(8). "But when a long train of abuses and usurpations pursuing invariably the same object, evinces a design to reduce them under absolute despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such government, and to provide new guards for their future security." prevail against the tyrant, from this there very often arise grave dissensions among the people, either while he is striving against the tyrant, or after the deposing of the tyrant, whilst the multitude is separated in parties with regard to the ordering of the rule. It happens, also, sometimes, that when by the help of anyone the multitude expels the tyrant, he himself, having accepted the power, takes to himself the tyranny, and, fearing to suffer himself what he wrought against another, he oppresses his sibjects with a more burdensome slavery." De Reg., Book I, ch. 6. (8). "Nor is such a society (of free men) to be regarded as acting unfaithfully in thus deposing the tyrant, even if it have previously sworn to him forever; for he deserved to be deserted, in not keeping faith in the ruling of his people, since this is an obligation on his part, if the compact made with him by the subjects is to be maintained." De Reg., Book I, ch. 6. We conclude that the mind of Thomas Aquinas was not far from Thomas Jefferson when the document, powerful enough to free America, was couched. The Declaration of Independence already lay Latinized in the books of the ablest general scholar in the history of the Catholic Church, and the best representative of her spirit and traditions: a satisfying proof that the thought of Roman Catholicism is inimical to tyranny and friendly indeed to the people, their rights, and the rational reign of liberty. We may even extend the parallel of Thomistic with American ideas, to show that the Angel of the Schools taught the very principles which projected the existing Constitution of the United States, and which Peletiah Webster embodied in his "epoch-making tract" of February 16, 1783. THE PHILADELPHIAN'S (1). "The Supreme authority of any State must have power to effect the ends of its appointment, otherwise these ends cannot be answered, and effectually secured; at best they are precarious. But at the same time, (2). "The supreme authority ought to be SO limited and checked if possible, as to prevent the abuse of power, or the exercise of powers that are not necessary to the ends of its appointment, but hurtful and oppressive to the subject, but to limit a supreme authority so far as to diminish its dignity, or lessen its power of doing good, would be to destroy or at least to corrupt it, and render it ineffectual to its ends. (3). "A number of sovereign States uniting into one Commonwealth, and appointing a supreme power to manage the affairs of the Union, do necessarily and avoidably part with and transfer over to such supreme power, so much of their own sovereignty as is necessary to render the ends of the union ineffectual, otherwise their confederation will be an union without bands, like a cask without hoops, that may and probably will fall to pieces, as soon as it is put to any exercise which requires strength." ST. THOMAS' . (1). "It is the property of the office of government to preserve the states it governs, and to use them for that purpose for which they were constituted." De Reg., Book I, ch. 13. (2). "The government of the kingdom is to be so tempered as to leave the appointed ruler no occasion for tyranny." De Reg., Book I, ch. 6. "A power that is united is more efficacious in producing its effect than a dispersed or divided power. For many, congregated together, achieve that which dividedly, by single units, could not be secured." De Reg., Book I, ch. 3. "So much the more perfect is a state by how much it provides, of istelf, the necessaries of life." De Reg., Book I, ch. 1. (3). "The imperfect is ordered to the perfect. But every part is ordered to the whole, as the imperfect to the perfect: And therefore every part is naturally on account of the whole........Now, every single person is compared to the entire community as the part to the whole." Summa Theol., Q. LXIV, a. 2. "The good of the people is better than the good of one who is of the people." Summa Theol., 1a 2ae, Q. XXIX, a. 2, ad 2. "There is a certain good proper to any man inasmuch as he is an individual;........but there is a certain common good which belongs to this or that man insofar as he is part of some whole; as to the soldier inasmuch as he is part of an army and the citizen inasmuch as he is part of the state." Quaest. Disput., De Caritate, Q. I, a. 4, ad 2. "There are diverse grades and orders of communities; the last is the civil community, ordained to a per se sufficiency for human life. Hence it is the completest of human unions........to which all other human unions are referred." Com. Polit., Book I, lec. 1. Comment:-These texts show the relation of the less to the greater and the necessity of the less becoming even lesser in the greater, in order to preserve itself the better. Which is precisely the thought of Webster. Clearly Aquinas would have withheld his approval from a national condition which wrung from George Washington the complaint, "We are one nation today and thirteen tomorrow." His principles made for the civil synthesis which, without destroying the individuality of the states any more than that of the individuals composing them, would "form a more perfect union, establish justice, insure domestic tranquility, provide for the common defence, promote the general welfare, and secure the blessing of liberty." In a word, he was an advocate of "the perfect community," which Peletiah Webster envisaged and our Constitution secured. Two centuries before Columbus discovered America geographically, it would seem that Aquinas had located it politically. In his politics, our country is in embryo. He differs from the founders of our republic and their achievement, only as summer from spring-time, or the full-blown blossom from the humble seed. To admit the merit and democracy of the United States, is to concede the same of the presaging Thomis tic thought. In the right-bills of our sovereign states, in the document of our Declaration of Independence, in the rationale of our Constitution, his finger appears. An invisible guest, he was present at the founding of our nation; as he is also present through its preservation. So long as she is true to justice and reason, the spirits in which she was conceived, our country cannot die. But justice and reason express the political apostolate of Aquinas, and are the very substance of his message. Ideally and practically, they are his theory of State. And in justice, the people must find their due: which is democracy. In reason, they must accept duty as well as claim right; which is the salvation of democracy. CHAPTER VIII CIVIL MENACES AND PROBLEMS 1.-EXTERNAL EVIL: WAR The panorama of St. Thomas' political philosophy now spreads before us. We see the State of his construction, firm with justice, united with love, happy with liberty, hopeful with religion, interested with labor, ideal, yet non-Altrurian. But menaces ever darken within and without; and the politics of Aquinas is complete only when his doctrine of the method whereby these visitations to civil society are to be met and removed, is duly expressed. The external danger is war; the internal-sedition, vice, and poverty. His thoughts on war are precise and pithy. A just campaign, he tells us, aims at peace. "We do not seek peace in order to be at war," he repeats from St. Augustine, "but we go to war in order to secure peace. Be peaceful, therefore, in warring, so that you may vanquish those whom you war against, and bring them to the prosperity of peace."704 The peace to be attained by war must be two-sided; the conqueror should share it with the vanquished. Hate must not still reverberate when the thunders of the fray have rolled away. Vindictiveness is thrice petty, in a nation that has been big and brave unto victory. Magnanimity alone is fitting. The fight must not continue to rage in hearts, after it has been finished on the field. By making peace the final cause of war, and by placing charity in the effect, Aquinas answers the moralist's and pacifist's objection: "Nothing but sin is contrary to an act of virtue. But war is contrary to peace. Therefore war is always a sin.” And here again we find the characteristic and democratic Thomistic consideration for the common good; which will more clearly appear in an exposition of the Doctor's three requisites to a just war: 704 Summa Theol., 2a 2ae, qu. XL, a. 1, ad. 3. Machiavelli's doctrine is in striking contrast. Il Principe, XIV. |