The Consolation of Philosophy

but viewed in its own nature particular. ‘But,’ thou wilt say, ‘if it is in my power to change my purpose, I shall make void providence, since I shall perchance change something which comes within its foreknowledge.’ My answer is: Thou canst indeed turn aside thy purpose; but since the truth of providence is ever at hand to see that thou canst, and whether thou dost, and whither thou turnest thyself, thou canst not avoid the Divine foreknowledge, even as thou canst not escape the sight of a present spectator, although of thy free will thou turn thyself to various actions. Wilt thou, then, say: ‘Shall the Divine knowledge be changed at my discretion, so that, when I will this or that, providence changes its knowledge correspondingly?’ ”

“Surely not.”

“True, for the Divine vision anticipates all that is coming, and transforms and reduces it to the form of its own present knowledge, and varies not, as thou deemest, in its foreknowledge, alternating to this or that, but in a single flash it forestalls and includes thy mutations without altering. And this ever-present comprehension and survey of all things God has received, not from the issue of future events, but from the simplicity of His own nature. Hereby also is resolved the objection which a little while ago gave thee offence⁠—that our doings in the future were spoken of as if supplying the cause of God’s knowledge. For this faculty of knowledge, embracing all things in its immediate cognizance, has itself fixed the bounds of all things, yet itself owes nothing to what comes after.

“And all this being so, the freedom of man’s will stands unshaken, and laws are not unrighteous, since their rewards and punishments are held forth to wills unbound by any necessity. God, who foreknoweth all things, still looks down from above, and the ever-present eternity of His vision concurs with the future character of all our acts, and dispenseth to the good rewards, to the bad punishments. Our hopes and prayers also are not fixed on God in vain, and when they are rightly directed cannot fail of effect. Therefore, withstand vice, practise virtue, lift up your souls to right hopes, offer humble prayers to Heaven. Great is the necessity of righteousness laid upon you if ye will not hide it from yourselves, seeing that all your actions are done before the eyes of a Judge who seeth all things.”

Epilogue

Within a short time of writing The Consolation of Philosophy, Boethius died by a cruel death. As to the manner of his death there is some uncertainty. According to one account, he was cut down by the swords of the soldiers before the very judgment seat of Theodoric; according to another, a cord was first fastened round his forehead, and tightened till “his eyes started”; he was then killed with a club.

Endnotes

1. Π (P) stands for the Political life, the life of action; θ (Th) for the Theoretical life, the life of thought. ↩

2. The Stoic, Epicurean, and other philosophical sects, which Boethius regards as heterodox. See also Book I, Ch. III. ↩

3. Iliad, I, 363. ↩

4. Plato, Republic, V, 473, D; Jowett, Vol. III, pp. 170, 171 (3rd ed.). ↩

5. Plato, Republic, I, 347, C; Jowett, III, p. 25. ↩

6. The distance from Rome to Pavia, the place of Boethius’ imprisonment, is 455 Roman miles. ↩

7. The moon is regarded as farthest from the sun at the full, and, as she wanes, approaching gradually nearer. ↩

8. Iliad, II, 204, 205. ↩

9. Iliad, XXIV, 527, 528. ↩

10. Cicero, De Republica, VI, 20, in the “Somnium Scipionis.” ↩

11. This solves the second of the points left in doubt at the end of Bk. I, Ch. VI. ↩

12. This solves the third. No distinct account is given of the first, but an answer may be gathered from the general argument of Bks. II, III, and IV. ↩

13. Catullus, LII, 2. ↩

14. The sword of Damocles. ↩

15. Euripides, “Andromache,” 319, 320. ↩

16. Paley translates the lines in Euripides’ “Andromache”: “They [the childless] are indeed spared from much pain and sorrow, but their supposed happiness is after all but wretchedness.” Euripides’ meaning is therefore really just the reverse of that which Boethius makes it. See Euripides, “Andromache,” ll. 418⁠–⁠420. ↩

17. Plato, “Timaeus,” 27, C; Jowett, Vol. III, p. 448. ↩

18. The substance of this poem is taken from Plato’s “Timaeus,” 29⁠–⁠42. See Jowett, Vol. III, pp. 448⁠–⁠462 (3rd ed.). ↩

19. The doctrine of Reminiscence⁠—i.e., that all learning is really recollection⁠—is set forth at length by Plato in the “Meno,” 81⁠–⁠86, and the “Phaedo,” 72⁠–⁠76. See Jowett, Vol. II, pp. 40⁠–⁠47 and 213⁠–⁠218. ↩

20. Plato, “Sophistes,” 244, E; Jowett, Vol. IV, p. 374. ↩

21. Plato, “Timaeus,” 29, B; Jowett, Vol. III, p. 449. ↩

22. The paradoxes in this chapter and chapter IV are taken from Plato’s “Gorgias.” See Jowett, Vol. II, pp. 348⁠–⁠366, and also pp. 400, 401 (“Gorgias,” 466⁠–⁠479, and 508, 509). ↩

23. “No trivial game is here; the strife
    Is waged for Turnus’ own dear life.”

    —⁠Conington

    See Virgil, Aeneid, XII, 764, 745: cf. Iliad, XXII, 159⁠–⁠162. ↩

24. To frighten away the monster swallowing the moon. The superstition was once common. See Tylor’s Primitive Culture, pp. 296⁠–⁠302. ↩

25. Lucan, Pharsalia,