The Natural Law and its Moral Precepts

As I noted in the discussion on “Man’s Natural Condition”, Aquinas believes that God is the
creator of everything. But to ensure that all creations act according to His grand design, Aquinas
posits that “God imprints on the whole of nature the principles of its proper actions” (ST II-First
Part, q. 93, a.5). This imprint is clearly proven by what he calls “natural inclination” in which all
creations manifest certain natural dispositions or tendencies both in their action and reaction in
virtue of their nature. Aquinas believes that every creature of God is bounded by eternal law as
shown by their natural inclination. Hence, for Aquinas, the eternal law is God’s wisdom that
directs the movements and actions of his creatures in their appropriate ways towards their proper
end. It is in this way that God ensures that everything flows according to his plan. But in contrast
to other irrational creatures that God created such as animals and plants, man, as rational, is
subject to the eternal laws in a way more excellent than them. While irrational creatures obey the
law by simply following their “natural inclination” spontaneously, humans follow their natural
inclination with elements of freedom and “understanding” of God’s command (ST II-First Part,
q. 93, a.5-6). Hence, we, humans know what and why we do things because of our innate
intuition. Our ability to understand “who we are” and “what our duties are” helps us to
distinguish appropriate human actions from improper ones. The issue, however, of eternal law is
that, though it is imprinted in everyone’s nature, only God knows fully what this law is. It is for
this reason that Aquinas presents the important role played by the natural law.

Aquinas claims that the natural law is a portion of the eternal law that God instilled into man’s
mind so that we can grasp it naturally (ST II-First Part q.90, a.4 ad 1). This natural law is
reflected in the natural operation of both intellect and will that we already discussed previously.
Meaning, our natural ability to know and direct our actions towards the “good” and the “end”,
through the operation of our intellect and will, testify to the workings of the natural law within
us. The natural law, therefore, is simply us acting and functioning properly as rational, moral
beings. For Aquinas, this is our way of participating in God’s design-plan (ST II-First Part, q.91,
a. 2). However, Aquinas further argues that for the natural law to remain dynamically active in
guiding us to act morally, our mind must be constantly disposed to moral precepts. It is in this
situation that Aquinas’s notion of synderesis and conscience  played an important role.

According to Aquinas, synderesis is an “innate disposition” of the human mind by virtue of

which we, humans, are able to grasp the first principle of natural law without the need for inquiry
(ST II-First Part, q. 51, a.1), while conscience is the natural tendency of man to apply such
principle to concrete life situation, which helps us determine right from wrong. In other words,
because of synderesis and conscience, we become aware that there are certain moral precepts in
which we know and feel that we are obliged to follow as moral beings. If we don’t follow those
moral principles, Aquinas believes that conscience will be there to “accuse, torment, or rebuke”
us (ST I, q. 79, a.13). So, conscience seems to be acting as the “voice of God”, which reminds us
if our actions are right or wrong. But what exactly is this innate moral principle of the natural
law that we, humans, have a natural inclination? Aquinas answers: “…good is to be done and
pursued, and evil is to be avoided. All other precepts of the natural law are based upon
this…” (ST II-First Part q.94, a.2). Thus, our natural inclinations to know, desire, and do good
and avoid evil become the means to gauge our moral life. This moral principle “do good and
avoid evil” will be further explained in relation to the principle of double effect in a little while.
However, the problem with such precepts is that the concept of “good” must be rationalized for
humans have various competing goals in life, as well as, varieties of competing “good” that need
rational discernment before exhibiting some appropriate actions. Besides, there are some acts
which we consider “good” but upon deeper analysis appears, in fact, bad. There is also the
problem of the inadequacy of human reason to discern the human “good” and the laws consonant
with it resulting in different people forming different judgments regarding human acts (ST II-
First Part, q.91, a. 4). All these issues on the defective perception of the “good”, the intellect and
will not functioning well in their deliberation, and the imperfections in our human perception and
understanding, for Aquinas, are all effects of sin. Hence, though, originally, we were born
naturally inclined and disposed to God’s law, we don’t listen to and obey our conscience for the
reason that sin had corrupted and misdirected our inclination (ST II-First Part, q.71, a.2, ad 3).
To address this conundrum, that is, to repair the damage created by sin, Aquinas sets some
concrete guiding moral principles for us to follow. In this way, man will be able to restore his
rational imperfections and develop the habit of acting in accordance to his nature so that in the
end he is transformed into a virtuous person―one who obeys the law out of his natural
inclination to do good and not because he is coerced to act in accordance with external forces.
Let me now briefly develop this point.

The Natural Moral Obligation 

Aquinas teaches that some of our moral obligations are rooted in our nature. As humans,
according to Aquinas, we have various natural inclinations such as self-preservation, procreation,
and just dealing with others. Our inclination to self-preservation obliged us to cherish the life
that God has given us. For this reason, any activity that ensures a healthy living is considered
moral, while those that endanger it through careless living or, intentionally, ending it in a form of
suicide is always immoral. We are also naturally inclined to propagate our species but, for
Aquinas, only in the context of sacred marriage. Thus, what results from the union of wife and
husband are considered moral, while any sexual relations outside of marriage would be wrong.
And lastly, as human beings, we also feel naturally inclined to live in peace with others through
just and fair relationship. Actions that harm or destroy a good relationship with others are
considered a bad act. Aquinas expressly claims that violating any of these natural inclinations is
an immoral act for it disobeys directly God’s command. Hence, we could say that the rightness
or wrongness of an act is gauged by how our actions respect or disregard our human nature.
Indeed, human flourishing is always the end point of our activities, but flourishing only happens
when there is an enhancement of our nature and not its destruction.