Temperance

Temperance is the virtue that moderates the attraction of pleasures and holds desire within the measure of reason. It bears above all on the strongest pleasures, those of food, drink and the union of bodies, where man is most prone to yield. The Latin word temperantia comes from temperare, “to blend in the right proportion”: temperance measures, it does not extinguish. The Greeks called it sōphrosynē (σωφροσύνη), the health of a mind that governs itself. Wisdom places it among the four virtues, under the name of self-control. “she teaches self-control and prudence, justice and courage.” Wisdom 8:7

The city without walls

Without this mastery, man is given over to his desires like an undefended place. “Like a city breached and left without walls is a man who cannot control himself.” Proverbs 25:28 Whoever yields to all his cravings weakens and gives himself away. “If you grant your soul all its whims, it will make you the laughingstock of your enemies.” Sirach 18:30 Excess leads further than one thinks. “intemperance has killed many, but whoever watches himself prolongs his life.” Sirach 37:31

Its domains

Temperance governs several desires, and takes a name according to each. Abstinence measures eating, sobriety drinking, chastity orders the desire of union to the gift of self in love. To these pleasures of the body are added other movements it moderates: modesty, which governs bearing and adornment; humility, which holds the desire for one’s own greatness; meekness, which calms anger. Everywhere, temperance brings back to measure what, without it, would sweep man away.

It governs even the desire to know: studiousness seeks the true with measure, where curiosity scatters itself in novelties and vain inquiries. To hold even the mind in order belongs to temperance.

Of these forms, chastity is the most demanding and the most universal: it binds every state of life, married or not, each according to his condition, and integrates the sexual power into the gift of self instead of undergoing it. The baptized lives it because his very body has become a sanctuary. “Your body is the temple of the Holy Spirit who is in you, whom you have from God, and you do not belong to yourselves.” 1 Corinthians 6:19 What God wills is holiness even in the body. “What God wills is your sanctification: that you abstain from immorality.” 1 Thessalonians 4:3

Between excess and contempt of the body

Temperance holds the mean between two deviations. By excess, intemperance seeks pleasure without restraint and makes desire its master. By defect, another deviation, rarer, refuses the goods God made good and despises the body as an evil. Temperance is not that harshness: it receives with measure and thanksgiving what God gives, making of it neither an idol nor an enemy. The body and its goods are good; disorder comes from use without rule, not from the thing desired. To order desire is to restore it to its truth.

Self-control, a fruit of the Spirit

This mastery is not only the effort of the will: it is also a fruit that the Holy Spirit ripens in the soul. “But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control.” Galatians 5:22-23 The grace of Christ gives one to hold what nature alone would not hold, even to the turning of desire itself. “Those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires.” Galatians 5:24 The Christian puts on Christ, and in him finds the strength not to follow his cravings. “put on the Lord Jesus Christ, and do not give in to the cravings of the flesh.” Romans 13:14

The athlete and ascesis

As the athlete trains to win, the Christian exercises himself in self-mastery. “Every athlete submits to complete discipline; they do it for a perishable crown, but we for an imperishable one.” 1 Corinthians 9:25 Paul describes this exercise upon himself. “I treat my body hard and master it, for fear that after proclaiming the message to others, I myself should be disqualified.” 1 Corinthians 9:27 Fasting and voluntary renunciation do not aim to punish the body, but to free the spirit: in denying oneself what is permitted, one learns to refuse what is forbidden, and the soul takes back the guidance of itself.

The Church gives this ascesis a common rule: the forty days of Lent, the Friday abstinence in memory of the Passion, the fast before communion. She did not invent it; Christ announced it for the time when the Bridegroom would be taken away. “days will come when the bridegroom will be taken from them; then they will fast.” Matthew 9:15

The temperate Christ

Christ opened this way. Before entering upon his mission, he fasts in the desert and faces hunger without yielding to the temptation to answer it by his own power. “After fasting forty days and forty nights, he was hungry at last.” Matthew 4:2 He teaches thus that man does not live by bread alone, but by the word of God. Following him, Peter calls to the sobriety that watches, for desire without guard opens the door to the enemy. “Be sober, keep watch. Your adversary, the devil, prowls like a roaring lion, looking for someone to devour.” 1 Peter 5:8 The body’s sobriety keeps the soul awake. “Do not get drunk on wine, which leads to debauchery; instead, let yourselves be filled with the Spirit.” Ephesians 5:18

The freedom of the temperate

Far from narrowing life, temperance makes it free. The one who governs his desires is no longer pulled in every direction: he possesses goods without being possessed by them, and tastes more purely what he receives with measure. It is to this freedom that grace educates the believer. “it trains us to renounce ungodliness and worldly desires, and to live in the present age with self-control, uprightness, and godliness.” Titus 2:12 Ordered to eternal life, temperance is the calm of a heart restored to itself and turned toward God.