714. What should we think of those who seek to enhance their pleasure in all sorts of excesses?
“Such individuals should be pitied rather than envied because they are very close to death.”
a) Physical or moral death?
“Both.”
Those who seek an enhancement of physical satisfactions in any kind of excess place themselves below animals, because even animals stop at the satisfaction of a need. They relinquish the reason given to them by God for their guidance, and the greater their excesses the more power they give to their animal nature over their spiritual nature. Diseases, illnesses and death itself are the consequences of excess. They also serve as atonements for transgressing God’s law.
