Are the attitudes in Firmicus’ two works incompatible?
Certainly the date of the Mathesis should be determined without any assumption as to what Firmicus’ religion was when he wrote it. For, if we regard his attitudes in Mathesis and De errore as incompatible, it will be as difficult to explain how he could write the De errore after having composed the Mathesis as vice versa. After the steadfast affirmation of astrological principles in the Mathesis it is no easier to explain the fierce spirit of intolerance toward paganism in the De errore than it is after the mention of Christ in the De errore to explain the omission of that name in the Mathesis. But are the two works really incompatible? My answer is, No. The divergences are such as may be explained by the different character of the two works and the different circumstances under which they were written. De errore is an impassioned polemic very possibly delivered as an oration before the emperors; Mathesis is a learned compilation on a pseudo-scientific subject composed at leisure for a friend with the help of previous treatises on the subject. Why should Firmicus mention Christ in the Mathesis? Does Boethius, after nearly two centuries more of Christian growth and although he wrote a work on the Trinity, mention Christ in The Consolation of Philosophy? Some apparent petty inconsistencies there may be between Firmicus’ two works, but if we accept a host of contradictions in Constantine the Great, the first Christian emperor, why balk at some inconsistency in a writer who urges Constantine’s children against profane cults? On the other hand, there are some striking correspondences between the De errore and Mathesis.
De errore is not unfavorable to astrology.
It is noteworthy in the first place that in the De errore Firmicus does not attack astrology. But if he had been converted to Christianity since writing the Mathesis and had abandoned the astrological doctrine there expounded, would he have failed to attack the error of that art like Augustine who testified that he had once believed in nativities? It is therefore obvious that Firmicus does not regard astrology as an error even at the time when he is penning the De errore as a Christian apologist. Moreover, his view of nature in the De errore is quite in accord with that of the astrologer, and he manifests the respect for natural science or physica ratio which one would expect from the author of the Mathesis. Thus we find him criticizing certain pagan cults as sharply for their incorrect physical notions as he does others for travestying Christian mysteries. In its opening chapters certain oriental religions are criticized for exalting each some one of the four elements above the others, and for neglecting that superior control of the world of terrestrial nature in which both Christian and astrologer confided. Another argument against pagan worships is that they include human and immoral elements which cannot be explained as based upon natural law[2220] and the rule of that supreme God or “God the fabricator,” “who composed all things by the orderly method of divine workmanship,”—phrases which, as Ziegler has shown,[2221] occur both in the De errore and Mathesis. Furthermore, in the De errore Firmicus’ allusions to the planets, which include a representation of the Sun making a reproachful address to certain pagans,[2222] indicate that he regarded the stars as of immense importance in the administration of the universe.
Attitude of both works to the emperors.
It is also worth remarking that in both works Firmicus sets the emperors above the rest of mankind and closely associates them with the celestial bodies and “the supreme God.” If in Mathesis he prays for the perpetuation of the line of Constantine and forbids astrologers to make predictions concerning the emperor on the ground that his fate is not subject to the stars but directly to the supreme God, “and inasmuch as the whole surface of the earth is subject to the emperor, he too is reckoned in the number of those gods whom the principal divinity has established to perform and preserve all things”:[2223]—if he says this in Mathesis, in De errore he repeatedly addresses the emperors as “most holy”[2224] and in one passage says, “You now, O Constantius and Constans, most holy emperors, and the virtue of your venerated faith must be implored. It is erected above men and, separated from earthly frailty, joins in alliance with things celestial and in all its acts so far as it can follows the will of the supreme God.... Your felicity is joined with God’s virtue, with Christ fighting at your side you have triumphed on behalf of human safety.”[2225]
Religious attitude of the Mathesis.
If the author of De errore is not unfavorable to astrology the author of the Mathesis is strongly inclined towards monotheism and decidedly religious. He indignantly repels the accusation that astrology, which teaches that “all our acts are arranged by the divine courses of the stars,” draws men away “from the cult of the gods and of religions.” “We cause the gods to be feared and worshiped, we demonstrate their might and majesty.”[2226] The passage just quoted and some others are suggestive of polytheism, and Firmicus frequently speaks of the planets as “gods.” Probably in this he is reproducing the phraseology and reflecting the attitude of the astrological works which he uses as his authorities and which belong to the period of the pagan past. His apotelesmata, too, or predictions of nativities for various horoscopes, give little or no indication of being especially adapted to a Christian society, although in some other respects they fit his own age.[2227] But while the work contains a considerable residue of paganism, its prevailing conception of deity is one supreme God, the rector of the planets, “who composed all things by the arrangement of everlasting law,”[2228] and who made man the microcosm from the four elements.[2229] He is prayed to thus:
An astrologer’s prayer.
“But lest my words be bereft of divine aid and the envy of some hateful man impugn them by hostile attacks, whoever thou art, God, who continuest day after day the course of the heavens in rapid rotation, who perpetuatest the mobile agitation of ocean’s tides, who strengthenest earth’s solidity in the immovable strength of its foundations, who refreshest with night’s sleep the toil of our earthly bodies, who when our strength is renewed returnest the grace of sweetest light, who stirrest all the substance of thy work by the salutary breath of the winds, who pourest forth the waves of streams and fountains in tireless force, who revolvest the varied seasons by sure periods of days: sole Governor and Prince of all, sole Emperor and Lord, whom all the celestial forces serve, whose will is the substance of perfect work, by whose faultless laws all nature is forever adorned and regulated; thou Father alike and Mother of every thing, thou bound to thyself, Father and Son, by one bond of relationship; to Thee we extend suppliant hands, Thee with trembling supplication we venerate; grant us grace to attempt the explanation of the courses of thy stars; thine is the power that somehow impels us to that interpretation. With a mind pure and separated from all earthly thoughts and purged from every stain of sin we have written these books for thy Romans.”[2230] Doubtless these words might have been written by a Neo-Platonist or a pagan, but it also seems likely that they were penned by a Christian astrologer.