28 born november 13 354 he died august 28 430 9

'28
Born November 13, 354, he died August 28, 430.
=9 Enarratio in psalmum
48, sermo 1.12, PL 36.552.
'30
In
Joannis evangelium 6.25, PL 35.1436-1437. Cf. ibid. at 6.26, PL 35.1437;
Enarratio in psalmum
118, sermo 11, PL 37.1531; Epistola 153.6.25, PL 33.665.
For other references to the problem of private
property, see De sermone Dei
in monte 2.14.47, PL 34.1290; Sermo 41.5, PL 38.250; Sermo 50.3.6, PL 38.328;
Sermo
113.2.2, PL 38.648.
[Vol. 34

PROBLEM OF PRIVATE PROPERTY
referred
to as historical actualities. The majority
of the Fathers, it
must be admited,
was fully aware of the actuality
of historical fact
and historical situation. Thus St. Augustine
reminded the secular au-
thorities
that certain postulates of social justice
should be recognized,
irrespective
of any apparant conflicts between the Church
and the
Roman Empire. The extent of the
criticism directed by St. Augustine
against the legal and social
order represented by the Roman Empire of
his day terminated
at this point. It does not occur to him, however,
to revolutionize this order.
Only in a very few instances did the Fathers
openly denounce the legal institutions of
the Empire by declaring them
null and
void. This is the more interesting since these institutions,
after all, were
in the main merely declaratory of the predominant
socio-economic trends of the day. Thus, on the whole, the Fathers
only attempted
to modify the effects of some legal provisions which
in their harshness were considered incompatible with the new Christian
spirit of social justice and Christian charity. In particular they could
not ignore the Roman idea of the significance of private property, the
ius utendi et abutenti. If the Roman jurists had interpreted this idea
in the light of the overall social meaning of
law, a decisive congruity
with the
spirit of Christian social philosophy would probably have
taken place. A successful
rapproachment between the Roman legal
order and Christian teachings, of course,
was conditioned upon the
dissolution of the ius abutendi and the determination of the ius utendi
as a ius utendi socialiter-the right to use one's property and posses-
sions in a social way, that is, in
a manner profiting the whole of society.
The influence of this Christian 'social interpretation
seems to be re-
flected in the Institutes of Justinian: Expedit enim rei publicae me quis
re suna male utatur-it is in the interest of the commonweal that no one
should make ill
use of his property.lsoa This provision, which is defi-
nitely the result of a late Roman development, definitely discards the
extreme solipsist view on private property characteristic of the earlier
Roman
law
23
3
It was, therefore, more reconcilable with the Patristic
concept of natural
law and natural justice. In this fashion also the
i3oa Institutes 1.8.2. This passage actually refers to a rescript of Emperor An-
toninus Pius (138-161)
which specifically restrains slave-owners from inflict-
ing cruel punishment on slaves. A similar idea can be found in Gaius 1.53,
which also refers to the treatment of slaves and, hence,
cannot really be
considered a general principle of Roman Law.