Abstract

Except for the necessary truth that "God is to be loved above all else," all the moral precepts that do in fact bind us are contingent. They do not even depend on what is perfective of human beings as such. One reason for Scotus's repudiation of eudaimonistic ethics is his belief that the natural appetite for human perfection, which is how most Scholastic philosophers characterize the will, is not a free appetite, any more than a stone's inclination to its natural place is free. And since morality requires freedom, it must point us to some object other than our own specific perfection. That object is the moral law itself. Just as God gave us a natural appetite for perfection, he gave us an innate inclination to follow the moral law, which is not to be understood in terms of what is perfective of human beings. This inclination, the affectio iustitiae, frees us from the deterministic pursuit of happiness. ;Further evidence for this looseness of fit between morality and human nature is the fact God has from time to time dispensed people from the moral law. Since our ultimate end does not absolutely require observance of the contingent precepts of the moral law, God can dispense people from those precepts without thereby preventing them from attaining their ultimate end. This possibility of dispensation, together with the fact that morality must be aimed at something other than human perfection, leads Scotus to reject any natural-law-style arguments for the contingent precepts of the moral law. The only arguments he accepts are those drawn from Scripture. Reason can only work within the present, contingent moral order to discern what following the divine will amounts to in a given situation. It cannot presume to justify that order itself