Part 25

“Thirdly, that which concerns this question of liberty from necessity most nearly, is that (c) a cause is said to be sufficient in respect of the ability of it to act, not in respect of its will to act. The concurrence of the will is needful to the production of a free effect. But the cause may be sufficient, though the will do not concur. As God is sufficient to produce a thousand worlds; but it doth not follow from thence, either that he hath produced them, or that he will produce them. The blood of Christ is a sufficient ransom for all mankind; but it doth not follow therefore, that all mankind shall be actually saved by virtue of his blood. A man may be a sufficient tutor, though he will not teach every scholar, and a sufficient physician, though he will not administer to every patient. For as much therefore as the concurrence of the will is needful to the production of every free effect, and yet the cause may be sufficient in sensu diviso, although the will do not concur; it follows evidently, that the cause may be sufficient, and yet something which is needful to the production of the effect, may be wanting; and that every sufficient cause is not a necessary cause.

“Lastly, if any man be disposed to wrangle against so clear light, and say, that though the free agent be sufficient in sensu diviso, yet he is not sufficient in sensu composito, to produce effect without the concurrence of the will, he saith true: but first, he bewrays the weakness and the fallacy of the former argument, which is a mere trifling between sufficiency in a divided sense, and sufficiency in a compounded sense. And seeing the concurrence of the will is not predetermined, there is no antecedent necessity before it do concur; and when it hath concurred, the necessity is but hypothetical, which may consist with liberty.”

ANIMADVERSIONS UPON THE ANSWER TO NO. XXXI.

In this place he disputeth against my definition of a sufficient cause, namely, that cause to which nothing is wanting needful to the producing of the effect. I thought this definition could have been misliked by no man that had English enough to know that a sufficient cause, and cause enough, signifieth the same thing. And no man will say that that is cause enough to produce an effect, to which any thing is wanting needful to the producing of it. But the Bishop thinks, if he set down what he understands by sufficient, it would serve to confute my definition: and therefore says: (a) “Two horses jointly are sufficient to draw a coach, which either of them singly is insufficient to do. Now to make the effect, that is, the drawing of the coach necessary, it is not only required that the two horses be sufficient to draw it, but also that it be necessary they shall be joined, and that the owner of the horses will let them draw, and that the smith hath not lamed them, and they be not resty, and list not to draw but when they list: otherwise the effect is contingent”. It seems the Bishop thinks two horses may be sufficient to draw a coach, though they will not draw, or though they be lame, or though they be never put to draw; and I think they can never produce the effect of drawing, without those needful circumstances of being strong, obedient, and having the coach some way or other fastened to them. He calls it a sufficient cause of drawing, that they be coach horses, though they be lame or will not draw. But I say they are not sufficient absolutely, but conditionally, if they be not lame nor resty. Let the reader judge, whether my sufficient cause or his, may properly be called cause enough.

(b) “Secondly, a cause may be said to be sufficient, either because it produceth that effect which is intended, as in the generation of a man; or else, because it is sufficient to produce that which is produced, as in the generation of a monster: the former is properly called a sufficient cause, the latter a weak and insufficient cause.” In these few lines he hath said the cause of the generation of a monster is sufficient to produce a monster, and that it is insufficient to produce a monster. How soon may a man forget his words, that doth not understand them. This term of insufficient cause, which also the School calls deficient, that they may rhyme to efficient, is not intelligible, but a word devised like hocus pocus, to juggle a difficulty out of sight. That which is sufficient to produce a monster, is not therefore to be called an insufficient cause to produce a man; no more than that which is sufficient to produce a man, is to be called an insufficient cause to produce a monster.

(c) “Thirdly, a cause is said to be sufficient in respect to the ability of it to act, not in respect of its will to act, &c. As God is sufficient to produce a thousand worlds.” He understands little, when men say, God is sufficient to produce many worlds, if he understand not the meaning to be, that he is sufficient to produce them if he will. Without this supposition, if he will, a man is not sufficient to produce any voluntary action, not so much as to walk, though he be in health and at liberty. The will is as much a sufficient cause without the strength to do, as the strength without the will. To that which he adds, that my definition is “a mere trifling between a sufficiency in a divided sense, and a sufficiency in a compounded sense”, I can make no answer; because I understand no more what he means by sufficiency in a divided sense, and sufficiency in a compounded sense, than if he had said sufficiency in a divided nonsense, and sufficiency in a compounded nonsense.

NO. XXXII.

T. H. Lastly, I hold that the ordinary definition of a free agent, namely, that a free agent is that, which when all things are present which are needful to produce the effect, can nevertheless not produce it, implies a contradiction, and is nonsense; being as much as to say, the cause may be sufficient, that is, necessary, and yet the effect not follow.

J. D. “This last point is but a corollary, or an inference from the former doctrine, that ‘every sufficient cause produceth its effect necessarily’; which pillar being taken away the superstructure must needs fall to the ground, having nothing left to support it. ‘Lastly, I hold’, saith he. What he is able to prove, is something: so much reason, so much trust. But what he holds, concerns himself, not others. But what holds he? ‘I hold’, saith he, ‘that the ordinary definition of a free agent implies a contradiction, and is nonsense.’ That which he calls the ‘ordinary definition’ of liberty, is the very definition which is given by the much greater part of Philosophers and Schoolmen. And doth he think that all these spake nonsense: or had no more judgment than to contradict themselves in a definition? He might much better suspect himself, than censure so many. Let us see the definition itself: ‘A free agent is that, which when all things are present that are needful to produce the effect, can nevertheless not produce it.’ I acknowledge the old definition of liberty, with little variation. But I cannot see this nonsense, nor discover this contradiction. For (a) in these words, ‘all things needful’, or ‘all things requisite’, the actual determination of the will is not included. But by all things needful or requisite, all necessary power either operative or elective, all necessary instruments and adjuments extrinsical and intrinsical, and all conditions are intended. As he that hath pen, and ink, and paper, a table, a desk, and leisure, the art of writing, and the free use of his hand, hath all things requisite to write if he will; and yet he may forbear if he will. Or as he that hath men, and money, and arms, and munition, and ships, and a just cause, hath all things requisite for war; yet he may make peace if he will. Or as the king proclaimed in the gospel (Matth. xxii. 4): I have prepared my dinner, my oxen and my fatlings are killed, all things are ready; come unto the marriage. According to T. H.’s doctrine, the guests might have told him that he said not truly, for their own wills were not ready. (b) And indeed if the will were (as he conceives it is) necessitated extrinsically to every act of willing, if it had no power to forbear willing what it doth will, nor to will what it doth not will; then if the will were wanting, something requisite to the producing of the effect was wanting. But now when science and conscience, reason and religion, our own and other men’s experience doth teach us, that the will hath a dominion over its own acts to will or nill without extrinsical necessitation, if the power to will be present in actu primo, determinable by ourselves, then there is no necessary power wanting in this respect to the producing of the effect.

“Secondly, these words, ‘to act or not to act, to work or not to work, to produce or not to produce’, have reference to the effect, not as a thing which is already done or doing, but as a thing to be done. They imply not the actual production, but the producibility of the effect. But when once the will hath actually concurred with all other causes and conditions and circumstances, then the effect is no more possible nor producible, but it is in being, and actually produced. Thus he takes away the subject of the question. The question is, whether effects producible be free from necessity. He shuffles out ‘effects producible’, and thrusts in their places ‘effects produced’, or which are in the act of production. Wherefore I conclude, that it is neither nonsense nor contradiction to say that a free agent, when all things requisite to produce the effect are present, may nevertheless not produce it.

ANIMADVERSIONS UPON THE ANSWER TO NO. XXXII.

The question is here whether these words ‘a free agent is that, which when all things needful to the production of the effect are present, can nevertheless not produce it’, imply a contradiction; as I say it does. To make it appear no contradiction, he saith: (a) “In these words, ‘all things needful’, or ‘all things requisite’, the actual determination of the will is not included”: as if the will were not needful nor requisite to the producing of a voluntary action. For to the production of any act whatsoever, there is needful, not only those things which proceed from the agent, but also those that consist in the disposition of the patient. And to use his own instance, it is necessary to writing, not only that there be pen, ink, paper, &c.; but also a will to write. He that hath the former, hath all things requisite to write if he will, but not all things necessary to writing. And so in his other instances, he that hath men and money, &c. (without that which he putteth in for a requisite), hath all things requisite to make war if he will, but not simply to make war. And he in the Gospel that had prepared his dinner, had all things requisite for his guests if they came, but not all things requisite to make them come. And therefore “all things requisite”, is a term ill defined by him.

(b) “And indeed if the will were (as he conceives it is) necessitated extrinsically to every act of willing; if it had no power to forbear willing what it doth will, nor to will what it does not will; then if the will were wanting, something requisite to the producing of the effect were wanting. But now when science and conscience, reason and religion, our own and other men’s experience doth teach us, that the will hath a dominion over its own acts to will or nill without extrinsical necessitation, if the power to will be present in actu primo, determinable by ourselves, then there is no necessary power wanting in this respect to the producing of the effect.” These words, “the will hath power to forbear willing what it doth will”; and these, “the will hath a dominion over its own acts”; and these, “the power to will is present in actu primo, determinable by ourselves”; are as wild as ever were any spoken within the walls of Bedlam: and if science, conscience, reason, and religion teach us to speak thus, they make us mad. And that which followeth is false: “to act or not to act, to work or not to work, to produce or not to produce, have reference to the effect, not as a thing which is already done or doing, but as a thing to be done”. For to act, to work, to produce, are the same thing with to be doing. It is not the act, but the power that hath reference to the future: for act and power differ in nothing but in this, that the former signifieth the time present, the latter the time to come. And whereas he adds, that I shuffle out effects producible, and thrust into their places effects produced; I must take it for an untruth, till he cite the place wherein I have done so.

NO. XXXIII.

T. H. For my first five points; where it is explicated, first, what spontaneity is; secondly, what deliberation is; thirdly, what will, propension, and appetite is; fourthly, what a free agent is; fifthly, what liberty is: there can be no other proof offered but every man’s own experience, by reflecting on himself, and remembering what he useth to have in his mind, that is, what he himself meaneth, when he saith, an action is spontaneous, a man deliberates, such is his will, that agent or that action is free. Now, he that so reflecteth on himself, cannot but be satisfied, that deliberation is the considering of the good and evil sequels of the action to come; that by spontaneity is meant inconsiderate proceeding; for else nothing is meant by it; that will is the last act of our deliberation; that a free agent, is he that can do if he will and forbear if he will; and that liberty is the absence of external impediments. But to those that out of custom speak not what they conceive, but what they hear, and are not able or will not take the pains to consider what they think, when they hear such words, no argument can be sufficient; because experience and matter of fact is not verified by other men’s arguments, but by every man’s own sense and memory. For example, how can it be proved, that to love a thing and to think it good are all one, to a man that does not mark his own meaning by those words? Or how can it be proved that eternity is not nunc stans, to a man that says these words by custom, and never considers how he can conceive the thing itself in his mind? Also the sixth point, that a man cannot imagine any thing to begin without a cause, can no other way be made known but by trying how he can imagine it. But if he try, he shall find as much reason, if there be no cause of the thing, to conceive it should begin at one time as another, that is, he hath equal reason to think it should begin at all times, which is impossible. And therefore he must think there was some special cause, why it began then rather than sooner or later; or else, that it began never, but was eternal.

J. D. “Now at length he comes to his main proofs; he that hath so confidently censured the whole current of Schoolmen and Philosophers of nonsense, had need to produce strong evidence for himself. So he calls his reasons, No. XXXVI., demonstrative proofs. All demonstrations are either from the cause or the effect, not from private notions and conceptions which we have in our minds. That which he calls a demonstration, deserves not the name of an intimation. He argues thus: ‘that which a man conceives in his mind by these words, spontaneity, deliberation, &c.; that they are’. This is his proposition, which I deny. (a) The true natures of things are not to be judged by the private ideas, or conceptions of men, but by their causes and formal reasons. Ask an ordinary person what upwards 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 encircle 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 pendulæ arbores. Again, what do men conceive ordinarily 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 air, either out of the vessel or out of the room: yet reason tells us, that the vessel is not truly empty, and that the air is a true body. I might give a hundred such like instances. He who leaves the conduct of his understanding to follow vulgar notions, shall plunge himself into a thousand errors; like him who leaves a certain guide to follow an ignus fatuus, or a will-with-the-wisp. So his proposition is false. (b) His reason, ‘that matter of fact is not verified by other men’s arguments, but by every man’s 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 truly to signify, 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 all 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 man’s; 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 custom, and never considers how he can conceive the thing itself in his mind’, 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 choice of his wife, to advise with the bells: 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 those 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 every spontaneous action indeliberate; a man may deliberate what he will eat, and yet eat it spontaneously. (d) Neither doth deliberation properly signify, 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 madmen, and natural fools, and children, and brute 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 ‘only 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 anything? Will he make himself guilty of the nonsense of the Schoolmen, 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 do it be determined, then the effect, or the action itself 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 wholly 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 loadstone 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 a hawk were at liberty to fly when her wings are plucked, but not when they are tied. And so he makes liberty from extrinsical impediments to be complete liberty; so he ascribes liberty to brute beasts, and liberty to rivers, and by consequence makes beasts and rivers to be capable of sin and punishment. Assuredly Xerxes, who caused the Hellespont to be beaten with so many stripes, was of this opinion. Lastly, T. H.’s reason, that ‘it is custom, or want of ability, or negligence, which makes a man conceive otherwise’, is but a begging of that which he should prove. Other men consider as seriously as himself, with as much judgment as himself, with less prejudice than himself, and yet they can apprehend no such sense of these words. Would he have other men feign 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 fantastical or imaginative reason. ‘How can a man imagine anything to begin without a cause, or if it should begin without a cause, why it should begin at this time rather than at that time?’ He saith truly, nothing can begin without a cause, that is, to be; but it may begin to act of itself without any other cause. Nothing can begin without a cause; but many things may begin, and do begin without necessary causes. A free cause may as well choose his time when he will begin, as a necessary cause be determined extrinsically when it must begin. And although free effects cannot be foretold, because they are not certainly predetermined in their causes; yet when the free causes do determine themselves, they are of as great certainty as the other. As when I see a bell ringing, I can conceive the cause of it as well why it rings now, as I know the interposition of the earth to be the cause of the eclipse of the moon, or the most certain occurrent in the nature of things.

(k) “And now that I have answered T. H.’s arguments drawn from the private conceptions of men concerning the sense of words, I desire him seriously without prejudice to examine himself, and those natural notions which he finds in himself, (not of words, but of things; these are from nature, those are by imposition), whether he doth not find by experience, that he doth many things which he might have left undone if he would, and omits many things which he might have done if he would; whether he doth not some things out of mere animosity and will, without either regard to the direction of right reason or serious respect of what is honest or profitable, only to show that he will have a dominion over his own actions; as we see ordinarily in children, and wise men find at some times in themselves by experience; (and I apprehend this very defence of necessity against liberty to be partly of that kind); whether he is not angry with those who draw him from his study, or cross him in his desires; (if they be necessitated to do it, why should he be angry with them, any more than he is angry with a sharp winter, or a rainy day that keeps him at home against his antecedent will?); whether he doth not sometimes blame himself, and say, ‘O what a fool was I to do thus and thus’, or wish to himself, ‘O that I had been wise’, or, ‘O that I had not done such an act’. If he have no dominion over his actions, if he be irresistibly necessitated to all things that he doth, he might as well wish, ‘O that I had not breathed,’ or blame himself for growing old, ‘O what a fool was I to grow old’.”

ANIMADVERSIONS UPON THE ANSWER TO NO. XXXIII.

I have said in the beginning of this number, that to define what spontaneity is, what deliberation is, what will, propension, appetite, a free agent, and liberty is, and to prove they are well defined, there can be no other proof offered, but every man’s own experience and memory of what he meaneth by such words. For definitions being the beginning of all demonstration, cannot themselves be demonstrated, that is, proved to another man; all that can be done, is either to put him in mind what those words signify commonly in the matter whereof they treat, or if the words be unusual, to make the definitions of them true by mutual consent in their signification. And though this be manifestly true, yet there is nothing of it amongst the Schoolmen, who use to argue not by rule, but as fencers teach to handle weapons, by quickness only of the hand and eye. The Bishop therefore boggles at this kind of proof; and says, (a) “the true natures of things are not to be judged by the private ideas or conceptions of men, but by their causes and formal reasons. Ask an ordinary person what upwards signifies,” &c. But what will he answer, if I should ask him, how he will judge of the causes of things, whereof he hath no idea or conception in his own mind? It is therefore impossible to give a true definition of any word without the idea of the thing which that word signifieth, or not according to that idea or conception. Here again he discovereth the true cause why he and other Schoolmen so often speak absurdly. For they speak without conception of the things, and by rote, one receiving what he saith from another by tradition, from some puzzled divine or philosopher, that to decline a difficulty speaks in such manner as not to be understood. And where he bids us ask an ordinary person what upwards signifieth, I dare answer for that ordinary person he will tell us as significantly as any scholar, and say it is towards heaven; and as soon as he knows the earth is round, makes no scruple to believe there are antipodes, being wiser in that point than were those which he saith to have been of more than ordinary capacities. Again, ordinary men understand not, he saith, the words empty and body; yes, but they do, just as well as learned men. When they hear named an empty vessel, the learned as well as the unlearned mean and understand the same thing, namely, that there is nothing in it that can be seen; and whether it be truly empty, the ploughman and the Schoolman know alike. “I might give”, he says, “a hundred such like instances.” That is true; a man may give a thousand foolish and impertinent instances of men ignorant in such questions of philosophy concerning emptiness, body, upwards, and downwards, and the like. But the question is not whether such and such tenets be true, but whether such and such words can be well defined without thinking upon the things they signified; as the Bishop thinks they may, when he concludeth with these words, “so his proposition is false”.

(b) “His reason, ‘that matter of fact is not verified by other men’s arguments, but by every man’s 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 truly to signify, is not to be judged by sense, but by reason.” A man is born with a capacity after due time and experience to reason truly; to which capacity of nature, if there be added no discipline at all, yet as far as he reasoneth he will reason truly; though by a right discipline he may reason truly in more numerous and various matters. But he that hath lighted on deceiving or deceived masters, that teach for truth all that hath been dictated to them by their own interest, or hath been cried up by other such teachers before them, have for the most part their natural reason, as far as concerneth the truth of doctrine, quite defaced or very much weakened, becoming changelings through the enchantments of words not understood. This cometh into my mind from this saying of the Bishop, that matter of fact is not verified by sense and memory, but by arguments. How is it possible that, without discipline, a man should come to think that the testimony of a witness, which is the only 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 syllogisms? Or how can an unlearned man be brought to think the words he speaks, ought to signify, when he speaks sincerely, anything else but that which himself meant by them? Or how can any man without learning take the question, “whether the sun be no bigger than a ball, or bigger than the earth”, to be a question of fact? Nor do I think that any man is so simple, as not 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 unlearned man so stupid, as to think eternity is this present instant of time standing still, and the same eternity to be the very next instant after; and consequently that there be so many eternities as there can be instants of time supposed? No, there is scholastic 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.” Not every spontaneous action indeliberate? This I get by striving to make sense of that which he strives to make nonsense. I never thought the word spontaneity English. Yet because he used it, I make such meaning of it as it would bear, and said it “meant inconsiderate proceeding, or nothing”. And for this my too much officiousness, I receive the reward of being thought by him not to be a rational man. I know that in the Latin of all authors but Schoolmen, actio spontanea signifies that action, whereof there is no apparent cause derived further than from the agent itself; and is in all things that have sense the same with voluntary, whether deliberated or not deliberated. And therefore where he distinguished it from voluntary, I thought he might mean indeliberate. But let it signify what it will, provided it be intelligible, it would make against him.

(d) “Neither doth deliberation properly signify ‘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.” If the Bishop’s words proceeded not from hearing and reading of others, but from his own thoughts, he could never have reprehended this definition of deliberation, especially in the manner he doth it; for he says, it is the considering 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 not all one with considering whether the sequel of using those means be good or evil.

(e) “Much less doth any man conceive with T. H. that ‘deliberation is an act of fancy’, not of reason, common to men of discretion with madmen, natural fools, children, and brute beasts”. I do indeed conceive that deliberation is an act of imagination or fancy; nay more, that reason and understanding also are acts of the imagination, that is to say, they are imaginations. I find it so by considering my own ratiocination; and he might find it so in his, if 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 trifles he calleth business; then when he speaks, he thinks of, that is to say, he imagines, his business; but here he thinks only upon the words of other men that have gone before him in this question, transcribing their conclusions and arguments, not his own 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 only the last appetite is to be called our will’.” Though the understanding and the will were two distinct faculties, yet followeth it not that the will and the deliberation are two distinct faculties. For the whole deliberation is nothing else but so many wills alternatively changed, according as a man understandeth or fancieth the good and evil sequels of the thing concerning which he deliberateth whether he shall pursue it, or of the means whether they conduce or not to that end, whatsoever it be, he seeketh to obtain. So that in deliberation there be many wills, whereof not 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 how this dropped from my pen. He found it in my answer No. III, and has been all this while about to confute it, so long indeed that he had forgot I said it; and now again brings another argument to prove a man is free to will, which is this: “Either the agent can will and forbear to will, or else he 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, are always willing one thing or other. But put the case, a man has a will to-day to do a certain action to-morrow; is he sure to have the same will to-morrow, when he is to do it? Is he free to-day, to choose to-morrow’s will? This is it that is now in question, and this argument maketh nothing for the affirmative or negative.

(h) “But we differ wholly 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 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 loadstone were free to point either towards the north or towards the south, because there is not a barricado in its way.” How does it appear, that he who conceives liberty aright, conceives a liberty in the subject to will or not to will; unless he mean liberty to do if he will, or not to do if he will not, which was never denied? Or how does it follow, that a stone is as free to ascend as descend, unless he prove there is no outward impediment to its ascent; which cannot be proved, for the contrary is true? Or how proveth he, that there is no outward impediment to keep that point of the loadstone, which placeth itself towards the north, from turning to the south? His ignorance of the causes external is not a sufficient argument that there are none. And whereas he saith, that according to my definition of liberty, “a hawk were at liberty to fly when her wings are plucked, but not when they are tied”; I answer that she is not at liberty to fly when her wings are tied; but to say, when her wings are plucked that she wanted the liberty to fly, were to speak improperly and absurdly; for in that case, men that speak English use to say she cannot fly. And for his reprehension of my attributing liberty to brute beasts and rivers; I would be glad to know whether it be improper language, to say a bird or beast may be set at liberty from the cage wherein they were imprisoned or to say that a river, which was stopped, hath recovered its free course; and how it follows, that a beast or river recovering this freedom must needs therefore “be capable of sin and punishment”?