Reply Obj. 1:  A circumstance, in so far as it specifies an action, is considered as a condition of the object, as stated above, and as being, as it were, a specific difference thereof.

Reply Obj. 2:  A circumstance, so long as it is but a circumstance, does not specify an action, since thus it is a mere accident:  but when it becomes a principal condition of the object, then it does specify the action.

Reply Obj. 3:  It is not every circumstance that places the moral action in the species of good or evil; since not every circumstance implies accord or disaccord with reason.  Consequently, although one action may have many circumstances, it does not follow that it is in many species.  Nevertheless there is no reason why one action should not be in several, even disparate, moral species, as said above (A. 7, ad 1; Q. 1, A. 3, ad 3). ________________________

ELEVENTH ARTICLE [I-II, Q. 18, Art. 11]

Whether Every Circumstance That Makes an Action Better or Worse,
Places a Moral Action in a Species of Good or Evil?

Objection 1:  It would seem that every circumstance relating to good or evil, specifies an action.  For good and evil are specific differences of moral actions.  Therefore that which causes a difference in the goodness or malice of a moral action, causes a specific difference, which is the same as to make it differ in species.  Now that which makes an action better or worse, makes it differ in goodness and malice.  Therefore it causes it to differ in species.  Therefore every circumstance that makes an action better or worse, constitutes a species.

Obj. 2:  Further, an additional circumstance either has in itself the character of goodness or malice, or it has not.  If not, it cannot make the action better or worse; because what is not good, cannot make a greater good; and what is not evil, cannot make a greater evil.  But if it has in itself the character of good or evil, for this very reason it has a certain species of good or evil.  Therefore every circumstance that makes an action better or worse, constitutes a new species of good or evil.

Obj. 3:  Further, according to Dionysius (Div.  Nom. iv), “evil is caused by each single defect.”  Now every circumstance that increases malice, has a special defect.  Therefore every such circumstance adds a new species of sin.  And for the same reason, every circumstance that increases goodness, seems to add a new species of goodness:  just as every unity added to a number makes a new species of number; since the good consists in “number, weight, and measure” (I, Q. 5, A. 5).

On the contrary, More and less do not change a species.  But more and less is a circumstance of additional goodness or malice.  Therefore not every circumstance that makes a moral action better or worse, places it in a species of good or evil.