Domingo de Soto 1494 – 1560
Domingo de Soto was a Spanish Dominican philosopher, theologian, and jurist of the School of Salamanca. Imperial theologian to Charles V at the Council of Trent and confessor to the same emperor, he held the prime chair of theology at Salamanca and produced major works on natural law, just war, and economics. His De Iustitia et Iure shaped the early modern doctrine of natural rights, private property, and the just treatment of the poor, while his Quaestiones in Octo Libros Physicorum Aristotelis included the first known statement of the law that freely falling bodies are uniformly accelerated, anticipating Galileo by a generation.
Key facts
- Nationality
- Spanish
- Era
- Modern
- Movements
- Scholasticism, Christian, Renaissance
Selected quotes
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Attributed to Domingo de Soto:
“Law is the rule of right reason directed to the common good.”
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Attributed to Domingo de Soto:
“A heavy body falls with uniformly accelerated motion.”
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Attributed to Domingo de Soto:
“Property is grounded in natural law, but its uses are limited by charity.”
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Attributed to Domingo de Soto:
“No people may be enslaved on the pretext of conversion.”
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Attributed to Domingo de Soto:
“The just war is fought to right a wrong, not to enrich the conqueror.”