Little Question Five of Principal Question Four
Whether a physician, farmer, gambler, and soldier are made fortunate by the stars in their actions
It is asked whether physicians, gamblers, soldiers, and farmers are made fortunate by the stars in their works.
It seems at first that this question should be answered affirmatively, as follows.
For, just as we see that certain inanimate or natural bodies acquire from celestial bodies and their impressions certain occult powers and singular efficacies, in addition to those which follow upon the active and passive qualities of the elements—as a magnet has the ability to draw iron from the power of a celestial body, and certain stones and herbs have other occult powers from heaven—so nothing prevents some human being from possessing, through the impression of a celestial body, some singular efficacy for accomplishing certain corporeal things prosperously which another does not possess, as does a physician in healing, or a farmer or soldier.
In response it must be said that Avicenna, Lord Henry of Hesse, and Saint Thomas in Book III Against the Gentiles answer this question in different ways.
For Avicenna says that a physician, farmer, gambler, soldier, and so forth do not prosper beyond other human beings in their works because of some impression of the heavens in their nativities.
Rather, this can arise from the strong imagination of a human being, which works great efficacies and marvelous effects not only in the human being but also in exterior matter, as is evident from the fascination exercised by old women, as will be said in the Third Decade.
Avicenna therefore says that, just as the number chosen upon the dice comes more quickly to a gambler who possesses a stronger and more vehement imagination concerning some desired number than to another who does not possess so strong an imagination, so also a physician, soldier, and farmer who imagine more strongly and strive more vehemently toward the desired effects will operate more powerfully and better than other physicians, farmers, and soldiers who do not strive so vehemently toward similar effects.
But this is not valid, because the aforesaid position of Avicenna concerning the imaginative power acting upon interior or exterior matter is rejected as vain and fantastical by philosophers as well as theologians. It has a foundation neither in reason nor in experience, as Saint Thomas adduces in Book III Against the Gentiles, chapter 103, and in Part I, question 116, as will be proved below in the ninth chapter of the Third Decade.
Another is the opinion of Lord Master Henry of Hesse upon Genesis, who holds against Thomas. He says that it cannot come to human beings from any disposition of heaven that they perform the things which they intend more profitably than other human beings.
This is evident, he says, because one power acting naturally always tends toward the same effect in a similar circumstance.
But we see that a soldier, physician, farmer, or gambler does not always tend toward the same effect in a similar circumstance. Therefore.
For example, if there were some occult natural power in the lot in a game of dice, it could not occur without the thing toward which the lot had been inclined by the heavens happening always or frequently. For if a celestial power in the lot turns the dice to seven pips, it will always move them in that manner, whether the gambler chooses seven or any other number. This, however, seems to be false and contrary to experience. Therefore.
The same must be said concerning a physician, farmer, and soldier.
If he is asked whence this prosperity in gaming occurs, Henry would say that it sometimes proceeds from God, so that someone may perform some exercise more prosperously than others.
Hence Sacred Scripture also attributes things of this kind to God’s direction, as is evident in Genesis 30, in the rearing and mating of Laban’s animals under Jacob’s care, and in Genesis 39, where the prosperity of Potiphar’s affairs in the hands of Joseph is attributed to God and not to natal fate.
In a game of dice or in similar affairs, however, someone can be made fortunate only by good or evil spirits. Through hidden cooperation they can accomplish this either by moving the dice in the air or by moving them in the hand of the person throwing them, so that whatever one person chooses upon the dice always happens for him and not for another.
Lord Henry says similarly concerning physicians that, all other things being equal on the part of the art of medicine and on the part of experience of the sick person, the application of medicines, and conduct, one physician is no more or less healing than another, except perhaps accidentally.
This would occur insofar as one physician might possess a certain corrupt, contagious, and pestiferous complexion which infects sick persons through sight, touch, or breath, just as the basilisk infects through sight and an unclean woman infects a mirror. Conversely, one should think the same concerning the complexion of a healthy, cheerful, lively, and salubrious physician who, all other things being equal, benefits a sick person more than another physician who is sickly, and so forth.
Likewise, a devout physician who in his practice has recourse by night to Jesus Christ, asking to be directed toward the health of the sick person whom he has in his care, benefits that sick person more than another who, all other things being equal, trusts only in his art while despising Christ, as is evident among devout physicians and among Jews practicing medicine.
He says the same concerning a soldier and a countryman. If they are believed to possess from the heavens, all other things being equal, that one fights more fortunately than another and that grain sown by the hand of one countryman comes forth better than grain similarly sown in the same field and at the same time by another countryman, this is superstitious, and these persons seem to act according to fatal superstition.
Again, he says that this position could give unbelieving and fantastical persons an occasion to think that Christ was born in such a way that he acquired from heaven a certain marvelous healing power, naturally healing through himself all whom he touched or saw, just as the basilisk kills.
The aforesaid author adds that those who hold the affirmative answer to the question to be true embrace that superstitious opinion concerning astrological images: that fixed natural things receive such impressions from the stars. Indeed, it would be believed that artificial things, such as images fabricated under certain configurations of the stars, receive impressions from the stars. This opinion, as he says, is most vain.
The aforesaid Henry also answers Thomas concerning the magnet, saying that the magnet does not possess a power of attracting iron accidentally superimposed upon it by heaven. Rather, it possesses this as a second quality derived from the whole species and consequent upon its specific complexion, just as occurs with the powers of herbs, stones, and seeds. These powers have not been superinfused by celestial bodies but are entirely consequent upon their specific complexions and forms.
Saint Thomas, however, holds that, just as natural bodies obtain certain occult powers consequent upon their species through the impression of celestial bodies so also certain human beings, through the impression of the heavens in their nativities, obtain certain occult powers by which they prosperously and effectively accomplish beyond other human beings the things which they intend.
He maintains this in Book III Against the Gentiles and also in Part II-II, question 96, article 2, where it is said that, although natural bodies obtain some occult power from celestial bodies, as has been said, images formed by astronomers possess no power from celestial bodies.
But if they appear to possess any power, it is from the operation of demons. A sign of this, he says, is that certain characters which naturally effect nothing must be inscribed upon them.
There he also establishes a difference between astronomical and necromantic images. In necromantic images there are explicit invocations, illusions, and explicit pacts with demons. In astronomical images, however, there are tacit pacts through the signs of certain figures or characters.
Therefore, both kinds of images are condemned in the Decrees, cause 26, question 2, chapter Illos.
Which of these opinions—namely, that of Saint Thomas or that of Lord Henry—should be held is not for one of my measure and ignorance to judge.
Greater assent should be given to Lord Thomas, both because he is holier and because his doctrine is more approved. I, however, would hold the path from which fewer inconveniences would follow.
These things are from the authorities introduced within this little question.