## 1. Life and Works




Rosmini was born in 1797 at Rovereto, Italy, a staunchly
Italian-speaking town, but at the time part of the Austro-Hungarian
Empire and ruled from Vienna. The Rosmini family, citizens of Rovereto
for several centuries, had become rich through the manufacture of silk,
and enjoyed the way of life proper to the lesser aristocracy. 
Antonio's
primary and secondary education was, however, catered for at the public
school, and through his own intensive reading. Tertiary education was
completed at the University of Padua. After ordination to the
priesthood in 1821, Rosmini studied and wrote at Rovereto until 1826,
and from 1826-28 at Milan. Despite his instinctive distaste for 
the
excesses of the French Revolution, which inevitably played a large part
in the cultural formation of persons growing to maturity in the first
quarter of the 19th century, Rosmini was not afraid to take a stand
against State interference in religious affairs. His 
*Panegyric for Pius VII* (1823) 
was considerably censored by the
Austrian-Hungarian government and published only in 1831. By this time,
Rosmini had founded his religious order (1828), and published at Rome
his fundamental philosophical work, 
*A New Essay concerning the Origin of Ideas* (1830). 
As the title suggests, this was intended
to supersede Locke's famous *Essay concerning Human
Understanding*. From then on, a torrent of philosophical and
theological works poured out until his death at Stresa. From 1836 until
1855, Rosmini was involved in constant controversy. The approbation of
his religious order (1836-38), his work on conscience (1840),
theological disputes (1843-48) and his participation in the 
political
events of 1848, occasioned strong debate which led in 1849 to the
inclusion of two of his works, *The Five Wounds of Holy Church*
and the *Civil Constitution according to Social Justice*, in the
*Index of Prohibited Books*. Strengthened by this, 
Rosmini's
theological and political opponents pressed for an examination of all
his works which led, however, to his exoneration (1854), a year before
his death at Stresa in northern Italy (1855). Condemnation came
posthumously (1888-9) when forty propositions, taken mostly from 
books
published after his death, were included in the decree *Post
Obitum* of Leo XIII. A remarkable swing in ecclesiastical opinion
took place in 2001 when a Vatican *Note* stated: 'The
motives for preoccupation and for doctrinal and prudential difficulties
which determined the promulgation of the decree *Post Obitum*
condemning the "Forty Propositions" drawn from the works of 
Antonio
Rosmini can now be considered as surmounted' (CDF,
*Osservatore Romano*, 1 July 2001).


## 2. Aim and Method




Rosmini describes his aim and method at some length in his *On
the Studies of the Author*. He sets out to combat error, to
systematise the truth, to present a philosophy that can serve as a
basis for the various branches of knowledge, and to offer philosophy as
an aid to theology. To achieve this, he upholds freedom to
philosophise, and sets out to reconcile, whenever possible, apparently
contrasting views. His intention throughout is to present an image of
knowledge as one, simple and indivisible.


### 2.1 Combating error




No one, he maintains, would err for the sake of erring.
Philosophical tradition in particular provides an object lesson in the
movement towards truth, and the elimination of error. Nevertheless, the
path forward is not pursued without error because the movement towards
higher levels of reflection takes place unevenly. Responses to
questions at level A are no longer adequate in form to resolve
questions at level B, which inevitably take on new aspects through
their application to new circumstances. The role of the philosopher is
to distinguish the form of difficulties, which may vary from age to age
or generation to generation, and to formulate questions in such a way
that it is possible to see both their historical antecedents and the
underlying principles to be employed in solving them. The process,
however, will never be complete. The same principles will always cry
out for application to new cases, and the same struggle to avoid error
will ensue.


### 2.2 Systematising the truth




The negative task of combating error is not, however, sufficient.
What is needed in addition, says Rosmini, is a 'system of
truth', that is, a system which shows clearly how the passage is
made from the most general, self-evident principles to more particular
levels of knowledge. Knowledge-wise, we move instinctively from the
more general to the particular. A mother does not begin by naming
roses, carnation and other species for her children; she first
indicates them all as 'flowers' before calling them by
their particular names. So 'being', which is the most
general of all notions, is the fundamental principle of human
knowledge which draws together every aspect of being. When
'being' is seen as the supreme principle of unity on which
all knowledge depends, truth--'being as
known'--has been systematised and is seen in all its
beauty. Since, however, the full application of being is never seen
once and for all, it is better to ensure adherence to principle than
to grasp at unconnected facts which serve at best as a ragbag of
erudition--better to grasp the principle of the wheel, for
example, than to know only a number of its applications.


### 2.3 Philosophy as a basis for the various branches of knowledge




Philosophy as 'the study of the final reasons' is thus
central to Rosmini's understanding. For him, the Enlightenment, with
its sensistic, subjectivist attitude and devotion to the act of
reasoning, rather than to the light of reason, degenerates inevitably
into a hotchpotch of negation and ignorance, leading to radical
corruption in ethics, and every other branch of philosophical
endeavour.


### 2.4 Philosophy as an aid to theology




The fragmentation of philosophy and its consequent separation from
theology is, according to Rosmini, a necessary consequence of
sensationalist thinking. There can be no place for revealed doctrine to
be expounded as true science unless certain truths are already
demonstrated, in the logical order at least, by philosophical reason.
On the other hand, theology itself often cannot make progress unless it
is prepared to turn to philosophy for assistance. The notions of body,
of person and of many other matters essential to theology, cannot be
adequately expressed in isolation from philosophical teaching. In its
turn, according to Rosmini, divine revelation does not cancel, but
completes and ennobles reason, especially by drawing its attention to
problems such as the relationship between person and nature which would
otherwise escape its attention.


### 2.5 Freedom to Philosophise




Error, the antithesis of knowledge, is the only intellectual
impediment to free, philosophical thought. From this principle, Rosmini
concludes that assent to erroneous prejudices, not assent to prejudice
as such, is the principal obstacle to be overcome by philosophers.
Their work consists in examining preconceptions and determining their
truth in order to provide grounds for rational persuasion about what
they know. To maintain, as many do, that the possession of some
unproven truth is inimical to philosophical thought is tantamount to
requiring nil knowledge in the prospective philosopher. Rather, a
person who knows something, but has not yet come to grips with the
reasons leading to it, is like a person who knows the answer to a
problem, but still has to consider the reason for the answer. In this
case, freedom is not constrained. The point at issue, therefore, in the
case of religion, is not that Christians, or Buddhists, or Muslims, or
any other religious persons, are necessarily hampered by their beliefs,
but whether these beliefs are true, and to what extent they are true.
It is not sufficient to state simply that only persons who are devoid
of any belief are capable of philosophising freely. Rather



> total freedom is a necessary condition of the truth of
> faith. If faith were considered divine although in conflict with
> reason, it would impose an impossible obligation and totally inhibit
> our reasoning activity. We would be unable to give our assent to either
> reason or faith, and would thus remain deprived of truth (*IP*
> 39 [All numbers in references to Rosmini's works are to paragraphs, not
> to pages]).




It is not the case, Rosmini would affirm, that only non-believers
have the capacity to enter the world of philosophical enquiry.


### 2.6 Reconciliation of Conclusions




According to Rosmini, eclecticism, especially that upheld by Victor
Cousin, is not the way to promote reconciliation between conclusions.
Philosophical systems are not brought together as a result of arbitrary
choice between what they offer. Each system, if it is truly such, will
have a principle from which deductions are made, and will be able to be
reconciled, despite accidental differences, with every other system
sharing the same principle. On the other hand, systems will not be
reconcilable, despite their accidental agreement, if their basic
principles differ. In the former case, agreement will be possible by
working back to the principle, and setting out once more from there; in
the second case, apparent agreement will only be skin-deep. Only shared
principles allow for effective reconciliation between systems.


## 3. The Objectivity of Thought and the Concept of Certainty




Rosmini sets out to establish the nature of thought and certainty in
his *A New Essay concerning the Origin of Ideas*. Faced by the
critical philosophy of Kant on the one hand, and by British empiricism
on the other, Rosmini reaches back to the pre-Socratics, to Plato and
Aristotle, to Augustine, Thomas Aquinas and Bonaventure, in an
endeavour to establish the nature of thought and the basis of certainty
in human existence. As his guiding principles he takes the following
rules:



> In explaining facts connected with the human spirit, we
> must not make fewer assumptions than are required to explain them...
> [nor must we] make more assumptions than are needed to explain the
> facts (*NE*, vol. 1, 26-7).




With this as his methodological foundation, he places Locke,
Condillac, Reid and Dugald Stewart among those whose explanation of the
fact of thought is deficient; Plato, Aristotle, Leibniz and Kant are
listed amongst those whose explanation is in many ways excessive. In
other words, he distinguishes between sensationalists who, according to
him, cannot explain the origin of ideas, and idealists who posit in
their explanation more ideas or forms than are necessary. For him,
however, human thought must depend upon the innate idea of being,
without which nothing is intelligible. We cannot think of what is not.
At the same time, nothing more is needed than the single idea of being,
and its possible determinations, brought about through sensation, to
explain all intellectual principles and the ramifications of
thought.


### 3.1 Objectivity




After observing the fact of thought, Rosmini concludes that its
absolute basis, without which nothing is thought and thought is
nothing, must be the knowledge of being. Reflection can remove
everything from thought, and still leave it embryonically sound
provided the mind is granted the idea of being as its governing light.
This idea, which possesses the divine attributes of universality,
infinity, necessity and possibility, is not God himself but merely the
possibility of things. Moreover, it acts in the mind, but without
becoming a subjective part of the mind. As intellectual light, it
illuminates, but from outside the mind. And it illuminates without
revealing its source, as natural light can be seen without our looking
at the sun. It is, as Dante would say, 'the light connecting
intellect and truth' (*Purgatorio* 6: 45) and, as such, is
the quasi-form of the intellect and the image of truth. Determinations
of this idea, all of which possess in some way the characteristics of
being, especially its objectivity, are provided through sensations
experienced in the animal part of human existence and illuminated,
being-wise, through the innate idea in which they are seen. Of
themselves, sensations do not constitute knowledge but, when felt in
the human subject, provide the matter of knowledge which determines the
idea of being, that is, the form of knowledge. Knowledge consists first
in the intuition of being, the universal, and then in a subsequent
series of judgments, or direct perceptions, through which knowing
subjects affirm the actual existence of what they have experienced
sensationally. These direct perceptions cannot err, although reflection
upon them, and a subsequent series of judgments, may be the source of
error. In a word, Rosmini holds that basic knowledge, consisting of the
idea of being and its immediate determinations, provides all that is
needed for objective thought. Against idealists, he reduces the formal
requirements of thought to the intuition of being; against
sensationalists, he maintains the *per se* inadequacy of the
senses to provide more than the matter of thought.


### 3.2 Certainty




Objectivity, therefore, is essentially a characteristic of what is
known. Certainty, in Rosmini's view, is a characteristic of the person
who knows, and can be defined as 'a firm and reasonable persuasion
that conforms to the truth' (*NE*, vol. 3, 1044). In other
words, we can be certain only of knowledge, not of error, and this
because, according to Rosmini, to know and to know the truth is the
same thing. The person who does not know the truth, does not know.
There is no doubt, of course, that it is possible to be persuaded, and
firmly persuaded, of error. But rational persuasion of error arrived at
through one's own reasoning is not possible. In this case, either the
premiss is wrong, or the argument is erroneous. On the other hand, the
persuasion must be firm. Certainty is not achieved without energy
directed into persuasion. Certainty requires that we know something to
be true, to be what it is, that we are persuaded that it is what we
know it to be, and that we have an adequate reason for our persuasion.
And precisely because error attempts to alter the being of things,
formal error will not be found rooted in the intellect nor in the
senses nor in involuntary reflection. It begins with the will, the only
human faculty capable of drawing the reason to invent what it does not
see, or to deny what it sees. Under pressure from the will, reason will
falsely affirm that being is not, or deny that being is.


## 4. The Dignity of the Human Person




It is already clear from what has been said that Rosmini, in his
solution to the basic problem of knowledge, has offered a perspective
which places human dignity on a transcendent level. Human beings are
made such, he would maintain, by the intuition of being which
accompanies them from the first moment of their existence. Through this
intuition, they share in the finality of being itself and in some
finite way participate in its infinite characteristics. Nevertheless,
the subjective element proper to the human being neither can nor should
be denied. Indeed, it has to be examined thoroughly if a rational
account is to be rendered of the essential unitary make-up of human
nature. This examination was carried out initially in Rosmini's *A
New Essay concerning the Origin of Ideas* as part of his
explanation of what he called 'impure' ideas, that is, ideas
which, as perceptive (not simply intellective), require for their
origin some sense experience. He pursued the investigation in his
*Anthropology as an Aid to Moral Science* and in
*Psychology* where in four volumes entitled *The Essence of
the Human Soul*, *The Development of the Human Soul*,
*Laws of Animality* and *Opinions about the Human Soul*,
he observed and discussed at length the animal, as well as the
intellectual side of human nature.




The first fact presented by observation on ourselves is the
essential distinction in human beings between that which feels and that
which is felt. According to Rosmini, these are quite different and
unconfusible elements with opposite characteristics. That which feels
is an immaterial principle (soul); that which is felt is the term
(body) of this principle. Together feeler and felt constitute feeling,
the underlying subject of reflection when attention is concentrated on
'myself' and those elements which constitute
'myself'. The chief action of body is to produce an
undetermined, shapeless extension which enables that which feels to
experience determined sensations of various kinds. This
'fundamental feeling', with its permanent perception of
unlimited space, is that in which all other feelings are perceived, and
runs parallel, as it were, with the idea of being in which all other
ideas are intuited. Reaction to perceived feelings constitutes vital
instinct (relative to the fundamental feeling) and sensuous instinct
(relative to the adventitious sensations). All feeling and instinct is
*per se* unknown in Rosmini's view, and comes to be known
through the formation in the knowing subject of ideas and perceptions
which depend upon the illumination provided by the idea of being. Thus,
for Rosmini, the human being is a knowing and feeling subject, having
within itself a principle which, formed by the light of being, knows
and reacts to what it knows through the faculties of intellect and
will, and feels and reacts to what it feels through the faculties of
sense and instinct. Within the human subject, the will - which reacts
to what is known--is the supreme active principle and as such
constitutes 'person' in the individual. The dignity of the
human being lies within the will as such, in the first place, and then
within the will's choice to second whatever the intellect knows. This
is also the foundation of genuine freedom within the human subject.
Free to adhere to or reject what is known, human beings cannot be
coerced by attempted external pressure or used as a means by others
without prejudice to the inviolable truth in which they share innately
through their participation in the light of being and which they attain
adventitiously through the direct perception that unfolds determined
truths to their intellectual gaze.


## 5. Morality




Rosmini's ethical philosophy springs directly from the analysis
summarised in the previous section. For him, 'the human being is a
knowing and feeling subject whose will, as supreme principle of
activity, provides the basis of the incommunicable individuality that
constitutes each real human nature as a person' (*Life*, p.
26). 'Person', as supreme principle, is also the subject of
moral activity, and is to be distinguished from all those habits and
acts within human beings which take place without the necessary
intervention of the person or, at most, effect the person indirectly.
For example, a good pianist is not necessarily a good person. Morality
deals necessarily with what people do as persons, with what affects
themselves as subjects who cannot step aside from the truth they know
without violating their adherence to truth. Rosmini deals with ethics,
the science of morality, in his *Principles of Ethics* and in
*Comparative and Critical History of Systems dealing with the
Principle of Morality.* The *History* first offers an
overview of systems which throughout history deny morality, or make it
impossible, or provide it with a subjective foundation. It then moves
on to summarise the objective view expressed by philosophers and
developed by Rosmini in *Principles of Ethics* .


### 5.1 Moral Obligation




This view, as stated by Rosmini, depends upon what he sees as a
self-evident principle that cannot be denied by any sane person. We are
bound, he says, to acknowledge (recognise) what we know for what we
know it to be. Granted that knowledge, according to Rosmini, is
co-terminus with truth, never with error, it is clear that Rosmini's
affirmation depends upon the self-evident need to affirm what one
knows. This, in turn, is an act by which the human subject is elevated,
at a reflective level, to the level of the truth which, already known
in the essential idea of being, is as sublime as being itself. On the
other hand, to deny what one knows is equivalent to stepping into
non-being, the antithesis of dignity. In more philosophical terms,
Rosmini maintains that the principle he enunciates, in which every
other moral dictate is implicitly included, may be characterised as
follows: it expresses moral essence because it calls for agreement
between the intellective act of the will and the ideal and real
entities of things known; it is simple and as such able to be
participated by every moral activity; it is evident because it is
nothing more than an expression of the principle of contradiction; it
is universal because all moral effects, denoted through external
actions, depend upon it; it is supreme because it offers no possibility
of further investigation; it provides the foundation for the
recognition of the human subject as an essentially moral being, that
is, one who, through the innate presence of the idea of being and the
principle of will, is furnished with the object of morality and
essential adherence to it. Finally, Rosmini's distinction between the
subject and object of morality opens a way, according to him, between
the extremes of ethical theory. On the one hand, the limitation of the
human subject provides for the possibility of moral error; on the
other, the necessity and immutability of the object, the idea of being,
furnish morality with its undeniable sense of obligation. It is a fatal
but all too frequent mistake, Rosmini contends, to attribute
characteristics proper to the subject (fallibility, error, and so on)
to the object, and characteristics of the object (necessity,
immutability and so on) to the subject.


### 5.2 Moral Good




A way is now present to describe adequately the nature of moral good
as opposed to eudemonological good. That which is good is desirable,
but what is desirable may either be desirable in itself, that is, as it
stands in the order of being, or simply desirable in so far it is good,
or imagined as good, for the individual. Moral good, says Rosmini, is
found when the will adheres to what is good according to the order of
being; eudemonological or utilitarian good is what is desired as good
for the individual, without reference to what is good in itself. Human
dignity is preserved only when, through an act of will, individuals
adhering in practice to beings as they are in their order, implicitly
adhere to the whole of being and to their presence in that order.
Immorality, by which entities are appreciated or desired but not in
their known order and thus not as they are, implies an essential
rebellion against the order of being and thus against being itself.
Self-imposed human indignity can go no lower than this.


### 5.3 Conscience




Having dealt with the nature of morality and moral obligation,
Rosmini turns his attention to conscience. He himself admits that such
a treatise is almost universally neglected by philosophers, and feels
himself constrained to justify such a study, which he undertakes with
an almost inevitable admixture of religious and theological elements.
Nevertheless, it is not difficult to filter the philosophical
principles in his work from characteristics proper to the faith he
professes. This is especially apparent in his approach to the nature of
conscience, an area in which his views first prompted the dissension's
between him and some of his co-religionists that would go on until the
end of his life. Rosmini defines conscience as a 'speculative
judgement that a person makes about the morality of his practical
judgement' (*C*19), that is, a judgement by which
individuals come to know the moral value of their actions without
necessarily acting upon it.




Several consequences can be drawn from this. First, morality in the
individual is prior to conscience, and can be present without
conscience; second, conscience can be mistaken (it is possible to form
a incorrect notion of the moral value of one's own action); third, it
does not follow that conscience, once formed, will give rise to action
in the person who forms it; fourth, conscience, if incorrect in its
judgement, must as far as possible be reformed. Conscience, therefore,
is only an adequate guide to morality when it provides accurate
information of the moral state of a subject's past, present or future
action. In the light of these affirmations, it is possible to see how
Rosmini lays the groundwork for overcoming the dilemma posed by the
question: must conscience always be followed? While it is certain that
the dictates of conscience can never be morally disregarded, it is
equally certain that a deliberately misleading act of conscience cannot
morally be followed. Sometimes, therefore, it will be morally
imperative to correct conscience, which is always possible through
proper reflection on the moral value of the human act posited or about
to be posited by the individual. Rosmini goes on to distinguish between
problems about conscience and problems connected with the formation of
conscience. In fact, conscience, according to him, is not present as
long as judgement is suspended about the moral value of an individual's
own action. Difficulties at this point are connected with the formation
of the judgement, not with the judgement itself.


## 6. Human Rights




Rosmini's view of 'person', seen as an inviolable end
which can never be reduced to the status of 'means', leads
spontaneously to what today is seen as paramount in human existence,
that is, the question of human rights. These rights are studied at
length in *The Philosophy of Right*, a six-volume treatise in
the only extant English translation. The general title of the work
shows immediately that for Rosmini all rights are founded in a single
element called 'right' from which all 'rights'
emanate, some innate in human beings, others springing from the
determined circumstances of individuals or societies. The treatise can
be summed up under three heads: the essence of right, individual
rights, social rights.


### 6.1 The Essence of Right




The basis of Rosmini's teaching on human rights is a consequence of
his moral theory, of which he gives a careful synthesis in a preface to
*The Philosophy of Right*. If each person is morally obliged to
recognise in practice what is known for what it is known to be, every
other human being will be recognised as essentially on a par with the
knowing person, and will have to be acknowledged as such. But because
each person is obliged to act in accordance with moral propriety, every
person is obliged to respect this obligation in the other on pain of
violating the moral law itself. Granted this principle as foundation,
and 'right' as a relationship between one person and others
by which a person has a claim to what is his own, Rosmini maintains
that 'person' is subsistent right. In other words, all rights
are founded on that to which persons have a claim in so far as they are
acting morally or are at least not acting immorally. Such activity
cannot be the object of attack on the part of others without violation
of persons as ends. 'Right', as he says, 'is a moral
governance or authority to act, or: right is a faculty to do what we
please, protected by the moral law which obliges others to respect that
faculty' (*ER*, vol. 1, 237).




The essence of right is, therefore, the activity of a person or
persons relative to other persons. This activity, however, can be
exercised either by individuals or by persons acting as members of a
society.


### 6.2 Rights of individuals




When a person's activity is actuated in a moral way, the object of
that activity becomes the person's own, that is, becomes proper to the
person in such a way that it cannot be violated without damage to the
person in whose ownership it is. Practical experience of this is found
in what Rosmini calls 'jural resentment', the injured feeling
that occurs on the occasion of violation of some right and gives rise
to an instinct for repossession or restitution. Such an experience is
obviously not a fact related solely to matter; it is fundamentally a
fact of the spirit where alone it can be felt. It is also an indication
of the sphere of jural freedom within which a person is and must be
left free. More importantly, 'person' does not possess right,
but--because formed by the light of being--is right itself; does
not possess freedom, but is freedom. The divisions of activity give
rise to two major kinds of rights in people. If what is possessed is
such from the very beginning of existence in a human being (life, for
example), the individual possesses innate right(s) which may be called
'natural' (pertaining essentially to human nature) or
'rational' (the rights are what they are and cannot be
otherwise). But rights may also be acquired by human beings during the
course of life through adventitious activity. When rights have been
established in this way, they too are inviolable although there are
circumstances, such as lack of use, which dissolve the relationship of
ownership and thus leave the field open to others who may wish to
extend their activity to the matter in question. Leaving these
circumstances aside, however, individual rights cannot be absorbed by
others. The State, for example, cannot absorb the inalienable rights
proper to persons, nor can it be considered as more than its individual
members in such a way that persons can be sacrificed for the sake of
society.


### 6.3 Social right




Nevertheless, societies exist within which rights arise from the
bonds between intellectual beings. According to Rosmini, these
societies fall under three headings: theocratic society, that is,
society between God and his creatures; domestic society, which is
divided into conjugal and parental society; and civil society, that is,
the communion desired by several families who wish to entrust the
preservation and the regulation of their rights to a single or
collective mind called 'government'. Rosmini considers at
some length the rights arising in these societies. In particular, he
ponders the title of rights possessed by the Creator over human beings,
the rights proper to husband and wife, and to parents. Of special
interest is his description of the State as a society which, while it
has the duty to influence for the common good only the modality and
exercise of rights in its citizens, has no power to create or destroy
human rights. In fact, the general purpose of the State is to arrange
the exercise of individual rights in such a way that individuals are
better able to enjoy the use of their innate and acquired rights. Thus,
although in time of war the exercise of certain rights may be curtailed
or even suspended, the rights remain invested in individuals to whose
exercise they must be restored in normal circumstances. It is clear
that Rosmini's view of civil society is completely anti-totalitarian.
He does not, however, espouse the cause of modern democracy According
to him, the principle of democracy is not 'one person, one
vote', but would depend rather upon the contribution made by
citizens to the well-being of the State. Difficult to arrange in
practice, the principle is nevertheless important, and can be
considered the obverse of 'No taxation without
representation'.


## 7. The Nature and Purpose of Society




It is clear that Rosmini's view of rights in human society depends
to a great extent on his views about the nature of society as such. In
fact, his earliest work as a philosopher (1818-1826) was almost totally
taken up with a study of society, and was only abandoned when he saw
that his ideas would lack a solid foundation unless the problem of
knowledge had first been confronted. Eventually (1837), he published
his ideas on society in *The Philosophy of Politics* in which he
deals with the principle according to which societies stand or fall,
and the end to which societies are directed. . However, despite the
universality of the principles examined in this work, their application
is restricted to civil society. According to Rosmini, the first rule
and criterion for governing any society whatsoever is this: That which
constitutes the existence or substance of a society is to be preserved
and strengthened even at the cost of neglect to accidental refinement.
This is also the first rule of politics. It follows that the greatest
errors of government are those by which the government of a society,
because of its excessive concern for the society's accidental progress,
loses sight of that which constitutes the substance of the society. The
steps taken towards decline, that is, towards the substitution of
essential matters by accidental, can be considered on four levels: the
periods of founders of societies and basic legislation; of genuine
development; of external splendour; of frivolity. Beginning from the
first stage, when attention is inevitably fixed on the nature itself of
a society, there is a gradual diminution of interest in underlying
societal values until weakness, manifested in attention to frivolities
and inability to concentrate on weightier matters, undermines the
society's inner cohesion and its ability to withstand external inimical
pressures. This would explain the profound truth lying behind
Machiavelli's observation: 'If a sect or republic is to survive
for any length of time, it must return frequently to its
beginning' (quoted in *PP*, vol. 1, 41)




For Rosmini, every society is simply the union of two or more people
undertaken with the intention of obtaining a common advantage.
'All the persons in this union [forming a society] together have
the role of end, and the advantage expected from the association is
applied equally to all (*PP*, vol. 2, 39). In other words, there
must be in every society a moral element, an element of justice, which
affects the behaviour of the members towards one another, even if
collectively (as in Plato's case of a band of robbers) they are unjust
towards non-members. Hence the excellence of what Rosmini calls
'the social bond'; where it is present and actuated, there is
no injustice; injustice begins in its absence. In other words, the
nature of society requires that those who form it, enjoy within it the
personal dignity of end. There is, therefore, a moral element inherent
in every society. Using some persons, some members, as means, even for
the apparent good of the whole, is repugnant to the very nature of
society. In a coherent universal society, such as that described by
Cicero--'This entire world is to be considered simply as a city
common to both gods and human beings' (quoted in *PP*, vol.
2, 49)--there will inevitably be a tendency to maximum justice. This
means, however, that no one in any society can make one person
subservient to another. All that is pertinent only to nature can be
used as means; all that which is proper to person, or to which persons
have extended themselves so that some thing or things have become
proper to them, must be respected as end. Here again, though, a
distinction must be made between that is proper to a member of a
society as a person, and the modality of that which is proper. In
certain cases, the government of a society may change the modality of
what is proper if this is for the common good. A piece of land required
for a road may, for instance, be substituted with an adequate sum of
money. But those things which have no modality, such as innocent life,
cannot be violated under the pretext of common good. It is clear that
these principles must direct the government of every society.




Rosmini also deals with the nature of the good which is the aim or
end of society. For him, this good is human good which 'resides in
virtue and the eudemonological appurtenances of virtue, and in general
in every good in so far as it is connected with virtue.' He
concludes, therefore, that every society, in so far as it is contrary
to virtue, is illegitimate because its aim is contrary to the essence
of society. At the same time, every law of society is invalid if, or in
so far as, it prevents members from achieving virtue. 'Without
virtue there is no human good, the end for which society is
established' (*PP*, vol. 2, 189). But while anti-virtue is
essentially detrimental to the good of any society, virtue of itself is
not the only element forming the good in question. Contentment of
spirit, that is, of the whole person, as distinct from passing pleasure
confined to parts of human nature, is also included in every society's
essential aim. Anything, therefore, opposed to contentment is
inevitably detrimental to society, whatever favour it may have found in
public opinion. Rosmini finds support for this affirmation in Hamilton,
whom he quotes approvingly (*PP*, vol. 2, 195).



> When occasions present themselves in which the interests of
> the people are at variance with their inclinations, it is the duty of
> the persons whom they have appointed to be the guardians of those
> interests to withstand the temporary delusion in order to give them
> time and opportunity for more cool and sedate reflection.




Public opinion, it would seem, is not an infallible criterion of
public good.


## 8. Natural theology




Rosmini's natural theology, in the conventional philosophical sense
of natural theology, can be summarised under two headings: proofs for
the existence of God, found scattered throughout his philosophical
writings, and theodicy, developed at length in a work of that name. But
it will also be considered, under the heading 'Being'
according to the meaning given it by Rosmini.


### 8.1 The existence of God




In his natural theology, Rosmini offers considerations which are
consistent with the basic principles of his philosophical teaching.
Although he does not deny the validity of *a posteriori* proofs
of the existence of God, he affirms that an *a priori* method is
more satisfactory because it sets off from the idea of being, the
foundation of his philosophy, and argues to the necessity of God's
existence. First, however, he posits a fundamental barrier to the
perception of God at a purely natural level of human nature. For
Rosmini, what is real can only be perceived through feeling, which
indeed is part of human existence but only at a finite level where it
cannot be the vehicle of the perception of God's infinite reality.
Ideal being, however, while expressing only the possibility, not the
reality of things, is shown on analysis to be characterised by
necessity, eternity and immateriality, factors which are intrinsic
marks of possibility. The idea of being, therefore, with its divine
characteristics serves as a bridge between God and human beings,
enabling us to posit proofs of God's existence without our knowing him
through perception, or real contact. One example of the *a
priori* proofs may be given here. If infinite, intelligible being
is present to the human mind--and Rosmini would maintain that it is--an infinite mind capable of giving this idea to humans must exist.
But such a mind cannot not be God. In this and all similar proofs,
there is a common mode of procedure. The existence of God is necessary
for the existence of intelligible being; but intelligible being
certainly exists; the existence of God is therefore necessary. Having
determined the existence of God, Rosmini then makes use of divinely
revealed truth as a basis on which to offer some reflections about the
nature of what he has proved to exist. These reflections, he would
maintain, lie within the scope of philosophy because they depend
methodologically solely on reason, and conclude with rational, not
authoritative affirmations. Their basis in revelation, however,
precludes any examination of them here.


### 8.2 Theodicy




Rosmini provides an exact description of his aim in his work on
theodicy. 'Theodicy (theou dike) means "justice of God". The
intent of this work, therefore, is simply this: to justify God's equity
and goodness in the distribution of good and evil in the world.'
(*Theodicy* preface).




He also provides a clear indication of the method he will follow in
the three books composing his *Theodicy*. The first prescribes
the norms to be followed in judging about the disposition of divine
providence if error is to be avoided; the second considers the laws of
nature, the necessary limitations of what is created and the chain of
causes operating in the universe; the third is devoted to the laws
according to which God's action takes place in the world he has
created. These laws all spring from a single norm, the law of the least
means, which Rosmini, following Aquinas, posits as follows: 'The
wise worker carries out his work in the briefest way possible'
(*Sapiens operator perficit opus suum breviori via qua potest*.
*ST*, III, q. 4, art. 5, ad 3um). From this law, another ten are
deduced whose titles provide a useful indication of their possible
application. They are the laws of: excluded superfluity, the permission
of evil, excluded equality, unity in the divine work, heroism,
antagonism, rapidity in work, accumulation of good, and germ. These
laws, according to Rosmini, are concerned with God's providence
relative to universal good. At the same time, but relative to
particular good, the law followed is that of: supreme justice, equity,
fittingness and conformity to God's divine attributes. Divine
governance consists in acting in such a way that the aspects of
universal and particular good are harmonised.


## 9. Being




The last nine years of Rosmini's life, with the exception of 1848-9
when he was actively engaged in political affairs, were spent in great
part working on his *Theosophy* (*Teosofia*). Despite its
size (five volumes), this monumental work remained unfinished at
Rosmini's death and was published posthumously. The title itself,
despite its obvious etymological implications, is today unhelpful. It
would seem to indicate a philosophy 'professing to achieve a
knowledge of God by spiritual ecstasy, direct intuition or special
individual relations' (*COD*). Rosmini, however, is
concerned here only with reasoning about God, and takes the word
'theosophy' in its fundamental meaning of 'wisdom about
God' in so far as God is the supreme Being and the apex of
philosophical speculation. Such speculation must sooner or later deal
with the problem of the One Being and many beings, with unity and
plurality in all their manifestations. In many ways, the book is a
direct challenge to Hegel and Schelling with whose philosophy Rosmini
had become thoroughly familiar as a result of the great editions of
their works published in the 1830s and early 1840s. Kant's teaching,
already challenged in Rosmini's *A New Essay concerning the Origin
of Ideas*, was now to be opposed in what Rosmini perceived as the
delirium and exaggerations of Kant's Idealist successors.



> Whenever we try to reduce the whole human being to
> speculation, and substitute the part for the whole, we presume that all
> human good must lie solely in speculation. As result, we make every
> effort to turn what is real into an idea; we try to derive from the
> idea the matter which constitutes the sensible world, together with the
> Spirit and finally God himself... But although Schelling and Hegel
> claimed that they had reached such total science, they still needed to
> teach it publicly not only for the sake of attaining the practice of
> virtue (which would make it worthwhile), but even to draw a salary.
> This proves without doubt that their absolute idea did not contain
> everything. If the world were present in it, as they said it was,
> wheat, bread and wine would have been there also. My theosophy
> certainly cannot give the public such magnificent and wonderful
> promises, but it will explain how the speculative human mind is
> inclined to find everything in itself. In other words, it will
> demonstrate that there must be an object which contains effectively
> within itself the universality of things, and that this object is not
> the idea in our mind. Nevertheless, the idea which shines in the human
> mind draws its form as object from that object. Hence, because the idea
> also is *per se* object, we easily confuse it, in our
> speculation, with the complete, subsistent object. A strong desire then
> arises in us of attributing to the idea which we intuit the attributes
> of the subsistent object which we know must exist, although we do not
> intuit it. The tendency to unity, an essential element of every
> intellect, causes this error and forces us towards an abyss of unseen
> absurdities in the hope that these will satisfy our desperate purpose.
> We should acknowledge (and this theosophy will demonstrate) that if
> being itself has an objective existence, it is *per se*
> intelligible, and that if it contains everything (that which is not
> being is nothing), everything must also be contained in that which is
> intelligible. Theosophy will also clearly show that, although being
> must actually have this primal form, human nature cannot intuit *the
> intelligible which contains all*. Human nature arrives at this
> solely by reasoning, which can provide only a formal, negative concept
> of it. We cannot therefore have either the absolute knowledge which
> Schelling attributes to us through direct intuition, or the absolute
> idea which his disciple, George Hegel (who was opposed to all
> immediacy), promised us by mediate reasoning... (*TH*, vol.
> 1, Preface, 9-10)




But the main thrust of the work is positive, rather than
critical.



> Theosophy will not be wasting time by demonstrating that
> behind this well-conceived and ingenious error [of Hegel] lies a great
> truth which those courageous speculative minds [Schelling and Hegel]
> tried in vain to grasp but could not. This truth is precisely the
> necessity I spoke of: there must be 'something intelligible and
> eternal which contains everything'... Nevertheless, although
> absolute knowledge is proper to God but not to us, we do have an
> absolute knowledge relative to form, but not to matter (cf.
> *NE*, vol. 1, 325, 474-476). This kind of absoluteness of human
> knowledge caused errors in the German school, which I have already
> discussed. Theosophy must speak at length about absolute human
> knowledge, indeed it must use it and more importantly be it. Theosophy
> is simply the Theory of Ens (this definition is not to be despised,
> despite its being only two words). Because ens is first of all infinite
> and absolute, and only later enclosed and existing within limits as
> finite, no thought could attain it unless thought itself somehow became
> absolute. A thought informed by an object which is in some way
> absolute, is itself in some way made absolute. Plato therefore rightly
> called the treatise on what is greatest, the treatise about ens. There
> is nothing in the universe or in our mind antecedent to ens or being.
> When, in the order of things, we remove being, nothing remains except
> darkness in the order of cognition. For this reason the doctrine of
> ens, which I call 'theosophy', corresponds to the concept of
> philosophy in the ancients. According to them, philosophy differs from
> other sciences in that all other sciences suppose undemonstrated
> principles. Philosophy, however, which borrows nothing from anywhere,
> uses its own materials to construct itself. It starts from no
> gratuitous hypothesis or supposition--on the contrary, it seeks and
> establishes what is undemonstrable, which gives it an unshakeable
> basis, and admits only what is necessary (*Ibid*.,
> 10-12).




For Rosmini, the problem of being is finally considered under the
three divisions of the science of theosophy: ontology, rational
theology and cosmology, each of which must enter into the other if the
science is to be complete. In fact, he maintains, it is impossible to
speak of being in all its universal essence (ontology), without regard
to the infinity and absoluteness of Being (rational theology), just as
it is impossible to consider the world philosophically (cosmology)
without taking its cause into consideration. Each of the three
divisions of theosophy is as essential to the whole as, according to
his example, the various vital organs are necessary to the existence of
an animal. But the centre and substance of the whole treatise is
teaching about God, without which there is no final explanation of the
being or the world. Theosophy, therefore, is a single science which,
through its division into three parts, is both one and three. Such an
affirmation is paradigmatic of the thrust of Rosmini's theosophy which
eventually enables him to confront this rational science with the
doctrine of the Trinity.


### 9.1 Ontology




Ontology, according to Rosmini's description of it, considers being
in all its universality, but only as the object of human thought which
puts limited, intellectual beings in contact with the possibility of
all that is, not with actuality (it is impossible, for instance, to
assuage hunger by thinking about a meal). Thought must, therefore,
reach out to absolute reality not through direct perception of God, but
by means of concepts. Ontology, dealing with these concepts
analytically and synthetically is, as it were, an immense preface to
rational theology. Ontology as the theory of being in all its
possibility is the necessary propedeutic to theology as the theory of
absolute being without which ontology itself is inevitably incomplete,
and cannot progress beyond a treatise on categories and on
dialectic.


### 9.2 Rational theology




If, as Rosmini suggests, ontology is the 'theory of abstract
being', rational theology is the 'theory of subsistent
Being'. These two parts of theosophy cannot, however, can be
distinguished only if the same universal concepts, of which both are
formed, can in some way be differentiated. This is done by considering
that ontology serves to find, review, and describe the nature and
relationship of these concepts; theology, in Rosmini's understanding,
synthesises them to form a single concept of the infinite Being. It is
true that such a concept remains abstract (the essence contained in the
concept is not beheld by the knowing subject), but the
'theologian' passes from the concept to affirm subsistent
Being, which is therefore no longer a mere concept, but something which
must exist in itself. An effort is then made in rational theology to
see how the ontological concepts have their truth and their foundation
in first subsistent Being. While this takes place, the concepts
themselves are identified and become one. Their separation, now
considered anew, is seen to be relative not to first subsistent Being,
but to the beholding, finite mind. The problem of the One and the many
is rooted not in the nature of absolute, subsistent Being, but in being
by participation.


### 9.3 Cosmology




Ontology, while a preface to rational theology, is also necessary
for knowledge of the intimate nature of finite being and the world.
Rosmini posits three reasons for this. First, although finite being is
perceived, perception is limited to very few beings. If the essential
conditions of this being are to be known, it is necessary to know the
common conditions of all finite beings. This cannot be done without
recourse to universal principles which enable us to deduce what is
lacking to limited experience. Second, the same principles are needed
to provide a notion of finite beings in themselves, divested of the
sensory phenomena that accompany their perception. Third, subsistent
Being, if known, would be intelligible *per se*. This is not the
case with finite beings, which are known through their participation in
intellectual light, and consequently remain unknown without some
relationship to concepts.