Chapter LII: William of Auvergne (2)

William also tells us of an ancient Latin magician who believed that the soul of an immaculate boy who had been slain by violence would have knowledge of past, present and future.[1226] He therefore murdered a boy, and then went insane himself and imagined that he heard responses from the boy’s soul. This was surely the work of demons. Other ancient philosophers blinded boys or themselves in order to increase the power of the soul in divination.[1227] William further mentions the old-wives of his own time who still persisted in divination and interpreting dreams and could not be made to desist even by beatings.[1228] He states that these old women still cherished the superstition of the augurs that if you find a bird’s nest with the mother bird and little ones or the eggs, and preserve it intact, all will go well with you, while if you harm it or separate any bird or egg from it you will encounter ill fortune.[1229]

[Sidenote: His treatment of astrology.]

William has much to say in his various works of the heavens and the stars, and he rarely overlooks an opportunity to have a tilt with the astrologers. Most of his statements and arguments had been often employed before, however, and he also repeats himself a great deal, and his long-drawn scholastic listing and rebutting of supposed reasons pro and con at times becomes insufferably tedious. We shall therefore compress his treatment to a very small space compared to that which it occupies in his own works and words.

[Sidenote: The philosophers on the nature of the heavens and stars.]

William states that Plato and Aristotle, Boethius, Hermes Trismegistus, and Avicenna, all believed the stars to be divine animals whose souls were as superior to ours, as their celestial bodies are.[1230] Since these philosophers regarded the stars as nobler, wiser, and more powerful than mortals, they made them guardians and guides of humanity, and distributed all earthly objects under their rule. Such doctrines William recalls examining when he was young in the books of judicial astrology and the volumes of magicians and sorcerers, from whom he would appear to distinguish the above-named philosophers none too carefully. He indeed explicitly classes “Plato and Aristotle and their followers” with “those who believe in judgments of the stars.”[1231] He also tells us that Plato regarded the entire universe as one divine animal, and that his followers regarded the tides as the breathing of this world animal; but that Aristotle and his school included only what is above the moon or even only the heaven of the fixed stars.[1232] Avicenna, too, called the heaven an animal obedient to God.

[Sidenote: William’s own opinion and attitude.]

William himself is inclined to think that the divisions and diversities of the nine spheres militate against their being animated by a single soul; and he rejects the theory that the world soul is composed of number and musical consonance.[1233] But he leaves Christians free, if they will, to believe with the Aristotelians and many Italian philosophers that the superior world is either one or many animals, that the heavens are either animated or rational.[1234] In this he sees no peril to the Faith; but hitherto Hebrew and Christian doctrine has not explored such matters, and Christians have been too absorbed in saving men’s souls to note whether the heavens had souls or no. It would indeed be strange if William denied the starry heavens some sort of soul or souls when he has attributed one to a sea-fish like the echinus.[1235] But he declares that “it is manifest that human souls are nobler than those which they put in heavenly bodies.” And he warns against the wicked error of identifying the Holy Spirit with the world soul. We have noted elsewhere his hostility to the theory of astrological necromancy that the heavens and stars are full of ministering spirits. He also contraverts the Aristotelian doctrines that there are as many intelligences moving the heavenly bodies as there are celestial motions and that the heavens love superior intelligences and strive to become assimilated to these.[1236]

[Sidenote: Objection to stars as cause of evil.]

Like most Christian apologists William adopts the argument that the stars, if rational, would not cause evils and misfortunes such as astrologers predict, and seems to think that all the evil in the world can be charged to the account of human perversity or the imperfections inherent in the matter of our inferior world, and that for these two sources of ill neither God nor the stars should be held responsible.[1237] He recognizes, it is true, that someone may argue that these evils exist by the will of the Creator, whose will is nevertheless always good, but he does not seem to see that the same reasoning may be applied to the rule of the stars. He seems to regard as a new discovery of his own and a point hitherto unrecognized by astrologers, the argument that ineptitude on the part of inferior matter receiving the force of the stars may account for many effects apparently due to the heavens. But in thinking this argument novel he is much mistaken. Really his only point here against astrologers is that some of them are careless in their phraseology and speak of the stars as causing evil, which he regards as blasphemy of Him who created the stars. “And all blasphemy against the Creator,” continues William in a truculent and intolerant tone which reveals the spirit of the medieval inquisition, “is an impiety to be exterminated with fire and sword.”

[Sidenote: Virtues of the stars.]

William raises certain difficulties in regard to astrological technique only to answer them himself. And he grants that fixed stars which seem close together may really be separated by vast distances and so have very different virtue. And he cannot deny “many marvelous and occult virtues” in celestial bodies, when he admits “so many and so great occult virtues” in terrestrial bodies. Indeed all philosophers agree that the virtues of the stars far surpass even those of precious stones. The variations in the heat of the sun, while its course continues constant, seem to William a sure indication that the other planets and fixed stars participate in influencing our world.

[Sidenote: Extent of their influence upon nature and man.]

While William was not unwilling to concede souls or reason to the stars, he believes that it is perilous for Christians to regard the souls of the heavens as “governors of inferior things and especially of human affairs.”[1238] Those who hold that man’s actions are caused of necessity by the motion of the sky and the positions of the stars, ruin, in his opinion, the foundations of law and morality.[1239] “Against that error, one ought not so much to dispute with arguments as fight with fire and sword.” Some have argued that because stars and lights were created before vegetation, animal life, and human beings, they are causes of these others, both generating and regulating them.[1240] In favor of this contention so much has been written that it can scarcely be read, says William, and the stars do give much aid in generation and in conservation of generated things, but not so much as the astrologers think.[1241] They should not be consulted even as signs--rather than causes--in human concerns.[1242] In our sublunar world their power extends only to the four elements and four humors and only to such animals composed of these as lack free will and obey natural necessity. Thus William really excludes only human free will and intellect from sidereal control,[1243] and he admits that “the multitude and populace from want of intelligence and other evil dispositions lives almost after the manner of brutes,” following natural impulse to a great extent, so that astrologers may predict popular agitations and mob uprisings with a fair degree of accuracy, but should not predict concerning individuals. Even in the case of individuals, however, he does not deny that natural virtues and vices are attributable to the stars, such vices, for instance, as irascibility, levity, and lubricity, which medical authorities ascribe not to moral fault but physical constitution.[1244] William would limit the influence of the stars not only by individual freedom of the will but by the power of prayer.[1245] He does not believe the decrees of fate so fixed and the laws of nature so unchangeable that God’s wrath may not be placated by prayer, and freedom from any threatening evil obtained from His goodness. Belief in the power of the stars and belief in the power of prayers: which is the more superstitious, which the more nearly scientific? Or which belief has led to progress in science?

[Sidenote: Against nativities, interrogations, and images.]

William complains that “Ptolemy and Haly and other astronomers” have attributed original sin and all its consequences to the constellations and hours of nativity, in that they have presumed to write books of horoscopes and nativities.[1246] He feels it “necessary to say something against that insanity” because of the great reputation such famous writers have among the “simple and stupid multitude” which regards them as profound sages and sublime prophets. Into William’s particular arguments against the art of casting nativities, which much resemble the arguments of Augustine and John of Salisbury, we will not go. Elsewhere he also attacks the practice of interrogations.[1247] He also strongly objects to the books which he says astrologers have written on discovering men’s secret thoughts through the significations of the stars.[1248]

William has much to say against astrological images, but his attitude has already been partially indicated in stating his attitude towards images, figures, and characters in general. He declares that belief in astrological images “derogates more from the honor and glory of the Creator than the error which attributes such virtue to the stars and luminaries themselves.” It seems to him “a strange and quite intolerable error to think that stars which cannot help themselves can bestow such gifts as invincibility, social graces, temperance or chastity.”[1249] Yet elsewhere we have heard him mention with seeming complaisance the bestowal of riches and checking of evil passions by emeralds and topazes. His best argument as against figures and characters in general is that such lifeless bodies cannot produce intellectual and moral effects in living human beings, especially when the engraved gems are, as is usual, hidden away somewhere, or buried underground.

[Sidenote: Astrology and religion and history.]

William condemns as error the association of the world’s leading religions with the planets, as Judaism with Saturn, Islam with Venus, and Christianity with the sun.[1250] The stars, he declares, are subject to religion, not religion to the stars, and Joshua made even the sun and moon stand still. William is candid enough to recognize that the seven-branched candlestick in the Jewish tabernacle designated the seven planets, but elsewhere states that the Mosaic Law forbade observation of the stars.[1251] William also considers the doctrine of the _magnus annus_ or Platonic year, that after 36,000 solar years history will repeat itself down to the minutest detail owing to the recurrence of the former series of positions of the constellations.[1252] Since this has the support of men of great reputation, he lists various arguments advanced in its favor and rebuts them in detail.

[Sidenote: Comets and the star of Bethlehem.]

William believes that comets appear in the sky and in the air “as signs of slaughters and other great events in the world.” He mentions “the universal belief” that they foretell the deaths of kings and political changes.[1253] But he asserts that the star announcing Christ’s birth was not of this sort and that the darkness at the time of the Crucifixion was not due to an ordinary eclipse.

FOOTNOTES:

[1102] _Gulielmi Alverni episcopi Parisiensis mathematici perfectissimi eximii philosophi ac theologi praestantissimi Opera omnia per Joannem Dominicum Traianum Neapolitanum Venetiis ex officina Damiani Zenari_, 1591. The _De universo_ occupies nearly half of the volume, pp. 561-1012. My references will be to this edition and to the _De universo_ unless some other title is specified. In it--and in such other editions of William’s works as I have seen--the chapter headings are often very poor guides to the contents, especially if the chapter is of any length. There are at Paris thirteenth century MSS of the _De fide_ and _De legibus_ (BN 15755) and _De universo_ (BN 15756).

The chief secondary work on William of Auvergne is Noel Valois, _Guillaume d’Auvergne_, Paris, 1880. One chapter is devoted to his attitude to the superstitions of his age, and goes to the other extreme from Daunou, HL XVIII, 375, whom Valois criticizes for calling William extremely credulous. The inadequacy of Valois’ chapter, at least from our standpoint, may be inferred from his total omission of William’s conception of “natural magic.” Valois has no treatment of William’s attitude to natural science but contents himself with a discussion of his philosophy and psychology. (See also M. Baumgartner, _Die Erkenntnislehre des Wilhelm von Auvergne_, Münster, 1893.) The chapter on William’s attitude to superstition is largely given over to examples of popular superstitions in the thirteenth century, supplementing legends of Brittany and other stories told by William with similar anecdotes from the pages of Stephen of Bourbon, Caesar of Heisterbach, and Gervaise of Tilbury. Valois’ citations of William’s works are from an edition in which the pages were numbered differently from those in the one I used.

[1103] Valois (1880), pp. 9-11.

[1104] Valois (1880), p. 53.

[1105] HL 18, 357.

[1106] II-iii-20, (pp. 994-95). Yet in another connection (I-i-46, pp. 625-26) William inconsistently makes the assertion that everything depends absolutely upon God’s will alone as an argument against employing magic images to gain one’s ends. He tells a story of a man who, when a magician offered to secure him some great dignity in his city, asked him if he could get it against God’s will. When the magician admitted that he could not, the man asked if he could prevent securing it if God willed it and the magician again answered “No.” The man then said that he would commit it all to God. William does not seem to see that this attitude is the same as that of ignorant persons who leave scientific investigation to God or of hungry people who expect God to feed them.

[1107] I-i-44, (p. 613).

[1108] I-i-42, (p. 608).

[1109] _Ibid._, (p. 606).

[1110] See I-iii-31, (p. 759). See also Valois, 304 and M. K. Werner, _Wilhelms von Auvergne Verhältniss z. d. Platonikern des XII. Jhts_, in _Vienna Sitzb._, vol. 74 (1873), p. 119 _et seq._

[1111] See I-ii-30, (p. 694) for an expression of this view.

[1112] I-ii-31, (p. 695).

[1113] II-iii-23, (pp. 1003-4).

[1114] _De legibus_, Cap. 25, (p. 75).

[1115] I-ii-21, (p. 680): II-iii-7, (p. 973).

[1116] II-iii-23, p. (1003): _De legibus_, Cap. 24, (p. 73): II-ii-29, (p. 820).

[1117] II-iii-7, (p. 971).

[1118] II-iii-22, (p. 998).

[1119] _De legibus_, Cap. 9, (pp. 38-39).

[1120] See Cap. 13 (p. 43) and before

[1121] Cap. 23, (p. 65).

[1122] Cap. 14, (pp. 44-45).

[1123] II-iii-22, (p. 998) ... opera huiusmodi quae opera magica et ludificationes vel hominum vel daemonum nuncupantur.

[1124] II-iii-7, (p. 971): II-iii-12, (pp. 977-79).

[1125] II-iii-21, (pp. 997-998) naturarum vires et potentias occultas, etc.

[1126] I-i-43, (p. 612): _De legibus_, Cap. 24, (p. 67).

[1127] _De legibus_, Cap. 14 (p. 44).

[1128] II-iii-22, (p. 999).

[1129] II-iii-23, (p. 1003).

[1130] _De legibus_, Cap. 14, (p. 46).

[1131] II-iii-21, (p. 998).

[1132] II-iii-12, (p. 979).

[1133] _De legibus_, Cap. 24, (pp. 67-68).

[1134] I-i-46, (p. 627).

[1135] _De legibus_, Cap. 24, (pp. 67-68).

[1136] I-i-43, (p. 612).

[1137] “Sensus naturae,” _De legibus_, Cap. 27, (p. 88).

[1138] See pp. 875, 876 and 983 as well as the following reference. I-i-46, (p. 624).

[1139] II-ii-70, (p. 870).

[1140] II-ii-69, (p. 869).

[1141] II-ii-70, (p. 870).

[1142] I-i-46, (p. 625).

[1143] II-iii-22, (p. 1000).

[1144] I-i-46, (p. 625).

[1145] I-i-46, (p. 626).

[1146] I-i-46, (p. 624).

[1147] I-i-46, (p. 627).

[1148] _De legibus_, Cap. 23, (p. 64): II-iii-22, (p. 999).

[1149] _De legibus_, Cap. 26, (p. 82).

[1150] _Ibid._, Cap. 27, (pp. 84 ff.).

[1151] II-iii-22, (p. 999).

[1152] _De legibus_, Cap. 26, (p. 84).

[1153] _Ibid._, Cap. 27, (pp. 86-87).

[1154] _Ibid._, Cap. 23, (p. 65).

[1155] II-iii-23, (p. 1003).

[1156] _De legibus_, Cap. 27, (p. 89).

[1157] _Ibid._, (pp. 87-88).

[1158] _Ibid._, (p. 89).

[1159] _De legibus_, Cap. 27, (p. 84).

[1160] _Ibid._, Cap. 4, (p. 34).

[1161] II-iii-25, (p. 1010).

[1162] II-ii-96, (p. 895).

[1163] _De universo_, pp. 996-7, also 1003; _De legibus_, cap. 27 (p. 89).

[1164] Berlin 956, 12th century, fol. 21, Hic incipit alchamia....

[1165] Bridges, II, 212.

[1166] _Theatrum Chymicum_, Strasburg, 1613, IV, 221.

[1167] Sloane 1118, 15th century, #28. Arthephii capitulum ex opere solis extractum.

[1168] Gildemeister in _Zeitsch. d. Deutsch. Morgenl. Ges._ XXXIII, 534: cited by Lippmann (1919), 408.

[1169] _De legibus_, Cap. 26, (pp. 81-82): I-i-44, (p. 613).

[1170] _De universo_ II-ii-37, (p. 831): II-ii-100 (p. 898).

[1171] _Ibid._, II-ii-96, (p. 895).

[1172] _Ibid._, II-iii-13, (p. 982): II-iii-24, (p. 1007).

[1173] _Ibid._, II-ii-63, (p. 860): II-ii-70, (p. 871): II-iii-6, (p. 968): II-iii-17, (p. 988).

[1174] _Ibid._, II-iii-24, (p. 1007).

[1175] _Ibid._, II-ii-84 and 85, (pp. 885-6).

[1176] Among errors condemned at Paris in 1240 by William as bishop the seventh was “that neither glorified souls nor glorious or glorified bodies will be in the empyrean heaven with the angels but in the watery or crystalline (heaven) which is above the firmament. Which they even presume to say of the blessed virgin. On the contrary it should be believed that there is the same place for holy angels and souls of the blest, namely, the empyrean heaven,” etc.

The eighth error was “that an angel can in the same instant be in different places and is everywhere if he wishes to be everywhere.”

These errors and various other sets of errors condemned at Paris and Oxford are printed in an incunabulum numbered IA.4778 in the British Museum.

[1177] _De universo_ I-i-34, (p. 595 ff). Also Cap. 43 (pp. 609 to 611).

[1178] Who William believes will exceed the saved in numbers: “De multitudine vero damnandorum omnis lex determinatum habet apud se quod multo maior futura sit multitudine glorificandorum.” The passage has already been quoted in HL XVIII, 371-2.

[1179] _De legibus_, Cap. 24, (p. 73.) _De universo_ II-ii-96, (p. 895).

[1180] _Ibid._, II-ii-70, (p. 871).

[1181] _Ibid._, II-ii-39 and 98, (pp. 833 and 897) and II-iii-6, (p. 967): also II-ii-96, (p. 895).

[1182] _De universo_, II-ii-97, (p. 896).

[1183] _De legibus_, Cap. 9, (pp. 38-39).

[1184] _De universo_, II-ii-29, (p. 820) and II-iii-6 to 8, (pp. 966 to 973).

[1185] _Ibid._, II-ii-37, (p. 831): II-ii-100, (p. 898).

[1186] _De universo_, II-iii-7, (p. 970).

[1187] _Ibid._, II-iii-12, (pp. 976-7).

[1188] _Ibid._, II-iii-24, (p. 1004).

[1189] _Ibid._, II-iii-25, (pp. 1009-10).

[1190] _Ibid._, II-iii-23, (p. 1000).

[1191] _De legibus_, Cap. 24, (p. 67).

[1192] _De universo_, I-ii-21, (p. 680), and II-ii-63, (p. 860).

[1193] _Ibid._, II-iii-12, (p. 979).

[1194] _De universo_, II-ii-70, (p. 871).

[1195] _Ibid._ (p. 1001).

[1196] _Ibid._ (pp. 1003-1004).

[1197] _Ibid._, II-iii-13, (p. 983).

[1198] _De legibus_, Cap. 26, (p. 83-4).

[1199] _De legibus_, Cap. 26, (p. 81).

[1200] _De universo_, II-iii-6, (p. 968).

[1201] _Ibid._, II-iii-17, (p. 987).

[1202] _Ibid._, II-iii-13, (p. 982).

[1203] _Ibid._, II-iii-24, (p. 1007).

[1204] _Ibid._, II-iii-17, (p. 988).

[1205] _Ibid._, II-iii-22, (p. 999).

[1206] I-iii-11, (p. 731: also pp. 756-57).

[1207] I-ii-16, (p. 668): II-iii-22 (p. 999).

[1208] II-ii-73, (p. 873): II-iii-22, (p. 998): II-iii-16, (p. 986): I-i-46, (p. 621).

[1209] NH 37, 60.

[1210] I-iii-11, (p. 731).

[1211] I-i-46, (p. 621).

[1212] The influence of this passage is seen in a MS at Paris which was once the property of the humanist Budé: BN nouv. acq. 433, anno 1486, fol. 1: Excerpta from William of Auvergne, “et primo ex capitulo de virtutibus occultis quorundam animalium herbarum et lapidum relatorum ad consideracionem astronomicam et astronomorum, ut plurimum, errancium.”

[1213] II-ii-76 (p. 876), necnon et exemplis occultarum operationum et mirabilium quaeque nonnulli medicorum et etiam quidam philosophorum naturalium empirica vocant.

[1214] II-iii-22, (p. 999).

[1215] I-i-59, (p. 639).

[1216] II-iii-21, (p. 997).

[1217] II-iii-20, (p. 995).

[1218] II-iii-16, (p. 986).

[1219] This illustration is also used by Peter of Abano, _Conciliator_, Diff. 135; and is found in the 219 opinions of Siger de Brabant and others condemned at Paris in 1277 (see below, Chapter 62).

[1220] I-i-46, (p. 621).

[1221] II-iii-22, (p. 998).

[1222] II-iii-22, (p. 999).

[1223] II-iii-18, (p. 989).

[1224] _Ibid._ and _De legibus_, Cap. 24, (p. 68).

[1225] II-iii-20, (p. 993).

[1226] II-iii-19, (p. 990).

[1227] II-iii-20, (p. 994).

[1228] I-iii-27, (pp. 750-51).

[1229] _De legibus_, Cap. 2, (p. 31).

[1230] _De legibus_, cap. 25 (p. 75). _De universo_, I-iii-27, (p. 751).

[1231] I-iii-28, (p. 753).

[1232] I-iii-27, (pp. 751-2).

[1233] I-iii-30, (p. 757).

[1234] I-iii-31, (p. 759).

[1235] I-ii-29, (p. 693).

[1236] I-ii-5, (p. 650): II-i-45, (p. 794): II-i-4, (p. 763).

[1237] I-i-46, (pp. 618-23).

[1238] I-iii-28, (pp. 753-4).

[1239] I-iii-20, (p. 740).

[1240] I-i-42, (pp. 606-7).

[1241] I-i-46, (pp. 627-8).

[1242] I-iii-31, (p. 759).

[1243] I-i-46, (pp. 628-9).

[1244] _Ibid._, (p. 620).

[1245] _Ibid._, (p. 626).

[1246] _De vitiis et peccatis_, cap. 6, (p. 264).

[1247] _De legibus_, cap. 20, (p. 55).

[1248] I-i-46, (p. 628).

[1249] _De universo_, I-i-46, (pp. 622 ff). _De legibus_, cap. 23, (p. 65).

[1250] _Ibid._, cap. 20, (p. 53).

[1251] _Ibid._, cap. 2, (p. 31): I-i-46, (p. 628).

[1252] I-ii-16 and 17, (pp. 667-9).

[1253] I-i-46, (p. 629).