And slew his child with priestly knife.
When by the cavern’s glimmering light
His comrades dear Odysseus saw
In the huge Cyclops’ hideous maw
Engulfed, he wept the piteous sight.
But blinded soon, and wild with pain—
In bitter tears and sore annoy—
For that foul feast’s unholy joy
Grim Polyphemus paid again.
His labours for Alcides win
A name of glory far and wide;
He tamed the Centaur’s haughty pride,
And from the lion reft his skin.
The foul birds with sure darts he slew;
The golden fruit he stole—in vain
The dragon’s watch; with triple chain
From hell’s depths Cerberus he drew.
With their fierce lord’s own flesh he fed
The wild steeds; Hydra overcame
With fire. ’Neath his own waves in shame
Maimed Achelous hid his head.
Huge Cacus for his crimes was slain;
On Libya’s sands Antaeus hurled;
The shoulders that upheld the world
The great boar’s dribbled spume did stain.
Last toil of all—his might sustained
The ball of heaven, nor did he bend
Beneath; this toil, his labour’s end,
The prize of heaven’s high glory gained.
Brave hearts, press on! Lo, heavenward lead
These bright examples! From the fight
Turn not your backs in coward flight;
Earth’s conflict won, the stars your meed!
Book V
Free Will and God’s Foreknowledge
Ch. I. Boethius asks if there is really any such thing as chance. Philosophy answers, in conformity with Aristotle’s definition (Physics, II, IV), that chance is merely relative to human purpose, and that what seems fortuitous really depends on a more subtle form of causation.—Ch. II. Has man, then, any freedom, if the reign of law is thus absolute? Freedom of choice, replies Philosophy, is a necessary attribute of reason. Man has a measure of freedom, though a less perfect freedom than divine natures.—Ch. III. But how can man’s freedom be reconciled with God’s absolute foreknowledge? If God’s foreknowledge be certain, it seems to exclude the possibility of man’s free will. But if man has no freedom of choice, it follows that rewards and punishments are unjust as well as useless; that merit and demerit are mere names; that God is the cause of men’s wickednesses; that prayer is meaningless.—Ch. IV. The explanation is that man’s reasoning faculties are not adequate to the apprehension of the ways of God’s foreknowledge. If we could know, as He knows, all that is most perplexing in this problem would be made plain. For knowledge depends not on the nature of the thing known, but on the faculty of the knower.—Ch. V. Now, where our senses conflict with our reason, we defer the judgment of the lower faculty to the judgment of the higher. Our present perplexity arises from our viewing God’s foreknowledge from the standpoint of human reason. We must try and rise to the higher standpoint of God’s immediate intuition.—Ch. VI. To understand this higher form of cognition, we must consider God’s nature. God is eternal. Eternity is more than mere everlasting duration. Accordingly, His knowledge surveys past and future in the timelessness of an eternal present. His foreseeing is seeing. Yet this foreseeing does not in itself impose necessity, any more than our seeing things happen makes their happening necessary. We may, however, if we please, distinguish two necessities—one absolute, the other conditional on knowledge. In this conditional sense alone do the things which God foresees necessarily come to pass. But this kind of necessity affects not the nature of things. It leaves the reality of free will unimpaired, and the evils feared do not ensue. Our responsibility is great, since all that we do is done in the sight of all-seeing Providence.
I
She ceased, and was about to pass on in her discourse to the exposition of other matters, when I break in and say: “Excellent is thine exhortation, and such as well beseemeth thy high authority; but I am even now experiencing one of the many difficulties which, as thou saidst but now, beset the question of providence. I want to know whether thou deemest that there is any such thing as chance at all, and, if so, what it is.”
Then she made answer: “I am anxious to fulfil my promise completely, and open to thee a way of return to thy native land. As for these matters, though very useful to know, they are yet a little removed from the path of our design, and I fear lest digressions should fatigue thee, and thou shouldst find thyself unequal to completing the direct journey to our goal.”
“Have no fear for that,” said I. “It is rest to me to learn, where learning brings delight so exquisite, especially when thy argument has been built up on all sides with undoubted conviction, and no place is left for uncertainty in what follows.”
She made answer: “I will accede to thy request;” and forthwith she thus began: “If chance be defined as a result produced by random movement without any link of causal connection, I roundly affirm that there is no such thing as chance at all, and consider the word to be altogether without meaning, except as a symbol of the thing designated. What place can be left for random action, when God constraineth all things to order? For ex nihilo nihil is sound doctrine which none of the ancients gainsaid, although they used it of material substance, not of the efficient principle; this they laid down as a kind of basis for all their reasonings concerning nature. Now, if a thing arise without causes, it will appear to have arisen from nothing. But if this cannot be, neither is it possible for there to be chance in accordance with the definition just given.”
“Well,” said I, “is there, then, nothing which can properly be called chance or accident, or is there something to which these names are appropriate, though its nature is dark to the vulgar?”
“Our good Aristotle,” says she, “has defined it concisely in his Physics,
