QUESTION 119
Prodigality
Next we have to consider prodigality (prodigalitas). And on this topic there are three questions:
(1) Is prodigality opposed to avarice? (2) Is prodigality a sin? (3) Is prodigality a more serious sin than
avarice?
Article 1
Is prodigality opposed to avarice?
It seems that prodigality (prodigalitas) is not opposed to avarice (avaritia):
Objection 1: Opposites cannot exist in the same thing at the same time. But some individuals are
simultaneously prodigal and ungenerous (illiberales). Therefore, prodigality is not opposed to avarice.
Objection 2: Opposites have to do with the same thing. But insofar as avarice is opposed to
generosity, it has to do with certain passi ons by which a man has affection for money. By contrast,
prodigality does not, it seems, have to do with any passions of the soul, since it has no affection for
money or anything else of that sort. Therefore, it is not the case that prodigality is opposed to avarice.
Objection 3: As has been established (ST 1-2, q. 72, a. 3), a sin receives its species mainly from its
end. But prodigality seems always to be ordered toward an illicit end for the sake of which one spends
his own resources, and mainly for the sake of pleasures; hence, Luke 15:3 says of the prodigal son that he
“had dissipated his own resources by living luxuriously.” Therefore, it seems that prodigality is opposed
to temperance and insensibility rather than to avarice and generosity.
But contrary to this: In Ethics 2 and 4 the Philosopher posits prodigality in opposition to
generosity and illiberality, which we are here calling ‘avarice’.
I respond: In moral matters the opposition of vices and virtues is attendant upon excess and
deficiency. Now avarice and prodigality differ in diverse ways with respect to excess and deficiency.
For the avaricious individual is excessi ve in his affection for riches, loving them more than is
appropriate, whereas the prodigal individual falls short in this, exercising less care about riches than is
appropriate.
By contrast, with respect to the exterior things, prodigality involves an excess i n giving one’s riches
away but falls short in holding on to them and in acquiring them, whereas avarice, on the contrary, falls
short in giving them away but is excessive in obtaining them and holding on to them.
Hence, it is clear that prodigality is opposed to avarice.
Reply to objection 1: Nothing prevents opposites from existing in the same thing in different
respects, and yet a thing is denominated more from what is more principal. Now just as, in the case of
generosity, which holds to the mean, the principal element is giving and it is toward giving that obtaining
and holding on to are ordered, so, too, avarice and prodigality are mainly looked at with respect to giving.
Hence, someone who is excessive in giving is called prodigal, whereas someone who is deficient in
giving is called avaricious.
Now as the Philosopher points out in Ethics 4, it sometimes happens that there is someone who is
deficient in giving but who is not excessive in obtaining. Similarly, it also happens that there is someone
who is excessive in giving (and is for this reason prodigal) and who is at the same time excessive in
obtaining—perhaps (a) out of a certain sort of necessity, because, while such individuals are excessive in
giving, they lack their own resources and so are forced to obtain them in an inappropriate manner, which
pertains to avarice, or (b) because their minds are disordered, for as long as they do not give for the sake
of any good end, then with virtue having been disdained, as it were, they do not care how they come into
their money or from where. And so it is not in the same respect that such individuals are both prodigal
and avaricious.
