Whether Justice Is in the Will As Its Subject?
Objection 1: It would seem that justice is not in the will as its
subject. For justice is sometimes called truth. But truth is not in
the will, but in the intellect. Therefore justice is not in the will
as its subject.
Obj. 2: Further, justice is about our dealings with others. Now it
belongs to the reason to direct one thing in relation to another.
Therefore justice is not in the will as its subject but in the reason.
Obj. 3: Further, justice is not an intellectual virtue, since it is
not directed to knowledge; wherefore it follows that it is a moral
virtue. Now the subject of moral virtue is the faculty which is
"rational by participation," viz. the irascible and the
concupiscible, as the Philosopher declares (Ethic. i, 13). Therefore
justice is not in the will as its subject, but in the irascible and
concupiscible.
_On the contrary,_ Anselm says (De Verit. xii) that "justice is
rectitude of the will observed for its own sake."
_I answer that,_ The subject of a virtue is the power whose act that
virtue aims at rectifying. Now justice does not aim at directing an
act of the cognitive power, for we are not said to be just through
knowing something aright. Hence the subject of justice is not the
intellect or reason which is a cognitive power. But since we are said
to be just through doing something aright, and because the proximate
principle of action is the appetitive power, justice must needs be in
some appetitive power as its subject.
Now the appetite is twofold; namely, the will which is in the reason
and the sensitive appetite which follows on sensitive apprehension,
and is divided into the irascible and the concupiscible, as stated in
the First Part (Q. 81, A. 2). Again the act of rendering his due to
each man cannot proceed from the sensitive appetite, because
sensitive apprehension does not go so far as to be able to consider
the relation of one thing to another; but this is proper to the
reason. Therefore justice cannot be in the irascible or concupiscible
as its subject, but only in the will: hence the Philosopher (Ethic.
v, 1) defines justice by an act of the will, as may be seen above (A.
1).
Reply Obj. 1: Since the will is the rational appetite, when the
rectitude of the reason which is called truth is imprinted on the
will on account of its nighness to the reason, this imprint retains
the name of truth; and hence it is that justice sometimes goes by the
name of truth.
Reply Obj. 2: The will is borne towards its object consequently on
the apprehension of reason: wherefore, since the reason directs one
thing in relation to another, the will can will one thing in relation
to another, and this belongs to justice.
Reply Obj. 3: Not only the irascible and concupiscible parts are
_rational by participation,_ but the entire _appetitive_ faculty, as
stated in _Ethic._ i, 13, because all appetite is subject to reason.
Now the will is contained in the appetitive faculty, wherefore it can
be the subject of moral virtue.
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