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 Learning OpenCV 3
Computer Vision in C++ with the OpenCV Library

Adrian Kaehler and Gary Bradski

Learning OpenCV 3
by Adrian Kaehler and Gary Bradski
Copyright © 2017 Adrian Kaehler, Gary Bradski. All rights reserved.
Printed in the United States of America.
Published by O’Reilly Media, Inc., 1005 Gravenstein Highway North,
Sebastopol, CA 95472.
O’Reilly books may be purchased for educational, business, or sales
promotional use. Online editions are also available for most titles
(http://www.oreilly.com/safari). For more information, contact our
corporate/institutional sales department: 800-998-9938 or
[email protected].

Editor: Dawn Schanafelt Indexer: Ellen Troutman

Production Editor: Kristen Brown Interior Designer: David Futato

Copyeditor: Rachel Monaghan Cover Designer: Karen Montgomery

Proofreader: James Fraleigh Illustrator: Rebecca Demarest

December 2016: First Edition

Revision History for the First Edition

2016-12-09: First Release

See http://oreilly.com/catalog/errata.csp?isbn=9781491937990 for

release details.
The O’Reilly logo is a registered trademark of O’Reilly Media, Inc.
Learning OpenCV 3, the cover image, and related trade dress are
trademarks of O’Reilly Media, Inc.
While the publisher and the authors have used good faith efforts to
ensure that the information and instructions contained in this work
are accurate, the publisher and the authors disclaim all responsibility
for errors or omissions, including without limitation responsibility for
damages resulting from the use of or reliance on this work. Use of
the information and instructions contained in this work is at your
own risk. If any code samples or other technology this work contains
or describes is subject to open source licenses or the intellectual
property rights of others, it is your responsibility to ensure that your
use thereof complies with such licenses and/or rights.
978-1-491-93799-0
[M]
Preface

This book provides a working guide to the C++ Open Source

Computer Vision Library (OpenCV) version 3.x and gives a general
background on the field of computer vision sufficient to help readers
use OpenCV effectively.

Purpose of This Book

Computer vision is a rapidly growing field largely because of four
trends:
The advent of mobile phones put millions of cameras in people’s
hands.

The Internet and search engines aggregated the resulting giant

flows of image and video data into huge databases.

Computer processing power became a cheap commodity.

Vision algorithms themselves became more mature (now with

the advent of deep neural networks, which OpenCV is
increasingly supporting; see dnn at opencv_contrib
[opencv_contrib]).

OpenCV has played a role in the growth of computer vision by

enabling hundreds of thousands of people to do more productive
work in vision. OpenCV 3.x now allows students, researchers,
professionals, and entrepreneurs to efficiently implement projects
and jump-start research by providing them with a coherent C++
computer vision architecture that is optimized over many platforms.
The purpose of this book is to:
 Comprehensively document OpenCV by detailing what function
calling conventions really mean and how to use them correctly

Give the reader an intuitive understanding of how the vision

algorithms work

Give the reader some sense of what algorithm to use and when
to use it

Give the reader a boost in implementing computer vision and

machine learning algorithms by providing many working code
examples to start from

Suggest ways to fix some of the more advanced routines when

something goes wrong

This book documents OpenCV in a way that allows the reader to

rapidly do interesting and fun things in computer vision. It gives an
intuitive understanding of how the algorithms work, which serves to
guide the reader in designing and debugging vision applications and
also makes the formal descriptions of computer vision and machine
learning algorithms in other texts easier to comprehend and
remember.
Who This Book Is For
This book contains descriptions, working code examples, and
explanations of the C++ computer vision tools contained in the
OpenCV 3.x library. Thus, it should be helpful to many different kinds
of users:

Professionals and entrepreneurs

For practicing professionals who need to rapidly prototype or
professionally implement computer vision systems, the sample
code provides a quick framework with which to start. Our
descriptions of the algorithms can quickly teach or remind the
reader how they work. OpenCV 3.x sits on top of a hardware
acceleration layer (HAL) so that implemented algorithms can run
efficiently, seamlessly taking advantage of a variety of hardware
platforms.
Students
This is the text we wish had back in school. The intuitive
explanations, detailed documentation, and sample code will
allow you to boot up faster in computer vision, work on more
interesting class projects, and ultimately contribute new
research to the field.
Teachers
Computer vision is a fast-moving field. We’ve found it effective
to have students rapidly cover an accessible text while the
instructor fills in formal exposition where needed and
supplements that with current papers or guest lectures from
experts. The students can meanwhile start class projects earlier
and attempt more ambitious tasks.
Hobbyists
Computer vision is fun — here’s how to hack it.
We have a strong focus on giving readers enough intuition,
documentation, and working code to enable rapid implementation of
real-time vision applications.
What This Book Is Not
This book is not a formal text. We do go into mathematical detail at
various points,1 but it is all in the service of developing deeper
intuitions behind the algorithms or to clarify the implications of any
assumptions built into those algorithms. We have not attempted a
formal mathematical exposition here and might even incur some
wrath along the way from those who do write formal expositions.
This book has more of an “applied” nature. It will certainly be of
general help, but is not aimed at any of the specialized niches in
computer vision (e.g., medical imaging or remote sensing analysis).
That said, we believe that by reading the explanations here first, a
student will not only learn the theory better, but remember it longer
as well. Therefore, this book would make a good adjunct text to a
theoretical course and would be a great text for an introductory or
project-centric course.

About the Programs in This Book

All the program examples in this book are based on OpenCV version
3.x. The code should work under Linux, Windows, and OS X. Using
references online, OpenCV 3.x has full support to run on Android
and iOS. Source code for the examples in the book can be fetched
from this book’s website; source code for OpenCV is available on
GitHub; and prebuilt versions of OpenCV can be loaded from its
SourceForge site.
OpenCV is under ongoing development, with official releases
occurring quarterly. To stay completely current, you should obtain
your code updates from the aforementioned GitHub site. OpenCV
maintains a website at http://opencv.org; for developers, there is a
wiki at https://github.com/opencv/opencv/wiki.
Prerequisites
For the most part, readers need only know how to program in C++.
Many of the math sections in this book are optional and are labeled
as such. The mathematics involve simple algebra and basic matrix
algebra, and assume some familiarity with solution methods to least-
squares optimization problems as well as some basic knowledge of
Gaussian distributions, Bayes’ law, and derivatives of simple
functions.
The math in this book is in support of developing intuition for the
algorithms. The reader may skip the math and the algorithm
descriptions, using only the function definitions and code examples
to get vision applications up and running.
How This Book Is Best Used
This text need not be read in order. It can serve as a kind of user
manual: look up the function when you need it, and read the
function’s description if you want the gist of how it works “under the
hood.” However, the intent of this book is tutorial. It gives you a
basic understanding of computer vision along with details of how
and when to use selected algorithms.
This book is written to allow its use as an adjunct or primary
textbook for an undergraduate or graduate course in computer
vision. The basic strategy with this method is for students to read
the book for a rapid overview and then supplement that reading with
more formal sections in other textbooks and with papers in the field.
There are exercises at the end of each chapter to help test the
student’s knowledge and to develop further intuitions.
You could approach this text in any of the following ways:

Grab bag
Go through Chapters 1–5 in the first sitting, and then just hit
the appropriate chapters or sections as you need them. This
book does not have to be read in sequence, except for Chapters
18 and 19 (which cover camera calibration and stereo imaging)
and Chapters 20, 21, and 22 (which cover machine learning).
Entrepreneurs and students doing project-based courses might
go this way.
Good progress
Read just two chapters a week until you’ve covered Chapters 1–
22 in 11 weeks (Chapter 23 will go by in an instant). Start on
projects and dive into details on selected areas in the field,
using additional texts and papers as appropriate.
The sprint
 Cruise through the book as fast as your comprehension allows,
covering Chapters 1–23. Then get started on projects and go
into detail on selected areas in the field using additional texts
and papers. This is probably the choice for professionals, but it
might also suit a more advanced computer vision course.
Chapter 20 is a brief chapter that gives general background on
machine learning, which is followed by Chapters 21 and 22, which
give more details on the machine learning algorithms implemented
in OpenCV and how to use them. Of course, machine learning is
integral to object recognition and a big part of computer vision, but
it’s a field worthy of its own book. Professionals should find this text
a suitable launching point for further explorations of the literature —
or for just getting down to business with the code in that part of the
library. The machine learning interface has been substantially
simplified and unified in OpenCV 3.x.
This is how we like to teach computer vision: sprint through the
course content at a level where the students get the gist of how
things work; then get students started on meaningful class projects
while supplying depth and formal rigor in selected areas by drawing
from other texts or papers in the field. This same method works for
quarter, semester, or two-term classes. Students can get quickly up
and running with a general understanding of their vision task and
working code to match. As they begin more challenging and time-
consuming projects, the instructor helps them develop and debug
complex systems.
For longer courses, the projects themselves can become instructional
in terms of project management. Build up working systems first;
refine them with more knowledge, detail, and research later. The
goal in such courses is for each project to be worthy of a conference
publication and with a few project papers being published
subsequent to further (post-course) work. In OpenCV 3.x, the C++
code framework, Buildbots, GitHub use, pull request reviews, unit
and regression tests, and documentation are together a good
example of the kind of professional software infrastructure a startup
or other business should put together.

Conventions Used in This Book

The following typographical conventions are used in this book:

Italic
Indicates new terms, URLs, email addresses, filenames, file
extensions, pathnames, directories, and Unix utilities.
Constant width
Indicates commands, options, switches, variables, attributes,
keys, functions, types, classes, namespaces, methods, modules,
properties, parameters, values, objects, events, event handlers,
XMLtags, HTMLtags, the contents of files, or the output from
commands.
Constant width bold
Shows commands or other text that should be typed literally by
the user. Also used for emphasis in code samples.
Constant width italic
Shows text that should be replaced with user-supplied values.
[...]
Indicates a reference to the bibliography.

NOTE
This icon signifies a tip, suggestion, or general note.
 WARNING
This icon indicates a warning or caution.

Using Code Examples

Supplemental material (code examples, exercises, etc.) is available
for download at https://github.com/oreillymedia/Learning-OpenCV-
3_examples.
OpenCV is free for commercial or research use, and we have the
same policy on the code examples in the book. Use them at will for
homework, research, or for commercial products! We would very
much appreciate you referencing this book when you do so, but it is
not required. An attribution usually includes the title, author,
publisher, and ISBN. For example: “Learning OpenCV 3 by Adrian
Kaehler and Gary Bradski (O’Reilly). Copyright 2017 Adrian Kaehler,
Gary Bradski, 978-1-491-93799-0.”
Other than hearing how it helped with your homework projects
(which is best kept a secret), we would love to hear how you are
using computer vision for academic research, teaching courses, and
in commercial products when you do use OpenCV to help you.
Again, it’s not required, but you are always invited to drop us a line.

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Please address comments and questions concerning this book to the
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Acknowledgments
A long-term open source effort sees many people come and go,
each contributing in different ways. The list of contributors to this
library is far too long to list here, but see the
.../opencv/docs/HTML/Contributors/doc_contributors.html file that
ships with OpenCV.

Thanks for Help on OpenCV

Intel is where the library was born and deserves great thanks for
supporting this project as it started and grew. From time to time,
Intel still funds contests and contributes work to OpenCV. Intel also
donated the built-in performance primitives code, which provides for
seamless speedup on Intel architectures. Thank you for that.
Google has been a steady funder of development for OpenCV by
sponsoring interns for OpenCV under its Google Summer of Code
project; much great work has been done through this funding.
Willow Garage provided several years of funding that enabled
OpenCV to go from version 2.x through to version 3.0. During this
time, the computer vision R&D company Itseez (recently bought by
Intel Corporation) has provided extensive engineering support and
web services hosting over the years. Intel has indicated verbal
agreement to continue this support (thanks!).
On the software side, some individuals stand out for special mention,
especially on the Russian software team. Chief among these is the
Russian lead programmer Vadim Pisarevsky, who is the largest single
contributor to the library. Vadim also managed and nurtured the
library through the lean times when boom had turned to bust and
then bust to boom; he, if anyone, is the true hero of the library. His
technical insights have also been of great help during the writing of
this book. Giving him managerial support has been Victor Eruhimov,
a cofounder of Itseez [Itseez] and now CEO of Itseez3D.
Several people consistently help out with managing the library
during weekly meetings: Grace Vesom, Vincent Rabaud, Stefano
Fabri, and of course, Vadim Pisarevsky. The developer notes for
these meetings can be seen at
https://github.com/opencv/opencv/wiki/Meeting_notes.
Many people have contributed to OpenCV over time; a list of more
recent ones is: Dinar Ahmatnurov, Pablo Alcantarilla, Alexander
Alekhin, Daniel Angelov, Dmitriy Anisimov, Anatoly Baksheev, Cristian
Balint, Alexandre Benoit, Laurent Berger, Leonid Beynenson,
Alexander Bokov, Alexander Bovyrin, Hilton Bristow, Vladimir
Bystritsky, Antonella Cascitelli, Manuela Chessa, Eric Christiansen,
Frederic Devernay, Maria Dimashova, Roman Donchenko, Vladimir
Dudnik, Victor Eruhimov, Georgios Evangelidis, Stefano Fabri, Sergio
Garrido, Harris Gasparakis, Yuri Gitman, Lluis Gomez, Yury
Gorbachev, Elena Gvozdeva, Philipp Hasper, Fernando J. Iglesias
Garcia, Alexander Kalistratov, Andrey Kamaev, Alexander Karsakov,
Rahul Kavi, Pat O’Keefe, Siddharth Kherada, Eugene Khvedchenya,
Anna Kogan, Marina Kolpakova, Kirill Kornyakov, Ivan Korolev, Maxim
Kostin, Evgeniy Kozhinov, Ilya Krylov, Laksono Kurnianggoro,
Baisheng Lai, Ilya Lavrenov, Alex Leontiev, Gil Levi, Bo Li, Ilya
Lysenkov, Vitaliy Lyudvichenko, Bence Magyar, Nikita Manovich, Juan
Manuel Perez Rua, Konstantin Matskevich, Patrick Mihelich,
Alexander Mordvintsev, Fedor Morozov, Gregory Morse, Marius Muja,
Mircea Paul Muresan, Sergei Nosov, Daniil Osokin, Seon-Wook Park,
Andrey Pavlenko, Alexander Petrikov, Philip aka Dikay900, Prasanna,
Francesco Puja, Steven Puttemans, Vincent Rabaud, Edgar Riba,
Cody Rigney, Pavel Rojtberg, Ethan Rublee, Alfonso Sanchez-Beato,
Andrew Senin, Maksim Shabunin, Vlad Shakhuro, Adi Shavit,
Alexander Shishkov, Sergey Sivolgin, Marvin Smith, Alexander
Smorkalov, Fabio Solari, Adrian Stratulat, Evgeny Talanin, Manuele
Tamburrano, Ozan Tonkal, Vladimir Tyan, Yannick Verdie, Pierre-
Emmanuel Viel, Vladislav Vinogradov, Pavel Vlasov, Philipp Wagner,
Yida Wang, Jiaolong Xu, Marian Zajko, Zoran Zivkovic.
Other contributors show up over time at
https://github.com/opencv/opencv/wiki/ChangeLog. Finally, Arraiy
[Arraiy] is now also helping maintain OpenCV.org (the free and open
codebase).

Thanks for Help on This Book

While preparing this book and the previous version of this book,
we’d like to thank John Markoff, science reporter at the New York
Times, for encouragement, key contacts, and general writing advice
born of years in the trenches. We also thank our many editors at
O’Reilly, especially Dawn Schanafelt, who had the patience to
continue on as slips became the norm while the errant authors were
off trying to found a startup. This book has been a long project that
slipped from OpenCV 2.x to the current OpenCV 3.x release. Many
thanks to O’Reilly for sticking with us through all that.

Adrian Adds...
In the first edition (Learning OpenCV) I singled out some of the
great teachers who helped me reach the point where a work like this
would be possible. In the intervening years, the value of the
guidance received from each of them has only grown more clear. My
many thanks go out to each of them. I would like to add to this list
of extraordinary mentors Tom Tombrello, to whom I owe a great
debt, and in whose memory I would like to dedicate my contribution
to this book. He was a man of exceptional intelligence and deep
wisdom, and I am honored to have been given the opportunity to
follow in his footsteps. Finally, deep thanks are due the OpenCV
community, for welcoming the first edition of this book and for your
patience through the many exciting, but perhaps distracting,
endeavors that have transpired while this edition was being written.
This edition of the book has been a long time coming. During those
intervening years, I have had the fortune to work with dozens of
different companies advising, consulting, and helping them build
their technology. As a board member, advisory board member,
technical fellow, consultant, technical contributor, and founder, I
have had the fortune to see and love every dimension of the
technology development process. Many of those years were spent
with Applied Minds, Inc., building and running our robotics division
there, or at Applied Invention corporation, a spinout of Applied
Minds, as a Fellow there. I was constantly pleased to find OpenCV at
the heart of outstanding projects along the way, ranging from health
care and agriculture to aviation, defense, and national security. I
have been equally pleased to find the first edition of this book on
people’s desks in almost every institution along the way. The
technology that Gary and I used to build Stanley has become
integral to countless projects since, not the least of which are the
many self-driving car projects now under way — any one of which,
or perhaps all of which, stand ready to change and improve daily life
for countless people. What a joy it is to be part of all of this! The
number of incredible minds that I have encountered over the years
— who have told me what benefit the first edition was to them in
the classes they took, the classes they taught, the careers they built,
and the great accomplishments that they completed — has been a
continuous source of happiness and wonder. I am hopeful that this
new edition of the book will continue to serve you all, as well as to
inspire and enable a new generation of scientists, engineers, and
inventors.
As the last chapter of this book closes, we start new chapters in our
lives working in robotics, AI, vision, and beyond. Personally, I am
deeply grateful for all of the people who have contributed the many
works that have enabled this next step in my own life: teachers,
mentors, and writers of books. I hope that this new edition of our
book will enable others to make the next important step in their own
lives, and I hope to see you there!
Gary Adds...
I founded OpenCV in 1999 with the goal to accelerate computer
vision and artificial intelligence and give everyone the infrastructure
to work with that I saw at only the top labs at the time. So few goals
actually work out as intended in life, and I’m thankful this goal did
work out 17 (!) years later. Much of the credit for accomplishing that
goal was due to the help, over the years, of many friends and
contributors too numerous to mention.2 But I will single out the
original Russian group I started working with at Intel, who ran a
successful computer vision company (Itseez.com) that was
eventually bought back into Intel; we started out as coworkers but
have since become deep friends.
With three teenagers at home, my wife, Sonya Bradski, put in more
work to enable this book than I did. Many thanks and love to her.
The teenagers I love, but I can’t say they accelerated the book. :)
This version of the book was started back at the former startup I
helped found, Industrial Perception Inc., which sold to Google in
2013. Work continued in fits and starts on random weekends and
late nights ever since. Somehow it’s now 2016 — time flies when
you are overwhelmed! Some of the speculation that I do toward the
end of Chapter 23 was inspired by the nature of robot minds that I
experienced with the PR2, a two-armed robot built by Willow
Garage, and with the Stanley project at Stanford — the robot that
won the $2 million DARPA Grand Challenge.
As we close the writing of this book, we hope to see you in startups,
research labs, academic sites, conferences, workshops, VC offices,
and cool company projects down the road. Feel free to say hello and
chat about cool new stuff that you’re doing. I started OpenCV to
support and accelerate computer vision and AI for the common
good; what’s left is your part. We live in a creative universe where
someone can create a pot, the next person turns that pot into a
drum, and so on. Create! Use OpenCV to create something
uncommonly good for us all!

1 Always with a warning to more casual users that they may skip such sections.

2 We now have many contributors, as you can see by scrolling past the updates
in the change logs at https://github.com/opencv/opencv/wiki/ChangeLog. We
get so many new algorithms and apps that we now store the best in self-
maintaining and self-contained modules in opencv_contrib).
Chapter 1. Overview

What Is OpenCV?
OpenCV [OpenCV] is an open source (see http://opensource.org)
computer vision library available from http://opencv.org. In 1999
Gary Bradski [Bradski], working at Intel Corporation, launched
OpenCV with the hopes of accelerating computer vision and artificial
intelligence by providing a solid infrastructure for everyone working in
the field. The library is written in C and C++ and runs under Linux,
Windows, and Mac OS X. There is active development on interfaces
for Python, Java, MATLAB, and other languages, including porting the
library to Android and iOS for mobile applications. OpenCV has
received much of its support over the years from Intel and Google,
but especially from Itseez [Itseez] (recently acquired by Intel), which
did the bulk of the early development work. Finally, Arraiy [Arraiy]
has joined in to maintain the always open and free OpenCV.org
[OpenCV].
OpenCV was designed for computational efficiency and with a strong
focus on real-time applications. It is written in optimized C++ and
can take advantage of multicore processors. If you desire further
automatic optimization on Intel architectures [Intel], you can buy
Intel’s Integrated Performance Primitives (IPP) libraries [IPP], which
consist of low-level optimized routines in many different algorithmic
areas. OpenCV automatically uses the appropriate IPP library at
runtime if that library is installed. Starting with OpenCV 3.0, Intel
granted the OpenCV team and OpenCV community a free-of-charge
subset of IPP (nicknamed IPPICV), which is built into and accelerates
OpenCV by default.
One of OpenCV’s goals is to provide a simple-to-use computer vision
infrastructure that helps people build fairly sophisticated vision
applications quickly. The OpenCV library contains over 500 functions
that span many areas in vision, including factory product inspection,
medical imaging, security, user interface, camera calibration, stereo
vision, and robotics. Because computer vision and machine learning
often go hand-in-hand, OpenCV also contains a full, general-purpose
Machine Learning library (ML module). This sublibrary is focused on
statistical pattern recognition and clustering. The ML module is highly
useful for the vision tasks that are at the core of OpenCV’s mission,
but it is general enough to be used for any machine learning
problem.

Who Uses OpenCV?

Most computer scientists and practical programmers are aware of
some facet of computer vision’s role, but few people are aware of all
the ways in which computer vision is used. For example, most people
are somewhat aware of its use in surveillance, and many also know
that it is increasingly being used for images and video on the Web. A
few have seen some use of computer vision in game interfaces. Yet
fewer people realize that most aerial and street-map images (such as
in Google’s Street View) make heavy use of camera calibration and
image stitching techniques. Some are aware of niche applications in
safety monitoring, unmanned flying vehicles, or biomedical analysis.
But few are aware how pervasive machine vision has become in
manufacturing: virtually everything that is mass-produced has been
automatically inspected at some point using computer vision.
The open source license for OpenCV has been structured such that
you can build a commercial product using all or part of OpenCV. You
are under no obligation to open-source your product or to return
improvements to the public domain, though we hope you will. In part
because of these liberal licensing terms, there is a large user
community that includes people from major companies (IBM,
Microsoft, Intel, SONY, Siemens, and Google, to name only a few)
and research centers (such as Stanford, MIT, CMU, Cambridge, and
INRIA). There is a Yahoo Groups forum where users can post
questions and discussion; it has almost 50,000 members. OpenCV is
popular around the world, with large user communities in China,
Japan, Russia, Europe, and Israel.
Since its alpha release in January 1999, OpenCV has been used in
many applications, products, and research efforts. These applications
include stitching images together in satellite and web maps, image
scan alignment, medical image noise reduction, object analysis,
security and intrusion detection systems, automatic monitoring and
safety systems, manufacturing inspection systems, camera
calibration, military applications, and unmanned aerial, ground, and
underwater vehicles. It has even been used in sound and music
recognition, where vision recognition techniques are applied to sound
spectrogram images. OpenCV was a key part of the vision system in
the robot from Stanford, “Stanley,” which won the $2M DARPA Grand
Challenge desert robot race [Thrun06].

What Is Computer Vision?

Computer vision1 is the transformation of data from a still or video
camera into either a decision or a new representation. All such
transformations are done to achieve some particular goal. The input
data may include some contextual information such as “the camera is
mounted in a car” or “laser range finder indicates an object is 1
meter away.” The decision might be “there is a person in this scene”
or “there are 14 tumor cells on this slide.” A new representation
might mean turning a color image into a grayscale image or removing
camera motion from an image sequence.
Because we are such visual creatures, it is easy to be fooled into
thinking that computer vision tasks are easy. How hard can it be to
find, say, a car when you are staring at it in an image? Your initial
intuitions can be quite misleading. The human brain divides the vision
signal into many channels that stream different kinds of information
into your brain. Your brain has an attention system that identifies, in
a task-dependent way, important parts of an image to examine while
suppressing examination of other areas. There is massive feedback in
the visual stream that is, as yet, little understood. There are
widespread associative inputs from muscle control sensors and all of
the other senses that allow the brain to draw on cross-associations
made from years of living in the world. The feedback loops in the
brain go back to all stages of processing, including the hardware
sensors themselves (the eyes), which mechanically control lighting
via the iris and tune the reception on the surface of the retina.
In a machine vision system, however, a computer receives a grid of
numbers from the camera or from disk, and that’s it. For the most
part, there’s no built-in pattern recognition, no automatic control of
focus and aperture, no cross-associations with years of experience.
For the most part, vision systems are still fairly naïve. Figure 1-1
shows a picture of an automobile. In that picture we see a side
mirror on the driver’s side of the car. What the computer “sees” is
just a grid of numbers. Any given number within that grid has a
rather large noise component and so by itself gives us little
information, but this grid of numbers is all the computer “sees.” Our
task, then, becomes to turn this noisy grid of numbers into the
perception “side mirror.” Figure 1-2 gives some more insight into why
computer vision is so hard.
Figure 1-1. To a computer, the car’s side mirror is just a grid of numbers
Figure 1-2. The ill-posed nature of vision: the 2D appearance of objects can change
radically with viewpoint

In fact, the problem, as we have posed it thus far, is worse than

hard: it is formally impossible to solve. Given a two-dimensional (2D)
view of a 3D world, there is no unique way to reconstruct the 3D
signal. Formally, such an ill-posed problem has no unique or definitive
solution. The same 2D image could represent any of an infinite
combination of 3D scenes, even if the data were perfect. However, as
already mentioned, the data is corrupted by noise and distortions.
Such corruption stems from variations in the world (weather, lighting,
reflections, movements), imperfections in the lens and mechanical
setup, finite integration time on the sensor (motion blur), electrical
noise in the sensor or other electronics, and compression artifacts
after image capture. Given these daunting challenges, how can we
make any progress?
In the design of a practical system, additional contextual knowledge
can often be used to work around the limitations imposed on us by
visual sensors. Consider the example of a mobile robot that must find
and pick up staplers in a building. The robot might use the facts that
a desk is an object found inside offices and that staplers are mostly
found on desks. This gives an implicit size reference; staplers must
be able to fit on desks. It also helps to eliminate falsely “recognizing”
staplers in impossible places (e.g., on the ceiling or a window). The
robot can safely ignore a 200-foot advertising blimp shaped like a
stapler because the blimp lacks the prerequisite wood-grained
background of a desk. In contrast, with tasks such as image retrieval,
all stapler images in a database may be of real staplers, and so large
sizes and other unusual configurations may have been implicitly
precluded by the assumptions of those who took the photographs;
that is, the photographer perhaps took pictures only of real, normal-
sized staplers. People also tend to center objects when taking
pictures and tend to put them in characteristic orientations. Thus,
there is often quite a bit of unintentional implicit information within
photos taken by people.
Contextual information can also be modeled explicitly with machine
learning techniques. Hidden variables such as size, orientation to
gravity, and so on can then be correlated with their values in a
labeled training set. Alternatively, one may attempt to measure
hidden bias variables by using additional sensors. The use of a laser
range finder to measure depth allows us to accurately measure the
size of an object.
The next problem facing computer vision is noise. We typically deal
with noise by using statistical methods. For example, it may be
impossible to detect an edge in an image merely by comparing a
point to its immediate neighbors. But if we look at the statistics over
a local region, edge detection becomes much easier. A real edge
should appear as a string of such immediate neighbor responses over
a local region, each of whose orientation is consistent with its
neighbors. It is also possible to compensate for noise by taking
statistics over time. Still other techniques account for noise or
distortions by building explicit models learned directly from the
available data. For example, because lens distortions are well
understood, one need only learn the parameters for a simple
polynomial model in order to describe — and thus correct almost
completely — such distortions.
The actions or decisions that computer vision attempts to make
based on camera data are performed in the context of a specific
purpose or task. We may want to remove noise or damage from an
image so that our security system will issue an alert if someone tries
to climb a fence or because we need a monitoring system that counts
how many people cross through an area in an amusement park.
Vision software for robots that wander through office buildings will
employ different strategies than vision software for stationary security
cameras because the two systems have significantly different
contexts and objectives. As a general rule, the more constrained a
computer vision context is, the more we can rely on those constraints
to simplify the problem and the more reliable our final solution will
be.
OpenCV is aimed at providing the basic tools needed to solve
computer vision problems. In some cases, high-level functionalities in
the library will be sufficient to solve the more complex problems in
computer vision. Even when this is not the case, the basic
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 “But, sir, how much must the article be worth, to justify our
proceeding to that extremity?”
“According to Reginald and Tanner, ‘the article must be of great
value in the estimation of a judicious man.’ And so think Layman and
Filiutius.”
“But, father, that is saying nothing to the purpose; where am I to
find ‘a judicious man’ (a rare person to meet with at any time), in
order to make this estimation? Why do they not settle upon an exact
sum at once?”
“Ay, indeed!” retorted the monk; “and was it so easy, think you, to
adjust the comparative value between the life of a man, and a
Christian man, too, and money? It is here I would have you feel the
need of our casuists. Show me any of your ancient fathers who will
tell for how much money we may be allowed to kill a man. What will
they say, but ‘Non occides—Thou shalt not kill?’”
“And who, then, has ventured to fix that sum?” I inquired.
“Our great and incomparable Molina,” he replied—“the glory of our
Society—who has, in his inimitable wisdom, estimated the life of a
man ‘at six or seven ducats; for which sum he assures us it is
warrantable to kill a thief, even though he should run off;’ and he
adds, ‘that he would not venture to condemn that man as guilty of
any sin who should kill another for taking away an article worth a
crown, or even less—unius aurei, vel minoris adhuc valoris;’ which
has led Escobar to lay it down as a general rule, ‘that a man may be
killed quite regularly, according to Molina, for the value of a crown-
piece.’”
“O father!” cried I, “where can Molina have got all this wisdom to
enable him to determine a matter of such importance, without any
aid from Scripture, the councils, or the fathers? It is quite evident
that he has obtained an illumination peculiar to himself, and is far
beyond St. Augustine in the matter of homicide, as well as of grace.
Well, now, I suppose I may consider myself master of this chapter of
morals; and I see perfectly that, with the exception of ecclesiastics,
nobody need refrain from killing those who injure them in their
property or reputation.”
“What say you?” exclaimed the monk. “Do you then suppose that
it would be reasonable that those who ought of all men to be most
respected, should alone be exposed to the insolence of the wicked?
Our fathers have provided against that disorder; for Tanner declares
that ‘Churchmen, and even monks, are permitted to kill, for the
purpose of defending not only their lives, but their property, and that
of their community.’ Molina, Escobar, Becan, Reginald, Layman,
Lessius, and others, hold the same language. Nay, according to our
celebrated Father Lamy,[170] priests and monks may lawfully prevent
those who would injure them by calumnies from carrying their ill
designs into effect, by putting them to death. Care, however, must
be always taken to direct the intention properly. His words are: ‘An
ecclesiastic or a monk may warrantably kill a defamer who threatens
to publish the scandalous crimes of his community, or his own
crimes, when there is no other way of stopping him; if, for instance,
he is prepared to circulate his defamations unless promptly
despatched. For, in these circumstances, as the monk would be
allowed to kill one who threatened to take his life, he is also
warranted to kill him who would deprive him of his reputation or his
property, in the same way as the men of the world.’”
“I was not aware of that,” said I; “in fact, I have been accustomed
simply enough to believe the very reverse, without reflecting on the
matter, in consequence of having heard that the Church had such an
abhorrence of bloodshed as not even to permit ecclesiastical judges
to attend in criminal cases.”[171]
“Never mind that,” he replied; “our Father Lamy has completely
proved the doctrine I have laid down, although, with a humility
which sits uncommonly well on so great a man, he submits it to the
judgment of his judicious readers. Caramuel, too, our famous
champion, quoting it in his Fundamental Theology, p. 543, thinks it
so certain, that he declares the contrary opinion to be destitute of
probability, and draws some admirable conclusions from it, such as
the following, which he calls ‘the conclusion of conclusions—
conclusionum conclusio:’ ‘That a priest not only may kill a slanderer,
but there are certain circumstances in which it may be his duty to do
so—etiam aliquando debet occidere.’ He examines a great many new
questions on this principle, such as the following, for instance: ‘May
the Jesuits kill the Jansenists?’”
“A curious point of divinity that, father!” cried I. “I hold the
Jansenists to be as good as dead men, according to Father Lamy’s
doctrine.”
“There now, you are in the wrong,” said the monk: “Caramuel
infers the very reverse from the same principles.”
“And how so, father?”
“Because,” he replied, “it is not in the power of the Jansenists to
injure our reputation. ‘The Jansenists,’ says he, ‘call the Jesuits
Pelagians; may they not be killed for that? No; inasmuch as the
Jansenists can no more obscure the glory of the Society than an owl
can eclipse that of the sun; on the contrary, they have, though
against their intention, enhanced it—occidi non possunt, quia nocere
non potuerunt.’”
“Ha, father! do the lives of the Jansenists, then, depend on the
contingency of their injuring your reputation? If so, I reckon them
far from being in a safe position; for supposing it should be thought
in the slightest degree probable that they might do you some
mischief, why, they are killable at once! You have only to draw up a
syllogism in due form, and, with a direction of the intention, you
may despatch your man at once with a safe conscience. Thrice
happy must those hot spirits be who cannot bear with injuries, to be
instructed in this doctrine! But woe to the poor people who have
offended them! Indeed, father, it would be better to have to do with
persons who have no religion at all, than with those who have been
taught on this system. For, after all, the intention of the wounder
conveys no comfort to the wounded. The poor man sees nothing of
that secret direction of which you speak; he is only sensible of the
direction of the blow that is dealt him. And I am by no means sure
but a person would feel much less sorry to see himself brutally killed
by an infuriated villain, than to find himself conscientiously stilettoed
by a devotee. To be plain with you, father, I am somewhat staggered
at all this; and these questions of Father Lamy and Caramuel do not
please me at all.”
“How so?” cried the monk. “Are you a Jansenist?”
“I have another reason for it,” I replied. “You must know I am in
the habit of writing from time to time, to a friend of mine in the
country, all that I can learn of the maxims of your doctors. Now,
although I do no more than simply report and faithfully quote their
own words, yet I am apprehensive lest my letter should fall into the
hands of some stray genius, who may take into his head that I have
done you injury, and may draw some mischievous conclusion from
your premises.”
“Away!” cried the monk; “no fear of danger from that quarter, I’ll
give you my word for it. Know that what our fathers have
themselves printed, with the approbation of our superiors, it cannot
be wrong to read nor dangerous to publish.”
I write you, therefore, on the faith of this worthy father’s word of
honor. But, in the mean time, I must stop for want of paper—not of
passages; for I have got as many more in reserve, and good ones
too, as would require volumes to contain them.—I am, &c.[172]
 LETTER VIII.[173]

CORRUPT MAXIMS OF THE CASUISTS RELATING TO JUDGES—USURERS—THE

CONTRACT MOHATRA—BANKRUPTS—RESTITUTION—DIVERS RIDICULOUS
NOTIONS OF THESE SAME CASUISTS.

Paris, May 28, 1656.

Sir,—You did not suppose that anybody would have the curiosity
to know who we were; but it seems there are people who are trying
to make it out, though they are not very happy in their conjectures.
Some take me for a doctor of the Sorbonne; others ascribe my
letters to four or five persons, who, like me, are neither priests nor
Churchmen. All these false surmises convince me that I have
succeeded pretty well in my object, which was to conceal myself
from all but yourself and the worthy monk, who still continues to
bear with my visits, while I still contrive, though with considerable
difficulty, to bear with his conversations. I am obliged, however, to
restrain myself; for were he to discover how much I am shocked at
his communications, he would discontinue them, and thus put it out
of my power to fulfil the promise I gave you, of making you
acquainted with their morality. You ought to think a great deal of the
violence which I thus do to my own feelings. It is no easy matter, I
can assure you, to stand still and see the whole system of Christian
ethics undermined by such a set of monstrous principles, without
daring to put in a word of flat contradiction against them. But after
having borne so much for your satisfaction, I am resolved I shall
burst out for my own satisfaction in the end, when his stock of
information has been exhausted. Meanwhile, I shall repress my
feelings as much as I possibly can; for I find that the more I hold my
tongue, he is the more communicative. The last time I saw him, he
told me so many things, that I shall have some difficulty in repeating
them all. On the point of restitution you will find they have some
most convenient principles. For, however the good monk palliates his
maxims, those which I am about to lay before you really go to
sanction corrupt judges, usurers, bankrupts, thieves, prostitutes and
sorcerers—all of whom are most liberally absolved from the
obligation of restoring their ill-gotten gains. It was thus the monk
resumed the conversation:—
“At the commencement of our interviews, I engaged to explain to
you the maxims of our authors for all ranks and classes; and you
have already seen those that relate to beneficiaries, to priests, to
monks, to domestics, and to gentlemen. Let us now take a cursory
glance of the remaining, and begin with the judges.
“Now I am going to tell you one of the most important and
advantageous maxims which our fathers have laid down in their
favor. Its author is the learned Castro Palao, one of our four-and-
twenty elders. His words are: ‘May a judge, in a question of right
and wrong, pronounce according to a probable opinion, in
preference to the more probable opinion? He may, even though it
should be contrary to his own judgment—imo contra propriam
opinionem.’”
“Well, father,” cried I, “that is a very fair commencement! The
judges, surely, are greatly obliged to you; and I am surprised that
they should be so hostile, as we have sometimes observed, to your
probabilities, seeing these are so favorable to them. For it would
appear from this, that you give them the same power over men’s
fortunes, as you have given to yourselves over their consciences.”
“You perceive we are far from being actuated by self-interest,”
returned he; “we have had no other end in view than the repose of
their consciences; and to the same useful purpose has our great
Molina devoted his attention, in regard to the presents which may be
made them. To remove any scruples which they might entertain in
accepting of these on certain occasions, he has been at the pains to
draw out a list of all those cases in which bribes may be taken with a
good conscience, provided, at least, there be no special law
forbidding them. He says: ‘Judges may receive presents from
parties, when they are given them either for friendship’s sake, or in
gratitude for some former act of justice, or to induce them to give
justice in future, or to oblige them to pay particular attention to their
case, or to engage them to despatch it promptly.’ The learned
Escobar delivers himself to the same effect: ‘If there be a number of
persons, none of whom have more right than another to have their
causes disposed of, will the judge who accepts of something from
one of them on condition—ex pacto—of taking up his cause first, be
guilty of sin? Certainly not, according to Layman; for, in common
equity, he does no injury to the rest, by granting to one, in
consideration of his present, what he was at liberty to grant to any
of them he pleased; and besides, being under an equal obligation to
them all in respect of their right, he becomes more obliged to the
individual who furnished the donation, who thereby acquired for
himself a preference above the rest—a preference which seems
capable of a pecuniary valuation—quæ obligatio videtur pretio
æstimabilis.’”
“May it please your reverence,” said I, “after such a permission, I
am surprised that the first magistrates of the kingdom should know
no better. For the first president[174] has actually carried an order in
Parliament to prevent certain clerks of court from taking money for
that very sort of preference—a sign that he is far from thinking it
allowable in judges; and everybody has applauded this as a reform
of great benefit to all parties.”
The worthy monk was surprised at this piece of intelligence, and
replied: “Are you sure of that? I heard nothing about it. Our opinion,
recollect, is only probable; the contrary is probable also.”
“To tell you the truth, father,” said I, “people think that the first
president has acted more than probably well, and that he has thus
put a stop to a course of public corruption which has been too long
winked at.”
 “I am not far from being of the same mind,” returned he; “but let
us waive that point, and say no more about the judges.”
“You are quite right, sir,” said I; “indeed, they are not half thankful
enough for all you have done for them.”
“That is not my reason,” said the father; “but there is so much to
be said on all the different classes, that we must study brevity on
each of them. Let us now say a word or two about men of business.
You are aware that our great difficulty with these gentlemen is to
keep them from usury—an object to accomplish which our fathers
have been at particular pains; for they hold this vice in such
abhorrence, that Escobar declares ‘it is heresy to say that usury is no
sin;’ and Father Bauny has filled several pages of his Summary of
Sins with the pains and penalties due to usurers. He declares them
‘infamous during their life, and unworthy of sepulture after their
death.’”
“O dear!” cried I, “I had no idea he was so severe.”
“He can be severe enough when there is occasion for it,” said the
monk; “but then this learned casuist, having observed that some are
allured into usury merely from the love of gain, remarks in the same
place, that ‘he would confer no small obligation on society, who,
while he guarded it against the evil effects of usury, and of the sin
which gives birth to it, would suggest a method by which one’s
money might secure as large, if not a larger profit, in some honest
and lawful employment, than he could derive from usurious
dealings.’”
“Undoubtedly, father, there would be no more usurers after that.”
“Accordingly,” continued he, “our casuist has suggested ‘a general
method for all sorts of persons—gentlemen, presidents, councillors,’
&c.; and a very simple process it is, consisting only in the use of
certain words which must be pronounced by the person in the act of
lending his money; after which he may take his interest for it
without fear of being a usurer, which he certainly would be on any
other plan.”
 “And pray what may those mysterious words be, father?”
“I will give you them exactly in his own words,” said the father;
“for he has written his Summary in French, you know, ‘that it may be
understood by everybody,’ as he says in the preface: ‘The person
from whom the loan is asked, must answer, then, in this manner: I
have got no money to lend; I have got a little, however, to lay out
for an honest and lawful profit. If you are anxious to have the sum
you mention in order to make something of it by your industry,
dividing the profit and loss between us, I may perhaps be able to
accommodate you. But now I think of it, as it may be a matter of
difficulty to agree about the profit, if you will secure me a certain
portion of it, and give me so much for my principal, so that it incur
no risk, we may come to terms much sooner, and you shall touch the
cash immediately.’ Is not that an easy plan for gaining money
without sin? And has not Father Bauny good reason for concluding
with these words: ‘Such, in my opinion, is an excellent plan by which
a great many people, who now provoke the just indignation of God
by their usuries, extortions, and illicit bargains, might save
themselves, in the way of making good, honest, and legitimate
profits?’”
“O sir!” I exclaimed, “what potent words these must be! Doubtless
they must possess some latent virtue to chase away the demon of
usury which I know nothing of, for, in my poor judgment, I always
thought that that vice consisted in recovering more money than
what was lent.”
“You know little about it indeed,” he replied. “Usury, according to
our fathers, consists in little more than the intention of taking the
interest as usurious. Escobar, accordingly, shows you how you may
avoid usury by a simple shift of the intention. ‘It would be downright
usury,’ says he, ‘to take interest from the borrower, if we should
exact it as due in point of justice; but if only exacted as due in point
of gratitude, it is not usury. Again, it is not lawful to have directly the
intention of profiting by the money lent; but to claim it through the
medium of the benevolence of the borrower—media benevolentia—is
not usury.’ These are subtle methods; but, to my mind, the best of
them all (for we have a great choice of them) is that of the Mohatra
bargain.”
“The Mohatra, father!”
“You are not acquainted with it, I see,” returned he. “The name is
the only strange thing about it. Escobar will explain it to you: ‘The
Mohatra bargain is effected by the needy person purchasing some
goods at a high price and on credit, in order to sell them over again,
at the same time and to the same merchant, for ready money and at
a cheap rate.’ This is what we call the Mohatra—a sort of bargain,
you perceive, by which a person receives a certain sum of ready
money, by becoming bound to pay more.”
“But, sir, I really think nobody but Escobar has employed such a
term as that; is it to be found in any other book?”
“How little you do know of what is going on, to be sure!” cried the
father. “Why, the last work on theological morality, printed at Paris
this very year, speaks of the Mohatra, and learnedly, too. It is called
Epilogus Summarum, and is an abridgment of all the summaries of
divinity—extracted from Suarez, Sanchez, Lessius, Fagundez,
Hurtado, and other celebrated casuists, as the title bears. There you
will find it said, at p. 54, that ‘the Mohatra bargain takes place when
a man who has occasion for twenty pistoles purchases from a
merchant goods to the amount of thirty pistoles, payable within a
year, and sells them back to him on the spot for twenty pistoles
ready money.’ This shows you that the Mohatra is not such an
unheard-of term as you supposed.”
“But, father, is that sort of bargain lawful?”
“Escobar,” replied he, “tells us in the same place, that there are
laws which prohibit it under very severe penalties.”
“It is useless, then, I suppose?”
“Not at all; Escobar, in the same passage, suggests expedients for
making it lawful: ‘It is so, even though the principal intention both of
the buyer and seller is to make money by the transaction, provided
the seller, in disposing of the goods, does not exceed their highest
price, and in re-purchasing them does not go below their lowest
price, and that no previous bargain has been made, expressly or
otherwise.’ Lessius, however, maintains, that ‘even though the
merchant has sold his goods, with the intention of re-purchasing
them at the lowest price, he is not bound to make restitution of the
profit thus acquired, unless, perhaps, as an act of charity, in the case
of the person from whom it has been exacted being in poor
circumstances, and not even then, if he cannot do it without
inconvenience—si commode non potest.’ This is the utmost length to
which they could go.”
“Indeed, sir,” said I, “any further indulgence would, I should think,
be rather too much.”
“Oh, our fathers know very well when it is time for them to stop!”
cried the monk. “So much, then, for the utility of the Mohatra. I
might have mentioned several other methods, but these may suffice;
and I have now to say a little in regard to those who are in
embarrassed circumstances. Our casuists have sought to relieve
them, according to their condition of life. For, if they have not
enough of property for a decent maintenance, and at the same time
for paying their debts, they permit them to secure a portion by
making a bankruptcy with their creditors.[175] This has been decided
by Lessius, and confirmed by Escobar, as follows: ‘May a person who
turns bankrupt, with a good conscience keep back as much of his
personal estate as may be necessary to maintain his family in a
respectable way—ne indecorè vivat? I hold, with Lessius, that he
may, even though he may have acquired his wealth unjustly and by
notorious crimes—ex injustitia et notorio delicto; only, in this case,
he is not at liberty to retain so large an amount as he otherwise
might.’”
“Indeed, father! what a strange sort of charity is this, to allow
property to remain in the hands of the man who has acquired it by
rapine, to support him in his extravagance rather than go into the
hands of his creditors, to whom it legitimately belongs!”
 “It is impossible to please everybody,” replied the father; “and we
have made it our particular study to relieve these unfortunate
people. This partiality to the poor has induced our great Vasquez,
cited by Castro Palao, to say, that ‘if one saw a thief going to rob a
poor man, it would be lawful to divert him from his purpose by
pointing out to him some rich individual, whom he might rob in place
of the other.’ If you have not access to Vasquez or Castro Palao, you
will find the same thing in your copy of Escobar; for, as you are
aware, his work is little more than a compilation from twenty-four of
the most celebrated of our fathers. You will find it in his treatise,
entitled ‘The Practice of our Society, in the matter of Charity towards
our Neighbors.’”
“A very singular kind of charity this,” I observed, “to save one man
from suffering loss, by inflicting it upon another! But I suppose that,
to complete the charity, the charitable adviser would be bound in
conscience to restore to the rich man the sum which he had made
him lose?”
“Not at all, sir,” returned the monk; “for he did not rob the man—
he only advised the other to do it. But only attend to this notable
decision of Father Bauny, on a case which will still more astonish
you, and in which you would suppose there was a much stronger
obligation to make restitution. Here are his identical words: ‘A
person asks a soldier to beat his neighbor, or to set fire to the barn
of a man that has injured him. The question is, Whether, in the
absence of the soldier, the person who employed him to commit
these outrages is bound to make reparation out of his own pocket
for the damage that has followed? My opinion is, that he is not. For
none can be held bound to restitution, where there has been no
violation of justice; and is justice violated by asking another to do us
a favor? As to the nature of the request which he made, he is at
liberty either to acknowledge or deny it; to whatever side he may
incline, it is a matter of mere choice; nothing obliges him to it,
unless it may be the goodness, gentleness, and easiness of his
disposition. If the soldier, therefore, makes no reparation for the
mischief he has done, it ought not to be exacted from him at whose
request he injured the innocent.’”
This sentence had very nearly broken up the whole conversation,
for I was on the point of bursting into a laugh at the idea of the
goodness and gentleness of a burner of barns, and at these strange
sophisms which would exempt from the duty of restitution the
principal and real incendiary, whom the civil magistrate would not
exempt from the halter. But had I not restrained myself, the worthy
monk, who was perfectly serious, would have been displeased; he
proceeded, therefore, without any alteration of countenance, in his
observations.
“From such a mass of evidence, you ought to be satisfied now of
the futility of your objections; but we are losing sight of our subject.
To revert, then, to the succor which our fathers apply to persons in
straitened circumstances, Lessius, among others, maintains that ‘it is
lawful to steal, not only in a case of extreme necessity, but even
where the necessity is grave, though not extreme.’”
“This is somewhat startling, father,” said I. “There are very few
people in this world who do not consider their cases of necessity to
be grave ones, and to whom, accordingly, you would not give the
right of stealing with a good conscience. And though you should
restrict the permission to those only who are really and truly in that
condition, you open the door to an infinite number of petty larcenies
which the magistrates would punish in spite of your ‘grave necessity,’
and which you ought to repress on a higher principle—you who are
bound by your office to be the conservators, not of justice only, but
of charity between man and man, a grace which this permission
would destroy. For after all, now, is it not a violation of the law of
charity, and of our duty to our neighbor, to deprive a man of his
property in order to turn it to our own advantage? Such, at least, is
the way I have been taught to think hitherto.”
“That will not always hold true,” replied the monk; “for our great
Molina has taught us that ‘the rule of charity does not bind us to
deprive ourselves of a profit, in order thereby to save our neighbor
from a corresponding loss.’ He advances this in corroboration of
what he had undertaken to prove—‘that one is not bound in
conscience to restore the goods which another had put into his
hands in order to cheat his creditors.’ Lessius holds the same
opinion, on the same ground.[176] Allow me to say, sir, that you have
too little compassion for people in distress. Our fathers have had
more charity than that comes to: they render ample justice to the
poor, as well as the rich; and, I may add, to sinners as well as saints.
For, though far from having any predilection for criminals, they do
not scruple to teach that the property gained by crime may be
lawfully retained. ‘No person,’ says Lessius, speaking generally, ‘is
bound, either by the law of nature or by positive laws (that is, by
any law), to make restitution of what has been gained by committing
a criminal action, such as adultery, even though that action is
contrary to justice.’ For, as Escobar comments on this writer, ‘though
the property which a woman acquires by adultery is certainly gained
in an illicit way, yet once acquired, the possession of it is lawful—
quamvis mulier illicitè acquisat, licitè tamen retinet acquisita.’ It is on
this principle that the most celebrated of our writers have formally
decided that the bribe received by a judge from one of the parties
who has a bad case, in order to procure an unjust decision in his
favor, the money got by a soldier for killing a man, or the
emoluments gained by infamous crimes, may be legitimately
retained. Escobar, who has collected this from a number of our
authors, lays down this general rule on the point, that ‘the means
acquired by infamous courses, such as murder, unjust decisions,
profligacy, &c., are legitimately possessed, and none are obliged to
restore them.’ And further, ‘they may dispose of what they have
received for homicide, profligacy, &c., as they please; for the
possession is just, and they have acquired a propriety in the fruits of
their iniquity.’”[177]
“My dear father,” cried I, “this is a mode of acquisition which I
never heard of before; and I question much if the law will hold it
good, or if it will consider assassination, injustice, and adultery, as
giving valid titles to property.”
 “I do not know what your law-books may say on the point,”
returned the monk; “but I know well that our books, which are the
genuine rules for conscience, bear me out in what I say. It is true
they make one exception, in which restitution is positively enjoined;
that is, in the case of any receiving money from those who have no
right to dispose of their property, such as minors and monks.
‘Unless,’ says the great Molina, ‘a woman has received money from
one who cannot dispose of it, such as a monk or a minor—nisi
mulier accepisset ab eo qui alienare non potest, ut a religioso et filio
familias. In this case she must give back the money.’ And so says
Escobar.”[178]
“May it please your reverence,” said I, “the monks, I see, are more
highly favored in this way than other people.”
“By no means,” he replied; “have they not done as much generally
for all minors, in which class monks may be viewed as continuing all
their lives? It is barely an act of justice to make them an exception;
but with regard to all other people, there is no obligation whatever
to refund to them the money received from them for a criminal
action. For, as has been amply shown by Lessius, ‘a wicked action
may have its price fixed in money, by calculating the advantage
received by the person who orders it to be done, and the trouble
taken by him who carries it into execution; on which account the
latter is not bound to restore the money he got for the deed,
whatever that may have been—homicide, injustice, or a foul act’ (for
such are the illustrations which he uniformly employs in this
question); ‘unless he obtained the money from those having no right
to dispose of their property. You may object, perhaps, that he who
has obtained money for a piece of wickedness is sinning, and
therefore ought neither to receive nor retain it. But I reply, that after
the thing is done, there can be no sin either in giving or in receiving
payment for it.’ The great Filiutius enters still more minutely into
details, remarking, ‘that a man is bound in conscience, to vary his
payments for actions of this sort, according to the different
conditions of the individuals who commit them, and some may bring
a higher price than others.’ This he confirms by very solid
arguments.”[179]
He then pointed out to me, in his authors, some things of this
nature so indelicate that I should be ashamed to repeat them; and
indeed the monk himself, who is a good man, would have been
horrified at them himself, were it not for the profound respect which
he entertains for his fathers, and which makes him receive with
veneration everything that proceeds from them. Meanwhile, I held
my tongue, not so much with the view of allowing him to enlarge on
this matter, as from pure astonishment at finding the books of men
in holy orders stuffed with sentiments at once so horrible, so
iniquitous, and so silly. He went on, therefore, without interruption in
his discourse, concluding as follows:—
“From these premises, our illustrious Molina decides the following
question (and after this, I think you will have got enough): ‘If one
has received money to perpetrate a wicked action, is he obliged to
restore it? We must distinguish here,’ says this great man; ‘if he has
not done the deed, he must give back the cash; if he has, he is
under no such obligation!’[180] Such are some of our principles
touching restitution. You have got a great deal of instruction to-day;
and I should like, now, to see what proficiency you have made.
Come, then, answer me this question: ‘Is a judge, who has received
a sum of money from one of the parties before him, in order to
pronounce a judgment in his favor, obliged to make restitution?’”
“You were just telling me a little ago, father, that he was not.”
“I told you no such thing,” replied the father; “did I express myself
so generally? I told you he was not bound to make restitution,
provided he succeeded in gaining the cause for the party who had
the wrong side of the question. But if a man has justice on his side,
would you have him to purchase the success of his cause, which is
his legitimate right? You are very unconscionable. Justice, look you,
is a debt which the judge owes, and therefore he cannot sell it; but
he cannot be said to owe injustice, and therefore he may lawfully
receive money for it. All our leading authors, accordingly, agree in
teaching ‘that though a judge is bound to restore the money he had
received for doing an act of justice, unless it was given him out of
mere generosity, he is not obliged to restore what he has received
from a man in whose favor he has pronounced an unjust
decision.’”[181]
This preposterous decision fairly dumbfounded me, and while I
was musing on its pernicious tendencies, the monk had prepared
another question for me. “Answer me again,” said he, “with a little
more circumspection. Tell me now, ‘if a man who deals in divination
is obliged to make restitution of the money he has acquired in the
exercise of his art?’”
“Just as you please, your reverence,” said I.
“Eh! what!—just as I please! Indeed, but you are a pretty scholar!
It would seem, according to your way of talking, that the truth
depended on our will and pleasure. I see that, in the present case,
you would never find it out yourself: so I must send you to Sanchez
for a solution of the problem—no less a man than Sanchez. In the
first place, he makes a distinction between ‘the case of the diviner
who has recourse to astrology and other natural means, and that of
another who employs the diabolical art. In the one case, he says,
the diviner is bound to make restitution; in the other he is not.’ Now,
guess which of them is the party bound?”
“It is not difficult to find out that,” said I.
“I see what you mean to say,” he replied. “You think that he ought
to make restitution in the case of his having employed the agency of
demons. But you know nothing about it; it is just the reverse. ‘If,’
says Sanchez, ‘the sorcerer has not taken care and pains to discover,
by means of the devil, what he could not have known otherwise, he
must make restitution—si nullam operam apposuit ut arte diaboli id
sciret; but if he has been at that trouble, he is not obliged.’”
“And why so, father?”
“Don’t you see?” returned he. “It is because men may truly divine
by the aid of the devil, whereas astrology is a mere sham.”
 “But, sir, should the devil happen not to tell the truth (and he is
not much more to be trusted than astrology), the magician must, I
should think, for the same reason, be obliged to make restitution?”
“Not always,” replied the monk: “Distinguo, as Sanchez says, here.
‘If the magician be ignorant of the diabolic art—si sit artis diabolicæ
ignarus—he is bound to restore: but if he is an expert sorcerer, and
has done all in his power to arrive at the truth, the obligation
ceases; for the industry of such a magician may be estimated at a
certain sum of money.’”
“There is some sense in that,” I said; “for this is an excellent plan
to induce sorcerers to aim at proficiency in their art, in the hope of
making an honest livelihood, as you would say, by faithfully serving
the public.”
“You are making a jest of it, I suspect,” said the father: “that is
very wrong. If you were to talk in that way in places where you were
not known, some people might take it amiss, and charge you with
turning sacred subjects into ridicule.”
“That, father, is a charge from which I could very easily vindicate
myself; for certain I am that whoever will be at the trouble to
examine the true meaning of my words will find my object to be
precisely the reverse; and perhaps, sir, before our conversations are
ended, I may find an opportunity of making this very amply
apparent.”
“Ho, ho,” cried the monk, “there is no laughing in your head now.”
“I confess,” said I, “that the suspicion that I intended to laugh at
things sacred, would be as painful for me to incur, as it would be
unjust in any to entertain it.”
“I did not say it in earnest,” returned the father; “but let us speak
more seriously.”
“I am quite disposed to do so, if you prefer it; that depends upon
you, father. But I must say, that I have been astonished to see your
friends carrying their attentions to all sorts and conditions of men so
far as even to regulate the legitimate gains of sorcerers.”
 “One cannot write for too many people,” said the monk, “nor be
too minute in particularizing cases, nor repeat the same things too
often in different books. You may be convinced of this by the
following anecdote, which is related by one of the gravest of our
fathers, as you may well suppose, seeing he is our present Provincial
—the reverend Father Cellot: ‘We know a person,’ says he, ‘who was
carrying a large sum of money in his pocket to restore it, in
obedience to the orders of his confessor, and who, stepping into a
bookseller’s shop by the way, inquired if there was anything new?—
numquid novi?—when the bookseller showed him a book on moral
theology, recently published; and turning over the leaves carelessly,
and without reflection, he lighted upon a passage describing his own
case, and saw that he was under no obligation to make restitution:
upon which, relieved from the burden of his scruples, he returned
home with a purse no less heavy, and a heart much lighter, than
when he left it:—abjecta scrupuli sarcina, retento auri pondere,
levior domum repetiit.’[182]
“Say, after hearing that, if it is useful or not to know our maxims?
Will you laugh at them now? or rather, are you not prepared to join
with Father Cellot in the pious reflection which he makes on the
blessedness of that incident? ‘Accidents of that kind,’ he remarks,
‘are, with God, the effect of his providence; with the guardian angel,
the effect of his good guidance; with the individuals to whom they
happen, the effect of their predestination. From all eternity, God
decided that the golden chain of their salvation should depend on
such and such an author, and not upon a hundred others who say
the same thing, because they never happen to meet with them. Had
that man not written, this man would not have been saved. All,
therefore, who find fault with the multitude of our authors, we would
beseech, in the bowels of Jesus Christ, to beware of envying others
those books which the eternal election of God and the blood of Jesus
Christ has purchased for them!’ Such are the eloquent terms in
which this learned man proves so successfully the proposition which
he had advanced, namely, ‘How useful it must be to have a great
many writers on moral theology—quàm utile sit de theologia morali
multos scribere!’”
“Father,” said I, “I shall defer giving you my opinion of that
passage to another opportunity; in the mean time, I shall only say
that as your maxims are so useful, and as it is so important to
publish them, you ought to continue to give me further instruction in
them. For I can assure you that the person to whom I send them
shows my letters to a great many people. Not that we intend to avail
ourselves of them in our own case; but indeed we think it will be
useful for the world to be informed about them.”
“Very well,” rejoined the monk, “you see I do not conceal them;
and, in continuation, I am ready to furnish you, at our next
interview, with an account of the comforts and indulgences which
our fathers allow, with the view of rendering salvation easy, and
devotion agreeable; so that in addition to what you have hitherto
learned as to particular conditions of men, you may learn what
applies in general to all classes, and thus you will have gone through
a complete course of instruction.”—So saying, the monk took his
leave of me.—I am, &c.

P. S.—I have always forgot to tell you that there are different
editions of Escobar. Should you think of purchasing him, I would
advise you to choose the Lyons edition, having on the title-page the
device of a lamb lying on a book sealed with seven seals; or the
Brussels edition of 1651. Both of these are better and larger than
the previous editions published at Lyons in the years 1644 and 1646.
[183]
 LETTER IX.

FALSE WORSHIP OF THE VIRGIN INTRODUCED BY THE JESUITS—DEVOTION

MADE EASY—THEIR MAXIMS ON AMBITION, ENVY, GLUTTONY,
EQUIVOCATION, AND MENTAL RESERVATIONS—FEMALE DRESS—GAMING—
HEARING MASS.

Paris, July 3, 1656.

Sir,—I shall use as little ceremony with you as the worthy monk
did with me, when I saw him last. The moment he perceived me, he
came forward with his eyes fixed on a book which he held in his
hand and accosted me thus: “‘Would you not be infinitely obliged to
any one who should open to you the gates of paradise? Would you
not give millions of gold to have a key by which you might gain
admittance whenever you thought proper? You need not be at such
expense; here is one—here are a hundred for much less money.’”
At first I was at a loss to know whether the good father was
reading, or talking to me, but he soon put the matter beyond doubt
by adding:
“These, sir, are the opening words of a fine book, written by
Father Barry of our Society; for I never give you anything of my
own.”
“What book is it?” asked I.
“Here is its title,” he replied: “‘Paradise opened to Philagio, in a
Hundred Devotions to the Mother of God, easily practised.’”
“Indeed, father! and is each of these easy devotions a sufficient
passport to heaven?”
 “It is,” returned he. “Listen to what follows: ‘The devotions to the
Mother of God, which you will find in this book, are so many celestial
keys, which will open wide to you the gates of paradise, provided
you practise them;’ and accordingly, he says at the conclusion, ‘that
he is satisfied if you practise only one of them.’”
“Pray, then, father, do teach me one of the easiest of them.”
“They are all easy,” he replied; “for example—‘Saluting the Holy
Virgin when you happen to meet her image—saying the little chaplet
of the pleasures of the Virgin—fervently pronouncing the name of
Mary—commissioning the angels to bow to her for us—wishing to
build her as many churches as all the monarchs on earth have done
—bidding her good morrow every morning, and good night in the
evening—saying the Ave Maria every day, in honor of the heart of
Mary’—which last devotion, he says, possesses the additional virtue
of securing us the heart of the Virgin.”[184]
“But, father,” said I, “only provided we give her our own in return,
I presume?”
“That,” he replied, “is not absolutely necessary, when a person is
too much attached to the world. Hear Father Barry: ‘Heart for heart
would, no doubt, be highly proper; but yours is rather too much
attached to the world, too much bound up in the creature, so that I
dare not advise you to offer, at present, that poor little slave which
you call your heart.’ And so he contents himself with the Ave Maria
which he had prescribed.”[185]
“Why, this is extremely easy work,” said I, “and I should really
think that nobody will be damned after that.”
“Alas!” said the monk, “I see you have no idea of the hardness of
some people’s hearts. There are some, sir, who would never engage
to repeat, every day, even these simple words, Good day, Good
evening, just because such a practice would require some exertion
of memory. And, accordingly, it became necessary for Father Barry
to furnish them with expedients still easier, such as wearing a
chaplet night and day on the arm, in the form of a bracelet, or
carrying about one’s person a rosary, or an image of the Virgin.[186]
‘And, tell me now,’ as Father Barry says, ‘if I have not provided you
with easy devotions to obtain the good graces of Mary?’”
“Extremely easy indeed, father,” I observed.
“Yes,” he said, “it is as much as could possibly be done, and I
think should be quite satisfactory. For he must be a wretched
creature indeed, who would not spare a single moment in all his
lifetime to put a chaplet on his arm, or a rosary in his pocket, and
thus secure his salvation; and that, too, with so much certainty that
none who have tried the experiment have ever found it to fail, in
whatever way they may have lived; though, let me add, we exhort
people not to omit holy living. Let me refer you to the example of
this, given at p. 34; it is that of a female who, while she practised
daily the devotion of saluting the images of the Virgin, spent all her
days in mortal sin, and yet was saved after all, by the merit of that
single devotion.”
“And how so?” cried I.
“Our Saviour,” he replied, “raised her up again, for the very
purpose of showing it. So certain it is, that none can perish who
practise any one of these devotions.”
“My dear sir,” I observed, “I am fully aware that the devotions to
the Virgin are a powerful mean of salvation, and that the least of
them, if flowing from the exercise of faith and charity, as in the case
of the saints who have practised them, are of great merit; but to
make persons believe that, by practising these without reforming
their wicked lives, they will be converted by them at the hour of
death, or that God will raise them up again, does appear calculated
rather to keep sinners going on in their evil courses, by deluding
them with false peace and fool-hardy confidence, than to draw them
off from sin by that genuine conversion which grace alone can
effect.”[187]
“What does it matter,” replied the monk, “by what road we enter
paradise, provided we do enter it? as our famous Father Binet,
formerly our provincial, remarks on a similar subject, in his excellent
book On the Mark of Predestination, ‘Be it by hook or by crook,’ as
he says, ‘what need we care, if we reach at last the celestial city.’”
“Granted,” said I; “but the great question is, if we will get there at
all?”
“The Virgin will be answerable for that,” returned he; “so says
Father Barry in the concluding lines of his book: ‘If, at the hour of
death, the enemy should happen to put in some claim upon you,
and occasion disturbance in the little commonwealth of your
thoughts, you have only to say that Mary will answer for you, and
that he must make his application to her.’”
“But, father, it might be possible to puzzle you, were one disposed
to push the question a little further. Who, for example, has assured
us that the Virgin will be answerable in this case?”
“Father Barry will be answerable for her,” he replied. “‘As for the
profit and happiness to be derived from these devotions,’ he says, ‘I
will be answerable for that; I will stand bail for the good Mother.’”
“But, father, who is to be answerable for Father Barry?”
“How!” cried the monk; “for Father Barry? is he not a member of
our Society? and do you need to be told that our Society is
answerable for all the books of its members? It is highly necessary
and important for you to know about this. There is an order in our
Society, by which all booksellers are prohibited from printing any
work of our fathers without the approbation of our divines and the
permission of our superiors. This regulation was passed by Henry
III., 10th May 1583, and confirmed by Henry IV., 20th December
1603, and by Louis XIII., 14th February 1612; so that the whole of
our body stands responsible for the publications of each of the
brethren. This is a feature quite peculiar to our community. And, in
consequence of this, not a single work emanates from us which does
not breathe the spirit of the Society. That, sir, is a piece of
information quite apropos.”[188]
“My good father,” said I, “you oblige me very much, and I only
regret that I did not know this sooner, as it will induce me to pay
considerably more attention to your authors.”
“I would have told you sooner,” he replied, “had an opportunity
offered; I hope, however, you will profit by the information in future,
and, in the mean time, let us prosecute our subject. The methods of
securing salvation which I have mentioned are, in my opinion, very
easy, very sure, and sufficiently numerous; but it was the anxious
wish of our doctors that people should not stop short at this first
step, where they only do what is absolutely necessary for salvation,
and nothing more. Aspiring, as they do without ceasing, after the
greater glory of God,[189] they sought to elevate men to a higher
pitch of piety; and as men of the world are generally deterred from
devotion by the strange ideas they have been led to form of it by
some people, we have deemed it of the highest importance to
remove this obstacle which meets us at the threshold. In this
department Father Le Moine has acquired much fame, by his work
entitled Devotion made Easy, composed for this very purpose. The
picture which he draws of devotion in this work is perfectly
charming. None ever understood the subject before him. Only hear
what he says in the beginning of his work: ‘Virtue has never as yet
been seen aright; no portrait of her, hitherto produced, has borne
the least verisimilitude. It is by no means surprising that so few have
attempted to scale her rocky eminence. She has been held up as a
cross-tempered dame, whose only delight is in solitude; she has
been associated with toil and sorrow; and, in short, represented as
the foe of sports and diversions, which are, in fact, the flowers of joy
and the seasoning of life.’”
“But, father, I am sure, I have heard at least, that there have been
great saints who led extremely austere lives.”
“No doubt of that,” he replied; “but still, to use the language of
the doctor, ‘there have always been a number of genteel saints, and
well-bred devotees;’ and this difference in their manners, mark you,
arises entirely from a difference of humors. ‘I am far from denying,’
says my author, ‘that there are devout persons to be met with, pale
and melancholy in their temperament, fond of silence and
retirement, with phlegm instead of blood in their veins, and with
faces of clay; but there are many others of a happier complexion,
and who possess that sweet and warm humor, that genial and
rectified blood, which is the true stuff that joy is made of.’
“You see,” resumed the monk, “that the love of silence and
retirement is not common to all devout people; and that, as I was
saying, this is the effect rather of their complexion than their piety.
Those austere manners to which you refer, are, in fact, properly the
character of a savage and barbarian, and, accordingly, you will find
them ranked by Father Le Moine among the ridiculous and brutal
manners of a moping idiot. The following is the description he has
drawn of one of these in the seventh book of his Moral Pictures: ‘He
has no eyes for the beauties of art or nature. Were he to indulge in
anything that gave him pleasure, he would consider himself
oppressed with a grievous load. On festival days, he retires to hold
fellowship with the dead. He delights in a grotto rather than a
palace, and prefers the stump of a tree to a throne. As to injuries
and affronts, he is as insensible to them as if he had the eyes and
ears of a statue. Honor and glory are idols with whom he has no
acquaintance, and to whom he has no incense to offer. To him a
beautiful woman is no better than a spectre; and those imperial and
commanding looks—those charming tyrants who hold so many
slaves in willing and chainless servitude—have no more influence
over his optics than the sun over those of owls,’ &c.”
“Reverend sir,” said I, “had you not told me that Father Le Moine
was the author of that description, I declare I would have guessed it
to be the production of some profane fellow, who had drawn it
expressly with the view of turning the saints into ridicule. For if that
is not the picture of a man entirely denied to those feelings which
the Gospel obliges us to renounce, I confess that I know nothing of
the matter.”[190]
“You may now perceive, then, the extent of your ignorance,” he
replied; “for these are the features of a feeble, uncultivated mind,
‘destitute of those virtuous and natural affections which it ought to
possess,’ as Father Le Moine says at the close of that description.
Such is his way of teaching ‘Christian virtue and philosophy,’ as he
announces in his advertisement; and, in truth, it cannot be denied
that this method of treating devotion is much more agreeable to the
taste of the world than the old way in which they went to work
before our times.”
“There can be no comparison between them,” was my reply, “and
I now begin to hope that you will be as good as your word.”
“You will see that better by-and-by,” returned the monk. “Hitherto
I have only spoken of piety in general, but, just to show you more in
detail how our fathers have disencumbered it of its toils and
troubles, would it not be most consoling to the ambitious to learn
that they may maintain genuine devotion along with an inordinate
love of greatness?”
“What, father! even though they should run to the utmost excess
of ambition?”
“Yes,” he replied; “for this would be only a venial sin, unless they
sought after greatness in order to offend God and injure the State
more effectually. Now venial sins do not preclude a man from being
devout, as the greatest saints are not exempt from them.[191]
‘Ambition,’ says Escobar, ‘which consists in an inordinate appetite for
place and power, is of itself a venial sin; but when such dignities are
coveted for the purpose of hurting the commonwealth, or having
more opportunity to offend God, these adventitious circumstances
render it mortal.’”
“Very savory doctrine, indeed, father.”
“And is it not still more savory,” continued the monk, “for misers to
be told, by the same authority, ‘that the rich are not guilty of mortal
sin by refusing to give alms out of their superfluity to the poor in the
hour of their greatest need?—scio in gravi pauperum necessitate
divites non dando superflua, non peccare mortaliter.’”
“Why truly,” said I, “if that be the case, I give up all pretension to
skill in the science of sins.”
“To make you still more sensible of this,” returned he, “you have
been accustomed to think, I suppose, that a good opinion of one’s
self, and a complacency in one’s own works, is a most dangerous
sin? Now, will you not be surprised if I can show you that such a
good opinion, even though there should be no foundation for it, is so
far from being a sin, that it is, on the contrary, the gift of God?”
“Is it possible, father?”
“That it is,” said the monk; “and our good Father Garasse[192]
shows it in his French work, entitled Summary of the Capital Truths
of Religion: ‘It is a result of commutative justice that all honest labor
should find its recompense either in praise or in self-satisfaction.
When men of good talents publish some excellent work, they are
justly remunerated by public applause. But when a man of weak
parts has wrought hard at some worthless production, and fails to
obtain the praise of the public, in order that his labor may not go
without its reward, God imparts to him a personal satisfaction, which
it would be worse than barbarous injustice to envy him. It is thus
that God, who is infinitely just, has given even to frogs a certain
complacency in their own croaking.’”
“Very fine decisions in favor of vanity, ambition, and avarice!” cried
I; “and envy, father, will it be more difficult to find an excuse for it?”
“That is a delicate point,” he replied. “We require to make use
here of Father Bauny’s distinction, which he lays down in his
Summary of Sins: ‘Envy of the spiritual good of our neighbor is
mortal, but envy of his temporal good is only venial.’”
“And why so, father?”
“You shall hear,” said he. “‘For the good that consists in temporal
things is so slender, and so insignificant in relation to heaven, that it
is of no consideration in the eyes of God and his saints.’”
“But, father, if temporal good is so slender, and of so little
consideration, how do you come to permit men’s lives to be taken
away in order to preserve it?”[193]
“You mistake the matter entirely,” returned the monk; “you were
told that temporal good was of no consideration in the eyes of God,
but not in the eyes of men.”
 “That idea never occurred to me,” I replied; “and now, it is to be
hoped that, in virtue of these same distinctions, the world will get rid
of mortal sins altogether.”
“Do not flatter yourself with that,” said the father; “there are still
such things as mortal sins—there is sloth, for example.”
“Nay, then, father dear!” I exclaimed, “after that, farewell to all
‘the joys of life!’”
“Stay,” said the monk, “when you have heard Escobar’s definition
of that vice, you will perhaps change your tone: ‘Sloth,’ he observes,
‘lies in grieving that spiritual things are spiritual, as if one should
lament that the sacraments are the sources of grace; which would
be a mortal sin.’”
“O my dear sir!” cried I, “I don’t think that anybody ever took it
into his head to be slothful in that way.”
“And accordingly,” he replied, “Escobar afterwards remarks: ‘I
must confess that it is very rarely that a person falls into the sin of
sloth.’ You see now how important it is to define things properly?”
“Yes, father, and this brings to my mind your other definitions
about assassinations, ambuscades, and superfluities. But why have
you not extended your method to all cases, and given definitions of
all vices in your way; so that people may no longer sin in gratifying
themselves?”
“It is not always essential,” he replied, “to accomplish that purpose
by changing the definitions of things. I may illustrate this by
referring to the subject of good cheer, which is accounted one of the
greatest pleasures of life, and which Escobar thus sanctions in his
‘Practice according to our Society:’ ‘Is it allowable for a person to eat
and drink to repletion, unnecessarily, and solely for pleasure?
Certainly he may, according to Sanchez, provided he does not
thereby injure his health; because the natural appetite may be
permitted to enjoy its proper functions.’”[194]
“Well, father, that is certainly the most complete passage, and the
most finished maxim in the whole of your moral system! What
comfortable inferences may be drawn from it! Why, and is gluttony,
then, not even a venial sin?”
“Not in the shape I have just referred to,” he replied; “but,
according to the same author, it would be a venial sin ‘were a person
to gorge himself, unnecessarily, with eating and drinking, to such a
degree as to produce vomiting.’[195] So much for that point. I would
now say a little about the facilities we have invented for avoiding sin
in worldly conversations and intrigues. One of the most
embarrassing of these cases is how to avoid telling lies, particularly
when one is anxious to induce a belief in what is false. In such
cases, our doctrine of equivocations has been found of admirable
service, according to which, as Sanchez has it, ‘it is permitted to use
ambiguous terms, leading people to understand them in another
sense from that in which we understand them ourselves.’”[196]
“I know that already, father,” said I.
“We have published it so often,” continued he, “that at length, it
seems, everybody knows of it. But do you know what is to be done
when no equivocal words can be got?”
“No, father.”
“I thought as much,” said the Jesuit; “this is something new, sir: I
mean the doctrine of mental reservations. ‘A man may swear,’ as
Sanchez says in the same place, ‘that he never did such a thing
(though he actually did it), meaning within himself that he did not
do so on a certain day, or before he was born, or understanding any
other such circumstance, while the words which he employs have no
such sense as would discover his meaning. And this is very
convenient in many cases, and quite innocent, when necessary or
conducive to one’s health, honor, or advantage.’”
“Indeed, father! is that not a lie, and perjury to boot?”
“No,” said the father; “Sanchez and Filiutius prove that it is not;
for, says the latter, ‘it is the intention that determines the quality of
the action.’[197] And he suggests a still surer method for avoiding
falsehood, which is this: After saying aloud, I swear that I have not
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