Neo-Scholasticism was a philosophical and theological school of thought that arose in the mid-nineteenth century as a revival of medieval scholasticism, especially the thought of St. Thomas Aquinas. In the later decades of the century and well into the 20th century Neo-Scholasticism dominated the Catholic intellectual milieu.Neo-Scholasticism was a philosophical and theological school of thought that arose in the mid–-nineteenth century as a revival of medieval scholasticism, especially of the thought of St. Thomas Aquinas. In the later decades of the nineteenth century and well into the twentieth, Neo-Scholasticism dominated the Catholic intellectual milieu.

In The Data of Modern Ethics Examined, John J. Ming compares the purely materialistic system of ethics with the Christian ethics that it professes to have supplanted and cast aside. He compares them, not from the point of view of theology—that comparison would be of no interest to unbelievers—but from the point of view of philosophy and reason.