Chapter 6
How Doubts Are To Be Solved By Those Unable
To Use The Preceding Rules
799. We must now deal with a particular case which, although not commonly found among civilised, Catholic nations, is present in the human race. We have indicated two ways of removing doubts about the lawfulness of our actions. The first is to apply the various rules we have given; these rules require a great deal of instruction and considerable precision of mind. The second is by means of any priest constituted by God as a teacher in Israel.
However, some simple-minded people are incapable of solving moral doubts by applying the right rules and, because of a lack of confessors or other competent authority, have no one to turn to for a decision. We need think only of ancient and primitive peoples to convince ourselves that many human beings can find themselves in this state. At the same time we must remember that morality applies to all human beings without exception, and that whatever our mental state and condition, a subjective moral norm must always be available to answer our need. This norm must be relative to and adapted to our condition, enabling us to avoid sin and live innocently. What form of rule therefore must be followed by those who have no light or help to solve their doubt about the lawfulness of an action?
The reader will notice that the case takes us back to the first of the two questions we proposed concerning unformed conscience. We leave the second question, which we have just discussed, on how to solve a doubt about the unlawfulness of an action, to return to the first question which concerns what we must do while in doubt. We have supposed that simple-minded people are devoid of all means for solving their moral doubts, and are therefore like people who have to act while still in doubt about the lawfulness of their action. In this state, as we have said, the safer way must be followed (cf. 471-473).
800. This accounts for the tutiorism of primitive peoples. We find it consistently in simple-minded people, who are incapable of distinguishing between a case of natural law forbidding something intrinsically evil and a case of positive law which by prohibiting something makes it evil although it is not intrinsically evil. Because of this inability, these peoples' doubts are complex and total; they doubt the general unlawfulness of an action without identifying the source of its unlawfulness. In this situation the simple-minded are always doubting whether the action is opposed to the natural or positive law, or whether it is intrinsically evil or not. They have no means of applying the law governing their action, and therefore, in order to act correctly, must keep to the safer way.(528)
801. Observation shows that this mode of action is suggested to the simple-minded by the light natural to them all. We should not be surprised therefore that tutiorism is the first system in history for judging the morality of human acts. It remained the only reliable system and rule of conscience until humanity advanced to another stage where tutiorism was first set aside and then rejected and condemned as false. Hence, the older a moral system is, the more rigid it appears. Rules of conscience are not so absolute that they can always remain the same relative to different states of individuals and the human race. They have a subjective truth which changes in keeping with the change of the state and condition of the subject. This observation has been neglected, which explains why the opinions of moralists are too universal.
Notes
(528) This tutiorism, suggested to the simple-minded by their natural light, comes under the rules for solving cases of perplexed conscience, which is apprehensive about evil in acting and not acting. In doubts of this kind, we must distinguish the degrees of probability and the amount of evil that is possible. The distinction allows us to formulate the following rules:
1. If the amount and probability of evil are the same on either side, nothing new must be done;2. If the evil is less on one side that on the other, but the probability is the same, we must choose the lesser evil;
3. If the evil is the same on both sides but the probability less on one side, the less probable evil is to be chosen;
4. If the evil is greater on one side but the probability less, the probability must be multiplied by the evil, and the lower result chosen. For example, suppose the evil on one side is 10 and the probability 1%, and on the other side the evil is 2 and the probability 40%. If we multiply the evil by the probability, we have 10% in the first case, and 80% in the second. This difference requires us to choose the 10% evil rather than the 80% evil. In other words, we must prefer the danger of a greater evil, because the small amount of this danger renders it relatively much more improbable.
These rules are found in the natural tutiorism under discussion. Obviously, a simple-minded person cannot state them explicitly; if he were able to distinguish them, he would have developed beyond the tutiorist stage of human moral behaviour. On the other hand, it is no less true that all the rules are virtually contained in the conscience formed at different times by a simple-minded person.