FATE.
Fate, in a general sense, denotes an inevitable necessity, depending on some superior cause. It is a term much used among the ancient philosophers. It is formed a fando, from speaking; and primarily implies the same with effatum, i. e. a word or decree pronounced by God; or a fixed sentence, whereby the deity has prescribed the order of things, and allotted every person what shall befal him. The Greeks called θμαρμενη, quasi, θρμος, nexus, a change, or necessary series of things, indissolubly linked together; and the moderns call it Providence. But independent of this sense of the word, in which it is used sometimes to denote the causes in nature, and sometimes the divine appointment, the word Fate has a farther meaning, being used to express some kind of necessity or other, or eternal designation of things, whereby all agents, necessary as well as voluntary, are swayed and directed to their ends.
Some authors have divided Fate into Astrological and Stoical.
Astrological fate, denotes a necessity of things and events, arising, as is supposed, from the influence and positions of the heavenly bodies, which give law to the elements and mixed bodies, as well as to the wills of men.
Stoical fate, or FATALITY, or FATALISM, is defined by Cicero, an order or series of causes, in which cause is linked to cause, each producing others; and in this manner all things flow from the one prime cause. Chrysippus defines it a natural invariable succession of all things, ab eterno, each involving the other. To this fate they subject the very gods themselves. Thus the poet observes, that the “parent of all things made laws at the beginning, by which he not only binds other things, but himself.” Seneca also remarks, Eadem necessitas et deos alligat. Irrevocabilis divina pariter et humana cursit vehit. Ipse ille omnium conditor et rector scripsit quidam fata, sed sequitur; semel scripsit, semper paret. This eternal series of causes, the poets call μοιραι, and parcæ, or destinies.
By some later authors Fate is divided into Physical and divine.
The first, or Physical fate, is an order and series of physical causes, appropriated to their effects. This series is necessary, and the necessity is natural. The principal or foundation of this Fate is nature, or the power and manner of acting which God originally gave to the several bodies, elements, &c. By this Fate it is that fire warms; bodies communicate motion to each other; the rising and falling of the tides, &c. And the effects of this Fate are all the events and phenomena in the universe, except such as arise from the human.
The second, or divine Fate, is what is more commonly called Providence. Plato, in his Phædo, includes both these in one definition; as intimating, that they were one and the same thing, actively and passively considered. Thus, Fatum Est ratio quædam divina, lexque naturæ comes, quæ transiri nequeat, quippe a causa pendens, quæ superior sit quibusvis impedimentis. Though that of Bœtius seems the clearer of the two:—Fatum, says he, est inhærens rebus molilibus despositio per quam providentia suis quæque nectet ordinibus.