Chapter IV — Knowledge Follows the Knower

The Text

Chapter IV

Then said she: 'This debate about providence is an old one, and is vigorously discussed by Cicero in his "Divination"; thou also hast long and earnestly pondered the problem, yet no one has had diligence and perseverance enough to find a solution. And the reason of this obscurity is that the movement of human reasoning cannot cope with the simplicity of the Divine foreknowledge; for if a conception of its nature could in any wise be framed, no shadow of uncertainty would remain. With a view of making this at last clear and plain, I will begin by considering the arguments by which thou art swayed. First, I inquire into the reasons why thou art dissatisfied with the solution proposed, which is to the effect that, seeing the fact of foreknowledge is not thought the cause of the necessity of future events, foreknowledge is not to be deemed any hindrance to the freedom of the will. Now, surely the sole ground on which thou arguest the necessity of the future is that things which are foreknown cannot fail to come to pass. But if, as thou wert ready to acknowledge just now, the fact of foreknowledge imposes no necessity on things future, what reason is there for supposing the results of voluntary action constrained to a fixed issue? Suppose, for the sake of argument, and to see what follows, we assume that there is no foreknowledge. Are willed actions, then, tied down to any necessity in this case?'

'Certainly not.'

'Let us assume foreknowledge again, but without its involving any actual necessity; the freedom of the will, I imagine, will remain in complete integrity. But thou wilt say that, even although the foreknowledge is not the necessity of the future event's occurrence, yet it is a sign that it will necessarily happen. Granted; but in this case it is plain that, even if there had been no foreknowledge, the issues would have been inevitably certain. For a sign only indicates something which is, does not bring to pass that of which it is the sign. We require to show beforehand that all things, without exception, happen of necessity in order that a preconception may be a sign of this necessity. Otherwise, if there is no such universal necessity, neither can any preconception be a sign of a necessity which exists not. Manifestly, too, a proof established on firm grounds of reason must be drawn not from signs and loose general arguments, but from suitable and necessary causes. But how can it be that things foreseen should ever fail to come to pass? Why, this is to suppose us to believe that the events which providence foresees to be coming were not about to happen, instead of our supposing that, although they should come to pass, yet there was no necessity involved in their own nature compelling their occurrence. Take an illustration that will help to convey my meaning. There are many things which we see taking place before our eyes—the movements of charioteers, for instance, in guiding and turning their cars, and so on. Now, is any one of these movements compelled by any necessity?'

'No; certainly not. There would be no efficacy in skill if all motions took place perforce.'

'Then, things which in taking place are free from any necessity as to their being in the present must also, before they take place, be about to happen without necessity. Wherefore there are things which will come to pass, the occurrence of which is perfectly free from necessity. At all events, I imagine that no one will deny that things now taking place were about to come to pass before they were actually happening. Such things, however much foreknown, are in their occurrence free. For even as knowledge of things present imports no necessity into things that are taking place, so foreknowledge of the future imports none into things that are about to come. But this, thou wilt say, is the very point in dispute—whether any foreknowing is possible of things whose occurrence is not necessary. For here there seems to thee a contradiction, and, if they are foreseen, their necessity follows; whereas if there is no necessity, they can by no means be foreknown; and thou thinkest that nothing can be grasped as known unless it is certain, but if things whose occurrence is uncertain are foreknown as certain, this is the very mist of opinion, not the truth of knowledge. For to think of things otherwise than as they are, thou believest to be incompatible with the soundness of knowledge.

'Now, the cause of the mistake is this—that men think that all knowledge is cognized purely by the nature and efficacy of the thing known. Whereas the case is the very reverse: all that is known is grasped not conformably to its own efficacy, but rather conformably to the faculty of the knower. An example will make this clear: the roundness of a body is recognised in one way by sight, in another by touch. Sight looks upon it from a distance as a whole by a simultaneous reflection of rays; touch grasps the roundness piecemeal, by contact and attachment to the surface, and by actual movement round the periphery itself. Man himself, likewise, is viewed in one way by Sense, in another by Imagination, in another way, again, by Thought, in another by pure Intelligence. Sense judges figure clothed in material substance, Imagination figure alone without matter. Thought transcends this again, and by its contemplation of universals considers the type itself which is contained in the individual. The eye of Intelligence is yet more exalted; for overpassing the sphere of the universal, it will behold absolute form itself by the pure force of the mind's vision. Wherein the main point to be considered is this: the higher faculty of comprehension embraces the lower, while the lower cannot rise to the higher. For Sense has no efficacy beyond matter, nor can Imagination behold universal ideas, nor Thought embrace pure form; but Intelligence, looking down, as it were, from its higher standpoint in its intuition of form, discriminates also the several elements which underlie it; but it comprehends them in the same way as it comprehends that form itself, which could be cognized by no other than itself. For it cognizes the universal of Thought, the figure of Imagination, and the matter of Sense, without employing Thought, Imagination, or Sense, but surveying all things, so to speak, under the aspect of pure form by a single flash of intuition. Thought also, in considering the universal, embraces images and sense-impressions without resorting to Imagination or Sense. For it is Thought which has thus defined the universal from its conceptual point of view: "Man is a two-legged animal endowed with reason." This is indeed a universal notion, yet no one is ignorant that the thing is imaginable and presentable to Sense, because Thought considers it not by Imagination or Sense, but by means of rational conception. Imagination, too, though its faculty of viewing and forming representations is founded upon the senses, nevertheless surveys sense-impressions without calling in Sense, not in the way of Sense-perception, but of Imagination. See'st thou, then, how all things in cognizing use rather their own faculty than the faculty of the things which they cognize? Nor is this strange; for since every judgment is the act of the judge, it is necessary that each should accomplish its task by its own, not by another's power.'

Song IVA Psychological Fallacy.^R

From the Porch's murky depths Comes a doctrine sage, That doth liken living mind To a written page; Since all knowledge comes through Sense, Graven by Experience.

'As,' say they, 'the pen its marks Curiously doth trace On the smooth unsullied white Of the paper's face, So do outer things impress Images on consciousness.'

But if verily the mind Thus all passive lies; If no living power within Its own force supplies; If it but reflect again, Like a glass, things false and vain—

Whence the wondrous faculty That perceives and knows, That in one fair ordered scheme Doth the world dispose; Grasps each whole that Sense presents, Or breaks into elements?

So divides and recombines, And in changeful wise Now to low descends, and now To the height doth rise; Last in inward swift review Strictly sifts the false and true?

Of these ample potencies Fitter cause, I ween, Were Mind's self than marks impressed By the outer scene. Yet the body through the sense Stirs the soul's intelligence.

When light flashes on the eye, Or sound strikes the ear, Mind aroused to due response Makes the message clear; And the dumb external signs With the hidden forms combines.

R A criticism of the doctrine of the mind as a blank sheet of paper on which experience writes, as held by the Stoics in anticipation of Locke. See Zeller, 'Stoics, Epicureans, and Sceptics,' Reichel's translation, p. 76.

A new modern English rendering, made from the Latin with AI assistance — a reading aid, not a scholarly edition.

Chapter IV

Then she said: "This is the old complaint about providence, vigorously stirred up by Marcus Tullius when he divided up the subject of divination, and one long and much investigated by you yourself — but by no means yet sufficiently and firmly cleared up by any of you. The cause of this darkness is that the movement of human reasoning cannot be brought up to the simplicity of the divine foreknowledge; for if this could in any way be conceived, no ambiguity at all would be left. This I will try at last to make plain and to resolve, once I have first weighed the things by which you are disturbed.

"For I ask: why do you think that argument of those who resolve the matter less effective — the one which, because it holds that foreknowledge is not the cause of necessity for future things, supposes that the freedom of the will is in no way hindered by foreknowledge? For do you draw your argument for the necessity of future things from anywhere else than from the fact that the things which are foreknown cannot fail to come about? If, then, foreknowledge adds no necessity to future things — which you yourself admitted just a little while ago — what is there to compel the voluntary outcomes of things to a fixed result? For the sake of argument, so that you may see what follows, let us suppose there is no foreknowledge. Surely, so far as this is concerned, the things that come from the will are not compelled to necessity?"

"By no means."

"Let us suppose again that it does exist, but that it lays no necessity upon things. There will remain, I think, the same whole and absolute freedom of the will. 'But foreknowledge,' you will say, 'though it is not a necessity that future things should come about, is nonetheless a sign that they will necessarily come about.' In this way, then, even if there had been no foreknowing, it would still be established that the outcomes of future things are necessary. For every sign only shows what is, but does not bring about what it signifies. Therefore it must first be demonstrated that nothing happens except by necessity, in order that foreknowledge may appear to be a sign of this necessity. Otherwise, if there is no such necessity, foreknowledge cannot be a sign of a thing that does not exist. Now it is established that a proof grounded on firm reasoning is to be drawn not from signs, nor from arguments fetched from outside, but from suitable and necessary causes.

"But how can it happen that the things which are foreseen as future should not come about? As if we believed that the things which providence foreknows will be, will not come about — and not rather supposed that, although they do come about, they nonetheless had in their own nature no necessity of coming about! This you may easily weigh from the following. For we watch with our own eyes many things while they are being done — such as the things charioteers are seen to do in steering and turning their teams, and the rest in this manner. Now does any necessity compel any of those things to be done so?"

"By no means. For the effect of skill would be in vain, if all things moved under compulsion."

"Things, then, which while they are happening lack the necessity of existing, these same things, before they happen, are future without necessity. Therefore there are certain things going to come about whose outcome is freed from all necessity. For I think no one will say that the things which now happen were not, before they happened, going to happen. These things, then, even when foreknown, have free outcomes. For just as the knowledge of present things imposes no necessity on the things that are happening, so the foreknowledge of future things imposes none on the things that are to come.

"'But this very point,' you say, 'is in doubt: whether there can be any foreknowledge of those things which do not have necessary outcomes.' For they seem to clash, and you think that, if they are foreseen, necessity follows; and that if necessity is absent, they cannot be foreknown at all, and that nothing can be grasped by knowledge except what is certain; and that if things of uncertain outcome are foreseen as though certain, this is the darkness of opinion, not the truth of knowledge. For you believe that to judge a thing otherwise than it is differs from the soundness of knowledge.

"The cause of this error is that everyone reckons that all the things he knows are known only according to the force and nature of the things themselves which are known. But the whole matter is the opposite. For everything that is known is grasped not according to its own force, but rather according to the faculty of those who know it. For, to make this clear by a brief example: sight and touch recognize the same roundness of a body differently. Sight, remaining at a distance, beholds the whole at once by casting its rays; touch, however, clinging and joined to the sphere, moving around its very circumference, grasps the roundness part by part. A man himself, too, is regarded differently by the senses, by imagination, by reason, and by intelligence. For the senses judge the shape as established in the underlying matter; imagination, however, judges the shape alone, without matter. Reason transcends even this, and by a universal consideration weighs the very species that is present in particulars. But the eye of intelligence stands higher still; for, having passed beyond the circuit of the universal, it beholds with the pure point of the mind that simple form itself.

"In this, the chief thing to consider is this: that the higher power of comprehension embraces the lower, but the lower in no way rises up to the higher. For the senses are capable of nothing outside matter, nor does imagination behold universal species, nor does reason grasp the simple form; but intelligence, gazing as if from above, having conceived the form, judges all the things that lie beneath it — but in that way in which it comprehends the form itself, which could be known to no other. For it knows the universal of reason, the shape of imagination, and the material sensible thing, using neither reason nor imagination nor the senses, but beholding all things, so to speak, formally in that one stroke of the mind. Reason too, when it looks at something universal, grasps imaginable or sensible things without using imagination or the senses. For it is reason that thus defines the universal of its own conception: 'Man is a two-footed rational animal.' And although this is a universal notion, no one is unaware that the thing is imaginable and sensible — yet reason considers it not by imagination or sense, but in a rational conception. Imagination too, although it took its beginning from the senses in seeing and forming shapes, nonetheless surveys all sensible things, even in the absence of sense, by a faculty of judging that is not sensible but imaginative.

"Do you see, then, how in knowing, all these use their own faculty rather than that of the things which are known? Nor is this unjust; for since every act of judgment is the act of the one judging, it is necessary that each carry out its own work by its own power, not by the power of another."

Song IVA Psychological Fallacy.

Once the Painted Porch brought forth old men of all too obscure mind, who believed that the senses and images, from outer bodies, were stamped upon the mind — as it is the custom, with a swift stylus, to fix pressed letters upon the smooth expanse of a page that bears no marks.

But if the mind, strong with its own powers, unfolds nothing by its own movements, but lies only passive, subject to the marks of bodies, and gives back, like a mirror, the empty images of things — whence then is there alive in our souls this notion that discerns all? What power perceives the particulars, or what divides the things once known? What gathers the divided up again, and, choosing now this path, now that, now lifts its head to the heights, now sinks down into the depths, then, turning back upon itself, refutes the false by the true?

This is a cause far more effective, far more powerful, than that which merely suffers the marks impressed upon it, as matter does.

Yet there comes before it, rousing and stirring the powers of the soul, a passion in the living body, when light strikes the eyes, or a voice rings in the ears. Then the roused vigor of the mind calls forth the species it holds within to movements like those impressions, applies them to the outer marks, and mingles the images with the forms hidden away within.