uel sensu sed in
rationali conceptione considerat. Imaginatio quoque tametsi ex sensibus
uisendi formandique figuras sumpsit exordium, sensu tamen absente
sensibilia quaeque conlustrat non sensibili sed imaginaria ratione
iudicandi. Videsne igitur ut in cognoscendo cuncta sua potius facultate
quam eorum quae cognoscuntur utantur? Neque id iniuria; nam cum omne
iudicium iudicantis actus exsistat, necesse est ut suam quisque operam non
ex aliena sed ex propria potestate perficiat.

IV.

"This," quoth she, "is an ancient complaint of providence, vehemently
pursued by Marcus Tullius in his _Distribution of Divination_,[174]
and a thing which thou thyself hast made great and long search after.
But hitherto none of you have used sufficient diligence and vigour in
the explication thereof. The cause of which obscurity is for that the
motion of human discourse cannot attain to the simplicity of the divine
knowledge, which if by any means we could conceive, there would not
remain any doubt at all; which I will endeavour to make manifest and
plain when I have first explicated that which moveth thee. For I demand
why thou thinkest their solution unsufficient, who think that free-will
is not hindered by foreknowledge, because they suppose that
foreknowledge is not the cause of any necessity in things to come. For
fetchest thou any proof for the necessity of future things from any
other principle, but only from this, that those things which are
foreknown cannot choose but happen? Wherefore if foreknowledge imposeth
no necessity upon future events, which thou didst grant not long before,
why should voluntary actions be tied to any certain success? For
example's sake, that thou mayest see what will follow, let us suppose
that there were no providence or foresight at all. Would those things
which proceed from free-will be compelled to any necessity by this
means?" "No." "Again, let us grant it to be, but that it imposeth no
necessity upon anything; no doubt the same freedom of will will remain
whole and absolute.

But thou wilt say, even though foreknowledge be not a necessity for
things to happen, yet it is a sign that they shall necessarily come to
pass. Wherefore now, even if there had been no foreknowledge, the events
of future things would have been necessary. For all signs only show what
is, but cause not that which they design. And consequently it must first
be