Book 8
19
But probably it does not really come from fortune, but seems to do so from the above cause. So that this argument does not prove that good fortune comes by nature, but that not all those who seem fortunate succeed because of fortune, but because of nature; nor does it prove that there is no such thing as fortune, nor that fortune is not the cause of anything, but that it is not the cause of all the things of which it seems to be the cause.
20
Yet someone may raise the question whether fortune is the cause of precisely this—forming a desire for the right thing at the right time. Or, on that showing, will not fortune be the cause of everything—even of thought and deliberation? since it is not the case, that one only deliberates when one has deliberated even previously to that deliberation,nor does one only think when one has previously thought before thinking, and so on to infinity, but there is some starting-point; therefore thought is not the starting-point of thinking, nor deliberation of deliberating. Then what else is, save fortune? It will follow that everything originates from fortune. Or shall we say that there is a certain starting-point outside which there is no other, and that this, merely owing to its being of such and such a nature, can produce a result of such and such a nature?
