113 GHAPTBR V CHANGE AND FORTUNE vpn agra. cee Intrinsic oontingeney 1s spoken of most properly in regard to effects that do not heve « per se cause, The margin of passive inderminatton found in every finite eause Le the proper reason why thet which 1s beyond the - +. intention of such en agent sometimes cones about; this is \o” true whether the egent be a free, intelligent cause or nature, 4 finite cause. mixed with potency is not perfeetly: determined in existence or in opusing, Created causes, then, are subject to » passive indeter= mination when they operste. This passive indetersination sometimes results in effects that were not intended by the couse, It te the sccidentel asuse of what is unintended and unforeseeable thet we must how investigate, for this is contingenoy in the strictest senso of the word, In Book II of his geners] introductinn to the Phil- osophy of Neture, Aristotle investigates the causes of the selence, He first defines nature, and then proceeds to « disoussion of the four causes, the materiel, efficient,1s formal end fingl, sines it pertains to the philosopher of Im addition, since wany things in nature aeem to happen by chance it will be importent to consider what chance is, and whether nature to demonstrete from all of the: 1t oan be @ cause of knowledge sbout natural things. With reference to acoidentsl causslity, in order to begin with what te more familiar, Aristotle first takes up the question of fortuitous happenings. ‘This te because fortune fe asater to approech sinoe we ourselves have ox= pertence of being the kind of seuse fortune te. That Ley we are aware that wo operate for en end end thet sometines things como shout without our intending them when we are: i: really: acting for the sake of something cleo, Henos, a °°" consideration of fortune will make us more femilier with wi’ what is common to both fortune and chance, and will help us to grasp the difference between these two species of acel= dontal cause. As St. Thomes explains in his commentary, there were eertein snofent philosophers who denied thet snything came about by chence., ne of the reasons they gave was that 2s, WpeibsEimpe s 1pobeVIts mas "Dieit ergo primo quod quidam di veruns an fortune et casus essent: et nogeverunt eo ease duabus retiontbus. Quarum prina ost, quie omnia iste quae dicuntur flerl » cau vel fortuna, inveniuntur habere aliguen causam determinatem, aliam a fortuna. Bt ponit huius- modi oxemplua: si onim aliquis venione ed forum, invoniat aliquem hominem quem volebat invenire, de quo tamen non opina= batur ante quod esset eum inventurus, dicimus quod inventio illius hominis ‘sit e fortuna? sed huius inventionis cause oat '» propter quam ivit ad forum, ubi erat illefer the chance event there always seema to be a determined suse of what happens, Even though these enclent thinkers held such a view they still sald that some things happen by ehense, Thus it is at least necessary to investigete what chanes and fortune axe, for Lt appeera thet things in nature such as eninels and plants have » determined cause, and yet oceasionslly there osours something extraordinary, which does not seem te have eny deterained reson; and we sey that such things happen by chance. In whst wey fortune snd chanos gre redused to a per se cause remaine to be seen after these two kinds of accidental esuses hove been distingul: shed, for they are not! reduced bo the sane isind of causa, elthough they are in the same genus, © and the differences between them must be noted first, As has been mentioned, the first kind of accidental cause to bo disoussed ia fortune, because Lt La better known to us than chance. Since fortune, then, ts ssid to be x cause, und ainos 8 cause ts known when we know the kind af things of whisk 1b is a cause, 1% fa necessary in the first place is obe serve that effects ave of three kinds: Pivst, there are things thet alveys teke pleces secondly, there are thone which do not always vome to be but frequently; thirdly, there ere things thet do not always come to be, nor for the most part, but seldom or rarely, An oceurrence of the