The Catholic bulletin. [volume] (St. Paul, Minn.) 1911-1995, 1915-06-26
DEBT 10 CATHOLIC WRITERS
FOUNDATION FOR MODERN LAW
or NATIONS LAID BY CATH.
oLIc THEoLooIANs.

.
the great European struggle has drawn
so much attention of late, owes great
debt to Catholic writer's and thinkers
is fact not generally known. The
credit for the creation of the law OF
nations as it is known today ordinarily
is given, even among scholars, to
Hugo de Groot or Grotius, the famous
author of de lure Belli ct Pacis'
and Mare Liberum.' Long before
his time, however, the great st. Thorn
as of Aquinas had at least in one in
stance paved the way for the estab-
lfshment of such Codes while Vas
quez and Suarez, the Spanish theolo-
gians and champions of the great
scholastic revival in their country,
laid the very foundations OF the mod
ern international Law
Non-Catholic authorities on the sub
ject bear witness to this fact. OF
Vasquez DIR. Edwin Maxey in his work
on international Law" says: Vas
quez, a Spanish monk, who put forth
the doctrine of the existence of
group of free states which were the
subjects OF reciprocal right irrespec-
tive of the will of world-empire :
This was good doctrine so far as it
went, but it lacked in. clearness, for
he identified these rights with the jus
naturale and as there was no agree
ment as to what constituted the jus
naturale his system is fatally lacking
in definiteness. Yet for his time, 1854.
the idea was undoubtedly an advance"
.(St. Louis, 1906, p. . 1t must be
remembered that it is the non-Cath-
Ollie Maxey who is here writing.
Upon the great Jesuit, Francis Sua-
rez, even greater praise is bestowed.
Wheaton, the leading American au-
thority, says to him: This Spanish
Jesuit has the merit of having clearly
conceived, and expressed, even at that
early day, in his treatise De Legibus
ac De Legislature, the distinction be-
tween what is commonly called the
law of nature and the conventional
rules of intercourse between nations.
(History of Law of Nations, p. 35.)
Sir James Macintosh, the we'll known
British philosopher and politician, is
equally appreciative of the contribu-
tions of Suarez to international Law.
In his Dissertation on the Progress
of Ethical Philosophy" he writes of
"Suarez, a Jesuit, whose Yoluminous
works amount to twenty-four volumes
;yo Fol;o opd cove ne him. Curvature
who, though he was the most upright
and candid of men, could not have
praised a Spanish Jesuit beyond his
deserts, calls Suarez the NOSE acute
of philosophers and divines. On a
practical matter, which may be natur-
ally mentioned here, though in strict
method it belongs to another subject,
the merit of Suarez is conspicuous.
He first saw that international law
was composed not only of the simple
principles of justice applied to the
intercourse between states, but OF
those. usages, long observed. in that
intercourse by the European race,
which have since been more exactly
distinguished as the consuetudinary
law acknowledged by the Christian
nations of Europe and America. On
this important point his views are
more clear than those of his contem
porary Alberico Gentili. 1t must even
be owned that the succeeding init
nation of the same general doctrine
by Grotius is somewhat more dark
perhaps from his excessive pursuit OF
concise diction." (The Miscellaneous
Works of the Right Honorable Sir
James Macintosh, New York, 1868
London, 1S46-p. 100
Facts such as these are we'll worthy
of remembrance by our Catholic PEG
pie. Too often do they forget the
great work of their leaders and think
ers in every line of endeavor and only
too frequently are unable to answer
the taunts of their none Catholic &C
quaintances that the Church is the
enemy of progress and the friend OF
ignorance. An excellent way to over
come this deficiency is to purchase
and read from time to time the Cath
olic Encyclopedias, the great work
of which Catholic scholarship is
rightly so proud.