Book I, Chapter 28

Here, then, for the fuller treatment of this subject, a brief inquiry into Fate must be made. For many assert that there is Fate, while many, and above all the Catholic Doctors, deny it. The Stoics, as Boethius testifies on the last chapter of the first Peri hermeneias, assert that there is Fate E1 and that all things are done by Fate. E2 Augustine bears the same witness in the City of God 5, 8 and 9, and many philosophers and poets agree with them. Against them Augustine says, in the first part on John, homily 37: "O, if your heart were not fatuous, you would not believe in Fate" 1. He likewise reproves and condemns it above, in homily 31. He also says, in the second book on Genesis according to the letter, 25, that Fate is to be spurned as alien to the soundness of the Faith.

The same Augustine also, in the Questions on the Old and New Law, Question 115 2, destroys with great struggle the fate of the stars and of the art of Mathesis 3. His reason is that, if it is posited, it destroys free choice in men and in God, and subjects Christ and his deeds to necessity. Moreover, in Against Faustus 2, dealing with the star of Christ that led the Magi, he rejects the fate of the stars from Christ and from all men. The blessed Gregory also, A1 homily 10, which is on the Epiphany, speaking of the same star, says thus. It is to be known that the Priscillianist heretics, who think that each person is born under the configurations of the stars, take this as support for their error, that a new star came forth when the Lord appeared in the flesh, whose fate they think that star to have been. But far be it from the hearts of the faithful to say that fate is anything; and he goes on to refute it with many arguments. Jerome also, in book 11, on that text of Isaiah 38, "In those days Hezekiah fell sick," etc., says: "The question of fate is resolved, and the chains of necessity and of causes. For no day of death is appointed beforehand for individuals; rather, by the will of God and for causes unknown to mortals, someone either lives or dies. This is especially so since, even in this life, the necessity of death is sometimes postponed, and we have read of very many raised after death." A2 Ambrose, moreover, in his Hexameron, treating of the work of the fourth day, refutes and confutes fate at length.

Gregory of Nyssa 4 also, as cited in the Gloss on Matthew 2, argues against those who posit fate on this ground: that prayers would then be foolish, that the nature of the contingent would be destroyed, and that there would be no free choice of the will. Chrysostom holds the same on that passage of Matthew, B1 as do many Catholic writers. With them agrees that Ovid Naso the Paelignian, in book 1 of De vetula, where he treats of the game of dice 5. He condemns it because it rests not on reason but on the chance fall of the dice, and on men's fortune or fate, saying thus: You do not know the fortunes of men, etc. If you posit Fate, fools are they who follow the Fates. For if fate were posited, there would be no freedom of choice; but freedom is something; therefore nothing— Fate is fatuous; fatuous are they who follow the Fates. Now of these, to use the words of the Philosopher, Ethics 1, 12 6: "Many, and ancient men, say this; few, and distinguished men, say that. It is reasonable that neither party errs in everything, but that each directs one thing, or very many, rightly." I therefore have recourse to that science which brings great fruits to the diligent: the science of dividing, according to the tradition of the Peripatetic school.

Fate, then, according to the opinion of the Doctors, is spoken of in two ways. In one way it is the common force of the stars, which universally regulates and constrains, by inevitable necessity, all things that happen in the world. In particular it is a certain stellar power, consisting in the configuration of the stars at the hour at which someone was conceived or born, which also imposes necessity on all future things concerning the one then born. In the other way Fate is so called from fando, from the speaking, that is, or utterance, of Jupiter, according to the Stoics and other pagan philosophers and poets, for whom he was the supreme God. Among Catholics this can be called the Utterance, or the Speech, of God 7. Stellar or astral fate is not to be posited, especially if it entails necessity, as the premises around the thirty-second part, and the thirty-ninth of the first Corollary, teach. So the Doctors reviewed above, and indeed all Catholic Doctors, unanimously condemn Fate. If, however, stellar fate imports not necessity but a certain disposition and inclination in men toward certain acts, it seems not to be altogether denied. But divine Fate is without doubt to be conceded.

Is it not written at the beginning of creation: God said, "Let there be light," and there was light? And so of the other creatures? And elsewhere: "He spoke, and they were made": "For whatever he willed he did, because his will is perfect." This divine fate belongs chiefly to the divine will, which is the efficacious cause of things, as the preceding chapters have taught.

This distinction is evident from Augustine, City of God 5, D1 1, 8 and 9. There, after rejecting the first member, he says at length of the second that the Stoics call Fate every connection and series of causes by which everything that happens happens. They attribute the whole of it to the will and power of the supreme God, who is most truly believed to foreknow all things and to leave nothing unordered. But they are shown to give the name Fate especially to the very will of the supreme God, whose power extends unconquerably through all things, since they invoke 8 Jupiter, whom they take to be the supreme God, on whom they say the connection of the Fates depends. And below, at 9: "We do not say," he says, D2 "that all things happen by fate; rather we say that nothing happens by fate. For the name of fate, where it is wont to be placed by speakers, that is, in the configuration of the stars under which each one was conceived or born—since the thing itself is idly asserted—we show to be worth nothing. But the order of causes, in which the will of God has the greatest power, we neither deny nor designate by the word 'fate', unless perhaps we understand fate as derived from fando, that is, from speaking. For we cannot deny that it is written in the holy writings: 'God has spoken once; these two things I have heard, that power belongs to God, and to you, Lord, mercy, because you will render to each according to his works.' For 'he has spoken once' is understood to mean that he has spoken immovably, that is, unchangeably, just as he knows unchangeably all things that are to be, and all that he himself is going to do." And above, in the first chapter of the same book: "Surely," he says, "human kingdoms are established by divine providence. If anyone, therefore, attributes them to fate because he gives the name of fate to the very will or power of God, let him hold his opinion but correct his tongue."

E1 With this agrees Isidore, Etymologies 8, 45 9, saying: The pagans say that Fate is whatever the gods speak, whatever Jupiter speaks; so they call it Fate from fando, that is, from speaking. If this name were not already usually understood of another thing, toward which we do not wish 10 to incline the hearts of men, we could reasonably call it Fate from fando: "For we cannot deny," etc., the words of Augustine set out above.

There is, moreover, another twofold distinction regarding Fate. In one way Fate is taken actively, for the speech or utterance of the divine will, or of God disposing all things. In another way it is taken passively, as indeed the name itself rather suggests the effect and passive disposition of this fate, inherent in the very things disposed 11. The first member is evident from Augustine, City of God 5, 8, who for this side cites Seneca, Homer, and the Stoics. For he cites from Seneca these verses:

Lead me, highest Father, ruler of the lofty heavens, wherever you please; there is no delay in obeying. Here I am, ready; make me unwilling, I shall follow groaning, and, being wicked, shall have to suffer what I might have done as a good man. The fates lead the willing, the unwilling they drag.

From Homer, moreover, he cites these verses, which Cicero turned into Latin:

Such are the minds of men as the light with which Father Jupiter himself has illuminated the fruitful lands 12.

And Augustine says that through these verses, which the Stoics allege for their opinion on Fate, it is most plainly declared what they take Fate to be, since they invoke Jupiter, whom they take to be the supreme God, on whom they say the connection of the Fates depends. Hence it seems that Aristotle, De anima 2, 148 13, unjustly rebukes Homer. He imputes to him that he supposes understanding to be something corporeal, like sensing, because (as Aristotle reports) he said that the intellect in earthly men is such B1 as the Father of men and gods brings on the day. For by "Father of men and gods" Homer did not mean the Sun or something corporeal, as Aristotle tacitly implies and his expositors say expressly. He meant Jupiter himself, the supreme Father of men as of the other gods, as is clear from his verses cited above, which convey this opinion. Nor should it count against this that he says "by light," as though he meant that Jupiter does this by means of some material light. For he can fittingly understand by this light the agent intellect, which, on your own testimony 14, De anima 3, 18, is compared to light; C1 whence also the Psalmist, Ps 35 [36]: "In your light we shall see light."

This first member of the distinction on Fate is evident also from the Philosopher, in the last chapter of De mundo, who explains the three ordinances of the Fates, as Isidore too does, Etymologies 8, 45: of the past, Atropos; of the future, Lachesis; of the present, Clotho. He says: "The story is completed"—namely, about the threefold Fate—"not in disorder." And all these are nothing other than God, as the vigorous Plato also says. Hence it is clear that this opinion is Plato's too.

The second member of the distinction set out above is evident from Philosophy, Consolation of Philosophy 4, prose 6, instructing Boethius thus: C2 "Every generation of things, and the whole progress of mutable natures, and whatever else is moved in any way, obtains its causes, order and forms from the stability of the divine mind. This, set in the art of its simplicity 15, establishes a manifold manner for things to be done. When this manner is beheld in the very purity of the divine intelligence, it is called providence; but when it is referred to those things which it moves and disposes, it was called Fate by the ancients. It will readily be clear that these are different. For providence is the divine reason itself, established in the supreme Prince of all, which disposes all things. Fate, however, is the disposition inherent in mobile things, through which providence binds each thing in its own orders. For providence embraces all things together, however diverse, however infinite. Fate, however, sorts out individual things, distributed in motion, places, forms and times. So this unfolding of the temporal order, gathered into one in the view of the divine mind, is providence, while the same gathering, sorted out and unfolded in times, is called Fate. Though these are different, yet the one depends on the other. For the fatal order proceeds from the simplicity of providence. Just as an artisan, perceiving in mind the form of the thing to be made, sets the effect of the work in motion, and leads through temporal orders what he had foreseen simply and in a single present, so God by providence disposes what is to be done singularly and stably, but administers by Fate, manifoldly and temporally, these very things which he has disposed. Whether, therefore, Fate is exercised by certain spirits ministering to divine providence, or by soul, or by all of nature serving it, or by the heavenly motions of the stars, or by angelic power, or by the manifold cleverness of demons, or by some of these, or by all of them, the fatal series is woven. This, at least, is manifest: that providence is the immobile and simple form of things to be done, while Fate is the mobile bond and temporal order of those things which the divine simplicity has disposed to be done. Hence it comes about that all things that are under Fate are subject to providence, to which Fate itself also is subject."

From these it seems that Boethius posits Fate only according to the effect, and not according to the efficiency of the divine will, as the theologians and philosophers named above do. It also seems that he argues gratuitously 16 against the Stoics, in his exposition of the first book of Aristotle's Peri hermeneias, where he treats of future contingents, on the ground that they posited that all things come from Fate. For they were speaking of Fate according to the efficacy of the divine will, as appears from what has been said. Hence they are free from every real error, even if perhaps not from a verbal one, as the preceding chapters taught. For this word "Fate" is suspect among Catholics, although the thing itself is sound. Having shown, then, in what way Fate is or is not, and what it is, it now remains to show of what kind it is. First, therefore, it must be shown that Fate, so called from fando, or the speech of God, is in a certain way the cause of all things that happen, whether naturally, by will, or in any other way whatever. The next of this 17 proves this. That all voluntary things come from Fate, that is, from speaking, or the connection of causes, appears from the next and the ninth of this.

Moreover, all who speak of Fate place it as much or more in voluntary human affairs than in any others whatever. This is also evident in City of God 5, 6 and 9, where Augustine says: "It does not follow that, if the order of all causes is certain to God, therefore nothing is in the choice of our will. For our wills themselves are in the order of causes, which is certain to God and is contained in his presence 18; since human wills too are causes of human works. And so he who foreknew all the causes of things certainly could not have been ignorant, among those causes, of our wills also, which he foreknew to be the causes of our works." Further on, having distinguished three kinds or genera of causes, the fortuitous, the natural and the voluntary, and again the cause which makes and is not made, that which makes and is made, and that which is made rather than makes, and having reduced all these kinds to the divine will, he adds: "How then does the order of causes, which is certain to the foreknowing God, bring it about that nothing is in our will, when in that very order of causes our wills have a large place? Let Cicero, then, contend with those who say that this order of causes is fatal, or rather call it itself by the name of Fate. This we abhor, chiefly on account of the word, which has not been accustomed to be understood of the thing in its truth. But that he denies that the order of all causes is most certain and best known to God's foreknowledge, we detest more than the Stoics do. Therefore our wills also have as much power as God willed and foreknew them to have. And so whatever they can do, they most certainly can do, and what they are going to do, they are altogether going to do, because he foreknew that they would have power and would act, whose foreknowledge cannot be deceived." He makes this clearer still in chapter 10. With this the authority of Boethius cited above agrees, but further on, in the same prose, it says more expressly: "This series of fate, or providence, binds the acts and fortunes of men with an indissoluble connection of causes."