III.P50: Wired to Correlate and to See As Causal

Res quæcunque potest esse per accidens spei aut metus causa.

Anything whatsoever is able to be, by accident, the cause of either hope or fear.

DEMONSTRATIO: Hæc propositio eadem via demonstratur qua propositio 15 hujus, quam vide una cum scholio II propositionis 18 hujus.

This same proposition is demonstrated by IIIIP15; see along with IIIP18S2.

SCHOLIUM: Res quæ per accidens spei aut metus sunt causæ, bona aut mala omina vocantur. Deinde quatenus hæc eadem omina sunt spei aut metus causa eatenus (per definitionem spei et metus, quam vide in scholio II propositionis 18 hujus) lætitiæ aut tristitiæ sunt causa et consequenter (per corollarium propositionis 15 hujus) eatenus eadem amamus vel odio habemus et (per propositionem 28 hujus) tanquam media ad ea quæ speramus, adhibere vel tanquam obstacula aut metus causas amovere conamur. Præterea ex propositione 25 hujus sequitur nos natura ita esse constitutos ut ea quæ speramus, facile, quæ autem timemus, difficile credamus et ut de iis plus minusve justo sentiamus. Atque ex his ortæ sunt superstitiones quibus homines ubique conflictantur. Cæterum non puto operæ esse pretium animi hic ostendere fluctuationes quæ ex spe et metu oriuntur quandoquidem ex sola horum affectuum definitione sequitur non dari spem sine metu neque metum sine spe (ut fusius suo loco explicabimus) et præterea quandoquidem quatenus aliquid speramus aut metuimus eatenus idem amamus vel odio habemus atque adeo quicquid de amore et odio diximus, facile unusquisque spei et metui applicare poterit.

Anythings which, by accident, are the causes of hope or fear, are called everything good or bad. Then insofar as these same things are the cause of hope or fear - just so far (by the definition of hope and fear, on which see IIIP18S2) are the cause of joy or sadness and consequently (by IIIP15C) just so much by the same do we love or hate and (by IIIP28) we try to invoke as if the means to things for which we hope, or to remove as if their obstacles or causes of fear. Besides from IIIP25 it follows that we are, by nature so, constituted so that we believe easily the things which we hope for, moreover with difficulty, (the things) which we fear and as a result, from these, we feel more or less than is just. And superstitions arising from these by which humans everywhere are conflicted. I do not think that for the rest of the work it worth the reward to show the fluctuations of the soul here which arise from the hope or fear since it follows from the definition alone of these affects that hope without fear and fear without hope do not exist (as we will explain more fully in another place) and besides since insofar as we hope for or fear something just so much do we love or hate the same and to such an extent as we have talked something about love and hate, it might easily have been applied to each and every hope and fear.