If Lull was an opponent of the art of transmuting metals rather than an adept in alchemy, he was at least a believer in astrology as several of his works show. It is true, and this is the more important to note as suggesting how Lull’s utterances on the subject of alchemy may also have been misunderstood, that the Histoire Littéraire de la France, in describing Raymond’s Tractatus novus de astronomia, written in 1297, gives the impression that it is directed against astrology, stating that Lull says that he has written it “to dissuade princes and magnates from trusting in the divinations of astrologers,” and adding, “Less worthy of praise is the second part of the work where the author assumes to apply to astronomy the principles of his art universal.”[2745] An examination of the treatise itself in manuscript[2746] shows that it is only of certain astrologers and diviners who deceive princes by false judgments from the stars that Raymond would have royalty beware. He writes his book not because “astronomy” (i.e. astrology) is false but because it is so difficult that often judgments made by the art turn out false, and because he wishes to investigate and discover new methods by which men can have greater knowledge of “astronomy” and its judgments. When he comes to speak of the properties of each planet, he remarks that “astronomers” attribute many properties to Saturn but do not prove them. He intends to employ his Art in investigating Saturn’s properties, and comes to the conclusion that men born under that planet are, among other traits, ponderously grave, suspicious by nature, disposed to toil and to build great edifices, and ambitious to hold office.[2747] Later on we find him spending many pages in listing different combinations of the planets in the signs as fortunate or unfortunate.[2748] All this, of course, is judicial astrology rather than astronomy. He “proves” also that the sky is animated by a moving and circular soul or spirit, and he states that “astronomers” recognize in their judgments that this soul of the sky is the cause of things caused in our inferior world.[2749] After a while, however, he does reprove “the philosophers who invented the science of astronomy” for “certain points in this science in which they have erred,” namely, in making it necessary and inevitable. Lull holds that God can alter nature as the smith alters the direction of his falling hammer, and that the human mind has free will to resist the influence of the stars.[2750] But this criticism of astrology is neither novel nor entirely justified. Lull never disputes but always accepts the theory that the heavenly bodies shed their influence and virtue upon inferiors. He does, however, speak slightingly of the art of geomancy and its practitioners.[2751]
To the condemnation of 1277 at Paris.
In the same year 1297 in which Raymond wrote the treatise just summarized he also published an imaginary dialogue dealing with the 219 opinions which had been condemned at Paris in 1277.[2752] In this dialogue “Socrates” undertakes the defense of philosophy while Raymond supports theology and the articles of condemnation. We have seen that a number of the opinions condemned were astrological in character. Raymond does not join in active condemnation of all of these, passing over a number in silence and perhaps intentionally evading them. On article 30, “that superior intelligences create rational souls without the motion of the sky; but that inferior intelligences create the vegetative and sensitive souls by means of the motion of the sky,” Raymond’s comment is that creation is the proper function of God. To Socrates’ repetition of the sixty-first article, “that God can do contrary things, that is, by means of a celestial body which is diverse in its whereabouts,” Raymond replies that God can act directly and produce contraries without the intervention of any heavenly body, if He wishes to, as He did in creating the four elements with their contrary qualities of hot and cold, dry and moist. Raymond adds, however, that God would not produce sins, since He is perfect in goodness. In reply to articles 92 and 102, that the heavenly bodies are moved by a soul and by appetitive virtue just like an animal, and that the soul of the sky is intelligence, Raymond answers that in his opinion it is correct to say that the sky has a motive soul but not a vegetative or sensitive or imaginative or rational soul. “If, however, I am not speaking the truth in this, I am prepared to receive correction; but I believe that I am speaking truly.” Raymond also upholds human free will as in the preceding treatise. The close of the present dialogue is, at least on the surface, an edifying instance of submission to ecclesiastical authority. Socrates asks Raymond if the theologians believe as he has been saying. Raymond replies that he believes so, since he has proved his own statements and believes them to be true, and he knows that the venerable lords and doctors of theology who are pillars of the Christian Faith believe only what is true. If, however, he has erred, it is unwittingly and unintentionally, and he humbly supplicates those most powerful masters to correct the words of their weak servant. Socrates chimes in that he has merely been repeating for his part what the ancient philosophers said, but that if any of it is contrary to Christianity, he does not want to believe it. He therefore proposes that they go to Paris and submit the book to the theologians there for their approval or correction, as his desire is to see “great concord between my lords the masters in theology and in philosophy.” It seems evident that behind his humble tone Lull is trying to soften down the condemnation of 1277 and substitute a somewhat more conciliatory attitude.
The book of Raymond on medicine and astronomy.
Lull’s attitude to astrology is further illustrated by a treatise in which he applies the method of his Art universal to the subject of astrological medicine.[2753] “Since the science of medicine is very difficult on account of its principles being so secret,” Raymond proposes to investigate them by means of his Art. His treatise has three divisions: the first, concerning the inferior world of the elements and the body of the human patient; the second, concerning the regions of the celestial bodies; and the third, consisting of questions. Raymond denotes the four elements by the letters from a to d, and the combinations of heat or cold with humidity and drought by the letters from e to h. He then introduces a figure with two circles representing the eighth sphere and the zodiac, since the motion of the planets controls that of the human body. These two circles are each divided into eight “houses,” which correspond to sixteen pairs of letters consisting of each of the four elements joined with each of the four letters denoting pairs of qualities, namely, ae, af, ag, ah, be, bf, bg, bh, ce, cf, cg, ch, de, df, dg, and dh. Raymond then discusses such topics as fevers, the pulse, evacuation, diet, bleeding, bathing, the color of the urine, digestion and indigestion, pains, appetite, and the method of grading medicines. The relation of his letters and “houses” to these matters may be seen from his statement that the house of ae causes one kind of appetite, that of be another, and so on. Coming to the second section of his treatise, Lull treats of the planets and signs and relates the conjunctions of the various planets with one another to his eight letters and their combinations. In the third part he puts illustrative problems and solves them by reference to his preceding text.
An uncomplimentary allusion to thirteenth century medicine.
We might think Lull an opponent of medicine, if we attended only to a passage in his Contemplation of God.[2754] Here he complains that doctors of the body are more sought after, better paid, more scrupulously obeyed than are physicians of the soul. They go well clad on good steeds, and amass wealth by working all sorts of impositions upon their patients, boasting of their knowledge of diseases of which they are really ignorant, prolonging the period of illness in order to increase their pay, and prescribing syrups and the like in large quantities because they share in the profits of the apothecaries. They try out potions on their patients which they would never take themselves, and there is no other art in the world so risky and over which there is so much disagreement. These remarks of Raymond are, however, the sort of satirical observations on medical practice that might be made at almost any period, so that it is difficult to tell if they are especially applicable to the thirteenth century.
Necromancy and divine names.
In closing we may note two brief indications of Lull’s belief in two other occult subjects, namely, necromancy and the power of divine names. Of necromancy he of course did not approve but in the treatise just cited he adduces the art of necromancy as evidence for the existence of God, since it requires the services of demons and they are no other beings than fallen angels who owe their existence to God.[2755] This somewhat tortuous theistic argument we have already heard advanced by Justin Martyr. In his treatise in Catalan on The Hundred Names of God Raymond asks, “Since God has put virtues in words, plants, and stones, how will He not have put far greater virtue into His names?”[2756]
[2730] A number of works on Lull have appeared recently: M. André, Le bienheureux Raymond Lulle, 3rd edition, Paris, 1900; S. M. Zwemer, Raymund Lull, First Missionary to the Moslems, New York, 1902; W. T. A. Barber, Raymond Lull, the illuminated doctor: a study in medieval missions, London, 1903; J. H. Probst, Caractère et origines des idées du bienheureux Raymond Lulle, Toulouse, 1912. By Barber also the article “Lullists” in ERE. The fullest discussion of Raymond’s writings seems to remain, however, that in HL 29: 1-386, which includes works still in MSS. The most accessible edition of the works in print is perhaps that of Salzinger, Mainz, 1721-1742, in ten folio volumes. The Revista Lulliana was started at Barcelona in 1901.