Prudence and the Virtues

“Prudence is the virtue that disposes practical reason to discern our true good in every circumstance and to choose the right means of achieving it.”(1) Like a charioteer, prudence directs the other moral virtues. It provides the means and measure. So, let us begin with fortitude. “The virtue of fortitude enables one to conquer fear, even fear of death, and to face trials and persecutions. It disposes one even to renounce and sacrifice his life in defense of a just cause.”(2) Prudence tells one to avoid the extremes of temerity (excessive fear) and rashness (excessive boldness). Prudence also tells a person when a cause is just and important enough to decide to conquer fear, face persecutions, and even to sacrifice one’s life. For example, in the life of St. Thomas More, prudence told St. Thomas that remaining Chancellor of the Realm [of England] was not sufficient cause to risk his life, so he resigned. Prudence did tell him that—when there was no other way to defend the cause—defense of the infallibility/primacy of the Pope and of the sanctity of marriage(3) were just causes worthy of the sacrifice of his life.

“Justice is the moral virtue that consists in the constant and firm will to give their due to God and neighbor. Justice toward God is called the ‘virtue of religion.’”(4) Justice is located in the will. Prudence sets the mean for justice. For instance, prudence says that attendance at Holy Mass on Sundays and daily prayers suffice for the fulfillment of the virtue of religion. Prudence also says that for one who is married to spend all day in Church praying his or her favorite novenas is wrong; it is neither prudent nor just, because the wife has to make time to care for her children, and the husband has his part to do also as head of the family. Children need their Mom and Dad to be with them and for them. Parents are not monks. Justice demands that they fulfill their vocation as parents.

“Temperance is the moral virtue that moderates the attraction of pleasures and provides balance in the use of created goods. … The temperate person directs the sensitive appetites toward what is good …”(5) Prudence directs temperance by setting the mean and measure, by saying how much is appropriate. For example, prudence tells a person when to stop drinking [alcoholic beverages] and when it is not appropriate to drink at all. Prudence informs temperance so that a person’s emotions can be integrated under the guidance of right reason. For instance, it is healthy to have an emotion of beauty when seeing or hearing a person of the complementary gender. Prudence helps keep this emotion under the control of right reason as it help’s one to avoid two extremes: 1) impure thoughts, desires, or actions, and 2) a puritanical attitude: “Sexuality is evil. Human emotions are evil.” In fact, it is no sin to have these unsolicited emotions; however, it is a failure in temperance and in prudence—and it is a sin—to deliberately seek out and/or cultivate impure thoughts and desires. One would do well to recall the personalistic norm of Vatican II, which is found in the document Gaudium et Spes: “No person may be an object of use, but only a subject of love.” Finally, as St. Thomas Aquinas taught, the holy man, the man of integrity, is able to laugh when it is appropriate and be serious when that’s appropriate. St. Thomas even says that it is objectively sinful to lack a sense of humor.

Grace and virtue are indispensable in living the Christian life. Furthermore, charity is the greatest of all the virtues.(6) In fact, charity is the form of all the virtues, as the Catechism of the Catholic Church explains:

The practice of all the virtues is animated an inspired by charity, which … is the form of the virtues; it articulates and orders them among themselves; it is the source and the goal of their Christian practice. Charity upholds and purifies our human ability to love, and raises it to the supernatural perfection of divine love.(7)

In that case, it seems reasonable to say that supernatural charity upholds and purifies all the natural moral virtues, raising them to the level of the infused moral virtues. Thus, it is above all by the supernatural virtue of charity that one is able to achieve the perfection of the sons of God.

The practice of the moral life animated by charity gives to the Christian the spiritual freedom of the children of God. He no longer stands before God as a slave, in servile fear, or as a mercenary looking for wages, but as a son … (8)

Footnotes:
1. Catechism of the Catholic Church #1806.
2. Ibid. #1808.
3. Divorce is against the natural law.
4. Catechism of the Catholic Church #1807.
5. Ibid. #1809.
6. Cf. I Corinthians 13:13
7. Catechism of the Catholic Church #1827.
8. Ibid. #1828.