The Goodness of Being

Article 3. The Goodness of Being

a) Meaning of Goodness　　b) Classification of Goodness　　c) Evil

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a) Meaning of Goodness

Transcendental goodness which, as we shall see, is but a phase of being itself and is in reality identified with being, consists in the fact that being in general, and any being in particular, can answer a tendency, a natural desire or appetite.

When is a thing called good? First, when it pleases, when it is enjoyable, when it affords satisfaction. Thus we speak of a good dinner, a good vacation, a good time. In the second place, a thing is called good when it is useful, and when it has all the qualities that fit it for its proper use. Thus we speak of a good broom, a good house, a good car. Further, we call a thing good when it serves a good purpose. Again, a thing is good when it meets the requirements of the moral law. Thus we speak of a good life, a good thought, a good action. We may sum up all these aspects of good in a practical way by saying that a thing is good (a) when it gives pleasure or satisfaction; (b) when it has all requisites for its proper use; (c) when it actually serves a good end or purpose; (d) when it squares with the rational requirements for proper human (i. e., moral) conduct.

Now, in all the phases or types of goodness here considered there is a common point, a common character. It is this: a good thing answers a natural appetite, tendency, or desire. Good answers tendency or appetite. In this fact we discern its fundamental nature. Aristotle was right when he said, “Good is what everything tends to or desires.”

Regarded in this fundamental way, good is manifestly a synonym for being. For every being (inasmuch as it is actual) is capable of answering a tendency, desire, or appetite. Actual being is there; and what is there can be aimed at, can be the goal of tendency or appetite. Hence actual being, in so far as it is being at all, is desirable or good. And potential being is, in the exact measure of its potentiality, also good or desirable; it is potential good. Hence it is just to say that being and goodness, or, more exactly, being and the good are interchangeable terms. The old Latin formula is, omne ens est bonum; ens et bonum convertuntur, that is, “Every being is good; the good and being are synonymous.”

Take another view of this same truth: We discern purpose in things; we see about us an ordered universe; things tend to their ends, their goals, and all, literally, “work together unto good.” Therefore there is in things a tendency or inclination or appetite by which they seek their ends, and the ends are therefore good. Anything that exists or can exist can be the object of a tendency or appetite; and only in the measure in which a being exists or can exist can it be such an object. But anything that exists or can exist is being. Therefore being and the good are synonymous terms. This is not goodness (or the good) of a certain type, but goodness in its root-meaning; goodness that transcends the boundaries of type and class; goodness that is transcendental. Omne ens est bonum; ens et bonum convertuntur.

b) Classification of Goodness

Goodness is classified as metaphysical, physical, and moral.

1. Metaphysical goodness (ontological goodness; transcendental goodness) is that goodness which we have seen to be synonymous with being. Metaphysical goodness is, first and foremost, synonymous with actual being. It extends, however, to potential being inasmuch as this being involves a direction and order towards actual existence. Thus metaphysical or transcendental goodness is a complete synonym for actual being; in only a secondary way does it extend to potential being, for potential being, lacking actuality, lacks perfection which is the measure of actual goodness.

2. Physical goodness is the perfection of a being which has all the rounded completeness which its nature requires. Any lack of a natural requirement is a lack of goodness, and such lack or absence of being (i. e., perfection) is not good but evil. Thus we say that bread is good bread when it has all the qualities and perfections that its nature as bread requires. And here we discern the meaning of an ancient axiom, Bonum ex integra causa; malum ex quocumque defectu, that is, “A thing, to be good, must be wholly and completely good; it is spoiled (made bad) by any defect.” We speak of physical goodness when we say that our health is good, or that our motor car is a good one, or that the carpenter has done a good job. Note that there can be such a thing as good food; we also see that there can be such a thing as good poison.

3. Moral goodness is the perfection which accrues to free human activity from the fact that such activity squares with the requirements of the moral law. Free human activity means all deliberate human thoughts, desires, words, deeds, omissions. And the requirements of the moral law (which is fundamentally God Himself, viewed as Divine Reason and Will, that is, as the Eternal Law) are manifested proximately to man by conscience, that is, by human reason pronouncing upon the lawfulness or unlawfulness of a situation here and now to be decided. Thus moral goodness is the goodness of human conduct which is in line with conscience. The absence or lack of moral goodness is moral evil or sin.

In addition to the classification of goodness just given there are certain other classes which we must notice here:

(a) A thing chosen as a suitable means to an end has the goodness of utility. It is called a bonum utile or “a useful good.” Thus a good broom not only illustrates physical goodness, but useful goodness. Thus, again, a painful and dangerous operation is, however undesirable in itself, a useful good; it is good as a means to the recovery of normal functions.

(b) A thing chosen for its own sake (and not as a means to something else) is a proper good. It is called a bonum honestum or “a seemly and fitting good.” Thus life and health are proper goods.

(c) A thing chosen for itself affords satisfaction when achieved, and, under this aspect as satisfying, it is called a bonum delectabile or “a pleasurable good.” Thus the enjoyment of health, or the pleasure one takes in a good dinner, indicates that health and pleasing food are pleasurable goods.

(d) A thing which truly answers an unspoiled natural tendency, or also a thing which answers a supernatural (i. e., grace-derived) tendency, is a real good. Contrasted with real good is apparent good, that is, a thing which has the outer seeming and the appeal of a real good, but which brings no lasting satisfaction. It is a truth established in philosophical psychology that man cannot deliberately choose evil for its own sake or under the true aspect of evil; man can only choose evil when he views it as good. Nor is this sad choice a mere mistake; in responsible persons acting deliberately, it is always a perverse and blameworthy choice. Man, in every human action,—that is, in every deliberate thought, word, deed,—acts for good, real or apparent.

(e) A good which belongs to the order of man’s outer, bodily life, is a material good. Such goods are man’s health, his property, his standing in the community, his good name. A good which perfects man’s mind, is an intellectual good; such goods are, for example, knowledge, studiousness, tact or prudence. A good which perfects man’s will, is a moral good; such, for instance, are justice, fortitude, purity.

(f) A good achievable by natural powers is a natural good; such a good is, for instance, acquired knowledge. A good achievable only by the aid of revelation or grace, is a supernatural good; such are the certitude of divine faith, confidence in God’s providence, the divine virtues (faith, hope, charity). Further, a good achievable by a creature is a finite good. God alone is infinite Good.

c) Evil

Evil is the absence of good, the lack of perfection, the privation of what ought to be present. Evil is accurately and simply defined as the privation of good.

We have distinguished goodness as metaphysical, physical, and moral. Academically, we may make a like classification of evil. But, as we have seen, being and goodness are metaphysically identified, and so it appears that there is no such thing as metaphysical evil. Every being is good.

On first sight it appears not only unlikely but downright untrue to say that every being is good. Is a wound or sore good? Is sickness good? Is sin good? The answer is that a wound or a sore or a sickness is physically bad, and that sin is morally bad. But we have no metaphysical badness or evil here. A wound or a sore or a sickness is not so much something positive as something negative; not so much the presence of something as the absence of something. Thus sickness is the absence of health; a wound or sore is the absence of physical soundness. And so also with sin; it is the lack of conformity between man’s conduct and the moral law; it is a failure, a falling away, a lack, an absence. These things which are physically or morally bad have no positive proper entity of their own which could be called evil; for their essence lies in a lack and an absence, and not in the entitative presence of anything; they are rather to be called non-being than being, and hence their badness or evil is not to be ascribed to being, which is ever good.

Being as such is good; any positive entity or being as such is good; and this is metaphysical goodness. Even the movement of the murderer’s arm in striking down his victim is good in itself; the same movement might readily be conceived as striking off the shackles of a slave. The action is even physically good. But it is morally evil. And its evil consists in the fact that what is itself good is misdirected, misapplied, used in a manner out of line with (hence lacking conformity with) the law which should govern human conduct.

Metaphysical evil, then, is utterly impossible. But physical and moral evil are not only possible, but manifest facts. Physical evil is any lack of elements, parts, functions, services, ends, purposes, that should be present in a natural agent, that is, in any duly constituted actual nature. All the perfections demanded by a rounded and complete nature must be present to render it worthy of the simple description physically good. Bonum ex integra causa; malum ex quocumque defectu: “A thing to be good must be wholly and completely good; it is rendered bad by (and to the extent of) any defect.”

Moral evil is sin. It is the lack of agreement between human activity and the norm or measure of what such activity ought to be. This norm is, as we have seen, fundamentally the Eternal Law (God, as Divine Reason and Will), and proximately human conscience, that is, human reason judging the present situation as in order or out of order, as lawful or unlawful. Now, moral evil is a lack of conformity between human conduct or activity on the one hand and conscience on the other. Like all evil, it is the absence or lack of something, not the entitative presence of something. In the face of moral, as of physical, evil, we can and must still declare that being as such is ever good; for moral evil, like physical evil, is, in its essence, non-being rather than being.

What, now, is the cause of evil? Well, since evil is essentially a deficiency, a lack, an absence, a non-being in itself, it requires not a cause which produces it, but a cause which fails to supply the deficiency. It requires not so much an efficient (i. e., producing) cause as a deficient cause. But, in so far as positive reality is the cause of evil (by reason of its lack of power, or by reason of its moral perversity) we must assert that the cause of evil is good in itself. The actual causes as realities have metaphysical or transcendental goodness. But they fail; they are lacking. Hence there is absent from their product the rounded perfection that should be there, and this absence or lack is what we call physical evil or badness. We see that the true cause of this evil is the lack, the failure, the deficiency of what is, in itself, good.

As to evil in the world about us, we find both the physical and the moral type. Of physical evil, God is the accidental cause, not the per se or direct cause. The most manifest of physical evils are sickness, death, plagues, bad climate, waste lands, noxious plants, dangerous animals, natural forces in destructive play. Yet these things are not evil in themselves, nor are they evil for man; man grows to full stature only under pressure and hardship; he would inevitably fail of attaining his great End if the earth were still a paradise. As bitter medicine and painful operations are sometimes required to restore health and soundness, so the so-called physical evils of existence are required by fallen man; rightly received, they drive out the deadly sickness of pride, they make man look to God, they help him achieve the purpose of his creation. Man, by the original sin, put “the times out of joint”; he upset the order of the world; he cannot, then, blame the consequent hardships upon God; and yet God allows the hardships to happen, and mercifully turns them to man’s account, to his lasting good. In this (accidental) sense, God is the cause of physical evil in the world.

Of moral evil, God is in no sense the cause. Having made man free, He does not destroy the gift of freedom, even when it is abused. And sin or moral evil is always the abuse of freedom, of free-will. Yet even out of sin, of which man is the author and not God in any sense, the merciful Creator and Provider draws good. For out of the sin of persecutors came the glorious constancy of the martyrs. Out of the ills of civic or industrial oppression arises the opportunity for the exercise of the social virtues, the works of mercy.

Summary of the Article

This Article has shown us the meaning of goodness and the good. We have seen herein how being and the good are really identified, and that they are distinguished only by a rational or logical distinction. We have classified the good as metaphysical or ontological, physical, and moral. We have discussed the negative nature of evil, the opposite and the privation of good. We have seen that metaphysical evil is utterly impossible. We have discussed physical and moral evil. We have indicated the cause of evil.