The concept of justice Cervantes employs in Don Quixote is that of St. Thomas Aquinas: “The proper act of justice is nothing other than rendering to each individual what is his own.” [2]
There is legal or general justice (also called common justice) which governs the duties of citizens toward the common good. There is also particular justice, which has two parts: 1) Commutative justice, that which governs the mutual dealings of two persons. 2) Distributive justice, that which regulates the relation of the community to individuals. [3]
Angel Pérez Martínez in his work, El Quijote y su idea de virtud (“Don Quixote and his idea of virtue”) observes: “The word ‘justice’ appears fifty times in Don Quixote, twenty in the first part and thirty in the second. The word ‘just’ appears thirty-six times.” (p.146) He remarks: “The search for justice is perhaps one of the most explicit virtues among the ideals of The Knight of the Sorrowful Face.” (p. 147)
The narrator
The narrator of the novel recounts Don Quixote’s motives to become a knight errant:
The truth is that when his mind was completely gone, he had the strangest thought any lunatic in the world ever had, which was that it seemed reasonable and necessary to him, both for the sake of his honor and as a service to the nation, to become a knight errant and travel the world with his armor and his horse to seek adventures and engage in everything he had read that knights errant engaged in, righting all manner of wrongs and, by seizing the opportunity and placing himself in danger and ending those wrongs, winning eternal renown and everlasting fame. [4]
Certainly, for Don Quixote, the pursuit of justice, righting all manner of wrongs, is essential to his mission.
The Shepherd Andrés
Don Quixote has just been dubbed a knight (Chapter 3) by the innkeeper of the inn whom the Don thought to be the lord of a castle. It was dawn and Don Quixote left the inn contented, high-spirited, and jubilant. He had not gone very far when he heard the sounds of feeble cries, like those of a person in pain.
Don Quixote directed Rocinante (his horse) toward the sounds. He saw a robust peasant whipping a boy about fifteen years old. He confronted the peasant and accused him of cowardice and cruelty. The peasant explained that the boy was one of his servants whom he was punishing for losing his sheep. Don Quixote commanded him to release the boy and to pay all owed wages. The farmer agreed, but told the knight that he had to take Andrés (the name of the boy) to his house because at the moment he had no money in his possession. To this Andrés protested:
“Me, go back with him?” […] “Not me! No, Señor, don’t even think of it; as soon as we’re alone he’ll skin me alive, just like St. Bartholomew.”
“No, he will not,” replied Don Quixote. “It is enough for me to command and he will respect me, and if he swears to me by the order of chivalry that he has received, I shall let him go free, and I shall guarantee the payment.”
“Señor, your grace, think of what you are saying,” said the boy. “For this master of mine is no knight and he’s never received any order of chivalry; he’s Juan Haldudo the rich man, and he lives in Quintanar.” (I, 4; 37)
The scene
Don Quixote left the scene, satisfied of having accomplished what he thought was a just deed.
When the farmer saw that the knight had disappeared from view, he tied the boy to the oak tree again and said: “I want to increase the debt so I can increase the payment.” (I, 4; 38) and “gave him so many lashes that he left him half-dead.” (I, 4; 38)
The episode does not conclude here but continues in Chapter 31 of the first part. Don Quixote encounters Andrés again, and he takes advantage of the situation to explain to all those present how he saved the boy from the lashes of his master (Chapter 4). He also enumerates the advantages of knight-chivalry. He told the boy to recount the past heroic deed. To which the boy replied:
“Everything that your grace has said is very true,” […] “but the matter ended in a way that was very different from what your grace imagines.” (I, 31; 264)
Commutative justice
The episode of Andrés presents a case of commutative justice. Don Quixote defends the weak (a fifteen years old boy) that is being punished by his master with extreme cruelty, perhaps an injustice and punishment very common at the time. (Pérez Martínez, pp. 156-157) Nevertheless, his attempt at righting the wrong fails because of the knight’s lack of prudence.
Prudence is the virtue that disposes practical reason to discern our true good in every circumstance and to choose the right means of achieving it, “is right reason in action,” [5] according to St. Tomas Aquinas. Joseph Pieper calls it: “The conscience of a particular situation” [6] and is always related to the “ways and means,” and to the “concrete reality.” (p.43) Angel Pérez Martínez remarks: “a previous requirement of the just action is a correct assessment of reality,” this being the reason why prudence is needed for the sake of justice.
Don Quixote lacks prudence because, due to his madness, he employs the lenses of chivalry to look at reality, and distorts it. He is incapable of grasping a situation that even a fifteen years old boy is able to understand and thus, to warn the knight: “For this master of mine is no knight and he’s never received any order of chivalry; he’s Juan Haldudo the rich man, and he lives in Quintanar.”
In conclusion, the only way that someone would be capable of choosing the good and achieving justice in a concrete situation is by establishing coherence between principles, means and ends.
[1] Angel Pérez Martínez. El Quijote y su idea de virtud. Madrid: CSIC, 2012. 143-146.
[2] Thomas Aquinas. Summa Theologica [II-II, Q.58, A.11] https://www3.nd.edu/~afreddos/summa-translation/TOC-part2-2.htm
[3] Angel Pérez Martínez, p.138.
[4] Miguel de Cervantes. Don Quixote. Edith Grossman Trans. New York: Harper Collins, 2005.p.21.
[5] Summa Theologica [I-I, Q.47, A. 2]
[6] Las virtudes fundamentales. Madrid: Rialp, 2022. p.43.
