age, either
spiritual or temporal, is not necessarily unlawful because some
people are thereby provoked to sin.

Otherwise it would be unlawful to manufacture arms or to make
war.

On these premises I base the following propositions:

1. The lottery is not in itself unlawful.

Proof. It is not prohibited by any law, divine, human, or
natural: divine, because it is not forbidden in Scripture;
human, because there is no law against it as there is against
hazard or dicing; natural, because it is not excluded as (_a_)
coming by good fortune, (_b_) provoking others to sin, (_c_)
vain and useless.

_a_ and _b_ are proved by premiss 1 and 4. _c_ is proved
because we are supposing that the lottery is undertaken in
order that the city of Bruges may make a profit with which to
pay off some of its municipal debt, or be lightened of some of
its common burdens, so that its citizens may be free to
journey whither they please. (That this last refers among other
things to pilgrimage, may be inferred from a reference to the
Canon Law on the undertaking of journeys, chapter on Sacred
Churches.)

2. The lottery is not prohibited by the human laws forbidding
hazard and dice.

Proof. The laws prohibiting these do not forbid the lottery,
nor can it be included under them by parity of reasoning. For
hazard is not forbidden because it depends on chance, or else
all gaming would be forbidden; and it is not forbidden to play
for small stakes or on the occasion of a party. But it (hazard)
is forbidden because, as Petrus de Palude says in book 4,
distinction 15, question 3, article 5, the person who loses is
wont to blaspheme; and also because men are tempted to lose
more than they can afford.'

We need not follow the argument in detail, but the fourth proposition
is interesting, 'That there is an injustice in the lotteries as
practised by some cities, in that the creditors of the city are
compelled against their will to take part in the lottery, and so
probably make a loss, for fear of not recovering the money owed to
them'. After six propositions come two contrary arguments, which are
refuted by five and two considerations; and then there is a brief
summing up.

Excellent reasoning this doubtless was, and the student who could
dispute over these intricacies for hours togethe