Temperance

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Temperance

• Lecture 7
• Moderate the attraction of pleasure and provide
  balance in use of created goods.

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Temperance

• Temperance
• The moral virtue that moderates the attraction of
  pleasures and provides balance in the use of
  created goods.
• Negative gives us the ability to overcome
  disordered desires that incline us to evil and
  sin.
• Positive gives us the ability to transform
  these desires for the good and maintain this good
  through balance.
• Temptation
• Not We will be bound and controlled by
  temptation the rest of our lives.
• Is We will always face temptations, however we
  ought not be controlled by them.

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Cardinal Virtues

• Four virtues upon which swing the gate of life.
• Prudence looks to all existent reality
• Justice looks to God and to the fellow man.
• Fortitude looks to relinquish his own
  possessions and life.
• Temperance looks at each man in himself.
• St. Augustine (CCC 1809)
• To live well is nothing other than to love God
  with all ones heart, with all ones soul and
  with all ones efforts from this it comes about
  that love is kept whole and uncorrupted (through
  temperance). No misfortune can disturb it (and
  this is fortitude). It obeys only God (and this
  is justice), and is careful in discerning things,
  so as not to be surprised by deceit or trickery
  (and this is prudence).

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Self-preservation

• Natural Desire
• What are the strongest urges in man for natural
  sensual enjoyment?
• Food / Drink / Sex
• These correspond to the most natural and
  primordial forces in man for self-preservation.

• Selfless
• Defends the inner-order of man.
• In this movement he does not become fixed upon
  himself in the act of self-preservation.

• Selfish
• When self-preservation goes beyond the natural
  inner-order.
• Self-destruction through the selfish degradation
  of the powers which aim at self-preservation.

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Temperance vs Intemperance

• Temperance
• Continence
• Chastity
• Humility
• Gentleness and Mildness
• Knowledge

• Intemperance
• Incontinence
• Unchastity
• Pride
• Uncontrollable Fury
• Greed

• In medio stat virtu
• Intemperance
• The lack of self-control where our desires
  overtake us and they tell us what to do.
• Insensibility
• The lack of desire for something. No attraction
  to a certain good.

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Truth

• Natural
• We can know what is true and what is not true.
• Revelation
• God has revealed to us what is true and good.
• Apostolic Succession
• Tolerance
• Everything is equal. Accept and tolerate
  everything.
• Truth what is good is not equal to what is bad.

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Happiness Cardinal Virtues

• Happiness
• To possess that which we were created to possess.
• What were we created to possess?
• Goods
• Happiness
• Prudence helps us to know the good.
• Justice helps us to actualize the good.
• Fortitude helps us to protect and preserve the
  good.
• Temperance helps us to maintain the good.
• Avoid evil, do good.

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Attacks against the Goods

• Temptation
• Causes us to seek one good to the neglect or
  attack of other goods.
• Temperance
• Helps us to pursue the goods in a balanced and
  ordered way.
• How do we master our feelings and desires?
• Check the bad thought and desire.
• Command the right thought and desire.
• Practice the right thought and desire.

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