever gone to such extremes. He appealed to doctrines whose application to ecclesiastical matters was equivalent to revolution, and whose re-action on the sphere of politics after their triumph over the Church would have been rapid and incalculable. For a century and a half the Church had been free from schism; by his action he let loose this terrible evil upon her. His culpable rashness gave a revolutionary and democratic turn to the struggle between the Empire and the Papacy. He repudiated all the canonical decisions regarding the Supremacy of the Pope which the Emperors of the House of Hapsburg had accepted, degraded the Empire to a mere Investiture from the Capitol, and despoiled the Crown of Charles the Great, in the eyes of all who believed in the ancient imperial hierarchy, of the last ray of its majesty. It is strange that under Louis the Roman Empire should actually have been thus desecrated and degraded, so soon after Dante’s idealization had crowned it with a halo of glory.

It is impossible in the present retrospect to describe all the vicissitudes of Church and State during the struggle which was so disastrous to both. Envenomed by the dependence of the Popes on France, the exasperation on both sides was intense. The ecclesiastical power was implacable, lost to all sense of moderation, dignity, or charity. The secular power, cowardly but defiant, shrank from no extreme, sought the aid of the lowest demagogues, and by its vacillations frustrated each favourable chance that arose. The long and obstinate warfare, so little honourable to either party, could have no result save the equal humiliation of both and the complete ruin of social order in Church and State. John XXII., restless and active to the last, died at a great age on the 4th December, 1334.

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Maxima Quidem

Introductory Note

Blessed Pope Pius IX is imagined by many as a bitter reactionary and megalomaniac, the Pope who locked himself up in the Vatican and shut out the modern world, who arranged his own apotheosis and announced “La Tradizione son Io!”  

We reject this slanderous caricature of the great Pope, whom we cannot help but venerate.  He was a zealous and holy man, plagued by political difficulties beyond his control, struggling to preserve the integrity of the faith amidst the death throes of Christendom.  Here at The Josias, we remember him fondly as the Pope of the Syllabus, the architect of the First Vatican Council, and the great defender of the rights of the Church vis a vis the modern nation state.   Continue reading →

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The Illegitimate State as Chastisement

by Gregory de Rivière-Blanche

 The following essay rounds out our series on the question of political legitimacy, taking up the question from a somewhat different angle, with the guidance of St. Paul and St. Thomas Aquinas. —The Editors

The Josias’s ongoing symposium regarding legitimacy has raised several interesting questions about the legitimacy of modern states. One point that has come up repeatedly in the various contributions is whether a Catholic ought to obey an illegitimate government.[1] In discussing this question, Daniel Lendman has assumed that the illegitimate state is necessarily at variance with the divine will.[2] For our part, we shall show that, to the contrary, the illegitimate state may be an expression of the divine will as a chastisement sent by God to a sinful people. We suggest, therefore, that the Catholic should consider this point when examining his relationship to an illegitimate government. Continue reading →

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On the Relation of the Individual Person and the Family to Civil Society

by Henri Grenier

In the second half of the 20th century a shift took place in much Catholic social and political thought. Catholic social teaching in the ‘Pian Age’ had called for an integrally Christian society, a restoration of a pre-modern ideal of political community, which saw in political community the ‘likeness and symbol as it were of the Divine Majesty’ (Sapientiae Christianae, 9), a likeness which was itself to be subject to the social kingship of Christ. But then the focus shifted toward the duty of the political power to respect the inalienable dignity of individual persons. As Russell Hittinger has pointed out, the idea of seeing the likeness of God in political authority was practically abandoned, and instead much emphasis was put on the likeness of God in the individual person. In our view this shift was highly imprudent, and its effects have been mostly pernicious. It has led to an exaggerated value being put on individual freedom of conscience, and in many cases to a policy of appeasement toward liberal ideology. The promoters of this new approach to social questions thought that it would aid in the re-evangelization of culture, but most of the evidence suggests that they were wrong. As Christian Roy has argued, a ‘Weberian paradox of the heterogeneity of the spiritual intentions and social effects of religious reform movements’ took place, in which ‘progressive Christian personalism’ ‘unwittingly helped usher in’ a ‘drift towards hedonistic secular individualism.’

This ‘personalist’ shift, as we can call it, is often attributed to Vatican II (or even Centesimus Annus), but it began earlier as a response to the horrors of World War II. Jacques Maritain was a key figure in the early phase of the shift. Having been in favor of authoritarian restorationism early on he came to support a form of modified democratic liberalism. He wanted to find a third way between totalitarianism and individualistic liberalism. He thought he could find it by distinguishing between man as an individual, who is a part of the polity and ordered to it, and man as a person, who transcends political community through his direct relation to God.

Some Thomists saw danger in Maritain’s position. They argued that far from finding a third way between totalitarianism and individualism such a position really adopted their common error of seeing the common good as being opposed to the proper good of individuals. Personalism was thus really reducible to individualism. Moreover, taken to its logical conclusions, the position would yield an absurd and blasphemous notion of human dignity. The most famous of these Thomist critiques was Charles De Koninck’s masterful treatise On the Primacy of the Common Good Against the Personalists. De Koninck did not explicitly refer to Maritain, but his work was generally taken to be directed against Maritain and Maritain’s followers.

The text that we offer below is from another philosopher working in Quebec, Henri Grenier (Thomistic Philosophy, Vol 3: Moral Philosophy, pp. 363-373), and it offers a critique of personalism remarkably similar to De Koninck’s. It is likely that Grenier influenced De Koninck, since the substance of Grenier’s remark appeared already in a 1938 edition of his manual, that is, one published several years before De Koninck’s book. Like De Koninck, Grenier never gives the names of the ‘personalists,’ but it is even clearer in Grenier’s case than in De Koninck’s that Maritain is the target. Grenier’s summary of the personalist distinction between person and individual in 1091:3° is almost a quotation from Maritain. — The Editors

  1. Statement of the question.

1° The problem of the relations which unite individual persons and families to civil society is of utmost importance, for today there are many theories which do not recognize the natural rights of the individual person and of the family, and which regard the State as omnipotent and as possessing all rights over persons and families.

2° The problem has three aspects, which may be stated as follows:

First, admitting that civil society has a proper end which is a good, we may ask: have the individual person and the family, both of which live in society, proper ends distinct from the end of civil society?

Secondly, if they have proper ends, are these ends directed to the end of civil society, or vice versa?

Thirdly, if the ends of the individual person and of the famliy are directed to the end of civil society, is it their absolutely ultimate end?

3° In the thesis, first, we state that the individual person and the family have, according to the ordinance of nature, their own proper ends, distinct from the end of civil society. Moreover, since the order, i.e., the ordinance, of nature is the ordinance of God Himself, the author of nature, civil society may not disavow them, nor place any obstacle in the way of their attainment.

Secondly, we state the proper ends of the individual person and of the family are directed to the end of civil society, not vice versa. Moreover, since this order or relation of ends obtains in society, it is directly concerned with external acts by which men work for the common good, although indirectly it can be concerned with internal acts, in as much as the latter can regulate external acts.

Thirdly, we assert that the end of civil society is not the absolutely ultimate end to which the ends of the individual person and of the family are directed.

  1. Opinions.— There are various opinions on the relations of the individual person and the family to civil society.

1° All who conceive civil society as an organism, in the strict sense of the term, i.e., as an entity possessing absolute unity, not merely unity of order, do not admit that the individual person and the family have proper ends which are distinct from the end of civil society. For a part of a whole which is an absolute unit, v.g., a hand, which is a part of man, has no operation which is not the operation of the whole, and therefore has no end which is not the end of the whole.

Such was the teaching of Plato, who conceived society as a superior man.

The same conclusion is reached by the Caesarists, with Machiavelli, who proclaim the omnipotence of the State; by the Democrats, with Rousseau, who conceive the general will as the source of all rights, even of private rights; by the Pantheists, with Fichte, Schelling and Hegel; and by the Socialists, with Bebel, Wagner, and others.

2° All Pantheists and Naturalists hold that the end of civil society is man’s absolutely ultimate end.

According to the exponents of these opinions, individual men are dependent on the State for everything, because all their rights are derived solely from the concessions of the State.

A summary of these errors is found in the thirty-ninth sentence of the Syllabus of Pope Pius IX: Reipublicae status, utpote omnium jurium origo et fons, jure quodam pollet nullis circumscripto limitibus.

3° Today, some Catholics teach that it is not as a person, i.e., as formally an individual substance of a rational nature, but as an individual, i.e., as multiplied in the same species, that man is subordinate to the end of civil society; for man, they say, is subordinate to the end of civil society, because he is related to civil society as the part to the whole ; but man is not a part of a whole, v.g., of the human species, because of his personality, but because of his individuation by which he is multiplied in the same species.

But this opinion appears untenable, because society is essentially a union of persons, i.e., of intelligible beings. If this were not so, a union of individual horses, or cows, or bears, etc., would be a society.

 

  1. Statement of the thesis.
    THESIS.    — THE INDIVIDUAL PERSON AND THE FAMILY IN CIVIL SOCIETY HAVE, ACCORDING TO THE ORDINANCE OF NATURE, THEIR OWN PROPER ENDS; AND THESE ENDS ARE DIRECTED TO THE END OF CIVIL SOCIETY, BUT NOT UNDER THE ASPECT OF THE ABSOLUTELY ULTIMATE END.

First part.— The individual person and the family have according to the ordinance of nature, their own proper ends.— The parts of a whole which have operations distinct from the operations of the whole have, according to the ordinance of nature, ends which are not the ends of the whole, i.e., have their own proper ends. But the individual person and the family are in civil society as the parts of a whole, and have operations which are not the operations of the whole. Therefore the individual and the family in civil society have, according to the ordinance of nature, their own proper ends.

Major.— Operation is an end in itself, or tends to a proper end. Therefore, when operations are distinct, ends also are distinct.

Minor.— The parts of a whole which has only unity of order have operations which are not the operations of the whole; v.g., a soldier in an army has operations which are not the operations of the whole army.[1] But civil society, of which the individual person and the family are parts, is a whole which has only unity of order: society is a stable union of a plurality of persons in pursuit of a common good. Therefore.

Second part.— The proper ends of the individual person and of the family are directed to the end of civil society.— The individual person and the family are to civil society as the parts to the whole: the individual person and the family are the natural parts from which the whole which is civil society results. But the ends of the parts are directed to the end of the whole. Therefore the proper ends of the individual and of the family are directed to the end of civil society.

The major is evident, for civil society is composed of individual persons and of families.

The minor also is evident: the good of the part, as a part, is necessarily directed the good of the whole.[2]

Third part.— The proper ends of the individual person and of the family are not directed to the end of civil society under the aspect of the absolutely ultimate end.— The end of civil society is the temporal happiness of this life. But the temporal happiness of this life is not man’s absolutely ultimate end. Therefore the end of civil society is not the absolutely ultimate end of the individual person and of the family, i.e., the proper ends of the individual person and of the family are not directed to the end of civil society under the aspect of the absolutely ultimate end.

The major is evident from what has been already said.

Minor.— Man’s absolutely ultimate end is the beatific vision, for which man is supernaturally elevated in accordance with the positive ordinance of God.[3]

 

  1. Scholia.

1° The civil authority, or the State, as it is called, has no right to refuse recognition to the proper ends determined by nature for the individual person and for the family, nor has it any right to limit them. On the contrary, the civil authority is in duty bound to aid the individual person and the family in the attainment of their proper ends, for these ends, as directed to the common good of society, lead to that temporal happiness which is the end of civil society.

2° The virtue by which the good of the individual person and of the family is directed to the end of civil society is legal justice.

In virtue of legal justice, citizens are mutually dependent on one another in regard to their end. Moderns call this mutual dependence solidarism, which, according to them, is divided into human political, family, and class solidarism.

In dealing with this division, two things must be kept in mind: first, up to the present, humanity is not constituted as a society; secondly, solidarism is not applied univocally to the different kinds of society.

Solidarism, in the strict sense, is found only in civil society, for civil society is the only society whose end is a good which, in the order of nature, is a perfect human good; and therefore only in it is realized, in the strict sense, legal justice by which man is wholly directed to the common good.

In other particular societies, there obtains between the members and the whole a relation only similar to the relation of legal justice, because the good which they pursue is not a perfect good, but rather an imperfect good. Therefore it is only by analogy that solidarism is found in them.

3° Although individual man is destined for civil society, society is for man, and not vice versa,[4] because its proper and immediate end is the temporal happiness of this life, which is the good of man. The temporal happiness of this life is directly the common good of the whole multitude, although, as a consequence, it becomes the good of individual men who appropriate it to themselves.

4° Society, under its formal aspect as a union, may be called the means by which man attains the temporal happiness of this life.[5] Society, however, considered as the union of all the members of the multitude for the pursuit of the common good, is not the means, but the cause by which individual man can attain the temporal happiness of this life: for the united members of the whole multitude are the cause of that happiness which individual men later appropriate to themselves.

5° According to Pius XI,[6] the following are the principal goods or rights with which God, the author of nature, has endowed individual man living in society: the right to life, to bodily integrity, and to whatever is necessary for life; the right to pursue his ultimate end in the manner determined for him by God; the rights of association and of the private ownership and use of property.

The proper ends of the family are the procreation and education of offspring, the mutual aid of the spouses, and the allaying of concupiscence. Hence the family, in accordance with the ordinance of nature, has the right to all things necessary for the attainment of these ends, as are the indissolubility and unity of marriage, its own authority and power of determining the means to attain its ends, without violation, however, of its subordination to civil society.

 

  1. Personalism.

1° Personalism is the teaching of those who, in order to safeguard the dignity of the human person, hold that the end of man, as a person, is superior to the end of civil society. Hence personalism denies that the proper ends of individual man are, as we have shown, directed to the end of civil society.

2° All Catholic philosophers hold that the supernatural end of the human person is not subordinate to the end of civil society. The problem with which we are concerned at present is the relation between the ends of the individual person and the end of civil society, in the natural order only.

3° Personalism holds that man may be considered either as an individual or as a person.

Man, considered as an individual, is, according to personalism, a part of civil society, and is related to it as the part to the whole.

But man, considered as a person, is superior to civil society, and is not related to it as the part to the whole. Therefore the ends of the individual man, in as much as the individual man is a person, i.e., has the dignity of a person, are not subordinate to the end of civil society.

Hence personalism may be defined: the doctrine of those who hold that the ends of the individual man, in as much as the individual man has the dignity of a person, are not subordinate, in the natural order, to the end of civil society, but vice versa.

4° In refutation of personalism, we may make the following observations.

a) The distinction which the personalists make between the individual and the person is of no value in the present question.

For the individual, considered as distinct from nature, can mean only one of two things: either a singular nature without subsistence; or a subsisting supposit in general,[7] not a supposit subsisting in a rational nature.

If the individual signifies a singular nature without subsistence, it is wrong to say that man, as an individual, is a part of civil society. For society is a stable union of men in the order of operation, and, moreover, operations are proper to the supposit, i.e., to the subsisting being, not to nature without subsistence.

If the individual means a supposit in general, it is again wrong to say that man, as an individual, is a part of civil society, for otherwise, as we have already pointed out, a union of irrational animals would be a society. The individual man is formally a part of civil society in as much as he is endowed with an intellect, i.e., as he is a person.

b) The end of civil society is the greatest of all human goods. Hence the subordination of the individual person to civil society, as the part to the whole, is not at variance with the dignity of the human person, but is a subordination of the human person to the human person’s greatest natural good, i.e., to the temporal happiness of this life.

c) Personalism is a form of individualism, because it makes the common good subordinate to the good of the individual person.

  1. Difficulties offered by personalism.

1° Man is related to civil society as the part to the whole. But man is not a part of a whole as a person, but as an individual: for the principle by which man is multiplied in the same species is not personality, but the principle of individuation. Therefore man is not a part of civil society as a person, but as an individual, i.e., it is as an individual that man is subordinate to society. (So teach the Personalists.)

Major.— As the part to the whole in the order of being, I deny; in the order of operation, I concede.

Minor.— It is not as a person, but as an individual, that man is a part of a whole in the order of being, I concede; in that order of operation which constitutes society, I deny.

Society, as we have seen, is not a union of a plurality in the order of being, but in the order of operation, for society is a union of men for the pursuit of a common good; and, since operation is proper to the supposit, it is formally as a person that man is a part of society, and therefore it is as a person, not as an individual, than man is subordinate to the end of society.

The principle of individuation, i.e., first matter signed by quantity, is the principle by which man is multiplied in a whole, that is to say, in the same species, in the order of being.

2° If the person is immediately destined for God, man as a person is not destined for society. But man is immediately destined for God.[8] Therefore man as a person is not destined for society. (So claim the Personalists).

Major.— If the person is immediately destined for God, is as much as he, as living in society, does not attain God, I concede; in as much as the person is not destined for another creature, as the irrational animal is destined for man, I deny.

Minor.— In as much as he, as living in society, does not attain God, I deny; in as much as he is not destined for another creature, as the irrational animal is destined for man, I concede.

3° If as a person man were destined for ciyil society, all that he is and all that he possesses would be destined for civil society. But all that man is and all that he possesses are not destined for civil society.[9] Therefore man, as a person, is not destined for civil society.

Major.— All that man is and all he possesses would be destined for society if the end of civil society were the absolutely ultimate end of human acts, I concede; if the end of civil society is ultimate only in its own order, in as much as it is the greatest of all human goods, I deny.

Minor.— Because the end of civil society is not the absolutely ultimate end of human acts, I concede; because man, as an individual person, is not destined for civil society, as the part to the whole, I deny.

The absolutely ultimate end of human acts is a divine good, i.e., the beatific vision; and the end of civil society, which is temporal happiness, is the ultimate end of human acts only in the order of human goods. Hence the end of civil society itself must be destined for a divine good. Hence all that man is and all that he possesses are not destined for civil society, but for a higher good.

4° That which has substantial unity is superior to that which has only accidental unity. But the individual person has substantial unity, whereas civil society has only accidental unity, i.e., unity of order. Therefore the individual person is superior to civil society, and is not related to it as the part to the whole.

Major.— As a being, I concede; as a good, I deny.

Minor.— The private good of the individual person is superior to the common good, I deny; is inferior, I concede.

Goodness and being, though identical in reality, are logically distinct, i.e., distinct by a distinction of reason; and, moreover, absolute being in not absolute goodness, whereas absolute, goodness is relative being (n. 533). Therefore the common good of persons united in society is greater than the private good of the individual person.

NOTES

[1] In Ethic. l. I, l. 1, n. 5

[2] I-II, q. 109, a. 3, c.

[3] Cf. In Politic., l. VII, 1. 2.

[4] Divini Redemptoris, n. 29.

[5] Ibidem.

[6] Ibid, n. 28.

[7] Et dico superfluum non solum respectu sui ipsius, quod est supra id quod est necessarium individuo, sed etiam respectu aliorum quorum cura ei incumbit; respectu quorum dicitur necessarium personae, secundum quod persona dignitatem importat.— II-II, q. 32, a. 5, c.

[8] Sola autem natura rationalis creata habet immediatum ordinem ad Deum; quia caetera creaturae non attingunt ad aliquid universale, sed solum ad aliquid particulare, participantes divinam bonitatem vel in essendo tantum, sicut inanimata, vel etiam in vivendo et cognoscendo singularia, sicut plantae et animalia. Natura autem rationalis, inquantum cognoscit universalem boni et entis rationem, habet immediatum ordinem ad universale essendi principium.— II-II, q. 2, a. 3.

[9] I-II, q. 21, a. 4, ad 3.

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The Lawfulness and Social Character of Private Ownership

by Henri Grenier

The Québécois priest, theologian, and philosopher, Henri Grenier (1899-1980), was the author of a popular Cursus Philosophiae that was translated into both French and English. He was a major Thomistic opponent of personalism, and is thought to have been an influence on the great Laval School Thomist, Charles De Koninck. The following passages are taken from Thomistic Philosophy, Vol 3: Moral Philosophy, trans. J.P.E. O’Hanley (Charlottetown: St. Dunstan’s University, 1949). A scan of the complete text of this volume can be found here.

I

LAWFULNESS OF PRIVATE OWNERSHIP

  1. Statement of the question.

1° We know that man has perfect dominion over external things, i.e., over things which are inferior to him, in as much as they are destined for man’s use. Such being the finality of external things, we may now ask: may the individual man and the family possess external things? This is the question of private ownership. Continue reading →

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Dissolving the Concept of Political Legitimacy

The following piece adds to the reflections of Felix de St. Vincent and Daniel Lendman on the concept of Political Legitimacy. – The Editors

1.  All rights are based on what is naturally due for the perfection of some existing relationship between persons: if the relationship exists, if it is to be perfected, then such and such an act or ability must be maintained within the relationship.  This is what a right is.

2.  If there is a right, there must be a real relationship, i.e. a relationship which is based on a real association of persons (whether by agency and effect, proximity, dependency, or whatever).

3.  If there is such a thing as a “right to be obeyed”, then there must be a relationship from which that right follows.

4.  If political legitimacy tells us about who holds a distinct species of right (the right to be the lawgiver), there must be some genuine difference which is attributable to the one holding the right, which gives that person or set of people their distinct status with respect to everyone else in the community.

5.  If we’re trying to figure out what makes governments legitimate or illegitimate, we need to figure out what constitutes the specific difference of a government.

6.  We could make a laundry list of common theories of legitimacy — but such a list ends up being a list of all the non-governmental relationships to which the relationship between government and citizen has been reduced per analogiam: the relationship between parent and child, or between two business partners, between a violent gang and its members, etc.

7.  A primary question, then, is this: Is the specific difference between a government and some other group or person which ought to be obeyed a difference in kind or in degree?  In other words: Is it correct to think of a government as just a very large and complex parent, or a very large and complex violent gang, or are these analogies simply grasping at part of the reality of the relationship between government and governed?

8.  In these other relationships the real bases of the right are various: (1) paternity/consanguinity, (2) the honesty characteristic of useful friendships, (3) fear of violence. . .

9.  Because it is possible for those in power to have legitimate authority over those who have not been raised subject to their government, the analogy to paternity need not apply, and does not seem necessary to government.

10.  Because the lawgiver need not have any reciprocal communication with those being governed, in order to have the right to be obeyed, the analogy to honesty in useful friendships does not seem to capture the specific difference of government.  The lawgiver need not listen or have any direct acquaintance with those governed to remain legitimate.

11.  While the possibility of servile fear (the threat of violence) seems necessary universally for government, this is very clearly not constitutive of the relationship between the lawgiver and the citizen, since in any state not on the verge of collapse, the vast majority of citizens are not compelled to obey by fear but out of civic piety or at a minimum a desire to cooperate with the lawgiver.

12.  If, then, neither the state’s paternal or penal roles, nor its position as friend or partner provide its specific difference, and these are the primary candidates for the real basis of legitimacy, then (assuming that there is such a difference, and that legitimacy is a real thing) there must be some other characteristic of states which makes them legitimate on the whole, and which occasionally includes these other features.  But what?

13.  How do we identify governments?  The possession of sufficient force to punish evildoers and suppress disorder in society.  The broad recognition of the government as government by those it governs.  The government’s self-designation as one to be obeyed.  The promulgation of laws which are intended to bind the people.  The perception that the government and its laws exist to promote the common good of society.  The reality of the government’s promotion of the common good of society.  The manner by which the government or its members receive their titles.  All of these contribute to the hold of a government on a community of people.

14.  But at this point it becomes clear that the question we asked originally (i.e. what characteristic sets the state up in such a relationship to the members of a society that they ought to obey its laws) was a bad question.  Why?

15.  The question we asked presumed that there was one primary reason for the state to be obeyed, and that political legitimacy is a unitary quality to be possessed or not possessed by the state as an agent, and by its laws as acts of that agent.

16.  In reality, there are many reasons why one ought to obey the state, and because these reasons can be divided from each other and attained or lost individually, there will not be a single determinate feature that is “political legitimacy”.

17. For example, one ought to obey the state for the sake of civic peace and order.  Given the existence of a lawgiver which is recognized by the community, when one begins to disobey the laws which are accepted by the community and come from the lawgiver, one creates a disharmony in the community, which is injurious to whatever order it presently has under the law, scandalous to those who accept the authority of the lawgiver, and potentially disastrous if it should raise the possibility of the overthrow of the government.

18.  Another example: one ought to obey the state out of civic piety, and this for various reasons.  Not just because the lawgiver, as the one responsible for setting society in order, has sustained the order necessary for your personal well-being, but also because your neighbors, who have directly provided the particular goods necessary for your well-being, by obeying the laws of the state make them norms for ordinary human interaction.  Civil disobedience is violence not just against some sovereign lawgiver off in the distance, but against all those around you who abide by the laws you are breaking.

19.  Another example: one ought to obey the state because the lawgiver should be assumed, until the contrary is abundantly clear, to have a superior grasp of what laws are conducive to the common good in each particular matter, and therefore to be naturally worthy of submission and obedience.

20.  Or again: one ought to obey the state because it is the entity which most plausibly claims to govern whatever aspects of life it has appropriated to itself, and therefore must be reckoned with as such.  Or because it is the sole force capable of enforcing the laws.  Or because (and I suspect this is the basis of Christ’s injunction to “render unto Caesar what is Caesar’s”) the priorities of one’s life should be so ordered that one sets spiritual goods above temporal goods, and therefore ought to cooperate as far as possible with the temporal power and make one’s primary motive in disposing of temporal goods the pursuit of spiritual gain.

21.  The motive for asking the question “What constitutes political legitimacy?” is twofold: first, the question seems to be raised when the idea of dissolving or overthrowing the government is at hand.  Second, it is raised when one wants to discover the limits of one’s proper obedience to the law.  We can now see that these two questions are very different, and in reality deal with two very different problems.

22.  The question of overthrowing a government is reducible to the question of when the lawgiver has reached such a degree of corruption that any obedience to his authority is contrary to the common good, destructive of the peace and harmony of society, and scandalous to one’s neighbors.  When this point has been reached, it seems that the proper response is to revolt.

23.  The question of disobeying the laws is more particular: one ought to obey the state as far as possible, as explained above, if only for the sake of peace, the avoidance of scandal, etc.  But in cases where obedience to the law requires the performance of evil acts or immediate cooperation in them, one should resist.  The extent of the proximity of one’s cooperation necessary to justify disobedience in this case is the same as the extent necessary to implicate one in the guilt of a neighbor for his sins.  In other words, this question is the same (I believe) as one raised by moral theologians about cooperation in any sin.

24.  Once one performs these analyses, the notion of political legitimacy as a definite feature of governments evaporates, and is replaced by an extremely diverse and complex set of considerations based on the real order of civil society and the relationships of power, instruction, friendship, and cooperation which constitute it, which cannot ordinarily be reduced to the binary “legitimate/illegitimate”.  Moreover, one grasps that the reality we were attempting to identify when we first spoke of the government’s “right to be obeyed” is often not a right held by virtue of the relationship between lawgiver and citizen, but between citizen and society, and therefore best thought of primarily as “the duty to obey” and not “the right to be obeyed”.

25.  This shift returns our focus to its proper object: the relationship between each member of a society and the society as a whole, which includes not only the lawgiver, but all the other members as well.  After all, there can be no lawgiver without a society governed by his laws, and it is impossible to understand those laws and the relationships which make them morally binding on citizens, without consideration of society, its common good, and the goods of its component individuals and communities.

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Locke’s Doctrine of Toleration: A Contract with Nothingness (Part III)

by Jeffrey Bond

Today we present the third and final installment of an essay on John Locke’s doctrine of toleration.  The first part can be found here, and the second here.  An earlier version of this essay appeared in A Letter from the Romans, the Newsletter of the Roman Forum and the Dietrich von Hildebrand Institute, February, 1999, No. 4.

PART III

Although Locke initially attempted to identify toleration with the Christian virtue of charity, his doctrine of dogmatic toleration actually rests upon his conviction that human knowledge concerning eternal salvation is wholly subjective. Although Locke’s epistemology is somewhat concealed in his Letter, we know from his Essay Concerning Human Understanding[1] that he is an empiricist. That is to say, Locke denies that man has any innate speculative or practical notions; rather, man depends solely upon sense perception and internal reflection to obtain knowledge. Accordingly, Locke defines knowledge as “the perception of the connexion and agreement, or disagreement and repugnancy of any of our Ideas” (p. 525). He asserts that his definition of knowledge is sound because it “is evident that the Mind knows not things immediately, but only by the intervention of the Ideas it has of them” (p. 563). Hence, Locke rejects the realistic epistemology of the ancients and the medievals who understood truth as the mind’s conformity to things. For Locke, reason has no intuitive capacity, no immediate grasp of the reality outside of itself; knowledge is therefore merely discursive. Indeed, Locke defines knowledge by the discursive act of the knower rather than by the object known. Man can know the operations of his own mind, but he cannot objectively know things outside of his mind. As a result, man is restricted to engaging in hypothetical explanations of the object before him by means of sense perception and introspection, for man cannot truly know the object itself.

We can understand, then, why Locke belittles the value of speculative knowledge at the beginning of his Essay Concerning Human Understanding. Since man cannot really grasp things as they are in themselves, he ought to turn his attention to matters that directly affect his life and conduct here and now. After all, Locke believes that the empirical phenomena that the mind encounters through the senses are in themselves worth little or nothing; it is the mind’s activity, according to Locke, which gives meaning to the otherwise meaningless phenomena. Here we see a perfect correspondence between Locke’s epistemology and his famous labor theory of value. In the Second Treatise, Locke stresses again and again that man’s labor gives value to nature which, prior to the addition of human effort, is relatively worthless. Since man can perceive no definite purpose or end in the empirical phenomena of nature, it is his labor, physical or mental, which artificially creates value where there was none before. In the physical realm, man’s labor transforms the meager material of nature into whatever his desires lead him to value; and in the mental realm, the activity of man’s mind brings organization and structure to the phenomena that he cannot really know in themselves. Therefore, just as physical labor is the source and value of real property, so too mental labor creates meaning by transforming the worthless raw materials of the empirical world into man’s own intellectual property, namely, his ideas.

Locke’s doctrine of toleration is a supreme example of man’s creative power with respect to intellectual property. Like the invention of money, which he identifies as the artificial creation most responsible for lifting man out of the poverty of the state of nature, Locke’s doctrine of toleration has no objective ground in the nature of things; and yet this doctrine, once it has been conventionally accepted by others, is capable of transforming the entire world in accordance with his personal vision. For Locke, even the law of non-contradiction, which the ancients and medievals identified as the first principle of the speculative intellect, has no intrinsic worth due to its speculative truth; the only value of the law of non-contradiction, or any other idea, is the labor put into formulating it, and its subsequent acceptance as valuable by others, much as men once agreed to make gold or silver the medium of exchange. Locke himself recognizes that his doctrine of toleration has no intrinsic value; but if men subjectively believe this doctrine to be true or valuable, much as they believe in money, then the doctrine becomes true and valuable for them. Although Locke rejects the possibility of a self-evident truth that can be grasped immediately by the mind, he is willing to operate as if his doctrine of toleration is self-evidently true. Simply put, the power to affect human behavior is more important to Locke than theoretical reasonableness, because man cannot really know whether or not his ideas actually conform to reality. Locke believes that man’s relation to the universe can only be defined in terms of man’s awareness of the ideas of order he constructs in his own mind, for each individual creates for himself the meaning of all empirical phenomena.

Locke’s position would seem to be as follows: since man cannot really obtain objective knowledge of a divine order outside of himself, it makes no sense to attempt to impose or even urge religious uniformity on men, for there is no standpoint outside of ourselves from which religious and political disputes can be settled. Consequently, it would be irrational to impose religious ceremonies and doctrines where man possesses mere opinions, and no real knowledge. For Locke, even the very idea of God is the product of the mind’s activity. In fact, the mind that conceives of God is really God himself. This radical subjectivism, however, is not directly taught by Locke, who apparently wished to avoid the anarchy to which this view would lead if widely embraced. Consider what Locke writes in his Two Tracts on Government about the destructive practical consequences of the collapse of all law: “all authority will vanish from the earth and, the seemly order of affairs being convulsed and the frame of government dissolved, each would be his own Lawmaker and his own God.”[2] While Locke’s view does in effect make each man the measure of all things—his own Lawmaker and his own God—Locke is at pains to conceal the full implications of his doctrine of dogmatic toleration. And yet, because he denies that there are any innate speculative or practical notions, Locke cannot really say that peace and order are objectively preferable to anarchy. He seems to grant implicitly that peace and order are self-evident goods for man, yet his own subjectivism undermines his arbitrary preference for a comfortable life rather than a violent death. Locke can really only say that he himself prefers peace and order to anarchy, although what he means by “peace” and “order” is of course wholly subjective. Apparently Locke spoke his real mind when he asserted at the beginning of the Letter that all claims of orthodoxy are disguised quest for power, for this assertion rightly applies to his own attempt to establish a new orthodoxy, i.e., to remake the world in his own image.

Despite first appearances, the doctrine of toleration is, ironically, an attempt to impose religious uniformity on the world. Locke’s claim to orthodoxy is hidden by his emphasis on toleration, but the toleration Locke preaches is dogmatic, not practical. Thus Locke gives the appearance of neutrality with respect to religious belief, but his position is anything but neutral. Real neutrality would have to allow men to consider every position, including the position that said it was the one and only true position. But this position, which is that of the Catholic Church, cannot be permitted because it directly questions the truth and authority of Locke’s dogmatic toleration. The Catholic Church, then, is the greatest impediment to Locke’s quest for power because the Church embraces dogmatic intolerance. Locke’s plan is to impose religious uniformity on the world by eliminating any real choice with respect to religion. The plan is as follows: as long as each religious group subordinates its doctrine and practices to the one supreme doctrine of toleration, these religious groups are free to differ all they want in their self-confessed subjective beliefs. And despite all their apparent disagreements, they will nevertheless belong to Locke’s universal church of toleration. The Catholic Church will then be eliminated by consensus, for all the other churches will be united against the Catholic Church for rejecting the one supreme dogma. Toleration will then become the ultimate religious good.

If the implications of Locke’s doctrine of toleration appear to be frightening, that is because they are. To see the real meaning of Locke’s doctrine is to see the internal logic of the modern enterprise. Although Locke repeatedly asserts, as do all contemporary Lockeans, that each individual is the measure for himself of religious truth, nevertheless Locke sets forth this very doctrine as somehow true for all men, namely, that God only requires each man to perform those actions and hold those beliefs that he subjectively believes God requires of him. But how, given Locke’s subjectivism, can he claim to know that the Catholic position—which says that each individual is not the measure of religious truth—is wrong? On Locke’s own terms, he must admit that an individual Catholic, who subjectively believes that the Catholic position is true, is as right in his belief as Locke is in his own. The reason Locke hates the Catholic position is that the individual Catholic claims that Catholic beliefs are objectively true and necessary for himself and others. Locke cannot say that the Catholic position is wrong, unless he claims that objectivity in religious matters is in fact possible after all. But because Locke begins by denying that men can resolve political and religious disputes on the basis of the objective merits of the conflicting positions, the best he can do is to try to achieve power over the Catholic position by convincing the world that the doctrine of toleration is in each man’s best interests. In this way, Locke works to create a universal consensus that the doctrine of toleration is sacrosanct. This, of course, requires the absolute suppression of true Catholic doctrine, or the transformation of Catholicism into a subjective sect like every other religious sect.

Recall that Locke said that only those who teach the duty of tolerating all men will be granted the right to toleration by the magistrate. Note that what is prior for Locke is the duty to tolerate others. Only those who will accept the duty of toleration are granted the civil right to be tolerated themselves. This priority that Locke gives to the duty of toleration is mirrored in the way in which men enter into the Lockean social contract. In fact, it is now clear that Locke’s doctrine of toleration is not an addition to the social contract, but the very essence of it. Each man must first renounce his natural right to denounce and punish evil in others before he is granted the civil right to have his life, liberty, and property protected by the magistrate. We can see, then, in the very origin of the social contract, the “logic” of our contemporary situation where our duty to tolerate evil has increasingly eclipsed individual rights, even understood in Lockean terms. When a man enters into a Lockean social contract and accepts the duty to tolerate the subjective opinions and practices of all other men, that man thereby renounces his right to make objective judgments. The apparently irresistible allure of this contract is that those who accept the duty of toleration will likewise have the right to have their own subjective views tolerated by others, as long as these view do not violate the doctrine of toleration which holds the entire contract together. Clearly modern man has not been able to resist Locke’s flattering assumption that each man’s subjective views are sufficient for his happiness as long as he does not insist on their absolute objectivity. Like his forebears in Eden, modern man seems unable to resist the promise of being a God unto himself, even at the price of being a communion of one.

Perhaps the most frightening aspect of Locke’s doctrine of toleration is that it is wholly negative and without objective content. Like Protestantism, which gave birth to this monster, Locke’s doctrine is only intelligible insofar as it is a rejection of Catholicism. Since an individual’s religious interests cannot be established objectively, the interests of each individual are determined by his freedom to choose those doctrines which he believes will advance his interests. But no one is really free to choose other than Locke’s position. The situation is much like that of the communist elections we were repeatedly told about in grade school: there are many candidates to choose from, but they are all communists. American elections in Lockeland are no different. By convincing men to embrace subjectivity as the pseudo-objective truth, Locke seemingly satisfies the soul’s desire for objective truth while simultaneously emptying that truth of any real content. Thus, man is left adrift in the sea of constantly shifting, subjectively determined interests of all parties to the social contract. Life is reduced to vector forces, and to the vectors go the spoils. In Lockland, objective claims about right and wrong will be rarely made, and even more rarely understood. Since there is no objective knowledge to which men can refer to resolve disputes, there is no real boundary to the magistrate’s authority, or rather, power over men. Thus does the so-called order established by Lockean law become an end in itself. Unlike the ancients and medievals, who understood law to be a means to promote other ends, such as virtue and the salvation of souls, Locke sees only the power of the law, not its reasonableness. And there is no standard external to the magistrate’s will that man can evaluate with his reason. Therefore, the obligation to obey does not depend upon knowledge, but upon power; and the sole foundation of the magistrate’s power is the need to avoid the consequences of anarchy. But one man’s anarchy is another man’s order. Hence, the will of the magistrate becomes the supreme temporal and spiritual power in Lockean society, and in Locke’s church there are conveniently no clergy from whom the magistrate must wrest power.

Although Locke’s imposition of a universal church is achieved indirectly rather than directly, it is all the more powerful for having entered, as it were, through the back door. And because Locke’s doctrine of toleration instills in men a subjectivist habit of mind, it renders them inhuman by eroding their ability and desire to make objective judgments about good and evil. Thus, Locke’s doctrine not only undermines the specifically human act of moral judgment, but it also destroys rationality itself. It is difficult to imagine a doctrine better suited to prepare minds for the reign of the Anti-Christ, the anti-Logos. Certainly Locke’s doctrine, which is contrary to reason, is grounded upon faith alone, where “faith” is understood in the most subjective sense of the word. In fact, Locke’s universal church seeks to replace the three supernatural virtues as follows: faith is reduced to an irrational belief in the social contract, which is really a contract with nothingness; hope is reduced to the vain expectation of endless material comfort; and charity is reduced to the supreme duty of toleration, the practice of which leads to the eternal loss of our very selves.

NOTES

[1] All quotations from Locke’s An Essay Concerning Human Understanding are from Nidditch, P., ed., An Essay Concerning Human Understanding (Oxford University, 1979).

[2] Abrams, P., ed., John Locke: Two Tracts on Government (Cambridge University, 1967), p. 45.