judgment is no part of the weight but is the sentence of the trier The understanding weigheth all Things Objects Means Circumstances Convenience Inconvenience but it self is not weighed Secondly the sensitive passion in some extraordinary cases may give a counterfeit weight to the object if it can detein or divert reason from the ballance but ordinarily the Means Circumstances and Causes concurrent they have their whole weight from the understanding So as they do not press the horses back at all until reason lay them on Thirdly he conceives that as each feather hath a certain natural weight whereby it concurs not arbitrarily but necessarily towards the overcharging of the horse So all objects and causes have a naturall efficiency whereby they do Physically determin the will which is a great mistake His Objects his Agents his Motives his Passions and all his concurrent causes ordinarily do onely moove the will morally not determine it naturally So as it hath in all ordinary actions a free dominion over it self His other example of a man that strikes whose will to strike followeth necessarily that thought he had of the sequell of this stroke immediately before the lifting up of his hand as it confounds passionate indeliberate thoughts with the dictates of right reason so it is very uncertain for between the cup and the lip between the lifting up of the hand and the blow the will may alter and the judgment also And lastly it is impertinent for that necessity of striking proceeds from the free determination of the Agent and not from the special influence of any outward determining causes And so it is onely a necessity upon supposition Concerning Medeas choise the strength of the argument doth not lye either in the fact of Medea which is but a fiction or in the authority of the Poet who writes things rather to be admired than believed but in the experience of all men who find it to be true in themselves That sometimes reason doth shew unto a man the exorbitancy of his passion that what he desires is but a pleasant good that what he loseth by such a choise is an honest good That that which is honest is to be preferred before that which is pleasant yet the will pursues that which is pleasant and neglects that which is honest St. Paul saith as much in earnest as is feined of Medea That he approoved not that which he did and that he did that which he hated Rom. 7. 15. The Roman Story is mistaken There was no bribe in the case but affection Whereas I urge that those things which are neerer to the senses do moove more powerfully he layes hold on it and without answering to that for which I produced it infers That the sense of present good is more immediate to the action than the foresight of evil consequents Which is true but it is not absolutely true by any antecedent necessity Let a man do what he may do and what he ought to do and sensitive objects will lose that power which they have by his own fault and neglect Antecedent or indeliberate concupiscence doth sometimes but rarely surprise a man and render the action not free But consequent and deliberated concupiscence which proceeds from the rational will â—oth render the action more free not less free and introduceth onely a necessity upon supposition Lastly he saith that a mans mourning more for the loss of his Child than for his sin makes nothing to the last dictate of the understanding Yes very much Reason dictates that a sin committed is a greater evil than the loss of a Child and ought more to be lamented for yet we see daily how affection prevailes against the dictate of reason That which he inferrs from hence that sorrow for sin is not voluntary and by consequence that repentance proceedeth from causes is true as to the latter part of it but not in his sense The causes from whence repentance doth proceed are Gods grace preventing and mans will concurring God prevents freely man concurs freely Those inferiour Agents which sometimes do concur as subordinate to the grace of God do not cannot determine the will naturally And therefore the former part of his inference that sorrow for sin is not voluntary is untrue and altogether groundless That is much more truely and much more properly said to be voluntary which proceeds from judgment and from the rational will than that which proceeds from passion and from the sensitive will One of the main grounds of all T. H. his errours in this question is that he acknowledgeth no efficacy but that which is natural Hence is this wild consequence Repentance hath causes and therefore it is not voluntary Free effects have free causes necessary effects necessary causes voluntary effects have sometimes free sometimes necessary causes Animadversions upon the Bishops Reply Numb XXIII a SUpposing the last dictate of the understanding did alwayes determine the Wil yet this determination being not antecedent in time nor proceeding from extrinsecall causes but from the proper resolution of the Agent who had now freely determined himself makes no absolute necessity but onely Hypothetical c. This is the Bishops answer to the necessity inferred from that that the Wil necessarily followeth the last dictate of the understanding which answer he thinks is not sufficiently taken away because the last act of the understanding is in time together with the Wil it self and therefore not antecedent It is true that the Wil is not produced but in the same Instant with the last dictate of the understanding but the necessity of the Wil and the necessity of the last dictate of the understanding may have been antecedent For that last dictate of the understanding was produced by causes antecedent and was then necessary though not yet produced as when a stone is falling the necessity of touching the earth is antecedent to the touch it self For all motion through any determined space necessarily makes a motion through the next space unlesse it be hindered by some contrary external motion and then the stop is as necessary as the proceeding would have been The Argument therefore from the last dictate of the understanding sufficiently inferreth an antecedent necessity as great as the necessity that a stone shall fall when it is already falling As for his other answer that the Wil does not certainly follow the last dictate of the understandig though it alwayes ought to follow it he himself says it is but probable but any man that speaks not by rote but thinks of what he says will presently find it false and that it is impossible to will any thing that appears not first in his understanding to be good for him And whereas he says the Wil ought to follow the last dictate of the understanding unlesse he mean that the man ought to follow it it is an insignificant speech for duties are the man 's not the Wils duties and if he means so then t is false for
a man ought not to follow the dictate of the understanding when it is erroneous b Of which I gave then three reasons one was that actions may be so equally circumstantiated that reason cannot give a positive sentence but leaves the election to liberty or chance To this he answers not a word There was no need of answer for he hath very often in this discourse contradicted it himself in that he maketh Reason to be the true root of liberty and men to have more or lesse liberty as they have more or lesse Reason How then can a man leave that to liberty when his Reason can give no sentence And for his leaving it to chance if by chance he mean that which hath no causes he destroyeth Providence and if he mean that which hath causes but unknown to us he leaveth it to necessity Besides it is false that actions may be so equally circumstantiated that Reason cannot give a positive sentence For though in the things to be elected there may be an exact equality yet there may be circumstances in him that is to elect to make him resolve upon that of the two which he considereth for the present and to break of all further deliberation for this cause that he must not to use his own instance by spending time in vain apply neither of the plaisters which the Chirurgion gives him to his wound Another of his reasons was because Reason doth not weigh every individual action to the uttermost grain True But does it therefore follow a man gives no sentence The Wil therefore may follow the dictate of the judgment whether the man weigh or not weigh all that might be weighed His third reason was because Passions and Affections sometime prevail against Judgment I consesse they prevail often against Wisdome which is it he means here by Judgment But they prevail not against the dictate of the understanding which he knows is the meaning of Judgment in this place And the Wil of a passionate and peevish fool doth no lesse follow the dictate of that little understanding he hath then the Wil of the wisest man followeth his wisedome c He explaineth the sense of the assertion by the comparison of the last feather wherewith he seems to be delighted seeing he useth it now the second time But let him like it as he Wil it is improper for three Reasons To me this comparison seemeth very proper and therefore I made no scruple though not much delighted with it as being no new comparison to use it again when there was need again For in the examination of truth I search rather for perspicuity then elegance But the Bishop with his School terms is far from perspicuity How neer he is to elegence I shall not forget to examine in due time But why is this comparison improper First because the determination of the Judgment is no part of the weight for the understanding weigheth all things Objects Means Circumstances Convenience Inconvenience but it self is not weighed In this comparison the Objects Means c. are the weights the man is the scale the understanding of a Convenience or Inconvenience is the pressure of those weights which incline him now one way now another and that inclination is the Wil. Again the Objects Means c. are the feathers that presse the Horse the feeling of that pressure is understanding and his patience or impatience the Wil to bear them if not too many or if too many to lye down under them T is therefore to little purpose that he saith the understanding is not weighed Secondly he says the comparison is improper because ordinarily the Means Circumstances and Causes concurrent have their whole weight from the understanding so as they do not presse the Horses back at all until Reason lay them on This and that which followeth that my Objects Agents Motives Passions and all my concurrent Causes ordinarily do onely move the Will morally not determine it naturally so as it hath in all ordinary actions a Free dominion over it self is all non sense for no man can understand that the understanding maketh any alteration in the Object in Weight or lightnesse nor that Reason lays on Objects upon the understanding nor that the Wil is moved nor that any motion is moral nor that these Words the Wil hath a Free dominion over it self signifie any thing With the rest of this Reply I shall trust the Reader and onely note the last Words where he makes me say Repentance hath causes and therefore it is not voluntary but I said repentance hath causes and that it is not voluntary he chops in and therefore and makes an absurd consequence which he would have the Reader believe was mine and then câ—nâ—utes it with these senselesse words Free effects have Free causes necessary effects necessary causes Voluntary effects have sometimes Free sometimes necessary causes Can any man but a Schoolman think the Wil is voluntary But yet the Wil is the cause of voluntary actions J. D. FIftly and lastly the Divine labours to find out a way how Num. 24. liberty may consist with the prescience and decrees of God But of this I had not very long since occasion to write a full discourse in answer to a Treatise against the prescience of things contingent I shall for the present only repeat these two things First we ought not to desert a certain truth because we are not able to comprehend the certain manner God should be but a poor God if we were able perfectly to comprehend all his Actions and Attributes Secondly in my poor judgment which I ever do and ever shall submit to better the readiest way to reconcile Contingence and Liberty with the decrees and prescience of God and most remote from the altercations of these times is to subject future contingents to the aspect of God according to that presentiality which they have in eternity Not that things future which are not yet existent are co-existent with God but because the infinite knowledge of God incircling all times in the point of eternity doth attain to their future Being from whence proceeds their objective and intelligible Being The main impediment which keeps men from subscribing to this way is because they conceive eternity to be an everlasting succession and not one indivisible point But if they consider that whatsoever is in God is God That there are no accidents in him for that which is infinitely perfect cannot be further perfected That as God is not wise but Wisedom it self not just but Justice it self so he is not eternal but Eternity it self They must needs conclude that therefore this eternity is indivisible because God is indivisible and therefore not successive but altogether an infinite point comprehending all times within it self T. H. THE last part of this discourse conteineth his opinion about reconciling Liberty with the Prescience and Decrees of God otherwise than some Divines have done against whom he had formerly written a
If the Will do not suspend but assent then the act is necessary but because the Will may suspend and not assent therefore it is not absolutely necessary In the former case the Will is moved necessarily and determinately In the later freely and indeterminately The former excitation is immediate the later is mediaté mediante intellectu and requires the help of the understanding In a word so great a difference there is between natural and moral efficacy as there is between his opinion and mine in this Question There remains onely the last dictate of the understanding which he maketh to be the last cause that concurreth to the determination of the Will and to the necessary production of the act as the last feather may be said to break an Horses back when there were somany laid on before that there wanted but that to do it I have shewed Numb 7. that the last dictate of the understanding is not alwaies absolute in it self nor conclusive to the Will and when it is conclusive yet it produceth no antecedent nor extrinsecal Necessity I shall only ad one thing more in present That by making the last judgement of right reason to be of no more weight then a single feather he wrongs the understanding as well as he doth the Will and endeavonrs to deprive the Will of its supreme power of application and to deprive the understanding of its supreme power of judicature and definition Neither corporeal agents and objects nor yet the sensitive appetite it self being an inferiour faculty and affixed to the Organ of the Body have any direct or immediate dominion or command over the rational Will It is without the sphear of their activity All the access which they have unto the Will is by the means of the understanding sometimes cleare and sometimes disturbed and of reason either right or mis-informed Without the help of the understanding all his second causes were not able of themselves to load the Horses back with so much weight as the least of all his feathers doth amount unto But we shall meet with his Horse load of feathers again Numb 23. These things being thus briefly touched he proceeds to his answer My argument was this If any of these â—rall these causes formerly recited do take away true liberty that is still intended from necessity then Adam before his fall had no true liberty But Adam before his fall had true liberty He mis-recites the argument and denies the consequence which is so clearly proved that no man living can doubt of it Because Adam was subjected to all the same causes as well as we the same decree the same prescience the same influences the same concourse of causes the same efficacy of objects the same dictates of reason But it is onely a mistake for it appears plainly by his following discourse that he intended to deny not the consequence but the assumption For he makes Adam to have had no liberty from necessity before his fall yea he proceeds so far as to affirm that all humane wills his and ours and each propension of our wills even during our deliberation are as much necessitated as any thing else whatsoever that we have no more power to forbear those actions which we do than the fire hath power not to burn Though I honour T. H. for his person and for his learning yet I must confess ingeniously I hate this Doctrine from my heart And I believe both I have reason so to do and al others who shall seriously ponder the horrid consequences which flow from it It destroyes liberty dishonours the nature of Man It makes the second causes outward objects to be the Rackets and Men to be but the Tennis-Balls of destiny It makes the first cause that is God Almighty to be the introducer of all evil and sin into the world as much as Man yea more than Man by as much as the motion of the Watch is more from the Artificer who did make it and wind it up than either from the spring or the wheels or the thred if God by his special influence into the second causes did necessitate them to operate as they did And if they being thus determined did necessitate Adam inevitably irresistably not by an accidental but by an essential subordination of causes to whatsoever he did Then one of these two absurdities must needs follow either that Adam did not sin and that there is no such thing as sin in the world because it proceeds naturally necssarily and essentially from God Or that God is more guilty of it and more the cause of evil than Man because Man is extrinsecally inevitably determined but so is not God And in causes essentially subordinate the cause of the cause is alwaies the cause of the effect What Tyrant did ever impose Lawes that were impossible for those to keep upon whom they were imposed and punish them for breaking those Laws which he himself had necessitated them to break which it was no more in their power not to break than it is in the power of the fire not to burn Excuse me if I hate this Doctrine with a perfect hatred which is so dishonourable both to God and Man which makes Men to blaspheme of necessity to steal of necessity to be hanged of necessity and to be damned of necessity And therefore I must say and say again Quicquid ostendes mihi sic incredulous odi It were better to be an Atheist to believe no God or to be a Manichee to believe two Gods a God of good and a God of evil or with the Heathens to believe thirty thousand Gods than thus to charge the true God to be the proper cause and the true Author of all the sins and evills which are in the world Animadversions upon the Bishops Reply Number XI aTHis Argument was sent forth only as an espie to make a more full discovery what were the true grounds of T. H. his supposed Necessity The Argument which he sendeth forth as an Espie is this If either the decree of God or the Fore-knowledge of God or the Influence of the Stars or the Concatenation which he saies falsly I call a Concourse of causes or the Physical or Moral Efficacy of objects or the last Dictate of the Understanding do take away true liberty then Adam before his fall had no true liberty In answer whereunto I said that all the things now existent were necessary to the production of the effect to come that the Fore-knowledge of God causeth nothing though the Will do that the influence of the Stars is but a small part of that cause which maketh the Necessity and that this consequence If the concourse of all the causes necessitate the effect then Adam had no true liberty was false But in his words if these do take away true liberty then Adam before his fall had no true liberty the consequence is good but then I deny that Necessity takes away Liberty the reason
sensitive appetites yet sin not i The Question then is not whether a man be necessitated to will or nill yet free to act or forbear But saving the ambiguous acception of the word Free the Question is plainly this whether all Agents and all events natural civil moral for we speak not now of the conversion of a sinner that concerns not this Question be predetermined extrinsecally and inevitably without their own concurrence in the determination so as all actions and events which either are or shall be cannot but be nor can be otherwise after any other manner or in any other place time number measure order nor to any other end than they are And all this in respect of the supream cause or a concourse of extrinsecal causes determining them to one k So my preface remains yet unanswered Either I was extrinsecally and inevitably predetermined to write this discourse without any concurrence of mine in the determination and without any power in me to change or oppose it or I was not so predetermined If I was then I ought not to be blamed for no man is justly blamed for doing that which never was in his power to shun If I was not so predetermined then mine actions and my will to act are neither compelled nor necessitated by any extrinsecal causes but I elect and choose either to write or to forbear according to mine own will and by mine own power And when I have resolved and elected it is but a necessity of supposition which may and doth consist with true liberty not a reall antecedent necessity The two hornes of this Dilemma are so strait that no mean can be given nor room to passe between them And the two consequences are so evident that instead of answering he is forced to decline them Animadversions upon his Reply Numb III. a THus much I will maintaine that that is no true necessity which he calleth Necessity nor that Liberty which he calleth Liberty nor that the Question which he makes the Question c. For the clearing whereof it behooveth us to know the difference between these three Necessity Spontaneity and Liberty I did expect that for the knowing of the difference between Necessity Spontaneity and Liberty he would have set down their Definitions For without these their difference cannot possibly appear for how can a man know how things differ unless he first know what they are which he offers not to shew He tels us that Necessity and Spontaneity may meet together and Spontaneity and Liberty but Necessity and Liberty never and many other things impertinent to the purpose For which because of the length I refer the Reader to the Place I note onely this that Spontaneity is a word not used in common English and they that understand Latine know it means no more than Appetite or Will and is not found but in living Creatures And seeing he saith that Necessity and Spontaneity may stand together I may say also that Necessity and Will may stand together and then is not the Will Free as he would have it from Necessitation There are many other things in that which followeth which I had rather the Reader would consider in his own words to which I referre him than that I should give him greater trouble in reciting them again For I do not fear it will be thought too hot for my fingers to shew the vanity of such words as these Intellectual appetire Conformity of the appetite to the object Rational will Elective power of the Rational will nor understand I how Reason can be the root of true Liberty if the Bishop as he saith in the beginning had the liberty to write this discourse I understand how objects and the Conveniences and the Inconveniences of them may be represented to a man by the help of his sences but how Reason representeth any thing to the Will I understand no more than the Bishop understands there may be Liberty in Children in Beasts and inanimate Creaturs For he seemeth to wonder how Children may be left at Liberty how Beasts imprisoned may be set at Liberty and how a River may have a free course and saith what will he ascribe Liberty to inanimate Creatures also And thus he thinks he hath made it clear how Necessity Spontaneity and Liberty differ from â—â—e another If the Reader find it so I am contented b His Necessity is just such another a Necessity upon supposition arising from the concourse of all the causes including the last dictate of the understanding in reasonable Creatures c. The Bishop might easily have seen that the Necessity I hold is the same Necessity that he denies namely a Necessity of things future that is an antecedent Necessity derived from the very beginning of time and that I put Necessity for an Impossibility of not being and that Impossibility as well as Possibility are never truly said but of the future I know as well as he that the cause when it is adaequate as he calleth it or entire as I call it is together in time with the effect But for all that the Necessity may be and is before the effect as much as any Necessity can be And though he call it a Necessity of supposition it is no more so than all other Necessity is The fire burneth neoessarily but not without supposition that there is fewel put to it And it burneth the fewel when it is put to it necessarily but it is by supposition that the ordinary course of nature is not hindred For the fire burnt not the three Children in the Furnace c But if these causes did operate Freely or Contingently if they might have suspended or denied their concurrence or have concurred after another manner then the effect was not truly and antecedently necessary but either free or Contingent It seems by this he understandeth not what these words Free and Contingent mean A little before he wondred I should attribute Liberty to inanimate Creatures and now he puts causes amongst those things that operate Freely By these causes it seems be understandeth onely men whereas I shewed before that Liberty is usually ascribed to whatsoever Agent is not hindred And when a man doth any thing Freely there be many other Agents immediate that concur to the effect he intendeth which work not Freely but necessarily as when the man moveth the Sword Freely the Sword woundeth necessarily nor can suspend or deny its concurrence And consequently if the man move not himself the man cannot deny â—is concurrence To which he cannot reply unless he say a man originally can move himself for which he will be able to find no Authority of any that have but tasted of the knowledge of motion Then for Contingent he understandeth not what it meaneth for it is all one to say it is Contingent and simply to say it is saving that when they say simply it is they consider not how or by what means but in saying it is contingent they tell us
it s left to her Husbands choice either to establish it or to make it void And Josh. 24. 15. Choose you this day whom you will serve c. But I and my house will serve the Lord. He makes his own choice and leaves them to the liberty of their election And 2 Sam. 24 12. I offer thee three things choose thee which of them I shall do If one of these three things was necessarily determined and the other two impossible how was it left to him to choose what should be done Therefore we have true liberty T. H. ANd the first place of Scripture taken from Numb 30. 14 is one of them that look another way The words are If a Wife make a vow it is left to her Husbands choice either to establish it or make it void for it prooves no more but that the Husband is a free or voluntary Agent but not that his choice therein is not necessitated or not determined to what he shall choose by praecedent necessary causes J. D. MY first Argument from Scripture is thus formed Arg. 1. Whosoever have a liberty or power of election are not determined to one by praecedent necessary causes But men have liberty of election The assumption or minor proposition is prooved by three places of Scripture Numb 30. 14. Josh. 24. 15. 2 Sam. 24. 12. I need not insist upon these because T. H. acknowledgeth that it is clearly prooved that there is election in Man But he denieth the major Proposition because saith he Man is necessitated or determined to what he shall choose by praecedent necessary causes I take away this answer three wayes First by Reason Election is evermore either of things 1. possible or at least of things conceived to be possible that is efficacious election when a man hopeth or thinketh of obteining the object Whatsoever the will chooseth it chooseth under the notion of good either honest or delightful or profitable but there can be no reall goodness apprehended in that which is known to be impossible It is true there may be some wandring pendulous wishes of known impossibilities as a man also that hath comitted an offence may wish he had not committed it but to choose efficaciously an impossibility is as impossible as an impossibility it self No man can think to obtein that which he knows impossible to be obteined but he who knows that all things are antecedently determined by necessary causes knows that it is impossible for any thing to be otherwise than it is Therefore to ascribe unto him a power of election to choose this or that indifferently is to make the same thing to be determined to one and to be not determined to one which are contradictories Again whosoever hath an elective power or a liberty to choose hath also a liberty or power to refuse Isa. 7. 10. Before the Child shall know to refuse the evil and choose the good He who chooseth this rather than that refuseth that rather than this As Moses choosing to suffer affliction with the people of God did thereby refuse the pleasures of sin Heb. 11. 24. But no man hath any power to refuse that which is necessarily praedetermined to be unlesse it be as the Fox refused the Grapes which were beyond his reach When one thing of two or three is absolutely determined the other are made thereby simply impossible a Secondly I proove it by instances and by that universal 2. notion which the world hath of election what is the difference between an elective and hereditary Kingdom but that in an elective Kingdom they have power or liberty to choose this or that Man indifferently But in an hereditary Kingdome they have no such power nor liberty Where the Law makes a certain Heir there is a necessitation to one where the Law doth not name a certain Heir there is no necessitation to one and there they have power or liberty to choose An haereditary prince may be as grateful and acceptable to his subjects and as willingly received by them according to that liberty which is opposed to compulsion or violence as he who is chosen yet he is not therefore an elective Prince In Germany all the Nobility and Commons may assent to the choice of the Emperour or be well pleased with it when it is concluded yet none of them elect or choose the Emperour but onely those six Princes who have a consultative deliberative and determinative power in his Election And if their votes or suffrages be equally divided three to three then the King of Bohemia hath the casting voice So likewise in Corporations or Common-wealths sometimes the People sometimes the Common Councell have power to name so many persons for such an office and the Supreme Magistrate or Senate or lesser Councel respectively to choose one of those And all this is done with that caution and secrecy by billets or other means that no man knowes which way any man gave his vote or with whom to be offended If it were necessarily and inevitably predetermined that this individual person and no other shall and must be chosen what needed all this circuit and caution to do that which is not possible to be done otherwise which one may do as well as a thousand and for doing of which no rational man can be offended if the electors were necessarily predetermined to elect this man and no other And though T. H. was pleased to passe by my University instance yet I may not untill I see what he is able to say unto it The Junior of the Mess in Cambridge divides the meat in four parts the Senior chooseth first then the second and third in their order The Junior is determined to one and hath no choice left unless it be to choose whether he will take that part which the rest have refused or none at all It may be this part is more agreable to his mind that any of the others would have been but for all that he cannot be said to choose it because he is determined to this one Even such a liberty of election is that which is established by T. H. Or rather much worse in two respects The Junior hath yet a liberty of contradiction left to choose whether he will take that part or not take any part but he who is precisely predetermined to the choice of this object hath no liberty to refuse it Secondly the Junior by dividing carefully may preserve to himself an equal share but he who is wholly determined by extrinsecal causes is left altogether to the mercy and disposition of another Thirdly I proove it by the texts alleadged Numb 30. 3. 13. If a Wife make a vow it is left to her Husbands choice either to establish it or make it void But if it be predetermined that he shall establish it it is not in his power to make it void If it be predetermined that he shall make it void it is not in his power to establish it
And howsoever it be determined yet being determined it is not in his power indifferently either to establish it or to make it void at his pleasure So Joshua 24. 15. Choose you this day whom ye will serve But I and my house will serve the Lord. It is too late to choose that this day which was determined otherwise yesterday whom ye will serve whether the Gods whom your fathers served or the Gods of the Amorites Where there is an election of this or that these Gods or those Gods there must needs be either an indifferency to both objects or at least a possibility of either I and my house will seve the Lord. If he were extrinsecally predetermined he should not say I will serve but I must serve And 2 Sam. 24. 12. I offer thee three things choose thee which of them I shall do How doth God offer three things to Davids choice if he had predetermined him to one of the three by a concourse of necessary extrinsecal causes If a soveraign Prince should descend so far as to offer a delinquent his choice whether he would be fined or imprisoned or banished and had under hand signed the sentence of his banishment what were it else but plain drollery or mockery This is the argument which in T. H. his opinion looks another way If it do it is as the Parthians used to fight flying His reason followes next to be considered Animadversions upon the Bishops Reply Number VI. IN this Number he hath brought three places of Scripture to prove Free-Will The first is If a Wife make a vow it is left to her Husbands choice either to establish it or to make it void And Choose you this day whom you will serve c. But I and my house will serve the Lord. And I offer thee three things choose thee which of them I shall do Which in the Reply he endeavoureth to make good but needed not seeing they prove nothing but that a man is Free to do if he will which I deny not He ought to prove he is Free to will which I deny a Secondly I prove it by instances and by that universal notion which the world hath of Election His instances are first the difference between an Hereditary Kingdom and an Elective and then the difference between the Senior and Junior of the Mess taking their commons both which prove the liberty of doing what they will but not a liberty to will for in the first case the Electors are Free to name whom they will but not to Will and in the second the Senior having an appetite chooseth what he hath an appetite to but chooseth not his appetite T. H. FOr if there come into the Husbands mind greater good by establishing Numb 7. than abrogating such a vow the establishing will follow necessarily And if the evill that will follow thereon in the Husbands opinion outweigh the good the contrary must needs follow And yet in this following of ones hopes and feares consisteth the nature of Election So that a man may both choose this and cannot but choose this And consequently choosing and necessity are joyned together J. D. â—THere is nothing said with more shew of reason in this cause by the patrons of necessity and adversaries of true liberty than this That the Will doth perpetually and infallibly follow the last dictate of the understanding or the last judgement of right reason 〈…〉 in this and this onely I confess T. H. hath good seconds Yet the common and approved opinion is contrary And justly For First this very act of the understanding is an effect of 1. the will and a testimony of its power and liberty It is the will which affecting some particular good doth ingage and command the understanding to consult and deliberate what means are convenient for atteining that end And though the Will it self be blind yet its object is good in general which is the end of all human actions Therefore it belongs to the Will as to the General of an Army to move the other powers of the soul to their acts and among the rest the understanding also by applying it and reducing its power into act So as whatsoever obligation the understanding doth put upon the Will is by the consent of the Will and derived from the power of the Will which was not necessitated to moove the understanding to consult So the Will is the Lady and Mistriss of human actions the understanding is her trusty counseller which gives no advise but when it is required by the Will And if the first consultation or deliberation be not sufficient the Will may moove a review and require the understanding to inform it self better and take advise of others from whence many times the judgment of the understanding doth receive alteration Secondly for the manner how the understanding doth 2. determine the Will it is not naturally but morally The Will is mooved by the understanding not as by an efficient having a causal influence into the effect but onely by proposing and representing the object And therefore as it were ridiculous to say that the object of the sight is the cause of seeing so it is to say that the proposing of the object by the understanding to the will is the cause of willing and therefore the understanding hath no place in that concourse of causes which according to T. H. do necessitate the will Thirdly the judgement of the understanding is not alwayes 3. practicè practicum nor of such a nature in it self as to oblige and determine the will to one Sometimes the understanding proposeth two or three means equally available to the atteining of one and the same end Sometimes it dictateth that this or that particular good is eligible or fit to be chosen but not that it is necessarily eligible or that it must be chosen It may judge this or that to be a fit means but not the onely means to attain the desired end In these cases no man can doubt but that the Will may choose or not choose this or that indifferently Yea though the understanding shall judge one of these means to be more expedient than another yet for as much as in the less expedient there is found the reason of good the Will in respect of that dominion which it hath over it self may accept that which the understanding judgeth to be less expedient and refuse that which it judgeth to be more expedient Fourthly sometimes the will doth not will the end so efficaciously 4. but that it may be and often is deterred from the prosecution of it by the difficulty of the means and notwithstanding the judgement of the understanding the will may still suspend its own act Fiftly supposing but not granting that the will did necessarily 5. follow the last dictate of the understanding yet this proves no antecedent necessity but coexistent with the act no extrinsecal necessity the will and the understanding being but
two faculties of the same soul no absolute necessity but meerly upon supposition And therefore the same Authors who matntain that the judgement of the understanding doth necessarily determine the will do yet much more earnestly oppugne T. H. his absolute necessity of all occurrences Suppose the Will shall apply the understanding to deliberate and not require a review Suppose the dictate of the understanding shall be absolute not this or that indifferently nor this rather than that comparatively but this positively nor this freely but this necessarily And suppose the will do will efficaciously and do not suspend its own act Then here is a necessity indeed but neither absolute nor extrinsecal nor antecedent flowing from a concourse of causes without our selves but a necessity upon supposition which we do readily grant So far T. H. is wide from the truth whilest he maintains either that the apprehension of a greater good doth neessitate the Will or that this is an absolute necessity b Lastly whereas he saith that the nature of election doth consist in following our hopes and fears I cannot but observe that there is not one word of Art in this whole treatife which he useth in the right sence I hope it doth not proceed out of an affectation of singularity nor out of a contempt of former Writers nor out of a desire to take in sunder the whole frame of Learning and new mould it after his own mind It were to be wished that at least he would give us a new Dictionary that we might understand his sence But because this is but touched here sparingly and upon the by I will forbear it until I meet with it again in its proper place And for the present it shall suffise to say that hopes and fears are common to brute Beasts but election is a rational act and is proper only to man who is Sanctius his animal mentisque capacius altae T. H. THE second place of Scripture is Josh. 24. 15. The third is 2 Sam. 24. 12. whereby t is clearly proved that there is election in man but not proved that such election was not necessitated by the hopes and fears and considerations of good and bad to follow which depend not on the Will nor are subject to election And therefore one answer serves all such places if they were a thousand J. D. THis answer being the very same with the former word for word which hath already sufficiently been shaken in pieces doth require no new reply Animadversions upon the Bishops Reply Numb VII a THere is no thing said with more show of reason in this cause by the Patrons of Necessity then this that the Wil doth perpetually and infallibly follow the last dictate of the understanding or the last judgement of right reason c. Yet the common and approved opinion is contrary and justly for first this very act of the understanding is an effect of the Will c. I note here first that the Bishop is mistaken in saying that I or any other Patron of Necessity are of opinion that the Will followes alwayes the last judgement of right Reason For it followeth as well the judgement of an erroneous as of a true reasoning and the truth in general is that it followeth the last opinion of the goodness or evilness of the object be the opinion true or false Secondly I note that in making the understanding to be an effect of the Will he thinketh a man may have a will to that which he not so much as thinks on And in saying that it is the Will which affecting some particular good doth ingage and command the Understanding to consult c. That he not onely thinketh the Will affecteth a particular good before the man understands it to be good but also he thinketh that these words doth command the understanding and these for it belongs to the Will as to the General of an Army to move the other powers of the soul to their acts and a great many more that follow which are not sense but meer confusion emptiness as for example The understanding doth determine the will not Naturally but Morally and The will is moved by the understanding is unintelligible Moved not as by an Efficient is non-sense And where he saith that it is ridiculous to say the object of the sight is the cause of seeing he showeth so clearly that he understandeth nothing at all of Natural Philosophy that I am sorry I had the ill fortune to be engaged with him in a dispute of this kind There is nothing that the simplest Country Man could say so absurdly concerning the understanding as this of the Bishop the judgement of the understanding is not alwaies practicè practicum A Country Man will acknowledge there is judgement in Men but will as soon say the judgement of the judgement as the judgement of the understanding And if practicè practicum had been sense he might have made a shift to put it into English Much more followeth of this stuff b Lastly whereas he saith that the nature of Election doth consist in following our hopes and fears I cannot but observe that there is not one word of Art in this whole treatise which he useth in the right sense I hope it doth not proceed out of an affectation of singularity nor out of a contempt of former Writers c. He might have said there is not a word of Jargon nor Nonsense and that it proceedeth from an affectation of truth and contempt of metaphysical Writers and a desire to reduce into frame the Learning which they have confounded and disordered T. H. SUpposing it seemes I might answer as I have done that Numb 8. Necessity and Election might stand together and instance in the actions of Children Fooles and brute Beasts whose fancies I might say are necessitated and determined to one before these his proofs out of Scripture he desires to prevent that instance and therefore sayes that the actions of children fooles mad-men and beasts are indeed determined but that they proceed not from election nor from free but from spontaneous Agents As for example that the Bee when it maketh honey does it spontaneously And when the Spider makes his webb he does it spontaneously and not by election Though I never meant to ground any answer upon the experience of what children fools mad-men and beasts do yet that your Lordship may understand what can be meant by spontaneous and how it differs from voluntary I will answer that distinction and shew that it fighteth against its fellow Arguments Your Lordship therefore is to consider that all voluntary actions where the thing that induceth the will is not fear are called also spontaneous and said to be done by a mans own accord As when a man giveth money voluntarily to another for Merchandise or out of affection he is said to do it of his own accord which in Latin is Sponte and therefore the action is spontaneous Though to give
attein to the use of reason by degrees so by degeees they become free Agents Then they do deliberate before they do not deliberate The rod may be a means to make them use their reason when they have power to exercise it but the rod cannot produce the power before they have it Thirdly for Fools and mad Men It is not to be understood of such mad Men as have their lucida intervalla who are mad and discreet by fitts when they have the use of reason they are no mad Men but may deliberate as well as others Nor yet of such Fools as are only comparative Fools that is less wise than others Such may deliberate though not so clearly nor so judiciously as others but of meer mad Men and meer natural Fools to say that they who have not the use of reason do deliberate or use reason implies a contradiction But his chiefest confidence is in his Bees and Spiders of whose actions he saith if I had been a spectator I would have confessed not only Election but also Art Prudence Policy very near equal to that of Mankind whose life as Aristotle saith is civill Truly I have contemplated their actions many times and have been much taken with their curious works yet my thoughts did not reflect so much upon them as upon their maker who is sic magnus in magnis that he is not minor in parvis So great in great things that he is not less in small things Yes I have seen those silliest of creatures and seeing their rare works I have seen enough to confute all the bold-faced Atheists of this age and their hellish blasphemies I see them but I praised the marvaillous works of God and admired that great and first intellect who hath both adapted their organs and determined their fancies to these particular works I was not so simple to ascribe those Rarities to their own invention which I knew to proceed from a meer instinct of Nature In all other things they are the dullest of creatures Naturalists write of Bees that their fancy is imperfect not distinct from their common sense spread over their whole body and only perceiving things present When Aristotle calls them Political or Sociable Creatures he did not intend it really that they lived a civil life but according to an Analogy because they do such things by instinct as truly Political Creatures do out of judgement Nor when I read in St. Ambrose of their Hexagones or Sexangular celles did I therefore conclude that they were Mathematicians Nor when I read in Crespet that they invoke God to their aid when they go out of their Hives beâ—â—â—ing their thighs in form of a crosse and bowing themselves did I therefore think that this was an act of religious piety or that they were capable of Theological vertues whom I see in all other things in which their fancies are not determined to be the silliest of creatures strangers not only to right reason but to all resemblances of it Seventhly concerning those actions which are done 7. upon precedent and passed deliberations They are not only spontaneous but free acts Habits contracted by use and experience do help the Will to act with more facility and more determinately as the hand of the Artificer is helped by his tools And precedent deliberations if they were sad and serious and prooved by experience to be profitable do save the labour of subsequent consultations frustra fit per plura quod fieri potest per pauciora yet nevertheless the actions which are done by vertue of these formerly acquired habits are no less free than if the deliberation were coexistent which this particular action He that hath gained an habit and skill to play such a lesson needs not a new deliberation how to play every time that he playes it over and over yet I am far from giving credit to him in this that walking or eating universally considered are free actions or proceed from true liberty not so much because they want a particular deliberation before every individual act as because they are animal motions and need no deliberation of reason as we see in brute beasts And nevertheless the same actions as they are considered individually and invested with their due circumstances may be and often are free actions subjected to the liberty of the Agent Lastly whereas T. H. compareth the first motions or 8. rash attempts of cholerick persons with such acquired habits it is a great mistake Those rash attempts are voluntary actions and may be facilitated sometimes by acquired habits But yet for as much as actions are often altered and varied by the circumstances of Time Place and Person so as that act which at one time is morally good at another time may be morally evil And for as much as a general precedent deliberation how to do this kind of action is not sufficient to make this or that particular action good or expedient which being in it self good yet particular circumstances may render inconvenient or unprofitable to some persons at some times in some places Therefore a precedent general deliberation how to do any act as for instance how to write is not sufficient to make a particular act as my writing this individual Reply to be freely done without a particular and subsequent deliberation A man learns French adviseâ—â—y that is a free act The same man in his choler and passion reviles his friend in French without any deliberation this is a spontaneous act but it is not a free act If he had taken time to advise he would not have reviled his friend Yet as it is not free so neither is it so necessary as the Bees making honey whose fancy is not only inclined but determined by nature to that act So every way he failes And his conclusion that the liberty of Election doth not take away the necessity of electing this or that individual thing is no consequent from my doctrine but from his own Neither do my arguments fight one against another but his private opinions fight both against me and against an undoubted truth A free Agent endowed with liberty of election or with an elective power may nevertheless be necessitated in some individual acts but those acts wherein he is necessitated do not flow from his elective power neither are those acts which flow from his elective power necessitated Animadversions upon the Bishops Reply Number VIII a THe first thing that I offer is how often he mistakes my meaning in this one Section First I make Voluntary and Spontaneous actions to be one and the same He saith I distinguish them c. It is very possible I may have mistaken him for neither he nor I understand him If they be one why did he without need bring in this strange word Spontaneous Or rather why did the School men bring it in if not meerly to shift off the difficulty of maintaining their tenet of Free-Will b Secondly he saith I distinguish between
born do all oblige us to the observation of them yet to none of all these did we give our actual consent Over and above all these exceptions he builds upon a wrong foundation that all Magestrates at first were elective The first Governours were Fathers of Families And when those petty Princes could not afford competent protection and security to their subjects many of them did resign their several and respective interists into the hands of one joint Father of the Country And though his ground had been true that all first Legislators were elective which is false yet his superstructure fails for it was done in hope and trust that they would make just Lawes If Magistrates abuse this trust and deceive the hopes of the people by making tyrannical Lawes yet it is without their consent A precedent trust doth not justifie the subsequent errours and abuses of a Trustee He who is duely elected a Legislator may exercise his Legislative power unduely The peoples implicite consent doth not render the tyrannical Lawes of their Legislators to be just d But his chiefest answer is that an action forhidden though it proceed from necessary causes yet if it were done willingly it may be justly punished which according to his custome he proves by an instance A man necessitated to steal by the strength of temptation yet if he steal willingly is justly put to death Here are two things and both of them untrue First he fails in his assertion Indeed we suffer justly for those necessities which we our selves have contracted by our own fault but not for extrinsecal antecedent necessities w ch were imposed upon us without our fault If that Law do not oblige to punishment which is not intimated because the subject is invincibly ignorant of it How much less that Law which prescribes absolute impossibilities unless perhaps invincible necessity be not as strong a plea as invincible ignorance That which he adds if it were done willingly though it be of great moment if it be rightly understood yet in his sense that is if a mans will be not in his own disposition and if his willing do not come upon him according to his will nor according to any thing else in his power it weighs not half so much as the least feather in all his horse-load For if that Law be unjust and tyrannical which commands a man to do that which is impossible for him to do then that Law is likewise unjust and tyrannical which commands him to wil that which is impossible for him to will Secondly his instance supposeth an untruth and is a plain begging of the Question No man is extrinsecally antecedently and irresistibly necessitated by temptation to steal The Devil may sollicite us but he cannot necessitate us He hath a faculty of perswading but not a power of compelling Nosignem habemus spiritus â—â—ammam ciet as Nazi anzen He blowes the coles but the fire is our own Mordet duntaxat sese in fauces illius objicientens as St. Austin he bites not until we thrust our selves into his mouth He may propose he may suggest but he cannot move the will effectively Resist the Devil and he will flie from you Jam. 4. 7. By faith we are able to quench all the fiery darts of the wicked Eph. 6. 16. And if Sathan who can both propose the object and choose out the fittest times and places to work upon our frailties and can suggest reasons yet cannot necessitate the will which is most certain then much less can outward objects do it alone They have no natural efficacy to determine the will Well may they be occasions but they cannot be causes of evil The sensitive appetite may engender a proclivity to steal but not a necessity to steal And if it should produce a kind of necessity yet it is but Moral not Natural Hypothetical not Absolute Coexistent not Antecedent from our selves nor Extrinsecall This necessity or rather proclivity was fâ—â—â— in its causes we our selves by our own negligence in not opposing our passions when we should and might have freely given it a kind of dominion over us Admit that some sudden passions may and do extraordinarily surprise us And therefore we say motus primo primi the first motions are not alwayes in our power neither are they free yet this is but very rarely and it is our own fault that they do surprise us Neither doth the Law punish the first motion to theft but the advised act of stealing The intention makes the thief But of this more largely Numb 25. e He pleads moreover that the Law is a cause of justice that it frames the wills of men to justice and that the punishment of one doth conduce to the preservation of many All this is most true of a just Law justly executed But this is no god-a-mercy to T. H. his opinion of absolute necessity If all actions and all events be predetermined Naturally Necessarily Extrinsecally how should the Law frame men morally to good actions He leaves nothing for the Law to do but either that which is done already or that which is impossible to be done If a man be chained to every individual act which he doth and from every act which he doth not by indissolvible bonds of inevitable necessity how should the Law either deterre him or frame him If a Dog be chained fast to a post the sight of a rod cannot draw him from it Make a thousand Lawes that the fire shall not burn yet it will burn And whatsoever men do according to T. H. they do it as necessarily as the fire burneth Hang up a thousand Theevs and if a man be determined inevitably to steal he must steal notwithstanding f He addes that the sufferings imposed by the Law upon delinquents respect not the evil act past but the good to come and that the putting of a delinquent to death by the Magistrate for any crime whatsoever cannot be justified before God except there be a reall intention to benefit others by his example The truth is the punishing of delinquents by Law respecteth both the evil act past and the good to come The ground of it is the evil act past the scope or end of it is the good to come The end without the ground cannot justifie the act A bad intention may make a good action bad but a good intention cannot make a bad action good It is not lawful to do evil that good may come of it nor to punish an innoceut person for the admonition of others that is to fall into a certain crime for fear of an uncertain Again though there were no other end of penalties inflicted neither probatory nor castigatory nor exemplary but only vindicatory to satisfie the Law out of a zeal of Justice by giving to every one his own yet the action is just and warrantable Killing as it is considered in it self without all undue circumstances was never prohibited to the lawful Magistrate who is the Vicegerent or
have withdrawn their obedience as Lions and Bears to shew that man hath lost the â—…cy of his dominion and the weakest creatures as Flies and Gnats to shew into what a degree of contempt he is fallen yet still the most profitable and useful creatures as Sheep and Oxen do in some degree retain their obedience i The next branch of his answer concernes consultations which saith he are not superfluous though all things come to pass necessarily because they are the cause which doth necessitate the effect and the means to bring it to pass We were told Numb 11. that the last dictate of right reason was but as the last feather which breaks the Horses back It is well yet that reason hath gained some command again and is become at least a Quarter-master Certainly if any thing under God have power to determine the will it is right reason But I have shewed sufficiently that reason doth not determine the will physically nor absolutely much less extrinsecally and antecedently and therefore it makes nothing for that necessity which T. H. hath undertaken to prove k He adds further that as the end is necessary so are the means And when it is determined that one thing shall be chosen before another it is determined also for what cause it shall be so chosen All which is truth but not the whole truth for as God ordaines means for all ends so he adapts and fits the means to their respective ends free means to free ends contingent means to contingent ends necessary means to necessary ends whereas T. H. would have all means all ends to be necessary If God hath so ordered the World that a man ought to use and may freely use those means of God which he doth neglect not by vertue of Gods decree but by his own fault If a man use those means of evil which he ought not to use and which by Gods decree he had power to forbear If God have left to man in part the free managery of human affairs and to that purpose hath endowed him with understanding then consultations are of use then provident care is needfull then it concerns him to use the means But if God have so ordered this world that a man cannot if he would neglect any means of good which by vertue of Gods decree it is possible for him to use and that he cannot possibly use any means of evill but those which are irresistibly and inevitably imposed upon him by an antecedent decree then not onely consultations are vain but that noble facnâ—ty of reason it self is vain do we think that we can help God Almighty to do his proper work In vain we trouble our selves in vain we take care to use those means which are not in our power to use or not to use And this is that which was conteined in my prolepsis or prevention of his answer though he be pleased both to disorder it and to silence it We cannot hope by our labours to alter the course of things set down by God let him perform his decree let the necessary causes do their work If we be those causes yet we are not in our own disposition we must do what we are ordained to do and more we cannot do Man hath no remedy but patience and to shrug up the shoulders This is the doctrine flowes from this opinion of absolute necessity Let us suppose the great wheel of the clock which sets all the little wheels a going to be as the decree of God that the motion of it were perpetually infallible from an intrinsecal principle even as Gods decree is Infallible Eternal All-sufficient Let us suppose the lesser wheels to be the second causes and that they do as certainly follow the motion of the great wheel without missing or swerving in the least degree as the second causes do pursue the determination of the first cause I desire to know in this case what cause there is to call a Councill of Smiths to consult and order the motion of that which was ordered and determined before to their hands Are men wiser than God yet all men know that the motion of the lesser wheels is a necessary means to make the clock sirike l But he tells me in great sadness that my Argument is just like this other If I shall live till to morrow I shall live till to morrow though I run my self through with a sword to day which saith he is a false consequence and a false proposition Truly if by running through he understands killing it is a false or rather a foolish proposition and implyes a contradiction To live till to morrow and â—o dye to day are inconsistent But by his favour this is not my consequence but this is his own opinion He would perswade us that it is absolutely necessary that a man shall live till to morrow and yet that it is possible that he may kill himself to day My Argument is this If there be a liberty and possibility for a man to kill himself to day then it is not absolutely necessary that he shall live till tomorrow but there is such a liberty therefore no such necessity And the consequence which I make here is this If it be absolutely necessary that a man shall live till to morrow then it is vain and superfluous for him to consult and deliberate whether he should dye to day or not And this is a true consequence The ground of his mistake is this that though it be true that a man may kill himself to day yet upon the supposition of his absolute necessity it is impossible Such Heterogeneous arguments and instances he produceth which are half builded upon our true grounds and the other half upon his false grounds m The next branch of my argument concerns Admonitions to which he gives no new answer and therefore I need not make any new reply saving onely to tell him that he mistakes my argument I say not onely If all things be necessary then admonitions are in vain but if all things be necessary then it is to no more purpose to admonish men of understanding than fools children or mad men That they do admonish the one and not the other is confessedly true and no reason under heaven can be given for it but this that the former have the use of reason and true liberty with a dominion over their own actions which children fools and mad men have not Concerning praise and dispraise he inlargeth himself The scope of his discourse is that things necessary may be praise-worthy There is no doubt of it but withal their praise reflects upon the free agent as the praise of a statue reflects upon the workman who made it To praise a thing saith he is to say it is good n True but this goodness is not a Metaphysical goodness so the worst of things and whatsoever hath a being is good Nor a Natural goodness The praise of it passeth wholly to the Author of Nature
debt That cannot â—e for they have no sense of debt or duty And I think he will not say that they have received a command to obey him from authority It resteth therefore that the dominion of man consists in this that men are too hard for Lions and Bears because though a Lion or a Bear be stronger than a man yet the strength and art and specially the Leaguâ—ing and Societies of men are a greater power than the ungoverned strength of unruly Beasts In this it is that consisteth this dominion of man and for the same reason when a hungry Lion meeteth an unarmed man in a desert the Lion hath the dominion over the man if that of man over Lions or over Sheeep and Oxen may be called dominion which properly it cannot nor can it be said that Sheep and Oxen do otherwise obey us than they would do a Lion And if we have dominion over Sheep and Oxen we exercise it not as dominion but as hostility for we keep them onely to labour and to be kill'd and devoured by us so that Lions and Bears would be as good Maters to them as we are By this short passage of his concerning Dominion and Obedience I have no reason to expect a very shrewd answer from him to my Leviathan i The next branch of his Answer concerns Consultations which saith he are not superfluous though all things come to pass necessarily because they are the cause which doth necessitate the effect and the means to bring it to pass His Reply to this is that he hath shewed sufficiently that reason doth not determine the will Physically c. If not Physically how then As he hath told us in another place Morally But what it is to determine a thing Morally no man living understands I doubt not but be had therefore the Will to write this Reply because I had answered his Treatise concerning true Liberty My answer therefore was at least in part the cause of his writing yet that is the cause of the nimble local motion of his fingers Is not the cause of local motion Physical His Will therefore was Physically and Extrinsecally and Antecedently and not Morally caused by my writing k He adds further that as the end is necessary so are the means And when it is determined that one thing shall be chosen before another it is determined also for what cause it shall be so chosen All which is truth but not the whole truth c. Is it not enough that it is truth must I put all the truth I know into two or three lines No. I should have added that God doth adapt and fit the means to their respective ends free means to free ends contingent means to contingent ends necessary means to necessary ends It may be I would have done so but for shame Free Contingent and Necessary are not words that can be joined to Means or Ends but to Agents and Actions that is to say to things that moove or are moved A Free Agent being that whose motion or action is not hindered nor stopt And a Free Action that which is produced by a Free Agent A Contingent Agent is the same with an Agent simply But because men for the most part think those things are produced without cause whereof they do not see the cause they use to call both the Agent and the Action Contingent as attributing it to fortune And therefore when the causes are Necessary if they perceive not the necessity they call those necessary Agents and Actions in things that have Appetite Free and in things inanimate Contingent The rest of his Reply to this point is very little of it applied to my answer I note onely that where he sayes but if God have so ordered the World that a man cannot if he would neglect any means of good c. He would fraudulently insinuate that it is my opinion that a man is not Free to Do if he will and to Abstain if he will Whereas from the beginning I have often declared that it is none of my opinion and that my opinion is only this that he is not Free to Will or which is all one he is not Master of his future Will After much unorderly discourse he comes in with This is the doctrine that flows from this opinion of absolute Necessity which is impertinent seeing nothing flows from it more than may be drawn from the confession of an eternal Prescience l But he tells me in great sadness that my Argument is no better than this If I shall live till to morrow I shall live till to morrow though I run my self thorow with a sword to day which saith he is a false consequence and a false proposition Truly if by running through he understand killing it is a false or rather a foolish proposition He saith right Let us therefore see how it is not like to his He sayes If it be absolutely necessary that a man shall live till to morrow then it is vain and superfluous for him to consult whether he should dye to day or not And this he sayes is a true consequence I cannot perceive how it is a better consequence than the former for if it be absolutely necessary that a man should live till to morrow and in health which may also be supposed why should he not if he have the curiosity have his head cut off to try what pain it is But the consequence is false for if there be a necessity of his living it is necessary also that he shall not have so foolish a curiosity But he cannot yet distinguish between a seen and unseen necessity and that is the cause he beleeveth his consequence to be good m The next branch of my Argument concerns Admonitions c. Which he saies is this If all things be necessary then it is to no more purpose to admonish men of understanding than fools children or madmen but That they do admonish the one and not the other is confessedly true and no reason under heaven can be given for it but this that the former have the use of reason and true liberty with a dominion over their own actions which children fools and madmen have not The true reason why we admonish men and not children c. is because admonition is nothing else but telling a man the good and evil consequences of his actions They who have experience of good and evill can better perceive the reasonableness of such admonition than they that have not and such as have like passions to those of the Admonitor do more easily conceive that to be good or bad which the Admonitor sayeth is so than they who have great passions and such as are contrary to his The first which is want of experience maketh children and fools unapt and the second which is strength of passion maketh madmen unwilling to receive admonition for children are ignorant and mad men in an errour concerning what is good or evill for themselves This
Lipsius that a Fate is a series or order of causes depending upon the Divine counsel though the Divines thought he came to near them as he thinks I do now And the reason why he was cautelous was because being a member of the Romish Church he had little confidence in the judgment and lenity of the Romish Clergie and not because he thought he had over-shot himself b Concerning the other distinction of liberty in respect of the first cause and liberty in respect of the second causes though he will not see that which it concerned him to answer c. as namely that the faculty of willing c. I answer that distinction he alledgeth not to bee mine but the Stoicks and therefore I had no reason to take notice of it for he disputeth not against me but others And whereas he says it concerned me to make that answer which he hath set down in the words following I cannot conceive how it concerneth me whatsoever it may do somebody else to soâ—aâ— absurdly I said that the first cause is a necessary cause of all the effects that are next and immediate to it which can not be doubted and though he deny it he does not disprove it For when he says those things which God wills without himself he wills freely and not necessarily He says rashly and untruly Rashly because there is nothing without God who is Infinite in whom are all things and in whom we live move and have our being and untruly because whatsoever God foreknew from eternity he willed from eternity and therefore necessarily But against this he argueth thus Whatsoever cause acts or works necessarily doth work or act all that it can do or all that is in its power but it is evident that God doth not all things which he can do c. In things inanimate the action is alwaies according to the extent of its power not taking in the Power of Willing because they have it not But in those things that have Wilâ— the action is according to the wâ—ole Power wiâ—â— and all It is true that God doth not all things that he can do if he will but that he can Will that which he hath not Willed from all eternity I deny unlesse that he can not only Wil a change but also change his wil which all Divines say is immutable and then they must needs be necessary effects that proceed from God And his Texts God could have raised up Children unto Abraham c. And sent twelve Legions of Angels c. make nothing against the necessity of those actions which from the first cause proceed immediately J. D. THirdly they distinguish between liberty from compulsion Numb 19. and liberty from necessitation The Will say they is free from compulsion but not free from necessitation And this they fortifie with two reasons First because it is granted by all Divines that hypothetical necessity or necessity upon a supposition may consist with liberty Secondly because God and the good Angels do good necessarily and yet are more free than we To the first reason I confess that necessity upon a supposition may sometimes consist with true liberty as when it signifies onely an infallible certitude of the understanding in that which it knows to be or that it shall be But if the supposition be not in the Agents power nor depend upon any thing that is in his power If there be an exteriour antecedent cause which doth necessitate the effect to call this free is to be mad with reason To the second reason I confess that God and the good Angels are more free than we are that is intensively in the degree of freedom but not extensively in the latitude of the object according to a liberty of exercise but not of specification A liberty of exercise that is to do or not to do may consist well with a necessity of specification or a determination to the doing of good But a liberty of exercise and a necessity of exercise A liberty of specification and a necessity of specification are not compatible nor can consist together He that is antecedently necessitated to do evil is not free to do good So this instance is nothing at all to the purpose T. H. BUT the distinction of free into free from compulsion and free from necessitation I acknowledg for to be free from compulsion is to do a thing so as terrour be not the cause of his will to do it for a man is then onely said to be compelled when fear makes him willing to it as when a man willingly throws his goods into the Sea to save himself or submits to his enemy for fear of being killed Thus all men that do any thing from love or revenge or lust are free from compulsion and yet their actions may be as necessary as those which are done upon compulsion for sometimes other passions work as forcibly as fear But free from necessitation I say nothing can be And 't is that which he undertook to disproove This distinction he sayes useth to be fortified by two reasons But they are not mine The first he sayes is That it is granted by all Divines that an hypothetical necessity or necessity upon supposition may stand with liberty That you may understand this I will give you an example of hypotheticall necessity If I shall live I shall eat this is an hypotheticall necessity Indeed it is a necessary proposition that is to say it is necessary that that proposition should be true whensoever uttered but t is not the necessity of the thing nor is it therefore necessary that the man shall live or that the man shall eat I do not use to fortifie my distinctions with such reasons Let him confute them as he will it contents me But I would have your Lordship take notice hereby how an easy and plain thing but withal false may be with the grave usage of such words as hypotheticall necessity and necessity upon supposition and such like tearms of Schoolmen obscur'd and made to seem profound learning The second reason that may confirm the distinction of free from compulsion and free from necessitation he sayes is that God and good Angels do good necessarily and yet are more free than we This reason though I had no need of it yet I think it so far forth good as it is true that God and good Angels do good necessarily and yet are free but because I find not in the Articles of our Faith nor in the Decrees of our Church set down in what manner I am to conceive God and good Angels to work by necessity or in what sense they work freely I suspend my sentence in that point and am content that there may be a freedom from compulsion and yet no freedom from necessitation as hath been prooved in that that a man may be necessitated to some actions without threats and without fear of danger But how he can avoid the consisting together of freedom and
necessity supposing God and good Angels are freer than men and yet do good necessarily that we must now examin I confess saith he that God and good Angels are more free than we that is intensively in degree of freedom not extensively in the latitude of the object according to a liberty of exercise not of specification Again we have here two distinctions that are no distinctions but made to seem so by tearms invented by I know not whom to cover ignorance and blind the understanding of the Reader For it cannot be conceived that there is any liberty greater than for a man to do what he will and to fobrear what he will One heat may be more intensive than another but not one liberty than another He that can do what he will hath all liberty possibly and he that cannot has nonâ— at all Also liberty as he says the Schooles call it of exercise which is as I have said before a liberty to do or not to do cannot be without a liberty which they call of specification that is to say a liberty to do or not to do this or that in particular for how can a man conceive that he has liberty to do any thing that hath not liberty to do this or that or somewhat in particular If a man be forbidden in Lent to eat this and that and every other particular kind of flesh how can he be understood to have a liberty to eat flesh more than he that hath no lâ—cense at all You may by this again see the vanity of distinctions used in the Schools And I do not doubt but that the imposing of them by authority of Doctors in the Church hath been a great cause that men have laboured though by sedition and evil courses to shake them off for nothing is more apt to beget hatred than the tyrannising over mans reason and understanding especially when it is done not by the Scripture bâ—â— by pretense of learning and more judgment than that of other men J. D. HE who will speak with some of our great undertakers about the grounds of learning had need either to speak by an Interpreter or to learn a new Language I dare not call it Jargon or Canting lately devised not to set forth the truth but to conceal falshood He must learn a new Liberty a new necessity a new Contingency a new Sufficiency a new Spontaneity a new kind of Deliberation a new kind of Election a new Eternity a new Compulsion and in conclusion a new Nothing a This proposition the will is free may be understood in two senses Either that the will is not compelled or that the will is not alwayes necessitated for if it be ordinarlly or at any time free from necessitation my assertion is true that there is freedom from necessity The former sense that the will is not compelled is acknowledged by all the world as a truth undeniable Voluntas non cogitur For if the will may be compelled then it may both will and not will the same thing at the same time under the same notion but this implies a contradiction Yet this Author like the good woman whom her husband sought up the stream when she was drowned upon pretense that when she was living she used to go contrary courses to all other people he holds that true compulsion and fear may make a man will that which he doth not will that is in his sense may compell the will As when a man willingly throws his goods into the Sea to save himself or submits to his enemy for fear of being killed I answer that T. H. mistakes sundry wayes in this discourse b First he erreth in this to think that actions proceeding from fear are properly compulsory actions which in truth are not only voluntary but free actions neither compelled nor so much as Physically necessitated Another man at the same time in the same Ship in the same storm may choose and the same individual man otherwise advised might choose not to throw his goods over-board It is the man himself who chooseth freely this means to preserve his life It is true that if he were not in such a condition or if he were freed from the grounds of his present fears he would not choose neither the casting of his goods into the Sea nor the submitting to his enemy But considering the present exigence of his affairs reason dictates to him that of two inconveniences the less is to be chosen as a comparative good Neither doth he will this course as the end or direct object of his desires but as the means to attain his end And what Fear doth in these cases Love Hope Hatred c. may do in other cases that is may occasion a man to elect those means to obtain his willed end which otherwise he would not elect As Jacob to serve seven yeers more rather than not to enjoy his beloved Rachel The Merchant to hazard himself upon the rough Seas in hope of profit Passions may be so violent that they may necessitate the will that is when they prevent deliberations but this is rarely and then the will is not free But they never properly compell it That which is compelled is against the will and that which is against the will is not willed c Secondly T. H. erres in this also where he saith that a man is then onely said to be compelled when fear makes him willing to an action As if force were not more prevalent with a man then fear we must know therefore that this word compelled is taken two wayes sometimes improperly that is when a man is mooved or occasioned by threats or fear or any passion to do that which he would not have done if those threats or that passion had not been Sometimes it is taken properly when we do any thing against our own inclination mooved by an external cause the will not consenting nor concurring but resisting as much as it can As in a rape or when a Christian is drawn or carried by violence to the Idols Temple Or as in the case of St. Peter John 21. 18. Another shall guide thee and carry thee whither thou wouldst not This is that compulsion which is understood when we say the will may be letted or changed or necessitated or that the imperate actions of the will that is the actions of the inferiour faculties which are ordinarily moved by the will may be compelled but that the immanent actions of the will that is to will to choose cannot be compelled because it is the nature of an action properly compelled to be done by an extrinsecal cause without the concurrence of the will d Thirdly the question is not whether all the actions of a man be free but whether they be ordinarily free Suppose some passions are so suddain and violent that they surprise a man and betray the succours of the soul and prevent deliberation as we see in some motus primo primi or antipathies how some men
will run upon the most dangerous objects upon the first view of a loathed creature without any power to contain themselves Such actions as these as they are not ordinary so they are not free because there is no deliberation nor election But where deliberation and election are as when a man throws his goods over-board to save the Ship or submits to his enemy to save his life there is alwayes true liberty Though T. H. slight the two reasons which I produce in favour of his cause yet they who urged them deserved not to be stighted unless it were because they were School-men The former reason is thus framed A necessity of supposition may consist with true liberty but that necessity which flowes from the naturall and extrinsecall determination of the will is a necessity of supposition To this my answer is in effect That e a necessity of supposition is of two kinds sometimes the thing supposed is in the power of the Agent to do or not to do As for a Romish Priest to vow continence upon supposition that he be a Romish Priest is necessary but because it was in his power to be a Priest or not to be a Priest therefore his vow is a free act So supposing a man to have taken Physick it is necessary that he keep at home yet because it was in his power to take a Medicine or not to take it therefore his keeping at home is free Again sometimes the thing supposed is not in the power of the Agent to do or not to do supposing a man to be extrem sick it is necessary that he keep at home or supposing that a man hath a naturall antipathy agâ—inst a Cat he runs necessarily away so soon as he sees her Because this antipathy this sickness are not in the power of the party affected therefore these acts are not free Jacob blessed his Sons Balaam blessed Israel these two acts being done are both necessary upon supposition But it was in Jacobs power not to have blessed his Sons So was it not in Balaams power not to have blessed Israel Numb 22. 3â— Jacobs will was determined by himself Balaams will was Physically determined by God Therefore Jacobs benediction proceeded from his own free election And Balaams from Gods determination So was Caâ—phas his Prophesy John 11. 51. Therefore the Text saith He spake not of himself To this T. H. saith nothing but only declareth by an impertinent instance what Hypotheticall signifies And then adviseth your Lordship to take notice how Errours and Ignorance may be cloked under grave Scholastick tearms And I do likewise intreat your Lordship to take notice that the greatest fraud and cheating lurks commonly under the pretense of plain dealing wee see Juglers commonly strip up their sleeves and promise extraordinary fair dealing before they begin to play their tricks Concerning the second argument drawn from the liberty of God and the good Angels As I cannot but approove his modesty in suspending his judgment concerning the manner how God and the good Angels do work necessarily or freely because he finds it not set down in the Articles of our Faith or the Decrees of our Church especially in this age which is so full of Atheisme and of those scoffers which St. Peter prophesied of 2 Pet. 3. 3. Who neither believe that there is God or Angels or that they have a Soul but only as â—alt to keep their bodies from putriâ—action So I can by no means assent unto him in that which followes that is to say that he hath proved that Liberty and Necessity of the same kind may consist together that is a liberty of exercise with a necessity of exercise or a liberty of specification with a necessity of specification Those actions which he saith are necessitated by passion are for the most part dictated by reason either truly or apparently right and resolved by the will itself But it troubles him that I say that God and the good Angels are more free than men intensively in the degree of freedom but not extensively in the latitude of the object according to a liberty of exercise but not of specification which he saith are no distinctions but tearms invented to cover ignorance Good words Doth he onely see Are all other men stark blind By his favour they are true and necessary distinctions And if he alone do not conceive them it is because distinctions as all other things have their fates according to the capacities or prejudices of their Readers But he urgeth two reasons One heat saith he may be more intensive than another but not one liberty than another Why not I wonder Nothing is more proper to a man than reason yet a man is more rational than a child and one man more rationall than another that is in respect of the use and exercise of reason As there are degrees of understanding so there are of liberty The good Angels have cleerer understandings than we and they are not hindred with passions as we and by consequence they have more use of liberty than we f His second reason is He that can do what he will hath all liberty and he that cannot do what he will hath no liberty If this be true then there are no degrees of liberty indeed But this which he calls liberty is rather an Omnipotence than a liberty to do whatsoever he will A man is free to shoot or not to shoot although he cannot hit the white whensoever he would We do good freely but with more difficulty and reluctation than the good Spirits The more rational and the less sensual the will is the greater is the degree of liberty His other exception against liberty of exercise and liberty of specification is a meer mistake which grows meerly from not rightly understanding what liberty of specification or contrariety is A liberty of specification saith he is a liberty to do or not to do this or that in particular Upon better advice he will find that this which he calls a liberty of specification is a liberty of contradiction and not of specification nor of contrariety To be free to do or not to do this or that particular good is a liberty of contradiction so likewise to be free to do or not to do this or that particular evill But to be free to do both good and evill is a liberty of contrariety which extends to contrary objects or to diverse kinds of things So his reason to proove that a liberty of exercise cannot be without a liberty of specification falls flat to the ground And he may lay aside his Lenten license for another occasion I am a shamed to insist upon these things which are so evident that no man can question them who doth understand them g And here he falls into another invective against distinctions and Scholastical expressions and the Doctors of the Church who by this means tyrannized over the understandings of other men What a presumption is this for
out of the power to will which power is commonly called the Will Howsoever it be the summe of his distinction is that a voluntary act may be done on compulsion that is to say by foul means but to will that or any act cannot be but by allurement or fair means Now seeing fair Means Allurements and Enticements produce the action which they do produce as necessarily as threatning and foul means it followes that to will may be made as necessary as any thing that is done by compulsion So that the distinction of actus imperatus and actus elicitus are but words and of no effect against necessity J. D. IN the next place follow two reasons of mine own against the same distinction the one taken from the former grounds that Election cannot consist with determination to one To this he saith he hath answered already No truth is founded upon a Rock He hath been so far from prevailing against it that he hath not been able to shake it a Now again he tells us that Election is not opposite to either Necessitation or Compulsion He might even as well tell us that a stone thrown upwards mooves naturally Or that a a woman can be ravished with her own will Consent takes away the Rape This is the strangest liberty that ever was heard of that a man is compelled to do what he would not and yet is free to do what he will And this he tells us upon the old score that he who submits to his enemy for fear of death chooseth to submit But we have seen formerly that this which he calls compulsion is not compulsion properly nor that natural determination of the will to one which is opposite to true Liberty He who submits to an enemy for saving his life doth either onely counterfeit and then there is no will to submit this disguise is no more than a stepping aside to avoid a present blow Or else he doth sincerely will a submission and then the will is changed There is a vast difference between compelling and changing the will Either God or man may change the will of man either by varying the condition of things or by informing the party otherwise but compelled it cannot be that is it cannot both will this and not will this as it is invested with the same circumstances though if the act were otherwise circumstantiated it might nill that freely which now it wills freely b Wherefore this kind of actions are called mixt actions that is partly voluntary partly unvoluntary That which is compelled in a mans present condition or distress that is not voluntary nor chosen That which is chosen as the remedy of its distress that is voluntary So hypothetically supposing a man were not in that distress they are involuntary but absolutely without any supposition at all taking the case as it is they are voluntary c His other instance of a man forced to prison that he may choose whether he will be haled thither upon the ground or walk upon his feet is not true By his leave that is not as he pleaseth but as it pleaseth them who have him in their power If they will drag him he is not free to walk And if they give him leave to walk he is not forced to be dragged d Having laid this foundation he begins to build upon it that other passions do necessitate as much as fear But he erres doubly first in his foundation fear doth not determine the rational will naturally and necessarily The last and greatest of the five terrible things is death yet the fear of death cannot necessitate a resolved mind to do a dishonest action which is worse than death The fear of the fiery furnace could not compel the three Children to worship an Idol nor the fear of the Lions necessitate Daniel to omit his duty to God It is our frailty that we are more afraid of empty shadows than of substantial dangers because they are neerer our senses as little Children fear a Mouse or a Visard more than fire or weather But as a fitte of the stone takes away the sense of the gout for the present so the greater passion doth extinguish the less The fear of Gods wrath and eternal torments doth expel corporal fear fear not them who kill the body but fear him who is able to cast both body and soul into hell Luc. 7. 4. e Da veniam Imperator tu carcerem ille gehennam minatur Excuse me O Emperor thou threatenest men with prison but he threatens me with hell f Secondly he erres in his superstruction also There is a great difference as to this case of justifying or not justifying an action between force and fear and other passions Force doth not only lessen the sin but takes it quite away Deâ—t 22. 26. He who forced a betrothed Damsell was to die but unto the Damsel saith he thou shalt do nothing there is in her no fault worthy of death Tamars beauty or Ammons love did not render him innocent but Ammons force rendred Tamar innocent But fear is not so prevalent as force Indeed if fear be great and justly grounded such as may fall upon a constant man though it do not dispense with the transgression of the negative Precepts of God or Nature because they bind to all times yet it diminisheth the offence even against them and pleades for pardon But it dispenseth in many cases with the trangression of the positive Law either Divine or humane because it is not probable that God or the Law would oblige man to the observation of all positive Precepts with so great dammage as the loss of his life The omission of Circumcision was no sin whilst the Isralites were travelling through the wilderness By T. H. his permission g I will propose a case to him A Gentleman sends his servant with mony to buy his dinner some Ruffians meet him by the way and take it from him by force The servant cryed for help and did what he could to defend himself but all would not serve The servant is innocent if he were to be tried before a Court of Areopagites Or suppose the Ruffians did not take it from him by force but drew their swords and threatned to kill him except he delivered it himself no wise man will conceive that it was either the Masters intention or the servants duty to hazard his life or limbs for saving of such a trifling sum But on the other side suppose this servant passing by some Cabaret or Tennis-court where his Camerads were drinking or playing should stay with them and drink or play away his mony and afterwards plead as T. H. doth here that he was overcome by the meer strength of temptation I trow neither T. H. nor any man else would admit of this excuse but punish him for it because neither was he necessitated by the temptation and what strength it had was by his own fault in respect of that vitious habit which he had contracted of
drinking or gaming Jam. 1. 14. Every man is tempted when he is drawn away of his own lust and entised Disordered passions of anger hatred lust if they be consequent as the case is here put by T. H. and flow from deliberation and election they do not only not diminish the fault but they aggravate it and render it much greater h He talks much of the motives to do the motives to forbear how they work upon and determine a man as if a reasonable man were no more than a Tennis-ball to be tossed to and fro by the Rackets of the second causes As if the will had no power to moove it self but were meerly passive like an artificiall Popingay remooved hither and thither by the bolts of the Archers who shoot on this side and on that What are motives but reasons or discourses framed by the understanding and freely mooved by the will What are the will and the understanding but faculties of the same soul and what is liberty but a power resulting from them both To say that the will is determined by these motives is as much as to say that the Agent is determined by himself If there be no necessitation before the judgment of right reason doth dictate to the will then there is no antecedent no extrinsecal necessitation at all i All the world knows that when the Agent is determined by himself then the effect is determined likewise in its cause But if he determined himself freely then the effect is free Motives determine not naturally but morally which kind of determination may consist with true liberty But if T. H. his opinion were true that the will were naturally determined by the Physical and special influence of extrinsecal causes not onely motives were vain but reason it self and deliberation were vain No saith he they are not vain because they are the means Yes if the means be superfluous they are vain what needed such a circuit of deliberation to advise what is fit to be done when it is already determined extrinsecally what must be done k He saith that the ignorance of the true causes and their power is the reason why we ascribe the effect to liberty but when we seriously consider the causes of things we acknowledge a necessity No such thing but just the contrary The more we consider and the cleerer we understand the greater is the liberty and the more the knowledge of our own liberty The less we consider and the more incapable that the understanding is the lesser is the liberty and the knowledge of it And where there is no consideration nor use of reason there is no liberty at all there is neither moral good nor evil Some men by reason that their exteriour senses are not totally bound have a trick to walk in their sleep Suppose such an one in that case should cast himself down a pair of stairs or from a bridge and break his neck or drown himself it were a mad Jury that would find this man accessary to his own death Why because it was not freely done he had not then the use of reason l Lastly he tells us that the will doth choose of necessity as well as the fire burns of neoessity If he intend no more but this that election is the proper and natural act of the will as burning is of the fire or that the elective power is as necessarily in a man as visibility he speaks truly but most impertinently For the question is not now of the elective power in actu primo whether it be an essential faculty of the soul but whether the act of electing this or that particular object be free and undetermined by any antecedent and extrinsecal causes But if he intend it in this other sense that as the fire hath no power to suspend its burning nor to distinguish between those combustible matters which are put unto it but burns that which is put unto it necessarily if it be combustible So the will hath no power to refuse that which it wills nor to suspend its own appetite He erres grossely The will hath power either to will or nill or to suspend that is neither to will nor nill the same object Yet even the burning of the fire if it be considered as it is invested with all particular circumstances is not otherwise so necessary an action as T. H. imagineth m Two things are required to make an effect necessary First that it be produced by a necessary cause such as fire is Secondly that it be necessarily produced Protagoras an Atheist began his Book thus Concerning the Gods I have nothing to say whether they be or they be not for which his Book was condemned by the Athenians to be burned The fire was a necessary Agent but the sentence or the application of the fire to the Book was a free act and therefore the burning of his Book was free Much more the rational will is free which is both a voluntary agent and acts voluntarily n My second reason against this distinction of Liberty from Compulsion but not from necessitation is new and demonstrates cleerly that to necessitate the will by a Physical necessity is to compel the will so far as the will is capable of Compulsion and that he who doth necessitate the will to evil after that manner is the true cause of evil and ought rather to be blamed than the will it self But T. H. for all he saith he is not surprised can be contented upon better advise to steal by all this in silence And to hide this tergiversation from the eyes of the Reader he makes an empty shew of braving against that famous and most necessary distinction between the elicite and imperate acts of the will first because the terms are improper secondly because they are obscure What Triviall and Grammatical objections are these to be used against the universal current of Divines and Philosophers Verborum ut Nummorum It is in words as it is in mony Use makes them proper and current A Tyrant at first signified a lawful and just Prince Now use hath quite changed the sense of it to denote either an Usurper or an Oppressor The word praemunire is now grown a good word in our English Laws by use and tract of time And yet at first it was meerly mistaken for a praemonere The names of Sunday Munday Tuesday were derived at first from those Heathenish Deities the Sun the Moon and the warlike God of the Germans Now we use them for distinction sake onely without any relation to their first original He is too froward that will refuse a piece of coin that is current throughout the world because it is not stamped after his own fancy So is he that rejects a good word because he understands not the derivation of it We see forrein words are daily naturalized and made free Denizons in every Country But why are the tearms improper Because saith he It attributes command and subjection to
the faculties of the soul as if they made a Common-wealth or family among themselves and could speak one to another Therefore he saith o They who invented this tearm of Actus Imperatus understood not any thing what it signified No why not It seemeth to me they understood it better than those who except against it They knew there are mentall tearms which are onely conceived in the mind as well as vocal tearms which are expressed with the tongue They knew that howsoever a Superiour do intimate a direction to his inferiour it is still a command Tarquin commanded his son by onely striking off the tops of the Poppies and was by him both understood and obeyed Though there be no formall Common-wealth or family either in the body or in the soul of man yet there is a subordination in the body of the inferiour members to the head there is a subordination in the soul of the inferiour faculties to the rational will Far be it from a reasonable man so far to dishonour his own nature as to equal fancy with understanding or the sensitive appetite with the reasonable will A power of command there is without all question though there be some doubt in what faculty this command doth principally reside whether in the will or in the understanding The true resolution is that the directive command for counsel is in the understanding And the applicative command or empire for putting in execution of what is directed is in the will The same answer serves for his second impropriety about the word Elicite For saith he as it is absurdly said that to dance is an act allured or drawn by fair means out of the ability to dance So it is absurdly said that to will or choose is an act drawn out of the power to will His objection is yet more improper than their expression The art of dancing rather resembles the understanding than the will That drawing which the Schools intend is cleer of another nature from that which he conceives By elicitation he understands a perswading or enticing with flattering words or sweet alluring insinuations to choose this or that But that elicitation which the Schools intend is a deducing of the power of the will into act that drawing which they mention is meerly from the appetibility of the object or of the end as a man draws a Child after him with the sight of a fair Apple or a Shepheard draws his sheep after him with the sight of a green bough So the end â—rawâ— the will to it by a Metaphorical motion What he understands here by an ability to dance is more than I know or any man els until he express himself in more proper tearms whether he understand the locomotive faculty alone or the art or acquired habit of dancing alone or both of these jointly It may be said aptly without any absurdity that the act of dancing is drawn out â—licâ—tur of the locomotive faculty helped by the acquired habit He who is so scrupulous about the received phrases of the Schools should not have let so many improper expressions have dropped from his pen as in this very passage he confounds the compelling of a voluntary action with the commanding of a voluntary action and willing with electing which he saith are all one Yet to will properly respects the end to elect the means p His other objection against this distinction of the acts of the will into Elicite and Imperate iâ— obscurity Might it not saith he have been as easily said in English a voluntary action Yes it might have been said as easily but not as truely nor properly Whatsoever hath its original from the will whether immediatly or mâ—diatly whether it be a proper act of the will it self as to elect or an act of the understanding as to deliberate or an act of the inferiour faculties or of the members is a voluntary action but neither the act of reason nor of the senses nor of the sensitive appetite nor of the members are the proper acts of the will nor drawn immediatly out of the will it self but the members and faculties are applyed to their proper and respective acts by the power of the will And so he comes to cast up the total sum of my second reason with the same faith that the unjust Steward did make his accounts Luk. 16. The sum of J. D's distinction is saith he that a voluntary act may be done on compulsion just contrary to what I have maintained that is to say by â—oul means But to will that or any act cannot be but by allurement or fair means I confess the distinction is mine because I use it as the Sun is mine or the Air is mine that is common to me with all who treat of this subject q But his mistakes are so thick both in relating my mind and his own that the Reader may conclude he is wandered out of his known way I will do my duty to shew him the right way First no acts which are properly said to be compelled are voluntary Secondly acts of terrour which he calls foul means which are sometimes in a large improper sense called compulsory actions may be and for the most part are consistent with true liberty Thirdly actions procâ—â—â—â—ng from blandishments or sweet perswasions which he calls fair means if they be indeliberated as in children who want the use of reason are not presently free actions Lastly the strength of consequent and deliberated desires doth neither diminish guilt nor excuse from punâ—â—â—ment as just fears of extream and imminent dangers thrâ—â—tâ—â—â— by extrinsecal agents often do because the strength oâ— the foâ—mer proceeds from our own fault and was freeâ—â— elected in the causes of it But neither desires nor fears which are consequent and deliberated do absolutely necessitate the will Animadversions upon the Bishops Reply Numb XX. a NOw again he tells us that Election is not opposite to either necessation or compulsion He might even as well tell us that a stone thrown upwards moves naturally or that a Woman 〈◊〉 be ravished with her own Will Consent takes away the Râ—â—e c. If that which I have told him again be false why shews he not why it is false Here is not one word of Argument against it To say I might have said as well that a stone thrown upwards moves naturally is no refutation but a deniall I will not dispute with him whether a stone thrown up move naturally or not I shall onely say to those Readers whose Judgements are not defaced with the abuse of Words that as a stone moveth not upwards of it self but by the Pâ—â—â—er of the Exernal Agent who giveth it a beginning of that motion So also when the stone falleth it is moved downward by the Power of some other Agent which though it be imperâ—eptible to the eye is not imperceptible to reason But because this is not proper discourse for the Bishop and because I have else where discoursed thereof
himself angry And of him that poured out the water when he was thirsty And the like Such things I confess have or may have been done and do prove onely that it was not necessary for Ulysses then to weâ—p nor for the Philosopher to strike nor for â—hat other maâ— to drink but it does not prove that it was not necessary for Ulysses then to abâ—â—ain as he did from weeping nor the Philosopher to abstain as he did from striking Nor the other man to forbear drinking And yet that was the thing he ought to have provâ—d Lastly he confesseth that the disposition of objects may be dangerous to liberty but cannot be destructive To which I answer tâ—â— impossible For liberty is never in any other danger than to be lost And if 〈◊〉 cannot be lost which he confesseth I may inâ—er it can be in no danger at all J. D. a THe third pretense was out of moral Philosophy misunderstood that outward objects do necessitate the will I shall not need to repeat what he hath omitted but onely to satisfie his exceptions b The first is that it is not material though the power of outward objects do proceed from our own faults if such faults of ours proceed not from causes in our own power Well but what if they do proceed from causes that are in our own power as in truth they do then his answer is a meer subterfuge If our faults proceed from causes that are not and were not in our own power then they are not our faults at all It is not a fault in us not to do those things which never were in our power to do But they are the faults of these causes frâ—m whence they do proceed c Next he confesseth that it â—â—â—n our power by good endeavours to alter those vitious habits which we had contracted and to get the contrary habit True saith he but then the contrary habit doth necessitate the one way as well as the former habit did the other way By which very consideration it appears that that which he calls a necessity is no more but a proclivity If it were a true necessity it could not be avoided nor altered by our endeavours The truth is Acquired habits do help and assist the faculty but they do not necessitate the faculty He who hath gotten to himself an habit of temperance may yet upon occasion commit an intemperate act And so on the contrary Acts are not opposed to habits but other habits d He adds that we are not mooved to prayer or any other action but by outward objects as pions company godly Preachers or something equivalent Wherein are two other mistakes first to make godly Preachers and pious company to be outward objects which are outward Agents Secondly to affirm that the will is not moved but by outward objects The will is mooved by it self by the understanding by the sensitive passions by Angels good aâ—d bad by men and most effectually by acts or habits infused by God whereby the will is excited extraordinarily indeed but efficaciously and determinately This is more than equivalent with outward objects Another branch of mine answer was that a resolved and prepared mind is able to resist both the appâ—tibility of objects and the unruliness of passions As I shewed by examples e He answers that I prove Ulysses was not necessitated to weep nor the Philosopher to strike but I do not prove that they were not necessitated to forbear He saith true I am not now proving but answering Yet my answer doth sufficiently prove that which I intend That the rational will hath power both to sleight the most appetible objects and to control the most unruly passions When he hath given a clear solution to those proofs which I have produced then it will be time for him to cry for more work Lastly whereas I say that outward objects may be dangerous but cannot be destructive to true liberty He catcheth at it and f objects that liberty is in no danger but to be lost but I say it cannot be lost therefore he infers that it is in no danger at all I answer First that liberty is in more danger to be abused than to be lost Many more men do abuse their wits than lose them Secondly liberty is in danger likewise to be weakened or diminished as when it is clogged by vicious habits contracted by our selves and yet it is not totally lost Thirdly though liberty cannot be totally lost out of the world yet it may be totally lost to this or that particular man as to the exercise of it Reason is the root of liberty and though nothing be more natural to a man than reason yet many by excess of study or by continual gurmandizing or by some extravagant passion which they have cherished in themselves or by doting too much upon some affected object do become very sorts and deprive themselves of the use of reason and consequently of Liberty And when the benefit of liberty is not thus universally lost yet it may be lost respectively to this or that particular occasion As he who makes choise of a bad wife hath lost his former liberty to chose a good one Animadversions upon the Bishops Reply Numb XXII a THe third pretence was out of Moral Philosophy misunderstood that outward objects do necessitate the Will I cannot imagine how the question whether outward objects do necessitate or not necessitate the Wilâ— can any â—ay be referred to Moral Philosophy The principles â—f moral Philosophy are the Laws wherewith outward objects have little to do as being for the most part inanimate which follow alwayes the force of nature without respect to moral Laws Nor can I conceive what purpose he had to bring this into his Reply to my answer wherein I attribute nothing in the Action of outward objects to Morallity b His first exception is that it is not material that the power of outward objects do proceed from our own faults if such faults of ours proceed not from causes in our own power Well but what if they do proceed from causes that are in our own power as in truth they do then his answer is a meer subterfuge But how prâ—vâ—s he that in truth they do Because else saith he they are not our faults at all Very well reasoned A Horse is lame from a cause that was not in his power therefore the lameness is no fault in the Horse But his meaning is tâ—s no injustice unlesse the causes were in his own power as if it were not injustice whatsoever is willingly done against the Law whatsoever it be that is the cause oâ— the Wil to do it c Next he confesseth that it is in our power by good endeavours to alter those vicious habits which we had contracted and to get the contrary habits There is no such confession in my answer I said Prayer Fasting c. May alter our habits But I never said that the Will to Pray Fast c.
each pace that he walks Thus many steps must he go not one more nor one less under pain of mortal sin What is this but a Rack and a Gibbet to the Conscience But God leaves many things indifferent though man be so curious he will not A good Architect will be sure to provide sufficient materials for his building but what particular number of stones or trees he troubles not his head And suppose he should weigh each action thus yet he doth not so still there is liberty Thirdly I conceive it is possible in this mist and weakness of human apprehension for two actions to be so equally circumstantiated that no discernable difference can appear between them upon discussion Aâ— suppose a Chirurgion should give two plaisters to his Patient and â—id him apply either oâ— them to his wound what can induce his reason more to the one than to the other but that he may refer it to chance whether he will use But leaving these probable speculations which I submit â—o better judgments I answer the Philosopher briefly thus Admitting that the will did necessarily follow the last dictare of the understanding as certainly in many things it doth Yet First this is no extrinsâ—â—al determination from without and a mans own resolution is not destructive to his own liberty but depends upon it So the person is still free Secondly this determination is not antecedent but joyned with the Action The understanding and the will are not different Agents but distinct faculties of the same soul. Here is an infallibility or an hypothetical necessity as we say Quicquid est quando est necessâ— est esse A necessity of consequence but not a necessity of consequent Though an Agent have certainly determined and so the Action be become infallible yet if the Agent did determine freely the Action likewise is free T. H. THE fourth opinion which he râ—jecteth is of them that make the will necessarily to follow the last dictate of the understanding but it seems he understands that Tenet in another sense than I do For he speaketh as if they that held it did suppose men must dispute the sequel of every astion they do great and small to the least grain which it a thing that he thinks with reason to be untrue But I understand it to signifie that thâ— will followes the last opinion or judgment immediatly proceding thâ— action concerning whether it be good to do it or not whether he hath weighed it long before or not at all And that I take to be the meaning of them that hold it As for example when a man strikes his will to strike followes necessarily that thought he had of the sequel of his stroke immediately before the liftinâ— of his hand Nâ—w iâ— it be understood in that sense the last dictate of the understanding does â—ertainly necessitate the action though not as the whole cause yet as the last cause as the last feather necessitates the breaking of an horses back when there are so many laid on before as there needeth but the addition oâ— that one to make the weight sufficient That which he alledgeth against this is first out of a Poet who in the person of Medea sayes Video Meliora proboque Deteriora sequorâ— But the saying as prâ—try as it is 〈◊〉 not true for though Medea saw many reasons to forbear killing her Children yet the last dictate of her judgment was that the present revenge on her husband outweighed them all and thereupon the wicked action followed necessarily Then the story of the Roman that of two competitors said one had the better reasons but the oâ— her must have the office This also maketh against him for the last dictate of his judgment that had the bestowing of the office was this that it was better to take a great bribe than reward a great merit Thirdly he objects that things neerer the senses moove more powerfully than reason What followeth thence but this That the sense of the present good is commonly more immediate to the Action than the foresight of the evill consequents to come Fourthly whereas he sayes that do what a man can he shall sorrow more for the death of his son than for the sin of his soul it makes nothing to the last dictate of the understanding but it argues plainly that sorrow for sin is not voluntary And by consequence repentance proceedeth from causes J. D. THE fourth pretense alledged against Liberty was that the will doth necessarily follow the last dictate of the understanding This objection is largely answered before in several places of this Reply and particularly Numb 7. In my former discourse I gave two answers to it The one certain and undoubted That a supposing the last dictate of the understanding did alwayes determine the will yet this determination being not antecedent in time nor proceeding from extrinsecal causes but from the proper resolution of the Agent who had now freely determined himself it makes no absolute necessity but onely hypothetical upon supposion that the Agent hath determined his own will after this or that manner Which being the main answer T. H. is so far from taking it away that he takes no notice of it The other part of mine answer was probable That it is not alwayes certain that the will doth alwayes actually follow the last dictate of the understanding though it alwayes ought to follow it b Of which I gave then three reasons one was that actions may be so equally circumstantiated or the case so intricate that reason cannot give a positive sentence but leaves the election to liberty or chance To this he answers not a word Another of my reasons was because reason doth not weigh nor is bound to weigh the convenience or inconvenience of every individual action to the uttermost grain in the balance of true judgement The truth of this reason is confessed by T. H. though he might have had more abetters in this than in the most part of his discourse that nothing is indifferent that a man cannot stroak his beard on one side but it was either necessary to do it or sinful to omit it from which confession of his it follows that in all those actions wherein reason doth not define what is most convenient there the will is free from the determination of the understanding and by consequence the last feather is wanting to break the horses back A third reason was because passions and affections sometimes prevail against judgment as I prooved by the example of Medea and Caesar by the neerness of the objects to the senses and by the estimation of a temporal loss more than sin Against this reason his whole answer is addressed And first c he explaineth the sense of the assertion by the comparison of the last feather wherewith he seems to be delighted seeing he useth it now the second time But let him like it as he will it is improper for three reasons First the determination of the
do a thing or not do a thing that he does nothing else but consider whether it be better for himself to do it or not to do it And to consider an action is to imagine the consequences of it both good and evil from whence is to be inferred that deliberation is nothing but alternate imagination of the good and evil sequells of an action or which is the same thing alternate hope and fear or alternate appetite to do or acquit the action of which he deliberateth J. D. a IF I did not know what deliberation was I should be little relieved in my knowledge by this description Sometimes he makes it to be a consideration or an act of the understanding sometimes an imagination or an act of the fancy sometimes he makes it to be an alternation of passions hope fear Sometimes he makes it concern the end sometimes to concern the means So he makes it I know not what The truth is this in brief Deliberation is an inquiry made by reason whether this or that definitely considered be a good and fit means or indefinitely what are good and fit means to be chosen for attaining some wished end Animadversions upon the Answer to Numb XXVI a IF I did not know what Deliberation was I should be little relieved in my knowledge by this description Sometimes he makes it to be a consideration or an act of the understanding sometimes an imagination or an act of the fancy c. So he makes it I know not what If the Bishop had observed what he does himself when he Deliberates reasons understands or imagins he would have known what to make of all that I have said in this Number He would have known that consideration understanding reason and all the passions of the mind are imaginations That to consider a thing is to imagine it that to understand a thing is to imagine it that to hope and fear are to imagine the things hoped for and feared The difference between them is that when we imagine the consequence of any thing we are said to consider that thing and when we have imagined any thing from a sign and especially from those signs we call names we are said to understand his meaning that maketh the sign and when we reason we imagine the consequence of affirmations and negations joyned together and when we hope or fear we imagine things good or hurtful to our selves insomuch as all these are but imaginations diversly named from different circumstances as any man may perceive as easily as he can look into his own thoughts But to him that thinketh not himself upon the things where of but upon the words where with he speaketh and taketh those words on trust from pushed Schoolmen it is not onely hard but impossible to be known And this is the reason that maketh him say I make Deliberation he knows not what But how is deliberation defined by him It is saith he an inquiry made by reason whether this or that definitely considered be a good and fit means or indefinitely what are good and fit means to be chosen for attaining some wished end If it were not his custome to say the understanding understandeth the Wil willeth and so of the rest of the faculties I should have believed that when he says deliberation is an inquiry made by reason he meaneth an inquiry made by the man that reasoneth for so it will be sense But the reason which a man useth in deliberation being the same thing that is called Deliberation his Definition that Deliberation is an inquiry made by reason is no more then if he had said Deliberation is an inquiry made by Deliberation a Definition good enough to be made by a School-man Nor is the rest of the Definition altogether as it should be for there is no such thing as an indefinite consideration of what are good and fit means but a man imagining first one thing then another considereth them successively and singly each one whether it conduceth to his ends or not T. H. THirdly I conceive that in all deliberations that is to say in all alternate succession of contrary appetites the last is that which we cal the Wil is immediatly before the doing of the action or next before the doing of it become impossible All other appetites to do and to quit that come upon a man during his deliberation are usually called intentions and inclinations but not wills there being but one will which also in this case may be called last will though the intention change often J. D. a STill here is nothing but confusion he confounds the faculty of the will with the act of volition he makes the wil to be the last part of deliberation he makes the intention which is a most proper and elicite act of the will or a willing of the end as it is to be attainâ—â— by certain means to be no willing at all but onely some antecedaneous inclination or propension He might as well say that the uncertain agitation of the needle hither and thither to find out the Pole the resting or fixing of it self directly towards the Pole were both the same thing But the grossest mistake is that he will acknowledge no act of a mans will to be his will but onely the last act which he calls the last will If the first were no will how comes this to be the last will According to this doctrine the will of a man should be as unchangeable as the Will of God at least so long as there is a possibility to effect it b According to this doctrine concupiscence with consent should be no sin for that which is not truely willed is not a sin Or rather should not be at all unless either the act followed or were rendred impossible by some intervening circumstances According to this Doctrine no man can say this is my will because he knowes not yet whether it shall be his last appeal The truth is there be many acts of the will both in respect of the means and of the end But that act which makes a mans actions to be truely free is Election which is the deliberate chosing or refusing of this or that means or the acceptation of one means before another where divers are represented by the understanding Animadversions upon the Answer to Numb XXVII a STill here is nothing but confusion he con founds the faculty of the Wil with the act of Volition he makes the Wil to be the last part of Deliberation he makes the intention which is a most proper and elicite act of the Wil to be no Willing at all but onely some antecedâ—nâ—ous he might as well have said antecedent inclination To confound the faculty of the Wil with the Wil were to confound a Wil with no Wil for the faculty of the Wil is no Wil the Act onely which he calls Volition is the Wil. As a man that sleâ—peth hath the Power of seeing and seeth not nor hath
signifies and whether our Antipodes have their heads upwards or downwards And he will not stick to tell you that if his head be upwards theirs must needs be downwards And this is because he knows not the formal reason thereof that the Heavens incircle the earth and what is towards Heaven is upwards This same erroneous notion of upwards and downwards before the true reason was fully discovered abused more than ordinary capacities as appears by their arguments of penduli homines and pendulae arbores Again what do men conceive ordinaryly by this word empty as when they say an empty vessel or by this word Body as when they say there is no body in that room they intend not to exclude the aire either out of the vessel or out of the room Yet reason tells us that the vessel is not truly empty and that the aire is a true body I might give an hundred such like instances He who leaves the conduct of his understanding to follow vulgar notions shall plunge himself into a thousand errours like him who leaves a certain guide to follow an ignis fatuus or a Will with the wispe So his proposition is false b His reason That matter of fact is not verified by other mens Arguments but by every mans own sense and memory is likewise maimed on both sides whether we hear such words or not is matter of fact and sense is the proper judge of it But what these words do or ought truely to signifie is not to be judged by sense but by reason Secondly reason may and doth oftentimes correct sense even about its proper object Sense tells us that the Sun is no bigger than a good Ball but reason demonstrates that it is many times greater than the whole Globe of the earth As to his instance How can it be proved that to love a thing and to think it good is al one to a man that doth not mark his own meaning by these words I confess it cannot be proved for it is not true Beauty and likeness and love do conciliate love as much as goodness Cos amoris amor Love is a passion of the will but to judge of goodness is an act of the understanding A Father may love an ungracious Child and yet not esteem him good A man loves his own house better than another mans yet he cannot but esteem many others better than his own His other instance How can it be proved that eternity is not nunc stans to a man that says these words by custome and never considers how he can conceive the thing it self in his minde is just like the former not to be proved by reason but by fancy which is the way he takes And it is not unlike the counsel which one gave to a Novice about the choise of his wife to advice with the Bels as he fancied so they sounded either take her or leave her c Then for his assumption it is as defective as his proposition That by these words spontaneity c. men do understand as he conceives No rational man doth conceive a spontaneous action and an indeliberate action to be all one every indeliberate action is not spontaneous The fire considers not whether it should burn yet the burning of it is not spontaneous Neither is evâ—ry spontaneous action indeliberate a man may deliberate what he will eat and yet eat it spontaneously d Neither doth deliberation properly signifie the considering of the good and evil sequels of an action to come But the considering whether this be a good and fit means or the best and fittest means for obtaining such an end The Physician doth not deliberate whether he should cure his Patient but by what means he should cure him Deliberation is of the means not of the end e Much less doth any man conceive with T. H. that deliberation is an imagination or an act of fancy not of reason common to men of discretion with mad men and natural fools and children and bruit beasts f Thirdly neither doth any understanding man conceive or can conceive that the will is an act of our deliberation The understanding and the will are two distinct faculties or that onely the last appetite is to be called our will So no man should be able to say this is my will because he knows not whether he shall persevere in it or not g Concerning the fourth point we agree that he is a free Agent that can do if he will and forbear if he will But I wonder how this dropped from his pen what is now become of his absolute necessity of all things if a man be free to do and to forbear any thing Will he make himself guilty of the non-sense of the School-men and run with them into contradictions for company It may be he will say he can do if he will and forbear if he will but he cannot will if he will This will not serve his turn for if the cause of a free action that is the will to be determined then the effect or the action it self is likewise determined a determined cause cannot produce an undetermined effect either the Agent can will and forbear to will or else he cannot do and forbear to do h But we differ holy about the fifth point He who conceives liberty aright conceives both a liberty in the subject to will or not to will and a liberty to the object to will this or that and a liberty from impediments T. H. by a new way of his own cuts off the liberty of the subject as if a stone was free to ascend or descend because it hath no outward impediment And the liberty towards the object as if the Needle touched with the Load-stone were free to point either towards the North or towards the South because there is not a Barricado in its way to hinder it yea he cuts off the liberty from inward impediments also As if an Hawk were at liberty to fly when her wings are plucked but not when they are tied And so he makes liberty from extrinsecal impediments to be compleat liberty so he ascribes liberty to bruit beasts and liberty to Rivers and by consequence makes Beasts and Rivers to be capeable of sin and punishment Assuredly Xerxes who caused the Hellespont to be beaten with so many stripes was of this opinion Lastly T. H. his reason that it is â—ustome or want of ability or negligence which makes a mâ—n câ—nceive otherwise is but a begging of that which he should prove Other men consider as seriously as himself with as much judgement as himself with less prejudice than himself and yet they can apprehend no suchsense of these words Wouldhe have other men feign that they see fiery Dragons in the Air because he affirms confidently that he sees them and wonders why others are so blind as not to see them i The reason for the sixth point is like the former a phantastical or imaginative reason How can a man imagine any
possible that without Discipline a man should come to think that the estimony of a witness which is the onely verifier of matter of fact should consist not in sense and memory so as he may say he saw and remembers the thing done but in Arguments or Sâ—llegismes Or how can an unlearnâ—d man be brought to think the words he speaks ought to signifie when he speaks sincerely any thing else but that which himself meant by them Or how can any man without learning take the question whether the Sun be no bigger then a ball or bigger then the Earth to be a question of fact Nor do I think that any man is so simple as â—â—t to find that to be good which he loveth good I say so far forth as it maketh him to love it or is there any unlâ—arned man so stâ—pid as to think Eternity is this present instant of time standing still and the same Eternit to be the very next instant after an consequently that there be so many eternities â—aâ— there can be instants of time supposed No there is Scâ—olasticâ— learning required in some measure to make one mad c Then for his assumption it is as defective as his proposition That by these words spontaneity c. Men do understand as he conceives c. No rational man doth conceive a spontaneous Action and an indeliberate Action to be all one Every indeliberate Action is not spontaneous c. Nor every spontaneous Action indeliberate This I get by striving to make sense of that which he strives to make non-sense I never thought the word spontaneity English Yet because he used it I made such meaning of it as it would bear and said it meant inconsiderate proceeding or nothing And for this my too much officioâ—snesse I râ—ceive the reward of bâ—ing thought by him not to be a rati nal man I know that in the Latine of all Authors but School-men Actio spontanea signifies that Action whereof there is no apparent cause derived further thâ—n from the Agent it self and is in all things that have sense the same with voluntary whether deliberated or not dâ—liberated And therefore where he distinguished it from voluntary I thought he might mean indeliberate but let it signifie what it will provided it be intelligible it would make against him d Neither doth deliberation properly signifie the considoring of the good â—nd evil sequells of an Action to come but the considering whether this be a good and fit means or the best and fittest means for obtaining such an end If the Biâ—â—ops words proceeded not from hearing and readiâ—g of others but from his own thoughts he could never have reprehended this â—efinition of Deliberation especiaâ—â—y in the manner he doth it for he says it is the consiâ—â—ring whether this or that be a good and fit means for obtaining such an end as if considering whether a means be good or not were nâ—t all â—nâ— with considering whether the sâ—quei of using those means be good or evil e Much lesse doth any man conceive with T. H. that deliberation is an Act oâ— Fancie not of Reason common to men of discretion with mad men natural fools children and brute beasts I do indeed conceive that dâ—liberation is an Act of Imagination or Fancie â—ay more that Reason and Understanding also are Aâ—â—s of the Imagination that is to say they are Imaginations I find it so by considering my own Ratioâ—â—nation and he might find it so iâ— his iâ— he did consider his own thoughts and not speak as he does by rote by rote I say when he disputes not by rote when he is about those trisâ—â—s he caâ—â—eth businesses then when he speaks he thinks of that is to say he Imagins his business but here he thinks onely upon the words of other men that have gone before him in thâ—â— question transcribing their conclusions and arguments not his oâ—n thoughts f Thirdly neither doth any understanding man conceive or can conceive either that the Will is an Act of our Deliberation the Understanding and the Will are two distinct faculties or that onely the last appetite is to be called our Wiâ—â— Though the understanding and the Will were two distinct faculties yet follow their not that the Will and the Deliberation are two distinct faculâ—iâ—s for the whole Deliberation is nothing else but so many Wills alternatively changâ—d according as a man understandeth or fancieth the good and evil sequels of the thing concerning which he deliberateth whether he shall pursâ—e it or of the means whâ—ther they conduce or not to that end whatsoever it be he seeketh to obtain So that in deliberation there be many wills whereof net any is the cause of a voluntary action but the last as I have said before answering this objection in another place g Concerning the fourth point we agree that he is a free Agent that can do if he Will and forbear if he Will. But I wonder how this dropped from his Pen c. It may be he will say he can do if he will and forbear if he will but he cannot will if he will He has no reason to wonder â—ow this dropped from my Pen. He sound it in my Answer Numb 3. and has been all his while about to confute it so long indeed that he had forget I said it And now agaiâ— brings another Argument to prâ—vâ— a man is free to Will which â—â—th either the Agent can Will and forbear to Will or else be cannot do and forbear to do There is no doubt a man can Will one thing or other and forbear to will it For men if they be awake â—re alwayes willing one thing or other But put the case a man hâ—s a Will today to do a certain Action to morrow is he sure to have the same Will tomorrow when he is to do it Is he free to day to chuse tomorrows Will This is it that 's now in question and this Argument maketh nothing for the assirmative or negative h But we differ wholy about the fifth point He who conceives Liberty aright conceives both a Liberty in the subject to Will or not to Will and a Liberty to the object to Will this or that and a Liberty from impediments T. H. by a new way of his own cuts of the â—iberty of the subject as if a stone were free to ascend or descend because it hath no outward impediment And the Liberty towards the object as if the needle touched with the Load-stone were free to point either towards the North or towards the South because there is not a Baricado in its way How does it appear that he who conceives Liberty aright conceives a Liberty in the subject to Will or noâ— to Will unlesse he mean Liberty to dâ— if he Will or not to do if he wiâ—l not which was never denied Or how does it follow that a stone is as free to ascend as descâ—nd uâ—leâ—â—e he prove there is no outward impeâ—iment to its ascent