THE SAME METHOD THAT HOOKER USED TO DETERMINE THE "FIRST LAW" of living the good life--that is, of subordinating the physical soul and body of man to his more dignified spiritual intellect or reason--can be used with respect to other mandates of reason. For example, presuming the existence of God, and his power, force, wisdom, and other properties, it follows that we owe God obedience, prayer, and honor. Thus Plato in his Timaeus and Theaetetus, and Aristotle in his Nichomachean Ethics and Metaphysics both present these deferential acts to God as moral obligations. These pagans' injunctions show a parallel with what is read in Old Testament (e.g., Deuteronomy 6:5) and in the teachings of Christ regarding the first and great Commandment (e.g., Matthew 22:38). Thus, in matters moral, Reason will lead us to same place as witness of the prophet of the teachings of the Word of God made flesh.
Reason also provides leads into the way in which relations among men ought to be conducted. Thus, "natural inducement" brings men to know Christ's second great Commandment: to love one's neighbor as one's self. This law is obtained from the awareness that we share nature with other men, and so operate under a moral imperative that arises from this equal station.
Reason is therefore the measure of "determining and setting down what is good to be done." I.8.8, 89. Reason's sentence, or judgment, is either mandatory, "showing what must be done," permissive, "declaring only what may be done," or admonitory, "opening what is the most convenient [i.e., fitting] for us to do." I.8.8, 89. Those judgments of reason that are obligatory delineate things that are moral absolutes. An example of such a judgment is the biblical story of Joseph. Reason made it mandatory for him, in other words an absolute imperative, not to yield to the "impotent desire of his lewd mistress." I.8.8, 89. There is never justification for adultery; it is ipso facto wrong under any circumstance. As an example of the second, permissive judgment, Hooker gives an example of when confronting "diverse things evil, all being not evitable." In such an instance, we can tolerate, even in some cases choose the lesser evil. As an example, of this Hooker gives the instance of divorce among the Jews, an evil that, according to Jesus, was permitted them by Moses because of their hardness of heart. (Mark 10:4) As an instance of admonitory judgments, Hooker gives the instance of the choice of those who sold their goods and laid the price of those goods at the foot of the Apostles. (Acts 4:37, 5:4) To sell one goods and give the proceeds to the Church was not mandatory, and possessions may have been held by the faithful without sin. A similar instance is in St. Paul's choice to maintain himself by his own labor, rather than rely solely upon the Church for his maintenance. (cf. 2 Thes. 3:8) This last part seems to be in the area of counsels, rather than law strictly so called.
Since reason's judgment as to the good may be mandatory, permissive, or admonitory, it follows that, while there are central, unvarying requirements, there can be great variety in good; there is "a latitude and extent" to goodness. Therefore, men are not good and evil simpliciter, as if there is "an indivisible point or center wherein goodness consists," that men have to overcome to be good, and failing to do so, are evil. Rather, we see "degrees of welldoing" among men, as we see variety "in the seldomness or oftenness of doing well." I.8.8, 89. At yet notwithstanding this variety, it remains that the law of reason is the guiding principle.
Reason also provides leads into the way in which relations among men ought to be conducted. Thus, "natural inducement" brings men to know Christ's second great Commandment: to love one's neighbor as one's self. This law is obtained from the awareness that we share nature with other men, and so operate under a moral imperative that arises from this equal station.
For seeing those things which are equal, must needs all have one measure; if I cannot but wish to receive all good, even as much at every man's hand as any man can wish unto his own soul: how should I look to have any part of my desire herein satisfied, unless my self be careful to satisfy the like desire, which is undoubtedly in other men, we all being of one, and the same nature? To have anything offered them repugnant to this desire must needs in all respects grieve them as much as me, so that if I do harm, I must look to suffer; there being no reason that others should show greater measure of love to me, than they have by me showed unto them. My desire therefore to be loved of my equals in nature as much as possible may be, imposes upon me a natural duty of bearing to them-ward fully the like affection.I.8.7, 88.This principle provides us a number of rules that govern our lives, including some of those mentioned in Justinian's Codex or Digest:
That because we would take no harm, we must therefore do none.I.8.7, 88.
That since we would not be in any thing extremely dealt with, we must ourselves avoid all extremity in our dealings.
That from all violence and wrong we are utterly to abstain.
Reason is therefore the measure of "determining and setting down what is good to be done." I.8.8, 89. Reason's sentence, or judgment, is either mandatory, "showing what must be done," permissive, "declaring only what may be done," or admonitory, "opening what is the most convenient [i.e., fitting] for us to do." I.8.8, 89. Those judgments of reason that are obligatory delineate things that are moral absolutes. An example of such a judgment is the biblical story of Joseph. Reason made it mandatory for him, in other words an absolute imperative, not to yield to the "impotent desire of his lewd mistress." I.8.8, 89. There is never justification for adultery; it is ipso facto wrong under any circumstance. As an example of the second, permissive judgment, Hooker gives an example of when confronting "diverse things evil, all being not evitable." In such an instance, we can tolerate, even in some cases choose the lesser evil. As an example, of this Hooker gives the instance of divorce among the Jews, an evil that, according to Jesus, was permitted them by Moses because of their hardness of heart. (Mark 10:4) As an instance of admonitory judgments, Hooker gives the instance of the choice of those who sold their goods and laid the price of those goods at the foot of the Apostles. (Acts 4:37, 5:4) To sell one goods and give the proceeds to the Church was not mandatory, and possessions may have been held by the faithful without sin. A similar instance is in St. Paul's choice to maintain himself by his own labor, rather than rely solely upon the Church for his maintenance. (cf. 2 Thes. 3:8) This last part seems to be in the area of counsels, rather than law strictly so called.
Since reason's judgment as to the good may be mandatory, permissive, or admonitory, it follows that, while there are central, unvarying requirements, there can be great variety in good; there is "a latitude and extent" to goodness. Therefore, men are not good and evil simpliciter, as if there is "an indivisible point or center wherein goodness consists," that men have to overcome to be good, and failing to do so, are evil. Rather, we see "degrees of welldoing" among men, as we see variety "in the seldomness or oftenness of doing well." I.8.8, 89. At yet notwithstanding this variety, it remains that the law of reason is the guiding principle.
[T]he nature of goodness being thus ample, a law is properly that which reason in such sort defines to be good that it must be done. And the law of reason or human nature is that which men by discourse of natural reason have rightly found out themselves to be all forever bound unto in their actions. Laws of reason have these marks to be known by. Such as keep them, resemble most lively in their voluntary actions, that very manner of working which nature herself does necessarily observe in the course of the whole world. The works of nature are all behooveful, beautiful, without superfluity or defect; even so theirs, if they be framed according to that which the law of reason teaches.I.8.9, 89-90.
Antigone and Polyneice's Corpse
Because all men are bound to the natural law, it is true, as Saints Augustine and Thomas have said, that all sins are against reason and the natural law. Thus St. Thomas in his Summa (IaIIae, q. 94, art. 3): Omnia peccata sunt in universum contra rationem et naturae legem. "All sins are universally against reason and the natural law." And St. Augustine (De Civitate Dei, 12.1) Omne vitium naturae nocet ac per hoc contra naturam est. "Now every vice injures nature, and is consequently contrary to nature." Even violations of the supernatural laws violate the natural law or the law of reason, since being generally evil, they violate the general principle of reason which requires men to shun or fly from evil. Yet the natural law or the law of reason does not "contain in it all manner of laws whereunto reasonable creatures are bound." Rather, it is generally held to bind men to those "duties, which all men by force of natural wit either do or might understand to be such duties as concern all men." I.8.10, 90-91.
Title Page of Of the Lawes of Ecclesiastical Politie
Hooker emphasizes that the law of reason is independent from the divine laws that have been revealed; therefore, "the laws [of reason] are investigable by reason without the help of revelation supernatural and divine." I.8.9, 90. Because the natural law is reason-based, knowledge of that law "is general," and so "the world has always been acquainted" with it, as it were from time immemorial. Thus we find in Sophocles's play Antigone the following sentiment with respect to those laws expressed by the play's protagonist, Antigone:
Οὐ γάρ τι νυ̑ν γε κἀχθὲς, ἀλλ’ ἀεί ποτεSoph. Ant., vv. 456-57. The natural law "is not agreed upon by one, or two, or few, but by all." I.8.9, 90. And yet, by this it ought not to be understood that every single man in particular knows and confesses that law. But the natural law is such that "being proposed no man can reject it as unreasonable and unjust." I.8.9, 90. And though it may not be known by every single man in particular, "there is nothing in it but any man (having natural perfection of wit, and ripeness of judgment) may be labor and travail find out." I.8.9, 90.
Ζῃ̑ ταυ̑τα, κοὐδεὶς οἰ̑δεν ἐξ ὅτου ’ϕάνη.
For their life is not of today or yesterday, but for all time,
and no man knows when they were first put forth.
And to conclude, the general principles thereof are such, as it is not easy to find men ignorant of them. Law rational therefore, which men commonly used to called the law of nature, meaning thereby the law which human nature knows itself in reason universally bound unto, which also for that cause may be termed most fitly the law of reason: this law, I say, comprehends all those things which men by the light of their natural understanding evidently know, or at leastwise may know, to be beseeming or unbeseeming, virtuous or vicious, good or evil for them to do.I.8.9, 90.
Because all men are bound to the natural law, it is true, as Saints Augustine and Thomas have said, that all sins are against reason and the natural law. Thus St. Thomas in his Summa (IaIIae, q. 94, art. 3): Omnia peccata sunt in universum contra rationem et naturae legem. "All sins are universally against reason and the natural law." And St. Augustine (De Civitate Dei, 12.1) Omne vitium naturae nocet ac per hoc contra naturam est. "Now every vice injures nature, and is consequently contrary to nature." Even violations of the supernatural laws violate the natural law or the law of reason, since being generally evil, they violate the general principle of reason which requires men to shun or fly from evil. Yet the natural law or the law of reason does not "contain in it all manner of laws whereunto reasonable creatures are bound." Rather, it is generally held to bind men to those "duties, which all men by force of natural wit either do or might understand to be such duties as concern all men." I.8.10, 90-91.
Title Page of Of the Lawes of Ecclesiastical Politie Hooker then addresses one of the most frequent arguments against the existence of a natural law, universally binding among all men. That argument is that the natural law is more frequently honored by its breach, than by obedience to it. There are seemingly as many understandings of right and wrong as there are cultures, and so experience would suggest--not that the law of right and wrong is a universal law--but rather that notions of right and wrong are relative, merely conventional. Hooker amply quotes here St. Augustine's De Doctrina Christiana:
Portrait of Richard Hooker
Charlemagne's Destruction of Irminsul by Leutemann
Quidam dormitantes, ut ita dicam, qui neque alto somno stultitiæ sopiebantur, nec in sapientiæ lucem poterant evigilare, putaverunt nullam esse justitiam per se ipsam, sed unicuique genti consuetudinem suam justam videri; quæ cum sit diversa omnibus gentibus, debeat autem incommutabilis manere justitia, fieri manifestum, nullam usquam esse justitiam. Non intellexerunt, (ne multa commemorem,) ‘Quod tibi fieri non vis, alii ne feceris,’ nullo modo posse ulla eorum gentili diversitate variari. Quæ sententia cum refertur ad dilectionem Dei, omnia flagitia moriuntur; cum ad proximi, omnia facinora.Hooker finds the source of man's practical inability to know the moral duties incumbent upon him through the law of reason or the natural law in "lewd and wicked custom, beginning perhaps at the first among few, afterwards spreading into greater multitudes, and so continuing from time to time." I.8.11, 91. These evil customs "smother the light of natural understanding, because men will not bend their wits to examine, whether things wherewith they have been accustomed, be good or evil." I.8.11, 91-92. It was evil customs that gave rise to pagan idolatry, "an absurdity to reason so palpable." I.8.11, 92. "The cause of which senseless stupidity is afterward imputed to custom." I.8.11, 92. Essentially, Hooker's analysis (the details of which will not be addressed in this blog) is one that follows the saying Quem Deus vult perdere, prius dementat. Those whom God abandons, he makes mad first. Hooker also insists that what he says with respect to idolatry strictly-so-called applies with equal force to broader sorts of intellectual and cultural blindness.
And, distracted by this endless variety of customs, some who were half asleep (as I may say)--that is, who were neither sunk in the deep sleep of folly, nor were able to awake into the light of wisdom--have thought that there was no such thing as absolute right, but that every nation took its own custom for right; and that, since every nation has a different custom, and right must remain unchangeable, it becomes manifest that there is no such thing as right at all. Such men did not perceive, to take only one example, that the precept, "Whatsoever ye would that men should do to you, do ye even so to them," cannot be altered by any diversity of national customs. And this precept, when it is referred to the love of God, destroys all vices when to the love of one's neighbor, puts an end to all crimes. For no one is willing to defile his own dwelling; he ought not, therefore, to defile the dwelling of God, that is, himself. And no one wishes an injury to be done him by another; he himself, therefore, ought not to do injury to another. (J. F. Shaw, trans.)
That which we say in this case of idolatry, serves for all other things, wherein the like kind of general blindness has prevailed against the manifest laws of reason. Within the compass of which laws we do not only comprehend whatsoever may be easily known to belong to the duty of all men, but even whatsoever may possibly be known to be of that quality, so that the same be by necessary consequence deduced out of clear and manifest principles. For if once we descend into probably collections what is convenient for men,we are then in the territory where free and arbitrary determinations, the territory where human laws take place, which laws are after to be considered.I.8.11, 93.
Portrait of Richard Hooker(The notion that idolatry blinds men to the natural law, smothers the light of natural understanding, and is the source of evil customs, is broader than Hooker's idols, i.e., religious images. Among moderns, this form of idolatry is rare. However, other forms, perhaps more subtle, of idolatry run rampant modernly. Using Francis Bacon's expansive notions of the idols of the mind allows us to apply Hooker's reasoning to many modern customary laws or moral principles that violate the natural law: the idols of the tribe (idola tribus), the idols of the cave (idola specus), the idols of the theater (idola teatri), and idols of the market place (idola fori) all present problems to human understanding of the natural law every bit as forceful as the stone idols crafted by human hand. As an example, a homosexual's unreasonable attachment to his vicious lifestyle raises the specter of an idolon specus, an idol of the cave, one where is own attachment to this lifestyle blinds him to seeing the utter absurdity and unreasonableness of his vice. As another example, a politician that speaks in terms of the socially-conventional "I am personally opposed to abortion, but I cannot force my beliefs on others" operates under an idolon fori and perhaps also under the dogmatism of liberalism, an idolon teatri. Similarly, one who advocates teaching children the merits of contraceptive sex as some sort of virtuous activity operates blinded by all four idola. A Southern slaveholder who justified his slave-owning operated under an idolon fori. A Nazi official who justified his anti-Semitism on false notions of race, or on spurious scientific grounds operated under an idolon fori or idolon teatri, respectively. All these were blind to what is obviously against natural law or the law of reason. Quem Deus vult perdere, prius dementat. A sure sign of moral dementia is idolatry, whether in external worship, or in thought. Indeed, mental idols are much more difficult to detect and, once detected, to uproot. It was easy for Charlemagne to destroy the Anglo-Saxon idol Irminsul. It is much harder to rout out mental patterns and customs that lead to such vicious institutions and mental habits that justify such vices as polygamy--parallel and serial, homosexual marriage, contraception and abortion, slavery and racism, and sexism--whether in the form of a misogynist machismo, a misandrist radical feminism. There is a certain parochial egocentrism that cultures suffer wherein they fail to see the log in their own eye, but see the splinter, or perhaps even the log, in the eyes of the past.)
Charlemagne's Destruction of Irminsul by Leutemann
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