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Objection 1: It would seem that temperance is not only about desires
and pleasures. For Tully says (De Invent. Rhet. ii, 54)
that "temperance is reason's firm and moderate mastery of lust and
other wanton emotions of the mind." Now all the passions of the soul
are called emotions of the mind. Therefore it seems that temperance is
not only about desires and pleasures.
Objection 2: Further, "Virtue is about the difficult and the
good" [Ethic. ii, 3]. Now it seems more difficult to temper
fear, especially with regard to dangers of death, than to moderate
desires and pleasures, which are despised on account of deadly pains
and dangers, according to Augustine (Questions 83, qu. 36).
Therefore it seems that the virtue of temperance is not chiefly about
desires and pleasures.
Objection 3: Further, according to Ambrose (De Offic. i,
43) "the grace of moderation belongs to temperance": and Tully
says (De Offic. ii, 27) that "it is the concern of temperance
to calm all disturbances of the mind and to enforce moderation." Now
moderation is needed, not only in desires and pleasures, but also in
external acts and whatever pertains to the exterior. Therefore
temperance is not only about desires and pleasures.
On the contrary, Isidore says (Etym.) [De Summo Bono xxxvii,
xlii, and De Different. ii, 39]: that "it is temperance
whereby lust and desire are kept under control."
I answer that, As stated above (Question 123, Article 12;
Question 136, Article 1), it belongs to moral virtue to
safeguard the good of reason against the passions that rebel against
reason. Now the movement of the soul's passions is twofold, as
stated above (FS, Question 23, Article 2), when we were
treating of the passions: the one, whereby the sensitive appetite
pursues sensible and bodily goods, the other whereby it flies from
sensible and bodily evils.
The first of these movements of the sensitive appetite rebels against
reason chiefly by lack of moderation. Because sensible and bodily
goods, considered in their species, are not in opposition to reason,
but are subject to it as instruments which reason employs in order to
attain its proper end: and that they are opposed to reason is owing to
the fact that the sensitive appetite fails to tend towards them in
accord with the mode of reason. Hence it belongs properly to moral
virtue to moderate those passions which denote a pursuit of the good.
On the other hand, the movement of the sensitive appetite in flying
from sensible evil is mostly in opposition to reason, not through being
immoderate, but chiefly in respect of its flight: because, when a man
flies from sensible and bodily evils, which sometimes accompany the
good of reason, the result is that he flies from the good of reason.
Hence it belongs to moral virtue to make man while flying from evil to
remain firm in the good of reason.
Accordingly, just as the virtue of fortitude, which by its very
nature bestows firmness, is chiefly concerned with the passion, viz.
fear, which regards flight from bodily evils, and consequently with
daring, which attacks the objects of fear in the hope of attaining some
good, so, too, temperance, which denotes a kind of moderation, is
chiefly concerned with those passions that tend towards sensible goods,
viz. desire and pleasure, and consequently with the sorrows that arise
from the absence of those pleasures. For just as daring presupposes
objects of fear, so too such like sorrow arises from the absence of the
aforesaid pleasures.
Reply to Objection 1: As stated above (FS, Question 23,
Articles 1,2; FS, Question 25, Article 1), when we were
treating of the passions, those passions which pertain to avoidance of
evil, presuppose the passions pertaining to the pursuit of good; and
the passions of the irascible presuppose the passions of the
concupiscible. Hence, while temperance directly moderates the
passions of the concupiscible which tend towards good, as a
consequence, it moderates all the other passions, inasmuch as
moderation of the passions that precede results in moderation of the
passions that follow: since he that is not immoderate in desire is
moderate in hope, and grieves moderately for the absence of the things
he desires.
Reply to Objection 2: Desire denotes an impulse of the appetite
towards the object of pleasure and this impulse needs control, which
belongs to temperance. on the other hand fear denotes a withdrawal of
the mind from certain evils, against which man needs firmness of mind,
which fortitude bestows. Hence temperance is properly about desires,
and fortitude about fears.
Reply to Objection 3: External acts proceed from the internal
passions of the soul: wherefore their moderation depends on the
moderation of the internal passions.
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