CHAPTER III

LAW AND THE STANDARD OF

MORALITY
A. CRITERION OF
MORALITY
⊹ What is the standard ⊹ The immediate or
of morality which is approximate norm of
the criterion or norm morality is rational
of the goodness of human nature or man
badness of human as man, meaning
acts? human nature as
considered by right
season.

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b. Is God’s will the criterion
or norm?
⊹ Some person believe that God’s will
ought to be the immediate or proximate
norm of morality,or that God’s will ought
to determine the goodness or badness of
humans acts.

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 Big
concep It is indeed good to think so,
but how does one determine
God’s will ? Is it written in
t the sky or communicated by
an angel?

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c. Is conscience the criterion
or norm?
⊹ Some persons erroneously believe that
conscience or “that tiny voice” is the
standard of morality. Conscience can be
manipulated or it can be too strict or too
lenient. Conscience is not objective , and
hence, it cannot be the proximate standard
of morality.

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CONSCIENCE CAN BE
SCRUPULOUS OR
UNSCRUPULOUS
SCRUPULOUS UNSCRUPULOUS

Considers any infraction Considers acts like

of the law as a grievous stealing and cheating as
sin or fault. minor faults and hence
allowable

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D. ELEMENTS OF LAW
⊹ To determine the moral law, one must
know what law is. Law is defined as an
ordinance of reason, promulgated by one
who has charge of community for the
common good.
⊹ A law is always reasonable ;otherwise, it
is not a law.

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FIRST PART OF THE
SECOND PART, TREATISE
ON LAW ,QUESTION 90,
ARTICLE 4
⊹ Four elements in law namely;
-An ordinance of reason
-By one who has charge of the community
-For the common good
-Promulgated

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E.THREE KINDS OF LAW
1. The Eternal law, 2. The Natural law, 3. The Positive law,
whereby God directs whereby God which is a rule of
all creatures unto the impresses His mind action freely
end of the universe and will upon established by a
creatures through competent authority
principle intrinsic or in some external,
natural to them; and palpable sign.

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f.synderesis
⊹ St. Thomas Aquinas writes that all men, at
the moment of birth bear an imprint of the
Creator, enabling them to follow a law
which the Creator in His divine wisdom
has decreed that all men follow for their
happiness and well-being on earth.

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g. Natural moral law
⊹ The Natural Moral Law is cryptically and
simply expressed as “Do good and avoid
evil”.
⊹ The Natural Moral Law is what
conscience applies to human act.

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 h.Theories regarding doubt
⊹ Rigorism states that: Law obliges until one
becomes certain of its non-existence.
⊹ Equiprobabilism states that: Law obliges
unless its non-existence is equally probable
⊹ Probabilism states that: a doubtful law does
not oblige.
⊹ Laxism states that: Law does not exist the
moment there is the slightest reason to doubt
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its existence.
 I.THE TEN
COMMANDMENTS
⊹ The Ten Commandments constitute the
Positive Law which renders and clear what
the Natural Law expressed in general term.
⊹ A careful study of the commandments
reveals that they are after all particular
application of the general law of “Do good
and avoid evil”.

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⊹ The commandments are divided into two:
the first three constitute our duties to God,
and the last seven constitute law for
ourselves and neighbors.
⊹ The Ten Commandments are the practical
application of the Natural Moral Law.

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⊹ The French Philosopher, Jean-Paul Sartre,
for instance, having been atheist,
considered four precepts to follow in
order to insure peace in a society: 1) Be
honest, 2) Do not tell a lie, 3) Do not beat
your wife, 4) Bring up your children
properly

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⊹ Another philosopher, Immanuel Kant,
had a different perspective. He did not
accept Ten Commandments as a standard
or rule of morality. Thus, his famous
categorical imperative, “Act only
according to that maxim by which you
can at the same time will that it should
become a universal law”.
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j.The eastern philosophers
⊹ INDIANS
-Do not have concrete standard for
determining the goodness or badness of
human acts. A person’s mode of action must
conform to his dharma or duty.
-The Indians believe that there are four
classes or castes of human beings: namely,
the brahmin, ksatriya, vaishya, and shudra.
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-One who belongs to the brahmin or the
nobility has a mode of conduct he should
observe.
-The ksatriya and vaishya have a certain
calling or station in life that calls for a
specific behavior. Farmers, soldiers and
businessmen, traders who belong to these
castes.
-The shudra or untouchables also have to
live life according to what shudra ought to 18
⊹ CHINESE
-The Chinese, like the Indians , do not have a
concrete standard of morality.
-For them, one must follow nature if one
wants to be happy in this world.
-Nature is tao which also the way, the truth,
the law.
-When one conforms to nature, one
experiences ease and tranquillity.
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⊹ BUDDHIST
-The originator of Buddhism was Gautama
Siddharta who was born in Nepal, north of
India , in the sixth century B.C.
-The Buddha(literally meaning “awakened” or
“illumined”) was a prince who was shielded
from all forms of pain and suffering.

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-He formulated the now famous Four Noble
truths: 1) Life is suffering; 2) Suffering is
caused by selfish craving 3) Suffering can be
eliminated; 4) Suffering can be eliminated by
the Eighthfold path.

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K.The greek philosophers
⊹ ARISTOTLE
-For Aristotle, virtue holds the key to one’s
happiness. Virtue lies in a Golden Mean
between two extremes. Aristotle advises
against extremes of behavior. The whole idea
of Golden Mean is moderation.

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⊹ One should not be a wastrel or a
spendthrift but must not be a miser either,
one ought to be frugal or economical. One
should neither be cowardly nor foolhardy
but ought to be brave. One should neither
be abstemious nor gluttonous but ought to
be moderate.

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⊹ Each individual has his own mean. There
is no standard golden mean.
⊹ Aristotle claims that it is very difficult to
aim that the mean between two extremes.
⊹ Does the Golden Mean doctrine Aristotle
serve as the standard of moral goodness or
badness? Aristotle’s doctrine is about
positive virtues, it does not tackle evil.

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⊹ EPICUREANISM
-The epicureanism, named after
Epicurus(341-270 B.C) considered the
pursuit of pleasure to be the essence of
happiness.
-“Be merry, for tomorrow you die”.
-The English word “epicurean” to describe
delightful food or other goods came from
Epicurus, and yet Epicurus live practically on
brown bread and water. 25
-He taught that pleasure is the ultimate good,
and pain is the only evil.
-It is normal for man to pursue his own
pleasure and to shun pain. If pain must be
suffered at all, it must only be as a means to
greater pleasure.

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⊹ STOICISM
-The stoics believed that in apathy and
indifference lies one’s happiness because one is
sheltered or vagaries or the up’s and downs of
life.
-Stoicism is one’s weapon against the
vicissitudes of life.
-Like their predecessors, the Stoics have not
really arrived at the standard of moral goodness
or but only at the safest manner of staving off
life’s unexpected turns. 27
L.MODERN ETHICAL
STANDARDS
⊹ UTILITARIANISM
-Utilitarianism as expounded by John Stuart
Mill, maintains that utility or usefulness is
the standard of morality.
-Anything that is useful is good; the opposite
is evil.

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happiness principle, holds that
actions are right in proportion
as they tend to promote
happiness. By happiness is
intended pleasure and the
absence of pain; by
unhappiness, pain and the
privation of pleasure”(from
utilitarianism)

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-Mill is also known for his Greatest Happiness
principle: “This being according to the utilitarian
opinion, the end of human action, is necessarily
also the standard of morality; which maybe
accordingly defined , the rules and precepts of
human conduct, by the observance of which an
existence such has been described might be, to the
greatest extent possible, secured all mankind; and
not only to them, but so far as the nature of things
admits, to the whole sentient creation”(From
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⊹ JEREMY BENTHAM
-Jeremy Bentham thinks along the same line.
“Pleasure is in itself a good…pain is in itself
an evil; and indeed without exception, the
only evil; or else the words good and evil
have no meaning” (From An Introduction to
the Principles of Morals and Legislation).

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-The theories of pleasure connote a wrong
notion of happiness. Pleasure is fleeting, but
happiness is lasting.
-Happiness, on the other hand, has no limit.
No man can ever say that he has enough of it.
Happiness has no saturation point.
-And because man does not live forever on
earth, no man has truly experienced real
happiness.
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m.A sound concept of human
nature
-If as stated earlier, rational human nature or
man as man, is the immediate or proximate
norm of mortality, it becomes necessary to
project a sound concept of human nature.
-To each of this life and powers belong a joy
and pain depending on whether this life or
powers are used according to their specific
nature and purpose.
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Man has three layers of life
and powers:
VEGETATIVE SENTIENT LIFE RATIONAL LIFE
LIFE Which he shares in Which he alone
Which he shares in common with brute possesses, and with
common with the animals, and with powers of
plants, and the powers like intellection and
powers that come external and volition.
with it, namely, internal sensation,
nutrition, growth appetition and
and reproduction; locomotion;

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1.appetites
⊹ Appetites belong to sentient life.
Appetition is the tendency towards objects
which considered pleasant, and away
from objects considered unpleasant.
⊹ Appetition or the activity of sense
appetites is properly called passion.

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2.Eleven passion of man
⊹ Love is the tendency towards a pleasant and
desirable.
⊹ Object desire the tendency to acquire the
pleasant or desirable object.
⊹ Joy results from the acquisition of the
desired object.
⊹ Sorrow the failure to acquire the object.
⊹ Hatred is repugnance towards an
undesirable object. 36
⊹ Aversion is repulsion towards the same
object.
⊹ When the desired object is within one’s
means of acquisition, Hope is experienced
, if not, despair.
⊹ If the evil to be avoided is within one’s
means, courage is experienced: If not,
fear.
⊹ Anger is revulsion, dissatisfaction over
the non-acquisition of desired goods or 37
3.Love of self is natural
⊹ Love of self is the most natural love. There
is nothing to be ashamed about loving
oneself.
⊹ “Love your. neighbor as you love yourself”
⊹ Love of self is the center of all passions.
⊹ The eleven passions can be either strong or
weak. A strong passion is called “emotion”;
a weak one, “feeling”.
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⊹ Hence, any one of the eleven passion can
be an emotion or feeling. There is an
emotion or feeling of love, desire, joy etc.
⊹ The passions of man are salutary to man’s
well-being. If man did not experience
these passions, his life would have been
drab and colorless.

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4.Proximate standard of
morality
⊹ This sound human nature is the proximate
standard of the morality: wholesome
human being with all the layers of life put
into their proper places.
⊹ The highest is man’s rational life; the
second is the animal’s sentient life; the
third and lowest is the plant’s vegetative
life
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5. Virtue as middle ground
⊹ To every activity, there is an ideal middle
ground called a virtue.
⊹ Each power implies a virtue.
⊹ There is a time or season to love and be
angry, to fear, to hope, to delight or feel
aversion, etc.
⊹ Each of these passions, when properly
experienced, gives man the power to live
fully 41
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Team Presentation

MIKE MORETE KATHERINE EUNICE ALAINE

FRIAS MANANQUIL RIVERA

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