Chapter IV — What divination is, and how many its species are

I. Marcus Tullius Cicero wrote two entire books on divination. At the very outset he describes it thus: "This opinion has already been common from the earliest ages, confirmed by the agreement of the Roman people and of all nations, that a certain divination exists among men" — that is, a foreknowledge and knowledge of future things. St. Thomas also devotes eight articles to this subject (II-II, q. 95), and gives the very same definition Cicero offers, saying that it consists in the foretelling of future things. Future things, he says, can be known beforehand in two ways: one, in their causes; the other, in themselves. Some causes are natural, producing their effects necessarily, such as the motions of the heavenly spheres and eclipses; others, though they do not produce their effects necessarily, nevertheless rarely fail to do so — as when the aspects and conjunctions of the stars bring on rain or drought. Now one who knows necessary causes can also know for certain the effects that necessarily follow from them. But one who knows causes that do not necessarily produce their effects, but only usually and rarely fail to, can foretell such things only by probable conjecture, not with certainty — in this way astrologers can foretell rain or drought from the observation of the stars, and physicians health or death. The effects of free causes, however, God alone knows; wherefore Isaiah (ch. 41) attributes the foreknowledge of future contingents to God alone: "Show the things that are to come hereafter, and we shall know that ye are gods."

II. The foretelling of future things through divine revelation is called prophecy — "Divination is in the lips of the king; his mouth shall not err in judgment" (Prov. 16). The foretelling of future things by the power of natural causes is called natural divination. But that foreknowledge of the future which occurs neither through divine revelation, nor through the power of natural causes, but solely through the agency of a demon, is properly called "divination" in the species of superstition. Hence St. Thomas concludes that the term "divination" is nearly always taken in a bad sense. It is of this divination that we now speak, which is commonly defined by theologians, following St. Thomas (II-II, q. 95, art. 1), as "the foreknowledge of future things by the agency of a demon." It is called "foreknowledge" because it can be conveyed by words or by signs. The words "by the agency of a demon" are added so that it may be understood that one who seeks knowledge of future things from God, not from a demon, does not commit this fault. It is called "of future things" because it chiefly foretells what is to come, although it can also concern the past.

III. Question I. What future things can demons foretell? Response: All those things that depend on natural causes — such as the conjunctions of the stars, the motions of the heavens, and the eclipses of the sun and moon — demons can foretell with certainty. Things that arise only contingently from natural causes — such as rains, droughts, plagues, storms, and the like — they can only conjecture probably. Things, however, that depend solely on the divine will, or on the free choice of men — such as the thoughts of the human heart, and future contingents — they cannot know at all, as St. Thomas teaches (I Part, q. 57, art. 3). Nevertheless, those demons who, by the sharpness of their intellect, grasp natural causes, and who penetrate men's native dispositions, temperaments, and inclinations, can foretell many things, even among those that proceed from men's free will. The order of freedom certainly lies beyond the bounds of natural causes, and escapes the grasp even of the subtlest demonic intellect; yet, on account of the connection between the order of free acts and the order of nature, demons can often foretell, through their own diviners, much that pertains to human freedom. They can likewise know future things through divine revelation. They can also foretell things happening in distant regions, on account of the speed of their movement. This much only can they teach their own diviners.

IV. Question II. In what manner do demons teach their diviners? Response: Demons instruct their diviners in many ways — sometimes by express words, making themselves visible to them; sometimes without any sensible appearance, uttering words in the air, or producing the same effect in sleep. Sometimes they instruct them through writings, or through the voice of animals. Diviners, for their part, prepare themselves to obtain such knowledge in various ways — now by burning incense, sometimes by offering sacrifices, now through signs and instruments, according to their various established conventions with the demons.

V. Question III. Is a demon's assistance always invoked by an explicit pact? Response: This invocation is sometimes explicit and solemn, whereby diviners enter into a mutual contract with a demon, who appears to them in royal guise, as it were seated upon a throne. Here the diviners renounce the divine religion, the sacraments, and the other mysteries, and promise the demon worship, pledging themselves to fulfill his wishes — a sacrilegious pact which they are accustomed to seal with a document signed in their own blood. Sometimes they enter into the pact with this solemnity omitted, but the demon prescribes certain formulas by which he promises to lend them help and assistance — either way, this is called an explicit pact. But when someone seeks to know things that lie beyond the grasp of the human mind by means of various vain and unsuitable methods forbidden by God — even though he does not wish to be instructed by a demon's agency — the demon nonetheless insinuates himself uninvited into such vain observances and signs, beyond the man's own intention; and this is called an implicit pact. St. Thomas explains the whole matter in a few words (II-II, q. 95, art. 4): "The counsel or help of demons is sought either explicitly or implicitly; a demon insinuates himself secretly, beyond man's intention, in order to foretell certain future things unknown to men."

VI. St. Thomas (loc. cit.) further enumerates various species of this divination, in which an explicit pact with a demon is involved. I cannot express these species more clearly than by citing the Angelic Doctor's own words. "Demons, when invoked, are accustomed to foretell future things in many ways. Sometimes indeed, by certain apparitions, they present themselves expressly to men's sight or hearing, in order to foretell future things: and this species is called prestige [illusion], because men's eyes are thereby deceived." The bodies, however, which are presented to diviners in this way are not true human bodies possessing real flesh, as Cajetan explains most excellently in his commentary on this article. Such simulated bodies, he says, fall short of true bodies in two respects. First, in the very substance of the flesh: for the father of lies himself confessed, when his flesh, as if made of ice, was exposed to touch, that he could not truly fashion human flesh — since he cannot combine natural elements without true human generation so as to produce real human flesh; and by similar reasoning he cannot produce human semen, but only transfer it. And from this it is made most clear how true was Christ's saying after his Resurrection: "Handle, and see, for a spirit hath not flesh and bones," as a demon has not. Secondly, in the pleasure of touch and of intercourse: for the natural union of human persons is the more pleasurable, the more the real surpasses the merely apparent. Thus far Cajetan, with a few omissions. St. Thomas adds that the second species of divination is through dreams, and this is called the divination of dreams. The third species is through the apparition or speech of the dead, and this species is called necromancy. The fourth is that which foretells future things through living men, as through those possessed — and this is divination by "pythons," so called from the Pythian Apollo, who was said to be the author of divination. The fifth species of divination is when a demon makes use of signs or figures of inanimate bodies — wood, iron, or stone — to foretell the future; and this is called geomancy. If, however, he makes use of water, this is the sixth species, called hydromancy; if of air, there arises the seventh species, called aeromancy; if of fire, the eighth species, called pyromancy. The ninth, finally, is called haruspicy, when future things are foretold through signs appearing in the entrails of animals sacrificed to demons.

VII. Divination that occurs without an explicit invocation of a demon is divided into two kinds. The first is when, in order to foreknow future things, we consider something in the dispositions of certain things which have no power at all to produce such knowledge; this kind of divination contains six species under it. The first is genethlialogy, which pertains to the astrologers called "genethliac," when they foretell men's fates, and what is to come to them, from the motion of the stars at their birth. The second is augury, which is done from the chattering of birds. The third is auspice, in which future things are foretold from the flight of birds, or the movement of other animals. The fourth is called omen, which is a prediction drawn from words uttered by men without any such intention. The fifth is chiromancy, from the lines of the hands. The sixth, finally, is called scapulimancy, when divination is made from certain signs appearing on the shoulder-blade of some animal.

VIII. To the second kind of divination belongs that in which future things are foretold from the consideration of things which men seriously undertake in order to inquire into something hidden, without any express invocation of a demon. If future events are foretold from the drawing of points or marks, this is called geomancy, and is the first species. The other is called sortilege (casting of lots), when future things are investigated either by considering the figures that arise from molten lead cast into water; or from certain slips, written or unwritten, hidden away, and it is observed which one each person draws; or by observing who draws the greater or lesser number, whether by the casting of uneven sticks, or by the throwing of dice; or finally, when, upon reflection, it is determined which page of a book will fall open when one considers what is to be revealed. All these go by the name of "lots."

IX. St. Thomas concludes this matter in almost these very words (loc. cit.): "There is a threefold kind of divination: the first is through the manifest invocation of demons, which pertains to necromancers; the second is through the mere consideration of the disposition or movement of some other thing, which pertains to augurs; the third is when we do something ourselves so that something hidden may be made manifest to us, which pertains to lots. Under each of these, however, many further kinds are contained, as is clear from what has been said."

X. Question IV. Are all the aforesaid species of divination morally distinct, such that they must be explained individually in confession? Response: From what has been said, the answer is clear. St. Thomas reduces divination to three genera: namely, to necromancy, augury, and lot-casting. That not all the recognized species of divination are morally distinct is established by the fact that, in whatever manner divinations are carried out — whether by the use of the stars, of fire, of water, or of dreams — they are opposed, in the same way, to the worship owed to God and to the end of religion. This diversity, then, is a material, not a moral, one — provided we are speaking of all the species enumerated together.

XI. Question V. Does divination carried out by an explicit pact with a demon differ, in moral species, from that carried out by a tacit pact? Response: The more common opinion teaches that these divinations do not differ in moral species, since a tacit and an explicit pact do not differ in kind. From this not a few draw the conclusion that the circumstance of an explicit pact need not be disclosed in confession, since aggravating circumstances need not necessarily be specified. But — setting aside the more rigorous discussion of the strict specific moral difference — I hold that a pact explicitly entered into with a demon must indeed be disclosed [in confession]... This explicit agreement and solemn compact, mutually struck between man and demon, betrays a malice so distinct from that of a merely tacit pact that even common sense itself perceives it. I therefore cannot agree with the opinion of the theologians of Salamanca (tract. 21, ch. 11, punct. 3, §2, n. 45), who, with others, teach that this explicit pact need not necessarily be disclosed in confession in every case, since it is merely an aggravating circumstance. First, even if it were merely an aggravating circumstance, it would not follow, on the opinion I hold more probable, that it may be passed over in silence in confession. Second, it is by no means so well established that these two pacts do not differ in moral species that one could conclude, without qualification, that such a difference need not be disclosed in confession. Indeed, St. Thomas himself, in the words cited above (n. 9), seems to indicate a specific, not merely a physical, distinction; for he adds there: "In all these it is graver to invoke a demon expressly than to do something by which one exposes oneself to becoming the object of such [demonic] insinuation, whatever it may bring." The theologians of Salamanca reply that the Angelic Doctor is speaking of a physical, not a moral, diversity here — a claim so patently absurd that no one fails to see it, since St. Thomas is not discussing physical controversies here, but moral theology. They add that this must be understood of a greater malice within the same species — but this response seems no better than the last. The Angelic Doctor plainly says that the reason for sinning is not the same; therefore, if the reason for sinning is not the same, the formal grounds of sinning are different, and therefore there is a specific moral distinction here, and not merely a material one — which always falls under the same formal ground, whichever way one turns it. It should be added, moreover, that whether or not there is a specific distinction, when a confessor hears of an express and solemn pact, he necessarily forms an altogether different, and more severe, judgment of the penitent. It matters little, say the theologians of Salamanca, whether this judgment is distinct. To this I answer that their response misses the truth by a great deal, not a little. This difference in judgment is given great weight by Sánchez, Castropalao, and very many other Probabilists themselves.

XII. Even the theologians of Salamanca themselves, however, along with other theologians, admit that this explicit pact must in practice be disclosed to the confessor — on the grounds that other sins commonly accompany such a pact: for there arises a grave danger of pernicious deception, both of the one who invokes the demon and of others, thus exposing oneself to grave danger of deception, whether of oneself or of others — a grave malice against charity. Likewise, the crime of idolatry is frequently committed in the express invocation of a demon, on account of the worship offered him. Heresy, too, is often contracted, whether by placing a certain trust in the demon, or by denying the true faith, religion, and the sacraments; and it not infrequently happens that an abuse of sacred things occurs in this invocation. On account of these crimes — of which at least one nearly always accompanies an explicit pact — all agree that such a pact must be disclosed in confession. I would add, following the more probable opinion, that this explicit pact must be disclosed in confession absolutely, even apart from these other crimes.

XIII. Question VI. Is it a mortal crime to divine by a pact, whether explicit or tacit? Response: The affirmative opinion is certain among all, and is clearly gathered both from Deuteronomy 18 — "Let there not be found among you anyone who consults soothsayers, or seeks oracles from spirits" — and from Isaiah 28: "You have said: We have entered into a covenant with death, and with hell we have made a pact." All likewise affirm that no invincible ignorance of an explicit pact can ever exist. For who could be ignorant that entering a covenant with the enemy [of mankind] is treacherous betrayal and monstrous treason? That invincible ignorance of a tacit pact can occur, several affirm; nor do I myself deny it — though I say this happens very rarely, especially once one has heard the aforesaid warnings. What, then, of those who make use of lots, of numerical calculations (commonly called "cabala"), and other such unsuitable means of divining the future, without any superstitious intention, indeed expressly professing that they place no faith in such vain signs? The theologians of Salamanca (loc. cit., n. 33), together with Sánchez, Bonacina, Navarro, De Lugo, and others, teach that these are excused from mortal sin when they do this once or twice. I myself would not dare to condemn them of mortal fault either. But what of those who indulge frequently in such nonsense with these vain signs? Let them consider, then, what danger they expose themselves to who indulge in such things not once or twice, but rather often, out of a certain vain and dangerous curiosity. What sort of speech is it, then, that requires the formula "once" or "twice" for the graver fault? Whoever plays at such games even once sins venially, all the surrounding circumstances lurking beneath. Why, then, should no one consider them safe from mortal guilt? What is it, then, that they ought not do, so that they might withdraw themselves from a certain light fault, and from the danger of a graver one?

XIV. Theologians commonly also teach that one must abstain from that pact whereby two people agree that whichever of them dies first will appear to the survivor and reveal to him the state of his soul's salvation. For although this pact, entered into with due submission to the divine will, is absolutely lawful in itself, yet on account of the danger of illusion — since a demon, aware of this pact, could deceive the survivor — it is more advisable to restrain such useless curiosity.