Boethius, The Consolation of Philosophy 5.3

“Then is there nothing which can be justly called chance, nor anything ‘by chance’?” I asked. “Or is there anything which common people know not, but which those words do suit?”

“My philosopher, Aristotle, defined it in his Physics shortly and well-nigh truly.”

“How?” I asked.

“Whenever anything is done with one intention, but something else, other than was intended, results from certain causes, that is called chance: as, for instance, if a man digs the ground for the sake of cultivating it, and finds a heap of buried gold.

“Such a thing is believed to have happened by chance, but it does not come from nothing, for it has its own causes, whose unforeseen and unexpected coincidence seem to have brought about a chance.

“For if the cultivator did not dig the ground, if the owner had not buried his money, the gold would not have been found. These are the causes of the chance piece of good fortune, which comes about from the causes that meet it, and move along with it, not from the intention of the actor.

“For neither the burier nor the tiller intended that the gold should be found; but, as I said, it was a coincidence, and it happened that the one dug up what the other buried.

“We may therefore define chance as an unexpected result from the coincidence of certain causes in matters where there was another purpose.

“The order of the Universe, advancing with its inevitable sequences, brings about this coincidence of causes.

“This order itself emanates from its source, which is Providence, and disposes all things in their proper time and place.”

—from Book 5, Prose 1

While I still could, I would teach the very section of Aristotle’s Physics that Lady Philosophy describes. I would, in fact, try to add the whole bit about the Four Causes, but as the curriculum became narrower, as legislated by our patriotic government or by our holy priests, I was left with very little chance to do so.

Now I can only sneak it in, when on one else is looking.

I know quite well that I am a dinosaur, but I do believe that a knowledge of the Four Causes will help anyone, in all aspects of life.

Where did it come from? We once called that the efficient cause, the source or origin of action, either proximate or ultimate.

What was it made out of? What were the parts? We once called that the material cause, that out of which things came.

What was its identity? What gave it a structure? We once called that the formal cause, how the bits were put together.

Where was it going? What was its end or purpose? We once called that the final cause, the aim and intention.

Everything in life, any aspect of life, only make sense within the context of these Four Causes, all joined together.

As I learned about philosophy over the years, I gained the ability to ask about each and every cause, at each and every juncture I faced.

Good Lord, how often I screwed up my life, and yet I somehow never screwed up my life when I followed that pattern of asking those precise questions.

Where did I come from? What am I made of? Who am I? Where am I going?

Answer those four questions with any quality, any at all, and you won’t go wrong. You’ve already won half the battle, just because you asked the questions to begin with.

Now Aristotle did wonder if there might be a Fifth Cause, chance or luck, that works alongside the others. He immediately rejected it.

No, not because it is an inconvenience, but because it is unintelligible. Do I not understand the why? That does not negate the why; it only means that I did not see where it came from, or how it was here, or where it was meant to go.

Deal me a hand of cards, and I might say it is all about chance. Hardly. If I knew the stack of the deck, however shuffled it might be, there would be no chance.

Throw me some dice on the table, and I might say it is all about chance. Hardly. If I knew all the physical variables, the position, the force, and the resistance, I would win every time.

“Well, you don’t know those things, so there is chance!”

Yes, but only in my own ignorance, not in how the cards are dealt, or how the dice will fall.

“Idiot! Only God could know all of that!”

Yes, exactly.

See? No Fifth Cause.

Written in 1/2016