Brownson on the End of Law

IN THIS EXCERPT from his critique of a reviewer Mercersburg Review, Orestes Brownson, addresses the relationship between God as our final cause or end, and the concept of law. All law, like all power, finds its source in God, and is never independent of him. The political philosophy behind modern secularism, which disdains this fact, is deeply flawed.



"The reviewer* sins against this undeniable truth, when he censures us for allowing man no autonomy, no right, collectively or individually, to be governed only by his own will, no voice in constituting the law to which he is to be subject. Nothing can be worse than this, for it supposes the law is created, and in part at least by man himself. But this cannot be. The law is not created at all; it is eternal, and, as a rule, has its seat, not in the creative will of God as such, not precisely in God regarded as first cause, but in God as final cause, that is, in God as the sovereign good, and is promulgated and enforced by God as supreme ruler, because he always rules as he creates, in accordance with and for himself as the sovereign good. The law is not only eternal, but immutable, and God himself cannot change it; for he cannot change his own immutable nature which is it. To suppose God creates it, is to suppose that he creates himself; to suppose that man creates it, is to suppose that man creates God; and to assert man's autonomy, or right to be governed only by his own will, is to deny that he is under law, or bound at all to seek God as the sovereign good. Does the reviewer maintain that we are not morally bound to seek God as our ultimate end? Does he deny all morality, and assert that man is free to live as he lists? Is he an Antinomian? We cannot believe it. Then God is himself man's law, and then man is morally bound to will what God wills, that is, to love what God loves, that is to say, God himself, as supreme good, and has no right to will or to love as his ultimate end anything else. How, then, pretend that man is his own legislator, his own lawgiver? As well might you say, man is his own maker, that man is God, nay, that man is God's maker. No laws that are not transcripts of the divine law, the eternal and immutable law, which is God himself, have any of the essential characteristics of law."


[The reviewer is the author of a piece in the Mercesburg Review who criticized Brownson's observations about Protestantism in various publications.]

[From Brownson's Works, "The Mercersburg Theology" (H. F. Brownson: Detroit, 1900), Vol. 3, p. 74.]

Brownson on Natural Law--The True Source of Human Rights

IN THIS EXCERPT from his "Philosophical Studies on Christianity," Orestes Brownson reminds us how human rights have no real substance without reference to the source of those rights, God. In modern "rights talk," the source of rights appears to have become autonomous from God. And so in the public forum we hear such empty talk such as a "right" to free speech (as if we have a right to spread falsehood or injure or defame others), a "right" to do what we want to our body (as if we are not answerable to God for it), a "right" to homosexual marriage (as if we have a right to morbidly cohabit in sin), a "right" to a divorce (as if we have a right to rend asunder what God has joined), etc., etc. ad nauseam. There are times--amidst this clamor of "rights talk" based upon nothing but air, nay, vacuous thinking or some primeval urge or misdirected lust antithetical to the good--when one wants to scream out in exasperation like Pope Leo XIII did in his Encyclical Tametsi Futura Prospicientibus: "The world has heard enough of the so-called 'rights of man.' Let it hear something of the rights of God." The need to retrofit God into our concept of right, or perhaps retrofit our concept of right under God who is their source, was true in the late 1800s when Brownson flourished, it is even more true now.



"The dominant tendency of our age is to atheism,--to exclude God, and to put humanity or nature in the place of God. It is this tendency which it is now especially necessary to resist and guard against. If, with some of our modern writers, more attached, it would seem, to the letter than imbued with the sense of the great doctors of the church, we assign to nature a proper legislative power and represent it as competent to found rights and impose duties, or contend that man has rights of his own, in the strict sense of the word, we here and now compromise the great truths of religion, and strengthen the atheistical tendency of the age. Never in reality did any of our great theologians teach that nature has a true and proper legislative power, for they all teach that what they call the law of nature is law only inasmuch as it is a transcript of the eternal law. They all teach, after St. Paul, that non est potestas nisi a Deo [there is no power, but that it is from God], that God is the absolute lord and proprietor of the universe, that he is the fountain of all law, or sole legislator, because all dominion belongs to him. Without law, neither right nor duty is conceivable, and without God as absolute and universal legislator, law is an unmeaning term. All legislative power is his, because he is the creator and final cause of all things, by whom and for whom all things exist; and no one can rightfully exercise any legislative authority, but as his delegate or vicar. In strictness, he [God] only has rights, because he only can impose duties. Then what we call human rights, whether rights of government or of subjects, are his rights and our duties, and duties, nay, all the rights which our theologians deduce from the law of nature, are no doubt real rights, and neither individuals nor governments can violate any one of them without wrong, . . . and which, if not recognized, renders the doctrine when applied to man in relationship human government favorable either to despotism or to anarchy; but though real rights, they are divine, not human, and their violation is not merely a crime against the individual, the state, or society, but, in the strict and proper sense of the word, a sin against God. This great truth, which underlies all Catholic teaching on the subject, but which the authorities do not always clearly and distinctly state, because in their time there was little danger of its being misapprehended, needs, it seems to us, to be now distinctly and prominently brought out, and earnestly insisted on as an elementary truth of which our age has nearly lost sight, and as the precise contradictory of its dominant heresy."


[From Brownson's Works, "Philosophical Studies on Christianity" (H. F. Brownson: Detroit, 1900), Vol. 3, p. 159-60.]

Brownson on the Natural Law--God as Final Cause is Lawgiver

IN THIS EXCERPT from his "A Letter to Protestants," Orestes Brownson stresses how it is Man's end, in God's design, toward which the natural law ultimately points. All law is founded on reason, and the reason for the law is its end. The end of the natural law is God. It is with focus on God as our last end, or final cause, that we consider him in the role of Lawgiver. It is with focus on God as our first cause, or the source of our beginning, that we consider him in his role as Creator. The Law, in other words, has no other purpose than to aim us towards God, which is our ultimate good. That is why there is ultimately no contradiction between Law, Justice, Mercy, and Love. All these have their end and fulfillment in God who is absolute Law, Justice, Mercy, and Love.



"God is the final as he is the first cause of all existences. He is our origin and end, the cause that created us, and the cause for which we are created, as you have seen in the fact that we are his and not our own, and are morally bound to render unto him the tribute of our whole being. The good of every creatures is the end for which it exists, and if we could conceive a creature existing for no end, such a creature would and could have no good. Hence God is our supreme good, because he is the supreme good in itself, and because he is our ultimate end. Our true good lies then in the possession of God, and we tend to it as we tend to him, that is, render ourselves unto him, or give him the worship that is his due, as has already been established.

The final cause is legislative, and the law every existence must be subject to is imposed by the end for which it exists. God as the first cause is our Creator; as final cause he is our Lawgiver. The law he imposes must be obeyed as the indispensable condition of attaining to our end, and without obedience to it there is and can be in the nature of things no good for us, since it is the law imposed by eternal justice, and the sovereign good; for God as the final cause of all existences is the sovereign good, and as sovereign Legislator is eternal justice."

[From Brownson's Works, "A Letter to Protestants" (H. F. Brownson: Detroit, 1902), Vol. 5, p. 328.]

Universal Ethic-Jesus Christ, the End of the Natural Law 2-The Logos Incarnate, the Living Law

5.1. The "Logos" Incarnate, the Living Law

103. Thanks to the natural light of reason, which is a participation in the divine Light, men and women are in a position of scrutinizing the intelligible order of the universe to discover therein the expression of the wisdom, the beauty, and the goodness of the Creator. As a result of this knowledge, they can insert themselves in such order with moral acts that conform to it. Now, thanks to a deeper understanding of God’s design of which the Creator is the fitting prelude, the Scriptures teach the believer that this world was created by the Logos, from him and with him, the Word of God, the beloved Son of the Father, the uncreated Wisdom, and that the world finds in Him life and subsistence. In fact the Son is "image of the invisible God, the first-born of all creation, since in him (en auto) were created all things, in the heavens and on earth, those visible and those invisible . . . . All things were created by means of Him (di’ auton), and in His sight (eis auton). He is before all things, and all exist in Him (en auto)" (Col. 1:15-17).(89) The Logos is therefore the key of creation. Man, created in the image of God, carries in himself a special imprint of this personal Logos. And so he is called to be conformed with and assimilated into the Son, "the first born among all his brothers" (Rom. 8:29).

104. But because of sin, man made a bad use of his freedom, and he has thus distanced himself from the source of wisdom. Having done so, man has distorted the knowledge that he otherwise would have been able to have of the objective order of things, even of the natural order. Men, knowing that their works are evil, hate the light and elaborate false theories to justify their sins. (90) So the image of God in man is seriously darkened. Even if men’s nature prompts them still to a realization in God (the creature cannot pervert itself to the point of being completely unable to recognize the many signs that the Creator offers of Himself in creation), at the same time the fact is that men are seriously damaged by sin so that they fail to appreciate the profound meaning of the world, and instead view it in terms of pleasure, of money, or of power.

105. With his salvific Incarnation, the Logos, taking on a human nature, restored the image of God and restored man to to that same image. So Jesus Christ, the new Adam, carries to completion the original design of the Father regarding man, and at the same time reveals man to himself. “The truth is that only in the mystery of the incarnate Word does the mystery of man take on light. For Adam, the first man, was a figure of Him Who was to come, namely Christ the Lord. Christ, the final Adam, by the revelation of the mystery of the Father and His love, fully reveals man to man himself and makes his supreme calling clear. . . . He Who is "the image of the invisible God" (Col. 1:15),(21) is Himself the perfect man. To the sons of Adam He restores the divine likeness which had been disfigured from the first sin onward. Since human nature as He assumed it was not annulled, by that very fact it has been raised up to a divine dignity in our respect too.”(91) Jesus Christ manifests therefore in His person an exemplary human life, in full conformity with the natural law. So he is the ultimate criterion to decipher correctly what are the authentic natural desires of man, when they are not concealed by the distortions introduced by sin and from disordered passions.


106. The incarnation of the Son was prepared by the economy of the old Law, sign of the love of God for His people Israel. According to some of the Fathers, one of the motives behind God giving to Moses a written law was to remind men of the exigencies of the natural law written in their hearts, but which was partially obscured and cancelled by sin.(92) This Law, which Judaism has identified with pre-existing Wisdom which presides over the destiny of the universe,(93) thus put forth, within the capacity of men marked by sin, the concrete practice of true wisdom, which consists in the love of God and of one’s neighbor. It contained liturgical and positive legal precepts, but also moral prescriptions, summarized in the Decalogue, which corresponded to the implications of the natural law. So the Christian tradition saw in the Decalogue a privileged and always valid expression of the natural law.(94)

107. Jesus Christ has not "come to abolish but to give full completion" to the Law (Matt 5:17).(95) As it appears in the Gospel texts, Jesus "taught like one with authority and not like the scribes" (Mark 1:22), and did not hesitate to relativize, or even to abolish, some of the particular and temporary dispositions of the Law. But He also confirmed the essential content and, in His person, carried out to perfection the practice of the Law, taking on for love the different types of precepts—moral, cultural, and legal—of the Mosaic Law, which corresponded with the three functions of prophet, priest, and king. St. Paul affirms that Christ is the end (telos) of the Law (Rom 10:4). Telos has here a double sense. Christ is the "end" of the Law, in the sense that the Law is pedagogical means which ought to lead mankind to Christ. But moreover, for all those who through faith live in Him by the Spirit of love, Christ "puts an end" to the positive obligations of the Law which were appended to the requirements of the natural law.(96)



108. In fact, Jesus expressed in different manners the ethical supremacy of Love (carità), which unites inseparably the love of God and the love of neighbor.(97) Love (carità) is the "new commandment" (John 13:34) that recapitulates all the Law and provides the key of interpretation for it: "From these two commandments depend all the Law and the Prophets" (Matt. 22:40). It also reveals the profound meaning of the golden rule. “Do not do to anyone that which you do not want done to you” (Tobit 4:15) becomes with Christ the commandment of love (amore) without limit. The context in which Jesus cites the golden rule determines in depth its comprehension. It is found at the center of a section that begins with the commandment: "Love your enemies, do good to those who hate you” and ends with the exhortation: “Be merciful as your Father in heaven is merciful.”(98) Going beyond the rule of commutative justice, in the shape of a challenge, it invites one to take the initiative of a love which is a gift of self. The parable of the good Samaritan is characteristic of this Christian application of the golden rule: the center of interest passes from the care of oneself to the care of the other.(99) The Beatitudes and the Sermon on the Mount explain the manner in which one ought to live the commandment of love, in thanksgiving and in the awareness of the other, elements proper of the new perspective assumed by Christian love. So the practice of love surpasses every closure and every limit. It gains a universal dimension and an incomparable force, since it renders the person capable of doing that which would be impossible without love.

109. But above all, Jesus carries to completion the law of love in the mystery of His holy Passion. Here, like Love incarnate, it reveals in a plenary human way what love is and what things it implies: to give life for those which one loves.(100) "Having loved his own who were in the world, he loved them to the end" (John 13:1). Through the obedience of love to the Father and through desire for His glory which consists in the salvation of men, Jesus accepts the suffering and the death of the cross for the benefit of sinners. The same person of Christ, Logos and incarnate Wisdom, so becomes the living law, the supreme rule for every Christian ethic. The sequela Christi [following of Christ], the imitatio Christi [imitation of Christ] are the concrete ways to realize the Law in all of its dimensions.

(89) Cf. also John 1:3-4; 1 Cor 8:6; Heb. 1:2-3.

(90) Cf. John 3:19-20; Rom. 1:24-25.

(91) Vatican II, pastoral Constitution Gaudium et spes, n. 22. Cf. Irenaeus of Lyons, Against the heresies, V, 16.2 [Sources chrétiennes, 153, 216-217] : "For in times long past, it was said that man was created after the image of God, but it was not [actually] shown; for the Word was as yet invisible, after whose image man was created, Wherefore also he did easily lose the similitude. When, however, the Word of God became flesh, He confirmed both these: for He both showed forth the image truly, since He became Himself what was His image; and He re-established the similitude after a sure manner, by assimilating man to the invisible Father through means of the visible Word.”

(92) Cf. St. Augustine, Enarrationes in Psalmos, LVII, 1 [Corpus christianorum, series latina, 39, 708] : " Inasmuch as the hand of our Maker in our very hearts hath written this truth, ‘That which to thyself thou wouldest not have done, do not thou to another.’ Of this truth, even before that the Law was given, no one was suffered to be ignorant, in order that there might be some rule whereby might be judged even those to whom Law had not been given. But lest men should complain that something had been wanting for them, there hath been written also in tables that which in their hearts they read not. For it was not that they had it not written, but read it they would not. There hath been set before their eyes that which in their conscience to see they would be compelled; and as if from without the voice of God were brought to them, to his own inward parts hath man been thus driven. (Quandoquidem manu formatoris nostri in ipsis cordibus nostris scripsit: “Quod tibi non vis fieri, ne facias alteri”. Hoc et antequam lex daretur nemo ignorare permissus est, ut esset unde iudicarentur et quibus lex non esset data. Sed ne sibi homines aliquid defuisse quaererentur, scriptum est et in tabulis quod in cordibus non legebant. Non enim scriptum non habebant, sed legere nolebant. Oppositum est oculis eorum quod in conscientia videre cogerentur; et quasi forinsecus admota voce Dei, ad interiora sua homo compulsus est)". Cf. St. Thomas Aquinas, In III Sent., d. 37, q. 1, to. 1: In III Sent., d. 37, q. 1, a. 1: "Necessarium fuit ea quae naturalis ratio dictat, quae dicuntur ad legem naturae pertinere, populo in praeceptum dari, et in scriptum redigi [...] quia per contrariam consuetudinem, qua multi in peccato praecipitabantur, iam apud multos ratio naturalis, in qua scripta erant, obtenebrata erat"; Summa theologiae, Ia-IIae, q. 98, art. 6.

(93) Cf. Sir 24:23 (Vulgate: 24:32-33).

(94) Cf. St. Thomas Aquinas, Summa theologiae, Ia-IIae, q. 100.

(95) The Byzantine liturgy of St. John Chrysostom expresses well the Christian conviction when it places on the mouth of the priest that blesses the deacon in the thanksgiving after communion: "Christ our God, You Who are the completion of the Law and of the Prophets, and You Who have completed the whole mission received from the Father, replenish our hearts with delight and joy, in every time, now and always, for ever and ever. Amen."

(96) Cf. Gal 3:24-26: “Therefore the Law has become our tutor to lead us to Christ, so that we may be justified by faith. But now that faith has come, we are no longer under a tutor. For you are all sons of God through faith in Christi Jesus." On the theological notion of completion, cf. Pontifical Biblical Commission, The Hebrew People and Their Holy Scriptures in the Christian Bible, especially n. 21.

(97) Cf. Matt. 22:37-40; Mark 12:29-31; Luke 10:27.

(98) Cf. Luke 6:27-36.

(99) Cf. Luke 10:25-37.

(100) Cf. John 15:13.

Universal Ethic-Jesus Christ, End of the Natural Law 1-Introduction

Chapter V:

Jesus Christ, End of the Natural Law

101. Grace does not destroy nature but heals it, comforts it, and leads it to its full realization. Therefore, even if the natural law is an expression of reason common to all men and can be presented in a consistent and true manner on the philosophical level, it is not outside the order of grace. Its requirements are present and operative in the different theological states that reach through to a humanity affected by the history of the salvation.



102. The design of salvation, of which the eternal Father has the initiative, was realized with the mission of the Son Who gave to men a new Law, the law of the Gospel. This Law of the Gospel consists principally in the grace of the Holy Spirit operating in the hearts of the faithful to sanctify them. The new Law aims above all to induct men into participating in the Trinitarian community of the divine persons, but, at the same time, it assumes and realizes in an eminent manner the natural law. In a certain way, it clearly recalls the requirements which can be obscured by sin or ignorance. In another way, freeing him from the law of sin--on account of which “there is in me the desire of the good, but not the capacity to carry it out" (Rom 7:18)—it gives to men the real capacity of surpassing their selfishness so as to carry out fully the humanizing requirements of the natural law.