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Objection 1: It would seem that despair is not contrary to hope.
Because "to one thing there is one contrary" (Metaph. x, 5).
But fear is contrary to hope. Therefore despair is not contrary to
hope.
Objection 2: Further, contraries seem to bear on the same thing.
But hope and despair do not bear on the same thing: since hope regards
the good, whereas despair arises from some evil that is in the way of
obtaining good. Therefore hope is not contrary to despair.
Objection 3: Further, movement is contrary to movement: while
repose is in opposition to movement as a privation thereof. But
despair seems to imply immobility rather than movement. Therefore it
is not contrary to hope, which implies movement of stretching out
towards the hoped-for good.
On the contrary, The very name of despair [desperatio] implies that
it is contrary to hope [spes].
I answer that, As stated above (Question 23, Article 2),
there is a twofold contrariety of movements. One is in respect of
approach to contrary terms: and this contrariety alone is to be found
in the concupiscible passions, for instance between love and hatred.
The other is according to approach and withdrawal with regard to the
same term; and is to be found in the irascible passions, as stated
above (Question 23, Article 2). Now the object of hope, which
is the arduous good, has the character of a principle of attraction,
if it be considered in the light of something attainable; and thus hope
tends thereto, for it denotes a kind of approach. But in so far as it
is considered as unobtainable, it has the character of a principle of
repulsion, because, as stated in Ethic. iii, 3, "when men come
to an impossibility they disperse." And this is how despair stands in
regard to this object, wherefore it implies a movement of withdrawal:
and consequently it is contrary to hope, as withdrawal is to approach.
Reply to Objection 1: Fear is contrary to hope, because their
objects, i.e. good and evil, are contrary: for this contrariety is
found in the irascible passions, according as they ensue from the
passions of the concupiscible. But despair is contrary to hope, only
by contrariety of approach and withdrawal.
Reply to Objection 2: Despair does not regard evil as such;
sometimes however it regards evil accidentally, as making the difficult
good impossible to obtain. But it can arise from the mere excess of
good.
Reply to Objection 3: Despair implies not only privation of hope,
but also a recoil from the thing desired, by reason of its being
esteemed impossible to get. Hence despair, like hope, presupposes
desire; because we neither hope for nor despair of that which we do not
desire to have. For this reason, too, each of them regards the
good, which is the object of desire.
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