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Objection 1: It would seem that a mortal sin can become venial.
Because venial sin is equally distant from mortal, as mortal sin is
from venial. But a venial sin can become mortal, as stated above
(Article 5). Therefore also a mortal sin can become venial.
Objection 2: Further, venial and mortal sin are said to differ in
this, that he who sins mortally loves a creature more than God, while
he who sins venially loves the creature less than God. Now it may
happen that a person in committing a sin generically mortal, loves a
creature less than God; for instance, if anyone being ignorant that
simple fornication is a mortal sin, and contrary to the love of God,
commits the sin of fornication, yet so as to be ready, for the love of
God, to refrain from that sin if he knew that by committing it he was
acting counter to the love of God. Therefore his will be a venial
sin; and accordingly a mortal sin can become venial.
Objection 3: Further, as stated above (Article 5, Objection
3), good is more distant from evil, than venial from mortal sin.
But an act which is evil in itself, can become good; thus to kill a
man may be an act of justice, as when a judge condemns a thief to
death. Much more therefore can a mortal sin become venial.
On the contrary, An eternal thing can never become temporal. But
mortal sin deserves eternal punishment, whereas venial sin deserves
temporal punishment. Therefore a mortal sin can never become venial.
I answer that, Venial and mortal differ as perfect and imperfect in
the genus of sin, as stated above (Article 1, ad 1). Now the
imperfect can become perfect, by some sort of addition: and,
consequently, a venial sin can become mortal, by the addition of some
deformity pertaining to the genus of mortal sin, as when a man utters
an idle word for the purpose of fornication. On the other hand, the
perfect cannot become imperfect, by addition; and so a mortal sin
cannot become venial, by the addition of a deformity pertaining to the
genus of venial sin, for the sin is not diminished if a man commit
fornication in order to utter an idle word; rather is it aggravated by
the additional deformity.
Nevertheless a sin which is generically mortal, can become venial by
reason of the imperfection of the act, because then it does not
completely fulfil the conditions of a moral act, since it is not a
deliberate, but a sudden act, as is evident from what we have said
above (Article 2). This happens by a kind of subtraction,
namely, of deliberate reason. And since a moral act takes its species
from deliberate reason, the result is that by such a subtraction the
species of the act is destroyed.
Reply to Objection 1: Venial differs from mortal as imperfect from
perfect, even as a boy differs from a man. But the boy becomes a man
and not vice versa. Hence the argument does not prove.
Reply to Objection 2: If the ignorance be such as to excuse sin
altogether, as the ignorance of a madman or an imbecile, then he that
commits fornication in a state of such ignorance, commits no sin either
mortal or venial. But if the ignorance be not invincible, then the
ignorance itself is a sin, and contains within itself the lack of the
love of God, in so far as a man neglects to learn those things whereby
he can safeguard himself in the love of God.
Reply to Objection 3: As Augustine says (Contra Mendacium
vii), "those things which are evil in themselves, cannot be well
done for any good end." Now murder is the slaying of the innocent,
and this can nowise be well done. But, as Augustine states (De
Lib. Arb. i, 4,5), the judge who sentences a thief to death,
or the soldier who slays the enemy of the common weal, are not
murderers.
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