Catalan Review
FRANCESC EIXIMENIS AND THE ENCYCLOPEDIC FUTURE: EIXIMENIS AS PROGNOSTICATOR/ON PROGNOSTICATION
Abstract
In his vernacular texts, Francesc Eiximenis often ventured to make predictions—sometimes on minor matters, occasionally on the future of entire kingdoms— despite his own uneasiness on the subject of prognostication in general. Despite the apparent contradiction implicit in this behavior, Eiximenis seems to have made a distinction between the concepts of foreknowledge and sorcery, rejecting outright any attempt to use the black art of necromancy to usurp God’s divine control over the actions of man.