Certain Conditions Necessary.

But for gambling to be conformable to the retirements of justice, certain well known conditions must be verified.

First, the gambler must be in a position to justly alienate the stake which he exposes in the game. A game is a contract in which the players stipulate or agree that something shall be ceded to the winner as a prize. It is quite clear that I am not at liberty to bargain to cede that which I have no right to alienate. Hence a man has no right to risk in gaming or betting that which is not his own. The shop assistant may not expose his master's money; nor the bank clerk the money of his bank. It is not enough, however, that the gambler be the owner of the money which he stakes. He must also have the free administration or disposal of it. And even if one be the owner and have the administration of money, still one is not free to risk it in betting or gambling if justice already claims it for other purposes, as, for example," if it should be required for the paying of one's just debts.

In the second place the game ought to be freely entered into. If anyone by force or fear induces another to gamble, he does him an injury and is guilty of sin. So far, I think, all theologians are agreed. But it is one thing to say that he is guilty of sin, and quite another thing to say that he is bound to restitution. We may therefore ask the further question: If he who coerced his opponent to play should happen to win, is he bound to make restitution? Cardinal Lugo and others hold that he is. They say that he is responsible not only for the injury done to his adversary, but for the entire loss which results from it, that therefore he is bound to make good the entire loss; and that this he can do only by making restitution. Many eminent theologians take an opposite view. Among them, even so great an authority as St. Alphonsus. They deny page 19 that the loss sustained is the effect of the injury. They hold that it is to be attributed to the ill-luck of the loser, or to the superior skill of the winner. Though the argument, as drawn out by St. Alphonsus, very much commends itself to my mind, I need not develop it here. St. Alphonsus admits that the loser has a right to rescind or cancel the contract which he made while under the influence of fear, and that, consequently, if he demands restitution, the winner is bound to make it. Consequently, when determining obligations, Lugo and he arrive at practically the same result.