1. First Opinion, which is that of the Philosophers

a. Exposition by Augustine of the Opinion

164. About the first article Augustine in City of God 12.14 reports the opinion of the ancient philosophers saying that the numerically same things return in a circuit of time. They posit that after the ‘great year’, that is, after a circuit of 36,000 years, everything will return numerically the same.

165. Their reasoning is that when the cause of things returns the same, the effect will be the same; and, as it is, all the celestial bodies will return to their position, because, on the supposition of Ptolemy in his Almagest 9.6 that the heaven of the fixed stars moves one degree in a hundred years contrary to the daily motion, the result is that the motion from East to West will be completed in 36,000 years.

b. Rejection of the Opinion

α. Through Scriptural Authorities

166. But this opinion is rejected there [n.164] by Augustine through the authority of Scripture:

Romans 6.9, “Christ being risen from the dead does not now die; death will no longer have dominion over him.” I Thessalonians 4.17, “We who are alive, who remain, will be taken up together.. .to meet Christ in the air, and thus we shall be always with the Lord.” Psalm 11.8-9, “Thou, O Lord, wilt preserve us and guard us from this generation forever;” - hence about those who hold the above opinion the Psalmist well adds, “the impious walk in a circuit.” p. By Reason

β. By Reason

167. And Augustine [ibid.] rejects it by reason, as regard beatitude, because according to the above circular process there would be no true beatitude, in that the blessed soul would be going to return to the miseries that it had before. And so, while it is blessed, it either believes it will never return, and then it is blessed with a false opinion, or believes it will return, and then it is afraid and consequently not blessed. And to the verse of Ecclesiastes 1.9-10, “There is nothing new under the sun.,” Augustine replies there [ibid.], “Far be it that we believe that those circuits are referred to in these words of Solomon; but the point must be taken either in a general sense, that the same things were before that will be, but not the same numerically, or, as some have understood, that the wise man [Solomon] wanted it to be understood that everything has already happened in the predestination of God, and that for this reason there is nothing new under the sun.”

168. The opinion can also be rejected as concerns the reason for it [nn.165, 167], because if some celestial motion be incommensurable with another (which can be proved if it be posited that, on the supposition of equal velocity on both sides, expanse is incommensurable with expanse over which the motion goes), then, I say, it follows that never will all the motions return to the same point. Nor is this feature of incommensurability in the motions opposed to the continuity of continuous motion, because if two movables were moved, one over the side of a square and the other over the diagonal of it, these motions would be incommensurable, and they would, if they lasted, perpetually fail to return to uniformity. But this question would require a long discussion of the individual motions that are congruent with the [Ptolemaic] epicycles and deferents, as to whether any motion incommensurable with another could be found in the whole heavens.

169. Again, the foundation adopted by Ptolemy [n.165] is rejected by Thebit,Thabit ibn Qurra, died 901. His rejection of the position held by Ptolemy position is reported by Roger Bacon, Communia Naturalium 2 p.5 ch.19. ⁶ who proves that the sphere of the fixed stars is not thus moved from West to East, because, according to Thebit, the star that was otherwise at the starting point of Capricorn in the ninth heaven [sc. sphere] would be at the starting point of Cancer in the ninth heaven. And therefore Thebit posited for the eighth heaven or for the heaven of the fixed stars a motion in certain small circles described on the starting point of Aries and of Libra in the ninth heaven. And he posited that it is a certain motion of precession and recession, according as the starting point of Aries, movable in its circle, is ascending, and as, oppositely, the starting point of Libra, movable in its circle, is descending; and as elsewhere, conversely, the head of Libra is ascending while the head of Aries is descending. And thus do the stars in the eighth heaven move in longitude and latitude together. If then this motion be proved to be completable in a period of time in which not all the lower spheres would be able to return to the same place that they had at the beginning of the motion, the proposed conclusion would follow.

170. Again, the reasoning [n.165] is defective, because identity of effect depends not only on the efficient cause but also on the matter; but the matter can be altogether different, or possess a different place in comparison with the heavens, because bodies can be prevented by the action of free choice from being in the ‘where’ where they were before. By such action too a body can be divided, and so the matter of it dispersed.

171. Again, manifest unacceptable results in the case of the human species follow on this position:

For it follows first that learning is nothing but remembering, which the Philosopher touches on in Posterior Analytics 1.1.71a1-11; and this is unacceptable because, as he proves in Posterior Analytics 2.19.99b22-27, it is unacceptable that the noblest habits exist in us and escape our notice.

172. Another unacceptable result is that the acts of free choice are not necessarily subject to the causality of the heavens, and consequently the acts will not necessarily return the same, and consequently not those acts either which necessarily depend on them. And however this example is posited by Augustine (ibid. n.164) about the saying of the philosophers, “As in this age,” he says, “Plato taught his students in the school called the Academy, so through innumerable ages backwards the same Plato and the same city and the same school and the same students are to be found.” And he adds, “Far be it from us to believe these things,” and he introduces the disproofs from Scripture previously brought forward [n.166].