moral sense, moral faculty

The capacity to distinguish between what is good and bad in of the other. conduct, and to approve of the one and disapprove The term moral sense was first used by Shaftes bury in his Inquiry Concerning Virtue. moral-theology, s. Ecclesiol.: "The science of priests sitting in the confe ional; the science which enables them to distinguish right from wrong, mortal sin from venial sin, counsels of perfection from strict obligations, and so to administer the Sacrament of Penance." ( Addis & Arnold .) [PENANCE, PENITENTIAL-BOOKS.] The literature of moral theology took its rise in the thirteenth century, and the science may be said to have received its definite form in the Theolog i a Moral is and the Homo Apos tolicus of St. Alphonsus Liguori, published about the middle of the last century, for nearly all the works on the subject since then follow the teachings of that Doctor of the Roman Church. [For the different schools of Moral Theology see LAXIST, PROBABILISM, PROBABILIORISM, RIGORISM, TUTOR ISM.]