Or again, good moves the appetite chiefly through possessing some property of happiness, which all men seek naturally.  Now in the first place happiness implies perfection, since happiness is a perfect good, to which belongs excellence or renown, which is desired by pride or vainglory. Secondly, it implies satiety, which covetousness seeks in riches that give promise thereof.  Thirdly, it implies pleasure, without which happiness is impossible, as stated in Ethic. i, 7; x, 6, 7, 8 and this gluttony and lust pursue.

On the other hand, avoidance of good on account of an attendant evil occurs in two ways.  For this happens either in respect of one’s own good, and thus we have sloth, which is sadness about one’s spiritual good, on account of the attendant bodily labor:  or else it happens in respect of another’s good, and this, if it be without recrimination, belongs to envy, which is sadness about another’s good as being a hindrance to one’s own excellence, while if it be with recrimination with a view to vengeance, it is anger. Again, these same vices seek the contrary evils.

Reply Obj. 1:  Virtue and vice do not originate in the same way:  since virtue is caused by the subordination of the appetite to reason, or to the immutable good, which is God, whereas vice arises from the appetite for mutable good.  Wherefore there is no need for the principal vices to be contrary to the principal virtues.

Reply Obj. 2:  Fear and hope are irascible passions.  Now all the passions of the irascible part arise from passions of the concupiscible part; and these are all, in a way, directed to pleasure or sorrow.  Hence pleasure and sorrow have a prominent place among the capital sins, as being the most important of the passions, as stated above (Q. 25, A. 4).

Reply Obj. 3:  Although anger is not a principal passion, yet it has a distinct place among the capital vices, because it implies a special kind of movement in the appetite, in so far as recrimination against another’s good has the aspect of a virtuous good, i.e. of the right to vengeance.

Reply Obj. 4:  Pride is said to be the beginning of every sin, in the order of the end, as stated above (A. 2):  and it is in the same order that we are to consider the capital sin as being principal.  Wherefore pride, like a universal vice, is not counted along with the others, but is reckoned as the “queen of them all,” as Gregory states (Moral. xxxi, 27).  But covetousness is said to be the root from another point of view, as stated above (AA. 1, 2).

Reply Obj. 5:  These vices are called capital because others, most frequently, arise from them:  so that nothing prevents some sins from arising out of other causes.  Nevertheless we might say that all the sins which are due to ignorance, can be reduced to sloth, to which pertains the negligence of a man who declines to acquire spiritual goods on account of the attendant labor; for the ignorance that can cause sin, is due to negligence, as stated above (Q. 76, A. 2).  That a man commit a sin with a good intention, seems to point to ignorance, in so far as he knows not that evil should not be done that good may come of it. ________________________