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THE TEACHING OF THE THOMIST TRACT ON LAW T HE TEACHING FUNCTION has been for a long time restricted to an elite class, closely supervised by political or ecclesiastical authority, and regulated by corporate statutes. In our own times the very idea of this type of authoritarian control and corporate regulation raises objections; in fact, the teaching function has been so diluted that it can be said to be reserved to no one and is open to all. The audience reached by a journalist, or even a songwriter, is often greater, due to the multiplicity and facility of means of expression, than that reached by a professor with degrees and official approval. However, to the extent that the teaching profession still exists, the training of teachers and the establishment of philosophically -oriented programs are less assured and are subject to many variations, since they are now more greatly influenced by the movements of public opinion. Political events, unpredictable as they are, currently have repercusions on the career and choice of teachers as well as upon the duration of programs and the spirit of teaching. Teaching must meet the needs of the people as they are expressed and are capable of being solved. Hence the demand of truth, to the extent that it is expressed and wherever it is concretely accompanied by the willingness to pay the price, bears less on objective and disinterested truth than it does on an exact adjustment of the student for his future tasks, either by organizing the teaching of moral theology to meet the need of the Church for confessors , or by channelling the flow of students toward subjects which will immediately assure them of a good position and answer the needs of economic development and of social welfare. It appears, therefore, that the teacher, because of his concern 18 14 JEAN TONNEAU for effectiveness, especially in the apostolic and the pastoral area, tries to become a journalist, if not a songwriter, in order to get a great hearing. He fears that, unless he does so, he will be thought of as a mandarin. The democratization of teaching easily tends towards a " massification." 1 I do not even wish to speak of the at times troubling overtones which accompany or run the risk of accompanying this symptom: a laziness which precludes sustained and silent effort; an appeal to the tinkle of vainglory. Above all there is the objection based on principle: why, what right have I to oppose them? Even the theologian who, more than anyone else, should say to himself: " My doctrine is not my own," experiences similar scruples. These he resists to the extent that he has not fallen prey to an idealistic epistemology or to phenomenology which denies "ready-made " truths, that is, precisely those which are not for everyone to create for himself, those which constitute the object of a doctrinal tradition . We should add that the process is one which is auto-accelerating ; once a striking formula hits the public ear it resonates and is amplified so that it seems to be a confirmation of its truth. It may have been proposed merely as a hypothesis by the author, but it soon succeeds too well for him to withdraw his conviction that it is firmly established, and thus it immediately passes for a conclusion of modem science (or an exigence of the modem conscience) . This is so much so that the author loses every chance of continuing and of deepening his thinking on the matter, of keeping his critical spirit on the alert. Paradoxically, success itself condemns him to psittacism.2 Moral science, and the theory of law 8 which forms part of it, are particularly suspect. It is amusing to note that Abbe 1 Cf. G. Gottier, Le langagc de la foi. Fidelite et invention, in Table Ronde, n. 250 (Nov. 1968), p. 67. • Cf. J. De Bourbon-Bosset as quoted by P. Gache, La France catholique, July 29, 1966, p. 6. • There is nothing quite as distressing to the public as this word theory, and authors avoid it as much as possible. TEACHING OF THE THOMIST TRACT ON LAW 15 J. M. Aubert begins his work, Loi de...

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