1 Objection 1: It would seem that our intellect knows the future. For our intellect knows by means of intelligible species abstracted from the here and now, and related indifferently to all time. But it can know the present. Therefore it can know the future.
1 Ad quartum sic proceditur. Videtur quod intellectus noster cognoscat futura. Intellectus enim noster cognoscit per species intelligibiles, quae abstrahunt ab hic et nunc, et ita se habent indifferenter ad omne tempus. Sed potest cognoscere praesentia. Ergo potest cognoscere futura.
2 Objection 2: Further, man, while his senses are in suspense, can know some future things, as in sleep, and in frenzy. But the intellect is freer and more vigorous when removed from sense. Therefore the intellect of its own nature can know the future.
2 Praeterea, homo quando alienatur a sensibus, aliqua futura cognoscere potest; ut patet in dormientibus et phreneticis. Sed quando alienatur a sensibus, magis viget intellectu. Ergo intellectus, quantum est de se, est cognoscitivus futurorum.
3 Objection 3: The intellectual knowledge of man is superior to any knowledge of brutes. But some animals know the future; thus crows by their frequent cawing foretell rain. Therefore much more can the intellect know the future.
3 Praeterea, cognitio intellectiva hominis efficacior est quam cognitio quaecumque brutorum animalium. Sed quaedam animalia sunt quae cognoscunt quaedam futura; sicut corniculae frequenter crocitantes significant pluviam mox futuram. Ergo multo magis intellectus humanus potest futura cognoscere.
4 On the contrary, It is written Eccles. 8, 6, 7), There is a great affliction for man, because he is ignorant of things past; and things to come he cannot know by any messenger.
4 Sed contra est quod dicitur Eccle. VIII, multa hominis afflictio, qui ignorat praeterita, et futura nullo potest scire nuntio.
5 I answer that, We must apply the same distinction to future things, as we applied above Article 3) to contingent things. For future things considered as subject to time are singular, and the human intellect knows them by reflection only, as stated above Article 1). But the principles of future things may be universal; and thus they may enter the domain of the intellect and become the objects of science. Speaking, however, of the knowledge of the future in a general way, we must observe that the future may be known in two ways: either in itself, or in its cause. The future cannot be known in itself save by God alone; to Whom even that is present which in the course of events is future, forasmuch as from eternity His glance embraces the whole course of time, as we have said above when treating of God's knowledge Question 14, Article 13). But forasmuch as it exists in its cause, the future can be known by us also. And if, indeed, the cause be such as to have a necessary connection with its future result, then the future is known with scientific certitude, just as the astronomer foresees the future eclipse. If, however, the cause be such as to produce a certain result more frequently than not, then can the future be known more or less conjecturally, according as its cause is more or less inclined to produce the effect.
5 Respondeo dicendum quod de cognitione futurorum eodem modo distinguendum est, sicut de cognitione contingentium. Nam ipsa futura ut sub tempore cadunt, sunt singularia, quae intellectus humanus non cognoscit nisi per reflexionem, ut supra dictum est. Rationes autem futurorum possunt esse universales, et intellectu perceptibiles, et de eis etiam possunt esse scientiae. Ut tamen communiter de cognitione futurorum loquamur, sciendum est quod futura dupliciter cognosci possunt, uno modo, in seipsis; alio modo, in suis causis. In seipsis quidem futura cognosci non possunt nisi a Deo; cui etiam sunt praesentia dum in cursu rerum sunt futura, inquantum eius aeternus intuitus simul fertur supra totum temporis cursum, ut supra dictum est cum de Dei scientia ageretur. Sed prout sunt in suis causis, cognosci possunt etiam a nobis. Et si quidem in suis causis sint ut ex quibus ex necessitate proveniant, cognoscuntur per certitudinem scientiae; sicut astrologus praecognoscit eclipsim futuram. Si autem sic sint in suis causis ut ab eis proveniant ut in pluribus, sic cognosci possunt per quandam coniecturam vel magis vel minus certam, secundum quod causae sunt vel magis vel minus inclinatae ad effectus.
6 Reply to Objection 1: This argument considers that knowledge which is drawn from universal causal principles; from these the future may be known, according to the order of the effects to the cause.
6 Ad primum ergo dicendum quod ratio illa procedit de cognitione quae fit per rationes universales causarum, ex quibus futura cognosci possunt secundum modum ordinis effectus ad causam.
7 Reply to Objection 2: As Augustine says Confess. xii), the soul has a certain power of forecasting, so that by its very nature it can know the future; hence when withdrawn from corporeal sense, and, as it were, concentrated on itself, it shares in the knowledge of the future. Such an opinion would be reasonable if we were to admit that the soul receives knowledge by participating the ideas as the Platonists maintained, because in that case the soul by its nature would know the universal causes of all effects, and would only be impeded in its knowledge by the body, and hence when withdrawn from the corporeal senses it would know the future.
But since it is connatural to our intellect to know things, not thus, but by receiving its knowledge from the senses; it is not natural for the soul to know the future when withdrawn from the senses: rather does it know the future by the impression of superior spiritual and corporeal causes; of spiritual causes, when by Divine power the human intellect is enlightened through the ministry of angels, and the phantasms are directed to the knowledge of future events; or, by the influence of demons, when the imagination is moved regarding the future known to the demons, as explained above Question 57, Article 3).
The soul is naturally more inclined to receive these impressions of spiritual causes when it is withdrawn from the senses, as it is then nearer to the spiritual world, and freer from external distractions. The same may also come from superior corporeal causes. For it is clear that superior bodies influence inferior bodies. Hence, in consequence of the sensitive faculties being acts of corporeal organs, the influence of the heavenly bodies causes the imagination to be affected, and so, as the heavenly bodies cause many future events, the imagination receives certain images of some such events.
These images are perceived more at night and while we sleep than in the daytime and while we are awake, because, as stated in De Somn. et Vigil. ii, impressions made by day are evanescent. The night air is calmer, when silence reigns, hence bodily impressions are made in sleep, when slight internal movements are felt more than in wakefulness, and such movements produce in the imagination images from which the future may be foreseen.
7 Ad secundum dicendum quod, sicut Augustinus dicit XII Confess., anima habet quandam vim sortis, ut ex sui natura possit futura cognoscere, et ideo quando retrahitur a corporeis sensibus, et quodammodo revertitur ad seipsam, fit particeps notitiae futurorum. Et haec quidem opinio rationabilis esset, si poneremus quod anima acciperet cognitionem rerum secundum participationem idearum, sicut Platonici posuerunt, quia sic anima ex sui natura cognosceret universales causas omnium effectuum, sed impeditur per corpus; unde quando a corporis sensibus abstrahitur, futura cognoscit. Sed quia iste modus cognoscendi non est connaturalis intellectui nostro, sed magis ut cognitionem a sensibus accipiat; ideo non est secundum naturam animae quod futura cognoscat cum a sensibus alienatur; sed magis per impressionem aliquarum causarum superiorum spiritualium et corporalium.
Spiritualium quidem, sicut cum virtute divina ministerio Angelorum intellectus humanus illuminatur, et phantasmata ordinantur ad futura aliqua cognoscenda; vel etiam cum per operationem Daemonum fit aliqua commotio in phantasia ad praesignandum aliqua futura quae Daemones cognoscunt, ut supra dictum est. Huiusmodi autem impressiones spiritualium causarum magis nata est anima humana suscipere cum a sensibus alienatur, quia per hoc propinquior fit substantiis spiritualibus, et magis libera ab exterioribus inquietudinibus. Contingit autem et hoc per impressionem superiorum causarum corporalium. Manifestum est enim quod corpora superiora imprimunt in corpora inferiora.
Unde cum vires sensitivae sint actus corporalium organorum, consequens est quod ex impressione caelestium corporum immutetur quodammodo phantasia. Unde cum caelestia corpora sint causa multorum futurorum, fiunt in imaginatione aliqua signa quorundam futurorum. Haec autem signa magis percipiuntur in nocte et a dormientibus, quam de die et a vigilantibus, quia, ut dicitur in libro de Somn. et Vigil., quae deferuntur de die, dissolvuntur magis; plus est enim sine turbatione aer noctis, eo quod silentiores sunt noctes. Et in corpore faciunt sensum propter somnum, quia parvi motus interiores magis sentiuntur a dormientibus quam a vigilantibus. Hi vero motus faciunt phantasmata, ex quibus praevidentur futura.
8 Reply to Objection 3: Brute animals have no power above the imagination wherewith to regulate it, as man has his reason, and therefore their imagination follows entirely the influence of the heavenly bodies. Thus from such animals' movements some future things, such as rain and the like, may be known rather from human movements directed by reason. Hence the Philosopher says De Somn. et Vig.), that some who are most imprudent are most far-seeing; for their intelligence is not burdened with cares, but is as it were barren and bare of all anxiety moving at the caprice of whatever is brought to bear on it.
8 Ad tertium dicendum quod animalia bruta non habent aliquid supra phantasiam quod ordinet phantasmata, sicut habent homines rationem; et ideo phantasia brutorum animalium totaliter sequitur impressionem caelestem. Et ideo ex motibus huiusmodi animalium magis possunt cognosci quaedam futura, ut pluvia et huiusmodi, quam ex motibus hominum, qui moventur per consilium rationis. Unde philosophus dicit, in libro de Somn. et Vigil., quod quidam imprudentissimi sunt maxime praevidentes, nam intelligentia horum non est curis affecta, sed tanquam deserta et vacua ab omnibus, et mota secundum movens ducitur.