legitimate in ecclesiastical law is used of children who have been legitimatized as well as of those who were born in lawful wedlock.
(b) The mind of the legislator and the scope of the law must be attended to. This rule does not imply that we must try to get at the private intention and object which the lawgiver had in view in making the law. It means that we must consider the circumstances which gave rise to the law, the object which it was designed to attain as expressed in the law itself, especially in the narrative or historical portion of it. The whole law should be pondered, not merely an isolated section; and if there is question of interpreting an answer or rescript sent in reply to a question or petition, this latter must be carefully considered.
(c) Laws which impose some new burden or restriction receive a strict interpretation, those which confer a favour a wide interpretation. For the lawgiver is presumed to be benignant towards his subjects, and to have expressed himself with precision and strictness in the disagreeable task of laying burdens on his people. In such a law, then, the word clerk will only comprehend the lower ranks of the clergy, whereas it will comprehend dignitaries and religious in favourable matters.
(d) A law must not be extended from one case to another even if the same reason exist in the two cases, for the reason of the law is not the law. And so although parish priests are bound to offer Mass on holy days of obligation for their parishioners, this obligation must not be extended to a parish priest's assistants, for such priests, though they have the care of souls, are not parish priests (Can. 475). If, however, anything unjust, inequitable, or absurd would follow from the application of this rule, then it must not be applied. And so, generally, where the law punishes the adultery of the husband, it must be applied to an adulterous wife; where power is granted to make a will, legacies may be left too. The less is contained in the greater (cf. Can. 18 ff.).
3. Epteikeia, or equity, is a benign and equitable interpretation of the law, by which it is not deemed to apply to some particular case. For cases arise where, if the law were applied, hardship and harm would be the result. The law is made for ordinary conditions and is intended to apply in ordinary circumstances; the lawgiver could not foresee all possible cases, and he is not presumed to intend the law to press unduly on individuals, so as to cause special hardship. So that when
