The English works of Thomas Hobbes of Malmesbury, Volume 05 (of 11)
Date: 2025-08-08T00:00:00+00:00
Keywords: Philosophy; English -- 17th century

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Title: The English works of Thomas Hobbes of Malmesbury, Volume 05 (of 11)

Author: Thomas Hobbes

Editor: Sir William Molesworth

Release date: August 8, 2025 [eBook #76650]
Most recently updated: October 14, 2025

Language: English

Original publication: London: John Bohn, 1839

Other information and formats: www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/76650

Credits: Emmanuel Ackerman, KD Weeks and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net (This book was produced from images made available by the HathiTrust Digital Library.)

*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE ENGLISH WORKS OF THOMAS HOBBES OF MALMESBURY, VOLUME 05 (OF 11) ***

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THE
ENGLISH WORKS
OF
THOMAS HOBBES.

THE
ENGLISH WORKS
OF
THOMAS HOBBES
OF MALMESBURY;
NOW FIRST COLLECTED AND EDITED
BY
SIR WILLIAM MOLESWORTH, BART.

VOL. V.

LONDON:

JOHN BOHN,

HENRIETTA STREET, COVENT GARDEN.

MDCCCXLI.

LONDON:

C. RICHARDS, PRINTER, ST. MARTIN’S LANE.

THE

QUESTIONS CONCERNING

LIBERTY, NECESSITY, AND CHANCE,

CLEARLY STATED AND DEBATED
BETWEEN
DR. BRAMHALL,
BISHOP OF DERRY,
AND
THOMAS HOBBES
OF MALMESBURY.

TO THE READER.

You shall find in this little volume the questions concerning necessity, freedom, and chance, which in all ages have perplexed the minds of curious men, largely and clearly discussed, and the arguments on all sides, drawn from the authority of Scripture, from the doctrine of the Schools, from natural reason, and from the consequences pertaining to common life, truly alleged and severally weighed between two persons, who both maintain that men are free to do as they will and to forbear as they will. The things they dissent in are, that the one holdeth, that it is not in a man’s power now to choose the will he shall have anon; that chance produceth nothing; that all events and actions have their necessary causes; that the will of God makes the necessity of all things. The other on the contrary maintaineth, that not only the man is free to choose what he will do, but the will also to choose what it shall will; that when a man willeth a good action, God’s will concurreth with his, else not; that the will may choose whether it will will, or not; that many things come to pass without necessity, by chance; that though God foreknow a thing shall be, yet it is not necessary that that thing shall be, inasmuch as God seeth not the future as in its causes, but as present. In sum, they adhere both of them to the Scripture; but one of them is a learned School-divine, the other a man that doth not much admire that kind of learning.

This is enough to acquaint you withal in the beginning; which also shall be more particularly explained by and by in the stating of the question, and dividing of the arguments into their several heads. The rest you shall understand from the persons themselves, when they enter. Fare ye well.

T. H.

THE QUESTIONS

CONCERNING

LIBERTY, NECESSITY, AND CHANCE.

Whether whatsoever comes to pass proceed from necessity, or some things from chance, has been a question disputed amongst the old philosophers long time before the incarnation of our Saviour, without drawing into argument on either side the almighty power of the Deity. But the third way of bringing things to pass, distinct from necessity and chance, namely, freewill, is a thing that never was mentioned amongst them, nor by the Christians in the beginning of Christianity. For St. Paul, that disputes that question largely and purposely, never useth the term of freewill; nor did he hold any doctrine equivalent to that which is now called the doctrine of freewill; but deriveth all actions from the irresistible will of God, and nothing from the will of him that runneth or willeth. But for some ages past, the doctors of the Roman Church have exempted from this dominion of God’s will the will of man; and brought in a doctrine, that not only man, but also his will is free, and determined to this or that action, not by the will of God, nor necessary causes, but by the power of the will itself. And though by the reformed Churches instructed by Luther, Calvin, and others, this opinion was cast out, yet not many years since it began again to be reduced by Arminius and his followers, and became the readiest way to ecclesiastical promotion; and by discontenting those that held the contrary, was in some part the cause of the following troubles; which troubles were the occasion of my meeting with the Bishop of Derry at Paris, where we discoursed together of the argument now in hand; from which discourse we carried away each of us his own opinion, and for aught I remember, without any offensive words, as blasphemous, atheistical, or the like, passing between us; either for that the Bishop was not then in passion, or suppressed his passion, being then in the presence of my Lord of Newcastle.

But afterwards the Bishop sent to his Lordship his opinion concerning the question in writing, and desired him to persuade me to send an answer thereunto likewise in writing. There were some reasons for which I thought it might be inconvenient to let my answer go abroad; yet the many obligations wherein I was obliged to him, prevailed with me to write this answer, which was afterwards not only without my knowledge, but also against my will, published by one that found means to get a copy of it surreptitiously. And thus you have the occasion of this controversy.

THE STATE OF THE QUESTION.

The question in general is stated by the Bishop himself, (towards the end of No. III.), in these words: “Whether all events, natural, civil, moral, (for we speak not now of the conversion of a sinner, that concerns not this question), be predetermined extrinsically and inevitably, without their own concurrence; so as all the 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 supreme cause, or a concourse of extrinsical causes, determining them to one.”

Which though drawn up to his advantage, with as much caution as he would do a lease, yet (excepting that which is not intelligible) I am content to admit. Not intelligible is, first, “that the conversion of a sinner concerns not the question.” If he mean, that the conversion of a sinner is from necessity, and predetermined, then he is, for so much as the question concerns religion, of the same mind that I am; and what he can mean else by that exception, I cannot guess. Secondly, these words, “without their own concurrence,” are insignificant, unless he mean that the events themselves should concur to their production: as that fire doth not necessarily burn without the concurrence of burning, as the words properly import: or at least without concurrence of the fuel. Those two clauses left out, I agree with him in the state of the question as it is put universally. But when the question is put of the necessity of any particular event, as of the will to write, or the like, then it is the stating of that particular question: but it is decided in the decision of the question universal.

He states the same question again in another place thus: “This is the very question where the water sticks between us, whether there be such a liberty free from necessitation and extrinsical determination to one, or not.” And I allow it also for well stated so.

Again he says, “In a word, so great difference there is between natural and moral efficacy, as there is between his opinion and mine in this question.” So that the state of the question is reduced to this, “Whether there be a moral efficacy which is not natural?” I say there is not: he says there is.

Again he writes thus: “And therefore as it were ridiculous to say, that the object of 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.” Here also the question is brought to this issue, “Whether the object of sight be the cause that it is seen?” But for these words, “proposing of the object by the understanding to the will,” I understand them not.

Again, he often useth such words as these: “The will willeth; the will suspendeth its act, (Rid est, the will willeth not); the understanding proposeth; the understanding understandeth.” Herein also lyeth the whole question. If they be true, I, if false, he is in error.

Again, the whole question is decided, when this is decided, “Whether he that willingly permitteth a thing to be done, when without labour, danger, or diversion of mind, he might have hindered it, do not will the doing of it?”

Again the whole question of free-will is included in this, “Whether the will determine itself?”

Again, it is included in this, “Whether there be an universal grace, which particular men can take without a particular grace to take it?”

Lastly, there be two questions; one, “Whether a man be free in such things as are within his power, to do what he will;” another, “Whether he be free to will.” Which is as much as to say (because will is appetite), it is one question, whether he be free to eat that has an appetite, and another, whether he be free to have an appetite? In the former, “whether a man be free to do what he will,”will,” I agree with the Bishop. In the latter, “whether he be free to will,” I dissent from him. And, therefore, all the places of Scripture that he allegeth to prove that a man hath liberty to do what he will, are impertinent to the question. If he has not been able to distinguish between these two questions, he has not done well to meddle with either: if he has understood them, to bring arguments to prove that a man is free to do if he will, is to deal uningenuously and fraudulently with his readers. And thus much for the state of the question.

THE FOUNTAINS OF ARGUMENT IN THIS QUESTION.

The arguments by which this question is disputed, are drawn from four fountains. 1. From authorities. 2. From the inconveniences consequent to either opinion. 3. From the attributes of God. 4. From natural reason.

The authorities are of two sorts, divine and human. Divine are those which are taken from the holy Scriptures. Human also are of two sorts; one, the authorities of those men that are generally esteemed to have been learned, especially in this question, as the Fathers, Schoolmen, and old Philosophers: the other, are the vulgar and most commonly received opinions in the world.

His reasons and places of Scripture I will answer the best I am able; but his human authorities I shall admit and receive as far as to Scripture and reason they be consonant, and no further.

And for the arguments derived from the attributes of God, so far forth as those attributes are argumentative, that is, so far forth as their significations be conceivable, I admit them for arguments; but where they are given for honour only, and signify nothing but an intention and endeavour to praise and magnify as much as we can Almighty God, there I hold them not for arguments, but for oblations; not for the language, but (as the Scripture calls them) for the calves of our lips; which signify not true nor false, nor any opinion of our brain, but the reverence and devotion of our hearts; and therefore they are no sufficient premises to infer truth or convince falsehood.

The places of Scripture that make for me are these. First, (Gen. xlv. 5): Joseph saith to his brethren that had sold him, Be not grieved nor angry with yourselves, that ye sold me hither: for God did send me before you to preserve life. And again (verse 8), So now it was not you that sent me hither, but God.

And concerning Pharaoh, God saith, (Exod. vii. 3): I will harden Pharaoh’s heart. And concerning Sihon King of Heshbon, Moses saith, (Deut. ii. 30): The Lord thy God hardened his spirit, and made his heart obstinate.

And of Shimei that did curse David, David himself saith, (2 Sam. xvi. 10): Let him curse, because the Lord hath said unto him, curse David. And (1 Kings, xii. 15): The King hearkened not to the people, for the curse was from the Lord.

And Job, disputing this very question, saith, (Job xii. 14): God shutteth man, and there can be no opening: and verse 16: The deceived and the deceiver are his: and verse 17: He maketh the Judges fools: and verse 24: He taketh away the heart of the chief of the people of the earth, and causeth them to wander in a wilderness where there is no way: and verse 25: He maketh them to stagger like a drunken man.

And of the King of Assyria, God saith, I will give him a charge to take the spoil, and to take the prey, and to tread them down like the mire of the streets. (Isaiah x. 6.)

And Jeremiah saith, (Jer. x. 23): O Lord, I know that the way of man is not in himself, it is not in man that walketh to direct his steps.

And to Ezekiel, whom God sent as a watchman to the house of Israel, God saith thus: When a righteous man doth turn from his righteousness, and commit iniquity, and I lay a stumbling block before him, he shall die; because thou hast not given him warning, he shall die in his sin. (Ezek. iii. 20.) Note here, God lays the stumbling block, yet he that falleth dieth in his sin: which shows that God’s justice in killing dependeth not on the sin only.

And our Saviour saith, (John vi. 44): No man can come to me, except the Father which hath sent me draw him.

And St. Peter, concerning the delivering of Christ to the Jews, saith thus, (Acts ii. 23): Him being delivered by the determinate counsel and foreknowledge of God, ye have taken, &c.

And again, those Christians to whom Peter and John resorted after they were freed from their troubles about the miracle of curing the lame man, praising God for the same, say thus: Of a truth against the holy child Jesus whom thou hast anointed, both Herod and Pontius Pilate, with the Gentiles and the people of Israel, were gathered together for to do whatsoever thy hand and thy counsel determined before to be done. (Acts iv. 27, 28.)

And St. Paul, Rom. ix. 16: It is not of him that willeth, nor of him that runneth, but of God that sheweth mercy: and verse 18, 19, 20: Therefore hath he mercy on whom he will have mercy, and whom he will he hardeneth. Thou wilt say unto me, why doth he yet find fault; for who hath resisted his will? Nay but, O man, who art thou that disputest against God? Shall the thing formed say to him that formed it, why hast thou made me thus?

And again, (1 Cor. iv 7): Who maketh thee differ from another? and what hast thou that thou hast not received? and 1 Cor. xii. 6: There are diversities of operations, but it is the same God that worketh all in all: and Eph. ii. 10: We are his workmanship created in Jesus Christ unto good works, which God hath before ordained that we should walk in them: and Philip. ii. 13: It is God that worketh in you both to will and to do, of his good pleasure.

To these places may be added all the places that make God the giver of all graces, that is to say, of all good habits and inclinations; and all the places wherein men are said to be dead in sin. For by all these it is manifest, that although a man may live holily if he will, yet to will is the work of God, and not eligible by man.

A second sort of places there be, that make equally for the Bishop and me; and they be such as say that a man hath election, and may do many things if he will, and also if he will he may leave them undone; but not that God Almighty naturally or supernaturally worketh in us every act of the will, as in my opinion; nor that he worketh it not, as in the Bishop’s opinion; though he use those places as arguments on his side.

The places are such as these, (Deut. xxx. 19): I call heaven and earth to record this day against you, that I have set before you life and death, blessing and cursing. Therefore choose life, that both thou and thy seed may live: and (Ecclesiasticus xv. 14): God in the beginning made man, and left him in the hand of his counsel: and verse 16, 17: He hath set fire and water before thee, stretch forth thy hand to whither thou wilt. Before man is life and death, and whether him liketh shall be given him.

And those places which the Bishop citeth: If a wife make a vow, it is left to her husband’s choice, either to establish it, or to make it void, (Numb. xxx. 13): and (Josh. xxiv. 15): Chuse ye this day whom you will serve, &c. But I and my house will serve the Lord: and (2 Sam. xxiv. 12): I offer thee three things, choose which of them I shall do: and (Isaiah vii. 16): before the child shall know to refuse the evil and choose the good. And besides these very many other places to the same effect.

The third sort of texts are those which seem to make against me. As Isaiah v. 4: What could have been done more to my vineyard, that I have not done in it?

And Jeremiah xix. 5: They have also built the high places of Baal, to burn their sons with fire for burnt offerings unto Baal; which I commanded not, nor spake it, neither came it into my mind.

And Hosea xiii. 9: O Israel, thy destructiondestruction is from thyself, but in me is thy help.

And 1 Tim. ii. 4: Who will have all men to be saved, and to come to the knowledge of truth.

And Eccl. xv. 11, 12: Say not thou, it is through the Lord I fell away; for thou oughtest not to do the things that he hateth. Say not thou, he hath caused me to err; for he hath no need of thee, sinful man. And many other places to the like purpose.

You see how great the apparent contradiction is between the first and the third sort of texts, which being both Scripture, may and must be reconciled and made to stand together; which unless the rigour of the letter be on one or both sides with intelligible and reasonable interpretations mollified, is impossible.

The Schoolmen, to keep the literal sense of the third sort of texts, interpret the first sort thus; the words of Joseph, It was not you that sent me hither, but God; they interpret in this manner: It was you that sold me into Egypt, God did but permit it; it was God that sent me and not you; as if the selling were not the sending. This is Suarez; of whom and the Bishop I would know, whether the selling of Joseph did infallibly and inevitably follow that permission. If it did, then that selling was necessitated beforehand by an eternal permission. If it did not, how can there be attributed to God a foreknowledge of it, when by the liberty of human will it might have been frustrated? I would know also whether the selling of Joseph into Egypt were a sin? If it were, why doth Joseph say, Be not grieved nor angry with yourselves that ye sold me hither? Ought not a man to be grieved and angry with himself for sinning? If it were no sin, then treachery and fratricide is no sin.

Again, seeing the selling of him consisted in these acts, binding, speaking, delivering, which are all corporeal motions, did God will they should not be, how then could they be done? Or doth he permit barely, and neither will nor nill corporeal and local motions? How then is God the first mover and cause of all local motion? Did he cause the motion, and will the law against it, but not the irregularity? How can that be, seeing the motion and law being existent, the contrariety of the motion and law is necessarily coexistent?

So these places, He hardened Pharaoh’s heart, he made Sihon’s heart obstinate, they interpret thus: “He permitted them to make their own hearts obstinate.” But seeing that man’s heart without the grace of God, is uninclinable to good, the necessity of the hardness of heart, both in Pharaoh and in Sihon, is as easily derived from God’s permission, that is, from his withholding his grace, as from his positive decree. And whereas they say, He wills godly and free actions conditionally and consequently, that is, if the man will them, then God wills them, else not; and wills not evil actions, but permits them; they ascribe to God nothing at all in the causation of any action either good or bad.

Now to the third sort of places, that seem to contradict the former, let us see if they may not be reconciled with a more intelligible and reasonable interpretation, than that wherewith the Schoolmen interpret the first.

It is no extraordinary kind of language, to call the commandments and exhortations and other significations of the will, by the name of will; though the will be an internal act of the soul, and commands are but words and signs external of that internal act. So that the will and the word are diverse things; and differ as the thing signified, and the sign. And hence it comes to pass, that the Word and Commandment of God, namely, the holy Scripture, is usually called by Christians God’s will, but his revealed will; acknowledging the very will of God, which they call his counsel and decree, to be another thing. For the revealed will of God to Abraham was, that Isaac should be sacrificed; but it was his will he should not. And his revealed will to Jonas, that Nineveh should be destroyed within forty days; but not his decree and purpose. His decree and purpose cannot be known beforehand, but may afterwards by the event; for from the event we may infer his will. But his revealed will, which is his word, must be foreknown, because it ought to be the rule of our actions.

Therefore, where it is said that God will have all men to be saved, it is not meant of his will internal, but of his commandments or will revealed; as if it had been said, “God hath given commandments, by following of which all men may be saved.” So where God says, O Israel, how often would I have gathered thee, &c., as a hen doth her chickens, but thou wouldest not, it is thus to be understood: “How oft have I by my prophets given thee such counsel, as, being followed, thou hadst been gathered,” &c. And the like interpretations are to be given to the like places. For it is not Christian to think, if God had the purpose to save all men, that any man could be damned; because it were a sign of want of power to effect what he would. So these words, What could have been done more to my vineyard, that I have not done: if by them be meant the Almighty power, might receive this answer: “Men might have been kept by it from sinning.” But when we are to measure God by his revealed will, it is as if he had said, “What directions, what laws, what threatenings could have been used more, that I have not used?” God doth not will and command us to inquire what his will and purpose is, and accordingly to do it; for we shall do that, whether we will or not; but to look into his commandments, that is, as to the Jews, the law of Moses; and as to other people, the laws of their country.

O Israel, thy destruction is from thyself, but in me is thy help: or as some English translations have it, O Israel, thou hast destroyed thyself, &c., is literally true, but maketh nothing against me; for the man that sins willingly, whatsoever be the cause of his will, if he be not forgiven, hath destroyed himself, as being his own act.

Where it is said, They have offered their sons unto Baal, which I commanded not, nor spake it, nor came it into my mind; these words, nor came it into my mind, are by some much insisted on, as if they had done it without the will of God. For whatsoever is done comes into God’s mind, that is, into his knowledge, which implies a certainty of the future action, and that certainty an antecedent purpose of God to bring it to pass. It cannot therefore be meant God did not will it, but that he had not the will to command it. But by the way it is to be noted, that when God speaks to men concerning his will and other attributes, he speaks of them as if they were like to those of men, to the end he may be understood. And therefore to the order of his work, the world, wherein one thing follows another so aptly as no man could order it by design, he gives the name of will and purpose. For that which we call design, which is reasoning, and thought after thought, cannot be properly attributed to God; in whose thoughts there is no fore nor after.

But what shall we answer to the words in Ecclesiasticus: Say not thou, it is through the Lord I fell away; say not thou, he hath caused me to err. If it had not been, say not thou, but “think not thou,” I should have answered that Ecclesiasticus is Apocrypha, and merely human authority. But it is very true that such words as these are not to be said; first, because St. Paul forbids it: Shall the thing formed, saith he, say to him that formed it, why hast thou made me so? Yet true it is, that he did so make him. Secondly, because we ought to attribute nothing to God but what we conceive to be honourable, and we judge nothing honourable but what we count so amongst ourselves; and because accusation of man is not honourable, therefore such words are not to be used concerning God Almighty. And for the same cause it is not lawful to say that any action can be done, which God hath purposed shall not be done; for it is a token of want of the power to hinder it. Therefore neither of them is to be said, though one of them must needs be true. Thus you see how disputing of God’s nature which is incomprehensible, driveth men upon one of these two rocks. And this was the cause I was unwilling to have my answer to the Bishop’s doctrine of liberty published.

And thus much for comparison of our two opinions with the Scriptures; which whether it favour more his or mine, I leave to be judged by the reader. And now I come to compare them again by the inconveniences which may be thought to follow them.

First, the bishop says, that this very persuasion, that all things come to pass by necessity, is able to overthrow all societies and commonwealths in the world. The laws, saith he, are unjust which prohibit that which a man cannot possibly shun.

Secondly, that it maketh superfluous and foolish all consultations, arts, arms, books, instruments, teachers, and medicines, and which is worst, piety and all other acts of devotion. For if the event be necessary, it will come to pass whatsoever we do, and whether we sleep or wake.

This inference, if there were not as well a necessity of the means as there is of the event, might be allowed for true. But according to my opinion, both the event and means are equally necessitated. But supposing the inference true, it makes as much against him that denies as against him that holds this necessity. For I believe the Bishop holds for as certain a truth, what shall be, shall be, as what is, is, or what has been, has been. And then the ratiocination of the sick man, “If I shall recover, what need I this unsavoury potion? if I shall not recover, what good will it do me?” is a good ratiocination. But the Bishop holds, that it is necessary he shall recover or not recover. Therefore it follows from an opinion of the Bishop’s, as well as from mine, that medicine is superfluous. But as medicine is to health, so is piety, consultation, arts, arms, books, instruments, and teachers, every one to its several end. Out of the Bishop’s opinion it follows as well as from mine, that medicine is superfluous to health. Therefore from his opinion as well as from mine, it followeth, (if such ratiocination were not unsound), that piety, consultation, &c. are also superfluous to their respective ends. And for the superfluity of laws, whatsoever be the truth of the question between us, they are not superfluous, because by the punishing of one, or of a few unjust men, they are the cause of justice in a great many.

But the greatest inconvenience of all that the Bishop pretends may be drawn from this opinion, is, “that God in justice cannot punish a man with eternal torments for doing that which it was never in his power to leave undone.” It is true, that seeing the name of punishment hath relation to the name of crime, there can be no punishment but for crimes that might have been left undone; but instead of punishment if he had said affliction, may not I say that God may afflict, and not for sin? Doth he not afflict those creatures that cannot sin? And sometimes those that can sin, and yet not for sin, as Job, and the man in the gospel that was born blind, for the manifestation of his power which he hath over his creature, no less but more than hath the potter over his clay to make of it what he please? But though God have power to afflict a man and not for sin without injustice, shall we think God so cruel as to afflict a man, and not for sin, with extreme and endless torment? Is it not cruelty? No more than to do the same for sin, when he that so afflicteth might without trouble have kept him from sinning. But what infallible evidence hath the Bishop, that a man shall be after this life eternally in torments and never die? Or how is it certain there is no second death, when the Scripture saith there is? Or where doth the Scripture say that a second death is an endless life? Or do the Doctors only say it? Then perhaps they do but say so, and for reasons best known to themselves. There is no injustice nor cruelty in him that giveth life, to give with it sickness, pain, torments, and death; nor in him that giveth life twice, to give the same miseries twice also. And thus much in answer to the inconveniences that are pretended to follow the doctrine of necessity.

On the other side from this position, that a man is free to will, it followeth that the prescience of God is quite taken away. For how can it be known beforehand what man shall have a will to, if that will of his proceed not from necessary causes, but that he have in his power to will or not will? So also those things which are called future contingents, if they come not to pass with certainty, that is to say, from necessary causes, can never be foreknown; so that God’s foreknowing shall sometimes be of things that shall not come to pass, which is as much to say, that his foreknowledge is none; which is a great dishonour to the all-knowing power.

Though this be all the inconvenient doctrine that followeth free-will, forasmuch as I can now remember; yet the defending of this opinion hath drawn the Bishop and other patrons of it into many inconvenient and absurd conclusions, and made them make use of an infinite number of insignificant words; whereof one conclusion is in Suarez, that God doth so concur with the will of man, that if man will, then God concurs; which is to subject not the will of man to God, but the will of God to man. Other inconvenient conclusions I shall then mark out, when I come to my observations upon the Bishop’s reply. And thus far concerning the inconveniences that follow both opinions.

The attribute of God which he draweth into argument is his justice, as that God cannot be just in punishing any man for that which he was necessitated to do. To which I have answered before, as being one of the inconveniences pretended to follow upon the doctrine of necessity. On the contrary, from another of God’s attributes, which is his foreknowledge, I shall evidently derive, that all actions whatsoever, whether they proceed from the will or from fortune, were necessary from eternity. For whatsoever God foreknoweth shall come to pass, cannot but come to pass, that is, it is impossible it should not come to pass, or otherwise come to pass than it was foreknown. But whatsoever was impossible should be otherwise, was necessary; for the definition of necessary is, that which cannot possibly be otherwise. And whereas they that distinguish between God’s prescience and his decree, say the foreknowledge maketh not the necessity without the decree; it is little to the purpose. It sufficeth me, that whatsoever was foreknown by God, was necessary: but all things were foreknown by God, and therefore all things were necessary. And as for the distinction of foreknowledge from decree in God Almighty, I comprehend it not. They are acts co-eternal, and therefore one.

And as for the arguments drawn from natural reason they are set down at large in the end of my discourse to which the Bishop maketh his reply; which how well he hath answered, shall appear in due time. For the present, the actions which he thinketh proceed from liberty of will, must either be necessitated, or proceed from fortune, without any other cause; for certainly to will is impossible without thinking on what he willeth. But it is in no man’s election what he shall at any named time hereafter think on. And this I take to be enough to clear the understanding of the reader, that he may be the better able to judge of the following disputation. I find in those that write of this argument, especially in the Schoolmen and their followers, so many words strangers to our language, and such confusion and inanity in the ranging of them, as that a man’s mind in the reading of them distinguisheth nothing. And as things were in the beginning before the Spirit of God was moved upon the abyss, tohu and bohu, that is to say, confusion and emptiness; so are their discourses.

“TO THE RIGHT HONOURABLE THE
MARQUIS OF NEWCASTLE,
ETC.

“Sir,--

“If I pretended to compose a complete treatise upon this subject, I should not refuse those large recruits of reasons and authorities which offer themselves to serve in this cause, for God and man, religion and policy, Church and Commonwealth, (a) against the blasphemous, desperate, and destructive opinion of fatal destiny. But as (b) mine aim, in the first discourse, was only to press home those things in writing, which had been agitated between us by word of mouth, (a course much to be preferred before verbal conferences, as being freer from passions and tergiversations, less subject to mistakes and misrelations, wherein paralogisms are more quickly detected, impertinences discovered, and confusion avoided), so my present intention is only to vindicate that discourse, and together with it, (c) those lights of the Schools, who were never slighted but where they were not understood. How far I have performed it, I leave to the judicious and impartial reader, resting for mine own part well contented with this, that I have satisfied myself.

Your Lordship’s most obliged,
to love and serve you,
“J. D.”

ANIMADVERSIONS UPON

THE BISHOP’S EPISTLE TO MY LORD OF NEWCASTLE.

(a) “Against the blasphemous, desperate, and destructive opinion of fatal destiny.”

This is but choler, such as ordinarily happeneth unto them who contend against greater difficulties than they expected.

(b) “My aim in the first discourse was only to press home those things in writing, which had been agitated between us by word of mouth: a course much to be preferred before verbal conferences, as being freer from passions, &c.”

He is here, I think, mistaken; for in our verbal conference there was not one passionate word, nor any objecting of blasphemy or atheism, nor any other uncivil word; of which in his writing there are abundance.

(c) “Those lights of the Schools, who were never slighted but where they were not understood.”

I confess I am not apt to admire every thing I understand not, nor yet to slight it. And though the Bishop slight not the Schoolmen so much as I do, yet I dare say he understands their writings as little as I do. For they are in most places unintelligible.

TO THE READER.

“Christian reader, this ensuing treatise was (a) neither penned nor intended for the press, but privately undertaken, that by the ventilation of the question truth might be cleared from mistakes. The same was Mr. Hobbes’ desire at that time, as appeareth by four passages in his book, wherein he requesteth and beseecheth that it may be kept private. But either through forgetfulness or change of judgment, he hath now caused or permitted it to be printed in England, without either adjoining my first discourse, to which he wrote that answer, or so much as mentioning this reply, which he hath had in his hands now these eight years. So wide is the date of his letter, in the year 1652, from the truth, and his manner of dealing with me in this particular from ingenuity, (if the edition were with his own consent). Howsoever, here is all that passed between us upon this subject, without any addition, or the least variation from the original.

“Concerning the nameless author of the preface, who takes upon him to hang out an ivy-bush before this rare piece of sublimated stoicism to invite passengers to purchase it, as I know not who he is, so I do not much heed it, nor regard either his ignorant censures or hyperbolical expressions. The Church of England is as much above his detraction, as he is beneath this question. Let him lick up the spittle of Dionysius by himself, as his servile flatterers did, and protest that it is more sweet than nectar; we envy him not; much good may it do him. His very frontispiece is a sufficient confutation of his whole preface, wherein he tells the world, as falsely and ignorantly as confidently, that ‘all controversy concerning predestination, election, free-will, grace, merits, reprobation, &c., is fully decided and cleared.’ Thus he accustometh his pen to run over beyond all limits of truth and discretion, to let us see that his knowledge in theological controversies is none at all, and into what miserable times we are fallen, when blind men will be the only judges of colours. Quid tanto dignum feret hic promissor hiatu.

“There is yet one thing more, whereof I desire to advertise the reader, (b) Whereas Mr. Hobbes mentions my objections to his book De Cive, it is true that ten years since I gave him about sixty exceptions, the one-half of them political, the other half theological, to that book, and every exception justified by a number of reasons, to which he never yet vouchsafed any answer. Nor do I now desire it, for since that, he hath published his Leviathan, Monstrum horrendum, informe, ingens, cui lumen ademptum, which affords much more matter of exception; and I am informed that there are already two, the one of our own Church, the other a stranger, who have shaken in pieces the whole fabric of his city, that was but builded in the air, and resolved that huge mass of his seeming Leviathan into a new nothing; and that their labours will speedily be published. But if this information should not prove true, I will not grudge upon his desire, God willing, to demonstrate, that his principles are pernicious both to piety and policy, and destructive to all relations of mankind, between prince and subject, father and child, master and servant, husband and wife; and that they who maintain them obstinately, are fitter to live in hollow trees among wild beasts, than in any Christian or political society. So God bless us.”us.”

ANIMADVERSIONS UPON

THE BISHOP’S EPISTLE TO THE READER.

(a) “Neither penned nor intended for the press, but privately undertaken, that by the ventilation of the question truth might be cleared. The same was Mr. Hobbes’ desire at that time, as appeareth by four passages in his book, &c.”

It is true that it was not my intention to publish any thing in this question. And the Bishop might have perceived, by not leaving out those four passages, that it was without my knowledge the book was printed; but it pleased him better to take this little advantage to accuse me of want of ingenuity. He might have perceived also, by the date of my letter, 1652, which was written 1646, (which error could be no advantage to me), that I knew nothing of the printing of it. I confess, that before I received the bishop’s reply, a French gentleman of my acquaintance in Paris, knowing that I had written something of this subject, but not understanding the language, desired me to give him leave to get it interpreted to him by an English young man that resorted to him; which I yielded to. But this young man taking his opportunity, and being a nimble writer, took a copy of it for himself, and printed it here, all but the postscript, without my knowledge, and (as he knew) against my will; for which he since hath asked me pardon. But that the Bishop intended it not for the press, is not very probable, because he saith he writ it to the end “that by the ventilation of the question, truth might be cleared from mistakes;” which end he had not obtained by keeping it private.

(b) “Whereas Mr. Hobbes mentions my objections to his book De Cive: it is true that ten years since, I gave him about sixty exceptions,” &c.

I did indeed intend to have answered those exceptions as finding them neither political nor theological, nor that he alleged any reasons by which they were to be justified. But shortly after, intending to write in English, and publish my thoughts concerning Civil Doctrine in that book which I entitled Leviathan, I thought his objections would by the clearness of my method fall off without an answer. Now this Leviathan he calleth “Monstrum horrendum, informe, ingens, cui lumen ademptum.” Words not far fetched, nor more applicable to my Leviathan, than to any other writing that should offend him. For allowing him the word monstrum, (because it seems he takes it for a monstrous great fish), he can neither say it is informe; for even they that approve not the doctrine, allow the method. Nor that it is ingens; for it is a book of no great bulk. Nor cui lumen ademptum; for he will find very few readers that will not think it clearer than his scholastic jargon. And whereas he saith there are two of our own Church (as he hears say) that are answering it; and that “he himself,” if I desire it, “will demonstrate that my principles are pernicious both to piety and policy, and destructive to all relations,” &c.: my answer is, that I desire not that he or they should so misspend their time; but if they will needs do it, I can give them a fit title for their book, Behemoth against Leviathan. He ends his epistle with “so God bless us.” Which words are good in themselves, but to no purpose here; but are a buffoonly abusing of the name of God to calumny.

A

VINDICATION OF TRUE LIBERTY

FROM

ANTECEDENT AND EXTRINSICAL NECESSITY.

J. D. “Either I am free to write this discourse for liberty against necessity, or I am not free. If I be free, I have obtained the cause, and ought not to suffer for the truth. If I be not free, yet I ought not to be blamed, since I do it not out of any voluntary election, but out of an inevitable necessity.”

T. H. Right Honourable, I had once resolved to answer J. D.’s objections to my book De Cive in the first place, as that which concerns me most; and afterwards to examine this Discourse of Liberty and Necessity, which, because I never had uttered my opinion of it, concerned me the less. But seeing it was both your Lordship’s and J. D.’s desire that I should begin with the latter, I was contented so to do. And here I present and submit it to your Lordship’s judgment.

J. D. “The first day that I did read over T. H.’s defence of the necessity of all things, was April 20th, 1646. Which proceeded not out of any disrespect to him; for if all his discourses had been geometrical demonstrations, able not only to persuade, but also to compel assent, all had been one to me, first my journey, and afterwards some other trifles which we call business, having diverted me until then. And then my occasions permitting me, and an advertisement from a friend awakening me, I set myself to a serious examination of it. We commonly see those who delight in paradoxes, if they have line enough, confute themselves; and their speculatives and their practices familiarly interfere one with another. (b) The very first words of T. H.’s defence trip up the heels of his whole cause; ‘I had once resolved.’ To resolve presupposeth deliberation. But what deliberation can there be of that which is inevitably determined by causes without ourselves, before we do deliberate? Can a condemned man deliberate whether he should be executed or not? It is even to as much purpose, as for a man to consult and ponder with himself whether he should draw in his breath, or whether he should increase in stature. Secondly, (c) to resolve implies a man’s dominion over his own actions, and his actual determination of himself. But he who holds an absolute necessity of all things, hath quitted this dominion over himself; and (which is worse) hath quitted it to the second extrinsical causes, in which he makes all his actions to be determined. One may as well call again yesterday, as resolve or newly determine that which is determined to his hand already. (d) I have perused this treatise, weighed T. H.’s answers, considered his reasons, and conclude that he hath missed, and misled the question, that the answers are evasions, that his arguments are paralogisms, that the opinion of absolute and universal necessity is but a result of some groundless and ill-chosen principles, and that the defect is not in himself, but that his cause will admit no better defence; and therefore, by his favour, I am resolved to adhere to my first opinion. Perhaps another man reading this discourse with other eyes, judgeth it to be pertinent and well-founded. How comes this to pass? The treatise is the same, the exterior causes are the same; yet the resolution is contrary. Do the second causes play fast and loose? Do they necessitate me to condemn, and necessitate him to maintain? What is it then? The difference must be in ourselves, either in our intellectuals, because the one sees clearer than the other; or in our affections, which betray our understandings, and produce an implicit adherence in the one more than in the other. Howsoever it be, the difference is in ourselves. The outward causes alone do not chain me to the one resolution, nor him to the other resolution. But T. H. may say, that our several and respective deliberations and affections are in part the causes of our contrary resolutions, and do concur with the outward causes to make up one total and adequate cause to the necessary production of this effect. If it be so, he hath spun a fair thread, to make all this stir for such a necessity as no man ever denied or doubted of. When all the causes have actually determined themselves, then the effect is in being; for though there be a priority in nature between the cause and the effect, yet they are together in time. And the old rule is, (e) ‘whatsoever is, when it is, is necessarily so as it is.’ This is no absolute necessity, but only upon supposition, that a man hath determined his own liberty. When we question whether all occurrences be necessary, we do not question whether they be necessary when they are, nor whether they be necessary in sensu composito, after we have resolved and finally determined what to do; but whether they were necessary before they were determined by ourselves, by or in the precedent causes before ourselves, or in the exterior causes without ourselves. It is not inconsistent with true liberty to determine itself, but it is inconsistent with true liberty to be determined by another without itself.

“T. H. saith further ‘that upon your Lordship’s desire and mine, he was contented to begin with this discourse of Liberty and Necessity,’ that is, to change his former resolution. (f) If the chain of necessity be no stronger, but that it may be snapped so easily insunder; if his will was no otherwise determined without himself, but only by the signification of your Lordship’s desire and my modest entreaty, then we may easily conclude that human affairs are not always governed by absolute necessity; that a man is lord of his own actions, if not in chief, yet in mean, subordinate to the Lord paramount of heaven and earth; and that all things are not so absolutely determined in the outward and precedent causes, but that fair entreaties and moral persuasions may work upon a good nature so far, as to prevent that which otherwise had been, and to produce that which otherwise had not been. He that can reconcile this with an antecedent necessity of all things, and a physical or natural determination of all causes, shall be great Apollo to me.

“Whereas T. H. saith that he had never uttered his opinion of this question, I suppose he intends in writing; my conversation with him hath not been frequent, yet I remember well that when this question was agitated between us two in your Lordship’s chamber by your command, he did then declare himself in words, both for the absolute necessity of all events, and for the ground of this necessity, the flux or concatenation of the second causes.”causes.”

ANIMADVERSIONS UPON THE BISHOP’S REPLY NO. I.

(a) “The first day that I did read over T. H.’s defence of necessity,” &c.

His deferring the reading of my defence of necessity, he will not, he saith, should be interpreted for disrespect. ’Tis well; though I cannot imagine why he should fear to be thought to disrespect me. “He was diverted,” he saith, “by trifles called business.” It seems then he acknowledgeth that the will can be diverted by business. Which, though said on the by, is contrary I think to the main, that the will is free; for free it is not, if anything but itself can divert it.

(b) “The very first words of T. H.’s defence, trip up the heels of his whole cause, &c.”

How so? “I had once,” saith he, “resolved. To resolve presupposeth deliberation. But what deliberation can there be of that which is inevitably determined without ourselves?” There is no man doubts but a man may deliberate of what himself shall do, whether the thing be impossible or not, in case he know not of the impossibility; though he cannot deliberate of what another shall do to him. Therefore his examples of the man condemned, of the man that breatheth, and of him that groweth, because the question is not what they shall do, but what they shall suffer, are impertinent. This is so evident, that I wonder how he that was before so witty as to say, my first words tripped up the heels of my cause, and that having line enough I would confute myself, could presently be so dull as not to see his argument was too weak to support so triumphant a language. And whereas he seemeth to be offended with paradoxes, let him thank the Schoolmen, whose senseless writings have made the greatest number of important truths seem paradox.

(c) This argument that followeth is no better. “To resolve,” saith he, “implies a man’s dominion over his actions, and his actual determination of himself,” &c.

If he understand what it is to resolve, he knows that it signifies no more than after deliberation to will. He thinks, therefore, to will is to have dominion over his own actions, and actually to determine his own will. But no man can determine his own will, for the will is appetite; nor can a man more determine his will than any other appetite, that is, more than he can determine when he shall be hungry and when not. When a man is hungry, it is in his choice to eat or not eat; this is the liberty of the man; but to be hungry or not hungry, which is that which I hold to proceed from necessity, is not in his choice. Besides these words, “dominion over his own actions,” and “determination of himself,” so far as they are significant, make against him. For over whatsoever things there is dominion, those things are not free, and therefore a man’s actions are not free; and if a man determine himself, the question will still remain, what determined him to determine himself in that manner.

(d) “I have perused this treatise, weighed T. H.’s answers, considered his reasons,” &c.

This and that which followeth, is talking to himself at random, till he come to allege that which he calleth an old rule, which is this: (e) “Whatsoever is, when it is, is necessarily so as it is. This is no absolute necessity, but only upon supposition that a man hath determined his own liberty,” &c.

If the bishop think that I hold no other necessity than that which is expressed in that old foolish rule, he neither understandeth me, nor what the word necessary signifieth. Necessary is that which is impossible to be otherwise, or that which cannot possibly otherwise come to pass. Therefore necessary, possible, and impossible have no signification in reference to time past or time present, but only time to come. His necessary, and his in sensu composito, signify nothing; my necessary is a necessary from all eternity; and yet not inconsistent with true liberty, which doth not consist in determining itself, but in doing what the will is determined unto. This “dominion over itself,” and this sensus compositus, and this, “determining itself,” and this, “necessarily is when it is,” are confused and empty words.

(f) “If the chain of necessity be no stronger but that it may be snapped so easily asunder, &c. by the signification of your lordship’s desire, and my modest entreaty, then we may safely conclude that human affairs,” &c.

Whether my Lord’s desire and the Bishop’s modest entreaty were enough to produce a will in me to write an answer to his treatise, without other concurrent causes, I am not sure. Obedience to his Lordship did much, and my civility to the Bishop did somewhat, and perhaps there were other imaginations of mine own that contributed their part. But this I am sure of, that altogether they were sufficient to frame my will thereto; and whatsoever is sufficient to produce any thing, produceth it as necessarily as the fire necessarily burneth the fuel that is cast into it. And though the Bishop’s modest entreaty had been no part of the cause of my yielding to it, yet certainly it would have been cause enough to some civil man, to have requited me with fairer language than he hath done throughout this reply.

NO. II.

T. H. And first I assure your Lordship, I find in it no new argument, neither from Scripture nor from reason, that I have not often heard before, which is as much as to say, that I am not surprised.

J. D. (a) “Though I be so unhappy that I can present no novelty to T. H., yet I have this comfort, that if he be not surprised, then in reason I may expect a more mature answer from him; and where he fails, I may ascribe it to the weakness of his cause, not to want of preparation. But in this cause I like Epictetus’s counsel well, that (b) the sheep should not brag how much they have eaten, or what an excellent pasture they do go in, but shew it in their lamb and wool. Opposite answers and downright arguments advantage a cause. To tell what we have heard or seen is to no purpose. When a respondent leaves many things untouched, as if they were too hot for his fingers, and declines the weight of other things, and alters the true state of the question, it is a shrewd sign either that he hath not weighed all things maturely, or else that he maintains a desperate cause.”

ANIMADVERSIONS UPON HIS REPLY NO. II.

(a) “Though I be so unhappy that I can present no novelty to T. H. yet I have this comfort, that if he be not surprised, then in reason I may expect a more mature answer from him,” &c.

Though I were not surprised, yet I do not see the reason for which he saith he may expect a more mature answer from me; or any further answer at all. For seeing I wrote this at his modest request, it is no modest expectation to look for as many answers as he shall be pleased to exact.

(b) “The sheep should not brag how much they have eaten, but shew it in their lamb and wool.”

It is no great bragging, to say I was not surprised; for whosoever chanceth to read Suarez’s Opuscula, where he writeth of free-will and of the concourse of God with man’s will, shall find the greatest part, if not all, that the Bishop hath urged in this question. But that which the Bishop hath said of the reasons and authorities which he saith in his epistle do offer themselves to serve in this cause, and many other passages of his book, I shall, I think, before I have done with him, make appear to be very bragging, and nothing else. And though he say it be Epictetus’s counsel, that sheep should shew what they eat in their lamb and wool, it is not likely that Epictetus should take a metaphor from lamb and wool; for it could not easily come into the mind of men that were not acquainted with the paying of tithes. Or if it had, he would have said lambs in the plural, as laymen use to speak. That which follows of my leaving things untouched, and altering the state of the question; I remember no such thing, unless he require that I should answer, not to his arguments only, but also to his syllables.

NO. III.

T. H. The preface is a handsome one, but it appears even in that, that he hath mistaken the question; for whereas he says thus, “if I be free to write this discourse, I have obtained the cause,” I deny that to be true. For it is not enough to his freedom of writing that he had not written it, unless he would himself; if he will obtain the cause, he must prove that, before he wrote it, it was not necessary he should write it afterwards. It may be he thinks it all one to say, “I was free to write it,” and “it was not necessary I should write it.” But I think otherwise; for he is free to do a thing, that may do it if he have the will to do it, and may forbear if he have the will to forbear. And yet if there be a necessity that he shall have the will to do it, the action is necessarily to follow; and if there be a necessity that he shall have the will to forbear, the forbearing also will be necessary. The question, therefore, is not whether a man be a free agent, that is to say, whether he can write or forbear, speak or be silent, according to his will; but whether the will to write, and the will to forbear, come upon him according to his will, or according to any thing else in his own power. I acknowledge this liberty, that I can do if I will: but to say, I can will if I will, I take to be an absurd speech. Wherefore I cannot grant him the cause upon this preface.

The Bishop’s reply.

J. D. “Tacitus speaks of a close kind of adversaries, which evermore begin with a man’s praise. The crisis or the catastrophe of their discourse is when they come to their but; as, he is a good natured man, but he hath a naughty quality; or, he is a wise man, but he hath committed one of the greatest follies; so here, ‘the preface is a handsome one, but it appears even in this that he hath mistaken the question.’ This is to give an inch, thatthat one may take away an ell without suspicion; to praise the handsomeness of the porch, that he may gain credit to the vilifying of the house. Whether of us hath mistaken the question, I refer to the judicious reader. (a) Thus much I will maintain, that that is no true necessity, which he calls necessity; nor that liberty, which he calls liberty; nor that the question, which he makes the question.

“First for liberty, that which he calls liberty, is no true liberty.

“For the clearing whereof, it behoveth us to know the difference between these three, necessity, spontaneity, and liberty.

“Necessity and spontaneity may sometimes meet together; so may spontaneity and liberty; but real necessity and true liberty can never meet together. Some things are necessary and not voluntary or spontaneous; some things are both necessary and voluntary; some things are voluntary and not free; some things are both voluntary and free; but those things which are truly necessary can never be free, and those things which are truly free can never be necessary. Necessity consists in an antecedent determination to one; spontaneity consists in a conformity of the appetite, either intellectual or sensitive, to the object; true liberty consists in the elective power of the rational will; that which is determined without my concurrence, may nevertheless agree well enough with my fancy or desires, and obtain my subsequent consent; but that which is determined without my concurrence or consent, cannot be the object of mine election. I may like that which is inevitably imposed upon me by another, but if it be inevitably imposed upon me by extrinsical causes, it is both folly for me to deliberate, and impossible for me to choose, whether I shall undergo it or not. Reason is the root, the fountain, the original of true liberty, which judgeth and representeth to the will, whether this or that be convenient, whether this or that be more convenient. Judge then what a pretty kind of liberty it is which is maintained by T. H., such a liberty as is in little children before they have the use of reason, before they can consult or deliberate of any thing. Is not this a childish liberty; and such a liberty as is in brute beasts, as bees and spiders, which do not learn their faculties as we do our trades, by experience and consideration? This is a brutish liberty, such a liberty as a bird hath to fly when her wings are clipped, or to use his own comparison, such a liberty as a lame man, who hath lost the use of his limbs, hath to walk. Is not this a ridiculous liberty? Lastly, (which is worse than all these), such a liberty as a river hath to descend down the channel. What! will he ascribe liberty to inanimate creatures also, which have neither reason, nor spontaneity, nor so much as sensitive appetite? Such is T. H.’s liberty.

(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. The adequate cause and the effect are together in time, and when all the concurrent causes are determined, the effect is determined also, and is become so necessary that it is actually in being; but there is a great difference between determining, and being determined. If all the collateral causes concurring to the production of an effect, were antecedently determined what they must of necessity produce, and when they must produce it, then there is no doubt but the effect is necessary. (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. This will be yet clearer by considering his own instance of casting ambs-ace, though it partake more of contingency than of freedom. Supposing the positure of the parties’ hand who did throw the dice, supposing the figure of the table and of the dice themselves, supposing the measure of force applied, and supposing all other things which did concur to the production of that cast, to be the very same they were, there is no doubt but in this case the cast is necessary. But still this is but a necessity of supposition; for if all these concurrent causes, or some of them, were contingent or free, then the cast was not absolutely necessary. To begin with the caster, he might have denied his concurrence, and not have cast at all; he might have suspended his concurrence, and not have cast so soon; he might have doubled or diminished his force in casting, if it had pleased him; he might have thrown the dice into the other table. In all these cases what becomes of his ambs-ace? The like uncertainties offer themselves for the maker of the tables, and for the maker of the dice, and for the keeper of the tables, and for the kind of wood, and I know not how many other circumstances. In such a mass of contingencies, it is impossible that the effect should be antecedently necessary. T. H. appeals to every man’s experience. I am contented. Let every one reflect upon himself, and he shall find no convincing, much less constraining reason, to necessitate him to any one of these particular acts more than another, but only his own will or arbitrary determination. So T. H.’s necessity is no absolute, no antecedent, extrinsical necessity, but merely a necessity upon supposition.

(d) “Thirdly, that which T. H. makes the question, is not the question. ‘The question is not,’ saith he, ‘whether a man may write if he will, and forbear if he will, but whether the will to write or the will to forbear come upon him according to his will, or according to any thing else in his own power.’ Here is a distinction without a difference. If his will do not come upon him according to his will, then he is not a free, nor yet so much as a voluntary agent, which is T. H.’s liberty. Certainly all the freedom of the agent is from the freedom of the will. If the will have no power over itself, the agent is no more free than a staff in a man’s hand. Secondly, he makes but an empty show of a power in the will, either to write or not to write. (e) If it be precisely and inevitably determined in all occurrences whatsoever, what a man shall will, and what he shall not will, what he shall write, and what he shall not write, to what purpose is this power? God and nature never made any thing in vain; but vain and frustraneous is that power which never was and never shall be deduced into act. Either the agent is determined before he acteth, what he shall will, and what he shall not will, what he shall act, and what he shall not act, and then he is no more free to act than he is to will; or else he is not determined, and then there is no necessity. No effect can exceed the virtue of its cause; if the action be free to write or to forbear, the power or faculty to will or nill, must of necessity be more free. Quod efficit tale, illud magis est tale. If the will be determined, the writing or not writing is likewise determined, and then he should not say, ‘he may write or he may forbear,’ but he must write or he must forbear. Thirdly, this answer contradicts the sense of all the world, that the will of man is determined without his will, or without any thing in his power. Why do we ask men whether they will do such a thing or not? Why do we represent reasons to them? Why do we pray them? Why do we entreat them? Why do we blame them, if their will come not upon them according to their will. Wilt thou be made clean? said our Saviour to the paralytic person (John v. 6); to what purpose, if his will was extrinsically determined? Christ complains, (Matth. xi. 17): We have piped unto you, and ye have not danced. How could they help it, if their wills were determined without their wills to forbear? And (Matth. xxiii. 37): I would have gathered your children together as the hen gathereth her chickens under her wings, but ye would not. How easily might they answer, according to T. H.’s doctrine, ‘Alas! blame not us; our wills are not in our own power or disposition; if they were, we would thankfully embrace so great a favour.’ Most truly said St. Austin, ‘Our will should not be a will at all, if it were not in our power.’ (f) This is the belief of all mankind, which we have not learned from our tutors, but is imprinted in our hearts by nature; we need not turn over any obscure books to find out this truth. The poets chaunt it in the theatres, the shepherds in the mountains, the pastors teach it in their churches, the doctors in the universities, the common people in the markets, and all mankind in the whole world do assent unto it, except an handful of men who have poisoned their intellectuals with paradoxical principles. Fourthly, this necessity which T. H. hath devised, which is grounded upon the necessitation of a man’s will without his will, is the worst of all others, and is so far from lessening those difficulties and absurdities which flow from the fatal destiny of the Stoics, that it increaseth them, and rendereth them unanswerable. (g) No man blameth fire for burning whole cities; no man taxeth poison for destroying men; but those persons who apply them to such wicked ends. If the will of man be not in his own disposition, he is no more a free agent than the fire or the poison. Three things are required to make an act or omission culpable. First, that it be in our power to perform it or forbear it; secondly, that we be obliged to perform it, or forbear it, respectively; thirdly, that we omit that which we ought to have done, or do that which we ought to have omitted. (h) No man sins in doing those things which he could not shun, or forbearing those things which never were in his power. T. H. may say, that besides the power, men have also an appetite to evil objects, which renders them culpable. It is true; but if this appetite be determined by another, not by themselves, or if they have not the use of reason to curb or restrain their appetites, they sin no more than a stone descending downward, according to its natural appetite, or the brute beasts who commit voluntary errors in following their 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 extrinsically 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 supreme cause, or a concourse of extrinsical causes determining them to one.

(k) “So my preface remains yet unanswered. Either I was extrinsically 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 extrinsical 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 real antecedent necessity. The two horns of this dilemma are so straight, that no mean can be given, nor room to pass between them. And the two consequences are so evident, that instead of answering he is forced to decline them.

ANIMADVERSIONS UPON HIS REPLY NO. III.

(a) “Thus much I will maintain, that this 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 behoveth 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 tells 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 only this, that spontaneity is a word not used in common English; and they that understand Latin, 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 refer 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 appetite, 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 senses; but how reason representeth anything to the will, I understand no more than the Bishop understands how there may be liberty in children, in beasts, and inanimate creatures. For he seemeth to wonder how children may be left at liberty; how beasts in prison 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 one 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 adequate, 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 necessarily; but not without supposition that there is fuel put to it. And it burneth the fuel, when it is put to it, necessarily; but it is by supposition, that the ordinary course of nature is not hindered; 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 understands not what these words, free and contingent, mean. A little before, he wondered I should attribute liberty to inanimate creatures, and now he puts causes amongst those things that operate freely. By these causes it seems he understandeth only men, whereas I shewed before that liberty is usually ascribed to whatsoever agent is not hindered. 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 his 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 they know not whether necessarily or not. But the Bishop thinking contingent to be that which is not necessary, instead of arguing against our knowledge of the necessity of things to come, argueth against the necessity itself. Again, he supposeth that free and contingent causes might have suspended or denied their concurrence. From which it followeth, that free causes, and contingent causes, are not causes of themselves, but concurrent with other causes, and therefore can produce nothing but as they are guided by those causes with which they concur. For it is strange he should say, they might have concurred after another manner; for I conceive not how, when this runneth one way, and that another, that they can be said to concur, that is, run together. And this his concurrence of causes contingent, maketh, he saith, the cast of ambs-ace not to have been absolutely necessary. Which cannot be conceived, unless it had hindered it; and then it had made some other cast necessary, perhaps deux-ace, which serveth me as well. For that which he saith of suspending his concurrence, of casting sooner or later, of altering the caster’s force, and the like accidents, serve not to take away the necessity of ambs-ace, otherwise than by making a necessity of deux-ace, or other cast that shall be thrown.

(d) “Thirdly, that which T. H. makes the question, is not the question,” &c.

He hath very little reason to say this. He requested me to tell him my opinion in writing concerning free-will. Which I did, and did let him know a man was free, in those things that were in his power, to follow his will; but that he was not free to will, that is, that his will did not follow his will. Which I expressed in these words: “The question is, whether the will to write, or the will to forbear, come upon a man according to his will, or according to any thing else in his own power.” He that cannot understand the difference between free to do if he will, and free to will, is not fit, as I have said in the stating of the question, to hear this controversy disputed, much less to be a writer in it. His consequence, “if a man be not free to will, he is not a free nor a voluntary agent,” and his saying, “the freedom of the agent is from the freedom of the will,” is put here without proof; nor is there any considerable proof of it through the whole book hereafter offered. For why? He never before had heard, I believe, of any distinction between free to do and free to will; which makes him also say, “if the will have not power over itself, the agent is no more free, than a staff in a man’s hand.” As if it were not freedom enough for a man to do what he will, unless his will also have power over his will, and that his will be not the power itself, but must have another power within it to do all voluntary acts.

(e) “If it be precisely and inevitably determined in all occurrences whatsoever, what a man shall will, and what he shall not will, and what he shall write, and what he shall not write, to what purpose is this power?” &c.

It is to this purpose, that all those things may be brought to pass, which God hath from eternity predetermined. It is therefore to no purpose here to say, that God and nature hath made nothing in vain. But see what weak arguments he brings next, which, though answered in that which is gone before, yet, if I answer not again, he will say they are too hot for my fingers. One is: “If the agent be determined what he shall will, and what he shall act, then he is no more free to act than he is to will;” as if the will being necessitated, the doing of what we will were not liberty. Another is: “If a man be free to act, he is much more free to will; because quod efficit tale, illud magis est tale;” as if he should say, “if I make him angry, then I am more angry; because quod efficit,” &c. The third is: “If the will be determined, then the writing is determined, and he ought not to say he may write, but he must write.” It is true, it followeth that he must write, but it doth not follow I ought to say he must write, unless he would have me say more than I know, as himself doth often in this reply.

After his arguments come his difficult questions. “If the will of man be determined without his will, or without any thing in his power, why do we ask men whether they will do such a thing or not?” I answer, because we desire to know, and cannot know but by their telling, nor then neither, for the most part. “Why do we represent reasons to them? Why do we pray them? Why do we entreat them?” I answer, because thereby we think to make them have the will they have not. “Why do we blame them?” I answer, because they please us not. I might ask him, whether blaming be any thing else but saying the thing blamed is ill or imperfect? May we not say a horse is lame, though his lameness came from necessity? or that a man is a fool or a knave, if he be so, though he could not help it? “To what purpose did our Saviour say to the paralytic person, wilt thou be made clean, if his will were extrinsically determined?” I answer, that it was not because he would know, for he knew it before; but because he would draw from him a confession of his want. “We have piped unto you, and ye have not danced; how could they help it?” I answer they could not help it. “I would have gathered your children as the hen gathereth her chickens under her wings, but ye would not. How easily might they answer, according to T. H.’s doctrine, Alas! blame not us, our wills are not in our own power?” I answer, they are to be blamed though their wills be not in their own power. Is not good good, and evil evil, though they be not in our power? and shall not I call them so? and is not that praise and blame? But it seems the Bishop takes blame, not for the dispraise of a thing, but for a pretext and colour of malice and revenge against him he blameth. And where he says our wills are in our power, he sees not that he speaks absurdly; for he ought to say, the will is the power; and through ignorance detecteth the same fault in St. Austin, who saith, “our will should not be a will at all, if it were not in our power;” that is to say, if it were not in our will.

(f) “This is the belief of all mankind, which we have not learned from our tutors, but is imprinted in our hearts by nature,” &c.

This piece of eloquence is used by Cicero in his defence of Milo, to prove it lawful for a man to resist force with force, or to keep himself from killing; which the Bishop, thinking himself able to make that which proves one thing prove any thing, hath translated into English, and brought into this place to prove free-will. It is true, very few have learned from tutors, that a man is not free to will; nor do they find it much in books. That they find in books, that which the poets chant in their theatres and the shepherds in the mountains, that which the pastors teach in the churches and the doctors in the universities, and that which the common people in the markets, and all mankind in the whole world do assent unto, is the same that I assent unto, namely, that a man hath freedom to do if he will; but whether he hath freedom to will, is a question which it seems neither the Bishop nor they ever thought on.

(g) “No man blameth fire for burning cities, nor taxeth poison for destroying men,” &c.

Here again he is upon his arguments from blame, which I have answered before; and we do as much blame them as we do men. For we say fire hath done hurt, and the poison hath killed a man, as well as we say the man hath done unjustly; but we do not seek to be revenged of the fire and of poison, because we cannot make them ask forgiveness, as we would make men to do when they hurt us. So that the blaming of the one and the other, that is, the declaring of the hurt or evil action done by them, is the same in both; but the malice of man is only against man.

(h) “No man sins in doing those things which he could not shun.”

He may as well say, no man halts which cannot choose but halt; or stumbles, that cannot choose but stumble. For what is sin, but halting or stumbling in the way of God’s commandments?

(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 acceptions of the word free, the question is plainly this,” &c.

This question, which the Bishop stateth in this place, I have before set down verbatim and allowed: and it is the same with mine, though he perceive it not. But seeing I did nothing, but at his request set down my opinion, there can be no other question between us in this controversy, but whether my opinion be the truth or not.

(k) “So my preface remains yet unanswered. Either I was extrinsically and inevitably predetermined to write this discourse,” &c.

That which he saith in the preface is, “that if he be not free to write this discourse, he ought not to be blamed; but if he be free, he hath obtained the cause.”

The first consequence I should have granted him, if he had written it rationally and civilly; the latter I deny, and have shown that he ought to have proved that a man is free to will. For that which he says, any thing else whatsoever would think, if it knew it were moved, and did not know what moved it. A wooden top that is lashed by the boys, and runs about sometimes to one wall, sometimes to another, sometimes spinning, sometimes hitting men on the shins, if it were sensible of its own motion, would think it proceeded from its own will, unless it felt what lashed it. And is a man any wiser, when he runs to one place for a benefice, to another for a bargain, and troubles the world with writing errors and requiring answers, because he thinks he doth it without other cause than his own will, and seeth not what are the lashings that cause his will?

NO. IV.

The Bishop’s reply.

J. D. “And so to fall in hand with the question without any further proems or prefaces, by liberty, I do neither understand a liberty from sin, nor a liberty from misery, nor a liberty from servitude, nor a liberty from violence, but I understand a liberty from necessity, or rather from necessitation; that is, an universal immunity from all inevitability and determination to one; whether it be of exercise only, which the Schools call a liberty of contradiction, and is found in God and in the good and bad angels, that is, not a liberty to do both good and evil, but a liberty to do or not to do this or that good, this or that evil, respectively; or whether it be a liberty of specification and exercise also, which the Schools call liberty of contrariety, and is found in men endowed with reason and understanding, that is, a liberty to do and not to do good and evil, this or that. Thus the coast being cleared,” &c.

T. H. In the next place he maketh certain distinctions of liberty, and says, he means not liberty from sin, nor from servitude, nor from violence, but from necessity, necessitation, inevitability, and determination to one. It had been better to define liberty, than thus to distinguish; for I understand never the more what he means by liberty. And though he says he means liberty from necessitation, yet I understand not how such a liberty can be, and it is a taking of the question without proof. For what else is the question between us, but whether such a liberty be possible or not? There are in the same place other distinctions, as a liberty of exercise only, which he calls a liberty of contradiction, namely, of doing not good or evil simply, but of doing this or that good, or this or that evil, respectively: and a liberty of specification and exercise also, which he calls a liberty of contrariety, namely, a liberty not only to do or not to do good or evil, but also to do or not to do this or that good or evil. And with these distinctions, he says, he clears the coast, whereas in truth he darkeneth his meaning, not only with the jargon of exercise only, specification also, contradiction, contrariety, but also with pretending distinction where none is. For how is it possible for the liberty of doing or not doing this or that good or evil, to consist, as he saith it doth in God and Angels, without a liberty of doing or not doing good or evil?

J. D. (a) “It is a rule in art, that words which are homonymous, of various and ambiguous significations, ought ever in the first place to be distinguished. No men delight in confused generalities, but either sophisters or bunglers. Vir dolosus versatur in generalibus, deceitful men do not love to descend to particulars; and when bad archers shoot, the safest way is to run to the mark. Liberty is sometimes opposed to the slavery of sin and vicious habits, as (Romans vi. 22): Now being made free from sin. Sometimes to misery and oppression, (Isaiah lviii. 6): To let the oppressed go free. Sometimes to servitude, as (Leviticus xxv. 10): In the year of jubilee ye shall proclaim liberty throughout the land. Sometimes to violence, as (Psalms cv. 20): The prince of his people let him go free. Yet none of all these is the liberty now in question, but a liberty from necessity, that is, a determination to one, or rather from necessitation, that is, a necessity imposed by another, or an extrinsical determination. These distinctions do virtually imply a description of true liberty, which comes nearer the essence of it, than T. H.’s roving definition, as we shall see in due place. And though he say that ‘he understands never the more what I mean by liberty,’ yet it is plain, by his own ingenuous confession, both that he doth understand it, and that this is the very question where the water sticks between us, whether there be such a liberty free from all necessitation and extrinsical determination to one. Which being but the stating of the question, he calls it amiss ‘the taking of the question.’ It were too much weakness to beg this question, which is so copious and demonstrable. (b) It is strange to see with what confidence, now-a-days, particular men slight all the Schoolmen, and Philosophers, and classic authors of former ages, as if they were not worthy to unloose the shoe-strings of some modern author, or did sit in darkness and in the shadow of death, until some third Cato dropped down from heaven, to whom all men must repair, as to the altar of Prometheus, to light their torches. I did never wonder to hear a raw divine out of the pulpit declare against School Divinity to his equally ignorant auditors. It is but as the fox in the fable, who, having lost his own tail by a mischance, would have persuaded all his followers to cut off theirs, and throw them away as unprofitable burthens. But it troubles me to see a scholar, one who hath been long admitted into the innermost closet of nature, and seen the hidden secrets of more subtle learning, so far to forget himself as to style School-learning no better than a plain jargon, that is, a senseless gibberish, or a fustian language, like the chattering noise of sabots. Suppose they did sometimes too much cut truth into shreds, or delight in abstruse expressions, yet certainly this distinction of liberty into liberty of contrariety and liberty of contradiction, or which is all one, of exercise only, or exercise and specification jointly, which T. H. rejects with so much scorn, is so true, so necessary, so generally received, that there is scarce that writer of note, either divine or philosopher, who did ever treat upon this subject, but he useth it.

“Good and evil are contraries, or opposite kinds of things. Therefore to be able to choose both good and evil, is a liberty of contrariety, or of specification. To choose this, and not to choose this, are contradictory, or which is all one, an exercise or suspension of power. Therefore to be able to do or forbear to do the same action, or to choose or not choose the same object, without varying of the kind, is a liberty of contradiction, or of exercise only. Now a man is not only able to do or forbear to do good only, or evil only, but he is able both to do and to forbear to do both good and evil. So he hath not only a liberty of the action, but also a liberty of contrary objects; not only a liberty of exercise, but also of specification; not only a liberty of contradiction, but also of contrariety. On the other side, God and the good angels can do or not do this or that good; but they cannot do and not do both good and evil. So they have only a liberty of exercise or contradiction, but not a liberty of specification or contrariety. It appears then plainly, that the liberty of man is more large in the extension of the object, which is both good and evil, than the liberty of God and the good angels, whose object is only good. But withal the liberty of man comes short in the intention of the power. Man is not so free in respect of good only, as God or the good angels, because (not to speak of God, whose liberty is quite of another nature) the understandings of the angels are clearer, their power and dominion over their actions is greater, they have no sensitive appetites to distract them, no organs to be disturbed. We see, then, this distinction is cleared from all darkness.

“And where T. H. demands, how it is possible for the liberty of doing or not doing this or that good or evil, to consist in God and angels, without a liberty of doing or not doing good or evil? the answer is obvious and easy, referendo singula singulis, rendering every act to its right object respectively. God and good angels have a power to do or not to do this or that good, bad angels have a power to do or not to do this or that evil; so both, jointly considered, have power respectively to do good or evil. And yet, according to the words of my discourse, God and good and bad angels, being singly considered, have no power to do good or evil, that is, indifferently, as man hath.”

ANIMADVERSIONS UPON THE BISHOP’S REPLY NO. IV.

He intendeth here to make good the distinctions of liberty of exercise, and liberty of contradiction; liberty of contrariety, and liberty of specification and exercise. And he begins thus:

(a) “It is a rule in art, that words which are homonymous, or of various and ambiguous significations, ought ever in the first place to be distinguished,” &c.

I know not what art it is that giveth this rule. I am sure it is not the art of reason, which men call logic. For reason teacheth, and the example of those who only reason methodically, (which are the mathematicians), that a man, when he will demonstrate the truth of what he is to say, must in the first place determine what he will have to be understood by his words; which determination is called definition; whereby the significations of his words are so clearly set down, that there can creep in no ambiguity. And therefore there will be no need of distinctions; and consequently his rule of art, is a rash precept of some ignorant man, whom he and others have followed.

The Bishop tells us that liberty is sometimes opposed to sin, to oppression, to servitude; which is to tell us, that they whom he hath read in this point, are inconsistent in the meaning of their own words; and, therefore, they are little beholden to him. And this diversity of significations he calls distinctions. Do men that by the same word in one place mean one thing, and in another another, and never tell us so, distinguish? I think they rather confound. And yet he says, that “these distinctions do virtually imply a description of true liberty, which cometh nearer the essence of it, than T. H.’s roving definition;” which definition of mine was this: “liberty is when there is no external impediment.” So that in his opinion a man shall sooner understand liberty by reading these words, (Romans vi. 22): Being made free from sin; or these words, (Isaiah lviii. 6): To let the oppressed go free; or by these words, (Leviticus xxv. 10): You shall proclaim liberty throughout the land, than by these words of mine: “liberty is the absence of external impediments to motion.” Also he will face me down, that I understand what he means by his distinctions of liberty of contrariety, of contradiction, of exercise only, of exercise and specification jointly. If he mean I understand his meaning, in one sense it is true. For by them he means to shift off the discredit of being able to say nothing to the question; as they do that, pretending to know the cause of every thing, give for the cause of why the load-stone draweth to it iron, sympathy, and occult quality; making they cannot tell, (turned now into occult), to stand for the real cause of that most admirable effect. But that those words signify distinction, I constantly deny. It is not enough for a distinction to be forked; it ought to signify a distinct conception. There is great difference between duadeduade distinctions and cloven feet.

(b) “It is strange to see with what confidence now-a-days particular men slight all the Schoolmen, and philosophers, and classic authors of former ages,” &c.

This word, particular men, is put here, in my opinion, with little judgment, especially by a man that pretendeth to be learned. Does the Bishop think that he himself is, or that there is any universal man? It may be he means a private man. Does he then think there is any man not private, besides him that is endued with sovereign power? But it is most likely he calls me a particular man, because I have not had the authority he has had, to teach what doctrine I think fit. But now, I am no more particular than he; and may with as good a grace despise the Schoolmen and some of the old Philosophers, as he can despise me, unless he can shew that it is more likely that he should be better able to look into these questions sufficiently, which require meditation and reflection upon a man’s own thoughts, he that hath been obliged most of his time to preach unto the people, and to that end to read those authors that can best furnish him with what he has to say, and to study for the rhetoric of his expressions, and of the spare time (which to a good pastor is very little) hath spent no little part in seeking preferment and increasing of riches; than I, that have done almost nothing else, nor have had much else to do but to meditate upon this and other natural questions. It troubles him much that I style School-learning jargon. I do not call all School-learning so, but such as is so; that is, that which they say in defending of untruths, and especially in the maintenance of free-will, when they talk of liberty of exercise, specification, contrariety, contradiction, acts elicite and exercite and the like; which, though he go over again in this place, endeavouring to explain them, are still both here and there but jargon, or that (if he like it better) which the Scripture in the first chaos calleth Tohu and Bohu.

But because he takes it so heinously, that a private man should so hardly censure School-divinity, I would be glad to know with what patience he can hear Martin Luther and Philip Melancthon speaking of the same? Martin Luther, that was the first beginner of our deliverance from the servitude of the Romish clergy, had these three articles censured by the University of Paris. The first of which was: “School-theology is a false interpretation of the Scripture, and Sacraments, which hath banished from us true and sincere theology.” The second is: “At what time School-theology, that is, mock-theology, came up, at the same time the theology of Christ’s Cross went down.” The third is: “It is now almost three hundred years since the Church has endured the licentiousness of School-Doctors in corrupting of the Scriptures.” Moreover, the same Luther in another place of his work saith thus; “School-theology is nothing else but ignorance of the truth, and a block to stumble at laid before the Scriptures.” And of Thomas Aquinas in particular he saith, that “it was he that did set up the kingdom of Aristotle, the destroyer of godly doctrine.” And of the philosophy whereof St. Paul biddeth us beware, he saith it is School-theology. And Melancthon, a divine once much esteemed in our Church, saith of it thus: “It is known that that profane scholastic learning, which they will have to be called Divinity, began at Paris; which being admitted, nothing is left sound in the Church, the Gospel is obscured, faith extinguished, the doctrine of works received, and instead of Christ’s people, we are become not so much as the people of the law, but the people of Aristotle’s ethics These were no raw divines, such as he saith preached to their equally ignorant auditors. I could add to these the slighting of School-divinity by Calvin and other learned Protestant Doctors; yet were they all but private men, who, it seems to the Bishop, had forgot themselves as well as I.

NO. V.

J. D. “Thus the coast being cleared, the next thing to be done, is to draw out our forces against the enemy; and because they are divided into two squadrons, the one of Christians, the other of heathen philosophers, it will be best to dispose ours also into two bodies, the former drawn from Scripture, the latter from reason.”

T. H. The next thing he doth, after the clearing of the coast, is the dividing of his forces, as he calls them, into two squadrons, one of places of Scripture, the other of reasons, which allegory he useth, I suppose, because he addresses the discourse to your Lordship, who is a military man. All that I have to say touching this, is, that I observe a great part of those his forces do look and march another way, and some of them do fight among themselves.

J. D. “If T. H. could divide my forces, and commit them together among themselves, it were his only way to conquer them. But he will find that those imaginary contradictions, which he thinks he hath espied in my discourse, are but fancies, and my supposed impertinences will prove his own real mistakings.”

In this fifth number there is nothing of his or mine, pertinent to the question, therefore nothing necessary to be repeated.

PROOFS OF LIBERTY OUT OF SCRIPTURE.--NO. VI.

The Bishop’s reply.

J. D. “First, whosoever have power of election, have true liberty; for the proper act of liberty is election. A spontaneity may consist with determination to one, as we see in children, fools, madmen, brute beasts, whose fancies are determined to those things which they act spontaneously, as the bees make honey, the spiders webs. But none of these have a liberty of election, which is an act of judgment and understanding, and cannot possibly consist with a determination to one. He that is determined by something before himself or without himself, cannot be said to choose or elect, unless it be as the junior of the mess chooseth in Cambridge, whether he will have the least part or nothing. And scarcely so much.

“But men have liberty of election. This is plain, (Numbers xxx. 13): If a wife make a vow it is left to her husband’s choice, either to establish it or to make it void. And (Joshua xxiv. 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 Samuel xxiv. 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 Numbers xxx. 13, is one of them that look another way. The words are, If a wife make a vow it is left to her husband’s choice, either to establish it or make it void. For it proves 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 precedent necessary causes.

J. D. “My first argument from Scripture is thus formed.

“Whosoever have a liberty or power of election, are not determined to one by precedent necessary causes.

“But men have liberty of election.

“The assumption or minor proposition is proved by three places of Scripture, (Numbers xxx. 13; Joshua xxiv. 15; 2 Samuel xxiv. 12.) I need not insist upon these, because T. H. acknowledgeth ‘that it is clearly proved 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 precedent necessary causes.’ I take away this answer three ways.

“First, by reason. Election is evermore either of things possible, or at least of things conceived to be possible, that is, efficacious election, when a man hopeth or thinketh of obtaining the object. Whatsoever the will chooseth, it chooseth under the notion of good, either honest, or delightful, or profitable. But there can be no real goodness apprehended in that which is known to be impossible. It is true, there may be some wandering pendulous wishes of known impossibilities, as a man also that hath committed an offence may wish he had not committed it. But to choose efficaciously an impossibility, is as impossible as an impossibility itself. No man can think to obtain that which he knows impossible to be obtained; but he who knows that all things are antecedently determined by necessary causes, knows that it is impossible for anything 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; (Isaiah vii. 16): 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 (Hebrews xi. 25), choosing to suffer affliction with the people of God, did thereby refuse the pleasures of sin. But no man hath any power to refuse that which is necessarily predetermined to be, unless it be as the fox refused the grapes which were beyond his reach. When one thing of two or three is absolutely determined, the others are made thereby simply impossible.

(a) “Secondly, I prove it by instances, and by that universal 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 kingdom, 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 hereditary 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 emperor, or be well pleased with it when it is concluded; yet none of them elect or choose the emperor, but only 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 commonwealths, sometimes the people, sometimes the common-council, have power to name so many persons for such an office, and the supreme magistrate, or senate, or lesser council respectively, to choose one of those. And all this is done with that caution and secresy, by billets or other means, that no man knows 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 pass by my University instance, yet I may not, until 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 agreeable to his mind than 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 extrinsical causes, is left altogether to the mercy and disposition of another.

“Thirdly, I prove it by the texts alleged. (Numb. xxx. 13): If a wife make a vow, it is left to her husband’s 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 xxiv. 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 to either. I and my house will serve the Lord. If he were extrinsically predetermined, he should not say I will serve, but I must serve. And (2 Samuel xxiv. 12): I offer thee three things, choose thee which of them I shall do. How doth God offer three things to David’s choice, if he had predetermined him to one of the three by a concourse of necessary extrinsical causes? If a sovereign prince should descend so far as to offer a delinquent his choice, whether he would be fined, or imprisoned, or banished, and had underhand signed the sentence of his banishment, what were it else but plain drollery or mockery? This is the argument which in T. H.’s opinion looks another way. If it do, it is as the Parthians used to fight, flying. His reason follows next to be considered.”

ANIMADVERSIONS UPON THE BISHOP’S REPLY NO. VI.

In this number he hath brought three places of Scripture to prove freewill. The first is, If a wife make a vow, it is left to her husband’s choice either to establish it or to make it void. And, Choose you this day whom ye 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.

NO. VII.

T. H. For if there came into the husband’s mind greater good by establishing than abrogating such a vow, the establishing will follow necessarily. And if the evil that will follow thereon in the husband’s opinion outweigh the good, the contrary must needs follow. And yet in this following of one’s hopes and fears consisteth the nature of election. So that a man may both choose this, and cannot but choose this. And consequently choosing and necessity are joined together.

The Bishop’s reply.

J. D. (a) “There is nothing said with more show 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 judgment of right reason. And in this, and this only, 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 the will, and a testimony of its power and liberty. It is the will, which affecting some particular good, doth engage and command the understanding to consult and deliberate what means are convenient for attaining that end. And though the will itself 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 move the understanding to consult. So the will is the lady and mistress of human actions; the understanding is her trusty counsellor, which gives no advice but when it is required by the will. And if the first consultation or deliberation be not sufficient, the will may move a review, and require the understanding to inform itself better and take advice of others, from whence many times the judgment of the understanding doth receive alteration.

“Secondly, for the manner how the understanding doth determine the will, it is not naturally but morally. The will is moved by the understanding, not as by an efficient having a causal influence into the effect, but only 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 judgment of the understanding is not always practice practicum, nor of such a nature in itself as to oblige and determine the will to one. Sometimes, the understanding proposeth two or three means equally available to the attaining 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 only 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 forasmuch as in the less expedient there is found the reason of good, the will in respect of that dominion which it hath over itself, 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, but that it may be, and often is deterred from the prosecution of it by the difficulty of the means; and notwithstanding the judgment of the understanding, the will may still suspend its own act.

“Fifthly, supposing, but not granting, that the will did necessarily follow the last dictate of the understanding, yet this proves no antecedent necessity, but coexistent with the act; no extrinsical necessity, the will and the understanding being but two faculties of the same soul; no absolute necessity, but merely upon supposition. And therefore the same authors who maintain that the judgment of the understanding doth necessarily determine the will, do yet much more earnestly oppugn T. H.’s 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 extrinsical, nor antecedent, flowing from a concourse of causes without ourselves, but a necessity upon supposition, which we do readily grant. So far T. H. is wide from the truth, whilst he maintains, either that the apprehension of a greater good doth necessitate 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 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, 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 sense. 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 suffice 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 altæ.

T. H. The second place of Scripture is Joshua xxiv. 15; the third is 2 Samuel xxiv. 12; whereby it 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 BISHOP’S REPLY NO. VII.

(a) “There is nothing said with more show of reason in this cause by the patrons of necessity than this, ‘that the will doth perpetually and infallibly follow the last dictate of the understanding, or the last judgment 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 follows always the last judgment of right reason. For it followeth as well the judgment 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 engage and command the understanding to consult,” &c, that he not only 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, are sense, which they are not, but mere confusion and 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 nonsense. 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 countryman could say so absurdly concerning the understanding, as this of the Bishop, “the judgment of the understanding is not always practice practicum.” A countryman will acknowledge there is judgment in men, but will as soon say the judgment of the judgment, as the judgment of the understanding. And if practice 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.

NO. VIII.

T. H. Supposing, it seems, I might answer as I have done, that necessity and election might stand together, and instance in the actions of children, fools, 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 says, that the actions of children, fools, madmen, 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 web, he does it spontaneously, and not by election. Though I never meant to ground any answer upon the experience of what children, fools, madmen, 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 show 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 man’s 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 one’s money willingly to a thief to avoid killing, or throw it into the sea to avoid drowning, where the motive is fear, be not called spontaneous. But every spontaneous action is not therefore voluntary; for voluntary presupposes some precedent deliberation, that is to say, some consideration and meditation of what is likely to follow, both upon the doing and abstaining from the action deliberated of; whereas many actions are done of our own accord, and are therefore spontaneous; of which nevertheless, as he thinks, we never consulted nor deliberated in ourselves, as when making no question nor any the least doubt in the world but that the thing we are about is good, we eat, or walk, or in anger strike or revile, which he thinks spontaneous, but not voluntary nor elective actions. And with such kind of actions he says necessitation may stand, but not with such as are voluntary, and proceed upon election and deliberation. Now if I make it appear to you that even these actions which he says proceed from spontaneity, and which he ascribes only to fools, children, madmen, and beasts, proceed from deliberation and election, and that actions inconsiderate, rash and spontaneous, are ordinarily found in those that are, by themselves and many more, thought as wise or wiser than ordinary men are; then his argument concludeth, that necessity and election may stand together, which is contrary to that which he intendeth by all the rest of his arguments to prove. And first, your Lordship’s own experience furnishes you with proof enough, that horses, dogs, and other brute beasts, do demur oftentimes upon the way they are to take: the horse, retiring from some strange figure he sees, and coming on again to avoid the spur. And what else doth man that deliberateth, but one while proceed toward action, another while retire from it, as the hope of greater good draws him, or the fear of greater evil drives him? A child may be so young as to do all which it does without all deliberation, but that is but till it chance to be hurt by doing somewhat, or till it be of age to understand the rod; for the actions wherein he hath once a check, shall be deliberated on a second time. Fools and madmen manifestly deliberate no less than the wisest men, though they make not so good a choice, the images of things being by diseases altered. For bees and spiders, if he had so little to do as to be a spectator of their actions, he would have confessed not only election, but also art, prudence, and policy in them, very near equal to that of mankind. Of bees Aristotle says, their life is civil. He is deceived, if he think any spontaneous action, after once being checked in it, differs from an action voluntary and elective, for even the setting of a man’s foot in the posture of walking, and the action of ordinary eating, was once deliberated, how and when it should be done; and though it afterwards became easy and habitual, so as to be done without fore-thought, yet that does not hinder but that the act is voluntary and proceeds from election. So also are the rashest actions of choleric persons voluntary and upon deliberation. For who is there, but very young children, that has not considered when and how far he ought, or safely may, strike or revile. Seeing then he agrees with me that such actions are necessitated, and the fancy of those that do them is determined to the actions they do, it follows out of his own doctrine, that the liberty of election does not take away the necessity of electing this or that individual thing. And thus one of his arguments fights against another.

The Bishop’s reply.The Bishop’s reply.

J. D. “We have partly seen before how T. H. hath coined a new kind of liberty, a new kind of necessity, a new kind of election; and now in this section a new kind of spontaneity, and a new kind of voluntary actions. Although he say that here is nothing new to him, yet I begin to suspect that either here are many things new to him, or otherwise his election is not the result of a serious mature deliberation. (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, so as spontaneous actions may be necessary, but voluntary actions cannot. Secondly, (b) I distinguish between free acts and voluntary acts. The former are always deliberate, the latter may be indeliberate; all free acts are voluntary, but all voluntary acts are not free. But he saith I confound them and make them the same. (c) Thirdly, he saith, I ascribe spontaneity only to fools, children, madmen, and beasts; but I acknowledge spontaneity hath place in rational men, both as it is comprehended in liberty, and as it is distinguished from liberty.

(d) “Yet I have no reason to be offended at it; for he deals no otherwise with me than he doth with himself. Here he tells us that ‘voluntary presupposeth deliberation.’ But (No. XXV.) he tells us contrary, ‘that whatsoever followeth the last appetite is voluntary, and where there is but one appetite, that is the last:’ and that ‘no action of a man can be said to be without deliberation, though never so sudden.’ So (No. XXXIII.) he tells us, that ‘by spontaneity is meant inconsiderate proceeding, or else nothing is meant by it:’ yet here he tells us, that ‘all voluntary actions which proceed not from fear, are spontaneous,’ whereof many are deliberate, as that wherein he instanceth himself, ‘to give money for merchandise.’ Thirdly, when I said that children, before they have the use of reason, act spontaneously, as when they suck the breast, but do not act freely, because they have not judgment to deliberate or elect, here T. H. undertakes to prove that they do deliberate and elect; and yet presently after confesseth again, that ‘a child may be so young, as to do what it doth without all deliberation.’

“Besides these mistakes and contradictions, he hath other errors also in this section. As this, that no actions proceeding from fear are spontaneous. He who throws his goods into the sea to avoid drowning, doth it not only spontaneously, but even freely. He that wills the end, wills the means conducing to that end. It is true that if the action be considered nakedly without all circumstances, no man willingly or spontaneously casts his goods into the sea. But if we take the action, as in this particular case, invested with all the circumstances, and in order to the end, that is, the saving of his own life, it is not only voluntary and spontaneous, but elective and chosen by him, as the most probable means for his own preservation. As there is an antecedent and a subsequent will, so there is an antecedent and a subsequent spontaneity. His grammatical argument, grounded upon the derivation of spontaneous from sponte, weighs nothing; we have learned in the rudiments of logic, that conjugates are sometimes in name only, and not in deed. He who casts his goods into the sea, may do it of his own accord in order to the end. Secondly, he errs in this also, that nothing is opposed to spontaneity but only fear. Invincible and antecedent ignorance doth destroy the nature of spontaneity or voluntariness, by removing that knowledge which should and would have prohibited the action. As a man thinking to shoot a wild beast in a bush, shoots his friend, which if he had known, he would not have shot. This man did not kill his friend of his own accord.

“For the clearer understanding of these things, and to know what spontaneity is, let us consult awhile with the Schools about the distinct order of voluntary or involuntary actions. Some acts proceed wholly from an extrinsical cause; as the throwing of a stone upwards, a rape, or the drawing of a Christian by plain force to the idol’s temple; these are called violent acts. Secondly, some proceed from an intrinsical cause, but without any manner of knowledge of the end, as the falling of a stone downwards; these are called natural acts. Thirdly, some proceed from an internal principle, with an imperfect knowledge of the end, where there is an appetite to the object, but no deliberation nor election; as the acts of fools, children, beasts, and the inconsiderate acts of men of judgment. These are called voluntary or spontaneous acts. Fourthly, some proceed from an intrinsical cause, with a more perfect knowledge of the end, which are elected upon deliberation. These are called free acts. So then the formal reason of liberty is election. The necessary requisite to election is deliberation. Deliberation implyeth the actual use of reason. But deliberation and election cannot possibly subsist with an extrinsical predetermination to one. How should a man deliberate or choose which way to go, who knows that all ways are shut against him and made impossible to him, but only one? This is the genuine sense of these words voluntary and spontaneous in this question. Though they were taken twenty other ways vulgarly or metaphorically, as we say spontaneous ulcers, where there is no appetite at all, yet it were nothing to this controversy, which is not about words, but about things; not what the words voluntary or free do or may signify, but whether all things be extrinsically predetermined to one.

“These grounds being laid for clearing the true sense of the words, the next thing to be examined is, that contradiction which he hath espied in my discourse, or how this argument fights against his fellows. ‘If I,’ saith T. H., ‘make it appear, that the spontaneous actions of fools, children, madmen, and beasts, do proceed from election and deliberation, and that inconsiderate and indeliberate actions are found in the wisest men, then this argument concludes that necessity and election may stand together, which is contrary to his assertion.’ If this could be made appear as easily as it is spoken, it would concern himself much, who, when he should prove that rational men are not free from necessity, goes about to prove that brute beasts do deliberate and elect, that is as much as to say, are free from necessity. But it concerns not me at all; it is neither my assertion nor my opinion, that necessity and election may not meet together in the same subject; violent, natural, spontaneous, and deliberate or elective acts may all meet together in the same subject. But this I say, that necessity and election cannot consist together in the same act. He who is determined to one, is not free to choose out of more than one. To begin with his latter supposition, ‘that‘that wise men may do inconsiderate and indeliberate actions,’actions,’ I do readily admit it. But where did he learn to infer a general conclusion from particular premises; as thus, because wise men do some indeliberate acts, therefore no act they do is free or elective? Secondly, for his former supposition, ‘that‘that fools, children, madmen, and beasts, do deliberate and elect,’elect,’ if he could make it good, it is not I who contradict myself, nor fight against mine own assertion, but it is he who endeavours to prove that which I altogether deny. He may well find a contradiction between him and me; otherwise to what end is this dispute? But he shall not be able to find a difference between me and myself. But the truth is, he is not able to prove any such thing; and that brings me to my sixth consideration, that neither horses, nor bees, nor spiders, nor children, nor fools, nor madmen do deliberate or elect.

“His first instance is in the horse, or dog, but more especially the horse. He told me that I divided my argument into squadrons, to apply myself to your Lordship, being a military man; and I apprehend that for the same reason he gives his first instance of the horse, with a submission to your own experience. So far well, but otherwise very disadvantageously to his cause. Men used to say of a dull fellow, that he hath no more brains than a horse. And the Prophet David saith, (Psalm xxxii. 9): Be not like the horse and mule, which have no understanding. How do they deliberate without understanding? And (Psalm xlix. 20), he saith the same of all brute beasts: Man being in honour had no understanding, but became like unto the beasts that perish. The horse ‘demurs upon his way.’ Why not? Outward objects, or inward fancies, may produce a stay in his course, though he have no judgment either to deliberate or elect. ‘He retires from some strange figure which he sees, and comes on again to avoid the spur.’ So he may; and yet be far enough from deliberation. All this proceeds from the sensitive passion of fear, which is a perturbation arising from the expectation of some imminent evil. But he urgeth, ‘what else doth a man that deliberateth?’ Yes, very much. The horse feareth some outward object, but deliberation is a comparing of several means conducing to the same end. Fear is commonly of one, deliberation of more than one; fear is of those things which are not in our power, deliberation of those things which are in our power; fear ariseth many times out of natural antipathies, but in these disconveniences of nature deliberation hath no place at all. In a word, fear is an enemy to deliberation, and betrayeth the succours of the soul. If the horse did deliberate, he should consult with reason, whether it were more expedient for him to go that way or not; he would represent to himself all the dangers both of going and staying, and compare the one with the other, and elect that which is less evil; he should consider whether it were not better to endure a little hazard, than ungratefully and dishonestly to fail in his duty towards his master, who did breed him and doth feed him. This the horse doth not; neither is it possible for him to do it. Secondly, for children, T. H. confesseth that they may be so young that they do not deliberate at all; afterwards, as they attain to the use of reason by degrees, so by degrees 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 madmen, it is not to be understood of such madmen as have their lucida intervalla, who are mad and discreet by fits; when they have the use of reason, they are no madmen, 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 mere madmen, and mere 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 civil.’ 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 saw them, but I praised the marvellous 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 as to ascribe those rarities to their own invention, which I knew to proceed from a mere 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 judgment. Nor when I read in St. Ambrose of their hexagons or sexangular cells, 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, bending their thighs in form of a cross, and bowing themselves; did I therefore think that this was an act of religious piety, or that they were capable of theological virtues, 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 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 proved 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 virtue of these formerly acquired habits, are no less free, than if the deliberation were coexistent with 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 plays 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 rash attempts of choleric 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 itself 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 advisedly; 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 fails. 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 BISHOP’S REPLY NO. 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 Schoolmen bring it in, if not merely to shift off the difficulty of maintaining their tenet of free-will?

(b) “Secondly, he saith I distinguish between free acts and voluntary acts; but he saith, I confound them and make them the same.”

In his reply No. II, he saith, that for the clearing of the question, we are to know the difference between these three, necessity, spontaneity, and liberty; and because I thought he knew that it could not be cleared without understanding what is will, I had reason to think that spontaneity was his new word for will. And presently after, “some things are necessary, and not voluntary or spontaneous; some things are both necessary and voluntary.” These words, voluntary and spontaneous, so put together, would make any man believe spontaneous were put as explicative of voluntary; for it is no wonder in the eloquence of the Schoolmen. Therefore, presently after, these words, “spontaneity consists in a conformity of the appetite, either intellectual or sensitive,” signify that spontaneity is a conformity or likeness of the appetite to the object; which to me soundeth as if he had said, that the appetite is like the object; which is as proper as if he had said, the hunger is like the meat. If this be the bishop’s meaning, as it is the meaning of the words, he is a very fine philosopher. But hereafter I will venture no more to say his meaning is this or that, especially where he useth terms of art.

(c) “Thirdly, he saith, I ascribe spontaneity only to fools, children, madmen, and beasts. But I acknowledge spontaneity hath place in rational men,” &c.

I resolve to have no more to do with spontaneity. But I desire the reader to take notice, that the common people, on whose arbitration dependeth the signification of words in common use, among the Latins and Greeks did call all actions and motions whereof they did perceive no cause, spontaneous and αυτοματα: I say, not those actions which had no causes; for all actions have their causes; but those actions whose causes they did not perceive. So that spontaneous, as a general name, comprehended many actions and motions of inanimate creatures; as the falling of heavy things downwards, which they thought spontaneous, and that if they were not hindered, they would descend of their own accord. It comprehended also all animal motion, as beginning from the will or appetite; because the causes of the will and appetite being not perceived, they supposed, as the Bishop doth, that they were the causes of themselves. So that which in general is called spontaneous, being applied to men and beasts in special, is called voluntary. Yet the will and appetite, though the very same thing, use to be distinguished in certain occasions. For in the public conversation of men, where they are to judge of one another’s will, and of the regularity and irregularity of one another’s actions, not every appetite, but the last is esteemed in the public judgment for the will: nor every action proceeding from appetite, but that only to which there had preceded or ought to have preceded some deliberation. And this I say is so, when one man is to judge of another’s will. For every man in himself knoweth that what he desireth or hath an appetite to, the same he hath a will to, though his will may be changed before he hath obtained his desire. The Bishop, understanding nothing of this, might, if it had pleased him, have called it jargon. But he had rather pick out of it some contradictions of myself. And therefore saith:

(d) “Yet I have no reason to be offended at it, (meaning such contradictions), for he dealeth no otherwise with me than he doth with himself.”

It is a contradiction, he saith, that having said that “voluntary presupposeth deliberation,” I say in another place, “that whatsoever followeth the last appetite, is voluntary, and where there is but one appetite, that is the last.” Not observing that voluntary presupposeth deliberation, when the judgment, whether the action be voluntary or not, is not in the actor, but in the judge; who regardeth not the will of the actor, where there is nothing to be accused in the action of deliberate malice; yet knoweth that though there be but one appetite, the same is truly will for the time, and the action, if it follow, a voluntary action.

This also he saith is a contradiction, that having said, “no action of a man can be said to be without deliberation, though never so sudden,” I say afterward that “by spontaneity is meant inconsiderate proceeding.”

Again he observes not, that the action of a man that is not a child, in public judgment how rash, inconsiderate, and sudden soever it be, it is to be taken for deliberation; because it is supposed, he ought to have considered and compared his intended action with the law; when, nevertheless, that sudden and indeliberate action was truly voluntary.

Another contradiction which he finds is this, that having undertaken to prove “that children before they have the use of reason do deliberate and elect,” I say by and by after a “child may be so young as to do what he doth without all deliberation.” I yet see no contradiction here; for a child may be so young, as that the appetite thereof is its first appetite, but afterward and often before it come to have the use of reason, may elect one thing and refuse another, and consider the consequences of what it is about to do. And why not as well as beasts, which never have the use of reason; for they deliberate, as men do? For though men and beasts do differ in many things very much, yet they differ not in the nature of their deliberation. A man can reckon by words of general signification, make propositions, and syllogisms, and compute in numbers, magnitudes, proportions, and other things computable; which being done by the advantage of language, and words of general significations, a beast that hath not language cannot do, nor a man that hath language, if he misplace the words, that are his counters. From hence to the end of this number, he discourseth again of spontaneity, and how it is in children, madmen, and beasts; which, as I before resolved, I will not meddle with; let the reader think and judge of it as he pleaseth.

NO. IX.

The Bishop’s reply.

J. D. “Secondly, (a) they who might have done, and may do, many things which they leave undone; and they who leave undone many things which they might do, are neither compelled nor necessitated to do what they do, but have true liberty. But we might do many things which we do not, and we do many things which we might leave undone, as is plain, (1 Kings iii. 11): Because thou hast asked this thing, and hast not asked for thyself long life, neither hast asked riches for thyself, nor hast asked the life of thine enemies &c. God gave Solomon his choice. He might have asked riches, but then he had not asked wisdom, which he did ask. He did ask wisdom, but he might have asked riches, which yet he did not ask. And (Acts v. 4): After it was sold, was it not in thine own power? It was in his own power to give it, and it was in his own power to retain it. Yet if he did give it, he could not retain it; and if he did retain it, he could not give it. Therefore we may do, what we do not. And we do not, what we might do. That is, we have true liberty from necessity.”

T. H. The second argument from Scripture consisteth in histories of men that did one thing, when, if they would, they might have done another. The places are two; one is in 1 Kings iii. 11, where the history says, God was pleased that Solomon, who might, if he would, have asked riches or revenge, did nevertheless ask wisdom at God’s hands. The other is the words of St. Peter to Ananias, (Acts v. 4): After it was sold, was it not in thine own power?

To which the answer is the same with that I answered to the former places: that they prove that there is election, but do not disprove the necessity which I maintain of what they so elect.

“We have had the very same answer twice before. It seemeth that he is well-pleased with it, or else he would not draw it in again so suddenly by head and shoulders to no purpose, if he did not conceive it to be a panchreston, a salve for all sores, or dictamnum, sovereign dittany, to make all his adversaries’ weapons to drop out of the wounds of his cause, only by chewing it, without any application to the sore. I will not waste the time to show any further, how the members of his distinction do cross one another, and one take away another. To make every election to be of one thing imposed by necessity, and of another thing which is absolutely impossible, is to make election to be no election at all. But I forbear to press that at present. If I may be bold to use his own phrase, his answer looks quite another way from mine argument. My second reason was this: ‘They who may do, and might have done many things which they leave undone, and who leave undone many things which they might do, are not necessitated, nor precisely and antecedently determined to what they do.’

“But we might do many things which we do not, and we do many things which we might leave undone, as appears evidently by the texts alleged. Therefore we are not antecedently and precisely determined, nor necessitated to do all things which we do. What is here of election in this argument? To what proposition, to what term doth T. H. apply his answer? He neither affirms, nor denieth, nor distinguisheth of any thing contained in my argument. Here I must be bold to call upon him for a more pertinent answer.”

ANIMADVERSIONS UPON THE BISHOP’S REPLY NO. IX.

The Bishop, for the proving of free-will, had alleged this text: Because thou hast asked this thing, and hast not asked for thyself long life, &c. And another, (Acts v. 4): After it was sold, was it not in thine own power? Out of which he infers, there was no necessity that Solomon should ask wisdom rather than long life, nor that Ananias should tell a lie concerning the price for which he sold his land: and my answer, that they prove election, but disprove not the necessity of election, satisfieth him not; because, saith he, (a) “they who might have done what they left undone, and left undone what they might have done, are not necessitated.”

But how doth he know (understanding power properly taken) that Solomon had a real power to ask long life? No doubt Solomon knew nothing to the contrary; but yet it was possible that God might have hindered him. For though God gave Solomon his choice, that is, the thing which he should choose, it doth not follow, that he did not also give him the act of election. And for the other text, where it is said, that the price of the land was in Ananias’s power, the word power signifieth no more than the word right, that is, the right to do with his own what he pleased, which is not a real and natural power, but a civil power made by covenant. And therefore the former answer is sufficient, that though such places are clear enough to prove election, they have no strength at all to take away necessity.

NO. X.

The Bishop’s reply.

J. D. “Thirdly, if there be no true liberty, but all things come to pass by inevitable necessity, then what are all those interrogations, and objurgations, and reprehensions, and expostulations, which we find so frequently in holy Scriptures, (be it spoken with all due respect), but feigned and hypocritical exaggerations? Hast thou eaten of the tree, whereof I commanded that thou shouldst not eat? (Gen. iii. 11.) And (verse 13) he saith to Eve, Why hast thou done this? And (Gen. iv. 6) to Cain, Why art thou wroth, and why is thy countenance cast down? And, (Ezech. xviii. 31): Why will ye die, O house of Israel? Doth God command openly not to eat, and yet secretly by himself or by the second causes necessitate him to eat? Doth he reprehend him for doing that, which he hath antecedently determined that he must do? Doth he propose things under impossible conditions? Or were not this plain mockery and derision? Doth a loving master chide his servant because he doth not come at his call, and yet knows that the poor servant is chained and fettered, so as he cannot move, by the master’s own order, without the servant’s default or consent? They who talk here of a twofold will of God, secret and revealed, and the one opposite to the other, understand not what they say. These two wills concern several persons. The secret will of God, is what he will do himself; the revealed will of God, is what he would have us to do; it may be the secret will of God to take away the life of the father, yet it is God’s revealed will that his son should wish his life and pray for his life. Here is no contradiction, where the agents are distinct. But for the same person to command one thing, and yet to necessitate him that is commanded to do another thing; to chide a man for doing that, which he hath determined inevitably and irresistibly that he must do; this were (I am afraid to utter what they are not afraid to assert) the highest dissimulation. God’s chiding proves man’s liberty.”

T. H. To the third and fifth arguments, I shall make but one answer.

J. D. (a) “Certainly distinct arguments, as the third and fifth are, the one drawn from the truth of God, the other from the justice of God, the one from his objurgations and reprehensions, the other from his judgments after life, did require distinct answers. But the plain truth is, that neither here, nor in his answer to the fifth argument, nor in this whole treatise, is there one word of solution or satisfaction to this argument, or to any part of it. All that looks like an answer is contained, No. XII: ‘That which he does is made just by his doing; just, I say, in him, not always just in us by the example; for a man that shall command a thing openly, and plot secretly the hinderance of the same, if he punish him whom he commanded so for not doing it, is unjust.’ (b) I dare not insist upon it, I hope his meaning is not so bad as the words intimate and as I apprehend, that is, to impute falsehood to Him that is truth itself, and to justify feigning and dissimulation in God, as he doth tyranny, by the infiniteness of his power and the absoluteness of his dominion. And therefore, by his leave, I must once again tender him a new summons for a full and clear answer to this argument also. He tells us, that he was not surprised. Whether he were or not, is more than I know. But this I see plainly, that either he is not provided, or that his cause admits no choice of answers. The Jews dealt ingeniously, when they met with a difficult knot which they could not untie, to put it upon Elias: Elias will answer it when he comes.

ANIMADVERSIONS UPON THE BISHOP’S REPLY NO. X.

The Bishop argued thus: “Thirdly, if there be no true liberty, but all things come to pass by inevitable necessity, then what are those interrogations we find so frequently in holy Scriptures, (be it spoken with all due respect), but feigned and hypocritical exaggerations?” Here putting together two repugnant suppositions, either craftily or (be it spoken with all due respect) ignorantly, he would have men believe, because I hold necessity, that I deny liberty, I hold as much that there is true liberty as he doth, and more, for I hold it as from necessity, and that there must of necessity be liberty; but he holds it not from necessity, and so makes it possible there may be none. His expostulations were, first, Hast thou eaten of the tree whereof I commanded thee that thou shouldst not eat? Secondly, Why hast thou done this? Thirdly, Why art thou wroth, and why is thy countenance cast down? Fourthly, Why will ye die, O house of Israel? These arguments requiring the same answer which some other do, I thought fit to remit them to their fellows. But the Bishop will not allow me that. For he saith,

(a) “Certainly, distinct arguments, as the third and fifth are, &c. did require distinct answers.”

I am therefore to give an account of the meaning of the aforesaid objurgations and expostulations; not of the end for which God said, Hast thou eaten of the tree, &c., but how those words may be taken without repugnance to the doctrine of necessity. These words, Hast thou eaten of the tree whereof I commanded that thou shouldst not eat, convince Adam that, notwithstanding God had placed in the garden a means to keep him perpetually from dying in case he should accommodate his will to obedience of God’s commandment concerning the tree of knowledge of good and evil, yet Adam was not so much master of his own will as to do it. Whereby is signified, that a mortal man, though invited by the promise of immortality, cannot govern his own will, though his will govern his actions; which dependence of the actions on the will, is that which properly and truly is called liberty. And the like may be said of the words to Eve, Why hast thou done this? and of those to Cain, Why art thou wroth? &c. and to Israel, Why will ye die, O house of Israel? But the Bishop here will say die signifieth not die, but live eternally in torments; for by such interpretations any man may answer anything. And whereas he asketh, “Doth God reprehend him for doing that which he hath antecedently determined him that he must do?” I answer, no; but he convinceth and instructeth him, that though immortality was so easy to obtain, as it might be had for the abstinence from the fruit of one only tree, yet he could not obtain it but by pardon, and by the sacrifice of Jesus Christ: nor is there here any punishment, but only a reducing of Adam and Eve to their original mortality, where death was no punishment but a gift of God. In which mortality he lived near a thousand years, and had a numerous issue, and lived without misery, and I believe shall at the resurrection obtain the immortality which then he lost. Nor in all this is there any plotting secretly, or any mockery or derision, which the Bishop would make men believe there is. And whereas he saith, that “they who talk here of a twofold will of God, secret and revealed, and the one opposite to the other, understand not what they say:” the Protestant doctors, both of our and other Churches, did use to distinguish between the secret and revealed will of God; the former they called voluntas bene placiti, which signifieth absolutely his will, the other voluntas signi, that is, the signification of his will, in the same sense that I call the one his will, the other his commandment, which may sometimes differ. For God’s commandment to Abraham was, that he should sacrifice Isaac, but his will was, that he should not do it. God’s denunciation to Nineveh was, that it should be destroyed within forty days, but his will was, that it should not.

(b) “I dare not insist upon it, I hope his meaning is not so bad, as the words intimate, and as I apprehend; that is, to impute falsehood to Him that is truth itself,” &c.

What damned rhetoric and subtle calumny is this? God, I said, might command a thing openly, and yet hinder the doing of it, without injustice; but if a man should command a thing to be done, and then plot secretly the hinderance of the same, and punish for the not doing it, it were injustice. This it is which the Bishop apprehends as an imputation of falsehood to God Almighty. And perhaps if the death of a sinner were, as he thinks, an eternal life in extreme misery, a man might as far as Job hath done, expostulate with God Almighty; not accusing him of injustice, because whatsoever he doth is therefore just because done by him; but of little tenderness and love to mankind. And this expostulation will be equally just or unjust, whether the necessity of all things be granted or denied. For it is manifest that God could have made man impeccable, and can now preserve him from sin, or forgive him if he please; and therefore, if he please not, the expostulation is as reasonable in the cases of liberty as of necessity.

NO. XI.

The Bishop’s reply.

J. D. “Fourthly, if either the decree of God, or the foreknowledge of God, or the influence of the stars, or the concatenation 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. For he was subjected to the same decrees, the same prescience, the same constellations, the same causes, the same objects, the same dictates of the understanding. But, quicquid ostendes mihi sic, incredulus odi; the greatest opposers of our liberty, are as earnest maintainers of the liberty of Adam. Therefore none of these supposed impediments take away true liberty.”

T. H. The fourth argument is to this effect: “If the decree of God, or his foreknowledge, or the influence of the stars, or the concatenation of causes, or the physical or moral efficacy of causes, or the last dictate of the understanding, or whatsoever it be, do take away true liberty, then Adam before his fall had no true liberty. Quicquid ostendes mihi sic, incredulus odi.” That which I say necessitateth and determineth every action, (that he may no longer doubt of my meaning), is the sum of all those things, which being now existent, conduce and concur to the production of that action hereafter, whereof if any one thing now were wanting, the effect could not be produced. This concourse of causes, whereof every one is determined to be such as it is by a like concourse of former causes, may well be called (in respect they were all set and ordered by the eternal cause of all things, God Almighty) the decree of God.

But that the foreknowledge of God should be a cause of any thing, cannot be truly said; seeing foreknowledge is knowledge, and knowledge dependeth on the existence of the things known, and not they on it.

The influence of the stars is but a small part of the whole cause, consisting of the concourse of all agents.

Nor doth the concourse of all causes make one simple chain or concatenation, but an innumerable number of chains joined together, not in all parts, but in the first link, God Almighty; and consequently the whole cause of an event does not always depend upon one single chain, but on many together.

Natural efficacy of objects does determine voluntary agents, and necessitates the will, and consequently the action; but for moral efficacy, I understand not what he means by it. The last dictate of the judgment concerning the good or bad that may follow on any action, is not properly the whole cause, but the last part of it; and yet may be said to produce the effect necessarily, in such manner as the last feather may be said to break an horse’s back, when there were so many laid on before as there wanted but that to do it.

Now for his argument, that if the concourse of all the causes necessitate the effect, that then it follows, Adam had no true liberty. I deny the consequence; for I make not only the effect, but also the election of that particular effect to be necessary, inasmuch as the will itself, and each propension of a man during his deliberation, is as much necessitated, and depends on a sufficient cause, as any thing else whatsoever. As for example, it is no more necessary that fire should burn, than that a man, or other creature, whose limbs be moved by fancy, should have election, that is, liberty to do what he has a fancy to, though it be not in his will or power to choose his fancy, or choose his election or will.

This doctrine, because he says he hates, I doubt had better been suppressed; as it should have been, if both your Lordship and he had not pressed me to an answer.

J. D. (a) “This argument was sent forth only as an espy to make a more full discovery, what were the true grounds of T. H.’s supposed necessity. Which errand being done, and the foundation whereupon he builds being found out, which is, as I called it, a concatenation of causes, and, as he calls it, a concourse of necessary causes; it would now be a superfluous and impertinent work in me to undertake the refutation of all those other opinions, which he doth not undertake to defend. And therefore I shall waive them at the present, with these short animadversions.

(b) “Concerning the eternal decree of God, he confounds the decree itself with the execution of his decree. And concerning the foreknowledge of God, he confounds that speculative knowledge, which is called the knowledge of vision, (which doth not produce the intellective objects, no more than the sensitive vision doth produce the sensible objects), with that other knowledge of God, which is called the knowledge of approbation, or a practical knowledge, that is, knowledge joined with an act of the will, of which divines do truly say, that it is the cause of things, as the knowledge of the artist is the cause of his work. John i.: God made all things by his word; that is, by his wisdom. Concerning the influence of the stars, I wish he had expressed himself more clearly. For as I do willingly grant, that those heavenly bodies do act upon these sublunary things, not only by their motion and light, but also by an occult virtue, which we call influence, as we see by manifold experience in the loadstone and shell-fish, &c.: so if he intend that by these influences they do naturally or physically determine the will, or have any direct dominion over human counsels, either in whole or in part, either more or less, he is in an error. Concerning the concatenation of causes, whereas he makes not one chain, but an innumerable number of chains, (I hope he speaks hyperbolically, and doth not intend that they are actually infinite), the difference is not material whether one or many, so long as they are all joined together, both in the first link, and likewise in the effect. It serves to no end but to shew what a shadow of liberty T. H. doth fancy, or rather what a dream of a shadow. As if one chain were not sufficient to load poor man, but he must be clogged with innumerable chains. This is just such another freedom as the Turkish galley-slaves do enjoy. But I admire that T. H., who is so versed in this question, should here confess that he understands not the difference between physical or natural, and moral efficacy: and much more that he should affirm, that outward objects do determine voluntary agents by a natural efficacy. No object, no second agent, angel or devil, can determine the will of man naturally, but God alone, in respect of his supreme dominion over all things. Then the will is determined naturally, when God Almighty, besides his general influence, whereupon all second causes do depend, as well for their being as for their acting, doth moreover at some times, when it pleases him in cases extraordinary, concur by a special influence, and infuse something into the will, in the nature of an act, or an habit, whereby the will is moved and excited, and applied to will or choose this or that. Then the will is determined morally, when some object is proposed to it with persuasive reasons and arguments to induce it to will. Where the determination is natural, the liberty to suspend its act is taken away from the will, but not so where the determination is moral. In the former case, the will is determined extrinsically, in the latter case intrinsically; the former produceth an absolute necessity, the latter only a necessity of supposition. 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 latter, freely and indeterminately. The former excitation is immediate; the latter is mediate 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 only 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 horse’s back, when there were so many laid on before that there wanted but that to do it.’ I have shewed (No. VII.) that the last dictate of the understanding is not always absolute in itself, nor conclusive to the will; and when it is conclusive, yet it produceth no antecedent nor extrinsical necessity. I shall only add one thing more at present, that by making the last judgment of right reason to be of no more weight than a single feather, he wrongs the understanding as well as he doth the will; and endeavours 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 itself, being an inferior 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 sphere of their activity. All the access which they have unto the will, is by the means of the understanding, sometimes clear and sometimes disturbed, and of reason, either right or misinformed. Without the help of the understanding, all his second causes were not able of themselves to load the horse’s back with so much weight as the least of all his feathers doth amount unto. But we shall meet with his horseload of feathers again, No. XXIII.

“These things being thus briefly touched, he proceeds to his answer. My argument was this: if any of these or all 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 only 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 human wills, his and ours, and each propension of our wills, even during our deliberation, are as much necessitated as anything 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 ingenuously, I hate this doctrine from my heart. And I believe both I have reason so to do, and all others who shall seriously ponder the horrid consequences which flow from it. It destroys liberty, and dishonours the nature of man. It makes the second causes and 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 thread, 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, irresistibly, 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, necessarily, and essentially from God; or that God is more guilty of it, and more the cause of evil than man, because man is extrinsically, inevitably determined, but so is not God. And in causes essentially subordinate, the cause of the cause is always the cause of the effect. What tyrant did ever impose laws 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, incredulus 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 evils which are in the world.”

ANIMADVERSIONS UPON THE BISHOP’S REPLY NO. XI.

(a) “This argument was sent forth only as an espy, to make a more full discovery, what were the true grounds of T. H.’s supposed necessity.”

The argument which he sendeth forth as an espy, is this: “If either the decree of God, or the foreknowledge of God, or the influence of the stars, or the concatenation (which he says falsely I call a concourse) of causes, of 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 foreknowledge 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 whereof, which is this, liberty is to choose what we will, not to choose our will, no inculcation is sufficient to make the Bishop take notice of, notwithstanding he be otherwhere so witty, and here so crafty, as to send out arguments for spies. The cause why I denied the consequence was, that I thought the force thereof consisted in this, that necessity in the Bishop’s opinion destroyed liberty.

(b) “Concerning the eternal decree of God,” &c.

Here begins his reply. From which if we take these words; “knowledge of approbation;” “practical knowledge;” “heavenly bodies act upon sublunary things, not only by their motion, but also by an occult virtue, which we call influence;” “moral efficacy;” “general influence;” “special influence;” “infuse something into the will;” “the will is moved;” “the will is induced to will;” “the will suspends its own act;” which are all nonsense, unworthy of a man, nay, and if a beast could speak, unworthy of a beast, and can befal no creature whose nature is not depraved by doctrine; nothing at all remaineth to be answered. Perhaps the word, occult virtue, is not to be taxed as unintelligible. But then I may tax therein the want of ingenuity in him that had rather say, that heavenly bodies do work by an occult virtue, than that they work he knoweth not how; which he would not confess, but endeavours to make occult be taken for a cause. The rest of this reply is one of those consequences, which I have answered in the beginning, where I compare the inconveniences of both opinions, that is, “that either Adam did not sin, or his sin proceeded necessarily from God;” which is no stronger a consequence than if out of this, “that a man is lame necessarily,” one should infer, that either he is not lame, or that his lameness proceeded necessarily from the will of God. To the end of this number there is nothing more of argument. The place is filled up with wondering and railing.

NO. XII.

The Bishop’s reply.

J. D. “Fifthly, if there be no liberty, there shall be no day of doom, no last judgment, no rewards nor punishments after death. A man can never make himself a criminal, if he be not left at liberty to commit a crime. No man can be justly punished for doing that which was not in his power to shun. To take away liberty hazards heaven, but undoubtedly it leaves no hell.”

T. H. The arguments of greatest consequence are the third and fifth, and fall both into one: namely, if there be a necessity of all events, that it will follow that praise and reprehension, reward and punishment, are all vain and unjust: and that if God should openly forbid, and secretly necessitate the same action, punishing men for what they could not avoid, there would be no belief among them of heaven or hell.

To oppose hereunto, I must borrow an answer from St. Paul (Rom. ix.), from the eleventh verse of the chapter to the eighteenth, is laid down the very same objection in these words: When they (meaning Esau and Jacob) were yet unborn, and had done neither good nor evil, that the purpose of God according to election, not by works, but by him that calleth, might remain firm, it was said to her (viz. to Rebecca) that the elder shall serve the younger. And what then shall we say, is there injustice with God? God forbid. It is not therefore in him that willeth, nor in him that runneth, but in God that showeth mercy. For the Scripture saith to Pharaoh, I have stirred thee up, that I may show my power in thee, and that my name may be set forth in all the earth. Therefore whom God willeth he hath mercy on, and whom he willeth he hardeneth. Thus, you see, the case put by St. Paul is the same with that of J. D., and the same objection in these words following (verse 19): Thou wilt ask me then, why will God yet complain; for who hath resisted his will? To this therefore the apostle answers, not by denying it was God’s will, or that the decree of God concerning Esau was not before he had sinned, or that Esau was not necessitated to do what he did; but thus (verse 20, 21): Who art thou, O man, that interrogatest God? Shall the work say to the workman, why hast thou made me thus? Hath not the potter power over the clay, of the same stuff to make one vessel to honour, another to dishonour? According therefore to this answer of St. Paul, I answer J. D.’s objection, and say, the power of God alone, without other help, is sufficient justification of any action he doth. That which men make among themselves here by pacts and covenants, and call by the name of justice, and according whereunto men are counted and termed rightly just and unjust, is not that by which God Almighty’s actions are to be measured or called just, no more than his counsels are to be measured by human wisdom. That which he does is made just by his doing; just I say in him, not always just in us by the example; for a man that shall command a thing openly, and plot secretly the hindrance of the same, if he punish him he so commanded for not doing it, is unjust. So also his counsels, they be therefore not in vain, because they be his, whether we see the use of them or not. When God afflicted Job, he did object no sin to him, but justified that afflicting him by telling him of his power. Hast thou (says God) an arm like mine? Where wast thou, when I laid the foundations of the earth? and the like. So our Saviour, concerning the man that was born blind, said, it was not for his sin, nor his parents’ sin, but that the power of God might be shown in him. Beasts are subject to death and torment, yet they cannot sin. It was God’s will it should be so. Power irresistible justified all actions really and properly, in whomsoever it be found. Less power does not. And because such power is in God only, he must needs be just in all his actions. And we, that not comprehending his counsels, call him to the bar, commit injustice in it.

I am not ignorant of the usual reply to this answer, by distinguishing between will and permission. As, that God Almighty does indeed permit sin sometimes, and that he also foreknoweth that the sin he permitteth shall be committed; but does not will it, nor necessitate it. I know also they distinguish the action from the sin of the action, saying, God Almighty doth indeed cause the action, whatsoever action it be, but not the sinfulness or irregularity of it, that is, the discordance between the action and the law. Such distinctions as these dazzle my understanding. I find no difference between the will to have a thing done, and the permission to do it, when he that permitteth it can hinder it, and knows it will be done unless he hinder it. Nor find I any difference between an action that is against the law, and the sin of that action. As for example, between the killing of Uriah, and the sin of David in killing Uriah. Nor when one is cause both of the action and of the law, how another can be cause of the disagreement between them, no more than how one man making a longer and shorter garment, another can make the inequality that is between them. This I know, God cannot sin, because his doing a thing makes it just, and consequently no sin: and because whatsoever can sin is subject to another’s law, which God is not. And therefore it is blasphemy to say, God can sin. But to say, that God can so order the world as a sin may be necessarily caused thereby in a man, I do not see how it is any dishonour to him. Howsoever, if such or other distinctions can make it clear that St. Paul did not think Esau’s or Pharaoh’s actions proceeded from the will and purpose of God, or that proceeding from his will could not therefore without injustice be blamed or punished, I will, as soon as I understand them, turn unto J. D.’s opinion. For I now hold nothing in all this question between us, but what seemeth to me not obscurely, but most expressly said in this place by St. Paul. And thus much in answer to his places of Scripture.

J. D. T. H. thinks to kill two birds with one stone, and satisfy two arguments with one answer, whereas in truth he satisfieth neither. First, for my third reason. (a) Though all he say here were as true as an oracle; though punishment were an act of dominion, not of justice in God; yet this is no sufficient cause why God should deny his own act, or why he should chide or expostulate with men, why they did that which he himself did necessitate them to do, and whereof he was the actor more than they, they being but as the stone, but he the hand that threw it. Notwithstanding anything which is pleaded here, this stoical opinion doth stick hypocrisy and dissimulation close to God, who is truth itself.

“And to my fifth argument, which he changeth and relateth amiss, as by comparing mine with his may appear, his chiefest answer is to oppose a difficult place of St. Paul (Rom. ix. 11.) Hath he never heard, that to propose a doubt is not to answer an argument: nec bene respondet qui litem lite resolvit? But I will not pay him in his own coin. Wherefore to this place alleged by him, I answer, the case is not the same. The question moved there is, how God did keep his promise made to Abraham, to be the God of him and of his seed, if the Jews who were the legitimate progeny of Abraham were deserted. To which the apostle answers (vers. 6, 7, 8), that that promise was not made to the carnal seed of Abraham, that is, the Jews, but to his spiritual sons, which were the heirs of his faith, that is, to the believing Christians; which answer he explicateth, first by the allegory of Isaac and Ishmael, and after in the place cited of Esau and Jacob. Yet neither does he speak there so much of their persons as of their posterities. And though some words may be accommodated to God’s predestination, which are there uttered, yet it is not the scope of that text, to treat of the reprobation of any man to hell fire. All the posterity of Esau were not eternally reprobated, as holy Job and many others. But this question which is now agitated between us, is quite of another nature, how a man can be a criminal who doth nothing but that which he is extrinsically necessitated to do, or how God in justice can punish a man with eternal torments for doing that which it was never in his power to leave undone; or why he who did imprint the motion in the heart of man, should punish man, who did only receive the impression from him. So his answer looks another way.

“But because he grounds so much upon this text, that if it can be cleared he is ready to change his opinion, I will examine all those passages which may seem to favour his cause. First, these words (ver. 11): being not yet born, neither having done any good or evil, upon which the whole weight of his argument doth depend, have no reference at all to those words (verse 13), Jacob have I loved, and Esau have I hated; for those words were first uttered by the prophet Malachi, many ages after Jacob and Esau were dead (Mal. i. 2, 3), and intended of the posterity of Esau, who were not redeemed from captivity as the Israelites were. But they are referred to those other words (verse 12), the elder shall serve the younger, which indeed were spoken before Jacob or Esau were born. (Gen. xxv. 23.) And though those words of Malachi had been used of Jacob and Esau before they were born, yet it had advantaged his cause nothing: for hatred in that text doth not signify any reprobation to the flames of hell, much less the execution of that decree, or the actual imposition of punishment, nor any act contrary to love. God saw all that he had made, and it was very good. Goodness itself cannot hate that which is good. But hatred there signifies comparative hatred, or a less degree of love, or at the most a negation of love. As (Gen. xxix. 31), when the Lord saw that Leah was hated, we may not conclude thence that Jacob hated his wife; the precedent verse doth fully expound the sense (verse 30): Jacob loved Rachel more than Leah. So (Matth. vi. 24), No man can serve two masters, for either he will hate the one and love the other. So (Luke xiv. 26), If any man hate not his father and mother, &c. he cannot be my disciple. St. Matthew (x. 37) tells us the sense of it: He that loveth father or mother more than me, is not worthy of me.

“Secondly, those words (ver. 15) I will have mercy on whom I will have mercy, do prove no more but this, that the preferring of Jacob before Esau, and of the Christians before the Jews, was not a debt from God either to the one or to the other, but a work of mercy. And what of this? All men confess that God’s mercies do exceed man’s deserts, but God’s punishments do never exceed man’s misdeeds. As we see in the parable of the labourers (Matth. xx. 13-15): Friend, I do thee no wrong. Did not I agree with thee for a penny? Is it not lawful for me to do with mine own as I will? Is thy eye evil, because I am good? Acts of mercy are free, but acts of justice are due.

“That which follows (verse 17) comes something nearer the cause. The Scripture saith unto Pharaoh, for this same purpose I have raised thee up, (that is, I have made thee a king, or I have preserved thee), that I might show my power in thee. But this particle, that, doth not always signify the main end of an action, but sometimes only a consequent of it, as Matth. ii. 15: He departed into Egypt, that it might be fulfilled which was spoken by the prophet, out of Egypt have I called my son. Without doubt Joseph’s aim or end of his journey was not to fulfil prophecies, but to save the life of the child. Yet because the fulfilling of the prophecy was a consequent of Joseph’s journey, he saith, that it might be fulfilled. So here, I have raised thee up, that I might show my power. Again, though it should be granted that this particle that, did denote the intention of God to destroy Pharaoh in the Red Sea, yet it was not the antecedent intention of God, which evermore respects the good and benefit of the creature, but God’s consequent intention upon the prevision of Pharaoh’s obstinacy, that since he would not glorify God in obeying his word, he should glorify God undergoing his judgments. Hitherto we find no eternal punishments, nor no temporal punishment without just deserts.

“It follows, (ver. 18), whom he will he hardeneth. Indeed hardness of heart is the greatest judgment that God lays upon a sinner in this life, worse than all the plagues of Egypt. But how doth God harden the heart? Not by a natural influence of any evil act or habit into the will, nor by inducing the will with persuasive motives to obstinacy and rebellion (James i. 13, 14): For God tempteth no man, but every man is tempted when he is drawn away of his own lust and enticed. Then God is said to harden the heart three ways; first, negatively, and not positively; not by imparting wickedness, but by not imparting grace; as the sun descending to the tropic of Capricorn, is said with us to be the cause of winter, that is, not by imparting cold, but by not imparting heat. It is an act of mercy in God to give his grace freely, but to detain it is no act of injustice. So the apostle opposeth hardening to shewing of mercy. To harden is as much as not to shew mercy.

“Secondly, God is said to harden the heart occasionally and not causally, by doing good, (which incorrigible sinners make an occasion of growing worse and worse), and doing evil; as a master by often correcting of an untoward scholar, doth accidentally and occasionally harden his heart, and render him more obdurate, insomuch as he grows even to despise the rod. Or as an indulgent parent by his patience and gentleness doth encourage an obstinate son to become more rebellious. So, whether we look upon God’s frequent judgments upon Pharaoh, or God’s iterated favours in removing and withdrawing those judgments upon Pharaoh’s request, both of them in their several kinds were occasions of hardening Pharaoh’s heart, the one making him more presumptuous, the other more desperately rebellious. So that which was good in it was God’s; that which was evil was Pharaoh’s. God gave the occasion, but Pharaoh was the true cause of his own obduration. This is clearly confirmed, Exodus viii. 15: When Pharaoh saw that there was respite, he hardened his heart. And Exodus ix. 34: When Pharaoh saw that the rain and the hail and the thunders were ceased, he sinned yet more, and hardened his heart, he and his servants. So Psalm cv. 25: He turned their hearts, so that they hated his people, and dealt subtly with them. That is, God blessed the children of Israel, whereupon the Egyptians did take occasion to hate them, as is plain, Exodus i. 7, 8, 9, 10. So God hardened Pharaoh’s heart, and Pharaoh hardened his own heart. God hardened it by not shewing mercy to Pharaoh, as he did to Nebuchadnezzar, who was as great a sinner as he, or God hardened it occasionally; but still Pharaoh was the true cause of his own obduration, by determining his own will to evil, and confirming himself in his obstinacy. So are all presumptuous sinners, (Psalm xcv. 8): Harden not your hearts as in the provocation, or as in the day of temptation in the wilderness.

“Thirdly, God is said to harden the heart permissively, but not operatively, nor effectively, as he who only lets loose a greyhound out of the slip, is said to hound him at the hare. Will you see plainly what St. Paul intends by hardening? Read Rom. ix. 22, 23: What if God, willing to shew his wrath and to make his power known (that is, by a consequent will, which in order of nature follows the prevision of sin), endured with much long-suffering the vessels of wrath fitted to destruction. And that he might make known the riches of his glory on the vessels of mercy, &c. There is much difference between enduring and impelling, or inciting the vessels of wrath. He saith of the vessels of mercy, that God prepared them unto glory. But of the vessels of wrath, he saith only that they were fitted to destruction, that is, not by God, but by themselves. St. Paul saith, that God doth endure the vessels of wrath with much long-suffering. T. H. saith, that God wills and effects by the second causes all their actions good and bad, that he necessitateth them, and determineth them irresistibly to do those acts which he condemneth as evil, and for which he punisheth them. If doing willingly, and enduring, if much long-suffering, and necessitating, imply not a contrariety one to another, reddat mihi minam Diogenes, let him that taught me logic, give me my money again.

“But T. H. saith, that this distinction between the operative and permissive will of God, and that other between the action and the irregularity, do dazzle his understanding. Though he can find no difference between these two, yet others do; St. Paul himself did (Acts xiii. 18): About the time of forty years suffered he their manners in the wilderness. And (Acts xiv. 16): Who in times past suffered all nations to walk in their own ways. T. H. would make suffering to be inciting, their manners to be God’s manners, their ways to be God’s ways. And (Acts xvii. 30): The times of this ignorance God winked at. It was never heard that one was said to wink or connive at that which was his own act. And (1 Cor. x. 13): God is faithful, who will not suffer you to be tempted above that you are able. To tempt is the devil’s act; therefore he is called the tempter. God tempts no man to sin, but he suffers them to be tempted. And so suffers, that he could hinder Satan, if he would. But by T. H.’s doctrine, to tempt to sin, and to suffer one to be tempted to sin when it is in his power to hinder it, is all one. And so he transforms God (I write it with horror) into the devil, and makes tempting to be God’s own work, and the devil to be but his instrument. And in that noted place, (Rom. ii. 4, 5): Despisest thou the riches of his goodness and forbearance and long-suffering, not knowing that the goodness of God leadeth thee to repentance; but after thy hardness and impenitent heart treasurest up unto thyself wrath against the day of wrath, and revelation of the righteous judgment of God? Here are as many convincing arguments in this one text against the opinion of T. H. almost as there are words. Here we learn that God is rich in goodness, and will not punish his creatures for that which is his own act; secondly, that he suffers and forbears sinners long, and doth not snatch them away by sudden death as they deserve. Thirdly, that the reason of God’s forbearance is to bring men to repentance. Fourthly, that hardness of heart and impenitency is not causally from God, but from ourselves. Fifthly, that it is not the insufficient proposal of the means of their conversion on God’s part, which is the cause of men’s perdition, but their own contempt and despising of these means. Sixthly, that punishment is not an act of absolute dominion, but an act of righteous judgment, whereby God renders to every man according to his own deeds, wrath to them and only to them who treasure up wrath unto themselves, and eternal life to those who continue patiently in well-doing. If they deserve such punishment who only neglect the goodness and long-suffering of God, what do they who utterly deny it, and make God’s doing and his suffering to be all one? I do beseech T. H. to consider what a degree of wilfulness it is, out of one obscure text wholly misunderstood to contradict the clear current of the whole Scripture. Of the same mind with St. Paul was St. Peter, (1 Peter iii. 20): The long-suffering of God waited once in the days of Noah. And 2 Peter iii. 15: Account that the long-suffering of the Lord is salvation. This is the name God gives himself, (Exod. xxxiv. 6): The Lord, the Lord God, merciful and gracious, long-suffering, &c.

(b) “Yet I do acknowledge that which T. H. saith to be commonly true, that he who doth permit any thing to be done, which it is in his power to hinder, knowing that if he do not hinder it, it will be done, doth in some sort will it. I say in some sort, that is, either by an antecedent will, or by a consequent will, either by an operative will, or by a permissive will, or he is willing to let it be done, but not willing to do it. Sometimes an antecedent engagement doth cause a man to suffer that to be done, which otherwise he would not suffer. So Darius suffered Daniel to be cast into the lion’s den, to make good his rash decree; so Herod suffered John Baptist to be beheaded, to make good his rash oath. How much more may the immutable rule of justice in God, and his fidelity in keeping his word, draw from him the punishment of obstinate sinners, though antecedently he willeth their conversion? He loveth all his creatures well, but his own justice better.better. Again, sometimes a man suffereth that to be done, which he doth not will directly in itself, but indirectly for some other end, or for the producing of some greater good; as a man willeth that a putrid member be cut off from his body, to save the life of the whole. Or as a judge, being desirous to save a malefactor’s life, and having power to reprieve him, doth yet condemn him for example’s sake, that by the death of one he may save the lives of many. Marvel not then if God suffer some creatures to take such courses as tend to their own ruin, so long as their sufferings do make for the greater manifestation of his glory, and for the greater benefit of his faithful servants. This is a most certain truth, that God would not suffer evil to be in the world unless he knew how to draw good out of evil. Yet this ought not to be understood, as if we made any priority or posteriority of time in the acts of God, but only of nature. Nor do we make the antecedent and consequent will to be contrary one to another; because the one respects man pure and uncorrupted, the other respects him as he is lapsed. The objects are the same, but considered after a diverse manner. Nor yet do we make these wills to be distinct in God; for they are the same with the divine essence, which is one. But the distinction is in order to the objects or things willed. Nor, lastly, do we make this permission to be a naked or a mere permission. God causeth all good, permitteth all evil, disposeth all things, both good and evil.

(c) “T. H. demands how God should be the cause of the action and yet not be the cause of the irregularity of the action. I answer, because he concurs to the doing of evil by a general, but not by a special influence. As the earth gives nourishment to all kinds of plants, as well to hemlock as to wheat; but the reason why the one yields food to our sustenance, the other poison to our destruction, is not from the general nourishment of the earth, but from the special quality of the root. Even so the general power to act is from God. In him we live, and move, and have our being. This is good. But the specification, and determination of this general power to the doing of any evil, is from ourselves, and proceeds from the free-will of man. This is bad. And to speak properly, the free-will of man is not the efficient cause of sin, as the root of the hemlock is of poison, sin having no true entity or being in it, as poison hath; but rather the deficient cause. Now no defect can flow from him who is the highest perfection. (d) Wherefore T. H. is mightily mistaken, to make the particular and determinate act of killing Uriah to be from God. The general power to act is from God, but the specification of this general and good power to murder, or to any particular evil, is not from God, but from the free-will of man. So T. H. may see clearly if he will, how one may be the cause of the law, and likewise of the action in some sort, that is, by general influence; and yet another cause concurring, by special influence and determining this general and good power, may make itself the true cause of the anomy or the irregularity. And therefore he may keep his longer and shorter garments for some other occasion. Certainly, they will not fit this subject, unless he could make general and special influence to be all one.

“But T. H. presseth yet further, that the case is the same, and the objection used by the Jews, (verse 19): Why doth he yet find fault; who hath resisted his will? is the very same with my argument; and St. Paul’s answer, (verse 20:) O man, who art thou that repliest against God? Shall the thing formed say unto him that formed it, why hast thou made me thus? Hath not the potter power over his clay? &c., is the very same with his answer in this place, drawn from the irresistible power and absolute dominion of God, which justifieth all his actions. And that the apostle in his answer doth not deny that it was God’s will, nor that God’s decree was before Esau’s sin.

“To which I reply, first, that the case is not at all the same, but quite different, as may appear by these particulars; first, those words, before they had done either good or evil, are not, cannot be referred to those other words, Esau have I hated. Secondly, if they could, yet it is less than nothing, because before Esau had actually sinned, his future sins were known to God. Thirdly, by the potter’s clay, here is not to be understood the pure mass, but the corrupted mass of mankind. Fourthly, the hating here mentioned is only a comparative hatred, that is, a less degree of love. Fifthly, the hardening which St. Paul speaks of, is not a positive, but a negative obduration, or a not imparting of grace. Sixthly, St. Paul speaketh not of any positive reprobation to eternal punishment, much less doth he speak of the actual inflicting of punishment without sin, which is the question between us, and wherein T. H. differs from all that I remember to have read, who do all acknowledge that punishment is never actually inflicted but for sin. If the question be put, why God doth good to one more than to another, or why God imparteth more grace to one than to another, as it is there, the answer is just and fit, because it is his pleasure, and it is sauciness in a creature in this case to reply, (Matthew xx. 15): May not God do what he will with his own? No man doubteth but God imparteth grace beyond man’s desert. (e) But if the case be put, why God doth punish one more than another, or why he throws one into hell-fire, and not another, which is the present case agitated between us; to say with T. H., that it is because God is omnipotent, or because his power is irresistible, or merely because it is his pleasure, is not only not warranted, but is plainly condemned by St. Paul in this place. So many differences there are between those two cases. It is not therefore against God that I reply, but against T. H. I do not call my Creator to the bar, but my fellow-creature; I ask no account of God’s counsels, but of man’s presumptions. It is the mode of these times to father their own fancies upon God, and when they cannot justify them by reason, to plead his omnipotence, or to cry, O altitudo, that the ways of God are unsearchable. If they may justify their drowsy dreams, because God’s power and dominion is absolute; much more may we reject such phantastical devices which are inconsistent with the truth and goodness and justice of God, and make him to be a tyrant, who is the Father of Mercies and the God of all consolation. The unsearchableness of God’s ways should be a bridle to restrain presumption, and not a sanctuary for spirits of error.

“Secondly, this objection contained ver. 19, to which the apostle answers ver. 20, is not made in the person of Esau or Pharaoh, as T. H. supposeth, but of the unbelieving Jews, who thought much at that grace and favour which God was pleased to vouchsafe unto the Gentiles, to acknowledge them for his people, which honour they would have appropriated to the posterity of Abraham. And the apostle’s answer is not only drawn from the sovereign dominion of God, to impart his grace to whom he pleaseth, as hath been shewed already, but also from the obstinacy and proper fault of the Jews, as appeareth verse 22: What if God, willing (that is, by a consequent will) to shew his wrath, and to make his power known, endureth with much long-suffering the vessels of wrath fitted to destruction. They acted, God endured; they were tolerated by God, but fitted to destruction by themselves; for their much wrong-doing, here is God’s much long-suffering. And more plainly, verse 31, 32: Israel hath not attained to the law of righteousness. Wherefore? Because they sought it not by faith, but as it were by the works of the law. This reason is set down yet more emphatically in the next chapter (Rom. x. 3): They (that is, the Israelites) being ignorant of God’s righteousness, (that is, by faith in Christ), and going about to establish their own righteousness, (that is, by the works of the law), have not submitted themselves unto the righteousness of God. And yet most expressly (chap. xi. 20): Because of unbelief they were broken off, but thou standest by faith. Neither was there any precedent binding decree of God, to necessitate them to unbelief, and consequently to punishment. It was in their own power by their concurrence with God’s grace to prevent these judgments, and to recover their former estate; verse 23: If they (that is, the unbelieving Jews) abide not still in unbelief they shall be grafted in. The crown and the sword are immovable, (to use St. Anselm’s comparison), but it is we that move and change places. Sometimes the Jews were under the crown, and the Gentiles under the sword; sometimes the Jews under the sword, and the Gentiles under the crown.

“Thirdly, though I confess that human pacts are not the measure of God’s justice, but his justice is his own immutable will, whereby he is ready to give every man that which is his own, as rewards to the good, punishments to the bad; so nevertheless God may oblige himself freely to his creature. He made the covenant of works with mankind in Adam; and therefore he punisheth not man contrary to his own covenant, but for the transgression of his duty. And divine justice is not measured by omnipotence or by irresistible power, but by God’s will. God can do many things according to his absolute power, which he doth not. He could raise up children to Abraham of stones, but he never did so. It is a rule in theology, that God cannot do anything which argues any wickedness or imperfection: as God cannot deny himself (2 Timothy ii. 13); he cannot lie (Titus i. 2). These and the like are the fruits of impotence, not of power. So God cannot destroy the righteous with the wicked (Genesis xviii. 25.) He could not destroy Sodom whilst Lot was in it, (Genesis xix. 22); not for want of dominion or power, but because it was not agreeable to his justice, nor to that law which himself had constituted. The apostle saith (Hebrews vi. 10), God is not unrighteous to forget your work. As it is a good consequence to say, this is from God, therefore it is righteous; so is this also, this thing is unrighteous, therefore it cannot proceed from God. We see how all creatures by instinct of nature do love their young, as the hen her chickens; how they will expose themselves to death for them. And yet all these are but shadows of that love which is in God towards his creatures. How impious is it then to conceive, that God did create so many millions of souls to be tormented eternally in hell, without any fault of theirs except such as he himself did necessitate them unto, merely to shew his dominion, and because his power is irresistible? The same privilege which T. H. appropriates here to power absolutely irresistible, a friend of his, in his book De Cive, cap. VI., ascribes to power respectively irresistible, or to sovereign magistrates, whose power he makes to be as absolute as a man’s power is over himself; not to be limited by any thing, but only by their strength. The greatest propugners of sovereign power think it enough for princes to challenge an immunity from coercive power, but acknowledge that the law hath a directive power over them. But T. H. will have no limits but their strength. Whatsoever they do by power, they do justly.

“But, saith he, God objected no sin to Job, but justified his afflicting him by his power. First, this is an argument from authority negatively, that is to say, worth nothing. Secondly, the afflictions of Job were no vindicatory punishments to take vengeance of his sins, (whereof we dispute), but probatory chastisements to make trial of his graces. Thirdly, Job was not so pure, but that God might justly have laid greater punishments upon him, than those afflictions which he suffered. Witness his impatience, even to the cursing of the day of his nativity (Job iii. 3). Indeed God said to Job, (Job xxxviii. 4): Where wast thou, when I laid the foundations of the earth? that is, how canst thou judge of the things that were done before thou wast born, or comprehend the secret causes of my judgments? And (Job xl. 9): Hast thou an arm like God? As if he should say, why art thou impatient; dost thou think thyself able to strive with God? But that God should punish Job without desert, here is not a word.

“Concerning the blind man mentioned John ix, his blindness was rather a blessing to him than a punishment, being the means to raise his soul illuminated, and to bring him to see the face of God in Jesus Christ. The sight of the body is common to us with ants and flies, but the sight of the soul with the blessed angels. We read of some who have put out their bodily eyes, because they thought they were an impediment to the eye of the soul. Again, neither he nor his parents were innocent, being conceived and born in sin and iniquity (Psalm li. 5). And in many things we offend all (James iii. 2). But our Saviour’s meaning is evident by the disciples’ question, John ix. 2. They had not so sinned, that he should be born blind; or they were not more grievous sinners than other men, to deserve an exemplary judgment more than they; but this corporal blindness befel him principally by the extraordinary providence of God, for the manifestation of his own glory in restoring him to his sight. So his instance halts on both sides; neither was this a punishment, nor the blind man free from sin. His third instance of the death and torments of beasts, is of no more weight than the two former. The death of brute beasts is not a punishment of sin, but a debt of nature. And though they be often slaughtered for the use of man, yet there is a vast difference between those light and momentary pangs, and the unsufferable and endless pains of hell; between the mere depriving of a creature of temporal life, and the subjecting of it to eternal death. I know the philosophical speculations of some, who affirm, that entity is better than non-entity, that it is better to be miserable and suffer the torments of the damned, than to be annihilated and cease to be altogether. This entity which they speak of, is a metaphysical entity abstracted from the matter, which is better than non-entity, in respect of some goodness, not moral nor natural, but transcendental, which accompanies every being. But in the concrete it is far otherwise, where that saying of our Saviour often takes place, (Matthew xxvi. 24): Woe unto that man by whom the Son of Man is betrayed. It had been good for that man, that he had not been born. I add, that there is an analogical justice and mercy due even to the brute beasts. Thou shalt not muzzle the mouth of the ox that treadeth out the corn. And, a just man is merciful to his beast.

(f) “But his greatest error is that which I touched before, to make justice to be the proper result of power. Power doth not measure and regulate justice, but justice measures and regulates power. The will of God, and the eternal law which is in God himself, is properly the rule and measure of justice. As all goodness, whether natural or moral, is a participation of divine goodness, and all created rectitude is but a participation of divine rectitude, so all laws are but participations of the eternal law from whence they derive their power. The rule of justice then is the same both in God and us: but it is in God, as in him that doth regulate and measure; in us, as in those who are regulated and measured. As the will of God is immutable, always willing what is just and right and good; so his justice likewise is immutable. And that individual action which is justly punished as sinful in us, cannot possibly proceed from the special influence and determinative power of a just cause. See then how grossly T. H. doth understand that old and true principle, that the will of God is the rule of justice; as if by willing things in themselves unjust, he did render them just by reason of his absolute dominion and irresistible power, as fire doth assimilate other things to itself, and convert them into the nature of fire. This were to make the eternal law a Lesbian rule. Sin is defined to be that which is done, or said, or thought, contrary to the eternal law. But by this doctrine nothing is done, nor said, nor thought, contrary to the will of God. St. Anselm said most truly, ‘then the will of man is good, and just, and right, when he wills that which God would have him to will.’will.’ But according to this doctrine, every man always wills that which God would have him to will. If this be true, we need not pray, Thy will be done in earth as it is in heaven. T. H. hath devised a new kind of heaven upon earth. The worst is, it is an heaven without justice. Justice is a constant and perpetual act of the will, to give every one his own; but to inflict punishment for those things which the judge himself did determine and necessitate to be done, is not to give every one his own; right punitive justice is a relation of equality and proportion between the demerit and the punishment. But supposing this opinion of absolute and universal necessity, there is no demerit in the world. We use to say, that right springs from law and fact; as in this syllogism, every thief ought to be punished, there is the law; but such an one is a thief, there is the fact; therefore he ought to be punished, there is the right. But this opinion of T. H. grounds the right to be punished, neither upon law, nor upon fact, but upon the irresistible power of God. Yea, it overturneth, as much as in it lies, all law; first, the eternal law, which is the ordination of divine wisdom, by which all creatures are directed to that end which is convenient for them, that is, not to necessitate them to eternal flames; then the law participated, which is the ordination of right reason, instituted for the common good, to show unto man what he ought to do, and what he ought not to do. To what purpose is it, to show the right way to him who is drawn and haled a contrary way by adamantine bonds of inevitable necessity?

(g) “Lastly, howsoever T. H. cries out, that God cannot sin, yet in truth he makes him to be the principal and most proper cause of all sin. For he makes him to be the cause, not only of the law and of the action, but even of the irregularity itself, and the difference between the action and the law, wherein the very essence of sin doth consist. He makes God to determine David’s will, and necessitate him to kill Uriah. In causes physically and essentially subordinate, the cause of the cause is evermore the cause of the effect. These are those deadly fruits which spring from the poisonous root of the absolute necessity of all things; which T. H. seeing, and that neither the sins of Esau, nor Pharaoh, nor any wicked person do proceed from the operative, but from the permissive will of God, and that punishment is an act of justice, not of dominion only, I hope that according to his promise he will change his opinion.

ANIMADVERSIONS UPON THE BISHOP’S REPLY NO. XII.

The Bishop had argued in this manner: “If there be no liberty, there shall be no last judgment, no rewards nor punishments after death.” To this I answered, that though God cannot sin, because what he doth, his doing maketh just, and because he is not subject to another’s law, and that therefore it is blasphemy to say that God can sin; yet to say, that God hath so ordered the world that sin may be necessarily committed, is not blasphemy. And I can also further say, though God be the cause of all motion and of all actions, and therefore unless sin be no motion nor action, it must derive a necessity from the first mover; nevertheless it cannot be said that God is the author of sin, because not he that necessitateth an action, but he that doth command and warrant it, is the author. And if God own an action, though otherwise it were a sin, it is now no sin. The act of the Israelites in robbing the Egyptians of their jewels, without God’s warrant had been theft. But it was neither theft, cozenage, nor sin; supposing they knew the warrant was from God. The rest of my answer to that inconvenience, was an opposing to his inconveniences the manifest texts of St. Paul, Rom. ix. The substance of his reply to my answer is this.

(a) “Though punishment were an act of dominion, not of justice, in God; yet this is no sufficient cause why God should deny his own act, or why he should chide or expostulate with men, why they did that which he himself did necessitate them to do.”

I never said that God denied his act, but that he may expostulate with men; and this may be (I shall never say directly, it is) the reason of that his expostulation, viz. to convince them that their wills were not independent, but were his mere gift; and that to do, or not to do, is not in him that willeth, but in God that hath mercy on, or hardeneth whom he will. But the Bishop interpreteth hardening to be a permission of God. Which is to attribute to God in such actions no more than he might have attributed to any of Pharaoh’s servants, the not persuading their master to let the people go. And whereas he compares this permission to the indulgence of a parent, that by his patience encourageth his son to become more rebellious, which indulgence is a sin; he maketh God to be like a sinful man. And indeed it seemeth that all they that hold this freedom of the will, conceive of God no otherwise than the common sort of Jews did, that God was like a man, that he had been seen by Moses, and after by the seventy elders (Exod. xxiv. 10); expounding that and other places literally. Again he saith, that God is said to harden the heart permissively, but not operatively; which is the same distinction with his first, namely negatively, not positively, and with his second, occasionally, and not causally. So that all his three ways how God hardens the heart of wicked men, come to this one of permission; which is as much as to say, God sees, looks on, and does nothing, nor ever did anything, in the business. Thus you see how the Bishop expoundeth St. Paul. Therefore I will leave the rest of his commentary upon Rom. ix. to the judgment of the reader, to think of the same as he pleaseth.

(b) “Yet I do acknowledge that which T. H. saith, ‘that he who doth permit anything to be done, which it is in his power to hinder, knowing that if he do not hinder it, it will be done, doth in some sort will it;’ I say in some sort, that is either by an antecedent will, or by a consequent will; either by an operative will, or by a permissive will; or he is willing to let it be done, but not willing to do it.”

Whether it be called antecedent, or consequent, or operative, or permissive, it is enough for the necessity of the thing that the heart of Pharaoh should be hardened; and if God were not willing to do it, I cannot conceive how it could be done without him.

(c) “T. H. demands how God should be the cause of the action, and yet not be the cause of the irregularity of the action? I answer, because he concurs to the doing of evil by a general, but not by a special, influence.”

I had thought to pass over this place, because of the nonsense of general and special influence. Seeing he saith that God concurs to the doing of evil, I desire the reader would take notice, that if he blame me for speaking of God as of a necessitating cause, and as it were a principal agent in the causing of all actions, he may with as good reason blame himself for making him by concurrence an accessory to the same. And indeed, let men hold what they will contrary to the truth, if they write much, the truth will fall into their pens. But he thinks he hath a similitude, which will make this permissive will a very clear business. “The earth,” saith he, “gives nourishment to all kinds of plants, as well to hemlock as to wheat; but the reason why the one yields food to our sustenance, the other poison to our destruction, is not from the general nourishment of the earth, but from the special quality of the root.” It seemeth by this similitude, he thinketh, that God doth, not operatively, but permissively will that the root of hemlock should poison the man that eateth it, but that wheat should nourish him he willeth operatively; which is very absurd; or else he must confess that the venomous effects of wicked men are willed operatively.

(d) “Wherefore“Wherefore T. H. is mightily mistaken, to make the particular and determinate act of killing Uriah to be from God. The general power to act, is from God; but the specification of this general and good power, to murder, or to any particular evil, is not from God, but from the free will of man.”

But why am I so mightily mistaken? Did not God foreknow that Uriah in particular, should be murdered by David in particular? And what God foreknoweth shall come to pass, can that possibly not come so to pass? And that which cannot possibly not come to pass, doth not that necessarily come to pass? And is not all necessity from God? I cannot see this great mistake. “The general power,” saith he, “to act is from God, but the specification to do this act upon Uriah, is not from God, but from free-will.” Very learnedly. As if there were a power that were not the power to do some particular act; or a power to kill, and yet to kill nobody in particular. If the power be to kill, it is to kill that which shall be by that power killed, whether it be Uriah or any other; and the giving of that power, is the application of it to the act; nor doth power signify anything actually, but those motions and present acts from which the act that is not now, but shall be hereafter, necessarily proceedeth. And therefore this argument is much like that which used heretofore to be brought for the defence of the divine right of the bishops to the ordination of ministers. They derive not, say they, the right of ordination from the civil sovereign, but from Christ immediately. And yet they acknowledge that it is unlawful for them to ordain, if the civil power do forbid them. But how have they right to ordain, when they cannot do it lawfully? Their answer is, they have the right, though they may not exercise it; as if the right to ordain, and the right to exercise ordination, were not the same thing. And as they answer concerning right, which is legal power, so the Bishop answereth concerning natural power, that David had a general power to kill Uriah from God, but not a power of applying this power in special to the killing of Uriah from God, but from his own free will; that is, he had a power to kill Uriah, but not to exercise it upon Uriah, that is to say, he had a power to kill him, but not to kill him, which is absurd.

(e) “But if the case be put why God doth punish one more than another, or why he throws one into hell fire, and not another, which is the present case between us; to say with T. H., that it is because God is omnipotent, or because his power is irresistible, or merely because it is his pleasure, is not only not warranted, but is plainly condemned by St. Paul in this place.”

I note first, that he hath no reason to say, the case agitated between us is, whether the cause why God punisheth one man more than another, be his irresistible power, or man’s sin. The case agitated between us is, whether a man can now choose what shall be his will anon, or at any time hereafter. Again, it is not true that he says, it is my opinion that the irresistible power of God is the cause why he punisheth one more than another. I say only that when he doth so, the irresistible power is enough to make it not unjust. But that the cause why God punisheth one more than another, is many times the will he hath to show his power, is affirmed in this place by St. Paul, Shall the thing formed, say to him that formed it, &c. And by our Saviour in the case of him that was born blind, where he saith, Neither hath this man sinned nor his parents; but that the works of God may be made manifest. And by the expostulation of God with Job. This endeavour of his to bring the text of St. Paul to his purpose, is not only frustrate, but the cause of many insignificant phrases in his discourse; as this: “It was in their own power, by their concurrence with God’s grace, to prevent these judgments, and to recover their former estates,” which is as good sense, as if he should say, that it is in his own power, with the concurrence of the sovereign power of England, to be what he will. And this, that “God may oblige himself freely to his creature.” For he that can oblige, can also, when he will, release; and he that can release himself when he will, is not obliged. Besides this, he is driven to words ill-becoming him that is to speak of God Almighty; for he makes him unable to do that which hath been within the ordinary power of men to do. “God,” he saith, “cannot destroy the righteous with the wicked;” which nevertheless is a thing ordinarily done by armies: and “He could not destroy Sodom while Lot was in it;” which he interpreteth, as if he could not do it lawfully. One text is Genesis xviii. 23, 24, 25. There is not a word that God could not destroy the righteous with the wicked. Only Abraham saith (as a man): Shall not the Judge of all the earth do right? Another is Genesis 22)22): Haste thee, escape thither; for I cannot do any thing till thou be come thither. Which is an ordinary phrase, in such a case where God had determined to burn the city and save a particular man, and signifieth not any obligation to save Lot more than the rest. Likewise concerning Job, who, expostulating with God, was answered only with the explication of the infinite power of God, the Bishop answereth, that there is never a word of Job’s being punished without desert; which answer is impertinent. For I say not that he was punished without desert, but that it was not for his desert that he was afflicted; for punished, he was not at all.

And concerning the blind man, (John ix.), who was born blind, that the power of God might be shewn in him; he answers that it was not a punishment, but a blessing. I did not say it was a punishment; certainly it was an affliction. How then doth he call it a blessing? Reasonably enough: “because,” saith he, “it was the means to raise his soul illuminated, and to bring him to see the face of God in Jesus Christ. The sight of the body is common to us with ants and flies, but the sight of the soul, with the blessed angels.” This is very well said; for no man doubts but some afflictions may be blessings; but I doubt whether the Bishop, that says he reads of some who have put out their bodily eyes, because they thought they were an impediment to the eye of the soul, think that they did well. To that where I say that brute beasts are afflicted which cannot sin, he answereth, that “there is a vast difference between those light and momentary pangs, and the unsufferable and endless pains of hell.” As if the length or the greatness of the pain, made any difference in the justice or injustice of the inflicting it.

(f) “But his greatest error is that which I touched before, to make justice to be the proper result of power.”

He would make men believe, I hold all things to be just, that are done by them who have power enough to avoid the punishment. This is one of his pretty little policies, by which I find him in many occasions to take the measure of his own wisdom. I said no more, but that the power, which is absolutely irresistible, makes him that hath it above all law, so that nothing he doth can be unjust. But this power can be no other than the power divine. Therefore let him preach what he will upon his mistaken text, I shall leave it to the reader to consider of it, without any further answer.

(g) “Lastly, howsoever T. H. cries out that God cannot sin, yet in truth he makes him to be the principal and most proper cause of all sin. For he makes him to be the cause not only of the law, and of the action, but even of the irregularity itself, &c. wherein the very essence of sin doth consist.”

I think there is no man but understands, no, not the Bishop himself, but that where two things are compared, the similitude or dissimilitude, regularity or irregularity, that is between them, is made in and by the making of the things themselves that are compared. The Bishop, therefore, that denies God to be the cause of the irregularity, denies him to be the cause both of the law and of the action. So that by his doctrine, there shall be a good law whereof God shall be no cause, and an action, that is, a local motion that shall depend upon another first mover that is not God. The rest of this number is but railing.

PROOFS OF LIBERTY DRAWN FROM REASON. NO. XIII.

The Bishop’s reply.

J. D. “The first argument is Herculeum or baculinum, drawn from that pleasant passage between Zeno and his man. The servant had committed some petty larceny, and the master was cudgelling him well for it. The servant thinks to creep under his master’s blind side, and pleads for himself that ‘the necessity of destiny did compel him to steal.’ The master answers, ‘the same necessity of destiny compels me to beat thee.’ He that denies liberty, is fitter to be refuted with rods than with arguments, until he confess that it is free for him that beats him, either to continue striking, or to give over, that is, to have true liberty.”

T. H. Of the arguments from reason, the first is that which he saith is drawn from Zeno’s beating of his man, which is therefore called argumentum baculinum, that is to say, a wooden argument. The story is this. Zeno held that all actions were necessary. His man therefore, being for some fault beaten, excused himself upon the necessity of it. To avoid this excuse, his master pleaded likewise the necessity of beating him. So that not he that maintained, but he that derided the necessity of things, was beaten; contrary to that he would infer; and the argument was rather withdrawn, than drawn, from the story.

J. D. “Whether the argument be withdrawn from the story, or the answer withdrawn from the argument, let the reader judge. T. H. mistakes the scope of the reason, the strength whereof doth not lie, neither in the authority of Zeno, a rigid Stoic, which is not worth a button in this cause; nor in the servant’s being an adversary to stoical necessity. For it appears not out of the story, that the servant did deride necessity, but rather that he pleaded it in good earnest for his own justification. Now in the success of the fray, we were told even now, that no power doth justify an action, but only that which is irresistible. Such was not Zeno’s. And therefore it advantageth neither of their causes, neither that of Zeno, nor this of T. H. What if the servant had taken the staff out of his master’s hand, and beaten him soundly, would not the same argument have served the man as well as it did the master, that the necessity of destiny did compel him to strike again? Had not Zeno smarted justly for his paradox? And might not the spectators well have taken up the judge’s apothegm, concerning the dispute between Corax and his scholar, ‘an ill egg of an ill bird’? But the strength of this argument lies partly in the ignorance of Zeno, that great champion of necessity, and the beggarliness of his cause, which admitted no defence but with a cudgel. No man, saith the servant, ought to be beaten for doing that which he is compelled inevitably to do: but I am compelled inevitably to steal. The major is so evident, that it cannot be denied. If a strong man shall take a weak man’s hand per force, and do violence with it to a third person, he whose hand is forced, is innocent, and he only culpable who compelled him. The minor was Zeno’s own doctrine; what answer made the great patron of destiny to his servant? very learnedly he denied the conclusion, and cudgelled his servant; telling him in effect, that though there was no reason why he should be beaten, yet there was a necessity why he must be beaten. And partly in the evident absurdity of such an opinion, which deserves not to be confuted with reasons, but with rods. There are four things, said the philosopher, which ought not to be called into question. First, such things whereof it is wickedness to doubt; as whether the soul be immortal, whether there be a God, such an one should not be confuted with reasons, but cast into the sea with a mill-stone about his neck, as unworthy to breathe the air, or to behold the light. Secondly, such things as are above the capacity of reason; as among Christians, the mystery of the Holy Trinity. Thirdly, such principles as are evidently true; as that two and two are four, in arithmetic; that the whole is greater than the part, in logic. Fourthly, such things as are obvious to the senses; as whether the snow be white. He who denied the heat of the fire, was justly sentenced to be scorched with fire; and he that denied motion, to be beaten until he recanted. So he who denies all liberty from necessitation, should be scourged until he become an humble suppliant to him that whips him, and confess that he hath power, either to strike, or to hold his hand.”

T. H. In this Number XIII. which is about Zeno and his man, there is contained nothing necessary to the instruction of the reader. Therefore I pass it over.

NO. XIV.

The Bishop’s reply.

J. D. “Secondly, this very persuasion that there is no true liberty, is able to overthrow all societies and commonwealths in the world. The laws are unjust, which prohibit that which a man cannot possibly shun. All consultations are vain, if every thing be either necessary or impossible. Who ever deliberated whether the sun should rise to-morrow, or whether he should sail over mountains? It is to no more purpose to admonish men of understanding than fools, children, or madmen, if all things be necessary. Praises and dispraises, rewards and punishments, are as vain as they are undeserved, if there be no liberty. All counsels, arts, arms, books, instruments, are superfluous and foolish, if there be no liberty. In vain we labour, in vain we study, in vain we take physic, in vain we have tutors to instruct us, if all things come to pass alike, whether we sleep or wake, whether we be idle or industrious, by unalterable necessity. But it is said, that though future events be certain, yet they are unknown to us: and therefore we prohibit, deliberate, admonish, praise, dispraise, reward, punish, study, labour, and use means. Alas! how should our not knowing of the event, be a sufficient motive to us to use the means, so long as we believe the event is already certainly determined, and can no more be changed by all our endeavours, than we can stay the course of heaven with our finger, or add a cubit to our stature? Suppose it be unknown, yet it is certain. We cannot hope to alter the course of things by our labours; let the necessary causes do their work, we have no remedy but patience, and shrug up the shoulders. Either allow liberty, or destroy all societies.”

T. H. The second argument is taken from certain inconveniences which he thinks would follow such an opinion. It is true that ill use may be made of it, and therefore your Lordship and J. D. ought, at my request, to keep private that I say here of it. But the inconveniences are indeed none; and what use soever be made of truth, yet truth is truth; and now the question is, not what is fit to be preached, but what is true. The first inconvenience he says is this, that laws which prohibit any action are then unjust. The second, that all consultationsconsultations are vain. The third, that admonitions to men of understanding, are of no more use than to fools, children, and madmen. The fourth, that praise, dispraise, reward, and punishment, are in vain. The fifth, that counsels, arts, arms, books, instruments, study, tutors, medicines, are in vain. To which argument, expecting I should answer by saying, that the ignorance of the event were enough to make us use means, he adds (as it were a reply to my answer foreseen) these words: “Alas, how should our not knowing of the event be a sufficient motive to make us use the means?” Wherein he saith right; but my answer is not that which he expecteth. I answer,

First, that the necessity of an action doth not make the law which prohibits it unjust. To let pass, that not the necessity, but the will to break the law, maketh the action unjust, because the law regardeth the will, and no other precedent causes of action; and to let pass, that no law can be possibly unjust, in as much as every man makes, by his consent, the law he is bound to keep, and which, consequently, must be just, unless a man can be unjust to himself: I say, what necessary cause soever precedes an action, yet, if the action be forbidden, he that doth it willingly, may justly be punished. For instance, suppose the law on pain of death prohibit stealing, and there be a man who by the strength of temptation is necessitated to steal, and is thereupon put to death: does not this punishment deter others from theft? Is it not a cause that others steal not? Doth it not frame and make their will to justice? To make the law is therefore to make a cause of justice, and to necessitate justice; and consequently it is no injustice to make such a law.

The institution of the law is not to grieve the delinquent for that which is passed and not to be undone; but to make him and others just, that else would not be so: and respecteth not the evil act past, but the good to come. Insomuch as without this good intention of future, no past act of a delinquent could justify his killing in the sight of God. But, you will say, how is it just to kill one man to amend another, if what was done were necessary? To this I answer, that men are justly killed, not for that their actions are not necessitated, but that they are spared and preserved, because they are not noxious; for where there is no law, there no killing, nor any thing else can be unjust. And by the right of nature we destroy, without being unjust, all that is noxious, both beasts and men. And for beasts, we kill them justly, when we do it in order to our own preservation. And yet J. D. confesseth, that their actions, as being only spontaneous and not free, are all necessitated and determined to that one thing which they shall do. For men, when we make societies or commonwealths, we lay down our right to kill, excepting in certain cases, as murder, theft, or other offensive actions. So that the right which the commonwealth hath, to put a man to death for crimes, is not created by the law, but remains from the first right of nature, which every man hath to preserve himself; for the law doth not take that right away, in case of criminals, who were by law excepted. Men are not therefore put to death or punished, for that their theft proceedeth from election; but because it was noxious and contrary to men’s preservation, and the punishment conducing to the preservation of the rest: inasmuch as to punish those that do voluntary hurt, and none else, frameth and maketh men’s wills, such as men would have them. And thus it is plain, that from the necessity of a voluntary action cannot be inferred the injustice of the law that forbiddeth it, or of the magistrate that punisheth it.

Secondly, I deny that it makes consultations to be in vain; it is the consultation that causeth a man, and necessitateth him, to choose to do one thing rather than another. So that unless a man say that cause to be in vain, which necessitateth the effect, he cannot infer the superfluousness of consultation out of the necessity of the election proceeding from it. But it seems he reasons thus: If I must needs do this rather than that, then I shall do this rather than that, though I consult not at all; which is a false proposition, a false consequence, and no better than this: If I shall live till to-morrow, I shall live till to-morrow, though I run myself through with a sword to-day. If there be a necessity that an action shall be done, or that any effect shall be brought to pass, it does not therefore follow that there is nothing necessarily required as a means to bring it to pass. And therefore, when it is determined that one thing shall be chosen before another, it is determined also for what cause it shall be chosen; which cause, for the most part, is deliberation or consultation. And therefore consultation is not in vain; and indeed the less in vain, by how much the election is more necessitated.

The same answer is to be given to the third supposed inconvenience; namely, that admonitions are in vain; for admonitions are parts of consultations; the admonitor being a counsellor, for the time, to him that is admonished.

The fourth pretended inconvenience is, that praise and dispraise, reward and punishment, will be in vain. To which I answer, that for praise and dispraise, they depend not at all on the necessity of the action praised or dispraised. For, what is it else to praise, but to say a thing is good? Good, I say, for me, or for somebody else, or for the state and commonwealth. And what is it to say an action is good, but to say, it is as I would wish, or as another would have it, or according to the will of the state, that is to say, according to law? Does J. D. think, that no action can please me or him, or the commonwealth, that should proceed from necessity?

Things may be therefore necessary and yet praiseworthy, as also necessary and yet dispraised, and neither of both in vain; because praise and dispraise, and likewise reward and punishment, do by example make and conform the will to good or evil. It was a very great praise, in my opinion, that Velleius Paterculus gives Cato, where he says, he was good by nature, et quia aliter esse non potuit.

To his fifth and sixth inconvenience, that counsels, arts, arms, books, instruments, study, medicines, and the like, would be superfluous, the same answer serves that to the former; that is to say, that this consequence, if the effect shall necessarily come to pass, then it shall come to pass without its cause, is a false one. And those things named, counsels, arts, arms, &c., are the causes of those effects.

J. D. “Nothing is more familiar with T. H. than to decline an argument. But I will put it into form for him. (a) The first inconvenience is thus pressed. Those laws are unjust and tyrannical, which do prescribe things absolutely impossible in themselves to be done, and punish men for not doing of them. But supposing T. H’s opinion of the necessity of all things to be true, all laws do prescribe absolute impossibilities to be done, and punish men for not doing of them. The former proposition is so clear that it cannot be denied. Just laws are the ordinances of right reason; but those laws which prescribe absolute impossibilities, are not the ordinances of right reason. Just laws are instituted for the public good; but those laws which prescribe absolute impossibilities, are not instituted for the public good.good. Just laws do show unto a man what is to be done, and what is to be shunned; but those laws which prescribe impossibilities, do not direct a man what he is to do, and what he is to shun. The minor is as evident. For if his opinion be true, all actions, all transgressions are determined antecedently inevitably to be done by a natural and necessary flux of extrinsical causes. Yea, even the will of man, and the reason itself is thus determined. And therefore whatsoever laws do prescribe any thing to be done, which is not done, or to be left undone which is done, do prescribe absolute impossibilities, and punish men for not doing of impossibilities. In all his answer there is not one word to this argument, but only to the conclusion. He saith, that ‘not the necessity, but the will to break the law makes the action unjust.’ I ask what makes the will to break the law; is it not his necessity? What gets he by this? A perverse will causeth injustice, and necessity causeth a perverse will. He saith, ‘the law regardeth the will, but not the precedent causes of action.’ To what proposition, to what term is this answer? He neither denies nor distinguisheth. First, the question here is not what makes actions to be unjust, but what makes laws to be unjust. So his answer is impertinent. It is likewise untrue. For first, that will which the law regards, is not such a will as T. H. imagineth. It is a free will, not a determined necessitated will; a rational will, not a brutish will. Secondly, the law doth look upon precedent causes, as well as the voluntariness of the action. If a child, before he be seven years old or have the use of reason, in some childish quarrel do willingly stab another, whereof we have seen experience, yet the law looks not upon it as an act of murder; because there wanted a power to deliberate, and consequently true liberty. Manslaughter may be as voluntary as murder, and commonly more voluntary; because being done in hot blood there is the less reluctation. Yet the law considers, that the former is done out of some sudden passion without serious deliberation, and the other out of prepensed malice and desire of revenge; and therefore condemns murder, as more wilful and more punishable than manslaughter.”

(b) “He saith, ‘that no law can possibly be unjust;’ and I say, that this is to deny the conclusion, which deserves no reply. But to give him satisfaction, I will follow him in this also, if he intended no more but that unjust laws are not genuine laws, nor bind to active obedience, because they are not the ordinations of right reason, not instituted for the common good, nor prescribe that which ought to be done; he said truly, but nothing at all to his purpose. But if he intend, as he doth, that there are no laws de facto, which are the ordinances of reason erring, instituted for the common hurt, and prescribing that which ought not to be done, he is much mistaken. Pharaoh’s law, to drown the male children of the Israelites (Exod. i. 22); Nebuchadnezzar’s law, that whosoever did not fall down and worship the golden image which he had set up, should be cast into the fiery furnace (Dan. iii. 4-6); Darius’s law, that whosoever should ask a petition of any God or man for thirty days, save of the king, should be cast into the den of lions (Dan. vi. 7); Ahasuerus’s law, to destroy the Jewish nation, root and branch (Esther iii. 13); the Pharisees’ law, that whosoever confesseth Christ, should be excommunicated (John ix. 22); were all unjust laws.

(c) “The ground of this error is as great an error itself (such an art he hath learned of repacking paradoxes); which is this, ‘that every man makes by his consent the law which he is bound to keep.’ If this were true, it would preserve them, if not from being unjust, yet from being injurious. But it is not true. The positive law of God, contained in the Old and New Testament; the law of nature, written in our hearts by the finger of God; the laws of conquerors, who come in by the power of the sword; the laws of our ancestors, which were made before we were 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 magistrates at first were elective. The first governors 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 interests 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 laws. If magistrates abuse this trust, and deceive the hopes of the people by making tyrannical laws, yet it is without their consent. A precedent trust doth not justify the subsequent errors and abuses of a trustee. He who is duly elected a legislator, may exercise his legislative power unduly. The people’s implicit consent doth not render the tyrannical laws of their legislators to be just.

(d) “But his chiefest answer is, that ‘an action forbidden, though it proceed from necessary causes, yet if it were done willingly, it may be justly punished;’ which, according to his custom, 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 ourselves have contracted by our own fault; but not for extrinsical antecedent necessities, which 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 man’s ‘will be not in his own disposition,’ and ‘if his willing do not come upon him according to his will, nor according to anything 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 will 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 extrinsically, antecedently, and irresistibly necessitated by temptation to steal. The devil may solicit us, but he cannot necessitate us. He hath a faculty of persuading, but not a power of compelling. Nos ignem habemus, spiritus flammam ciet; as Gregory Nazianzen, he blows the coals, but the fire is our own. Mordet duntaxat sese in fauces illius objicientem; as St. Austin, he bites not, until we thrust ourselves into his mouth. He may propose, he may suggest, but he cannot move the will effectively. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you (James iv. 7). By faith we are able to quench all the fiery darts of the wicked (Ephes. vi. 16). And if Satan, 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 ourselves, nor extrinsical. This necessity, or rather proclivity, was free in its causes; we ourselves 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 always 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 No. XXV.

(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.’s opinion of absolute necessity. If all actions and all events be predetermined naturally, necessarily, extrinsically, 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 indissolvable bonds of inevitable necessity, how should the law either deter 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 laws 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 thieves, and if a man be determined inevitably to steal, he must steal notwithstanding.

(f) “He adds, that ‘the sufferings imposed by the law upon delinquents, respect not the evil act passed, 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 real intention to benefit others by his example.’ The truth is, the punishing of delinquents by law, respecteth both the evil act passed and the good to come. The ground of it, is the evil act passed, the scope or end of it, is the good to come. The end without the ground cannot justify 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 innocent 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 satisfy 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 itself, without all undue circumstances, was never prohibited to the lawful magistrate, who is the vice-gerent or lieutenant of God, from whom he derives his power of life and death.

“T. H. hath one plea more. As a drowning man catcheth at every bulrush, so he lays hold on every pretence to save a desperate cause. But first, it is worth our observation to see how oft he changeth shapes in this one particular. (g) First, he told us, that it was the irresistible power of God that justifies all his actions, though he command one thing openly, and plot another thing secretly, though he be the cause not only of the action, but also of the irregularity; though he both give man power to act, and determine this power to evil as well as good; though he punish the creatures, for doing that which he himself did necessitate them to do. But being pressed with reason, that this is tyrannical, first to necessitate a man to do his will, and then to punish him for doing of it, he leaves this pretence in the plain field, and flies to a second; that therefore a man is justly punished for that which he was necessitated to do, because the act was voluntary on his part. This hath more show of reason than the former, if he did make the will of man to be in his own disposition; but maintaining that the will is irresistibly determined to will whatsoever it doth will, the injustice and absurdity is the same, first to necessitate a man to will, and then to punish him for willing. The dog only bites the stone which is thrown at him with a strange hand, but they make the first cause to punish the instrument for that which is his own proper act. Wherefore not being satisfied with this, he casts it off and flies to his third shift. ‘Men are not punished,’ saith he, ‘therefore, because their theft proceeded from election,’ (that is, because it was willingly done, for to elect and will, saith he, are both one; is not this to blow hot and cold with the same breath?) ‘but because it was noxious and contrary to men’s preservation.’ Thus far he saith true, that every creature by the instinct of nature seeks to preserve itself: cast water into a dusty place, and it contracts itself into little globes, that is to preserve itself. And those who are noxious in the eye of the law, are justly punished by them to whom the execution of the law is committed; but the law accounts no persons noxious, but those who are noxious by their own fault. It punisheth not a thorn for pricking, because it is the nature of the thorn, and it can do no otherwise, nor a child, before it have the use of reason. If one should take my hand perforce and give another a box on the ear with it, my hand is noxious, but the law punisheth the other who is faulty. And therefore he hath reason to propose the question, ‘how it is just to kill one man to amend another, if he who killed did nothing but what he was necessitated to do.’ He might as well demand, how it is lawful to murder a company of innocent infants, to make a bath of their lukewarm blood for curing the leprosy. It had been a more rational way, first to have demonstrated that it is so, and then to have questioned why it is so. His assertion itself is but a dream, and the reason which he gives of it why it is so, is a dream of a dream.

“The sum of it is this; ‘that where there is no law, there no killing or any thing else can be unjust; that before the constitution of commonwealths, every man had power to kill another, if he conceived him to be hurtful to him; that at the constitution of commonwealths, particular men lay down this right in part, and in part reserve it to themselves, as in case of theft or murder; that the right which the commonwealth hath to put a malefactor to death, is not created by the law, but remaineth from the first right of nature which every man hath to preserve himself; that the killing of men in this case is as the killing of beasts in order to our own preservation.’ This may well be called stringing of paradoxes.

“But first, (h) there never was any such time when mankind was without governors and laws, and societies. Paternal government was in the world from the beginning, and the law of nature. There might be sometimes a root of such barbarous thievish brigands, in some rocks or deserts, or odd corners of the world; but it was an abuse and a degeneration from the nature of man, who is a political creature. This savage opinion reflects too much upon the honour of mankind.

“Secondly, there never was a time when it was lawful, ordinarily, for private men to kill one another for their own preservation. If God would have had men live like wild beasts, as lions, bears, or tigers, he would have armed them with horns, or tusks, or talons, or pricks; but of all creatures man is born most naked, without any weapon to defend himself, because God had provided a better means of security for him, that is, the magistrate.

“Thirdly, that right which private men have to preserve themselves, though it be with the killing of another, when they are set upon to be murdered or robbed, is not a remainder or a reserve of some greater power which they have resigned, but a privilege which God hath given them, in case of extreme danger and invincible necessity, that when they cannot possibly have recourse to the ordinary remedy, that is, the magistrate, every man becomes a magistrate to himself.

“Fourthly, nothing can give that which it never had. The people, whilst they were a dispersed rabble, (which in some odd cases might happen to be), never had justly the power of life and death, and therefore they could not give it by their election. All that they do is to prepare the matter, but it is God Almighty that infuseth the soul of power.

“Fifthly and lastly, I am sorry to hear a man of reason and parts to compare the murdering of men with the slaughtering of brute beasts. The elements are for the plants, the plants for the brute beasts, the brute beasts for man. When God enlarged his former grant to man, and gave him liberty to eat the flesh of his creatures for his sustenance, (Gen. ix. 3), yet man is expressly excepted (verse 6): Whoso sheddeth man’s blood, by man shall his blood be shed. And the reason is assigned, for in the image of God made he man. Before sin entered into the world, or before any creatures were hurtful or noxious to man, he had dominion over them as their lord and master. And though the possession of this sovereignty be lost in part, for the sin of man, which made not only the creatures to rebel, but also the inferior faculties to rebel against the superior, from whence it comes that one man is hurtful to another; yet the dominion still remains. Wherein we may observe how sweetly the providence of God doth temper this cross; that though the strongest creatures have withdrawn their obedience, as lions and bears, to shew that man hath lost the excellency 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 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.’ We were told (No. XI.) ‘that the last dictate of right reason was but as the last feather which breaks the horse’s 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 extrinsically, 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 ordains 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 virtue of God’s decree, but by his own fault; if a man use those means of evil, which he ought not to use, and which by God’s 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 needful, 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 virtue of God’s decree it is possible for him to use, and that he cannot possibly use any means of evil, but those which are irresistibly and inevitably imposed upon him by an antecedent decree; then not only consultations are vain, but that noble faculty of reason itself is vain. Do we think that we can help God Almighty to do his proper work? In vain we trouble ourselves, 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 contained 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 that flows from this opinion of absolute necessity. Let us suppose the great wheel of the clock which sets all the little wheels going, to be as the decree of God, and that the motion of it were perpetually infallible from an intrinsical principle, even as God’s 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 council 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 strike.

(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 myself 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 implies a contradiction. To live till to-morrow, and to die to-day, are inconsistent. But by his favour, this is not my consequence, but this is his own opinion. He would persuade 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 to-morrow; 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 die 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 only to tell him, that he mistakes my argument. I say not only, 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 madmen. 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.

“Concerning praise and dispraise, he enlargeth himself. The scope of his discourse is, that ‘things necessary may be praiseworthy.’ 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; God saw all that he had made, and it was very good: but a moral goodness, or a goodness of actions rather than of things. The moral goodness of an action is the conformity of it with right reason. The moral evil of an action is the deformity of it, and the alienation of it from right reason. It is moral praise and dispraise which we speak of here. To praise anything morally, is to say, it is morally good, that is, conformable to right reason. The moral dispraise of a thing is to say, it is morally bad, or disagreeing from the rule of right reason. So moral praise is from the good use of liberty, moral dispraise from the bad use of liberty; but if all things be necessary, then moral liberty is quite taken away, and with it all true praise and dispraise. Whereas T. H. adds, that ‘to say a thing is good, is to say, it is as I would wish, or as another would wish, or as the state would have it, or according to the law of the land;’ he mistakes infinitely. He, and another, and the state, may all wish that which is not really good, but only in appearance. We do often wish what is profitable or delightful, without regarding so much as we ought what is honest. And though the will of the state where we live, or the law of the land, do deserve great consideration, yet it is no infallible rule of moral goodness. And therefore to his question, ‘whether nothing that proceeds from necessity can please me,’ I answer, yes. The burning of the fire pleaseth me, when I am cold; and I say, it is good fire, or a creature created by God for my use and for my good. Yet I do not mean to attribute any moral goodness to the fire, nor give any moral praise to it, as if it were in the power of the fire itself either to communicate its heat or to suspend it; but I praise first the Creator of the fire, and then him who provided it. As for the praise which Velleius Paterculus gives Cato, that he was good by nature, et quia aliter esse non potuit; it hath more of the orator, than either of the theologian or philosopher in it. Man in the state of innocency did fall and become evil; what privilege hath Cato more than he? No, by his leave. Narratur et divi Catonis sæpe mero caluisse virtus. But the true meaning is, that he was naturally of a good temper, not so prone to some kinds of vice as others were. This is to praise a thing, not an action, naturally, not morally. Socrates was not of so good a natural temper, yet proved as good a man; the more his praise, by how much the difficulty was the more to conform his disorderly appetite to right reason.

“Concerning reward and punishment, he saith not a word, but only that they frame and conform the will to good, which hath been sufficiently answered. They do so indeed; but if his opinion were true, they could not do so. But because my aim is not only to answer T. H., but also to satisfy myself, (o) though it be not urged by him, yet I do acknowledge that I find some improper and analogical rewards and punishments used to brute beasts, as the hunter rewards his dog, the master of the decoy-duck whips her when she returns without company. And if it be true, which he affirmeth a little before that I have confessed, ‘that the actions of brute beasts are all necessitated and determined to that one thing which they shall do,’ the difficulty is increased.

“But first, my saying is misalleged. I said, that some kinds of actions which are most excellent in brute beasts, and make the greatest show of reason, as the bees working their honey, and the spiders weaving their webs, are yet done without any consultation or deliberation, by a mere instinct of nature, and by a determination of their fancies to these only kinds of works. But I did never say, I could not say, that all their individual actions are necessary, and antecedently determined in their causes, as what days the bees shall fly abroad, and what days and hours each bee shall keep in the hive, how often they shall fetch in thyme on a day, and from whence. These actions and the like, though they be not free, because brute beasts want reason to deliberate, yet they are contingent, and therefore not necessary.

“Secondly, I do acknowledge, that as the fancies of some brute creatures are determined by nature to some rare and exquisite works; so in others, where it finds a natural propension, art, which is the imitator of nature, may frame and form them according to the will of the artist to some particular actions and ends, as we see in setting-dogs, and coy-ducks, and parrots; and the principal means whereby they effect this, is by their backs or by their bellies, by the rod or by the morsel, which have indeed a shadow or resemblance of rewards and punishments. But we take the word here properly, not as it is used by vulgar people, but as it is used by divines and philosophers, for that recompense which is due to honest and dishonest actions. Where there is no moral liberty, there is neither honesty nor dishonesty, neither true reward nor punishment.

“Thirdly, (p) when brute creatures do learn any such qualities, it is not out of judgment, or deliberation, or discourse, by inferring or concluding one thing from another, which they are not capable of. Neither are they able to conceive a reason of what they do, but merely out of memory or out of a sensitive fear or hope. They remember that when they did after one manner, they were beaten; and when they did after another manner, they were cherished; and accordingly they apply themselves. But if their individual actions were absolutely necessary, fear or hope could not alter them. Most certainly, if there be any desert in it, or any praise due unto it, it is to them who did instruct them.

Lastly, concerning arts, arms, books, instruments, study, physic, and the like, he answereth not a word more than what is already satisfied. And therefore I am silent.

ANIMADVERSIONS UPON THE BISHOP’S REPLY NO. XIV.

(a) “The first inconvenience is thus pressed. Those laws are unjust and tyrannical, which do prescribe things absolutely impossible in themselves to be done, and punish men for not doing of them.”

I have already, in the beginning, where I recite the inconveniences that follow the doctrine of necessity, made clear that the same inconveniences follow not the doctrine of necessity, any more than they follow this truth, whatsoever shall be, shall be, which all men must confess; the same also followeth upon this, that whatsoever God foreknows, cannot but come to pass in such time and manner as he hath foreknown it. It is therefore evident that these inconveniences are not rationally deduced from those tenets. Again, it is a truth manifest to all men, that it is not in a man’s power to-day, to choose what will he shall have to-morrow, or an hour, or any time after. Intervening occasions, business, which the Bishop calls trifles, (trifles of which the Bishop maketh here a great business), do change the will. No man can say what he will do to-morrow, unless he foreknow, which no man can, what shall happen before to-morrow. And this being the substance of my opinion, it must needs be that when he deduceth from it, that counsels, arts, arms, medicines, teachers, praise, prayer, and piety, are in vain, that his deduction is false, and his ratiocination fallacy. And though I need make no other answer to all that he can object against me, yet I shall here mark out the causes of his several paralogisms.

“Those laws,” he saith, “are unjust and tyrannical, which do prescribe things absolutely impossible to be done, and punish men for not doing of them.” In which words this is one absurdity, that a law can be unjust; for all laws are divine or civil, neither of which can be unjust. Of the first there is no doubt. And as for civil laws, they are made by every man that is subject to them; because every one of them consenteth to the placing of the legislative power. Another is this, in the same words, that he supposeth there may be laws that are tyrannical; for if he that maketh them have the sovereign power, they may be regal, but not tyrannical; if tyrant signify not King, as he thinks it doth not. Another is in the same words, “that a law may prescribe things absolutely impossible in themselves to be done.” When he says impossible in themselves, he understands not what himself means. Impossible in themselves are contradictions only, as to be and not to be at the same time, which the divines say is not possible to God. All other things are possible at least in themselves. Raising from the dead, changing the course of nature, making of a new heaven, and a new earth, are things possible in themselves; for there is nothing in their nature able to resist the will of God. And if laws do not prescribe such things, why should I believe they prescribe other things that are more impossible. Did he ever read in Suarez of any tyrant that made a law commanding any man to do and not to do the same action, or to be and not to be at the same place in one and the same moment of time. But out of the doctrine of necessity, it followeth he says, that “all laws do prescribe absolute impossibilities to be done.” Here he has left out in themselves, which is a wilful fallacy.

He further says that “just laws are the ordinances of right reason;” which is an error that hath cost many thousands of men their lives. Was there ever a King, that made a law which in right reason had been better unmade? And shall those laws therefore not be obeyed? Shall we rather rebel? I think not, though I am not so great a divine as he. I think rather that the reason of him that hath the sovereign authority, and by whose sword we look to be protected both against war from abroad and injuries at home, whether it be right or erroneous in itself, ought to stand for right to us that have submitted ourselves thereunto by receiving the protection.

But the Bishop putteth his greatest confidence in this, that whether the things be impossible in themselves, or made impossible by some unseen accident, yet there is no reason that men should be punished for not doing them. It seems he taketh punishment for a kind of revenge, and can never therefore agree with me, that take it for nothing else but for a correction, or for an example, which hath for end the framing and necessitating of the will to virtue; and that he is no good man, that upon any provocation useth his power, though a power lawfully obtained, to afflict another man without this end, to reform the will of him or others. Nor can I comprehend, as having only humane ideas, that that punishment which neither intendeth the correction of the offender, nor the correction of others by example, doth proceed from God.

(b) “He saith that no law can possibly be unjust,” &c.

Against this he replies that the law of Pharaoh, to drown the male children of the Israelites; and of Nebuchadnezzar, to worship the golden image; and of Darius, against praying to any but him in thirty days; and of Ahasuerus, to destroy the Jews; and of the Pharisees, to excommunicate the confessors of Christ; were all unjust laws. The laws of these kings, as they were laws, have relation only to the men that were their subjects; and the making of them, which was the action of every one of those kings, who were subjects to another king, namely, to God Almighty, had relation to the law of God. In the first relation, there could be no injustice in them; because all laws made by him to whom the people had given the legislative power, are the acts of every one of that people; and no man can do injustice to himself. But in relation to God, if God have by a law forbidden it, the making of such laws is injustice. Which law of God was to those heathen princes no other but salus populi, that is to say, the properest use of their natural reason for the preservation of their subjects. If therefore those laws were ordained out of wantonness, or cruelty, or envy, or for the pleasing of a favourite, or out of any other sinister end, as it seems they were, the making of those laws was unjust. But if in right reason they were necessary for the preservation of those people of whom they had undertaken the charge, then was it not unjust. And for the Pharisees, who had the same written law of God that we have, their excommunication of the Christians, proceeding, as it did, from envy, was an act of malicious injustice. If it had proceeded from misinterpretation of their own Scriptures, it had been a sin of ignorance. Nevertheless, as it was a law to their subjects (in case they had the legislative power, which I doubt of), the law was not unjust. But the making of it was an unjust action, of which they were to give account to none but God. I fear the Bishop will think this discourse too subtile; but the judgment is the reader’s.

(c) “The ground of this error,” &c., “is this: that every man makes by his consent the law which he is bound to keep,” &c.

The reason why he thinketh this an error, is because the positive law of God, contained in the Bible, is a law without our assent; the law of nature was written in our hearts by the finger of God without our assent; the laws of conquerors, who come in by the power of the sword, were made without our assent; and so were the laws of our ancestors, which were made before we were born. It is a strange thing that he that understands the nonsense of the Schoolmen, should not be able to perceive so easy a truth as this which he denieth. The Bible is a law. To whom? To all the world? He knows it is not. How came it then to be a law to us? Did God speak it viva voce to us? Have we then any other warrant for it than the word of the prophets? Have we seen the miracles? Have we any other assurance of their certainty than the authority of the Church? And is the authority of the Church any other than the authority of the commonwealth, or that of the commonwealth any other than that of the head of the commonwealth, or hath the head of the commonwealth any other authority than that which hath been given him by the members? Else, why should not the Bible be canonical as well in Constantinople as in any other place? They that have the legislative power make nothing canon, which they make not law, nor law, which they make not canon. And because the legislative power is from the assent of the subjects, the Bible is made law by the assent of the subjects. It was not the Bishop of Rome that made the Scripture law without his own temporal dominions; nor is it the clergy that make it law in their dioceses and rectories. Nor can it be a law of itself without special and supernatural revelation. The Bishop thinks because the Bible is law, and he is appointed to teach it to the people in his diocese, that therefore it is law to whomsoever he teach it; which is somewhat gross, but not so gross as to say that conquerors who come in by the power of the sword, make their laws also without our assent. He thinks, belike, that if a conqueror can kill me if he please, I am presently obliged without more ado to obey all his laws. May not I rather die, if I think fit? The conqueror makes no law over the conquered by virtue of his power; but by virtue of their assent, that promised obedience for the saving of their lives. But how then is the assent of the children obtained to the laws of their ancestors? This also is from the desire of preserving their lives, which first the parents might take away, where the parents be free from all subjection; and where they are not, there the civil power might do the same, if they doubted of their obedience. The children therefore, when they be grown up to strength enough to do mischief, and to judgment enough to know that other men are kept from doing mischief to them by fear of the sword that protecteth them, in that very act of receiving that protection, and not renouncing it openly, do oblige themselves to obey the laws of their protectors; to which, in receiving such protection, they have assented. And whereas he saith, the law of nature is a law without our assent, it is absurd; for the law of nature is the assent itself that all men give to the means of their own preservation.

(d) “But his chiefest answer is, that an action forbidden, though it proceed from necessary causes, yet if it were done willingly, may be justly punished,” &c.

This the Bishop also understandeth not, and therefore denies it. He would have the judge condemn no man for a crime, if it were necessitated; as if the judge could know what acts are necessary, unless he knew all that hath anteceded, both visible and invisible, and what both every thing in itself, and altogether, can effect. It is enough to the judge, that the act he condemneth be voluntary. The punishment whereof may, if not capital, reform the will of the offender; if capital, the will of others by example. For heat in one body doth not more create heat in another, than the terror of an example createth fear in another, who otherwise were inclined to commit injustice.

Some few lines before, he hath said that I built upon a wrong foundation, namely, “that all magistrates were at first elective;” I had forgot to tell you, that I never said nor thought it. And therefore his reply, as to that point, is impertinent.

Not many lines after, for a reason why a man may not be justly punished when his crime is voluntary, he offereth this: “that law is unjust and tyrannical, which commands a man to will that which is impossible for him to will.” Whereby it appears, he is of opinion that a law may be made to command the will. The style of a law is do this, or do not this; or, if thou do this, thou shalt suffer this; but no law runs thus, will this, or will not this; or, if thou have a will to this, thou shalt suffer this. He objecteth further, that I beg the question, because no man’s will is necessitated. Wherein he mistakes; for I say no more in that place, but that he that doth evil willingly, whether he be necessarily willing, or not necessarily, may be justly punished. And upon this mistake he runneth over again his former and already answered nonsense, saying, “we ourselves, by our own negligence in not opposing our passions when we should and might, have freely given them a kind of dominion over us;” and again, motus primo primi, the first motions are not always in our power. Which motus primo primi, signifies nothing; and “our negligence in not opposing our passions,” is the same with “our want of will to oppose our will,” which is absurd; and “that we have given them a kind of dominion over us,” either signifies nothing, or that we have a dominion over our wills, or our wills a dominion over us, and consequently either we or our wills are not free.

(e) “He pleads moreover that the law is a cause of justice,” &c. “All this is most true, of a just law justly executed.”

But I have shown that all laws are just, as laws, and therefore not to be accused of injustice by those that owe subjection to them; and a just law is always justly executed. Seeing then that he confesseth that all that he replieth to here is true, it followeth that the reply itself, where it contradicteth me, is false.

(f) “He addeth that the sufferings imposed by the law upon delinquents, respect not the evil act passed, 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 real intention to benefit others by his example.”

This he neither confirmeth nor denieth, and yet forbeareth not to discourse upon it to little purpose; and therefore I pass it over.

(g) “First he told us, that it was the irresistible power of God that justifies all his actions; though he command one thing openly, and plot another thing secretly; though he be the cause not only of the action, but also of the irregularity, &c.”

To all this, which hath been pressed before, I have answered before; but that he says I say, “having commanded one thing openly, he plots another thing secretly,” it is not mine, but one of his own ugly phrases. And the force it hath, proceeded out of an apprehension he hath, that affliction is not God’s correction, but his revenge upon the creatures of his own making; and from a reasoning he useth, “because it is not just in a man to kill one man for the amendment of another, therefore neither is it so in God;” not remembering that God hath, or shall have killed all the men in the world, both nocent and innocent.

My assertion, he saith, “is a dream, and the sum of it this; that where there is no law, there no killing or anything else can be unjust; that before the constitution of commonwealths, every man had power to kill another,” &c., and adds, that “this may well be called stringing of paradoxes.” To these my words he replies:

(h) “There was never any time when mankind was without governors, laws, and societies.”

It is very likely to be true, that since the creation there never was a time in which mankind was totally without society. If a part of it were without laws and governors, some other parts might be commonwealths. He saw there was paternal government in Adam; which he might do easily, as being no deep consideration. But in those places where there is a civil war at any time, at the same time there is neither laws, nor commonwealth, nor society, but only a temporal league, which every discontented soldier may depart from when he pleases, as being entered into by each man for his private interest, without any obligation of conscience: there are therefore almost at all times multitudes of lawless men. But this was a little too remote from his understanding to perceive. Again, he denies, that ever there was a time when one private man might lawfully kill another for his own preservation; and has forgotten that these words of his (No. II.), “this is the belief of all mankind, which we have not learned from our tutors, but is imprinted in our hearts by nature; we need not turn over any obscure books to find out this truth,” &c.; which are the words of Cicero in the defence of Milo, and translated by the Bishop to the defence of free-will, were used by Cicero to prove this very thing, that it is and hath been always lawful for one private man to kill another for his own preservation. But where he saith it is not lawful ordinarily, he should have shown some particular case wherein it is unlawful. For seeing it is a “belief imprinted in our hearts,” not only I, but many more are apt to think it is the law of nature, and consequently universal and eternal. And where he saith, this right of defence where it is, “is not a remainder of some greater power which they have resigned, but a privilege which God hath given them in case of extreme danger and invincible necessity,” &c.; I also say it is a privilege which God hath given them, but we differ in the manner how; which to me seems this, that God doth not account such killing sin. But the Bishop it seems would have it thus: God sends a bishop into the pulpit to tell the people it is lawful for a man to kill another man when it is necessarynecessary for the preservation of his own life; of which necessity, that is, whether it be invincible, or whether the danger be extreme, the bishop shall be the judge after the man is killed, as being a case of conscience. Against the resigning of this our general power of killing our enemies, he argues thus: “Nothing can give that which it never had; the people whilst they were a dispersed rabble, which in some odd cases might happen to be, never had justly the power of life and death, and therefore they could not give it by their election,” &c. Needs there much acuteness to understand, what number of men soever there be, though not united into government, that every one of them in particular having a right to destroy whatsoever he thinketh can annoy him, may not resign the same right, and give it to whom he please, when he thinks it conducible to his preservation? And yet it seems he has not understood it.

He takes it ill that I compare the “murdering of men with the slaughtering of brute beasts:” as also a little before, he says, “my opinion reflects too much upon the honour of mankind: the elements are for the plants, the plants for the brute beasts, and the brute beasts for man.” I pray, when a lion eats a man, and a man eats an ox, why is the ox more made for the man, than the man for the lion? “Yes,” he saith, “God gave man liberty (Gen. ix. 3) to eat the flesh of the creatures for his sustenance.” True, but the lion had the liberty to eat the flesh of man long before. But he will say, no; pretending that no man of any nation, or at any time, could lawfully eat flesh, unless he had this licence of holy Scripture, which it was impossible for most men to have. But how would he have been offended, if I had said of man as Pliny doth: “quo nullum est animal neque miserius, neque superbius?” The truth is, that man is a creature of greater power than other living creatures are, but his advantages do consist especially in two things: whereof one is the use of speech, by which men communicate one with another, and join their forces together, and by which also they register their thoughts that they perish not, but be reserved, and afterwards joined with other thoughts, to produce general rules for the direction of their actions. There be beasts that see better, others that hear better, and others that exceed mankind in other senses. Man excelleth beasts only in making of rules to himself, that is to say, in remembering, and in reasoning aright upon that which he remembereth. They which do so, deserve an honour above brute beasts. But they which mistaking the use of words, deceive themselves and others, introducing error, and seducing men from the truth, are so much less to be honoured than brute beasts, as error is more vile than ignorance. So that it is not merely the nature of man, that makes him worthier than other living creatures, but the knowledge that he acquires by meditation, and by the right use of reason in making good rules of his future actions. The other advantage a man hath, is the use of his hands for the making of those things which are instrumental to his well-being. But this advantage is not a matter of so great honour, but that a man may speak negligently of it without offence. And for the dominion that a man hath over beasts, he saith, “it is lost in part for the sin of man, because the strongest creatures, as lions and bears, have withdrawn their obedience; but the most profitable and useful creatures, as sheep and oxen, do in some degree retain their obedience.” I would ask the Bishop, in what consisteth the dominion of man over a lion or a bear. Is it in an obligation of promise, or of debt? That cannot be; 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 especially the leaguing 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 sheep 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 only to labour, and to be killed and devoured by us; so that lions and bears would be as good masters 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 “showed 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 he 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 extrinsically, 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 move or are moved: a free agent being that whose motion or action is not hindered or stopped, 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 only that where he says, “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 myself through 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 says, “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 die to-day or not.” “And this,” he says, “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 an unseen necessity, and that is the cause he believeth his consequence to be good.

(m) “The next branch of my argument concerns admonitions,” &c.

Which he says 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 evil, 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 saith 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 madmen in an error, concerning what is good or evil for themselves. This is not to say children and madmen want true liberty, that is, the liberty to do as they will, nor to say that men of judgment, or the admonitor himself hath a dominion over his own actions, more than children or madmen, (for their actions are also voluntary), or that when he admonisheth he hath always the use of reason, though he have the use of deliberation, which children, fools, madmen, and beasts also have. There be, therefore, reasons under heaven which the Bishop knows not of.

Whereas I had said, that things necessary may be praiseworthy, and to praise a thing is to say it is good, he distinguisheth and saith:

(n) “True, but this goodness is not a metaphysical goodness; so whatsoever hath a being is good; nor a natural goodness; the praise of it passeth wholly to the Author of nature, &c.; but a moral goodness, or a goodness of actions, rather than of things. The moral goodness of an action is the conformity of it to right reason,” &c.

There hath been in the Schools derived from Aristotle’s Metaphysics, an old proverb rather than an axiom: ens, bonum, et verum convertuntur. From hence the Bishop hath taken this notion of a metaphysical goodness, and his doctrine that whatsoever hath a being is good; and by this interpreteth the words of Gen. i. 31: God saw all that he had made, and it was very good. But the reason of those words is, that good is relative to those that are pleased with it, and not of absolute signification to all men. God therefore saith, that all that he had made was very good, because he was pleased with the creatures of his own making. But if all things were absolutely good, we should be all pleased with their being, which we are not, when the actions that depend upon their being are hurtful to us. And therefore, to speak properly, nothing is good or evil but in regard of the action that proceedeth from it, and also of the person to whom it doth good or hurt. Satan is evil to us, because he seeketh our destruction, but good to God, because he executeth his commandments. And so his metaphysical goodness is but an idle term, and not the member of a distinction. And as for natural goodness and evilness, that also is but the goodness and evilness of actions; as some herbs are good because they nourish, others evil because they poison us; and one horse is good because he is gentle, strong, and carrieth a man easily; another bad, because he resisteth, goeth hard, or otherwise displeaseth us; and that quality of gentleness, if there were no more laws amongst men than there is amongst beasts, would be as much a moral good in a horse or other beast as in a man. It is the law from whence proceeds the difference between the moral and the natural goodness: so that it is well enough said by him, that “moral goodness is the conformity of an action with right reason”; and better said than meant; for this right reason, which is the law, is no otherwise certainly right than by our making it so by our approbation of it and voluntary subjection to it. For the law-makers are men, and may err, and think that law, which they make, is for the good of the people sometimes when it is not. And yet the actions of subjects, if they be conformable to the law, are morally good, and yet cease not to be naturally good; and the praise of them passeth to the Author of nature, as well as of any other good whatsoever. From whence it appears that moral praise is not, as he says, from the good use of liberty, but from obedience to the laws; nor moral dispraise from the bad use of liberty, but from disobedience to the laws. And for his consequence, “if all things be necessary, then moral liberty is quite taken away, and with it all true praise and dispraise”, there is neither truth in it, nor argument offered for it; for there is nothing more necessary than the consequence of voluntary actions to the will. And whereas I had said, that to say a thing is good, is to say it is as I or another would wish, or as the state would have it, or according to the law of the land, he answers, that “I mistake infinitely”. And his reason is, because “we often wish what is profitable or delightful, without regarding as we ought what is honest”. There is no man living that seeth all the consequences of an action from the beginning to the end, whereby to weigh the whole sum of the good with the whole sum of the evil consequence. We choose no further than we can weigh. That is good to every man, which is so far good as he can see. All the real good, which we call honest and morally virtuous, is that which is not repugnant to the law, civil or natural; for the law is all the right reason we have, and, (though he, as often as it disagreeth with his own reason, deny it), is the infallible rule of moral goodness. The reason whereof is this, that because neither mine nor the Bishop’s reason is right reason fit to be a rule of our moral actions, we have therefore set up over ourselves a sovereign governor, and agreed that his laws shall be unto us, whatsoever they be, in the place of right reason, to dictate to us what is really good. In the same manner as men in playing turn up trump, and as in playing their game their morality consisteth in not renouncing, so in our civil conversation our morality is all contained in not disobeying of the laws.

To my question, “whether nothing could please him, that proceeded from necessity”, he answers: “yes; the fire pleaseth him when he is cold, and he says it is good fire, but does not praise it morally”. He praiseth, he says, first the Creator of the fire, and then him who provided it. He does well; yet he praiseth the fire when he saith it is good, though not morally. He does not say it is a just fire, or a wise, or a well-mannered fire, obedient to the laws; but these attributes it seems he gives to God, as if justice were not of his nature, but of his manners. And in praising morally him that provided it, he seems to say, he would not say the fire was good, if he were not morally good that did provide it.

To that which I had answered concerning reward and punishment, he hath replied, he says, sufficiently before, and that that which he discourseth here, is not only to answer me, but also to satisfy himself, and saith:

(o) “Though it be not urged by him, yet I do acknowledge that I find some improper and analogical rewards and punishments, used to brute beasts, as the hunter rewards his dog,” &c.

For my part, I am too dull to perceive the difference between those rewards used to brute beasts, and those that are used to men. If they be not properly called rewards and punishments, let him give them their proper name. It may be he will say, he has done it in calling them analogical; yet for any thing that can be understood thereby, he might have called them paragogical, or typical, or topical, if he had pleased. He adds further, that whereas he had said that the actions of bees and spiders were done without consultation, by mere instinct of nature, and by a determination of their fancies, I misallege him, and say he made their individual actions necessary. I have only this to answer, that, seeing he says that by instinct of nature their fancies were determined to special kinds of works, I might justly infer they were determined every one of them to some work; and every work is an individual action; for a kind of work in the general, is no work. But these their individual actions, he saith, “are contingent, and therefore not necessary”; which is no good consequence: for if he mean by contingent, that which has no cause, he speaketh not as a Christian, but maketh a Deity of fortune; which I verily think he doth not. But if he mean by it, that whereof he knoweth not the cause, the consequence is nought.

The means whereby setting-dogs, and coy-ducks, and parrots, are taught to do what they do, “is by their backs, by their bellies, by the rod, or by the morsel, which have indeed a shadow or resemblance of rewards and punishments: but we take the word here properly, not as it is used by vulgar people, but as it is used by divines and philosophers,” &c. Does not the Bishop know that the belly hath taught poets, and historians, and divines, and philosophers, and artificers, their several arts, as well as parrots? Do not men do their duty with regard to their backs, to their necks, and to their morsels, as well as setting-dogs, coy-ducks, and parrots? Why then are these things to us the substance, and to them but the shadow or resemblance of rewards or punishments?

(p) “When brute creatures do learn any such qualities, it is not out of judgment or deliberation or discourse, by inferring or concluding one thing from another, which they are not capable of; neither are they able to conceive a reason of what they do,” &c.: but “they remember that when they did after one manner, they were beaten, and when they did after another manner, they were cherished; and accordingly they apply themselves.”

If the Bishop had considered the cogitations of his own mind, not then when he disputeth, but then when he followed those businesses which he calleth trifles, he would have found them the very same which he here mentioneth; saving instead of beating, (because he is exempt from that), he is to put in damage. For, setting aside the discourse of the tongue in words of general signification, the ideas of our minds are the same with those of other living creatures, created from visible, audible, and other sensible objects to the eyes and other organs of sense, as their’s are. For as the objects of sense are all individual, that is, singular, so are all the fancies proceeding from their operations; and men reason not but in words of universal signification, uttered or tacitly thought on. But perhaps he thinketh remembrance of words to be the ideas of those things which the words signify; and that all fancies are not effected by the operation of objects upon the organs of our senses. But to rectify him in those points is greater labour (unless he had better principles) than I am willing, or have at this time leisure, to undergo.

Lastly, whereas he says, “if their individual actions were absolutely necessary, fear or hope could not alter them”: that is true. For it is fear and hope, that makes them necessarily what they are.

NO. XV.

The Bishop’s reply.

J. D. “Thirdly, let this opinion be once radicated in the minds of men, that there is no true liberty, and that all things come to pass inevitably, and it will utterly destroy the study of piety. Who will bewail his sins with tears? What will become of that grief, that zeal, that indignation, that holy revenge, which the Apostle speaks of, if men be once thoroughly persuaded that they could not shun what they did? A man may grieve for that which he could not help; but he will never be brought to bewail that as his own fault, which flowed not from his own error, but from antecedent necessity. Who will be careful or solicitous to perform obedience, that believeth there are inevitable bounds and limits set to all his devotions, which he can neither go beyond, nor come short of? To what end shall he pray God to avert those evils which are inevitable, or to confer those favours which are impossible? We indeed know not what good or evil shall happen to us: but this we know, that if all things be necessary, our devotions and endeavours cannot alter that which must be. In a word, the only reason why those persons, who tread in this path of fatal destiny, do sometimes pray, or repent, or serve God, is because the light of nature, and the strength of reason, and the evidence of Scripture, do for that present transport them from their ill-chosen grounds, and expel those stoical fancies out of their heads. A complete Stoic can neither pray, nor repent, nor serve God to any purpose. Either allow liberty, or destroy Church as well as commonwealth, religion as well as policy.”

T. H. His third argument consisteth in other inconveniences which he saith will follow, namely, impiety and negligence of religious duties, repentance and zeal to God’s service. To which I answer, as to the rest, that they follow not. I must confess, if we consider the far greatest part of mankind, not as they should be, but as they are, that is, as men whom either the study of acquiring wealth or preferments, or whom the appetite of sensual delights, or the impatience of meditating, or the rash embracing of wrong principles, have made unapt to discuss the truth of things, that the dispute of this question will rather hurt than help their piety. And therefore, if he had not desired this answer, I would not have written it. Nor do I write it, but in hope your Lordship and he will keep it private. Nevertheless, in very truth, the necessity of events does not of itself draw with it any impiety at all. For piety consisteth only in two things; one, that we honour God in our hearts, which is, that we think of his power as highly as we can: for to honour any thing, is nothing else but to think it to be of great power. The other, that we signify that honour and esteem by our words and actions, which is called cultus or worship of God. He therefore, that thinketh that all things proceed from God’s eternal will, and consequently are necessary, does he not think God omnipotent? does he not esteem of his power as highly as is possible; which is to honour God as much as can be in his heart? Again, he that thinketh so, is he not more apt by external acts and words to acknowledge it, than he that thinketh otherwise? Yet is this external acknowledgment the same thing which we call worship. So this opinion fortifieth piety in both kinds, externally and internally, and therefore is far from destroying it. And for repentance, which is nothing but a glad returning into the right way after the grief of being out of the way, though the cause that made him go astray were necessary, yet there is no reason why he should not grieve; and again, though the cause why he returned into the way were necessary, there remain still the causes of joy. So that the necessity of the actions taketh away neither of those parts of repentance, grief for the error, nor joy for the returning. And for prayer, whereas he saith that the necessity of things destroys prayer, I deny it. For though prayer be none of the causes that move God’s will, his will being unchangeable, yet since we find in God’s word, he will not give his blessings but to those that ask them, the motive to prayer is the same. Prayer is the gift of God, no less than the blessings. And the prayer is decreed together in the same decree wherein the blessing is decreed. It is manifest, that thanksgiving is no cause of the blessing passed; and that which is passed, is sure and necessary. Yet even amongst men, thanks are in use as an acknowledgment of the benefit past, though we should expect no new benefit for our gratitude. And prayer to God Almighty is but thanksgiving for his blessings in general; and though it precede the particular thing we ask, yet it is not a cause or means of it, but a signification that we expect nothing but from God, in such manner as He, not as we will. And our Saviour by word of mouth bids us pray, “thy will, not our will be done”; and by example teaches us the same; for he prayed thus: Father, if it be thy will, let this cup pass, &c. The end of prayer, as of thanksgiving, is not to move, but to honour God Almighty, in acknowledging that what we ask can be effected by Him only.

J. D. “I hope T. H. will be persuaded in time, that it is not the coveteousness, or ambition, or sensuality, or sloth, or prejudice of his readers, which render this doctrine of absolute necessity dangerous, but that it is, in its own nature, destructive to true godliness; (a) and though his answer consist more of oppositions than of solutions, yet I will not willingly leave one grain of his matter unweighed. (b) First, he errs in making inward piety to consist merely in the estimation of the judgment. If this were so, what hinders but that the devils should have as much inward piety as the best Christians? For they esteem God’s power to be infinite, and tremble. Though inward piety do suppose the act of the understanding, yet it consisteth properly in the act of the will, being that branch of justice which gives to God the honour which is due unto him. Is there no love due to God, no faith, no hope? (c) Secondly, he errs in making inward piety to ascribe no glory to God, but only the glory of his power or omnipotence. What shall become of all other the Divine attributes, and particularly of his goodness, of his truth, of his justice, of his mercy, which beget a more true and sincere honour in the heart than greatness itself? Magnos facile laudamus, bonos lubenter. (d) Thirdly, this opinion of absolute necessity destroys the truth of God, making him to command one thing openly, and to necessitate another privately; to chide a man for doing that which he hath determined him to do; to profess one thing, and to intend another. It destroys the goodness of God, making him to be a hater of mankind, and to delight in the torments of his creatures; whereas the very dogs licked the sores of Lazarus, in pity and commiseration of him. It destroys the justice of God, making him to punish the creatures for that which was his own act, which they had no more power to shun, than the fire hath power not to burn. It destroys the very power of God, making him to be the true author of all the defects and evils which are in the world. These are the fruits of impotence, not of omnipotence. He who is the effective cause of sin, either in himself or in the creature, is not almighty. There needs no other devil in the world to raise jealousies and suspicions between God and his creatures, or to poison mankind with an apprehension that God doth not love them, but only this opinion, which was the office of the serpent (Gen. iii. 5). Fourthly, for the outward worship of God; (e) how shall a man praise God for his goodness, who believes him to be a greater tyrant than ever was in the world; who creates millions to burn eternally, without their fault, to express his power? How shall a man hear the word of God with that reverence, and devotion, and faith, which is requisite, who believeth that God causeth his gospel to be preached to the much greater part of Christians, not with any intention that they should be converted and saved, but merely to harden their hearts, and to make them inexcusable? How shall a man receive the blessed sacrament with comfort and confidence, as a seal of God’s love in Christ, who believeth that so many millions are positively excluded from all fruit and benefit of the passions of Christ, before they had done either good or evil? How shall he prepare himself with care and conscience, who apprehendeth that eating and drinking unworthily is not the cause of damnation, but, because God would damn a man, therefor he necessitates him to eat and drink unworthily? How shall a man make a free vow to God without gross ridiculous hypocrisy, who thinks he is able to perform nothing but as he is extrinsically necessitated? Fifthly, for repentance, how shall a man condemn and accuse himself for his sins, who thinks himself to be like a watch which is wound up by God, and that he can go neither longer nor shorter, faster nor slower, truer nor falser, than he is ordered by God? If God sets him right, he goes right; if God sets him wrong, he goes wrong. How can a man be said to return into the right way, who never was in any other way but that which God himself had chalked out for him? What is his purpose to amend, who is destitute of all power, but as if a man should purpose to fly without wings, or a beggar who hath not a groat in his purse, purpose to build hospitals?

“We use to say, admit one absurdity, and a thousand will follow. To maintain this unreasonable opinion of absolute necessity, he is necessitated (but it is hypothetically, he might change his opinion if he would) to deal with all ancient writers as the Goths did with the Romans, who destroyed all their magnificent works, that there might remain no monument of their greatness upon the face of the earth. Therefore he will not leave so much as one of their opinions, nor one of their definitions, nay, not one of their terms of art standing. (f) Observe what a description he hath given us here of repentance: ‘it is a glad returning into the right way, after the grief of being out of the way’. It amazed me to find gladness to be the first word in the description of repentance. His repentance is not that repentance, nor his piety that piety, nor his prayer that kind of prayer, which the Church of God in all ages hath acknowledged. Fasting, and sackcloth, and ashes, and tears, and humicubations, used to be companions of repentance. Joy may be a consequent of it, not a part of it. (g) It is a returning: but whose act is this returning? Is it God’s alone, or doth the penitent person concur also freely with the grace of God? If it be God’s alone, then it is his repentance, not man’s repentance. What need the penitent person trouble himself about it? God will take care of his own work. The Scriptures teach us otherwise, that God expects our concurrence (Revel. iii. 19, 20): Be zealous and repent: behold I stand at the door and knock; if any man hear my voice, and open the door, I will come in to him. It is a ‘glad returning into the right way’. Why dare any man call that a wrong way, which God himself hath determined? He that willeth and doth that which God would have him to will and to do, is never out of his right way. It follows in his description, after the grief, &c. It is true, a man may grieve for that which is necessarily imposed upon him; but he cannot grieve for it as a fault of his own, if it never was in his power to shun it. Suppose a writingmaster shall hold his scholar’s hand in his, and write with it; the scholar’s part is only to hold still his hand, whether the master write well or ill; the scholar hath no ground either of joy or sorrow, as for himself; no man will interpret it to be his act, but his master’s. It is no fault to be out of the right way, if a man had not liberty to have kept himself in the way.

“And so from repentance he skips quite over new obedience to come to prayer, which is the last religious duty insisted upon by me here. But according to his use, without either answering or mentioning what I say; which would have showed him plainly what kind of prayer I intend, not contemplative prayer in general, as it includes thanksgiving, but that most proper kind of prayer which we call petition, which used to be thus defined, to be an act of religion by which we desire of God something which we have not, and hope that we shall obtain it by him; quite contrary to this, T. H. tells us, (h) that prayer ‘is not a cause nor a means of God’s blessing, but only a signification that we expect it from him’. If he had told us only, that prayer is not a meritorious cause of God’s blessings, as the poor man by begging an alms doth not deserve it, I should have gone along with him. But to tell us, that it is not so much as a means to procure God’s blessing, and yet with the same breath, that ‘God will not give his blessings but to those who pray’, who shall reconcile him to himself? The Scriptures teach us otherwise, (John xvi. 23): Whatsoever ye shall ask the Father in my name, he will give it you: (Matth. vii. 7): Ask, and it shall be given you, seek, and ye shal find, knock, and it shall be opened unto you. St. Paul tells the Corinthians (2 Cor. i. 11), that he was helped by their prayers: that is not all; that the gift was bestowed upon him by their means. So prayer is a means. And St. James saith (chap. v. 16): The effectual fervent prayer of a righteous man availeth much. If it be effectual, then it is a cause. To show this efficacy of prayer, our Saviour useth the comparison of a father towards his child, of a neighbour towards his neighbour; yea, of an unjust judge, to shame those who think that God hath not more compassion than a wicked man. This was signified by Jacob’s wrestling and prevailing with God. Prayer is like the tradesman’s tools, wherewithal he gets his living for himself and his family. But, saith he, ‘God’s will is unchangeable’. What then? He might as well use this against study, physic, and all second causes, as against prayer. He shows even in this, how little they attribute to the endeavours of men. There is a great difference between these two: mutare voluntatem, to change the will; (which God never doth, in whom there is not the least shadow of turning by change; his will to love and hate was the same from eternity, which it now is and ever shall be; his love and hatred are immovable, but we are removed; non tellus cymbam, tellurem cymba reliquit); and velle mutationem, to will a change; which God often doth. To change the will, argues a change in the agent; but to will a change, only argues a change in the object. It is no inconstancy in a man to love or to hate as the object is changed. Præsta mihi omnia eadem, et idem sum. Prayer works not upon God, but us; it renders not him more propitious in himself, but us more capable of mercy. He saith this, ‘that God doth not bless us, except we pray, is a motive to prayer’. Why talks he of motives, who acknowledgeth no liberty, nor admits any cause but absolutely necessary? He saith, ‘prayer is the gift of God, no less than the blessing which we pray for, and contained in the same decree with the blessing’. It is true, the spirit of prayer is the gift of God. Will he conclude from thence, that the good employment of one talent, or of one gift of God, may not procure another? Our Saviour teacheth us otherwise: Come thou good and faithful servant, thou hast been faithful in little, I will make thee ruler over much. Too much light is an enemy to the sight, and too much law is an enemy to justice. I could wish we wrangled less about God’s decrees, until we understood them better. But, saith he, ‘thanksgiving is no cause of the blessing past, and prayer is but a thanksgiving’. He might even as well tell me, that when a beggar craves an alms, and when he gives thanks for it, it is all one. Every thanksgiving is a kind of prayer, but every prayer, and namely petition, is not a thanksgiving. In the last place he urgeth, that ‘in our prayers we are bound to submit our wills to God’s will.’ Who ever made any doubt of this? We must submit to the preceptive will of God, or his commandments; we must submit to the effective will of God, when he declares his good pleasure by the event or otherwise. But we deny, and deny again, either that God wills things ad extra, without himself, necessarily, or that it is his pleasure that all second causes should act necessarily at all times; which is the question, and that which he allegeth to the contrary comes not near it.

ANIMADVERSIONS UPON THE BISHOP’S REPLY NO. XV.

(a) “And though his answer consist more of oppositions than of solutions, yet I will not willingly leave one grain of his matter unweighed.”

It is a promise of great exactness, and like to that which is in his Epistle to the Reader: “Here is all that passed between us upon this subject, without any addition or the least variation from the original,” &c.: which promises were both needless, and made out of gallantry; and therefore he is the less pardonable in case they be not very rigidly observed. I would therefore have the reader to consider, whether these words of mine: “our Saviour bids us pray, thy will, not our will, be done, and by example teaches us the same; for he prayed thus: Father, if it be thy will let this cup pass,” &c.: which seem at least to imply that our prayers cannot change the will of God, nor divert him from his eternal decree: have been weighed by him to a grain, according to his promise. Nor hath he kept his other promise any better; for (No. VIII.) replying to these words of mine, “if he had so little to do as to be a spectator of the actions of bees and spiders, he would have confessed not only election, but also art, prudence, and policy in them,” &c., he saith, “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”. This passage is added to that which passed between us upon this subject; for it is not in the copy which I have had by me, as himself confesseth, these eight years; nor is it in the body of the copy he sent to the press, but only in the margin, that is to say, added out of anger against me, whom he would have men think to be one of the bold-faced atheists of this age.

In the rest of this reply he endeavoureth to prove, that it followeth from my opinion, that there is no use of piety. My opinion is no more than this, that a man cannot so determine to-day, the will which he shall have to the doing of any action to-morrow, as that it may not be changed by some external accident or other, as there shall appear more or less advantage to make him persevere in the will to the same action, or to will it no more. When a man intendeth to pay a debt at a certain time, if he see that the detaining of the money for a little longer may advantage himself, and seeth no other disadvantage equivalent likely to follow upon the detention, he hath his will changed by the advantage, and therefore had not determined his will himself; but when he foreseeth discredit or perhaps imprisonment, then his will remaineth the same, and is determined by the thoughts he hath of his creditor, who is therefore an external cause of the determination of the debtor’s will. This is so evident to all men living, though they never studied school-divinity, that it will be very strange if he draw from it the great impiety he pretends to do. Again, my opinion is only this: that whatsoever God foreknows shall come to pass, it cannot possibly be that that shall not come to pass; but that which cannot possibly not come to pass, that is said by all men to come to pass necessarily; therefore all events that God foreknows shall come to pass, shall come to pass necessarily. If therefore the Bishop draw impiety from this, he falleth into the impiety of denying God’s prescience. Let us see now how he reasoneth.

(b) “First, he errs in making inward piety to consist merely in the estimation of the judgment. If this were so, what hinders but that the devils should have as much inward piety as the best Christians; for they esteem God’s power to be infinite, and tremble?”

I said, that two things concurred to piety; one, to esteem his power as highly as is possible; the other, that we signify that estimation by our words and actions, that is to say, that we worship him. This latter part of piety he leaveth out; and then, it is much more easy to conclude as he doth, that the devils may have inward piety. But neither so doth the conclusion follow. For goodness is one of God’s powers, namely, that power by which he worketh in men the hope they have in him; and is relative; and therefore, unless the devil think that God will be good to him, he cannot esteem him for his goodness. It does not therefore follow from any opinion of mine, that the devil may have as much inward piety as a Christian. But how does the Bishop know how the devils esteem God’s power; and what devils does he mean? There are in the Scripture two sorts of things, which are in English translated devils. One, is that which is called Satan, Diabolus, and Abaddon, which signifies in English, an enemy, an accuser, and a destroyer of the Church of God. In which sense, the devils are but wicked men. How then is he sure that they esteem God’s power to be infinite? For, trembling infers no more than that they apprehend it to be greater than their own. The other sort of devils are called in the Scripture dæmonia, which are the feigned Gods of the heathen, and are neither bodies nor spiritual substances, but mere fancies, and fictions of terrified hearts, feigned by the Greeks and other heathen people, and which St. Paul calleth nothings; for an idol, saith he, is nothing. Does the Bishop mean, that these nothings esteem God’s power to be infinite and tremble? There is nothing that has a real being, but God, and the world, and the parts of the world; nor has anything a feigned being, but the fictions of men’s brains. The world and the parts thereof are corporeal, endued with the dimensions of quantity, and with figure. I should be glad to know, in what classes of entities which is a word that schoolmen use, the Bishop ranketh these devils, that so much esteem God’s power, and yet not love him nor hope in him, if he place them not in the rank of those men who are enemies to the people of God, as the Jews did.

(c) “Secondly, he errs in making inward piety to ascribe no glory to God, but only the glory of his power or omnipotence. What shall become of all other the Divine attributes, and particularly of his goodness, of his truth, of his justice, of his mercy,” &c.

He speaketh of God’s goodness and mercy, as if they were no part of his power. Is not goodness, in him that is good, the power to make himself beloved, and is not mercy goodness? Are not, therefore, these attributes contained in the attribute of his omnipotence? And justice in God, is it anything else, but the power he hath, and exerciseth in distributing blessings and afflictions? Justice is not in God as in man, the observation of the laws made by his superiors. Nor is wisdom in God, a logical examination of the means by the end, as it is in men; but an incomprehensible attribute given to an incomprehensible nature, for to honour him. It is the Bishop that errs, in thinking nothing to be power but riches and high place, wherein to domineer and please himself, and vex those that submit not to his opinions.

(d) “Thirdly, this opinion of absolute necessity destroys the truth of God, making him to command one thing openly, and to necessitate another privately, &c. It destroys the goodness of God, making him to be a hater of mankind, &c. It destroys the justice of God, making him to punish the creatures for that which was his own act, &c. It destroys the very power of God, making him to be the true author of all the defects and evils which are in the world.”

If the opinion of absolute necessity do all this, then the opinion of God’s prescience does the same; for God foreknoweth nothing, that can possibly not come to pass; but that which cannot possibly not come to pass, cometh to pass of necessity. But how doth necessity destroy the truth of God, by commanding and hindering what he commandeth? Truth consisteth in affirmation and negation, not in commanding and hindering; it does not therefore follow, if all things be necessary that come to pass, that therefore God hath spoken an untruth; nor that he professeth one thing, and intendeth another. The Scripture, which is his word, is not the profession of what he intendeth, but an indication of what those men shall necessarily intend, whom he hath chosen to salvation, and whom he hath determined to destruction. But on the other side, from the negation of necessity, there followeth necessarily the negation of God’s prescience; which is in the Bishop, if not ignorance, impiety. Or how “destroyeth it the goodness of God, or maketh him to be a hater of mankind, and to delight in the torments of his creatures, whereas the very dogs licked the sores of Lazarus in pity and commiseration of him”? I cannot imagine, when living creatures of all sorts are often in torments as well as men, that God can be displeased with it: without his will, they neither are nor could be at all tormented. Nor yet is he delighted with it; but health, sickness, ease, torments, life and death, are without all passion in him dispensed by him; and he putteth an end to them then when they end, and a beginning when they begin, according to his eternal purpose, which cannot be resisted. That the necessity argueth a delight of God in the torments of his creatures, is even as true, as that it was pity and commiseration in the dogs that made them lick the sores of Lazarus. Or how doth the opinion of necessity “destroy the justice of God, or make him to punish the creatures for that which was his own act”? If all afflictions be punishments, for whose act are all other creatures punished which cannot sin? Why may not God make the affliction, both of those men that he hath elected, and also of those whom he hath reprobated, the necessary causes of the conversion of those he hath elected; their own afflictions serving therein as chastisements, and the afflictions of the rest as examples? But he may perhaps think it no injustice to punish the creatures that cannot sin with temporary punishments, when nevertheless it would be injustice to torment the same creatures eternally. This may be somewhat to meekness and cruelty, but nothing at all to justice and injustice: for in punishing the innocent, the injustice is equal, though the punishments be unequal. And what cruelty can be greater than that which may be inferred from this opinion of the Bishop; that God doth torment eternally, and with the extremest degree of torment, all those men which have sinned, that is to say, all mankind from the creation to the end of the world which have not believed in Jesus Christ, whereof very few, in respect of the multitude of others, have so much as heard of his name; and this, when faith in Christ is the gift of God himself, and the hearts of all men in his hands to frame them to the belief of whatsoever he will have them to believe? He hath no reason therefore, for his part, to tax any opinion, for ascribing to God either cruelty or injustice. Or how doth it “destroy the power of God, or make him to be the author of all the defects and evils which are in the world”? First, he seemeth not to understand what author signifies. Author, is he which owneth an action, or giveth a warrant to do it. Do I say, that any man hath in the Scripture, which is all the warrant we have from God for any action whatsoever, a warrant to commit theft, murder, or any other sin? Does the opinion of necessity infer that there is such a warrant in the Scripture? Perhaps he will say, no, but that this opinion makes him the cause of sin. But does not the Bishop think him the cause of all actions? And are not sins of commission actions? Is murder no action? And does not God himself say, non est malum in civitate quod ego non feci; and was murder not one of those evils? Whether it were or not, I say no more but that God is the cause, not the author, of all actions and motions. Whether sin be the action, or the defect, or the irregularity, I mean not to dispute. Nevertheless I am of opinion, that the distinction of causes into efficient and deficient is bohu, and signifies nothing.

(e) “How shall a man praise God for his goodness, who believes him to be a greater tyrant than ever was in the world; who creates millions to burn eternally without their fault, to express his power?”

If tyrant signify, as it did when it came first in use, a king, it is no dishonour to believe that God is a greater tyrant than ever was in the world; for he is the King of all kings, emperors, and commonwealths. But if we take the word, as it is now used, to signify those kings only, which they that call them tyrants, are displeased with, that is, that govern not as they would have them, the Bishop is nearer the calling him a tyrant, than I am; making that to be tyranny, which is but the exercise of an absolute power; for he holdeth, though he see it not, by consequence, in withdrawing the will of man from God’s dominion, that every man is a king of himself. And if a man cannot praise God for his goodness, who creates millions to burn eternally without their fault; how can the Bishop praise God for his goodness, who thinks he hath created millions of millions to burn eternally, when he could have kept them so easily from committing any fault? And to his “how shall a man hear the word of God with that reverence, and devotion, and faith, which is requisite, who believeth that God causeth his gospel to be preached to the much greater part of Christians, not with any intention that they should be converted and saved,” &c.; I answer, that those men who so believe, have faith in Jesus Christ, or they have not faith in him. If they have, then shall they, by that faith, hear the word of God with that reverence, and devotion, and faith, which is requisite to salvation. And for them that have no faith, I do not think he asketh how they shall hear the word of God with that reverence, and devotion, and faith, which is requisite; for he knows they shall not, until such time as God shall have given them faith. Also he mistakes, if he think that I or any other Christian believe, that God intendeth, by hardening any man’s heart, to make that man inexcusable, but to make his elect the more careful.

Likewise to his question, “how shall a man receive the sacrament with comfort, who believeth that so many millions are positively excluded from the benefit of Christ’s passion, before they had done either good or evil”; I answer as before, by faith, if he be of God’s elect; if not, he shall not receive the sacrament with comfort. I may answer also, that the faithful man shall receive the sacrament with comfort, by the same way that the bishop receiveth it with comfort. For he also believeth that many millions are excluded from the benefit of Christ’s passion, (whether positively or not positively is nothing to the purpose, nor doth positively signify any thing in this place); and that, so long before they had either done good or evil, as it was known to God before they were born that they were so excluded.

To his “how shall he prepare himself with care and conscience, who apprehendeth that eating and drinking unworthily is not the cause of damnation, but because God would damn a man, therefore he necessitates him”: I answer, that he that eateth and drinketh unworthily, does not believe that God necessitates him to eat and drink unworthily, because he would damn him; for neither does he think he eats and drinks unworthily, nor that God intends to damn him; for he believeth no such damnation, nor intendeth any preparation. The belief of damnation is an article of Christian faith; so is also preparation to the sacrament. It is therefore a vain question, how he that hath no faith shall prepare himself with care and conscience to the receiving of the sacrament. But to the question, how they shall prepare themselves, that shall at all prepare themselves; I answer, it shall be by faith, when God shall give it them.

To his “how shall a man make a free vow to God, who thinks himself able to perform nothing, but as he is extrinsically necessitated”: I answer, that if he make a vow, it is a free vow, or else it is no vow; and yet he may know, when he hath made that vow, though not before, that it was extrinsically necessitated; for the necessity of vowing before he vowed, hindered not the freedom of his vow, but made it.

Lastly, to “how shall a man condemn and accuse himself for his sins, who thinks himself to be like a watch which is wound up by God,” &c.: I answer, though he think himself necessitated to what he shall do, yet, if he do not think himself necessitated and wound up to impenitence, there will follow upon his opinion of necessity no impediment to his repentance. The Bishop disputeth not against me, but against somebody that holds a man may repent, that believes at the same time he cannot repent.

(f) “Observe what a description he has given us here of repentance: ‘It is a glad returning into the right way, after the grief of being out of the way.’ It amazed me to find gladness to be the first word in the description of repentance.”

I could never be of opinion that Christian repentance could be ascribed to them, that had as yet no intention to forsake their sins and to lead a new life. He that grieves for the evil that hath happened to him for his sins, but hath not a resolution to obey God’s commandments better for the time to come, grieveth for his sufferings, but not for his doings; which no divine, I think, will call Christian repentance. But he that resolveth upon amendment of life, knoweth that there is forgiveness for him in Christ Jesus; whereof a Christian cannot possibly be but glad. Before this gladness there was a grief preparative to repentance, but the repentance itself was not Christian repentance till this conversion, till this glad conversion. Therefore I see no reason why it should amaze him to find gladness to be the first word in the description of repentance, saving that the light amazeth such as have been long in darkness. And “for the fasting, sackcloth, and ashes”, they were never parts of repentance perfected, but signs of the beginning of it. They are external things; repentance is internal. This doctrine pertaineth to the establishing of Romish penance; and being found to conduce to the power of the clergy, was by them wished to be restored.

(g) “It is a returning; but whose act is this returning? If it be God’s alone, then it is his repentance, not man’s repentance; what need the penitent person trouble himself about it?”

This is ill argued; for why is it God’s repentance, when he gives man repentance, more than it is God’s faith, when he gives man faith. But he labours to bring in a concurrence of man’s will with God’s will; and a power in God to give repentance, if man will take it; but not the power to make him take it. This concurrence he thinks is proved by Revel. iii. 19, 20: “Be zealous, and repent. Behold, I stand at the door, and knock. If any man hear my voice, and open the door, I will come in to him”. Here is nothing of concurrence, nor of anything equivalent to it, nor mention at all of the will or purpose, but of the calling or voice by the minister. And as God giveth to the minister a power of persuading, so he giveth also many times a concurrence of the auditor with the minister in being persuaded. Here is therefore somewhat equivalent to a concurrence with the minister, that is, of man with man; but nothing of the concurrence of man, whose will God frameth as he pleaseth, with God that frameth it. And I wonder how any man can conceive, when God giveth a man a will to do anything whatsoever, how that will, when it is not, can concur with God’s will to make itself be.

The next thing he excepteth against is this, that I hold, (h) “that prayer is not a cause, nor a means of God’s blessing, but only a signification that we expect it from him.”

First, instead of my words, “a signification that we expect nothing but from him,” he hath put “a signification that we expect it from him”. There is much difference between my words and his, in the sense and meaning; for in the one, there is honour ascribed to God, and humility in him that prayeth; but in the other, presumption in him that prayeth, and a detraction from the honour of God. When I say, prayer is not a cause nor a means, I take cause and means in one and the same sense; affirming that God is not moved by any thing that we do, but has always one and the same eternal purpose, to do the same things that from eternity he hath foreknown shall be done; and methinks there can be no doubt made thereof. But the Bishop allegeth (2 Cor. i. 11): that “St. Paul was helped by their prayers, and that the gift was bestowed upon them by their means;” and (James v. 16): “The effectual and fervent prayer of a righteous man availeth much”. In which places, the words means, effectual, availeth, do not signify any causation; for no man nor creature living can work any effect upon God, in whom there is nothing, that hath not been in him eternally heretofore, nor that shall not be in him eternally hereafter; but do signify the order in which God hath placed men’s prayers and his own blessings. And not much after, the Bishop himself saith, “prayer works not upon God, but us”. Therefore, it is no cause of God’s will, in giving us his blessings, but is properly a sign, not a procuration of his favour.

The next thing he replieth to is, that I make prayer to be a kind of thanksgiving; to which he replies, “he might even as well tell me, that when a beggar craves an alms, and when he gives thanks for it, it is all one.” Why so? Does not a beggar move a man by his prayer, and sometime worketh in him a compassion not without pain, and as the Scripture calls it, a yearning of the bowels; which is not so in God, when we pray to him? Our prayer to God is a duty; it is not so to man. Therefore, though our prayers to man be distinguished from our thanks, it is not necessary it should be so in our prayers and thanks to God Almighty.

To the rest of his reply, in this No. XV, there needs no further answer.

NO. XVI.

The Bishop’s reply.

J. D. “Fourthly, the order, beauty, and perfection of the world doth require that in the universe should be agents of all sorts, some necessary, some free, some contingent. He that shall make, either all things necessary, guided by destiny; or all things free, governed by election; or all things contingent, happening by chance: doth overthrow the beauty and the perfection of the world.”

T. H. The fourth argument from reason, is this. The order, beauty, and perfection of the world requireth that in the universe there should be agents of all sorts, some necessary, some free, some contingent. He that shall make all things necessary, or all things free, or all things contingent, doth overthrow the beauty and perfection of the world.

In which argument I observe, first, a contradiction. For seeing he that maketh anything, in that he maketh it, he maketh it to be necessary, it followeth, that he that maketh all things, maketh all things necessary to be. As if a workman make a garment, the garment must necessarily be. So if God make every thing, every thing must necessarily be. Perhaps the beauty of the world requireth, though we know it not, that some agents should work without deliberation, which he calls necessary agents; and some agents with deliberation, and those both he and I call free agents; and that some agents should work, and we not know how; and those effects we both call contingent. But this hinders not, but that he that electeth, may have his election necessarily determined to one by former causes; and that which is contingent, and imputed to fortune, be nevertheless necessary, and depend on precedent necessary causes. For by contingent, men do not mean that which hath no cause, but which hath not for cause any thing which we perceive. As for example; when a traveller meets with a shower, the journey had a cause, and the rain had a cause, sufficient enough to produce it; but because the journey caused not the rain, nor the rain the journey, we say, they were contingent one to another. And thus you see, though there be three sorts of events, necessary, contingent, and free, yet they may be all necessary, without the destruction of the beauty or perfection of the universe.

J. D. “The first thing he observes in mine argument, is contradiction, as he calls it; but in truth, it is but a deception of the sight, as one candle sometimes seems to be two, or a rod in the water shows to be two rods; quicquid recipitur, recipitur ad modum recipientis. But what is this contradiction? Because I say, he who maketh all things, doth not make them necessary. What! a contradiction and but one proposition! That were strange. I say, God hath not made all agents necessary; he saith, God hath made all agents necessary. Here is a contradiction indeed; but it is between him and me, not between me and myself. But though it be not a formal contradiction, yet perhaps it may imply a contradiction in adjecto. Wherefore to clear the matter, and dispel the mist which he hath raised, it is true, that everything when it is made, it is necessary that it be made so as it is, that is, by a necessity of infallibility, or supposition, supposing that it be so made; but this is not that absolute, antecedent necessity, whereof the question is between him and me. As to use his own instance: before the garment be made, the tailor is free to make it either of the Italian, Spanish, or French fashion indifferently; but after it is made, it is necessary that it be of that fashion whereof he hath made it, that is, by a necessity of supposition. But this doth neither hinder the cause from being a free cause, nor the effect from being a free effect; but the one did produce freely, and the other was freely produced. So the contradiction is vanished.”

“In the second part of his answer, (a) he grants; that there are some free agents, and some contingent agents, and that perhaps the beauty of the world doth require it; but like a shrewd cow, which after she hath given her milk casts it down with her foot, in the conclusion he tells us, that nevertheless they are all necessary. This part of his answer is a mere logomachy, as a great part of the controversies in the world are, or a contention about words. What is the meaning of necessary, and free, and contingent actions? I have showed before what free and necessary do properly signify; but he misrecites it. He saith, I make all agents which want deliberation, to be necessary; but I acknowledge that many of them are contingent. (b) Neither do I approve his definition of contingents, though he say I concur with him, that they are ‘such agents as work we know not how’. For, according to this description, many necessary actions should be contingent, and many contingent actions should be necessary. The loadstone draweth iron, the jet chaff, we know not how; and yet the effect is necessary; and so it is in all sympathies and antipathies or occult qualities. Again, a man walking in the streets, a tile falls down from a house, and breaks his head. We know all the causes, we know how this came to pass. The man walked that way, the pin failed, the tile fell just when he was under it; and yet this is a contingent effect: the man might not have walked that way, and then the tile had not fallen upon him. Neither yet do I understand here in this place by contingents, such events as happen beside the scope or intention of the agents; as when a man digging to make a grave, finds a treasure; though the word be sometimes so taken. But by contingents, I understand all things which may be done and may not be done, may happen or may not happen, by reason of the indetermination or accidental concurrence of the causes. And those same things which are absolutely contingent, are yet hypothetically necessary. As supposing the passenger did walk just that way, just at that time, and that the pin did fail just then, and the tile fall; it was necessary that it should fall upon the passenger’s head. The same defence will keep out his shower of rain. But we shall meet with his shower of rain again, No. XXXIV; whither I refer the further explication of this point.”

ANIMADVERSIONS UPON THE BISHOP’S REPLY NO. XVI.

In this number he would prove that there must be free agents and contingent agents, as well as necessary agents, from the order, beauty, and perfection of the world. I that thought that the order, beauty, and perfection of the world required that which was in the world, and not that which the Bishop had need of for his argument, could see no force of consequence to infer that which he calls free and contingent. That which is in the world, is the order, beauty, and perfection which God hath given the world; and yet there are no agents in the world, but such as work a seen necessity, or an unseen necessity; and when they work an unseen necessity in creatures inanimate, then are those creatures said to be wrought upon contingently, and to work contingently; and when the necessity unseen is of the actions of men, then it is commonly called free, and might be so in other living creatures; for free and voluntary are the same thing. But the Bishop in his reply hath insisted most upon this, that I make it a contradiction to say that “he that maketh a thing, doth not make it necessary”, and wonders how a contradiction can be in one proposition, and yet within two or three lines after found it might be. And therefore, to clear the matter, he saith that such necessity is not antecedent, but a necessity of supposition: which, nevertheless, is the same kind of necessity which he attributeth to the burning of the fire, where there is a necessity that the thing thrown into it shall be burned; though yet it be but burning, or but departing from the hand that throws it in; and, therefore, the necessity is antecedent. The like is in making a garment; the necessity begins from the first motion towards it, which is from eternity, though the tailor and the Bishop are equally insensible of it. If they saw the whole order and conjunction of causes, they would say it were as necessary as any thing else can possibly be; and therefore God that sees that order and conjunction, knows it is necessary.

The rest of his reply is to argue a contradiction in me; for he says,

(a) “I grant that there are some free agents, and some contingent agents, and that perhaps the beauty of the world doth require it; but like a shrewd cow, which, after she hath given her milk, casts it down with her foot, in the conclusion I tell him, that nevertheless they are all necessary.”

It is true that I say some are free agents, and some contingent; nevertheless they may be all necessary. For according to the significations of the words necessary, free, and contingent, the distinction is no more but this. Of agents, some are necessary, some are contingent, and some are free agents; and of agents, some are living creatures, and some are inanimate; which words are improper, but the meaning of them is this. Men call necessary agents, such as they know to be necessary, and contingent agents, such inanimate things as they know not whether they work necessarily or no, and free agents, men whom they know not whether they work necessarily or no. All which confusion ariseth from that presumptuous men take for granted, that that is not, which they know not.

(b) “Neither do I approve his definition of contingents; that they are such agents as work we know not how.”

The reason is, because it would follow that many necessary actions should be contingent, and many contingent actions necessary. But that which followeth from it really is no more but this: that many necessary actions would be such as we know not to be necessary, and many actions which we know not to be necessary, may yet be necessary; which is a truth. But the Bishop defineth contingents thus: “all things which may be done and may not be done, may happen or may not happen, by reason of the indetermination or accidental concurrence of the causes”. By which definition, contingent is nothing, or it is the same that I say it is. For there is nothing can be done and not be done, nothing can happen and not happen, by reason of the indetermination or accidental concurrence of the causes. It may be done or not done for aught he knows, and happen or not happen for any determination he perceiveth; and that is my definition. But that the indetermination can make it happen or not happen, is absurd; for indetermination maketh it equally to happen or not to happen, and therefore both; which is a contradiction. Therefore indetermination doth nothing; and whatsoever causes do, is necessary.

NO. XVII.

The Bishop’s reply.

J. D. “Fifthly, take away liberty, and you take away the very nature of evil, and the formal reason of sin. If the hand of the painter were the law of painting, or the hand of the writer the law of writing, whatsoever the one did write, or the other paint, must infallibly be good. Seeing therefore that the first cause is the rule and law of goodness, if it do necessitate the will or the person to evil, either by itself immediately, or mediately by necessary flux of second causes, it will no longer be evil. The essence of sin consists in this, that one commit that which he might avoid. If there be no liberty to produce sin, there is no such thing as sin in the world. Therefore it appears, both from Scripture and reason, that there is true liberty.”

T. H. To the fifth argument from reason, which is, that if liberty be taken away, the nature and formal reason of sin is taken away, I answer by denying the consequence. The nature of sin consisteth in this, that the action done proceed from our will, and be against the law. A judge, in judging whether it be sin or not which is done against the law, looks at no higher cause of the action than the will of the doer. Now when I say the action was necessary, I do not say it was done against the will of the doer, but with his will, and so necessarily; because man’s will, that is, every act of the will, and purpose of man had a sufficient, and therefore a necessary cause, and consequently every voluntary action was necessitated. An action therefore may be voluntary and a sin, and nevertheless be necessary. And God may afflict by right derived from his omnipotency, though sin were not. And the example of punishment on voluntary sinners, is the cause that produceth justice, and maketh sin less frequent; for God to punish such sinners, as I have shewed before, is no injustice. And thus you have my answer to his objections, both out of Scripture and reason.

The Bishop’s reply.

J. D. “Scis tu simulare cupressum. Quid hoc?”Quid hoc?” It was shrewd counsel which Alcibiades gave to Themistocles, when he was busy about his accounts to the state; that he should rather study how to make no accounts. So it seems T. H. thinks it a more compendious way, to baulk an argument, than to satisfy it. And if he can produce a Rowland against an Oliver, if he can urge a reason against a reason, he thinks he hath quitted himself fairly. But it will not serve his turn. And that he may not complain of misunderstanding it, as those who have a politic deafness to hear nothing but what liketh them, I will first reduce mine argument into form, and then weigh what he saith in answer, or rather in opposition to it. (a) That opinion which takes away the formal reason of sin, and by consequence, sin itself, is not to be approved; this is clear, because both reason and religion, nature and Scripture, do prove, and the whole world confesseth, that there is sin. But this opinion, of the necessity of all things by reason of a conflux of second causes, ordered and determined by the first cause, doth take away the very formal reason of sin. This is proved thus. That which makes sin itself to be good, and just, and lawful, takes away the formal cause, and destroys the essence of sin; for if sin be good, and just, and lawful, it is no more evil, it is no sin, no anomy. But this opinion of the necessity of all things, makes sin to be very good, and just, and lawful; for nothing can flow essentially by way of physical determination from the first cause, which is the law and rule of goodness and justice, but that which is good, and just, and lawful. But this opinion makes sin to proceed essentially by way of physical determination from the first cause, as appears in T. H.’s whole discourse. Neither is it material at all whether it proceed immediately from the first cause, or mediately, so as it be by a necessary flux of second and determinate causes, which produce it inevitably. To these proofs he answers nothing, but only by denying the first consequence, as he calls it, and then sings over his old song, ‘that the nature of sin consisteth in this, that the action proceed from our will, and be against the law’, which, in our sense, is most true, if he understand a just law, and a free rational will. (b) But supposing, as he doth, that the law enjoins things impossible in themselves to be done, then it is an unjust and tyrannical law; and the transgression of it is no sin, not to do that which never was in our power to do. And supposing, likewise as he doth, that the will is inevitably determined by special influence from the first cause, then it is not man’s will, but God’s will, and flows essentially from the law of goodness.

(c) “That which he adds of a judge, is altogether impertinent as to his defence. Neither is a civil judge the proper judge, nor the law of the land the proper rule of sin. But it makes strongly against him; for the judge goes upon a good ground; and even this which he confesseth, that ‘the judge looks at no higher cause than the will of the doer’, proves that the will of the doer did determine itself freely, and that the malefactor had liberty to have kept the law, if he would. Certainly, a judge ought to look at all material circumstances, and much more at all essential causes. Whether every sufficient cause be a necessary cause, will come to be examined more properly, No. XXXI. For the present it shall suffice to say, that liberty flows from the sufficiency, and contingency from the debility of the cause. (d) Nature never intends the generation of a monster. If all the causes concur sufficiently, a perfect creature is produced; but by reason of the insufficiency, or debility, or contingent aberration of some of the causes, sometimes a monster is produced. Yet the causes of a monster were sufficient for the production of that which was produced, that is a monster: otherwise a monster had not been produced. What is it then? A monster is not produced by virtue of that order which is set in nature, but by the contingent aberration of some of the natural causes in their concurrence. The order set in nature is, that every like should beget its like. But supposing the concurrence of the causes to be such as it is in the generation of a monster, the generation of a monster is necessary; as all the events in the world are when they are, that is, by an hypothetical necessity. (e) Then he betakes himself to his old help, that God may punish by right of omnipotence, though there were no sin. The question is not now what God may do, but what God will do, according to that covenant which he hath made with man, fac hoc et vives, do this and thou shalt live. Neither doth God punish any man contrary to this covenant (Hosea xiii. 9): O Israel, thy destruction is from thyself; but in me is thy help. He that wills not the death of a sinner, doth much less will the death of an innocent creature. By death or destruction in this discourse the only separation of soul and body is not intended, which is a debt of nature, and which God, as Lord of life and death, may justly do, and make it not a punishment, but a blessing to the party; but we understand, the subjecting of the creature to eternal torments. Lastly, he tells of that benefit which redounds to others from exemplary justice; which is most true, but not according to his own grounds. For neither is it justice to punish a man for doing that which it was impossible always for him not to do; neither is it lawful to punish an innocent person, that good may come of it. And if his opinion of absolute necessity of all things were true, the destinies of men could not be altered, either by examples or fear of punishment.”

ANIMADVERSIONS UPON THE BISHOP’S REPLY NO. XVII.

Whereas he had in his first discourse made this consequence: “if you take away liberty, you take away the very nature of evil, and the formal reason of sin”: I denied that consequence. It is true, he who taketh away the liberty of doing, according to the will, taketh away the nature of sin; but he that denieth the liberty to will, does not so. But he supposing I understood him not, will needs reduce his argument into form, in this manner. (a) “That opinion which takes away the formal reason of sin, and by consequence, sin itself, is not to be approved.” This is granted. “But the opinion of necessity doth this.” This I deny; he proves it thus: “this opinion makes sin to proceed essentially, by way of physical determination from the first cause. But whatsoever proceeds essentially by way of physical determination from the first cause, is good, and just, and lawful. Therefore this opinion of necessity maketh sin to be very good, just, and lawful.” He might as well have concluded, whatsoever man hath been made by God, is a good and just man. He observeth not that sin is not a thing really made. Those things which at first were actions, were not then sins, though actions of the same nature with those which were afterwards sins; nor was then the will to anything a sin, though it were a will to the same thing, which in willing now, we should sin. Actions became sins then first, when the commandment came; for, as St. Paul saith, without the law sin is dead; and sin being but a transgression of the law, there can be no action made sin but by the law. Therefore this opinion, though it derive actions essentially from God, it derives not sins essentially from him, but relatively and by the commandment. And consequently the opinion of necessity taketh not away the nature of sin, but necessitateth that action which the law hath made sin. And whereas I said the nature of sin consisteth in this, that ‘it is an action proceeding from our will and against the law’, he alloweth it for true; and therefore he must allow also, that the formal reason of sin lieth not in the liberty or necessity of willing, but in the will itself, necessary or unnecessary, in relation to the law. And whereas he limits this truth which he allowed, to this, that the law be just, and the will a free rational will, it serves to no purpose; for I have shown before, that no law can be unjust. And it seemeth to me that a rational will, if it be not meant of a will after deliberation, whether he that deliberateth reasoneth aright or not, signifieth nothing. A rational man is rightly said; but a rational will, in other sense than I have mentioned, is insignificant.

(b) “But supposing, as he doth, that the law enjoins things impossible in themselves to be done, then it is an unjust and tyrannical law, and the transgression of it no sin,” &c. “And supposing likewise, as he doth, that the will is inevitably determined by special influence from the first cause, then it is not man’s will, but God’s will.” He mistakes me in this. For I say not the law enjoins things impossible in themselves; for so I should say it enjoined contradictories. But I say the law sometimes, the law-makers not knowing the secret necessities of things to come, enjoins things made impossible by secret and extrinsical causes from all eternity. From this his error he infers, that the laws must be unjust and tyrannical, and the transgression of them no sin. But he who holds that laws can be unjust and tyrannical, will easily find pretence enough, under any government in the world, to deny obedience to the laws, unless they be such as he himself maketh, or adviseth to be made. He says also, that I suppose the will is inevitably determined by special influence from the first cause. It is true; saving that senseless word influence, which I never used. But his consequence, “then it is not man’s will, but God’s will”, is not true; for it may be the will both of the one and of the other, and yet not by concurrence, as in a league, but by subjection of the will of man to the will of God.

(c) “That which he adds of a judge, is altogether impertinent as to his defence. Neither is a civil judge the proper judge, nor the law of the land a proper rule of sin.” A judge is to judge of voluntary crimes. He has no commission to look into the secret causes that make them voluntary. And because the Bishop had said the law cannot justly punish a crime that proceedeth from necessity, it was no impertinent answer to say, “the judge looks at no higher cause than the will of the doer”. And even this, as he saith, is enough to prove, that “the will of the doer did determine itself freely, and that the malefactor had liberty to have kept the law if he would”. To which I answer, that it proves indeed that the malefactor had liberty to have kept the law if he would; but it proveth not that he had the liberty to have a will to keep the law. Nor doth it prove that the will of the doer did determine itself freely; for, nothing can prove nonsense. But here you see what the Bishop pursueth in this whole reply, namely, to prove that a man hath liberty to do if he will, which I deny not; and thinks when he hath done that, he hath proved a man hath liberty to will, which he calls the will’s determining of itself freely. And whereas he adds, “a judge ought to look at all essential causes”; it is answer enough to say, he is bound to look at no more than he thinks he can see.

(d) “Nature never intends the generation of a monster. If all the causes concur sufficiently, a perfect creature is produced; but by reason of the insufficiency, or debility, or contingent aberration of some of the causes, sometimes a monster is produced.” He had no sooner said this, but finding his error he retracteth it, and confesseth that “the causes of a monster were sufficient for the production of that which was produced, that is, of a monster; otherwise a monster had not been produced;” which is all that I intended by sufficiency of the cause. But whether every sufficient cause be a necessary cause or not, he meaneth to examine in No. XXXI. In the meantime he saith only, that liberty flows from the sufficiency, and contingency from the debility of the cause; and leaves out necessity, as if it came from neither. I must note also, that where he says nature never intends the generation of a monster, I understand not whether by nature he means the Author of nature, in which meaning he derogates from God; or nature itself, as the universal work of God; and then it is absurd; for the universe, as one aggregate of things natural, hath no intention. His doctrine that followeth concerning the generation of monsters, is not worth consideration; therefore I leave it wholly to the judgment of the reader.

(e) “Then he betakes himself to his old help, that God may punish by right of omnipotence, though there were no sin. The question is not, now what God may do, but what God will do, according to that covenant which he hath made with man, Fac hoc et vives, do this and thou shalt live.” It is plain (to let pass that he puts punishment where I put affliction, making a true sentence false) that if a man do this he shall live, and he may do this if he will. In this the Bishop and I disagree not. This therefore is not the question; but whether the will to do this, or not to do this, be in a man’s own election. Whereas he adds, ‘he that wills not the death of a sinner, doth much less will the death of an innocent creature’; he had forgot for awhile, that both good and evil men are by the will of God all mortal; but presently corrects himself, and says, he means by death, eternal torments, that is to say, eternal life, but in torments; to which I have answered once before in this book, and spoken much more amply in another book, to which the Bishop hath inclination to make an answer, as appeareth by his epistle to the reader. That which followeth to the end of this number, hath been urged and answered already divers times; I therefore pass it over.

NO. XVIII.

The Bishop’s reply.

J. D. “But the patrons of necessity being driven out of the plain field with reason, have certain retreats or distinctions which they fly unto for refuge. First, they distinguish between Stoical necessity and Christian necessity, between which they make a threefold difference.

“First, say they, the Stoics did subject Jupiter to destiny, but we subject destiny to God. I answer, that the Stoical and Christian destiny are one and the same; Fatum, quasi effatum Jovis. Hear Seneca: Destiny is the necessity of all things and actions depending upon the disposition of Jupiter, &c. I add, that the Stoics left a greater liberty to Jupiter over destiny, than these stoical Christians do to God over his decrees, either for the beginnings of things, as Euripides, or for the progress of them, as Chrysippus, or at least of the circumstances of time and place, as all of them generally. So Virgil: Sed trahere et moras ducere, &c. So Osyris in Apuleius, promiseth him to prolong his life, ultra fato constituta tempora, beyond the times set down by the destinies.

“Next, they say, that the Stoics did hold an eternal flux and necessary connexion of causes; but they believed that God doth act præter et contra naturam, besides and against nature. I answer, that it is not much material whether they attribute necessity to God, or to the stars, or to a connexion of causes, so as they establish necessity. The former reasons do not only condemn the ground or foundation of necessity, but much more necessity itself upon what ground soever. Either they must run into this absurdity, that the effect is determined, the cause remaining undetermined; or else hold such a necessary connexion of causes as the Stoics did.

“Lastly, they say, the Stoics did take away liberty and contingence, but they admit it. I answer, what liberty or contingence was it they admit but a titular liberty and an empty shadow of contingence, who do profess stiffly that all actions and events, which either are or shall be, cannot but be, nor can be otherwise, after any other manner, in any other place, time, number, order, measure, nor to any other end, than they are; and that in respect of God determining them to one. What a poor ridiculous liberty or contingency is this!

“Secondly, they distinguish between the first cause, and the second causes; they say, that in respect of the second causes many things are free, but in respect of the first cause all things are necessary. This answer may be taken away two ways.

“First, so contraries shall be true together; the same thing at the same time shall be determined to one, and not determined to one; the same thing at the same time must necessarily be, and yet may not be. Perhaps they will say, not in the same respect. But that which strikes at the root of this question is this, if all the causes were only collateral, this exception might have some colour: but where all the causes being joined together, and subordinate one to another, do make but one total cause, if any one cause (much more the first) in the whole series or subordination of causes be necessary, it determines the rest, and without doubt makes the effect necessary. Necessity or liberty is not to be esteemed from one cause, but from all the causes joined together. If one link in a chain be fast, it fastens all the rest.

“Secondly, I would have them tell me whether the second causes be predetermined by the first cause, or not. If it be determined, then the effect is necessary, even in respect of the second causes. If the second cause be not determined, how is the effect determined, the second cause remaining undetermined? Nothing can give that to another which it hath not itself. But say they, nevertheless the power or faculty remaineth free. True, but not in order to the act, if it be once determined. It is free, in sensu diviso, but not in sensu composito. When a man holds a bird fast in his hand, is she therefore free to fly where she will, because she hath wings? Or a man imprisoned or fettered, is he therefore free to walk where he will, because he hath feet and a locomotive faculty? Judge without prejudice, what a miserable subterfuge is this which many men confide so much in.

CERTAIN DISTINCTIONS WHICH HE SUPPOSING MAY BE BROUGHT TO HIS ARGUMENTS, ARE BY HIM REMOVED.

T. H. He saith, “a man may perhaps answer, that the necessity of things held by him is not a Stoical necessity, but a Christian necessity,” &c., but this distinction I have not used, nor indeed have ever heard before. Nor do I think any man could make Stoical and Christian two kinds of necessities, though they may be two kinds of doctrine. Nor have I drawn my answer to his arguments from the authority of any sect, but from the nature of the things themselves.

But here I must take notice of certain words of his in this place, as making against his own tenet. “Where all the causes”, saith he, “being joined together, and subordinate one to another, do make but one total cause, if any one cause, much more the first, in the whole series of subordination of causes be necessary, it determines the rest, and without doubt maketh the effect necessary.” For that which I call the necessary cause of any effect, is the joining together of all causes subordinate to the first, into one total cause. If any one of those, saith he, especially the first, produce its effect necessarily, then all the rest are determined, and the effect also necessary. Now, it is manifest, that the first cause is a necessary cause of all the effects that are next and immediate to it; and therefore by his own reason, all effects are necessary. Nor is that distinction of necessary in respect of the first cause, and necessary in respect of second causes, mine; it does, as he well noteth, imply a contradiction.

J. D. “Because T. H. disavows these two distinctions, I have joined them together in one paragraph. He likes not the distinction of necessity, or destiny, into Stoical and Christian; no more do I. We agree in the conclusion, but our motives are diverse. My reason is, because I acknowledge no such necessity either as the one or as the other; and because I conceive that those Christian writers, who do justly detest the naked destiny of the Stoics, as fearing to fall into those gross absurdities and pernicious consequences which flow from thence, do yet privily, though perhaps unwittingly, under another form of expression introduce it again at the back-door, after they had openly cast it out at the fore-door. But T. H. rusheth boldly without distinctions, which he accounts but jargon, and without foresight, upon the grossest destiny of all others, that is, that of the Stoics. He confesseth, that “they may be two kinds of doctrine.” May be? Nay, they are; without all peradventure. And he himself is the first who bears the name of a Christian, that I have read, that hath raised this sleeping ghost out of its grave, and set it out in its true colours. But yet he likes not the names of Stoical and Christian destiny. I do not blame him, though he would not willingly be accounted a Stoic. To admit the thing, and quarrel about the name, is to make ourselves ridiculous. Why might not I first call that kind of destiny which is maintained by Christians, Christian destiny: and that other maintained by Stoics, Stoical destiny? But I am not the inventor of the term. If he had been as careful in reading other men’s opinions, as he is confident in setting down his own, he might have found not only the thing, but the name itself often used. But if the name of fatum Christianum do offend him, let him call it with Lipsius, fatum verum; who divides destiny into four kinds: 1. mathematical or astrological destiny: 2. natural destiny: 3. Stoical or violent destiny: and 4. true destiny; which he calls, ordinarily, nostrum, our destiny, that is, of Christians; and fatum pium, that is, godly destiny; and defines it just as T. H. doth his destiny, to be (a) a series or order of causes depending upon the divine counsel (De Constantia, lib. 1. cap. xvii. xviii. xix). Though he be more cautelous than T. H. to decline those rocks which some others have made shipwreck upon, yet the divines thought he came too near them; as appears by his Epistle to the Reader in a later edition, and by that note in the margin of his twentieth chapter, ‘Whatsoever I dispute here, I submit to the judgment of the wise, and being admonished I will convert it; one may convince me of error, but not of obstinacy.’ So fearful was he to over-shoot himself; and yet he maintained both true liberty and true contingency. T. H. saith, ‘he hath not sucked his answer from any sect’; and I say, so much the worse. It is better to be the disciple of an old sect, than the ring-leader of a new.

(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, like those old Lamiæ, which could put out their eyes when they list; as, namely, that the faculty of willing, when it is determined in order to the act, (which is all the freedom that he acknowledgeth), is but like the freedom of a bird when she is first in a man’s hand, &c.: yet he hath espied another thing wherein I contradict myself, because I affirm, that if any one cause in the whole series of causes, much more the first cause, be necessary, it determineth the rest. But, saith he, ‘it is manifest that the first cause is a necessary cause of all the effects that are next’. I am glad; yet it is not I who contradict myself, but it is some of his manifest truths which I contradict; that ‘the first cause is a necessary cause of all effects’; which I say is a manifest falsehood. Those things which God wills without himself, he wills freely, not necessarily. Whatsoever cause acts or works necessarily, doth act or work all that it can do, or all that is in its power. But it is evident that God doth not all things without himself, which he can do, or which he hath power to do. He could have raised up children unto Abraham of the very stones which were upon the banks of Jordan (Luke iii. 8); but he did not. He could have sent twelve legions of angels to the succour of Christ, (Matth. xxvi. 53); but he did not. God can make T. H. live the years of Methuselah; but it is not necessary that he shall do so, nor probable that he will do so. The productive power of God is infinite, but the whole created world is finite. And, therefore God might still produce more, if it pleased him. But thus it is, when men go on in a confused way, and will admit no distinctions. If T. H. had considered the difference between a necessary being, and a necessary cause, or between those actions of God which are immanent within himself, and the transient works of God which are extrinsical without himself; he would never have proposed such an evident error for a manifest truth. Qui pauca considerat, facile pronuntiat.”

ANIMADVERSIONS UPON THE BISHOP’S REPLY NO. XVIII.

The Bishop, supposing I had taken my opinion from the authority of the Stoic philosophers, not from my own meditation, falleth into dispute against the Stoics: whereof I might, if I pleased, take no notice, but pass over to No. XIX. But that he may know I have considered their doctrine concerning fate, I think fit to say thus much, that their error consisteth not in the opinion of fate, but in feigning of a false God. When therefore they say, fatum est effatum Jovis, they say no more but that fate is the word of Jupiter. If they had said it had been the word of the true God, I should not have perceived anything in it to contradict; because I hold, as most Christians do, that the whole world was made, and is now governed by the word of God, which bringeth a necessity of all things and actions to depend upon the Divine disposition. Nor do I see cause to find fault with that, as he does, which is said by Lipsius, that (a) fate is a series or order of causes depending upon the Divine counsel; though the divines thought he came too near the rocks, 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 clergy; 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 allegeth, not to be mine, but the Stoics’; 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 speak absurdly.

I said that the first cause is a necessary cause of all the effects that are next and immediate to it; which cannot 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 always 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 will, the action is according to the whole power, will 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; unless that he can not only will a change, but also change his will, 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.

NO. XIX.

The Bishop’s reply.

J. D. “Thirdly, they distinguish between liberty from compulsion, and liberty from necessitation. The will, say they, is free from compulsion, but not free from necessitation. And this they fortify 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 only 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 agent’s power, nor depend upon anything that is in his power; if there be an exterior 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 acknowledge. For to be free from compulsion, is to do a thing so as terror be not the cause of his will to do it. For a man is then only 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 anything 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 it is that which he undertook to disprove. This distinction, he says, useth to be fortified by two reasons. But they are not mine. The first, he says, 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 hypothetical necessity. If I shall live, I shall eat; this is an hypothetical necessity. Indeed, it is a necessary proposition; that is to say, it is necessary that that proposition should be true, whensoever uttered; but it 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 fortify 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 hypothetical necessity, and necessity upon supposition, and such like terms of Schoolmen, obscured and made to seem profound learning.

The second reason that may confirm the distinction of free from compulsion, and free from necessitation, he says, 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 proved 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 examine.

“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 terms 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 forbear 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 possible; and he that cannot, has none at all. Also liberty (as he says the Schools 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 license 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 man’s reason and understanding, especially when it is done, not by the Scripture, but by pretence 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 falsehood. 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 always necessitated; for if it be ordinarily, 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 pretence that when she was living she used to go contrary courses to all other people, holds, that true compulsion and fear may make a man will that which he doth not will, that is, in his sense may compel 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 ways 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 overboard. 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 years 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 compel it. That which is compelled, is against the will; and that which is against the will, is not willed.

(c) “Secondly, T. H. errs in this also, where he saith, that ‘a man is then only said to be compelled, when fear makes him willing to an action’: as if force were not more prevalent with a man, than fear. We must know therefore, that this word compelled is taken two ways: sometimes improperly, that is, when a man is moved 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, moved 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 idol’s temple. Or as in the case of St. Peter (John xxi. 18): Another shall gird thee, and carry thee whither thou wouldest 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 inferior 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 extrinsical 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 sudden 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 overboard to save the ship, or submits to his enemy to save his life, there is always 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 slighted, 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 flows from the natural and extrinsical 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 physic, 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 extremely sick, it is necessary that he keep at home; or supposing that a man hath a natural antipathy against a cat, he runs necessarily away so soon as he sees her: because this antipathy, and 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 Jacob’s power, not to have blessed his sons; so was it not in Balaam’s power, not to have blessed Israel (Numb. xxii. 38). Jacob’s will was determined by himself; Balaam’s will was physically determined by God. Therefore Jacob’s benediction proceeded from his own free election; and Balaam’s from God’s determination. So was Caiphas’ prophecy (John xi. 51): therefore the text saith, he spake not of himself. To this T. H. saith nothing; but only declareth by an impertinent instance, what hypothetical signifies; and then adviseth your Lordship, to take notice how errors and ignorance may be cloaked under grave scholastic terms. And I do likewise intreat your Lordship to take notice, that the greatest fraud and cheating lurks commonly under the pretence of plain dealing. We see jugglers 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 approve 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 atheism, and of those scoffers which St. Peter prophesied of, (2 Pet. iii. 3), who neither believe that there is God or angels, or that they have a soul, but only as salt, to keep their bodies from putrifaction; so I can by no means assent unto him in that which follows, 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 terms invented to cover ignorance. Good words. Doth he only 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 rational 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 clearer understandings than we, and they are not hindered 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 reluctance 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 mere mistake, which grows merely 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 evil. But to be free to do both good and evil, is a liberty of contrariety, which extends to contrary objects or to diverse kind of things. So his reason to prove that a liberty of exercise cannot be without a liberty of specification, falls flat to the ground: and he may lay aside his lenten licence for another occasion. I am ashamed 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 one private man, who will not allow human liberty to others, to assume to himself such a licence to control so magistrally, and to censure of gross ignorance and tyrannising over men’s judgments, yea, as causes of the troubles and tumults which are in the world, the doctors of the Church in general, who have flourished in all ages and all places, only for a few necessary and innocent distinctions. Truly, said Plutarch, that a sore eye is offended with the light of the sun. (h) What then, must the logicians lay aside their first and second intentions, their abstracts and concretes, their subjects and predicates, their modes and figures, their method synthetic and analytic, their fallacies of composition and division, &c.? Must the moral philosopher quit his means and extremes, his principia congenita et acquisita, his liberty of contradiction and contrariety, his necessity absolute and hypothetical, &c.? Must the natural philosopher give over his intentional species, his understanding agent and patient, his receptive and eductive power of the matter, his qualities infusæ or influxæ, symbolæ or dissymbolæ, his temperament ad pondus and ad justitiam, his parts homogeneous and heterogeneous, his sympathies and antipathies, his antiperistasis, &c.? Must the astrologer and the geographer leave their apogæum and perigæum, their artic and antartic poles, their equator, zodiac, zenith, meridian, horizon, zones, &c.? Must the mathematician, the metaphysician, and the divine, relinquish all their terms of art and proper idiotisms, because they do not relish with T. H.’s palate? But he will say, they are obscure expressions. What marvel is it, when the things themselves are more obscure? Let him put them into as plain English as he can, and they shall be never a whit the better understood by those who want all grounds of learning. Nothing is clearer than mathematical demonstration: yet let one who is altogether ignorant in mathematics hear it, and he will hold it to be as T. H. terms these distinctions, plain fustian or jargon. Every art or profession hath its proper mysteries and expressions, which are well known to the sons of art, not so to strangers. Let him consult with military men, with physicians, with navigators; and he shall find this true by experience. Let him go on shipboard, and the mariners will not leave their starboard and larboard, because they please not him, or because he accounts it gibberish. No, no: it is not the School divines, but innovators and seditious orators, who are the true causes of the present troubles of Europe. (i) T. H. hath forgotten what he said in his book, De Cive, cap. XII.: ‘that it is a seditious opinion, to teach that the knowledge of good and evil belongs to private persons’: and cap. XVII. ‘that in questions of faith, the civil magistrates ought to consult with ecclesiastical doctors, to whom God’s blessing is derived by imposition of hands so as not to be deceived in necessary truths, to whom our Saviour hath promised infallibility.’ These are the very men whom he traduceth here. There he ascribes infallibility to them; here he accuseth them of gross superstitious ignorance. There he attributes too much to them; here he attributes too little. Both there and here he takes too much upon him; (1 Cor. xiv. 32): The spirits of the prophets are subject to the prophets.”

ANIMADVERSIONS UPON THE BISHOP’S REPLY NO. XIX.

(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 always necessitated, &c. The former sense, that the will is not compelled, is acknowledged by all the world as a truth undeniable.” I never said the will is compelled, but do agree with the rest of the world in granting that it is not compelled. It is an absurd speech to say it is compelled, but not to say it is necessitated, or a necessary effect of some cause. When the fire heateth, it doth not compel heat; so likewise when some cause maketh the will to anything, it doth not compel it. Many things may compel a man to do an action, in producing the will; but that is not a compelling of the will, but of the man. That which I call necessitation, is the effecting and creating of that will which was not before, not a compelling of a will already existent. The necessitation or creation of the will, is the same thing with the compulsion of the man, saving that we commonly use the word compulsion, in those actions which proceed from terror. And therefore this distinction is of no use; and that raving which followeth immediately after it, is nothing to the question, whether the will be free, though it be to the question, whether the man be free.

(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.” I never said nor doubted, but such actions were both voluntary and free; for he that doth any thing for fear, though he say truly he was compelled to it, yet we deny not that he had election to do or not to do, and consequently that he was a voluntary and free agent. But this hinders not, but that the terror might be a necessary cause of his election of that which otherwise he would not have elected, unless some other potent cause made it necessary he should elect the contrary. And therefore, in the same ship, in the same storm, one man may be necessitated to throw his goods overboard, and another man to keep them within the ship; and the same man in a like storm be otherwise advised, if all the causes be not like. But that the same individual man, as the Bishop says, that chose to throw his goods overboard, might chose not to throw his goods overboard, I cannot conceive; unless a man can choose to throw overboard and not to throw overboard, or be so advised and otherwise advised, all at once.

(c) “Secondly, T. H. errs in this also, where he saith, that ‘a man is then only said to be compelled, when fear makes him willing to an action.’ As if force were not more prevalent with a man than fear,” &c. When I said fear, I think no man can doubt but the fear of force was understood. I cannot see therefore what quarrel he could justly take, at saying that a man is compelled by fear only; unless he think it may be called compulsion when a man by force, seizing on another man’s limbs, moveth them as himself, not as the other man pleaseth. But this is not the meaning of compulsion: neither is the action so done, the action of him that suffereth, but of him that useth the force. But this, as if it were a question of the propriety of the English tongue, the Bishop denies; and says when a man is moved by fear, it is improperly said he is compelled. But when a man is moved by an external cause, the will resisting as much as it can, then he says, he is properly said to be compelled; as in a rape, or when a Christian is drawn or carried by violence to the idol’s temple. Insomuch as by this distinction it were very proper English to say, that a stone were compelled when it is thrown, or a man when he is carried in a cart. For my part, I understand compulsion to be used rightly of living creatures only, which are moved only by their own animal motion, in such manner as they would not be moved without the fear. But of this dispute the English and well-bred reader is the proper judge.

(d) “Thirdly, the question is not, whether all the actions of a man be free, but whether they be ordinarily free.” Is it impossible for the Bishop to remember the question, which is whether a man be free to will? Did I ever say, that no actions of a man are free? On the contrary, I say that all his voluntary actions are free, even those also to which he is compelled by fear. But it does not therefore follow but that the will, from whence those actions and their election proceed, may have necessary causes, against which he hath never yet said anything. That which followeth immediately, is not offered as a proof, but as explication, how the passions of a man surprise him; therefore I let it pass, noting only that he expoundeth motus primo primi, which I understood not before, by the word antipathy.

(e) “A necessity of supposition is of two kinds; sometimes a thing supposed, is in the power of the agent to do or not to do, &c.; sometimes a thing supposed, is not in the power of the agent to do or not to do,” &c.

When the necessity is of the former kind of supposition, then, he says, freedom may consist with this necessity, in the latter sense that it cannot. And to use his own instances, to vow continence in a Romish priest, upon supposition that he is a Romish priest, is a necessary act, because it was in his power to be a priest or not. On the other side, supposing a man having a natural antipathy against a cat; because this antipathy is not in the power of the party affected, therefore the running away from the cat is no free act.

I deny not but that it is a free act of the Romish priest to vow continence, not upon the supposition that he was a Romish priest, but because he had not done it unless he would; if he had not been a Romish priest, it had been all one to the freedom of his act. Nor is his priesthood anything to the necessity of his vow, saving that if he would not have vowed he should not have been made a priest. There was an antecedent necessity in the causes extrinsical; first, that he should have the will to be a priest, and then consequently that he should have the will to vow. Against this he allegeth nothing. Then for his cat, the man’s running from it is a free act, as being voluntary, and arising from a false apprehension (which nevertheless he cannot help) of some hurt or other the cat may do him. And therefore the act is as free as the act of him that throweth his goods into the sea. So likewise the act of Jacob in blessing his sons, and the act of Balaam in blessing Israel, are equally free and equally voluntary, yet equally determined by God, who is the author of all blessings, and framed the will of both of them to bless, and whose will, as St. Paul saith, cannot be resisted. Therefore both their actions were necessitated equally; and, because they were voluntary, equally free. As for Caiphas’ his prophecy, which the text saith he spake not of himself, it was necessary; first, because it was by the supernatural gift of God to the high-priests, as sovereigns of the commonwealth of the Jews, to speak to the people as from the mouth of God, that is to say, to prophecy; and secondly, whensoever he did speak not as from God, but as from himself, it was nevertheless necessary he should do so, not that he might not have been silent if he would, but because his will to speak was antecedently determined to what he should speak from all eternity, which he hath yet brought no argument to contradict.

He approveth my modesty in suspending my judgment concerning the manner how the good angels do work, necessarily or freely, because I find it not set down in the articles of our faith, nor in the decrees of our Church. But he useth not the same modesty himself. For whereas he can apprehend neither the nature of God nor of angels, nor conceive what kind of thing it is which in them he calleth will, he nevertheless takes upon him to attribute to them liberty of exercise, and to deny them a liberty of specification; to grant them a more intensive liberty than we have, but not a more extensive; using, not incongruously, in the incomprehensibility of the subject incomprehensible terms, as liberty of exercise and liberty of specification, and degrees of intension in liberty; as if one liberty, like heat, might be more intensive than another. It is true that there is greater liberty in a large than in a straight prison, but one of those liberties is not more intense than the other.

(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.” It is one thing to say a man hath liberty to do what he will, and another thing to say he hath power to do what he will. A man that is bound, would say readily he hath not the liberty to walk; but he will not say he wants the power. But the sick man will say he wants the power to walk, but not the liberty. This is, as I conceive, to speak the English tongue: and consequently an Englishman will not say, the liberty to do what he will, but the power to do what he will, is omnipotence. And therefore either I or the Bishop understand not English. Whereas he adds that I mistake the meaning of the words liberty of specification, I am sure that in that way wherein I expound them, there is no absurdity. But if he say, I understand not what the Schoolmen mean by it, I will not contend with him; for I think they know not what they mean themselves.

(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 understanding of other men. What a presumption is this, for one private man,” &c. That he may know I am no enemy to intelligible distinctions, I also will use a distinction in the defence of myself against this his accusation. I say therefore that some distinctions are scholastical only, and some are scholastical and sapiential also. Against those that are scholastical only, I do and may inveigh. But against those that are scholastical and sapiential also, I do not inveigh. Likewise some doctors of the Church, as Suarez, Johannes à Duns, and their imitators, to breed in men such opinions as the Church of Rome thought suitable to their interest, did write such things as neither other men nor themselves understood. These I confess I have a little slighted. Other doctors of the Church, as Martin Luther, Philip Melancthon, John Calvin, William Perkins, and others, that did write their sense clearly, I never slighted, but always very much reverenced and admired. Wherein, then, lieth my presumption? If it be because I am a private man, let the Bishop also take heed he contradict not some of those whom the world worthily esteems, lest he also (for he is a private man) be taxed of presumption.

(h) “What then, must the logicians lay aside their first and second intentions, their abstracts and concretes &c.: must the moral philosopher quit his means and extremes, his principia congenita et acquisita, his liberty of contradiction and contrariety, his necessity absolute and hypothetical, &c.: must the natural philosopher give over his intentional species, &c.: because they do not relish with T. H.’s palate?” I confess that among the logicians, Barbara, Celarent, Darii, Ferio, &c. are terms of art. But if the Bishop think that words of first and second intention, that abstract and concrete, that subjects and predicates, moods and figures, method synthetic and analytic, fallacies of composition and division, be terms of art, I am not of his opinion. For these are no more terms of art in logic, than lines, figures, squares, triangles, &c. in the mathematics. Barbara, Celarent, and the rest that follow, are terms of art, invented for the easier apprehension of young men, and are by young men understood. But the terms of the School with which I have found fault, have been invented to blind the understanding, and cannot be understood by those that intend to learn divinity. And to his question whether the moral philosopher must quit his means and extremes, I answer, that though they are not terms of art, he ought to quit them when they cannot be understood; and when they can, to use them rightly. And therefore, though means and extremes be terms intelligible, yet I would have them quit the placing of virtue in the one, and of vice in the other. But for his liberty of contradiction and contrariety, his necessity absolute and hypothetical, if any moral philosopher ever used them, then away with them; they serve for nothing but to seduce young students. In like manner, let the natural philosopher no more mention his intentional species, his understanding agent and patient, his receptive and eductive power of the matter, his qualities infusæ or influxæ, symbolæ or dissymbolæ, his temperament ad pondus and ad justitiam. He may keep his parts homogeneous and heterogeneous; but his sympathies and antipathies, his antiperistasis and the like names of excuses rather than of causes, I would have him fling away. And for the astrologer, (unless he means astronomer), I would have him throw away his whole trade. But if he mean astronomer, then the terms of apogæum and perigæum, artic, antartic, equator, zodiac, zenith, meridian, horizon, zones, &c. are no more terms of art in astronomy, than a saw or a hatchet in the art of a carpenter. He cites no terms of art for geometry; I was afraid he would have put lines, or perhaps equality or inequality, for terms of art. So that now I know not what be those terms he thinks I would cast away in geometry. And lastly, for his metaphysician, I would have him quit both his terms and his profession, as being in truth (as Plutarch saith in the beginning of the life of Alexander the Great) not at all profitable to learning, but made only for an essay to the learner; and the divine to use no word in preaching but such as his auditors, nor in writing but such as a common reader, may understand. And all this, not for the pleasing of my palate, but for the promotion of truth.

(i) “T. H. hath forgotten what he said in his book, De Cive, cap. XII., that it is ‘a seditious opinion to teach that the knowledge of good and evil belongs to private persons’: and cap. XVII, that ‘in questions of faith the civil magistrates ought to consult with the ecclesiastical doctors, to whom God’s blessing is derived by imposition of hands, so as not to be deceived in necessary truths,’ &c. There he attributes too much to them, here he attributeth too little; both there and here he takes too much upon him. The spirits of the prophets are subject to the prophets.” He thinks he hath a great advantage against me from my own words in my book De Cive, which he would not have thought if he had understood them. The knowledge of good and evil is judicature, which in Latin is cognitio causarum, not scientia. Every private man may do his best to attain a knowledge of what is good and evil in the action he is to do; but to judge of what is good and evil in others, belongs not to him, but to those whom the sovereign power appointeth thereunto. But the Bishop not understanding, or forgetting, that cognoscere is to judge, as Adam did of God’s commandment, hath cited this place to little purpose. And for the infallibility of the ecclesiastical doctors by me attributed to them, it is not that they cannot be deceived, but that a subject cannot be deceived in obeying them when they are our lawfully constituted doctors. For the supreme ecclesiastical doctor, is he that hath the supreme power: and in obeying him no subject can be deceived, because they are by God himself commanded to obey him. And what the ecclesiastical doctors, lawfully constituted, do tell us to be necessary in point of religion, the same is told us by the sovereign power. And therefore, though we may be deceived by them in the belief of an opinion, we cannot be deceived by them in the duty of our actions. And this is all that I ascribe to the ecclesiastical doctors. If they think it too much, let them take upon them less. Too little they cannot say it is, who take it, as it is, for a burthen. And for them who seek it as a worldly preferment, it is too much. I take, he says, too much upon me. Why so? Because the spirits of the prophets are subject to the prophets. This is it that he finds fault with in me, when he says that I am a private man, that is to say, no prophet, that is to say, no bishop. By which it is manifest, that the Bishop subjecteth not his spirit but to the Convocation of bishops. I admit that every man ought to subject his spirit to the prophets. But a prophet is he that speaketh unto us from God; which I acknowledge none to do, but him that hath due authority so to do. And no man hath due authority so to do immediately, but he that hath the supreme authority of the commonwealth; nor mediately, but they that speak such things to the people, as he that hath the supreme authority alloweth of. And as it is true in this sense, that the spirits of the prophets are subject to the prophets; so it is also true that we ought not to believe every spirit, but to try the spirits, whether they are of God; because many false prophets are gone out into the world (1 John iv. 1). Therefore I that am a private man, may examine the prophets; which to do, I have no other means but to examine whether their doctrine be agreeable to the law; which theirs is not, who divide the commonwealth into two commonwealths, civil and ecclesiastical.

NO. XX.

The Bishop’s reply.

J. D. “Now to the distinction itself, I say, first, that the proper act of liberty is election, and election is opposed, not only to coaction, but also to coarctation, or determination to one. Necessitation or determination to one, may consist with spontaneity, but not with election or liberty; as hath been showed. The very Stoics did acknowledge a spontaneity. So our adversaries are not yet gone out of the confines of the Stoics.

“Secondly, to rip up the bottom of this business, this I take to be the clear resolution of the Schools. There is a double act of the will: the one more remote, called imperatus, that is, in truth the act of some inferior faculty, subject to the command of the will, as to open or shut one’s eyes; without doubt these actions may be compelled. The other act is nearer, called actus elicitus, an act drawn out of the will, as to will, to choose, to elect. This may be stopped or hindered by the intervening impediment of the understanding, as a stone lying on a table is kept from its natural motion; otherwise the will should have a kind of omnipotence. But the will cannot be compelled to an act repugnant to its inclination, as when a stone is thrown upwards into the air; for that is both to incline and not to incline to the same object at the same time, which implies a contradiction. Therefore to say the will is necessitated, is to say, the will is compelled so far as the will is capable of compulsion. If a strong man holding the hand of a weaker, should therewith kill a third person, hæc quidem vis est, this is violence; the weaker did not willingly perpetrate the fact, because he was compelled. But now suppose this strong man had the will of the weaker in his power as well as the hand, and should not only incline, but determine it secretly and insensibly to commit this act: is not the case the same? Whether one ravish Lucretia by force, as Tarquin, or by amatory potions and magical incantations not only allure her, but necessitate her to satisfy his lust, and incline her effectually, and draw her inevitably and irresistibly, to follow him spontaneously, Lucretia in both these conditions is to be pitied. But the latter person is more guilty, and deserves greater punishment, who endeavours also, so much as in him lies, to make Lucretia irresistibly partake of his crime. I dare not apply it, but thus only: take heed how we defend those secret and invincible necessitations to evil, though spontaneous and free from coaction.

“These are their fastnesses.”

T. H. In the next place, he bringeth two arguments against distinguishing between being free from compulsion, and free from necessitation. The first is, that election is opposite, not only to coaction or compulsion, but also to necessitation or determination to one. This is it he was to prove from the beginning, and therefore bringeth no new argument to prove it. And to those brought formerly, I have already answered; and in this place I deny again, that election is opposite to either. For when a man is compelled, for example, to subject himself to an enemy or to die, he hath still election left in him, and a deliberation to bethink which of these two he can better endure; and he that is led to prison by force, hath election, and may deliberate, whether he will be haled and trained on the ground, or make use of his feet.

Likewise when there is no compulsion, but the strength of temptation to do an evil action, being greater than the motives to abstain, necessarily determines him to the doing of it, yet he deliberates whilst sometimes the motives to do, sometimes the motives to forbear, are working on him, and consequently he electeth which he will. But commonly, when we see and know the strength that moves us, we acknowledge necessity; but when we see not, or mark not the force that moves us, we then think there is none, and that it is not causes, but liberty that produceth the action. Hence it is that they think he does not choose this, that of necessity chooseth it; but they might as well say fire does not burn, because it burns of necessity. The second argument is not so much an argument, as a distinction, to show in what sense it may be said that voluntary actions are necessitated, and in what sense not. And therefore he allegeth, as from the authority of the Schools and that which “rippeth up the bottom of the question”, that there is a double act of the will. The one, he says, is actus imperatus, an act done at the command of the will by some inferior faculty of the soul, as to open or shut one’s eyes: and this act may be compelled. The other, he says, is actus elicitus, an act allured, or an act drawn forth by allurement out of the will, as to will, to choose, to elect: this, he says, cannot be compelled. Wherein letting pass that metaphorical speech of attributing command and subjection to the faculties of the soul, as if they made a commonwealth or family among themselves, and could speak one to another, which is very improper in searching the truth of the question: you may observe first, that to compel a voluntary act is nothing else but to will it. For it is all one to say, my will commands the shutting of mine eyes or the doing of any other action, and to say, I have the will to shut mine eyes. So that actus imperatus here, might as easily have been said in English, a voluntary action, but that they that invented the term understood not any thing it signified. Secondly you may observe, that actus elicitus is exemplified by these words, to will, to elect, to choose, which are all one; and so to will is here made an act of the will; and indeed, as the will is a faculty or power of a man’s soul, so to will is an act of it according to that power. But 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 also to say, that to will is an act allured or drawn out of the power to will, which power is commonly called the will. Howsoever it be, the sum 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 threatening and foul means, it follows, 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 moves naturally; or that 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 only 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 mixed actions, that is partly voluntary, partly involuntary. That which is compelled in a man’s 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 errs 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 nearer our senses; as little children fear a mouse or a visard more than fire or weather. But as a fit of the stone takes away the sense of the gout for the present, so the greater passion doth extinguish the less. The fear of God’s wrath and eternal torments doth expel corporeal fear: fear not them who kill the body, but fear him who is able to cast both body and soul into hell (Luke xii. 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 errs 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. He who forced a betrothed damsel was to die; ‘but unto the damsel,’ saith he, ‘thou shalt do nothing, there is in her no fault worthy of death’ (Deut. xxii. 26). Tamar’s beauty, or Ammon’s love, did not render him innocent; but Ammon’s force rendered 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 pleads for pardon. But it dispenseth in many cases with the transgression of the positive law, either divine or human; because it is not probable that God or the law would oblige man to the observation of all positive precepts, with so great damage as the loss of his life. The omission of circumcision was no sin, whilst the Israelites were travelling through the wilderness. By T. H.’s permission, (g) I will propose a case to him. A gentleman sends his servant with money to buy a dinner; some Russians meet him by the way, and take it from him by force; the servant cried 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 Russians did not take it from him by force, but drew their swords and threatened to kill him except he delivered it himself; no wise man will conceive, that it was either the master’s intention or the servant’s 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 comrades were drinking or playing, should stay with them, and drink or play away his money, and afterwards plead, as T. H. doth here, that he was overcome by the mere 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 vicious habit which he had contracted of drinking or gaming: (James i. 14): Every man is tempted, when he is drawn away of his own lust and enticed. 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 and 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 move itself, but were merely passive, like an artificial popingay removed 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 moved 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 extrinsical 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.’s opinion were true, that the will were naturally determined by the physical and special influence of extrinsical causes, not only motives were vain, but reason itself 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 extrinsically 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 clearer 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 exterior senses are not totally bound, have a trick to walk in their sleep. Suppose such a 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 necessity’. 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 extrinsical 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 errs grossly. 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 clearly 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 itself. 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 trivial 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 money: 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 a usurper or an oppressor. The word præmunire is now grown a good word in our English laws, by use and tract of time; and yet at first it was merely mistaken for a præmonere. The names of Sunday, Monday, 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 only, 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 foreign words are daily naturalized and made free denizens in every country. But why are the terms improper? ‘Because,’ saith he, ‘it attributes command, and subjection to the faculties of the soul, as if they made a commonwealth or family among themselves, and could speak one to another.’ Therefore, he saith, (o) they who invented this term of actus imperatus, understood not anything what it signified. No; why not? It seemeth to me, they understood it better than those who except against it. They knew there are mental terms, which are only conceived in the mind, as well as vocal terms, which are expressed with the tongue. They knew, that howsoever a superior do intimate a direction to his inferior, it is still a command. Tarquin commanded his son by only striking off the tops of the poppies, and was by him both understood and obeyed. Though there be no formal commonwealth or family either in the body or in the soul of man, yet there is a subordination in the body, of the inferior members to the head; there is a subordination in the soul, of the inferior 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 or 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 is it absurdly said, that to will or choose, is an act drawn out of the power to will’. His objection is yet more improper than the expression. The art of dancing rather resembles the understanding than the will. That drawing which the Schools intend, is clear of another nature from that which he conceives. By elicitation, he understands a persuading 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 merely 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 shepherd draws his sheep after him with the sight of a green bough: so the end draws 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 else, until he express himself in more proper terms; 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 (elicitur) 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 dropt 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, is 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 truly, nor properly. Whatsoever hath its original from the will, whether immediately or mediately, whether it be a proper act of the will itself, as to elect, or an act of the understanding, as to deliberate, or an act of the inferior 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 immediately out of the will itself; but the members and faculties are applied 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 (Luke xvi). ‘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 foul 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 show him the right way. First, no acts which are properly said to be compelled, are voluntary. Secondly, acts of terror, (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 proceeding from blandishments or sweet persuasions, (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 punishment, as just fears of extreme and imminent dangers threatened by extrinsical agents often do; because the strength of the former proceeds from our own fault, and was freely elected in the causes of it; but neither desires nor fears, which are consequent and deliberated, do absolutely necessitate the will.

ANIMADVERSIONS UPON THE BISHOP’S REPLY NO. XX.

(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 moves naturally, or that a woman can be ravished with her own will. Consent takes away the rape,” &c. If that which I have told him again, be false, why shows 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 denial. I will not dispute with him, whether a stone thrown up move naturally or not. I shall only say to those readers whose judgments are not defaced with the abuse of words, that as a stone moveth not upwards of itself, but by the power of the external 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 imperceptible to the eye, is not imperceptible to reason. But because this is not proper discourse for the Bishop, and because I have elsewhere discoursed thereof expressly, I shall say nothing of it here. And whereas he says, ‘consent takes away the rape’; it may perhaps be true, and I think it is; but here it not only inferreth nothing, but was also needless, and therefore in a public writing is an indecent instance, though sometimes not unnecessary in a spiritual court. In the next place, he wonders how “a man is compelled, and yet free to do what he will”; that is to say, how a man is made to will, and yet free to do what he will. If he had said, he wondered how a man can be compelled to will, and yet be free to do that which he would have done if he had not been compelled, it had been somewhat; as it is, it is nothing. Again he says, “he who submits to an enemy for saving his life, doth either only counterfeit, or else his will is changed,” &c.: all which is true. But when he says he doth counterfeit, he doth not insinuate that he may counterfeit lawfully; for that would prejudice him hereafter, in case he should have need of quarter. But how this maketh for him, or against me, I perceive not. “There is a vast difference,” saith he, “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,” &c. I say the same; the will cannot be compelled; but the man may be, and is then compelled, when his will is changed by the fear of force, punishment, or other hurt from God or man. And when his will is changed, there is a new will formed, (whether it be by God or man), and that necessarily; and consequently the actions that flow from that will, are both voluntary, free, and necessary, notwithstanding that he was compelled to do them. Which maketh not for the Bishop, but for me.

(b) “Wherefore this kind of actions are called mixed actions, that is partly voluntary, partly involuntary, &c. So supposing a man were not in that distress, they are involuntary.” That some actions are partly voluntary, partly involuntary, is not a new, but a false opinion. For one and the same action can never be both voluntary and involuntary. If therefore parts of an action be actions, he says no more but that some actions are voluntary, some involuntary; or that one multitude of actions may be partly voluntary, partly involuntary. But that one action should be partly voluntary, partly involuntary, is absurd. And it is the absurdity of those authors which he unwarily gave credit to. But to say, supposing the man had not been in distress, that then the action had been involuntary, is to say, that the throwing of a man’s goods into the sea, supposing he had not been in a storm, had been an involuntary action; which is also an absurdity; for he would not have done it, and therefore it had been no action at all. And this absurdity is his own.

(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.” It is enough for the use I make of that instance, that a man when in the necessity of going to prison, though he cannot elect nor deliberate of being prisoner in the jail, may nevertheless deliberate sometimes, whether he shall walk or be haled thither.

(d) “Having laid this foundation, he begins to build upon it, that other passions do necessitate as much as fear. But he errs doubly,” &c. First, he says, I err in this, that I say that fear determines the rational will naturally and necessarily. And first, I answer, that I never used that term of rational will. There is nothing rational but God, angels, and men. The will is none of these. I would not have excepted against this expression, but that every where he speaketh of the will and other faculties as of men, or spirits in men’s bellies. Secondly, he offereth nothing to prove the contrary. For that which followeth: “the last and greatest of five terrible things is death; yet the fear of death cannot necessitate a resolved mind to a dishonest action; 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,” &c.: I grant him that the greatest of five (or of fifteen, for he had no more reason for five than fifteen) terrible things doth not always necessitate a man to do a dishonest action, and that the fear of the fiery furnace could not compel the three children, nor the lions Daniel, to omit their duty; for somewhat else, namely, their confidence in God, did necessitate them to do their duty. That the fear of God’s wrath doth expel corporeal fear, is well said, and according to the text he citeth: and proveth strongly, that fear of the greater evil may necessitate in a man a courage to endure the lesser evil.

(e) “Da veniam imperator; tu carcerem, ille gehennam minatur:--Excuse me, O Emperor; thou threatenest men with prison, but God threatens me with hell.” This sentence, and that which he saith No. XVII, that neither the civil judge is the proper judge, nor the law of the land is the proper rule of sin, and divers other sayings of his to the same effect, make it impossible for any nation in the world to preserve themselves from civil wars. For all men living equally acknowledging, that the High and Omnipotent God is to be obeyed before the greatest emperors; every one may pretend the commandment of God to justify his disobedience. And if one man pretendeth that God commands one thing, and another man that he commands the contrary, what equity is there to allow the pretence of one more than of another? Or what peace can there be, if they be all allowed alike? There will therefore necessarily arise discord and civil war, unless there be a judge agreed upon, with authority given to him by every one of them, to show them and interpret to them the Word of God; which interpreter is always the emperor, king, or other sovereign person, who therefore ought to be obeyed. But the Bishop thinks that to shew us and interpret to us the Word of God, belongeth to the clergy; wherein I cannot consent unto him. Excuse me, O Bishop, you threaten me with that you cannot do; but the emperor threateneth me with death, and is able to do what he threateneth.

(f) “Secondly, he errs in his superstruction also. There is a great difference, as to this case of justifying or not justifying an action, between force and fear, &c. Force doth not only lessen the sin, but takes it quite away, &c.” I know not to what point of my answer this reply of his is to be applied. I had said, the actions of men compelled are, nevertheless, voluntary. It seems that he calleth compulsion force; but I call it a fear of force, or of damage to be done by force, by which fear a man’s will is framed to somewhat to which he had no will before. Force taketh away the sin, because the action is not his that is forced, but his that forceth. It is not always so in compulsion; because, in this case, a man electeth the less evil under the notion of good. But his instances of the betrothed damsel that was forced, and of Tamar, may, for anything there appeareth in the text, be instances of compulsion, and yet the damsel and Tamar be both innocent. In that which immediately followeth, concerning how far fear may extenuate a sin, there is nothing to be answered. I perceive in it he hath some glimmering of the truth, but not of the grounds thereof. It is true, that just fear dispenseth not with the precepts of God or nature; for they are not dispensable; but it extenuateth the fault, not by diminishing anything in the action, but by being no transgression. For if the fear be allowed, the action it produceth is allowed also. Nor doth it dispense in any case with the law positive, but by making the action itself lawful; for the breaking of a law is always sin. And it is certain that men are obliged to the observation of all positive precepts, though with the loss of their lives, unless the right that a man hath to preserve himself make it, in case of a just fear, to be no law. “The omission of circumcision was no sin,” he says, “whilst the Israelites were travelling through the wilderness.” It is very true, but this has nothing to do with compulsion. And the cause why it was no sin, was this: they were ready to obey it, whensoever God should give them leisure and rest from travel, whereby they might be cured; or at least when God, that daily spake to their conductor in the desert, should appoint him to renew that sacrament.

(g) “I will propose a case to him,” &c. The case is this. A servant is robbed of his master’s money by the highway, but is acquitted because he was forced. Another servant spends his master’s money in a tavern. Why is he not acquitted also, seeing he was necessitated? “Would,” saith he, “T. H. admit of this excuse?” I answer, no: but I would do that to him, which should necessitate him to behave himself better another time, or at least necessitate another to behave himself better by his example.

(h) “He talks much of the motives to do, and 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,” &c. May not great things be produced by second causes, as well as little; and a foot-ball as well as a tennis-ball? But the Bishop can never be driven from this, that the will hath power to move itself; but says it is all one to say, that “an agent can determine itself,” and that “the will is determined by motives extrinsical”. He adds, that “if there be no necessitation before the judgment of right reason doth dictate to the will, then there is no antecedent nor extrinsical necessitation at all”. I say indeed, the effect is not produced before the last dictate of the understanding; but I say not, that the necessity was not before; he knows I say, it is from eternity. When a cannon is planted against a wall, though the battery be not made till the bullet arrive, yet the necessity was present all the while the bullet was going to it, if the wall stood still: and if it slipped away, the hitting of somewhat else was necessary, and that antecedently.

(i) “All the world knows, that when the agent is determined by himself, then the effect is determined likewise in its cause.” Yes, when the agent is determined by himself, then the effect is determined likewise in its cause; and so anything else is what he will have it. But nothing is determined by itself, nor is there any man in the world that hath any conception answerable to those words. But “motives,” he says, “determine not naturally, but morally”. This also is insignificant; for all motion is natural or supernatural. Moral motion is a mere word, without any imagination of the mind correspondent to it. I have heard men talk of a motion in a court of justice; perhaps this is it which he means by moral motion. But certainly, when the tongue of the judge and the hands of the clerks are thereby moved, the motion is natural, and proceeds from natural causes; which causes also were natural motions of the tongue of the advocate. And whereas he adds, that if this were true, then “not only motives, but reason itself and deliberation were vain”; it hath been sufficiently answered before, that therefore they are not vain, because by them is produced the effect. I must also note, that oftentimes in citing my opinion he puts in instead of mine, those terms of his own, which upon all occasions I complain of for absurdity; as here he makes me to say, that which I did never say, “special influence of extrinsical causes”.

(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.” If he understand the authors which he readeth upon this point, no better than he understands what I have here written, it is no wonder he understandeth not the truth of the question. I said not, that when we consider the causes of things, but when we see and know the strength that moves us, we acknowledge necessity. “No such thing,” says the Bishop, “but just the contrary; the more we consider, and the clearer we understand, the greater is the liberty,” &c. Is there any doubt, if a man could foreknow, as God foreknows, that which is hereafter to come to pass, but that he would also see and know the causes which shall bring it to pass, and how they work, and make the effect necessary? For necessary it is, whatsoever God foreknoweth. But we that foresee them not, may consider as much as we will, and understand as clearly as we will, but are never the nearer to the knowledge of their necessity; and that, I said, was the cause why we impute those events to liberty, and not to causes.

(l) “Lastly, he tells us, that the will doth choose of necessity, as well as the fire burns of necessity. If he intend no more but this, that election is the proper and natural act of the will, as burning is of the fire &c., he speaks truly, but most impertinently; for the question is not now of the elective power, in actu primo, &c.” Here again he makes me to speak nonsense. I said, “the man chooseth of necessity”; he says I say, “the will chooseth of necessity”. And why: but because he thinks I ought to speak as he does, and say as he does here, that “election is the act of the will”. No: election is the act of a man, as power to elect is the power of a man. Election and will are all one act of a man; and the power to elect, and the power to will, one and the same power of a man. But the Bishop is confounded by the use of calling by the name of will, the power of willing in the future; as they also were confounded, that first brought in this senseless term of actus primus. My meaning is, that the election I shall have of anything hereafter, is now as necessary, as that the fire, that now is and continueth, shall burn any combustible matter thrown into it hereafter: or to use his own terms, the will hath no more power to suspend its willing, than the burning of the fire to suspend its burning: or rather more properly, the man hath no more power to suspend his will, than the fire to suspend its burning. Which is contrary to that which he would have, namely, that a man should have power to refuse what he wills, and to suspend his own appetite. For to refuse what one willeth, implieth a contradiction; the which also is made much more absurd by his expression. For he saith, the will hath power to refuse what it wills, and to suspend its own appetite: whereas the will, and the willing, and the appetite is the same thing. He adds that “even the burning of the fire, if it be considered as it is invested with all particular circumstances, is not so necessary an action as T. H. imagineth”. He doth not sufficiently understand what I imagine. For I imagine, that of the fire which shall burn five hundred years hence, I may truly say now, it shall burn necessarily; and of that which shall not burn then, (for fire may sometimes not burn the combustible matter thrown into it, as in the case of the three children), that it is necessary it shall not burn.

(m) “Two things are required to make an effect necessary: first that it be produced by a necessary cause, &c.: secondly, that it be necessarily produced, &c.” To this I say nothing, but that I understand not how a cause can be necessary, and the effect not be necessarily produced.

(n) “My second reason against this distinction of liberty from compulsion, but not from necessitation, is new, and demonstrates clearly, 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, &c.” By this second reason, which he says is new, and demonstrates, &c, I cannot find what reason he means. For there are but two, whereof the latter is in these words: “Secondly, to rip up the bottom of this business, this I take to be the clear resolution of the Schools; there is a double act of the will; the one more remote, called imperatus, &c.; the other act is nearer, called actus elicitus,” &c. But I doubt whether this be it he means, or no. For this being the resolution of the Schools, is not new; and being a distinction only, is no demonstration; though perhaps he may use the word demonstration, as every unlearned man now-a-days does, to signify any argument of his own. As for the distinction itself, because the terms are Latin, and never used by any author of the Latin tongue, to shew their impertinence I expounded them in English, and left them to the reader’s judgment to find the absurdity of them himself. And the Bishop in this part of his reply endeavours to defend them. And first, he calls it a trivial and grammatical objection, to say they are improper and obscure. Is there anything less beseeming a divine or a philosopher, than to speak improperly and obscurely, where the truth is in question? Perhaps it may be tolerable in one that divineth, but not in him that pretendeth to demonstrate. It is not the universal current of divines and philosophers, that giveth words their authority, but the generality of them who acknowledge that they understand them. Tyrant and præmunire, though their signification be changed, yet they are understood; and so are the names of the days, Sunday, Monday, Tuesday. And when English readers not engaged in School divinity, shall find imperate and elicit acts as intelligible as those, I will confess I had no reason to find fault.

But my braving against that famous and most necessary distinction, between the elicit and imperate acts of the will, he says was only to hide from the eyes of the reader a tergiversation in not answering this argument of his; ‘he who doth necessitate the will to evil, is the true cause of evil; but God is not the cause of evil; therefore he does not necessitate the will to evil’. This argument is not to be found in this No. XX., to which I here answered; nor had I ever said that the will was compelled. But he, taking all necessitation for compulsion, doth now in this place, from necessitation simply, bring in this inference concerning the cause of evil, and thinks he shall force me to say that God is the cause of sin. I shall say only what is said in the Scripture, non est malum, quod ego non feci. I shall say what Micaiah saith to Ahab, (1 Kings xxii. 23): Behold, the Lord hath put a lying spirit into the mouth of all these thy prophets. I shall say that that is true, which the prophet David saith (2 Sam. xvi. 10): Let him curse; because the Lord hath said unto him, curse David. But that which God himself saith of himself (1 Kings xii. 15): The king hearkened not to the people, for the cause was from the Lord: I will not say, least the Bishop exclaim against me; but leave it to be interpreted by those that have authority to interpret the Scriptures. I say further, that to cause sin is not always sin, nor can be sin in him that is not subject to some higher power; but to use so unseemly a phrase, as to say that God is the cause of sin, because it soundeth so like to saying that God sinneth, I can never be forced by so weak an argument as this of his. Luther says, we act necessarily; necessarily by necessity of immutability, not by necessity of constraint: that is in plain English, necessarily, but not against our wills. Zanchius says, (Tract. Theol. cap. VI. Thes. I.): The freedom of our will doth not consist in this, that there is no necessity of our sinning; but in this, that there is no constraint. Bucer (Lib. de Concordia): Whereas the Catholics say, man has free will, we must understand it of freedom from constraint, and not freedom from necessity. Calvin (Inst. cap. II. sec. VI.): And thus shall man be said to have free will, not because he hath equal freedom to do good and evil, but because he does the evil he does, not by constraint, but willingly. Monsr. du Moulin, in his Buckler of the Faith (art. IX): The necessity of sinning is not repugnant to the freedom of the will. Witness the devils, who are necessarily wicked, and yet sin freely without constraint. And the Synod of Dort: Liberty is not opposite to all kinds of necessity and determination. It is indeed opposite to the necessity of constraint: but standeth well enough with the necessity of infallibility. I could add more: for all the famous doctors of the Reformed Churches, and with them St. Augustin, are of the same opinion. None of these denied that God is the cause of all motion and action, or that God is the cause of all laws; and yet they were never forced to say, that God is the cause of sin.

(o) “‘They who invented this term of actus imperatus, understood not’, he saith, ‘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 mental terms, which are only conceived in the mind, as well as vocal terms, which are expressed with the tongue, &c.” In this place the Bishop hath discovered the ground of all his errors in philosophy, which is this; that he thinketh, when he repeateth the words of a proposition in his mind, that is, when he fancieth the words without speaking them, that then he conceiveth the things which the words signify: and this is the most general cause of false opinions. For men can never be deceived in the conceptions of things, though they may be, and are most often deceived by giving unto them wrong terms or appellations, different from those which are commonly used and constituted to signify their conceptions. And therefore they that study to attain the certain knowledge of the truth, do use to set down beforehand all the terms they are to express themselves by, and declare in what sense they shall use them constantly. And by this means, the reader having an idea of every thing there named, cannot conceive amiss. But when a man from the hearing of a word hath no idea of the thing signified, but only of the sound and of the letters whereof the word is made, which is that he here calleth mental terms, it is impossible he should conceive aright, or bring forth any thing but absurdity; as he doth here, when he says, “that when Tarquin delivered his commands to his son by only striking off the tops of the poppies, he did it by mental terms”; as if to strike off the head of a poppy, were a mental term. It is the sound and the letters, that maketh him think elicitus and imperatus somewhat. And it is the same thing that makes him say, for think it he cannot, that to will or choose, is drawn, or allured, or fetched out of the power to will. For drawing cannot be imagined but of bodies; and therefore to will, to speak, to write, to dance, to leap, or any way to be moved, cannot be said intelligibly to be drawn, much less to be drawn out of a power, that is to say, out of an ability; for whatsoever is drawn out, is drawn out of one place into another. He that can discourse in this manner in philosophy, cannot probably be thought able to discourse rationally in any thing.

(p) “His other objection against this distinction of the acts of the will into elicit and imperate, is 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 truly, nor as properly.” He says, actus imperatus is when a man opens or shuts his eyes at the command of the will. I say, when a man opens and shuts his eyes according to his will, that it is a voluntary action; and I believe we mean one and the same thing. Whether of us speak more properly or more truly, let the reader judge.

(q) “But his mistakes are so thick, &c., 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 terror, &c.” This is nothing but Tohu and Bohu.

NO. XXI.

The Bishop’s reply.

J. D. “The rest are umbrages quickly dispelled. First, the astrologer steps up, and subjects liberty to the motions of heaven, to the aspects and ascensions of the stars:

----Plus etenim fati valet hora benigni,

Quam si nos Veneris commendet epistola Marti.

“I stand not much upon them, who cannot see the fishes swimming beside them in the rivers, yet believe they see those which are in heaven; who promise great treasures to others, and beg a groat for themselves. The stars at the most do but incline, they cannot necessitate.

“Secondly, the physician subjects liberty to the complexion and temperature of the body. But yet this comes not home to a necessity. Socrates, and many others, by assiduous care have corrected the pernicious propensions, which flowed from their temperatures.”

T. H. In the rest of his discourse he reckoneth up the opinions of certain professions of men, touching the causes wherein the necessity of things, which they maintain, consisteth. And first, he saith, the astrologer deriveth his necessity from the stars. Secondly, that the physician attributeth it to the temper of the body. For my part, I am not of their opinion; because neither the stars alone, nor the temperature of the patient alone is able to produce any effect without the concurrence of all other agents. For there is hardly any one action, how casual soever it seem, to the causing whereof concur not whatsoever is in rerum natura. Which, because it is a great paradox, and depends on many antecedent speculations, I do not press in this place.

J. D. “Towards the latter end of my discourse, I answered some specious pretences against liberty. The two first were of the astrologer and the physician: the one subjecting liberty to the motions and influences of the heavenly bodies; the other to the complexions of men. (a) The sum of my answer was, that the stars and complexions do incline, but not at all necessitate the will: to which all judicious astronomers and physicians do assent. And T. H. himself doth not dissent from it. So as to this part, there needs no reply.

(b) “But whereas he mentions a ‘great paradox of his own, that there is hardly any one action to the causing of which concurs not whatsoever is in rerum natura’; I can but smile to see with what ambition our great undertakers do affect to be accounted the first founders of strange opinions, as if the devising of an ill-grounded paradox were as great an honour as the invention of the needle, or the discovery of the new world. And as to this paradox in particular, I meddle not with natural actions, because the subject of my discourse is moral liberty. But if he intend not only the kinds of things, but every individual creature, and not only in natural but voluntary actions, I desire to know how Prester John, or the great Mogul, or the king of China, or any one of so many millions of their subjects, do concur to my writing of this reply. If they do not, among his other speculations concerning this matter I hope he will give us some restrictions. It were hard to make all the negroes accessary to all the murders that are committed in Europe.”

ANIMADVERSIONS UPON THE BISHOP’S REPLY NO. XXI.

There is not much in this part of his reply that needeth animadversion. But I must observe, where he saith, (a) “the sum of my answer was, that the stars and complexions do incline, but not at all necessitate the will:” he answereth nothing at all to me, who attribute not the necessitation of the will to the stars and complexions, but to the aggregate of all things together that are in motion. I do not say, that the stars or complexions of themselves do incline men to will; but when men are inclined, I must say that that inclination was necessitated by some causes or other.

(b) “But whereas he mentions ‘a great paradox of his own; that there is hardly any one action, to the causing of which concurs not whatsoever is in rerum natura’; I can but smile to see with what ambition our great undertakers do affect to be accounted the first founders of strange opinions, &c.” The Bishop speaks often of paradoxes with such scorn or detestation, that a simple reader would take a paradox either for felony or some other heinous crime, or else for some ridiculous turpitude; whereas perhaps a judicious reader knows what the word signifies; and that a paradox, is an opinion not yet generally received. Christian religion was once a paradox; and a great many other opinions which the Bishop now holdeth, were formerly paradoxes. Insomuch as when a man calleth an opinion a paradox, he doth not say it is untrue, but signifieth his own ignorance; for if he understood it, he would call it either a truth or an error. He observes not, that but for paradoxes we should be now in that savage ignorance, which those men are in that have not, or have not long had laws and commonwealth, from whence proceedeth science and civility. There was not long since a scholar that maintained, that if the least thing that had weight should be laid down upon the hardest body that could be, supposing it an anvil of diamant, it would at the first access make it yield. This I thought, and much more the Bishop would have thought, a paradox. But when he told me, that either that would do it, or all the weight of the world would not do it, because if the whole weight did it, every the least part thereof would do its part, I saw no reason to dissent. In like manner when I say, ‘there is hardly any one action to the causing of which concurs not whatsoever is in rerum natura;’ it seems to the Bishop a great paradox; and if I should say that all action is the effect of motion, and that there cannot be a motion in one part of the world, but the same must also be communicated to all the rest of the world, he would say that this were no less a paradox. But yet if I should say, that if a lesser body, as a concave sphere or tun, were filled with air, or other liquid matter, and that any one little particle thereof were moved, all the rest would be moved also, he would conceive it to be true, or if not he, a judicious reader would. It is not the greatness of the tun that altereth the case; and therefore the same would be true also, if the whole world were the tun; for it is the greatness of this tun that the Bishop comprehendeth not. But the truth is comprehensible enough, and may be said without ambition of being the founder of strange opinions. And though a grave man may smile at it, he that is both grave and wise will not.

NO. XXII.

The Bishop’s reply.

J. D. “Thirdly, the moral philosopher tells us how we are haled hither and thither with outward objects. To this I answer, “First, that the power which outward objects have over us, is for the most part by our own default, because of those vicious habits which we have contracted. Therefore though the actions seem to have a kind of violence in them, yet they were free and voluntary in their first originals. As a paralytic man, to use Aristotle’s comparison, shedding the liquor deserves to be punished, for though his act be unwilling, yet his intemperance was willing, whereby he contracted this infirmity.

“Secondly I answer, that concupiscence, and custom, and bad company, and outward objects do indeed make a proclivity, but not a necessity. By prayers, tears, meditations, vows, watchings, fastings, humi-cubations, a man may get a contrary habit, and gain the victory, not only over outward objects, but also over his own corruptions, and become the king of the little world of himself.

Si metuis, si prava cupis, si duceris irâ,
Servitii patiere jugum, tolerabis iniquas
Interius leges. Tunc omnia jure tenebis,
Cum poteris rex esse tui.

“Thirdly, a resolved mind, which weighs all things judiciously and provides for all occurrences, is not so easily surprised with outward objects. Only Ulysses wept not at the meeting with his wife and son. I would beat thee, said the philosopher, but that I am angry. One spake lowest, when he was most moved. Another poured out the water, when he was thirsty. Another made a covenant with his eyes. Neither opportunity nor enticement could prevail with Joseph. Nor the music nor the fire, with the three children. It is not the strength of the wind, but the lightness of the chaff, which causeth it to be blown away. Outward objects do not impose a moral, much less a physical necessity; they may be dangerous, but cannot be destructive to true liberty.”

T. H. Thirdly, he disputeth against the opinion of them that say, external objects presented to men of such and such temperatures, do make their actions necessary; and says, the power, that such objects have over us, proceeds from our own fault. But that is nothing to the purpose, if such fault of ours proceedeth from causes not in our own power. And therefore that opinion may hold true, for all this answer. Further, he saith, prayer, fasting, &c., may alter our habits. It is true: but when they do so, they are causes of the contrary habit, and make it necessary; as the former habit had been necessary, if prayer, fasting, &c., had not been. Besides we are not moved, nor disposed to prayer or any other action, but by outward objects, as pious company, godly preachers, or something equivalent. In the next place he saith, a resolved mind is not easily surprised. As the mind of Ulysses, who, when others wept, he alone wept not. And of the philosopher that abstained from striking, because he found 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 only that it was not necessary for Ulysses then to weep, nor for the philosopher to strike, nor for that other man to drink: but it does not prove that it was not necessary for Ulysses then to abstain, 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 proved.

Lastly, he confesseth that the disposition of objects may be dangerous to liberty, but cannot be destructive. To which I answer, it is impossible; for liberty is never in any other danger than to be lost. And if it cannot be lost, which he confesseth, I may infer it can be in no danger at all.

J. D. (a) “The third pretence was out of moral philosophy misunderstood, that outward objects do necessitate the will. I shall not need to repeat what he hath omitted, but only to satisfy 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 mere 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 from whence they do proceed. (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 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 moved to prayer or any other action, but by outward objects, as pious 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 moved by itself, by the understanding, by the sensitive passions, by angels good and 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 appetibility of objects, and the unruliness of passions: as I showed by example. (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 slight 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, (f) and 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 ourselves, 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 gormandizing, or by some extravagant passion which they have cherished in themselves, or by doting too much upon some affected object, do become very sots, 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 choice of a bad wife, hath lost his former liberty to choose a good one.”one.”

ANIMADVERSIONS UPON THE BISHOP’S REPLY NO. 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 will, can any way be referred to moral philosophy. The principles of moral philosophy are the laws; wherewith outward objects have little to do, as being for the most part inanimate, and which follow always 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 morality.

(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 mere subterfuge.” But how proves 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, it is no injustice unless 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 of the will 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. is in our own power. “‘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.” Again he mistakes: for I said that prayer, fasting, &c. when they alter our habits, do necessarily cause the contrary habits; which is not to say, that the habit necessitates, but is necessitated. But this is common with him, to make me say that which out of reading, not out of meditation, he useth to say himself. But how doth it appear, that prayer and fasting, &c. make but a proclivity in men to do what they do? For if it were but a proclivity, then what they do they do not. Therefore they either necessitate the will, or the will followeth not. I contend for the truth of this only, that when the will followeth them, they necessitate the will; and when a proclivity followeth, they necessitate the proclivity. But the Bishop thinks I maintain, that that also is produced necessarily, which is not produced at all.

(d) “He adds, ‘that we are not moved to prayer or any other action, but by outward objects, as pious company, and 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 moved by itself, &c”. The first mistake, he urgeth that I call preachers and company objects. Is not the preacher to the hearer the object of his hearing? No, perhaps he will say, it is the voice which is the object; and that we hear not the preacher, but his voice; as before he said, the object of sight was not the cause of sight. I must therefore once more make him smile with a great paradox, which is this; that in all the senses, the object is the agent; and that it is, when we hear a preacher, the preacher that we hear; and that his voice is the same thing with the hearing and a fancy in the hearer, though the motion of the lips and other organs of speech be his that speaketh. But of this I have written more largely in a more proper place.

My second mistake, in affirming that the will is not moved but by outward objects, is a mistake of his own. For I said not, the will is not moved, but we are not moved: for I always avoid attributing motion to any thing but body. The will is produced, generated, formed, and created in such sort as accidents are effected in a corporeal subject; but moved it cannot be, because it goeth not from place to place. And whereas he saith, “the will is moved by itself,” if he had spoken properly as he ought to do, and said, the will is made or created by itself, he would presently have acknowledged that it was impossible. So that it is not without cause men use improper language, when they mean to keep their errors from being detected. And because nothing can move that is not itself moved, it is untruly said that either the will or any thing else is moved by itself, by the understanding, by the sensitive passions, or by acts or habits; or that acts or habits are infused by God. For infusion is motion, and nothing is moved but bodies.

(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.” By his favour, though he be answering now, he was proving then. And what he answers now, maketh nothing more toward a proof than was before. For these words, “the rational will hath power to slight the most appetible objects, and to control the most unruly passions,” are no more, being reduced into proper terms, than this: the appetite hath power to be without appetite towards most appetible objects, and to will contrary to the most unruly will; which is jargon.

(f) “He 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 lost, &c.; secondly, liberty is in danger likewise to be weakened by vicious habits; thirdly, it may be totally lost.” It is true that a man hath more liberty one time than another, and in one place than another; which is a difference of liberty as to the body. But as to the liberty of doing what we will, in those things we are able to do it cannot be greater one time than another. Consequently outward objects can no ways endanger liberty, further than it destroyeth it. And his answer, that liberty is in more danger to be abused than lost, is not to the question, but a mere shift to be thought not silenced. And whereas he says liberty is diminished by vicious habits, it cannot be understood otherwise than that vicious habits make a man the less free to do vicious actions; which I believe is not his meaning. And lastly, whereas he says that “liberty is lost, when reason is lost; and that they who by excess of study, or by continual gormandising, or by extravagant passion, &c., do become sots, have consequently lost their liberty”: it requireth proof. For, for any thing that I can observe, mad men and fools have the same liberty that other men have, in those things that are in their power to do.

NO. XXIII.

The Bishop’s reply.

J. D. “Fourthly, the natural philosopher doth teach, that the will doth necessarily follow the last dictate of the understanding. It is true indeed the will should follow the direction of the understanding; but I am not satisfied that it doth evermore follow it. Sometimes this saying hath place: video meliora proboque, deteriora sequor. As that great Roman said of two suitors, that the one produced the better reasons, but the other must have the office. So reason often lies dejected at the feet of affection. Things nearer to the senses move more powerfully. Do what a man can, he shall sorrow more for the death of his child, than for the sin of his soul; yet appreciatively in the estimation of judgment, he accounts the offence of God a greater evil than any temporal loss.

“Next, I do not believe that a man is bound to weigh the expedience or inexpedience of every ordinary trivial action to the least grain in the balance of his understanding; or to run up into his watch-tower with his perspective to take notice of every jackdaw that flies by, for fear of some hidden danger. This seems to me to be a prostitution of reason to petit observations as concerning every rag that a man wears, each drop of drink, each morsel of bread that he eats, 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 may 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 discernible difference can appear between them upon discussion. As suppose a chirurgeon should give two plaisters to his patient, and bid him apply either of 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 to better judgments, I answer the philosopher briefly thus: admitting that the will did necessarily follow the last dictate of the understanding, as certainly in many things it doth: yet, first, this is no extrinsical determination from without, and a man’s 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 joined 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, necesse est esse: a necessity of consequence, but not a necessity of consequent. Though an agent have certainly determined, and so thethe action be become infallible, yet if the agent did determine freely, the action likewise is free.”

T. H. The fourth opinion which he rejecteth, 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 action they do, great and small, to the least grain; which is a thing that he thinks with reason to be untrue. But I understand it to signify, that the will follows the last opinion or judgment, immediately preceding the 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 follows necessarily that thought he had of the sequel of his stroke, immediately before the lifting of his hand. Now if it be understood in that sense, the last dictate of the understanding does certainly necessitate the action, though not as the whole cause, yet as the last cause: as the last feather necessitates the breaking of a horse’s back, when there are so many laid on before, as there needeth but the addition of that one to make the weight sufficient. That which he allegeth against this, is first, out of a poet, who in the person of Medea says, video meliora proboque, deteriora sequor. But the saying, as pretty as it is, 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 other 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 nearer the senses move 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 evil consequents to come? Fourthly, whereas he says, 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 pretence alleged 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 No. VII. 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 always determine the will, yet this determination being not antecedent in time, nor proceeding from extrinsical causes, but from the proper resolution of the agent, who had now freely determined himself, it makes no absolute necessity, but only hypothetical, upon supposition 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 always certain that the will doth always actually follow the last dictate of the understanding, though it always 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 judgment. 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 stroke 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 horse’s back. A third reason was, because passions and affections sometimes prevail against judgment: as I proved by the example of Medea and Cæsar, by the nearness 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 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 itself is not weighed. Secondly, the sensitive passion, in some extraordinary cases, may give a counterfeit weight to the object, if it can detain or divert reason from the balance: but ordinarily the means, circumstances, and causes concurrent, they have their whole weight from the understanding; so as they do not press the horse’s back at all, until reason lay them on. Thirdly, he conceives that as each feather has a certain natural weight, whereby it concurs not arbitrarily, but necessarily towards the overcharging of the horse; so all objects and causes have a natural efficiency, whereby they do physically determine the will; which is a great mistake. His objects, his agents, his motives, his passions, and all his concurrent causes, ordinarily do only move the will morally, not determine it naturally. So as it hath in all ordinary actions a free dominion over itself.

“His other example, of a man that strikes, ‘whose will to strike followeth necessarily that thought he had of the sequel of his 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 only a necessity upon supposition.

“Concerning Medea’s choice, the strength of the argument doth not lie 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 choice 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 (Rom. vii. 15) saith as much in earnest, as is feigned of Medea: that he approved not that which he did, and that he did that which he hated. The Roman story is mistaken: there was no bribe in the case but affection. Whereas I urge, that those things which are nearer to the senses do move more powerfully, he lays 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, doth render the action more free, not less free, and introduceth only a necessity upon supposition.

“Lastly, he saith, that ‘a man’s mourning more for the loss of his child than for his sin, makes nothing to the last dictates 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 prevails against the dictate of reason. That which he infers 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 God’s grace preventing, and man’s will concurring. God prevents freely, man concurs freely. Those inferior 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 truly 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.’s errors 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 BISHOP’S REPLY NO. XXIII.

(a) “Supposing the last dictate of the understanding did always determine the will, yet this determination, being not antecedent in time, nor proceeding from extrinsical causes, but from the proper resolution of the agent, who had now freely determined himself, makes no absolute necessity, but only hypothetical, &c.” This is the Bishop’s answer to the necessity inferred from that, that the will 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 will itself, and therefore not antecedent. It is true, that the will is not produced but in the same instant with the last dictate of the understanding; but the necessity of the will, 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 itself. For all motion through any determined space, necessarily makes a motion through the next space, unless 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 will does not certainly follow the last dictate of the understanding, though it always 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 anything that appears not first in his understanding to be good for him. And whereas he says the will ought to follow the last dictate of the understanding, unless he mean that the man ought to follow it, it is an insignificant speech; for duties are the man’s not the will’s duties: and if he meanshe means so, then it 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 less liberty, as they have more or less 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 off 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 chirurgeon 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 will 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 sometimes prevail against judgment.” I confess they prevail often against wisdom, 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 will of a passionate and peevish fool doth no less follow the dictate of that little understanding he hath, than the will of the wisest man followeth his wisdom.

(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.” 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 than elegance. But the Bishop with his School-terms is far from perspicuity. How near he is to elegance, 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 itself 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 will. Again, the objects, means, &c, are the feathers that press the horse, the feeling of that pressure is understanding, and his patience or impatience the will to bear them, if not too many, or if too many, to lie down under them. It 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 press the horse’s 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 only move the will morally, not determine it naturally, so as it hath in all ordinary actions a free dominion over itself,” is all nonsense. For no man can understand, that the understanding maketh any alteration in the object in weight or lightness; nor that reason lays on objects upon the understanding; nor that the will is moved, nor that any motion is moral; nor that these words, the will hath a free dominion over itself, signify anything. With the rest of this reply I shall trust the reader; and only 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 confutes it with these senseless 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 will is voluntary? But yet the will is the cause of voluntary actions.

NO. XXIV.

The Bishop’s reply.

J. D. “Fifthly and lastly, the divine labours to find out a way how 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 wisdom itself, not just, but justice itself, so he is not eternal, but eternity itself: 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 itself.”

T. H. The last part of this discourse containeth 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 treatise, out of which he only repeateth two things. One is, that “we ought not to desert a certain truth, for not being able to comprehend the certain manner of it”. And I say the same; as for example, that he ought not to desert this certain truth: that there are certain and necessary causes, which make every man to will what he willeth, though he do not yet conceive in what manner the will of man is caused. And yet I think the manner of it is not very hard to conceive: seeing that we see daily, that praise, dispraise, reward, punishment, good and evil sequels of men’s actions retained in memory, do frame and make us to the election of whatsoever it be that we elect; and that the memory of such things proceeds from the senses, and sense from the operation of the objects of sense, which are external to us, and governed only by God Almighty; and by consequence, all actions, even of free and voluntary agents, are necessary.

The other thing he repeateth is, that “the best way to reconcile contingency and liberty with the prescience and decrees of God, is to subject future contingents to the aspect of God”. The same is also my opinion, but contrary to what he hath all this while laboured to prove. For hitherto he held liberty and necessity, that is to say, liberty and the decrees of God, irreconcilable; unless the aspect of God (which word appeareth now the first time in this discourse) signify somewhat else besides God’s will and decree, which I cannot understand. But he adds, that we must subject them “according to that presentiality which they have in eternity”; which he says cannot be done by them that conceive eternity to be an everlasting succession, but only by them that conceive it an indivisible point. To this I answer, that as soon as I can conceive eternity to be an indivisible point, or any thing but an everlasting succession, I will renounce all I have written on this subject. I know St. Thomas Aquinas calls eternity nunc stans, an ever abiding now; which is easy enough to say, but though I fain would, I never could conceive it; they that can, are more happy than I. But in the mean time he alloweth hereby all men to be of my opinion, save only those that conceive in their minds a nunc stans; which I think are none. I understand as little, how it can be true that “God is not just, but justice itself, not wise but wisdom itself, not eternal but eternity itself”: nor how he concludes thence that “eternity is a point indivisible, and not a succession”: nor in what sense it can be said, that an “infinite point,” &c, wherein is no succession, can “comprehend all times,” though time be successive.

These phrases I find not in the Scripture. I wonder therefore what was the design of the Schoolmen to bring them up; unless they thought a man could not be a true Christian, unless his understanding be first strangled with such hard sayings.

And thus much in answer to his discourse; wherein I think not only his squadrons, but also his reserves of distinctions are defeated. And now your Lordship shall have my doctrine concerning the same question, with my reasons for it, positively and briefly as I can, without any terms of art, in plain English.

J. D. (a) “That poor discourse which I mention, was not written against any divines, but in way of examination of a French treatise, which your Lordship’s brother did me the honour to show me at York. (b) My assertion is most true, that we ought not to desert a certain truth because we are not able to comprehend the certain manner. Such a truth is that which I maintain, that the will of man in ordinary actions is free from extrinsical determination: a truth demonstrable in reason, received and believed by all the world. And therefore, though I be not able to comprehend or express exactly the certain manner how it consists together with God’s eternal prescience and decrees, which exceed my weak capacity, yet I ought to adhere to that truth which is manifest. But T. H.’s opinion, of the absolute necessity of all events by reason of their antecedent determination in their extrinsical and necessary causes, is no such certain truth, but an innovation, a strange paradox, without probable grounds, rejected by all authors, yea, by all the world. Neither is the manner how the second causes do operate, so obscure, or so transcendent above the reach of reason, as the eternal decrees of God are. And therefore in both these respects, he cannot challenge the same privilege. I am in possession of an old truth, derived by inheritance or succession from mine ancestors. And therefore, though I were not able to clear every quirk in law, yet I might justly hold my possession until a better title were showed for another. He is no old possessor, but a new pretender, and is bound to make good his claim by evident proofs: not by weak and inconsequent suppositions or inducements, such as those are which he useth here, of ‘praises, dispraises, rewards, punishments, the memory of good and evil sequels and events’; which may incline the will, but neither can nor do necessitate the will: nor by uncertain and accidental inferences, such as this; ‘the memory of praises, dispraises, rewards, punishments, good and evil sequels, do make us’ (he should say, dispose us) ‘to elect what we elect; but the memory of these things is from the sense, and the sense from the operation of the external objects, and the agency of external objects is only from God; therefore all actions, even of free and voluntary agents, are necessary’. (c) To pass by all the other great imperfections which are to be found in this sorite, it is just like that old sophistical piece: He that drinks well sleeps well, he that sleeps well thinks no hurt, he that thinks no hurt lives well; therefore he that drinks well lives well.

(d) “In the very last passage of my discourse I proposed mine own private opinion, how it might be made appear, that the eternal prescience and decrees of God are consistent with true liberty and contingency. And this I set down in as plain terms as I could, or as so profound a speculation would permit: which is almost wholly misunderstood by T. H., and many of my words wrested to a wrong sense. As first, where I speak of the aspect of God, that is, his view, his knowledge, by which the most free and contingent actions were manifest to him from eternity, (Heb. iv. 13, all things are naked and open to his eyes), and this not discursively, but intuitively, not by external species, but by his internal essence; he confounds this with the will and the decrees of God; though he found not the word aspect before in this discourse, he might have found prescience. (e) Secondly, he chargeth me, that hitherto I have maintained that ‘liberty and the decrees of God are irreconcilable.’ If I have said any such thing, my heart never went along with my pen. No, but his reason why he chargeth me on this manner is, because I have maintained that ‘liberty and the absolute necessity of all things’ are irreconcilable. That is true indeed. What then? ‘Why,’ saith he, ‘necessity and God’s decrees are all one.’ How all one? That were strange indeed. Necessity may be a consequent of God’s decrees; it cannot be the decree itself. (f) But to cut his argument short: God hath decreed all effects which come to pass in time; yet not all after the same manner, but according to the distinct natures, capacities, and conditions of his creatures, which he doth not destroy by his decree; some he acteth, with some he co-operateth by special influence, and some he only permitteth. Yet this is no idle or bare permission; seeing he doth concur both by way of general influence, giving power to act; and also by disposing all events necessary, free, and contingent to his own glory. (g) Thirdly, he chargeth me, that I ‘allow all men to be of his opinion, save only those that conceive in their minds a nunc stans, or how eternity is an indivisible point, rather than an everlasting succession’. But I have given no such allowance. I know there are many other ways proposed by divines, for reconciling the eternal prescience and decrees of God with the liberty and contingency of second causes; some of which may please other judgments better than this of mine. Howsoever, though a man could comprehend none of all these ways, yet remember what I said, that a certain truth ought not to be rejected, because we are not able, in respect of our weakness, to understand the certain manner or reason of it. I know the loadstone hath an attractive power to draw the iron to it; and yet I know not how it comes to have such a power.

“But the chiefest difficulty which offers itself in this section is, whether eternity be an indivisible point, as I maintain it; or an everlasting succession, as he would have it. According to his constant use, he gives no answer to what was urged by me, but pleads against it from his own incapacity. ‘I never could conceive,’ saith he, ‘how eternity should be an indivisible point.’ I believe, that neither we nor any man else can comprehend it so clearly as we do these inferior things. The nearer that anything comes to the essence of God, the more remote it is from our apprehension. But shall we therefore make potentialities, and successive duration, and former and later, or a part without a part, as they say, to be in God? Because we are not able to understand clearly the divine perfection, we must not therefore attribute any imperfection to him.

(h) “He saith moreover, that ‘he understands as little how it can be true which I say, that God is not just but justice itself, not eternal but eternity itself.’ It seems, howsoever he be versed in this question, that he hath not troubled his head overmuch with reading School-divines or metaphysicians, if he make faculties or qualities to be in God really distinct from his essence. God is a most simple or pure act, which can admit no composition of substance and accidents. Doth he think, that the most perfect essence of God cannot act sufficiently without faculties and qualities? The infinite perfection of the Divine essence excludes all passive or receptive powers, and cannot be perfected more than it is by any accidents. The attributes of God are not divers virtues or qualities in him, as they are in the creatures; but really one and the same with the Divine essence, and among themselves. They are attributed to God to supply the defect of our capacity, who are not able to understand that which is to be known of God under one name, or one act of the understanding.

“Furthermore he saith, that ‘he understands not how I conclude from hence, that eternity is an indivisable point, and not a succession’. (i) I will help him. The Divine substance is indivisible; but eternity is the Divine substance. The major is evident, because God is actus simplicissimus, a most simple act; wherein there is no manner of composition, neither of matter and form, nor of subject and accidents, nor of parts, &c; and by consequence no divisibility. The minor hath been clearly demonstrated in mine answer to his last doubt, and is confessed by all men that whatsoever is in God, is God.

“Lastly, he saith, he conceives not ‘how it can be said, that an infinite point, wherein is no succession, can comprehend all time which is successive’. I answer, that it doth not comprehend it formally, as time is successive; but eminently and virtually, as eternity is infinite. To-day all eternity is co-existent with this day: to-morrow all eternity will be co-existent with to-morrow: and so in like manner with all the parts of time, being itself without parts. He saith, ‘he finds not these phrases in the Scripture’. No, but he may find the thing in the Scripture, that God is infinite in all his attributes, and not capable of any imperfection.

“And so to show his antipathy against the Schoolmen, that he hath no liberty or power to contain himself when he meets with any of their phrases or tenets, he falls into another paroxism or fit of inveighing against them; and so concludes his answer with a plaudite to himself, because he had defeated both my squadrons of arguments and reserves of distinctions

Dicite Io pæan, et Io bis dicite pæan.

“But“But because his eyesight was weak, and their backs were towards him, he quite mistook the matter. Those whom he saw routed and running away, were his own scattered forces.”

ANIMADVERSIONS UPON THE BISHOP’S REPLY, NO. XXIV.

(a) “That poor discourse which I mention, was not written against any divines, but in way of examination of a French treatise, &c”. This is in reply to those words of mine, “this discourse containeth 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 treatise”. If the French treatise were according to his mind, what need was there that the examination should be written? If it were not to his mind, it was in confutation of him, that is to say, written against the author of it: unless perhaps the Bishop thinks that he writes not against a man, unless he charge him with blasphemy and atheism, as he does me.

(b) “My assertion is most true, that we ought not to desert a certain truth, because we are not able to comprehend the certain manner.” To this I answered, that it was true; and as he alleged it for a reason why he should not be of my opinion, so I alleged it for a reason why I should not be of his. But now in his reply he saith, that his opinion is “a truth demonstrable in reason, received and believed by all the world. And therefore, though he be not able to comprehend or express exactly the certain manner how this liberty of will consists with God’s eternal prescience and decrees, yet he ought to adhere to that truth which is manifest.” But why should he adhere to it, unless it be manifest to himself? And if it be manifest to himself, why does he deny that he is able to comprehend it? And if he be not able to comprehend it, how knows he that it is demonstrable? Or why says he that so confidently, which he does not know? Methinks that which I have said, namely, that “that which God foreknows shall be hereafter, cannot but be hereafter, and at the same time that he foreknew it should be; but that which cannot but be, is necessary; therefore what God foreknows, shall be necessarily, and at the time foreknown”: this I say looketh somewhat liker to a demonstration, than any thing that he hath hitherto brought to prove free will. Another reason why I should be of his opinion, is that he is “in possession of an old truth derived to him by inheritance or succession from his ancestors”. To which I answer, first, that I am in possession of a truth derived to me from the light of reason. Secondly, that whereas he knoweth not whether it be the truth that he possesseth, or not; because he confesseth he knows not how it can consist with God’s prescience and decrees; I have sufficiently shewn that my opinion of necessity not only agrees with, but necessarily followeth from the eternal prescience and decrees of God. Besides, it is an unhandsome thing for a man to derive his opinion concerning truth by succession from his ancestors; for our ancestors, the first Christians, derived not therefore their truth from the Gentiles, because they were their ancestors.

(c) “To pass by all the other great imperfections which are to be found in this sorite, it is just like an old philosophical piece: he that drinks well, sleeps well; he that sleeps well, thinks no hurt; he that thinks no hurt, lives well; therefore he that drinks well, lives well.” My argument was thus: “election is always from the memory of good and evil sequels; memory is always from the sense; and sense always from the action of external bodies; and all action from God; therefore all actions, even of free and voluntary agents, are from God, and consequently necessary”. Let the Bishop compare now his scurrilous argumentation with this of mine; and tell me, whether he that sleeps well, doth all his lifetime think no hurt.

(d) “In the very last passage of my discourse I proposed my own private opinion, how it might be made appear that the eternal prescience and decrees of God are consistent with true liberty and contingency, &c.” If he had meant by liberty, as other men do, the liberty of action, that is, of things which are in his power to do which he will, it had been an easy matter to reconcile it with the prescience and decrees of God; but meaning the liberty of will, it was impossible. So likewise, if by contingency he had meant simply coming to pass, it had been reconcilable with the decrees of God; but meaning coming to pass without necessity, it was impossible. And therefore though it be true he says, that “he set it down in as plain terms as he could”, yet it was impossible to set it down in plain terms. Nor ought he to charge me with misunderstanding him, and wresting his words to a wrong sense. For the truth is, I did not understand them at all, nor thought he understood them himself; but was willing to give them the best interpretation they would bear; which he calls wresting them to a wrong sense. And first, I understood not what he meant by the aspect of God. For if he had meant his foreknowledge, which word he had often used before; what needed he in this one place only to call it aspect? Or what need he here call it his view? Or say that all things are open to the eyes of God not discursively, but intuitively; which is to expound eyes in that text, Hebr. iv. 13, not figuratively but literally, nevertheless excluding external species, which the Schoolmen say are the cause of seeing? But it was well done to exclude such insignificant speeches, upon every occasion whatsoever. And though I do not hold the foreknowledge of God to consist in discourse; yet I shall be never driven to say it is by intuition, as long as I know that even a man hath foreknowledge of all those things which he intendeth himself to do, not by discourse, but by knowing his own purpose; saving that man hath a superior power over him, that can change his purpose; which God hath not. And whereas he says, I confound this aspect with the will and decrees of God, he accuseth me wrongfully. For how could I so confound it, when I understood not what it meant?

(e) “Secondly, he chargeth me, that hitherto I have maintained that ‘liberty and the decrees of God are irreconcileable’”. And the reason why I do so is, because he maintained that liberty and the absolute necessity of all things are irreconcileable. If liberty cannot stand with necessity, it cannot stand with the decrees of God, of which decrees necessity is a consequent. I needed not to say, nor did say, that necessity and God’s decrees are all one: though if I had said it, it had not been without authority of learned men, in whose writings are often found this sentence, voluntas Dei, necessitas rerum.

(f) “But to cut his argument short: God hath decreed all effects which come to pass in time, yet not all after the same manner, but according to the distinct natures, capacities, and conditions of his creatures; which he doth not destroy by his decree: some he acteth.” Hitherto true. Then he addeth: “with some he co-operateth by special influence; and some he only permitteth; yet this is no idle or bare permission”. This is false. For nothing operateth by its own original power, but God himself. Man operateth not but by special power, (I say special power, not special influence), derived from God. Nor is it by God’s permission only, as I have often already shown, and as the Bishop here contradicting his former words confesseth. For to permit only, and barely to permit, signify the same thing. And that which he says, that God concurs by way of general influence, is jargon. For every concurrence is one singular and individual concurrence; and nothing in the world is general, but the signification of words and other signs.

(g) “Thirdly, he chargeth me, that ‘I allow all men to be of his opinion, save only those that conceive in their minds a nunc stans, or how eternity is an indivisible point, rather than an everlasting succession.’ But I have given no such allowance.” Surely if the reason wherefore my opinion is false, proceed from this, that I conceive not eternity to be nunc stans, but an everlasting succession, I am allowed to hold my opinion till I can conceive eternity otherwise: at least he allows men not till then to be of his opinion. For he hath said, “that the main impediment which keeps men from subscribing to that way of his, is because they conceive eternity to be an everlasting succession, and not one indivisible point”. As for the many other ways which he says are “proposed by divines for reconciling the eternal prescience and decrees of God with the liberty and contingency of second causes”, if they mean such liberty and contingency as the Bishop meaneth, they are proposed in vain; for truth and error can never be reconciled. But “however,” saith he, “though a man could comprehend none of all these ways, yet we must remember that a certain truth ought not to be rejected, because we are not able to understand the reason of it.” For “he knows,” he says, “the loadstone hath an attractive power to draw the iron to it, and yet he knoweth not how it cometh to have such a power.” I know the load-stone hath no such attractive power; and yet I know that the iron cometh to it, or it to the iron; and therefore wonder not, that the Bishop knoweth not how it cometh to have that power. In the next place he saith, I bring nothing to prove that eternity is not an indivisible point, but my own incapacity “that I cannot conceive it”. The truth is, I cannot dispute neither for nor against (as he can do) the positions I understand not. Nor do I understand what derogation it can be to the divine perfection, to attribute to it potentiality, that is (in English) power, and successive duration; for such attributes are often given to it in the Scripture.

(h) “He saith moreover, that ‘he understands as little how it can be true which I say, that God is not just, but justice itself, nor eternal, but eternity itself’. It seems, howsoever he be versed in this question, that he hath not troubled his head over-much with reading School-divines, or metaphysicians.” They are unseemly words to be said of God: I will not say, blasphemous and atheistical, which are the attributes he gives to my opinions, because I do not think them spoken out of an evil mind, but out of error: they are, I say, unseemly words to be said of God, that he is not just, that he is not eternal, and (as he also said) that he is not wise; and cannot be excused by any following but, especially when the but is followed by that which is not to be understood. Can any man understand how justice is just, or wisdom wise? and whereas justice is an accident, one of the moral virtues, and wisdom another; how God is an accident or moral virtue? It is more than the Schoolmen or metaphysicians can understand; whose writings have troubled my head more than they should have done, if I had known that amongst so many senseless disputes, there had been so few lucid intervals. But I have considered since, where men will undertake to reason out of natural philosophy of the incomprehensible nature of God, that it is impossible they should speak intelligibly, or in other language than metaphysic, wherein they may contradict themselves, and not perceive it; as he does here, when he says, “the attributes of God are not diverse virtues or qualities in him, as they are in the creatures, but really one and the same with the divine essence and amongst themselves, and attributed to God to supply the defect of our capacity”. Attributes are names; and therefore it is a contradiction, to say they are really one and the same with the divine essence. But if he mean the virtues signified by the attributes, as justice, wisdom, eternity, divinity, &c; so also they are virtues, and not one virtue, (which is still a contradiction); and we give those attributes to God, not to shew that we apprehend how they are in him, but to signify how we think it best to honour him.

(i) “‘In the next place he will help me to understand,’ he says, ‘how eternity is an indivisible point.’ The divine substance is indivisible; but eternity is the divine substance. The major is evident, because God is actus simplicissimus; the minor hath been clearly demonstrated in my answer to his last doubt, and is confessed by all men, that whatsoever is attributed to God is God.” The major is so far from being evident, that actus simplicissimus signifieth nothing. The minor is said by some men, thought by no man; for whatsoever is thought, is understood. And all that he hath elsewhere and here dilated upon it, is as perfect nonsense, as any man ever writ on purpose to make merry with. And so is that whereby he answers to my objection, that a point cannot comprehend all time, which is successive; namely, his distinction, that “a point doth not comprehend all time formally, as time is successive; but eminently and virtually, as eternity is infinite”. And this, “to-day all eternity is co-existent with this day, and to-morrow all eternity will be co-existent with to-morrow”. It is well that his eternity is now come from a nunc stans to be a nunc fluens, flowing from this day to the next, and so on. This kind of language is never found in the Scripture. No, but the thing, saith he, is found there, namely, that God is infinite in all his attributes. I would he could shew me the place where God is said to be infinite in all his attributes. There be places enough to shew that God is infinite in power, in wisdom, mercy, &c: but neither is he said to be infinite in names (which is the English of attributes), nor that he is an indivisible point, nor that a point doth comprehend time eminently and virtually; nor that to-day all eternity is co-existent with to-day, &c. And thus much in answer to his reply upon my answer. That which remaineth, is my reply upon his answer to my positive doctrine on this subject.

MY OPINION ABOUT LIBERTY AND NECESSITY NO. XXV.

T. H. First, I conceive that when it cometh into a man’s mind to do or not to do some certain action, if he have no time to deliberate, the doing or abstaining necessarily followeth the present thought he had of the good or evil consequence thereof to himself. As for example, in sudden anger the action shall follow the thought of revenge, in sudden fear the thought of escape. Also when a man hath time to deliberate, but deliberates not, because never anything appeared that could make him doubt of the consequence, the action follows his opinion of the goodness or harm of it. These actions I call voluntary. He, if I understand him aright, calls them spontaneous. I call them voluntary, because those actions that follow immediately the last appetite, are voluntary. And here, where there is one only appetite, that one is the last.

Besides, I see it is reasonable to punish a rash action; which could not be justly done by man, unless the same were voluntary. For no action of a man can be said to be without deliberation, though never so sudden; because it is supposed he had time to deliberate all the precedent time of his life, whether he should do that kind of action or not. And hence it is, that he that killeth in a sudden passion of anger, shall nevertheless be justly put to death: because all the time wherein he was able to consider whether to kill were good or evil, shall be held for one continual deliberation; and consequently the killing shall be judged to proceed from election.

The Bishop’s reply.

J. D. “This part of T. H.’s discourse hangs together like a sick man’s dreams. (a) Even now he tells us, that ‘a man may have time to deliberate, yet not deliberate’. By and by he saith, that ‘no action of a man, though never so sudden, can be said to be without deliberation’. He tells us, No. XXXIII., that ‘the scope of this section is to show what is spontaneous’. Howbeit he showeth only what is voluntary; (b) so making voluntary and spontaneous to be all one; whereas before he had told us, that ‘every spontaneous action is not voluntary, because indeliberate; nor every voluntary action spontaneous, if it proceed from fear.’ (c) Now he tells us, that ‘those actions which follow the last appetite, are voluntary; and where there is one only appetite, that is the last’. But before he told us, that ‘voluntary presupposeth some precedent deliberation and meditation of what is likely to follow, both upon the doing and abstaining from the action’. (d) He defines liberty, No. XXIX., to be ‘the absence of all extrinsical impediments to action’. And yet in his whole discourse he laboureth to make good, that whatsoever is not done, is therefore not done, because the agent was necessitated by extrinsical causes not to do it. Are not extrinsical causes, which determine him not to do it, extrinsical impediments to action? So no man shall be free to do any thing but that which he doth actually. He defines a free agent to be ‘him who hath not made an end of deliberating’ (No. XXVIII.). And yet defines liberty to be ‘an absence of outward impediments’. There may be outward impediments, even whilst he is deliberating. As a man deliberates whether he shall play at tennis: and at the same time the door of the tennis-court is fast locked against him. And after a man hath ceased to deliberate, there may be no outward impediments: as when a man resolves not to play at tennis, because he finds himself ill-disposed, or because he will not hazard his money. So the same person, at the same time, should be free and not free, not free and free. And as he is not firm to his own grounds, so he confounds all things, the mind and the will, the estimative faculty and the understanding, imagination with deliberation, the end with the means, human will with the sensitive appetite, rational hope or fear with irrational passions, inclinations with intentions, a beginning of being with a beginning of working, sufficiency with efficiency. So as the greatest difficulty is to find out what he aims at. So as I had once resolved not to answer this part of his discourse; yet upon better advice I will take a brief survey of it also; and show how far I assent unto, or dissent from that which I conceive to be his meaning.

“And first, concerning sudden passions, as anger or the like. (e) That which he saith, that ‘the action doth necessarily follow the thought’, is thus far true; that those actions which are altogether undeliberated and do proceed from sudden and violent passions, or motus primo primi, which surprise a man, and give him no time to advise with reason, are not properly and actually in themselves free, but rather necessary actions; as when a man runs away from a cat or a custard out of a secret antipathy.

(f) “Secondly, as for those actions ‘wherein actual deliberation seems not necessary, because never anything appeared that could make a man doubt of the consequence’: I do confess, that actions done by virtue of a precedent deliberation, without any actual deliberation in the present, when the act is done, may notwithstanding be truly both voluntary and free acts, yea, in some cases and in some sense, more free than if they were actually deliberated of in present. As one who hath acquired by former deliberation and experience a habit to play upon the virginals, needs not deliberate what man or what jack he must touch, nor what finger of his hand he must move to play such a lesson; yea, if his mind should be fixed, or intent to every motion of his hand, or every touch of a string, it would hinder his play, and render the action more troublesome to him. Wherefore I believe, that not only his playing in general, but every motion of his hand, though it be not presently deliberated of, is a free act, by reason of his precedent deliberation. So then (saving improprieties of speech, as calling that voluntary which is free, and limiting the will to the last appetite; and other mistakes, as that no act can be said to be without deliberation) we agree also for the greater part in this second observation.

(g) “Thirdly, whereas he saith, that ‘some sudden acts proceeding from violent passions, which surprise a man, are justly punished’; I grant they are so sometimes; but not for his reason, because they have been formerly actually deliberated of; but because they were virtually deliberated of, or because it is our fault that they were not actually deliberated of, whether it was a fault of pure negation, that is, of not doing our duty only, or a fault of bad disposition also, by reason of some vicious habit which we had contracted by our former actions. To do a necessary act is never a fault, nor justly punishable, when the necessity is inevitably imposed upon us by extrinsical causes. As if a child, before he had the use of reason, shall kill a man in his passion; yet because he wanted malice to incite him to it, and reason to restrain him from it, he shall not die for it in the strict rules of particular justice, unless there be some mixture of public justice in the case.

(h) “But if the necessity be contracted by ourselves, and by our own faults, it is justly punishable. As he who by his wanton thoughts in the day-time doth procure his own nocturnal pollution: a man cannot deliberate in his sleep, yet it is accounted a sinful act, and consequently, a free act, that is, not actually free in itself, but virtually free in its causes; and though it be not expressly willed and chosen, yet it is tacitly and implicitly willed and chosen, when that is willed and chosen from whence it was necessarily produced. By the Levitical law, if a man digged a pit and left it uncovered, so that his neighbour’s ox or his ass did fall into it, he was bound to make reparation; not because he did choose to leave it uncovered on purpose that such a mischance might happen, but because he did freely omit that which he ought to have done, from whence this damage proceeded to his neighbour. Lastly, there is great difference between the first motions, which sometimes are not in our power, and subsequent acts of killing or stealing, or the like, which always are in our power if we have the use of reason, or else it is our own fault that they are not in our power. Yet to such hasty acts done in hot blood the law is not so severe, as to those which are done upon long deliberation and prepensed malice, unless, as I said, there be some mixture of public justice in it. He that steals a horse deliberately, may be more punishable by the law than he that kills the owner by chance-medley: yet the death of the owner was more noxious, (to use his phrase), and more damageable to the family, than the stealth of the horse. So far was T. H. mistaken in that also, that the right to kill men doth proceed merely from their being noxious (No. XIV).”

ANIMADVERSIONS UPON THE BISHOP’S ANSWER TO MY OPINION ABOUT LIBERTY AND NECESSITY NO. XXV.

(a) “Even now he tells us, that ‘a man may have time to deliberate, yet not deliberate’. By and by he saith, that ‘no action of a man, though never so sudden, can be said to be without deliberation’.” He thinks he hath here caught me in a contradiction; but he is mistaken; and the cause is, that he observed not that there may be a difference between deliberation and that which shall be construed for deliberation by a judge. For a man may do a rash act suddenly without deliberation; yet because he ought to have deliberated, and had time enough to deliberate whether the action were lawful or not, it shall not be said by the judge that it was without deliberation, who supposeth that after the law known, all the time following was time of deliberation. It is therefore no contradiction, to say a man deliberates not, and that he shall be said to deliberate by him that is the judge of voluntary actions.

(b) “Again, where he says, ‘he maketh voluntary and spontaneous actions to be all one’, whereas before he had told us that ‘every spontaneous action is not voluntary, because indeliberate; nor every voluntary action spontaneous, if it proceed from fear’.” He thinks he hath espied another contradiction. It is no wonder if speaking of spontaneous, which signifieth nothing else in Latin (for English it is not) but that which is done deliberately or indeliberately without compulsion, I seem to the Bishop, who hath never given any definition of that word, not to use it as he would have me. And it is easy for him to give it any signification he please, as the occasion shall serve to charge me with contradiction. In what sense I have used that word once, in the same I have used it always, calling that spontaneous which is without co-action or compulsion by terror.

(c) “Now he tells us, that ‘those actions which follow the last appetite are voluntary, and where there is one only appetite, that is the last’. But before he told us, that ‘voluntary presupposeth some precedent deliberation and meditation of what is likely to follow, both upon the doing and abstaining from the action’.” This is a third contradiction he supposeth he hath found, but is again mistaken. For when men are to judge of actions, whether they be voluntary or not, they cannot call that action voluntary, which followed not the last appetite. But the same men, though there were no deliberation, shall judge there was, because it ought to have been, and that from the time that the law was known to the time of the action itself. And therefore both are true, that voluntary may be without, and yet presupposed in the law not to be without deliberation.

(d) “He defines liberty (No. XXIX.) to be ‘the absence of all extrinsical impediments to action’. And yet in his whole discourse he laboureth to make good, that whatsoever is not done, is therefore not done, because the agent was necessitated by extrinsical causes not to do it. Are not extrinsical causes which determine him not to do it, extrinsical impediments to action?” This definition of liberty, that it is “the absence of all extrinsical impediments to action”, he thinks he hath sufficiently confuted by asking whether the extrinsical causes, which determine a man not to do an action, be not extrinsical impediments to action. It seems by his question he makes no doubt but they are; but is deceived by a too shallow consideration of what the word impediment signifieth. For impediment or hinderance signifieth an opposition to endeavour. And therefore if a man be necessitated by extrinsical causes not to endeavour an action, those causes do not oppose his endeavour to do it, because he has no such endeavour to be opposed; and consequently extrinsical causes that take away endeavour, are not to be called impediments; nor can any man be said to be hindered from doing that, which he had no purpose at all to do. So that this objection of his proceedeth only from this, that he understandeth not sufficiently the English tongue. From the same proceedeth also that he thinketh it a contradiction, to call a free agent him that hath not yet made an end of deliberating, and to call liberty an absence of outward impediments. “For,” saith he, “there may be outward impediments, even while he is deliberating.” Wherein he is deceived. For though he may deliberate of that which is impossible for him to do; as in the example he allegeth of him that deliberateth whether he shall play at tennis, not knowing that the door of the tennis-court is shut against him; yet it is no impediment to him that the door is shut, till he have a will to play; which be hath not till he hath done deliberating whether he shall play or not. That which followeth of my confounding mind and will; the estimative faculty and the understanding; the imagination and deliberation; the end and the means; the human will and the sensitive appetite; rational hope or fear, and irrational passions; inclinations and intentions; a beginning of being and a beginning of working; sufficiency and efficiency: I do not find in anything that I have written, any impropriety in the use of these or any other English words; nor do I doubt but an English reader, who hath not lost himself in School-divinity, will very easily conceive what I have said. But this I am sure, that I never confounded beginning of being with beginning of working, nor sufficiency with efficiency; nor ever used these words, sensitive appetite, rational hope, or rational fear, or irrational passions. It is therefore impossible I should confound them. But the Bishop is either mistaken, or else he makes no scruple to say that which he knows to be false, when he thinks it will serve his turn.

(e) “That which he saith, that ‘the action doth necessarily follow the thought’, is thus far true; that those actions which are altogether undeliberated, and do proceed from violent passions, &c, are not properly, and actually in themselves free, but rather necessary actions, as when a man runs away from a cat or a custard.” Thus far he says is true. But when he calls sudden passions motus primo primi, I cannot tell whether he says true or not, because I do not understand him; nor find how he makes his meaning ever the clearer by his example of a cat and a custard, because I know not what he means by a secret antipathy. For what that antipathy is he explaineth not by calling it secret, but rather confesseth he knows not how to explain it. And because he saith, it is thus far true, I expect he should tell me also how far it is false.

(f) “Secondly, as for those actions wherein actual deliberation seems not necessary, ‘because never anything appeared that could make a man doubt of the consequence’; I do confess that actions done by virtue of a precedent deliberation, without any actual deliberation for the present, may notwithstanding be truly voluntary and free acts.” In this he agrees with me. But where he adds, “yea, in some cases, and in some sense more free, than if they were actually deliberated of in present”, I do not agree with him. And for the instance he bringeth to prove it, in the man that playeth on an instrument with his hand it maketh nothing for him. For it proveth only, that the habit maketh the motion of his hand more ready and quick; but it proveth not that it maketh it more voluntary, but rather less; because the rest of the motions follow the first by an easiness acquired from long custom; in which motion the will doth not accompany all the strokes of the hand, but gives a beginning to them only in the first. Here is nothing, as I expected, of how far that which I had said, namely, that the action doth necessarily follow the thought, is false; unless it be “improprieties of speech, as calling that voluntary which is free, and limiting the will to the last appetite; and other mistakes, as that no act can be said to be without deliberation”. For improprieties of speech, I will not contend with one that can use motus primo primi, practice practicum, actus elicitus, and many other phrases of the same kind. But to say that free actions are voluntary; and that the will which causeth a voluntary action, is the last appetite; and that that appetite was immediately followed by the action; and that no action of a man can be said in the judgment of the law, to be without deliberation: are no mistakes, for anything that he hath proved to the contrary.

(g) “Thirdly, whereas he saith, that ‘some sudden acts, proceeding from violent passions which surprise a man, are justly punished’; I grant they are so sometimes, but not for his reason, &c.” My reason was, “because he had time to deliberate from the instant that he knew the law, to the instant of his action, and ought to have deliberated”, that therefore he may be justly punished. The Bishop grants they are justly punished, and his reason is, “because they were virtually deliberated of”, or, “because it is our fault they were not actually deliberated of”. How a man does deliberate, and yet not actually deliberate, I understand not. If virtual deliberation be not actual deliberation, it is no deliberation. But he calleth virtual deliberation, that which ought to have been, and was not; and says the same that he condemns in me. And his other reason, namely, because it is our fault that we deliberated not, is the same that I said, that we ought to have deliberated, and did not. So that his reprehension here, is a reprehension of himself, proceeding from that the custom of School-language hath made him forget the language of his country. And to that which he adds, “that a necessary act is never a fault, nor justly punishable, when the necessity is inevitably imposed upon us by extrinsical causes”, I have sufficiently answered before in diverse places; shewing that a fault may be necessary from extrinsical causes, and yet voluntary; and that voluntary faults are justly punishable.

(h) “But if the necessity be contracted by ourselves, it is justly punishable. As he who by his wanton thoughts in the day time, doth procure his own nocturnal pollution.” This instance, because it maketh not against anything I have held, and partly also because it is a stinking passage, (for surely if, as he that ascribes eyes to the understanding, allows me to say it hath a nose, it stinketh to the nose of the understanding); this sentence I pass over, observing only the canting terms, not actually free in itself, but virtually free in its causes. In the rest of his answer to this No. XXV, I find nothing alleged in confutation of anything I have said, saving that his last words are, that “T. H. is mistaken in that also, that the right to kill men doth proceed merely from their being noxious” (No. XIV.). But to that I have in the same No. XIV. already answered. I must not pass over, that a little before he hath these words: “If a child, before he have the use of reason, shall kill a man in his passion, yet because he wanted malice to incite him to it, and reason to restrain him from it, he shall not die for it, in the strict rules of particular justice, unless there be some mixture of public justice in the case”. The Bishop would make but an ill judge of innocent children, for such are they that, for want of age, have not use enough of reason to abstain from killing. For the want of reason proceeding from want of age, does therefore take away the punishment, because it taketh away the crime, and makes them innocent. But he introduceth another justice, which he calleth public; whereas he called the other particular. And by this public justice, he saith, the child though innocent may be put to death. I hope we shall never have the administration of public justice in such hands as his, or in the hands of such as shall take counsel from him. But the distinction he makes is not by himself understood. There are public causes, and private causes. Private are those, where the parties to the cause are both private men. Public are those, where one of the parties is the commonwealth, or the person that representeth it, and the cause criminal. But there is no distinction of justice into public and private. We may read of men that, having sovereign power, did sometimes put an innocent to death, either upon a vow; as Jepthah did in sacrificing his daughter; or when it hath been thought fit that an innocent person should be put to death to save a great number of people. But to put to death a child, not for reason of state, which he improperly calls public justice, but for killing a man, and at the same time to acknowledge such killing to be no crime, I think was never heard of.

NO. XXVI.

T. H. Secondly, I conceive when a man deliberates whether he shall 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 sequels 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.

The Bishop’s reply.

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 and 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 NO. 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 imagines, 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 anything, we are said to consider that thing; and when we have imagined anything 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 joined together; and when we hope or fear, we imagine things good or hurtful to ourselves: insomuch as all these are but imaginations diversely 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 whereof, but upon the words wherewith he speaketh, and taketh those words on trust from puzzled Schoolmen, it is not only 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 custom to say, the understanding understandeth, the will 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 than if he had said, deliberation is an inquiry made by deliberation; a definition good enough to be made by a Schoolman. 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.

NO. XXVII.

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 call the will, and is immediately 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.

The Bishop’s reply.

J. D. (a) “Still here is nothing but confusion; he confounds the faculty of the will with the act of volition; he makes the will to be the last part of deliberation; he makes the intention, which is a most proper and elicit act of the will, or a willing of the end, as it is to be attained by certain means, to be no willing at all, but only 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, and the resting or fixing of itself directly towards the pole, were both the same thing. But the grossest mistake is, that he will acknowledge no act of man’s will, to be his will, but only 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 his 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 truly willed is not a sin; or rather should not be at all, unless either the act followed, or were rendered impossible by some intervening circumstances. According to this doctrine no man can say, this is my will, because he knows 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 man’s actions to be truly free, is election; which is the deliberate choosing 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 NO. XXVII.

(a) “Still here is nothing but confusion; he confounds the faculty of the will with the act of volition; he makes the will to be the last part of deliberation; he makes the intention, which is a most proper and elicit act of the will, to be no willing at all, but only some antecedaneous (he might as well have said, antecedent) inclination.” To confound the faculty of the will with the will, were to confound a will with no will; for the faculty of the will is no will; the act only which he calls volition, is the will. As a man that sleepeth hath the power of seeing, and seeth not, nor hath for that time any sight; so also he hath the power of willing, but willeth nothing, nor hath for that time any will. I must therefore have departed very much from my own principles, if I have confounded the faculty of the will with the act of volition. He should have done well to have shown where I confounded them. It is true, I make the will to be the last part of deliberation; but it is that will which maketh the action voluntary, and therefore needs must be the last. But for the preceding variations of the will to do and not to do, though they be so many several wills, contrary to and destroying one another, they usually are called intentions; and therefore they are nothing to the will, of which we dispute, that maketh an action voluntary. And though a man have in every long deliberation a great many wills and nills, they use to be called inclinations, and the last only will which is immediately followed by the voluntary action. But nevertheless, both he that hath those intentions, and God that seeth them, reckoneth them for so many wills.

(b) “According to this doctrine, concupiscence with consent should be no sin; for that which is not truly willed, is not a sin.” This is no consequent to my doctrine: for I hold that they are, in the sight of God, so many consents, so many willings, which would have been followed by actions, if the actions had been in their power. It had been fitter for a man in whom is required gravity and sanctity more than ordinary, to have chosen some other kind of instance. But what meaneth he by concupiscence with consent? Can there be concupiscence without consent? It is the consent itself. There may be also a lawful concupiscence with consent. For concupiscence makes not the sin, but the unlawfulness of satisfying such concupiscence; and not the consent, but the will and design to prosecute that which a man knoweth to be unlawful. An appetite to another man’s bread, is concupiscence; and though it be with consent to eat, it is no sin; but the design to take it from the other, notwithstanding that he may fail in his design, that is the sin. And this instance might have served his turn as well as the other; and for consent, if he had understood the truth, he might have put design.

NO. XXVIII.

T. H. Fourthly, that those actions which man is said to do upon deliberation, are said to be voluntary, and done upon choice and election. So that voluntary action, and action proceeding from election, is the same thing. And that of a voluntary agent, it is all one to say he is free, and to say he hath not made an end of deliberating.

The Bishop’s reply.

J. D. (a) “This short section might pass without an animadversion, but for two things. The one is, that he confounds a voluntary act with a free act. A free act is only that which proceeds from the free election of the rational will after deliberation; but every act that proceeds from the sensitive appetite of man or beast, without deliberation or election, is truly voluntary. (b) The other thing observable is his conclusion, that ‘it is all one to say a man is free, and to say he hath not made an end of deliberating’; which confession of his overturns his whole structure of absolute necessity. For if every agent be necessitated to act what he doth act by a necessary and natural flux of extrinsical causes, then he is no more free before he deliberates, or whilst he deliberates, than he is after; but by T. H.’s confession here, he is more free whilst he deliberates, than he is after. And so after all his flourishes, for an absolute or extrinsical necessity, he is glad to set himself down, and rest contented with an hypothetical necessity, which no man ever denied or doubted of; ascribing the necessitation of a man in free acts to his own deliberation, and in indeliberate acts to his last thought, No. XXV. What is this to a natural and special influence of extrinsical causes? (c) “Again, ‘liberty’, saith he, ‘is an absence of extrinsical impediments’; but deliberation doth produce no new extrinsical impediment; therefore let him choose which part he will, either he is free after deliberation, by his own doctrine, or he was not free before. Our own deliberation, and the direction of our own understanding, and the election of our own will, do produce an hypothetical necessity, that the event be such as the understanding hath directed, and the will elected. But for as much as the understanding might have directed otherwise, and the will have elected otherwise, this is far from an absolute necessity. Neither doth liberty respect only future acts, but present acts also. Otherwise God did not freely create the world. In the same instant wherein the will elects, it is free, according to a priority of nature, though not of time, to elect otherwise. And so in a divided sense, the will is free, even whilst it acts; though in a compounded sense it be not free. Certainly, deliberation doth constitute, not destroy liberty.

ANIMADVERSIONS UPON THE ANSWER TO NO. XXVIII.

(a) “This short section might pass, but for two things; one is, that he confounds a voluntary act with a free act.” I do indeed take all voluntary acts to be free, and all free acts to be voluntary; but withal that all acts, whether free or voluntary, if they be acts, were necessary before they were acts. But where is the error? ‘A free act’, saith he, ‘is only that which proceeds from the free election of the rational will, after deliberation; but every act that proceeds from the sensitive appetite of man or beast, without deliberation or election, is truly voluntary.’ So that my error lies in this, that I distinguish not between a rational will and a sensitive appetite in the same man. As if the appetite and will in man or beast were not the same thing, or that sensual men and beasts did not deliberate, and choose one thing before another, in the same manner that wise men do. Nor can it be said of wills, that one is rational, the other sensitive; but of men. And if it be granted that deliberation is always (as it is not) rational, there were no cause to call men rational more than beasts. For it is manifest by continual experience, that beasts do deliberate.

(b) “The other thing observable is his conclusion, that ‘it is all one to say, a man is free, and to say, he hath not made an end of deliberating’: which confession of his overturns his whole structure of absolute necessity.” Why so? ‘Because’, saith he, ‘if every agent be necessitated to act what he doth act by extrinsical causes, then he is no more free before he deliberates, or whilst he deliberates, than he is after’. But this is a false consequence; he should have inferred thus:--“then he is no less necessitated before he deliberates than he is after”; which is true, and yet nevertheless he is more free. But taking necessity to be inconsistent with liberty, which is the question between us: instead of necessitated he puts in not free. And therefore to say ‘a man is free till he hath made an end of deliberating’, is no contradiction to absolute and antecedent necessity. And whereas he adds presently after, that I ascribe the necessitation of a man in free acts to his own deliberation, and in indeliberate acts to his last thoughts: he mistakes the matter. For I ascribe all necessity to the universal series or order of causes, depending on the first cause eternal: which the Bishop understandeth, as if I had said in his phrase, to a special influence of extrinsical causes; that is, understandeth it not at all.

(c) “Again, ‘liberty,’ saith he, ‘is an absence of extrinsical impediments’: but deliberation doth produce no new extrinsical impediment; therefore either he is free after deliberation, or he was not free before.” I cannot perceive in these words any more force of inference, than of so many other words whatsoever put together at adventure. But be his meaning what he will, I say not that deliberation produceth any impediments: for there are no impediments but to the action, whilst we are endeavouring to do it, which is not till we have done deliberating. But during the deliberation there arise thoughts in him that deliberateth, concerning the consequence of the action whereof he deliberateth, which cause the action following; which are not impediments to that action which was not done, but the causes of that which was done. That which followeth in this Number is not intelligible, by reason of the insignificance of these words, “understanding directeth; will electeth; hypothetical necessity”; which are but jargon, and his “divided sense” and “compounded sense”, nonsense. And this also, “liberty respecteth not future acts only, but present acts also”, is unintelligible. For how can a man have liberty to do or not to do that which is at the same instant already done. For where he addeth, “otherwise God did not freely create the world”, it proves nothing; because he had the liberty to create it, before it was created. Besides, it is a profaning of the name of God, to make instances of his incomprehensible working in a question as this is, merely natural.

NO. XXIX.

T. H. Fifthly, I conceive liberty to be rightly defined in this manner:--Liberty is the absence of all the impediments to action, that are not contained in the nature, and in the intrinsical quality of the agent. As for example, the water is said to descend freely, or to have liberty to descend by the channel of the river, because there is no impediment that way; but not across, because the banks are impediments. And though water cannot ascend, yet men never say it wants the liberty to ascend, but the faculty or power; because the impediment is in the nature of the water and intrinsical. So also we say, he that is tied wants the liberty to go, because the impediment is not in him, but in his bonds; whereas we say not so of him that is sick or lame, because the impediment is in himself.

The Bishop’s reply.

J. D. (a) “How that should be a right definition of liberty, which comprehends neither the genus nor the difference, neither the matter nor form of liberty, which doth not so much as accidentally describe liberty by its marks and tokens; how a real faculty or the elective power should be defined by a negation, or by an absence, is past my understanding, and contrary to all the rules of right reason which I have learned. Negatives cannot explicate the nature of things defined. By this definition, a stone hath liberty to ascend into the air, because there is no outward impediment to hinder it; and so a violent act may be a free act. Just like his definition are his instances of the liberty of the water to descend down the channel, and a sick or lame man’s liberty to go. The latter is an impotence, and not a power or a liberty. The former is so far from being a free act, that it is scarce a natural act. Certainly the proper natural motion of water, as of all heavy bodies, is to descend directly downwards towards the centre; as we see in rain, which falls down perpendicularly. Though this be far from a free act, which proceeds from a rational appetite; yet it is a natural act, and proceeds from a natural appetite, and hath its reason within itself. So hath not the current of the river in its channel, which must not be ascribed to the proper nature of the water, but either to the general order of the universe, for the better being and preservation of the creatures: (otherwise the waters should not move in seas and rivers as they do, but cover the face of the earth, and possess their proper place between the air and the earth, according to the degree of their gravity): or to an extrinsical principle, whilst one particle of water thrusteth and forceth forward another, and so comes a current, or at least so comes the current to be more impetuous; to which motion the position of the earth doth contribute much, both by restraining that fluid body with its banks from dispersing itself, and also by affording way for a fair and easy descent by its proclivity. He tells us sadly, that “the water wants liberty to go over the banks, because there is an extrinsical impediment; but to ascend up the channel, it wants not liberty, but power”. Why? Liberty is a power; if it want power to ascend, it wants liberty to ascend. But he makes the reason why the water ascends not up the channel, to be intrinsical, and the reason why it ascends not over the banks, to be extrinsical; as if there were not a rising of the ground up the channel, as well as up the banks, though it be not so discernible, nor always so sudden. The natural appetite of the water is as much against the ascending over the banks, as the ascending up the channel. And the extrinsical impediment is as great, ascending up the channel, as over the banks; or rather greater, because there it must move, not only against the rising soil, but also against the succeeding waters, which press forward the former. Either the river wants liberty for both, or else it wants liberty for neither.

But to leave his metaphorical faculties, and his catachrestical liberty: how far is his discourse wide from the true moral liberty; which is the question between us? His former description of a free agent, that is, ‘he who hath not made an end of deliberating’, though it was wide from the mark, yet it came much nearer the truth than this definition of liberty; unless perhaps he think that the water hath done deliberating whether it will go over the banks, but hath not done deliberating whether it will go up the channel”.

ANIMADVERSIONS UPON THE ANSWER TO NO. XXIX.

(a) “How that should be a right definition of liberty, which comprehends neither the genus nor the difference, neither the matter nor the form of liberty, &c: how a real faculty or the elective power, should be defined by a negation or by an absence: is past my understanding, and contrary to all the rules of right reason which I have learned.” A right definition is that which determineth the signification of the word defined, to the end that in the discourse where it is used, the meaning of it may be constant and without equivocation. This is the measure of a definition, and intelligible to an English reader. But the Bishop, that measures it by the genus and the difference, thinks, it seems, though he write English, he writes not to an English reader unless he also be a Schoolman. I confess the rule is good, that we ought to define, when it can be done, by using first some more general term, and then by restraining the signification of that general term, till it be the same with that of the word defined. And this general term the School calls genus, and the restraint difference. This, I say, is a good rule where it can be done; for some words are so general, that they cannot admit a more general in their definition. But why this ought to be a law of definition, I doubt it would trouble him to find the reason; and therefore I refer him (he shall give me leave sometimes to cite, as well as he,) to the fourteenth and fifteenth articles of the sixth chapter of my book De Corpore. But it is to little purpose that he requires in a definition so exactly the genus and the difference, seeing he does not know them when they are there. For in this my definition of liberty, the genus is absence of impediments to action; and the difference or restriction is that they be not contained in the nature of the agent. The Bishop therefore, though he talk of genus and difference, understands not what they are, but requires the matter and form of the thing in the definition. Matter is body, that is to say, corporeal substance, and subject to dimension, such as are the elements, and the things compounded of the elements. But it is impossible that matter should be part of a definition, whose parts are only words; or to put the name of matter into the definition of liberty, which is immaterial. “How a real faculty can be defined by an absence, is”, saith he, “past my understanding.” Unless he mean by real faculty a very faculty, I know not how a faculty is real. If he mean so, then a very absence is as real as a very faculty. And if the word defined signify an absence or negation, I hope he would not have me define it by a presence or affirmation. Such a word is liberty; for it signifieth freedom from impediments, which is all one with the absence of impediments, as I have defined it. And if this be contrary to all the rules of right reason, that is to say, of logic, that he hath learned, I should advise him to read some other logic than he hath yet read, or consider better those he did read when he was a young man and could less understand them. He adds, that “by this definition, a stone hath liberty to ascend into the air, because there is no outward impediment to hinder it”. How knows he whether there be impediments to hinder it or not? Certainly if a stone were thrown upwards, it would either go upwards eternally, or it must be stopped by some outward impediment, or it must stop itself. He hath confessed, that nothing can move itself; I doubt not therefore that he will confess also, that it cannot stop itself. But stopped we see it is; it is therefore stopped by impediments external. He hath in this part of his answer ventured a little too far in speaking of definition, and of impediments, and motion; and bewrayed too much his ignorance in logic and philosophy; and talked so absurdly of the current of rivers, and of the motion of the seas, and of the weight of water, that it cannot be corrected otherwise than by blotting it all out.

NO. XXX.

T. H. Sixthly, I conceive nothing taketh beginning from itself, but from the action of some other immediate agent without itself: and that therefore when first a man had an appetite or will to something, to which immediately before he had no appetite nor will, the cause of his will is not the will itself, but something else not in his own disposing. So that, whereas it is out of controversy that of voluntary actions the will is a necessary cause; and by this which is said, the will is also caused by other things whereof it disposeth not; it followeth that voluntary actions have all of them necessary causes, and therefore are necessitated.

The Bishop’s reply.

J. D. “This sixth point doth not consist in explicating of terms, as the former; but in two proofs, that voluntary actions are necessitated. The former proof stands thus: ‘Nothing takes beginning from itself, but from some agent without itself, which is not in its own disposing therefore, &c’. Concedo omnia; (a) I grant all he saith. The will doth not take beginning from itself. Whether he understand by will the faculty of the will, which is a power of the reasonable soul, it takes not beginning from itself, but from God, who created and infused the soul into man, and endowed it with this power: or whether he understand by will the act of willing, it takes not beginning from itself, but from the faculty or from the power of willing, which is in the soul. This is certain; finite and participated things cannot be from themselves, nor be produced by themselves. What would he conclude from hence? That therefore the act of willing takes not its beginning from the faculty of the will? Or that the faculty is always determined antecedently, extrinsically, to will that which it doth will? He may as soon draw water out of a pumice, as draw any such conclusion out of these premises. Secondly, for his “taking a beginning”, either he understands a beginning of being, or a beginning of working and acting. If he understand a beginning of being, he saith most truly, that nothing hath a beginning of being in time from itself. But this is nothing to his purpose: the question is not between us, whether the soul of man or the will of man be eternal. But if he understand a beginning of working or moving actually, it is a gross error. All men know that when a stone descends, or fire ascends, or when water, that hath been heated, returns to its former temper; the beginning or reason is intrinsical, and one and the same thing doth move and is moved in a diverse respect. It moves in respect of the form, and it is moved in respect of the matter. Much more man, who hath a perfect knowledge and prenotion of the end, is most properly said to move himself. Yet I do not deny but that there are other beginnings of human actions, which do concur with the will: some outward, as the first cause by general influence, which is evermore requisite, angels or men by persuading, evil spirits by tempting, the object or end by its appetibility, the understanding by directing. So passions and acquired habits. But I deny that any of these do necessitate or can necessitate the will of man by determining it physically to one, except God alone, who doth it rarely, in extraordinary cases. And where there is no antecedent determination to one, there is no absolute necessity, but true liberty.

(b) “His second argument is ex concessis: ‘It is out of controversy’, saith he, ‘that of voluntary actions the will is a necessary cause’. The argument may be thus reduced: necessary causes produce necessary effects; but the will is a necessary cause of voluntary actions. I might deny his major. Necessary causes do not always produce necessary effects, except they be also necessarily produced; as I have shewed before in the burning of Protagoras’s book. But I answer clearly to the minor, that the will is not a necessary cause of what it wills in particular actions. It is without controversy indeed, for it is without all probability. That it wills when it wills, is necessary; but that it wills this or that, now or then, is free. More expressly, the act of the will may be considered three ways; either in respect of its nature, or in respect of its exercise, or in respect of its object. First, for the nature of the act: that which the will wills, is necessarily voluntary, because the will cannot be compelled. And in this sense, ‘it is out of controversy, that the will is a necessary cause of voluntary actions’. Secondly, for the exercise of its acts, that is not necessary: the will may either will or suspend its act. Thirdly, for the object, that is not necessary, but free: the will is not extrinsically determined to its objects. As for example: the cardinals meet in the conclave to choose a Pope; whom they choose, he is necessarily Pope. But it is not necessary that they shall choose this or that day. Before they were assembled, they might defer their assembling; when they are assembled, they may suspend their election for a day or a week. Lastly, for the person whom they will choose, it is freely in their own power; otherwise if the election were not free, it were void, and no election at all. So that which takes its beginning from the will, is necessarily voluntary; but it is not necessary that the will shall will this or that in particular, as it was necessary that the person freely elected should be Pope: but it was not necessary either that the election should be at this time, or that this man should be elected. And therefore voluntary acts in particular have not necessary causes, that is, they are not necessitated.”

ANIMADVERSIONS UPON THE ANSWER TO NO. XXX.

I had said, that nothing taketh beginning from itself, and that the cause of the will is not the will itself, but something else which it disposeth not of. Answering to this, he endeavours to shew us the cause of the will.

(a) “I grant”, saith he, “that the will doth not take beginning from itself, for that the faculty of the will takes beginning from God, who created the soul, and poured it into man, and endowed it with this power; and for that the act of willing takes not beginning from itself, but from the faculty or from the power of willing, which is in the soul. This is certain; finite and participated things cannot be from themselves, nor be produced by themselves. What would he conclude from hence? That therefore the act of willing takes not its beginning from the faculty of the will?” It is well that he grants finite things (as for his participated, it signifies nothing here) cannot be produced by themselves. For out of this I can conclude that the act of willing is not produced by the faculty of willing. He that hath the faculty of willing, hath the faculty of willing something in particular. And at the same time he hath the faculty of nilling the same. If therefore the faculty of willing be the cause he willeth anything whatsoever, for the same reason the faculty of nilling will be the cause at the same time of nilling it: and so he shall will and nill the same thing at the same time, which is absurd. It seems the Bishop had forgot, that matter and power are indifferent to contrary forms and contrary acts. It is somewhat besides the matter, that determineth it to a certain form; and somewhat besides the power, that produceth a certain act: and thence it is, that is inferred this that he granteth, that nothing can be produced by itself; which nevertheless he presently contradicteth, in saying, that “all men know when a stone descends, the beginning is intrinsical”, and that “the stone moves in respect of the form”. Which is as much as to say, that the form moveth the matter, or that the stone moveth itself; which before he denied. When a stone ascends, the beginning of the stone’s motion was in itself, that is to say, intrinsical, because it is not the stone’s motion, till the stone begins to be moved; but the motion that caused it to begin to ascend, was a precedent and extrinsical motion of the hand or other engine that threw it upward. And so when it descends, the beginning of the stone’s motion is in the stone; but nevertheless, there is a former motion in the ambient body, air or water, that causeth it to descend. But because no man can see it, most men think there is none; though reason, wherewith the Bishop (as relying only upon the authority of books) troubleth not himself, convince that there is.

(b) “His second argument is, ex concessis: ‘It is out of controversy, that of voluntary actions the will is a necessary cause’. The argument may be thus reduced: necessary causes produce necessary effects; but the will is a necessary cause of voluntary actions. I might deny his major; necessary causes do not always produce necessary effects, except they be also necessarily produced.” He has reduced the argument to nonsense, by saying necessary causes produce not necessary effects. For necessary effects, unless he mean such effects as shall necessarily be produced, is insignificant. Let him consider therefore with what grace he can say, necessary causes do not always produce their effects, except those effects be also necessarily produced. But his answer is chiefly to the minor, and denies that the will is not a necessary cause of what it wills in particular actions. That it wills when it wills, saith he, is necessary; but that it wills this or that, is free. Is it possible for any man to conceive, that he that willeth, can will anything but this or that particular thing? It is therefore manifest, that either the will is a necessary cause of this or that or any other particular action, or not the necessary cause of any voluntary action at all. For universal actions there be none. In that which followeth, he undertaketh to make his doctrine more expressly understood by considering the act of the will three ways: “in respect of its nature, in respect of its exercise, and in respect of its object”. For the nature of the act, he saith, that “that which the will wills, is necessarily voluntary”, and that in this sense he grants it is out of controversy, that the will is a necessary cause of voluntary actions. Instead of “that which the will wills”, to make it sense, read that which the man wills; and then if the man’s will be, as he confesseth, a necessary cause of voluntary actions, it is no less a necessary cause that they are actions, than that they are voluntary. For the exercise of the act, he saith that “the will may either will, or suspend its act”. This is the old canting, which hath already been sufficiently detected. But to make it somewhat, let us read it thus: the man that willeth, may either will or suspend his will: and thus it is intelligible, but false; for how can he that willeth, at the same time suspend his will? And for the object he says, that “it is not necessary but free”, &c. His reason is, because, he says, it was not necessary, for example, in choosing a Pope, to choose him this or that day, or to choose this or that man. I would be glad to know, by what argument he can prove the election not to have been necessitated: for it is not enough for him to say, I perceive no necessity in it; nor to say, they might have chosen another, because he knows not whether they might or not; nor to say if he had not been freely elected, the election had been void or none. For though that be true, it does not follow that the election was not necessary; for there is no repugnance to necessity, either in election or in freedom. And whereas he concludeth, “therefore voluntary acts in particular, are not necessitated”; I would have been glad he had set down what voluntary acts there are, not particular, which by his restricting of voluntary acts he grants to be necessitated.

NO. XXXI.

T. H. Seventhly, I hold that to be a sufficient cause, to which nothing is wanting that is needful to the producing of the effect. The same is also a necessary cause: for if it be possible that a sufficient cause shall not bring forth the effect, then there wanted somewhat which was needful to the producing of it; and so the cause was not sufficient. But if it be impossible that a sufficient cause should not produce the effect, then is a sufficient cause a necessary cause: for that is said to produce an effect necessarily, that cannot but produce it. Hence it is manifest, that whatsoever is produced, is produced necessarily: for whatsoever is produced, hath had a sufficient cause to produce it, or else it had not been. And therefore also voluntary actions are necessitated.

The Bishop’s reply.

J. D. “This section contains a third argument to prove that all effects are necessary; for clearing whereof, it is needful to consider how a cause may be said to be sufficient or insufficient.

“First, several causes singly considered may be insufficient, and the same taken conjointly be sufficient to produce an effect. As (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 their conjunction be necessary, and their habitude such as they may draw it. If the owner of one of these horses will not suffer him to draw; if the smith have shod the other in the quick, and lamed him; if the horse have cast a shoe, or be a resty jade, and will not draw but when he list; then the effect is not necessarily produced, but contingently more or less, as the concurrence of the causes is more or less contingent.

(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. Now, if the debility of the cause be not necessary, but contingent, then the effect is not necessary, but contingent. It is a rule in logic, that the conclusion always follows the weaker part. If the premises be but probable, the conclusion cannot be demonstrative. It holds as well in causes as in propositions. No effect can exceed the virtue of its cause. If the ability or debility of the causes be contingent, the effect cannot be necessary.

“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.

The Bishop’s reply.

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.

The Bishop’s reply.

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”?

(i) “The reason for the sixth point is like the former, a phantastical 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 without a necessary cause.” He granteth nothing can begin without a cause; and he hath granted formerly that nothing can cause itself. And now he saith, it may begin to act of itself. The action therefore begins to be without any cause, which he said nothing could do, contradicting what he had said but in the line before. And for that that he saith, that “many things may begin not without a cause, but without a necessary cause”; it hath been argued before; and all causes have been proved, if entire and sufficient causes, to be necessary. And that which he repeateth here, namely, that “a free cause may choose his time when he will begin to work”; and that “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”; it has been made appear sufficiently before that it is but jargon, the words free cause and determining themselves being insignificant, and having nothing in the mind of man answerable to them.

(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 to examine himself, &c.” One of his interrogatories is this, “whether I find not by experience, that I do many things which I might have left undone if I would”. This question was needless, because all the way I have granted him that men have liberty to do many things if they will, which they left undone because they had not the will to do them. Another interrogatory is this, “whether I do not some things without regard to the direction of right reason, or serious respect of what is honest or profitable”. This question was in vain, unless he think himself my confessor. Another is, “whether I writ not this defence against liberty, only to show I will have a dominion over my own actions”. To this I answer, no: but to show I have no dominion over my will, and this also at his request. But all these questions serve in this place for nothing else, but to deliver him of a jest he was in labour withal: and therefore his last question is, “whether I do not sometimes say, ‘Oh, what a fool was I to do thus and thus!’ or, ‘Oh, that I had been wise!’ or, ‘Oh, what a fool was I to grow old!’”old!’” Subtle questions, and full of episcopal gravity! I would he had left out charging me with blasphemous, desperate, destructive, and atheistical opinions. I should then have pardoned him his calling me fool; both because I do many things foolishly, and because, in this question disputed between us, I think he will appear a greater fool than I.

NO. XXXIV.

T. H. For the seventh point, that all events have necessary causes, it is there proved in that they have sufficient causes. Further, let us in this place also suppose any event never so casual, as for example, the throwing ambs-ace upon a pair of dice; and see if it must not have been necessary before it was thrown. For, seeing it was thrown, it had a beginning, and consequently a sufficient cause to produce it; consisting partly in the dice, partly in the outward things, as the posture of the party’s hand, the measure of force applied by the caster, the posture of the parts of the table, and the like. In sum, there was nothing wanting that was necessarily requisite to the producing of that particular cast; and consequently, that cast was necessarily thrown. For if it had not been thrown, there had wanted somewhat requisite to the throwing of it; and so the cause had not been sufficient. In the like manner it may be proved that every other accident, how contingent soever it seem, or how voluntary soever it be, is produced necessarily; which is that J. D. disputes against. The same also may be proved in this manner. Let the case be put for example, of the weather. It is necessary, that to-morrow it shall rain or not rain. If therefore it be not necessary it shall rain, it is necessary it shall not rain. Otherwise it is not necessary that the proposition, it shall rain or it shall not rain, should be true. I know there are some that say, it may necessarily be true, that one of the two shall come to pass, but not singly, that it shall rain or it shall not rain. Which is as much as to say, one of them is necessary, yet neither of them is necessary. And therefore, to seem to avoid that absurdity, they make a distinction, that neither of them is true determinate, but indeterminate. Which distinction either signifies no more than this: one of them is true, but we know not which, and so the necessity remains, though we know it not: or if the meaning of the distinction be not that, it has no meaning. And they might as well have said, one of them is true tytyrice, but neither of them tupatulice.

The Bishop’s reply.

J. D. (a) “His former proof, that all sufficient causes are necessary causes, is answered before (No. XXXI). (b) And his two instances of casting ambs-ace, and raining to-morrow, are altogether impertinent to the question now agitated between us, for two reasons. First, our present controversy is concerning free actions, which proceed from the liberty of man’s will: both his instances are of contingent actions, which proceed from the indetermination or contingent concurrence of natural causes. First, that there are free actions which proceed merely from election, without any outward necessitation, is a truth so evident as that there is a sun in the heavens; and he that doubteth of it, may as well doubt whether there be a shell without the nut, or a stone within the olive. A man proportions his time each day, and allots so much to his devotions, so much to his study, so much to his diet, so much to his recreations, so much to necessary or civil visits, so much to his rest; he who will seek for I know not what causes of all this without himself, except that good God who hath given him a reasonable soul, may as well seek for a cause of the Egyptian pyramids among the crocodiles of Nilus. (c) Secondly, for mixed actions which proceed from the concurrence of free and natural agents, though they be not free, yet they are not necessary. As, to keep my former instance, a man walking through a street of a city to do his occasions, a tile falls from a house and breaks his head. The breaking of his head was not necessary, for he did freely choose to go that way without any necessitation; neither was it free, for he did not deliberate of that accident; therefore it was contingent, and by undoubted consequence, there are contingent actions in the world which are not free. Most certainly by the concurrence of free causes, as God, the good and bad angels, and men, with natural agents, sometimes on purpose and sometimes by accident, many events happen, which otherwise had never happened; many effects are produced, which otherwise had never been produced. And admitting such things to be contingent, not necessary, all their consequent effects, not only immediate, but mediate, must likewise be contingent, that is to say, such as do not proceed from a continued connexion and succession of necessary causes; which is directly contrary to T. H.’s opinion.

(d) “Thirdly, for the actions of brute beasts, though they be not free, though they have not the use of reason to restrain their appetites from that which is sensitively good by the consideration of what is rationally good, or what is honest, and though their fancies be determined by nature to some kinds of work; yet to think that every individual action of theirs, and each animal motion of theirs, even to the least murmur or gesture, is bound by the chain of unalterable necessity to the extrinsical causes or objects, I see no ground for it. Christ saith, one of these sparrows doth not fall to the ground without your heavenly Father, that is, without an influence of power from him, or exempted from his disposition; he doth not say, which your heavenly Father casteth not down. Lastly, for the natural actions of inanimate creatures, wherein there is not the least concurrence of any free or voluntary agents, the question is yet more doubtful. For many things are called contingent in respect of us, because we know not the cause of them, which really and in themselves are not contingent, but necessary. Also many things are contingent in respect of one single cause, either actually hindered, or in possibility to be hindered, which are necessary in respect of the joint concurrence of all collateral causes. (e) But whether there be a necessary connexion of all natural causes from the beginning, so as they must all have concurred as they have done, and in the same degree of power, and have been deficient as they have been in all events whatsoever, would require a further examination, if it were pertinent to this question of liberty; but it is not. It is sufficient to my purpose, to have showed that all elective actions are free from absolute necessity: and moreover, that the concurrence of voluntary and free agents with natural causes, both upon purpose and accidentally, hath helped them to produce many effects, which otherwise they had not produced, and hindered them from producing many effects, which otherwise they had produced: and that if this intervention of voluntary and free agents had been more frequent than it hath been, as without doubt it might have been, many natural events had been otherwise than they are. And therefore he might have spared his instance of casting ambs-ace and raining to-morrow. And first, for his casting ambs-ace: if it be thrown by a fair gamester with indifferent dice, it is a mixed action; the casting of the dice is free, but the casting of ambs-ace is contingent. A man may deliberate whether he will cast the dice or not; but it were folly to deliberate whether he will cast ambs-ace or not, because it is not in his power, unless he be a cheater that can cog the dice, or the dice be false dice; and then the contingency, or degree of contingency, ceaseth accordingly as the caster hath more or less cunning, or as the figure or making of the dice doth incline them to ambs-ace more than to another cast, or necessitate them to this cast and no other. Howsoever, so far as the cast is free or contingent, so far it is not necessary: and where necessity begins, there liberty and contingency do cease to be. Likewise his other instance of raining or not raining to-morrow, is not of a free elective act, nor always of a contingent act. In some countries, as they have their stati venti, their certain winds at set seasons; so they have their certain and set rains. The Ethiopian rains are supposed to be the cause of the certain inundation of Nilus. In some eastern countries they have rain only twice a year, and those constant; which the Scriptures call the former and the later rain. In such places not only the causes do act determinately and necessarily, but also the determination or necessity of the event is foreknown to the inhabitants. In our climate, the natural causes celestial and sublunary do not produce rain so necessarily at set times; neither can we say so certainly and infallibly, it will rain to-morrow, or it will not rain to-morrow. Nevertheless, it may so happen that the causes are so disposed and determined, even in our climate, that this proposition, it will rain to-morrow or it will not rain to-morrow, may be necessary in itself; and the prognostics, or tokens, may be such in the sky, in our own bodies, in the creatures, animate and inanimate, as weather glasses, &c., that it may become probably true to us that it will rain to-morrow, or it will not rain to-morrow. But ordinarily, it is a contingent proposition to us; whether it be contingent also in itself, that is, whether the concurrence of the causes were absolutely necessary, whether the vapours or matter of the rain may not yet be dispersed, or otherwise consumed, or driven beyond our coast, is a speculation which no way concerns this question. So we see one reason why his two instances are altogether impertinent; because they are of actions which are not free, nor elective, nor such as proceed from the liberty of man’s will.

“Secondly, our dispute is about absolute necessity; his proofs extend only to hypothetical necessity. Our question is, whether the concurrence and determination of the causes were necessary before they did concur, or were determined. He proves that the effect is necessary after the causes have concurred, and are determined. The freest actions of God or man are necessary, by such a necessity of supposition, and the most contingent events that are, as I have showed plainly, No. III, where his instance of ambs-ace is more fully answered. So his proof looks another way from his proposition. His proposition is, ‘that the casting of ambs-ace was necessary before it was thrown’. His proof is, that it was necessary when it was thrown. Examine all his causes over and over, and they will not afford him one grain of antecedent necessity. The first cause is in the dice: true, if they be false dice there may be something in it; but then his contingency is destroyed: if they be square dice, they have no more inclination to ambs-ace, than to cinque and quatre, or any other cast. His second cause is ‘the posture of the party’s hand’: but what necessity was there that he should put his hands into such a posture? None at all. The third cause is ‘the measure of the force applied by the caster’. Now for the credit of his cause let him but name, I will not say a convincing reason nor so much as a probable reason, but even any pretence of reason, how the caster was necessitated from without himself to apply just so much force, and neither more nor less. If he cannot, his cause is desperate, and he may hold his peace for ever. His last cause is the posture of the table. But tell us in good earnest, what necessity there was why the caster must throw into that table rather than the other, or that the dice must fall just upon that part of the table, before the cast was thrown: he that makes these to be necessary causes, I do not wonder if he make all effects necessary effects. If any one of these causes be contingent, it is sufficient to render the cast contingent; and now that they are all so contingent, yet he will needs have the effect to be necessary. And so it is when the cast is thrown; but not before the cast was thrown, which he undertook to prove. Who can blame him for being so angry with the Schoolmen, and their distinctions of necessity into absolute and hypothetical, seeing they touch his freehold so nearly?

“But though his instance of raining to-morrow be impertinent, as being no free action, yet because he triumphs so much in his argument, I will not stick to go a little out of my way to meet a friend. For I confess the validity of the reason had been the same, if he had made it of a free action, as thus: either I shall finish this reply to-morrow, or I shall not finish this reply to-morrow, is a necessary proposition. But because he shall not complain of any disadvantage in the alteration of his terms, I will for once adventure upon his shower of rain. And first, I readily admit his major, that this proposition, either it will rain to-morrow or it will not rain to-morrow, is necessarily true: for of two contradictory propositions, the one must of necessity be true, because no third can be given. But his minor, that ‘it could not be necessarily true, except one of the members were necessarily true’, is most false. And so is his proof likewise, that ‘if neither the one nor the other of the members be necessarily true, it cannot be affirmed that either the one or the other is true’. A conjunct proposition may have both parts false, and yet the proposition be true; as, if the sun shine it is day, is a true proposition at midnight. And T. H. confesseth as much, No. XIX. ‘If I shall live I shall eat, is a necessary proposition, that is to say, it is necessary that that proposition should be true whensoever uttered. But it is not the necessity of the thing, nor is it therefore necessary that the man shall live or that the man shall eat’. And so T. H. proceeds: ‘I do not use to fortify my distinctions with such reasons’. But it seemeth he hath forgotten himself, and is contented with such poor fortifications. And though both parts of a disjunctive proposition cannot be false; because if it be a right disjunction, the members are repugnant, whereof one part is infallibly true; yet vary but the proposition a little to abate the edge of the disjunctions, and you shall find in that which T. H. saith to be true, that it is not the necessity of the thing which makes the proposition to be true. As for example, vary it thus: I know that either it will rain to-morrow or that it will not rain to-morrow, is a true proposition: but it is not true that I know it will rain to-morrow, neither is it true that I know it will not rain to-morrow; wherefore the certain truth of the proposition doth not prove that either of the members is determinately true in present. Truth is a conformity of the understanding to the thing known, whereof speech is an interpreter. If the understanding agree not with the thing, it is an error; if the words agree not with the understanding, it is a lie. Now the thing known, is known either in itself or in its causes. If it be known in itself as it is, then we express our apprehension of it in words of the present tense; as the sun is risen. If it be known in its cause, we express ourselves in words of the future tense; as to-morrow will be an eclipse of the moon. But if we neither know it in itself, nor in its causes, then there may be a foundation of truth, but there is no such determinate truth of it that we can reduce it into a true proposition. We cannot say it doth rain to-morrow, or it doth not rain to-morrow; that were not only false but absurd. We cannot positively say it will rain to-morrow, because we do not know it in its causes, either how they are determined or that they are determined. Wherefore the certitude and evidence of the disjunctive proposition is neither founded upon that which will be actually to-morrow, for it is granted that we do not know that; nor yet upon the determination of the causes, for then we would not say indifferently either it will rain or it will not rain, but positively it will rain, or positively it will not rain. But it is grounded upon an undeniable principle, that of two contradictory propositions the one must necessarily be true. (f) And therefore to say, either this or that will infallibly be, but it is not yet determined whether this or that shall be, is no such senseless assertion that it deserved a tytyrice tupatulice, but an evident truth which no man that hath his eyes in his head can doubt of.

(g) “If all this will not satisfy him, I will give one of his own kind of proofs; that is, an instance. That which necessitates all things, according to T. H. (No. XI), is the decree of God, or that order which is set to all things by the eternal cause. Now God himself, who made this necessitating decree, was not subjected to it in the making thereof; neither was there any former order to oblige the first cause necessarily to make such a decree; therefore this decree being an act ad extra, was freely made by God without any necessitation. Yet nevertheless this disjunctive proposition is necessarily true: either God did make each a decree, or he did not make such a decree. Again, though T. H.’s opinion were true, that all events are necessary, and that the whole Christian world are deceived who believe that some events are free from necessity; yet he will not deny, but if it had been the good pleasure of God, he might have made some causes free from necessity; seeing that it neither argues any imperfection, nor implies any contradiction. Supposing therefore that God had made some second causes free from any such antecedent determination to one; yet the former disjunction would be necessarily true: either this free undetermined cause will act after this manner, or it will not act after this manner. Wherefore the necessary truth of such a disjunctive proposition doth not prove that either of the members of the disjunction singly considered, is determinately true in present; but only that the one of them will be determinately true to-morrow.

ANIMADVERSIONS UPON THE ANSWER TO NO. XXXIV.

(a) “His former proof, that all sufficient causes are necessary causes, is answered before (No. XXXI).” When he shall have read my animadversions upon that answer of his, he will think otherwise, whatsoever he will confess.

(b) “And his two instances of casting ambs-ace, and of raining to-morrow, are altogether impertinent to the question, for two reasons.” His first reason is, “because”, saith he, “our present controversy is concerning free actions, which proceed from the liberty of man’s will; and both his instances are of contingent actions, which proceed from the indetermination, or contingent concurrence of natural causes”. He knows that this part of my discourse, which beginneth at No. XXV, is no dispute with him at all, but a bare setting down of my opinion concerning the natural necessity of all things; which is opposite, not only to the liberty of will, but also to all contingence that is not necessary. And therefore these instances were not impertinent to my purpose; and if they be impertinent to his opinion of the liberty of man’s will, he does impertinently to meddle with them. And yet for all he pretends here, that the question is only about liberty of the will; yet in his first discourse (No. XVI), he maintains that “the order, beauty, and perfection of the world doth require that in the universe should be agents of all sorts, some necessary, some free, some contingent”. And my purpose here is to show by those instances, that those things which we esteem most contingent are nevertheless necessary. Besides, the controversy is not whether free actions which proceed from the liberty of man’s will, be necessary or not; for I know no action which proceedeth from the liberty of man’s will. But the question is, whether those actions which proceed from the man’s will, be necessary. The man’s will is something, but the liberty of his will is nothing. Again, the question is not whether contingent actions which proceed from the indetermination or contingent concurrence of natural causes, (for there is nothing that can proceed from indetermination), but whether contingent actions be necessary before they be done; or whether the concurrence of natural causes, when they happen to concur, were not necessitated so to happen; or whether whatsoever chanceth, be not necessitated so to chance. And that they are so necessitated, I have proved already with such arguments as the Bishop, for aught I see, cannot answer. For to say, as he doth, that “there are free actions which proceed merely from election, without any outward necessitation, is a truth so evident as that there is a sun in the heavens”, is no proof. It is indeed as clear as the sun, that there are free actions proceeding from election; but that there is election without any outward necessitation, is dark enough.

(c) “Secondly, for mixed actions, which proceed from the concurrence of free and natural agents, though they be not free, yet they are not necessary, &c.” For proof of this he instanceth in a tile, that falling from a house breaks a man’s head, neither necessarily nor freely, and therefore contingently. Not necessarily, “for”, saith he, “he did freely choose to go that way without any necessitation”. Which is as much as taking the question itself for a proof. For what is else the question, but whether a man be necessitated to choose what he chooseth? “Again”, saith he, “it was not free, because he did not deliberate whether his head should be broken or not”; and concludes “therefore it was contingent; and by undoubted consequence, there are contingent actions in the world which are not free”. This is true, and denied by none; but he should have proved, that such contingent actions are not antecedently necessary by a concurrence of natural causes; though a little before he granteth they are. For whatsoever is produced by a concurrence of natural causes, was antecedently determined in the cause of such concurrence, though, as he calls it, contingent concurrence; not perceiving that concurrence and contingent concurrence are all one, and suppose a continued connection and succession of causes which make the effect necessarily future. So that hitherto he hath proved no other contingence than that which is necessary.

(d) “Thirdly, for the actions of brute beasts, &c, to think each animal motion of theirs is bound by the chain of unalterable necessity, I see no ground for it.” It maketh nothing against the truth, that he sees no ground for it. I have pointed out the ground in my former discourse, and am not bound to find him eyes. He himself immediately citeth a place of Scripture that proveth it, where Christ saith, one of these sparrows doth not fall to the ground without your heavenly Father; which place, if there were no more, were a sufficient ground for the assertion of the necessity of all those changes of animal motion in birds and other living creatures, which seem to us so uncertain. But when a man is dizzy with influence of power, elicit acts, permissive will, hypothetical necessity, and the like unintelligible terms, the ground goes from him. By and by after he confesseth that “many things are called contingent in respect of us, because we know not the cause of them, which really and in themselves are not contingent, but necessary”; and errs therein the other way; for he says in effect, that many things are, which are not; for it is all one to say, they are not contingent, and they are not. He should have said, there be many things, the necessity of whose contingence we cannot or do not know.

(e) “But whether there be a necessary connexion of all natural causes from the beginning, so as they must all have concurred as they have done, &c, would require a further examination, if it were pertinent to this question of liberty; but it is not. It is sufficient to my purpose to have showed, &c.” If there be a necessary connexion of all natural causes from the beginning, then there is no doubt but that all things happen necessarily, which is that that I have all this while maintained. But whether there be or no, he says, it requires a further examination. Hitherto therefore he knows not whether it be true or no, and consequently all his arguments hitherto have been of no effect, nor hath he showed anything to prove, what he purposed, that elective actions are not necessitated. And whereas a little before he says, that to my arguments to prove that sufficient causes are necessary, he hath already answered; it seemeth he distrusteth his own answer, and answers again to the two instances of casting ambs-ace, and raining or not raining to-morrow; but brings no other argument to prove the cast thrown not to be necessarily thrown, but this, that he does not deliberate whether he shall throw that cast or not. Which argument may perhaps prove that the casting of it proceedeth not from free will, but proves not anything against the antecedent necessity of it. And to prove that it is not necessary that it should rain or not rain to-morrow; after telling us that the Ethiopian rains cause the inundation of Nilus: that in some eastern countries they have rain only twice a year, which the Scripture, he saith, calleth the former and the latter rain; (I thought he had known it by the experience of some travellers, but I see he only gathereth it from that phrase in Scripture of former and latter rain); I say, after he has told us this, to prove that it is not necessary it should rain or not rain to-morrow he saith that “in our climate the natural causes, celestial and sublunary, do not produce rain so necessarily at set times, as in the eastern countries; neither can we say so certainly and infallibly, it will rain to-morrow, or it will not rain to-morrow”. By this argument a man may take the height of the Bishop’s logic. “In our climate the natural causes do not produce rain so necessarily at set times, as in some eastern countries. Therefore they do not produce rain necessarily in our climate, then when they do produce it”. And again, “we cannot say so certainly and infallibly, it will rain to-morrow or it will not rain to-morrow; therefore it is not necessary either that it should rain, or that it should not rain to-morrow”: as if nothing were necessary the necessity whereof we know not. Another reason, he saith, why my instances are impertinent, is because “they extend only to an hypothetical necessity”, that is, that the necessity is not in the antecedent causes; and thereupon challengeth me for the credit of my cause to name some reason, “how the caster was necessitated from without himself to apply just so much force to the cast, and neither more nor less; or what necessity there was why the caster must throw into that table rather than the other, or that the dice must fall just upon that part of the table, before the cast was thrown”. Here again, from our ignorance of the particular causes that concurring make the necessity he inferreth, that there was no such necessity at all; which indeed is that which hath in all this question deceived him, and all other men that attribute events to fortune. But I suppose he will not deny that event to be necessary, where all the causes of the cast, and their concurrence, and the cause of that concurrence are foreknown, and might be told him, though I cannot tell him. Seeing therefore God foreknows them all, the cast was necessary; and that from antecedent causes from eternity; which is no hypothetical necessity.

And whereas to my argument to prove, that ‘raining to-morrow if it shall then rain, and not raining to-morrow if it shall then not rain’, was therefore necessary, because ‘otherwise this disjunctive proposition, it shall rain or not rain to-morrow, is not necessary’, he answereth that “a conjunct proposition may have both parts false, and yet the proposition be true; as, if the sun shine it is day, is a true proposition at midnight”: what has a conjunct proposition to do with this in question, which is disjunctive? Or what be the parts of this proposition, if the sun shine, it is day? It is not made of two propositions, as a disjunctive is; but is one simple proposition, namely, this, the shining of the sun is day. Either he has no logic at all, or thinks they have no reason at all that are his readers. But he has a trick, he saith, to abate the edge of the disjunction, by varying ther proposition thus, “I know that it will rain to-morrow, or that it will not rain to-morrow, is a true proposition”; and yet saith he, “it is neither true that I know it will rain to-morrow, neither is it true that I know it will not rain to-morrow”. What childish deceit, or childish ignorance is this; when he is to prove that neither of the members is determinately true in a disjunctive proposition, to bring for instance a proposition not disjunctive? It had been disjunctive if it had gone thus, I know that it will rain to-morrow, or I know that it will not rain to-morrow; but then he had certainly known determinately one of the two.

(f) “And therefore to say, either this or that will infallibly be, but it is not yet determined whether this or that shall be, is no such senseless assertion that it deserved a tytyrice tupatulice”. But it is a senseless assertion, whatsoever it deserve, to say that this proposition, it shall rain or not rain, is true indeterminedly, and neither of them true determinedly; and little better, as he hath now qualified it, “that it will infallibly be, though it be not yet determined whether it shall be or no”.

(g) “If all this will not satisfy him, I will give him one of his own kinds of proof, that is, an instance. That which necessitates all things, according to T. H. is the decree of God, &c.” His instance is, “that God himself made this necessitating decree, and therefore this decree, being an act ad extra, was freely made by God, without any necessitation”. I do believe the Bishop himself believeth that all the decrees of God have been from all eternity, and therefore he will not stand to this, that God’s decrees were ever made; for whatsoever hath been made, hath had a beginning. Besides, God’s decree is his will; and the Bishop hath said formerly, that the will of God is God, the justice of God, God, &c. If therefore God made a decree, according to the Bishop’s opinion God made himself. By which we may see, what fine stuff it is that proceedeth from disputing of incomprehensibles. Again he says, “if it had been the good pleasure of God, he might have made some causes free from necessity; seeing that it neither argues any imperfection, nor implies any contradiction”. If God had made either causes or effects free from necessity, he had made them free from his own prescience; which had been imperfection. Perhaps he will say, that in these words of his, the decree, being an act ad extra, was freely made by God, I take no notice of that act ad extra, as being too hot for my fingers. Therefore now I take notice of it, and say that it is neither Latin, nor English, nor sense.

NO. XXXV.

T. H. The last thing, in which also consisteth the whole controversy, namely, that there is no such thing as an agent, which, when all things requisite to action are present, can nevertheless forbear to produce it, or (which is all one) that there is no such thing as freedom from necessity; is easily inferred from that which hath been before alleged. For if it be an agent, it can work; and if it work, there is nothing wanting of what is requisite to produce the action; and consequently the cause of the action is sufficient; and if sufficient, then also necessary, as hath been proved before.

The Bishop’s reply.

J. D. “I wonder that T. H. should confess, that the whole weight of this controversy doth rest upon this proposition: ‘that there is no such thing as an agent, which, when all things requisite to action are present, can nevertheless forbear to act’act’; and yet bring nothing but such poor bullrushes to support it. (a) ‘If it be an agent’, saith he, ‘it can work’; what of this? A posse ad esse non valet argumentum: from can work to will work, is a weak inference. And from will work to doth work upon absolute necessity, is another gross inconsequence. He proceeds thus: ‘if it work, there is nothing wanting of what is requisite to produce the action’. True, there wants nothing to produce that which is produced; but there may want much to produce that which was intended. One horse may pull his heart out, and yet not draw the coach whither it should be, if he want the help or concurrence of his fellows. ‘And consequently’, saith he, ‘the cause of the action is sufficient’. Yes, sufficient to do what it doth, though perhaps with much prejudice to itself; but not always sufficient to do what it should do, or what it would do. As he that begets a monster, should beget a man, and would beget a man if he could. The last link of his argument follows: (b) ‘and if sufficient, then also necessary’. Stay there; by his leave, there is no necessary connexion between sufficiency and efficiency; otherwise God himself should not be all-sufficient. Thus his argument is vanished. But I will deal more favourably with him, and grant him all that which he labours so much in vain to prove, that every effect in the world hath sufficient causes; yea more, that supposing the determination of the free and contingent causes, every effect in the world is necessary. (c) But all this will not advantage his cause the black of a bean: for still it amounts but to an hypothetical necessity, and differs as much from that absolute necessity, which he maintains, as a gentleman who travels for his pleasure, differs from a banished man, or a free subject from a slave.”

ANIMADVERSIONS UPON THE ANSWER TO NO. XXXV.

(a) “‘If it be an agent,’ saith he, ‘it can work’. What of this? A posse ad esse non valet argumentum; from can work to will work, is a weak inference. And from will work to doth work upon absolute necessity, is another gross inconsequence.” Here he has gotten a just advantage; for I should have said, if it be an agent it worketh, not it can work. But it is an advantage which profiteth little to his cause. For if I repeat my argument again in this manner: that which is an agent, worketh; that which worketh, wanteth nothing requisite to produce the action or the effect it produceth, and consequently is thereof a sufficient cause; and if a sufficient cause, then also a necessary cause: his answer will be nothing to the purpose. For whereas to these words, ‘that which worketh, wanteth nothing requisite to produce the action or the effect it produceth,’ he answereth, “it is true, but there may want much to produce that which was intended”, it is not contrary to any thing that I have said. For I never maintained, that whatsoever a man intendeth, is necessarily performed; but this, whatsoever a man performeth, is necessarily performed, and what he intendeth, necessarily intended, and that from causes antecedent. And therefore to say, as he doth, that the cause is sufficient to do what it doth, but not always sufficient to do what a man should or would do, is to say the same that I do. For I say not, that the cause that bringeth forth a monster, is sufficient to bring forth a man; but that every cause is sufficient to produce only the effect it produceth; and if sufficient, then also necessary.

(b) “‘And if sufficient, then also necessary’. Stay there; by his leave, there is no necessary connexion between sufficiency and efficiency; otherwise God himself should not be all-sufficient.” All-sufficiency signifieth no more, when it is attributed to God, than omnipotence; and omnipotence signifieth no more, than the power to do all things that he will. But to the production of any thing that is produced, the will of God is as requisite as the rest of his power and sufficiency. And consequently, his all-sufficiency signifieth not a sufficiency or power to do those things he will not. But he will deal, he says, so favourably with me, as to grant me all this, which I labour, he saith, so much in vain to prove: and adds, (c) “But all this will not advantage his cause the black of a bean; for still it amounts but to an hypothetical necessity”. If it prove no more, it proves no necessity at all; for by hypothetical necessity he means the necessity of this proposition, the effect is, then when it is; whereas necessity is only said truly of somewhat in future. For necessary is that which cannot possibly be otherwise; and possibility is always understood of some future time. But seeing he granteth so favourably that sufficient causes are necessary causes, I shall easily conclude from it, that whatsoever those causes do cause, are necessary antecedently. For if the necessity of the thing produced, when produced, be in the same instant of time with the existence of its immediate cause; then also that immediate cause was in the same instant with the cause by which it was immediately produced; the same may be said of the cause of this cause, and so backward eternally. From whence it will follow, that all the connexion of the causes of any effect from the beginning of the world, were altogether existent in one and the same instant; and consequently, all the time from the beginning of the world, or from eternity to this day, is but one instant, or a nunc stans; which he knows by this time is not so.

NO. XXXVI.

T. H. And thus you see how the inconveniences, which he objecteth must follow upon the holding of necessity, are avoided, and the necessity itself demonstratively proved. To which I could add, if I thought it good logic, the inconvenience of denying necessity; as that it destroys both the decrees and prescience of God Almighty. For whatsoever God hath purposed to bring to pass by man as an instrument, or foreseeth shall come to pass, a man, if he have liberty, such as he affirmeth from necessitation, might frustrate and make not to come to pass: and God should either not foreknow it and not decree it, or he should foreknow such things shall be as shall never be, and decree that which shall never come to pass.

The Bishop’s reply.

J. D. “Thus he hath laboured in vain to satisfy my reasons, and to prove his own assertion. But for demonstration, there is nothing like it among his arguments. Now he saith, (a) he could add other arguments, if he thought it good logic. There is no impediment in logic, why a man may not press his adversary with those absurdities which flow from his opinion; argumentum ducens ad impossibile or ad absurdum, is a good form of reasoning. But there is another reason of his forbearance, though he be loath to express it. Hæret lateri læthalis arundo. The arguments drawn from the attributes of God do stick so close in the sides of his cause, that he hath no mind to treat of that subject. By the way, take notice of his own confession, that ‘he could add other reasons, if he thought it good logic’. If it were predetermined in the outward causes, that he must make this very defence and no other, how could it be in his power to add or subtract any thing: just as if a blind man should say in earnest, I could see if I had mine eyes? Truth often breaks out whilst men seek to smother it. (b) But let us view his argument: ‘if a man have liberty from necessitation, he may frustrate the decrees of God, and make his prescience false’. First, for the decrees of God, this is his decree that man should be a free agent; if he did consider God as a most simple act, without priority or posteriority of time, or any composition; he would not conceive of his decrees, as of the laws of the Medes and Persians, long since enacted and passed before we were born, but as coexistent with ourselves, and with the acts which we do by virtue of those decrees. Decrees and attributes are but notions to help the weakness of our understanding to conceive of God. The decrees of God are God himself, and therefore justly said to be before the foundation of the world was laid: and yet coexistent with ourselves, because of the infinite and eternal being of God. The sum is this, the decree of God, or God himself eternally, constitutes or ordains all effects which come to pass in time, according to the distinct natures or capacities of his creatures. An eternal ordination is neither past nor to come, but always present. So free actions do proceed as well from the eternal decree of God, as necessary; and from that order which he hath set in the world.

“As the decree of God is eternal, so is his knowledge. And therefore to speak truly and properly, there is neither fore-knowledge nor after-knowledge in him. The knowledge of God comprehends all times in a point, by reason of the eminence and virtue of its infinite perfection. And yet I confess, that this is called fore-knowledge in respect of us. But this fore-knowledge doth produce no absolute necessity. Things are not therefore, because they are foreknown; but therefore they are foreknown, because they shall come to pass. If any thing should come to pass otherwise than it doth, yet God’s knowledge could not be irritated by it; for then he did not know that it should come to pass, as now it doth. Because every knowledge of vision necessarily presupposeth its object, God did know that Judas should betray Christ; but Judas was not necessitated to be a traitor by God’s knowledge. If Judas had not betrayed Christ, then God had not fore-known that Judas should betray him. The case is this: a watchman standing on the steeple’s-top, as it is the use in Germany, gives notice to them below, who see no such things, that company are coming, and how many; his prediction is most certain, for he sees them. What a vain correction were it for one below to say, what if they did not come, then a certain prediction may fail. It may be urged, that there is a difference between these two cases. In this case, the coming is present to the watchman; but that which God fore-knows, is future. God knows what shall be; the watchman only knows what is. I answer, that this makes no difference at all in the case, by reason of that disparity which is between God’s knowledge and ours. As that coming is present to the watchman, which is future to them who are below: so all those things which are future to us, are present to God, because his infinite and eternal knowledge doth reach to the future being of all agents and events. Thus much is plainly acknowledged by T. H. No. XI: that ‘fore-knowledge is knowledge, and knowledge depends on the existence of the things known, and not they on it’. To conclude, the prescience of God doth not make things more necessary than the production of the things themselves; but if the agents were free agents, the production of the things doth not make the events to be absolutely necessary, but only upon supposition that the causes were so determined. God’s prescience proveth a necessity of infallibility, but not of antecedent extrinsical determination to one. If any event should not come to pass, God did never foreknow that it would come to pass. For every knowledge necessarily presupposeth its object.

ANIMADVERSIONS UPON THE ANSWER TO NO. XXXVI.

(a) “‘He could add’, he saith, ‘other arguments, if he thought it good logic,’ &c. There is no impediment in logic, why a man may not press his adversary with those absurdities which flow from his opinion.” Here he misrecites my words; which are, ‘I could add, if I thought it good logic, the inconvenience of denying necessity; as that it destroys both the decrees and prescience of God Almighty’. But he makes me say I could add other arguments; then infers, that there is no impediment in logic, why a man may not press his adversary with the absurdities that flow from his opinion, because argumentum ducens ad impossibile is a good form of reasoning; making no difference between absurdities, which are impossibilities, and inconveniences, which are not only possible but frequent. And though it be a good form of reasoning to argue from absurdities, yet it is no good form of reasoning to argue from inconveniences; for inconvenience may stand well enough with truth.

(b) “But let us view his argument: ‘If a man have liberty from necessitation, he may frustrate the decrees of God, and make his prescience false’. This is his decree, that man should be a free agent. If he did consider God as a most simple act, without priority or posteriority of time, or any composition, he would not conceive of his decrees as long since enacted, but as coexistent with ourselves”. Here again he would have me conceive eternity to be nunc stans, that is, an instant of time, and that instant of time to be God; which neither he nor I can conceive, nor can without impiety say, as he doth here, that the decrees of God are God. In which consisteth all the rest of his answer to this Number, saving that he putteth in sometimes, that “the foreknowledge of God produceth not necessity”, which is granted him; but that anything can be foreknown which shall not necessarily come to pass, which was not granted, he proveth no otherwise than by his assertion, “that every instant of time is God”; which is denied him.

NO. XXXVII.

T. H. This is all that hath come into my mind touching this question, since I last considered it. And I humbly beseech your Lordship to communicate it only to J. D. And so praying God to prosper your Lordship in all your designs, I take leave, and am, my most noble and obliging Lord,

Your most humble servant,

T. H.

The Bishop’s reply.

J. D. “He is very careful to have this discourse kept secret, as appears in this section, and in the XIVth and XVth sections. If his answer had been kept private, I had saved the labour of a reply. But hearing that it was communicated, I thought myself obliged to vindicate both the truth and myself. I do not blame him to be cautious; for in truth, this assertion is of desperate consequence, and destructive to piety, policy, and morality. (a) If he had desired to have it kept secret, the way had been to have kept it secret himself. It will not suffice to say, as No. XIV, that ‘truth is truth’: This is the common plea of all men. Neither is it sufficient for him to say, as No. XV, that ‘it was desired by me’, long before that he had discovered his opinion by word of mouth. And my desire was to let some of my noble friends see the weakness of his grounds, and the pernicious consequences of that opinion. (b) But if he think that this ventilation of the question between us two may do hurt, truly I hope not. The edge of his discourse is so abated, that it cannot easily hurt any rational man, who is not too much possessed with prejudice.”prejudice.”

ANIMADVERSIONS UPON THE ANSWER TO NO. XXXVII.

In this place I said nothing, but that I would have my Lord of Newcastle to communicate it only to the Bishop. And in his answer he says, (a) “if I had desired to have it kept secret, the way had been to have kept it secret myself”. My desire was, it should not be communicated by my Lord of Newcastle to all men indifferently. But I barred not myself from showing it privately to my friends; though to publish it was never my intention, till now provoked by the uncivil triumphing of the Bishop in his own errors to my disadvantage.

(b) “But if he think that this ventilation of the question may do hurt, truly I hope not. The edge of his discourse is so abated, that it cannot easily hurt any rational man, who is not too much possessed with prejudice.” It is confidently said; but not very pertinently to the hurt I thought might proceed from a discourse of this nature. For I never thought it could do hurt to a rational man, but only to such men as cannot reason in those points which are of difficult contemplation. For a rational man will say with himself, they whom God will bring to a blessed and happy end, those he will put into an humble, pious, and righteous way; and of those whom he will destroy, he will harden the hearts: and thereupon examining himself whether he be in such a way or not, the examination itself would, if elected, be a necessary cause of working out his salvation with fear and trembling. But the men who I thought might take hurt thereby, are such as reason erroneously, saying with themselves, if I shall be saved, I shall be saved whether I walk uprightly or no: and consequently thereunto, shall behave themselves negligently, and pursue the pleasant way of the sins they are in love with. Which inconvenience is not abated by this discourse of the Bishop; because they understand not the grounds he goeth on, of nunc stans, motus primo primi, elicit acts, imperate acts, and a great many other such unintelligible words.

NO. XXXVIII.

T. H. Postscript. Arguments seldom work on men of wit and learning, when they have once engaged themselves in a contrary opinion. If anything do it, it is the shewing of them the causes of their errors, which is this. Pious men attribute to God Almighty, for honour sake, whatsoever they see is honourable in the world, as seeing, hearing, willing, knowing, justice, wisdom, &c.: but deny him such poor things as eyes, ears, brains, and other organs, without which we worms neither have nor can conceive such faculties to be: and so far they do well. But when they dispute of God’s actions philosophically, then they consider them again as if he had such faculties, and in that manner as we have them. This is not well; and thence it is they fall into so many difficulties. We ought not to dispute of God’s nature; he is no fit subject of our philosophy. True religion consisteth in obedience to Christ’s lieutenants, and in giving God such honour, both in attributes and actions, as they in their several lieutenancies shall ordain.

The Bishop’s reply.

J. D. “Though sophistical captions do seldom work on men of wit and learning, because by constant use they have their senses exercised to discern both good and evil (Heb. v. 14), yet (a) solid and substantial reasons work sooner upon them than upon weaker judgments. The more exact the balance is, the sooner it discovers the real weight that is put into it; especially if the proofs be proposed without passion or opposition. Let sophisters and seditious orators apply themselves to the many-headed multitude, because they despair of success with men of wit and learning. Those whose gold is true, are not afraid to have it tried by the touch. Since the former way hath not succeeded, T. H. hath another to shew as the causes of our errors, which he hopes will prove more successful. When he sees he can do no good by sight, he seeks to circumvent us under colour of courtesy: Fistula dulce canit, volucrem dum decipit auceps. As they who behold themselves in a glass, take the right hand for the left, and the left for the right (T. H. knows the comparison); so we take our own errors to be truths, and other men’s truths to be errors, (b) If we be in an error in this, it is such an error as we sucked from nature itself, such an error as is confirmed in us by reason and experience, such an error as God himself in his sacred Word hath revealed, such an error as the Fathers and Doctors of the Church in all ages have delivered, such an error wherein we have the concurrence of all the best philosophers, both natural and moral, such an error as bringeth to God the glory of justice, and wisdom, and goodness, and truth, such an error as renders men more devout, more pious, more industrious, more humble, more penitent for their sins. Would he have us resign up all these advantages, to dance blindfold after his pipe? No, he persuades us too much to our loss. But let us see what is the imaginary cause of our imaginary error. Forsooth, because ‘we attribute to God whatsoever is honourable in the world, as seeing, hearing, willing, knowing, justice, wisdom; but deny him such poor things as eyes, ears, brains’brains’; and so far, he saith ‘we do well.’ He hath reason, for since we are not able to conceive of God as he is, the readiest way we have, is by removing all that imperfection from God, which is in the creatures; so we call him infinite, immortal, independent: or by attributing to him all those perfections which are in the creatures, after a most eminent manner; so we call him best, greatest, most wise, most just, most holy. (c) But saith he, ‘When they dispute of God’s actions philosophically, then they consider them again, as if he had such faculties, and in that manner as we have them’.

“And is this the cause of our error? That were strange indeed; for they who dispute philosophically of God, do neither ascribe faculties to him in that manner that we have them, nor yet do they attribute any proper faculties at all to God. God’s understanding and his will is his very essence, which, for the eminency of its infinite perfection, doth perform all those things alone in a most transcendant manner, which reasonable creatures do perform imperfectly by distinct faculties. Thus to dispute of God with modesty and reverence, and to clear the Deity from the imputation of tyranny, injustice, and dissimulation, which none do throw upon God with more presumption than those who are the patrons of absolute necessity, is both comely and Christian.

“It is not the desire to discover the original of a supposed error, which draws them ordinarily into these exclamations against those who dispute of the Deity. For some of themselves dare anatomize God, and publish his eternal decrees with as much confidence, as if they had been all their lives of his cabinet council. But it is for fear lest those pernicious consequences which flow from that doctrine essentially, and reflect in so high a degree upon the supreme goodness, should be laid open to the view of the world; just as the Turks do first establish a false religion of their own devising, and then forbid all men upon pain of death to dispute upon religion; or as the priests of Moloch, the abomination of the Ammonites, did make a noise with their timbrels all the while the poor infants were passing through the fire in Tophet, to keep their pitiful cries from the ears of their parents. So (d) they make a noise with their declamations against those who dare dispute of the nature of God, that is, who dare set forth his justice, and his goodness, and his truth, and his philanthropy, only to deaf the ears and dim the eyes of the Christian world, lest they should hear the lamentable ejulations and howlings, or see that rueful spectacle of millions of souls tormented for evermore (e) in the flames of the true Tophet, that is, hell, only for that which, according to T. H.’s doctrine, was never in their power to shun, but which they were ordered and inevitably necessitated to do, only to express the omnipotence and dominion, and to satisfy the pleasure of Him, who is in truth the Father of all mercies, and the God of all consolation. (f) This is life eternal (saith our Saviour), to know the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom he hath sent (John xvii. 3.). Pure religion, and undefiled before God and the Father, is this, to visit the fatherless and widows in their affliction, and to keep himself unspotted from the world, saith St. James (James i. 27.). Fear God and keep his commandments; for this is the whole duty of man, saith Solomon (Eccles. xii. 13.). But T. H. hath found out a more compendious way to heaven: ‘True religion’, saith he, ‘consisteth in obedience to Christ’s lieutenants, and giving God such honour, both in attributes and actions, as they in their several lieutenancies shall ordain’. That is to say, be of the religion of every ChristianChristian country where you come. To make the civil magistrate to be Christ’s lieutenant upon earth, for matters of religion, and to make him to be supreme judge in all controversies, whom all must obey, is a doctrine so strange, and such an uncouth phrase to Christian ears, that I should have missed his meaning, but that I consulted with his book, De Cive, c. XV. sect. 16, and c. XVII. sect. 28. What if the magistrate shall be no Christian himself? What if he shall command contrary to the law of God or nature? Must we obey him rather than God? (Acts iv. 19.) Is the civil magistrate become now the only ground and pillar of truth? I demand then, why T. H. is of a different mind from his sovereign, and from the laws of the land, concerning the attributes of God and his decrees? This is a new paradox, and concerns not this question of liberty and necessity. Wherefore I forbear to prosecute it further, and so conclude my reply with the words of the Christian poet,

Jussum est Cæsaris ore Galieni,
Quod princeps colit ut colamus omnes.
Æternum colo Principem, dierum
Factorem, Dominumque Galieni.[A]

A. Prudentius. περι στεφανων. Hymn. vi.

ANIMADVERSIONS UPON THE ANSWER TO THE POSTSCRIPT NO. XXXVIII.

He taketh it ill that I say that arguments do seldom work on men of wit and learning, when they have once engaged themselves in a contrary opinion. Nevertheless it is not only certain by experience, but also there is reason for it, and that grounded upon the natural disposition of mankind. For it is natural to all men to defend those opinions, which they have once publicly engaged themselves to maintain; because to have that detected for error, which they have publicly maintained for truth, is never without some dishonour, more or less; and to find in themselves that they have spent a great deal of time and labour in deceiving themselves, is so uncomfortable a thing, as it is no wonder if they employ their wit and learning, if they have any, to make good their errors. And, therefore, where he saith, (a) “solid and substantial reasons work sooner upon them, than upon weaker judgments; and that the more exact the balance is, the sooner it discovers the real weight that is put into it”: I confess, the more solid a man’s wit is, the better will solid reasons work upon him. But if he add to it that which he calls learning, that is to say, much reading of other men’s doctrines without weighing them with his own thoughts, then their judgments become weaker, and the balance less exact. And whereas he saith, “that they whose gold is true, are not afraid to have it tried by the touch”; he speaketh as if I had been afraid to have my doctrine tried by the touch of men of wit and learning; wherein he is not much mistaken, meaning by men of learning (as I said before) such as had read other men, but not themselves. For by reading others, men commonly obstruct the way to their own exact and natural judgment, and use their wit both to deceive themselves with fallacies, and to requite those, who endeavour at their own entreaty to instruct them, with revilings.

(b) “If we be in an error, it is such an error as is sucked from nature; as is confirmed by reason, by experience, and by Scripture; as the Fathers and Doctors of the Church of all ages have delivered; an error, wherein we have the concurrence of all the best philosophers, an error that bringeth to God the glory of justice, &c.; that renders men more devout, more pious, more humble, more industrious, more penitent for their sins.” All this is but said; and what heretofore hath been offered in proof for it, hath been sufficiently refuted, and the contrary proved; namely, that it is an error contrary to the nature of the will; repugnant to reason and experience; repugnant to the Scripture; repugnant to the doctrine of St. Paul, (and ’tis pity the Fathers and Doctors of the Church have not followed St. Paul therein); an error not maintained by the best philosophers, (for they are not the best philosophers, which the Bishop thinketh so); an error that taketh from God the glory of his prescience, nor bringeth to him the glory of his other attributes; an error that maketh men, by imagining they can repent when they will, neglect their duties; and that maketh men unthankful for God’s graces, by thinking them to proceed from the natural ability of their own will.

(c) “‘But,’ saith he, ‘when they dispute of God’s actions philosophically, then they consider them again as if he had such faculties, and in such manner as we have them.’ And is this the cause of our error? That were strange indeed; for they who dispute philosophically of God, do neither ascribe faculties to him, in that manner that we have them, nor yet do they attribute any proper faculties at all to God. God’s understanding and his will is his very essence, &c.” Methinks he should have known at these years, that to dispute philosophically is to dispute by natural reason, and from principles evident by the light of nature, and to dispute of the faculties and proprieties of the subject whereof they treat. It is therefore unskilfully said by him, that they who dispute philosophically of God, ascribe unto him no proper faculties. If no proper faculties, I would fain know of him what improper faculties he ascribes to God. I guess he will make the understanding and the will, and his other attributes, to be in God improper faculties, because he cannot properly call them faculties; that is to say, he knows not how to make it good that they are faculties, and yet he will have these words, “God’s understanding and his will are his very essence”, to pass for an axiom of philosophy. And whereas I had said, we ought not to dispute of God’s nature, and that He is no fit subject of our philosophy, he denies it not, but says I say it.

(d) “With a purpose to make a noise with declaiming against those who dare dispute of the nature of God, that is, who dare set forth his justice and his goodness, &c.” The Bishop will have much ado to make good, that to dispute of the nature of God, is all one with setting forth his justice and his goodness. He taketh no notice of these words of mine, ‘pious men attribute to God Almighty for honour’s sake, whatsoever they see is honourable in the world’; and yet this is setting forth God’s justice, goodness, &c, without disputing of God’s nature.

(e) “In the flames of the true Tophet, that is hell.” The true Tophet was a place not far from the walls of Jerusalem, and consequently on the earth. I cannot imagine what he will say to this in his answer to my Leviathan, if there he find the same, unless he say, that in this place by the true Tophet, he meant a not true Tophet.

(f) “This is life eternal (saith our Saviour) to know the only true God, and Jesus Christ, &c.” This which followeth to the end of his answer and of the book, is a reprehension of me, for saying that ‘true religion consisteth in obedience to Christ’s lieutenants’. If it be lawful for Christians to institute amongst themselves a commonwealth and magistrates, whereby they may be able to live in peace one with another, and unite themselves in defence against a foreign enemy; it will certainly be necessary to make to themselves some supreme judge in all controversies, to whom they ought all to give obedience. And this is no such strange doctrine, nor so uncouth a phrase to Christian ears, as the Bishop makes it, whatsoever it be to them that would make themselves judges of the Supreme Judge himself. No; but, saith he, Christ is the Supreme Judge, and we are not to obey men rather than God. Is there any Christian man that does not acknowledge that we are to be judged by Christ, or that we ought not to obey him rather than any man that shall be his lieutenant upon earth? The question therefore is, not of who is to be obeyed, but of what be his commands. If the Scripture contain his commands, then may every Christian know by them what they are. And what has the Bishop to do with what God says to me when I read them, more than I have to do with what God says to him when he reads them, unless he have authority given him by him whom Christ hath constituted his lieutenant? This lieutenant upon earth, I say, is the supreme civil magistrate, to whom belongeth the care and charge of seeing that no doctrine may be taught the people, but such as may consist with the general peace of them all, and with the obedience that is due to the civil sovereign. In whom would the Bishop have the authority reside of prohibiting seditious opinions, when they are taught (as they are often) in divinity books and from the pulpit? I could hardly guess, but that I remember that there have been books written to entitle the bishops to a divine right, underived from the civil sovereign. But because he maketh it so heinous a matter, that the supreme civil magistrate should be Christ’s lieutenant upon earth, let us suppose that a bishop, or a synod of bishops, should be set up (which I hope never shall) for our civil sovereign; then that which he objecteth here, I could object in the same words against himself. For I could say in his own words, This is life eternal, to know the only true God, and Jesus Christ (John xvii. 3.). Pure religion, and undefiled before God is this, to visit the fatherless, &c. (James i. 27.) Fear God and keep his commandments (Eccles. xii. 13.). But the Bishop hath found a more compendious way to heaven, namely, that true religion consisteth in obedience to Christ’s lieutenants; that is (now by supposition), to the bishops. That is to say, that every Christian of what nation soever, coming into the country which the bishops govern, should be of their religion. He would make the civil magistrate to be Christ’s lieutenant upon earth for matters of religion, and supreme judge in all controversies, and say they ought to be obeyed by all; how strange soever and uncouth it seem to him now, the sovereignty being in others. And I may say to him, what if the magistrate himself (I mean by supposition the bishops) should be wicked men; what if they should command as much contrary to the law of God or nature, as ever any Christian king did, (which is very possible); must we obey them rather than God? Is the civil magistrate become now the only ground and pillar of truth? No:

Synedri jussum est voce episcoporum,

Ipsum quod colit ut colamus omnes.

Æternum colo Principem, dierum

Factorem, Dominumque episcoporum.

And thus the Bishop may see, there is little difference between his Ode and my Parode to it; and that both of them are of equal force to conclude nothing.

The Bishop knows that the kings of England, since the time of Henry VIII, have been declared by act of Parliament supreme governors of the Church of England, in all causes both civil and ecclesiastical, that is to say, in all matters both ecclesiastical and civil, and consequently of this Church supreme head on earth; though perhaps he will not allow that name of head. I should wonder therefore, whom the Bishop would have to be Christ’s lieutenant here in England for matters of religion, if not the supreme governor and head of the Church of England, whether man or woman whosoever he be, that hath the sovereign power, but that I know he challenges it to the Bishops, and thinks that King Henry VIII. took the ecclesiastical power away from the Pope, to settle it not in himself, but them. But he ought to have known, that what jurisdiction, or power of ordaining ministers, the Popes had here in the time of the king’s predecessors till Henry VIII, they derived it all from the king’s power, though they did not acknowledge it; and the kings connived at it, either not knowing their own right, or not daring to challenge it; till such time as the behaviour of the Roman clergy had undeceived the people, which otherwise would have sided with them. Nor was it unlawful for the king to take from them the authority he had given them, as being Pope enough in his own kingdom without depending on a foreign one: nor is it to be called schism, unless it be schism also in the head of a family to discharge, as often as he shall see cause, the school-masters he entertaineth to teach his children. If the Bishop and Dr. Hammond, when they did write in the defence of the Church of England against imputation of schism, quitting their own pretences of jurisdiction and jus divinum, had gone upon these principles of mine, they had not been so shrewdly handled as they have been, by an English Papist that wrote against them.

And now I have done answering to his arguments, I shall here, in the end of all, take that liberty of censuring his whole book, which he hath taken in the beginning, of censuring mine. ‘I have’, saith he, (No. I.) ‘perusedperused T. H.’s answers, considered his reasons, and conclude he hath missed and mislaid the question; that his answers are evasions, that his arguments are paralogisms, and that the opinion of absolute and universal necessity is but a result of some groundless and ill chosen principles.’ And now it is my turn to censure. And first, for the strength of his discourse and knowledge of the point in question, I think it much inferior to that which might have been written by any man living, that had no other learning besides the ability to write his mind; but as well perhaps as the same man would have done it if to the ability of writing his mind he had added the study of School-divinity. Secondly, for the manners of it, (for to a public writing there belongeth good manners), it consisteth in railing and exclaiming and scurrilous jesting, with now and then an unclean and mean instance. And lastly, for his elocution, the virtue whereof lieth not in the flux of words, but in perspicuity, it is the same language with that of the kingdom of darkness. One shall find in it, especially where he should speak most closely to the question, such words as these: divided sense, compounded sense, hypothetical necessity, liberty of exercise, liberty of specification, liberty of contradiction, liberty of contrariety, knowledge of approbation, practical knowledge, general influence, special influence, instinct, qualities infused, efficacious election, moral efficacy, moral motion, metaphorical motion, practice practicum, motus primo primi, actus eliciti, actus imperati, permissive will, consequent will, negative obduration, deficient cause, simple act, nunc stans; and other like words of nonsense divided: besides many propositions such as these: the will is the mistress of human actions, the understanding is her counsellor, the will chooseth, the will willeth, the will suspends its own act, the understanding understandeth, (I wonder how he missed saying, the understanding suspendeth its own act,) the will applies the understanding to deliberate; the will requires of the understanding a review; the will determines itself; a change may be willed without changing of the will; man concurs with God in causing his own will; the will causeth willing; motives determine the will not naturally, but morally; the same action may be both future and not future; God is not just but justice, not eternal but eternity; eternity is nunc stans; eternity is an infinite point which comprehendeth all time, not formally, but eminently; all eternity is co-existent with to-day, and the same co-existent with to-morrow: and many other like speeches of nonsense compounded, which the truth can never stand in need of. Perhaps the Bishop will say, these terms and phrases are intelligible enough; for he hath said in his reply to No. XXIV, that his opinion is demonstrable in reason, though he be not able to comprehend, how it consisteth together with God’s eternal prescience; and though it exceed his weak capacity, yet he ought to adhere to that truth which is manifest. So that to him that truth is manifest, and demonstrable by reason, which is beyond his capacity; so that words beyond capacity are with him intelligible enough.

But the reader is to be judge of that. I could add many other passages that discover, both his little logic, as taking the insignificant words above recited, for terms of art; and his no philosophy in distinguishing between moral and natural motion, and by calling some motions metaphorical, and by his blunders at the causes of sight and of the descent of heavy bodies, and his talk of the inclination of the load-stone, and divers other places in his book.

But to make an end, I shall briefly draw up the sum of what we have both said. That which I have maintained is, that no man hath his future will in his own present power. That it may be changed by others, and by the change of things without him; and when it is changed, it is not changed nor determined to any thing by itself; and that when it is undetermined, it is no will; because every one that willeth, willeth something in particular. That deliberation is common to men with beasts, as being alternate appetite, and not ratiocination; and the last act or appetite therein, and which is immediately followed by the action, is the only will that can be taken notice of by others, and which only maketh an action in public judgment voluntary. That to be free is no more than to do if a man will, and if he will to forbear; and consequently that this freedom is the freedom of the man, and not of the will. That the will is not free, but subject to change by the operation of external causes. That all external causes depend necessarily on the first eternal cause, God Almighty, who worketh in us both to will and to do, by the mediation of second causes. That seeing neither man nor any thing else can work upon itself, it is impossible that any man in the framing of his own will should concur with God, either as an actor or as an instrument. That there is nothing brought to pass by fortune as by a cause, nor any thing without a cause, or concurrence of causes, sufficient to bring it so to pass; and that every such cause, and their concurrence, do proceed from the providence, good pleasure, and working of God; and consequently, though I do with others call many events contingent, and say they happen, yet because they had every of them their several sufficient causes, and those causes again their former causes, I say they happen necessarily. And though we perceive not what they are, yet there are of the most contingent events as necessary causes as of those events whose causes we perceive; or else they could not possibly be foreknown, as they are by him that foreknoweth all things. On the contrary, the Bishop maintaineth: that the will is free from necessitation; and in order thereto that the judgment of the understanding is not always practice practicum, nor of such a nature in itself as to oblige and determine the will to one, though it be true that spontaneity and determination to one may consist together. That the will determineth itself, and that external things, when they change the will, do work upon it not naturally, but morally, not by natural motion, but by moral and metaphorical motion. That when the will is determined naturally, it is not by God’s general influence, whereon depend all second causes, but by special influence, God concurring and pouring something into the will. That the will when it suspends not its act, makes the act necessary; but because it may suspend and not assent, it is not absolutely necessary. That sinful acts proceed not from God’s will, but are willed by him by a permissive will, not an operative will, and that he hardeneth the heart of man by a negative obduration. That man’s will is in his own power, but his motus primo primi not in his own power, nor necessary save only by a hypothetical necessity. That the will to change, is not always a change of will. That not all things which are produced, are produced from sufficient, but some things from deficient causes. That if the power of the will be present in actu primo, then there is nothing wanting to the production of the effect. That a cause may be sufficient for the production of an effect, though it want something necessary to the production thereof; because the will may be wanting. That a necessary cause doth not always necessarily produce its effect, but only then when the effect is necessarily produced. He proveth also, that the will is free, by that universal notion which the world hath of election: for when of the six Electors the votes are divided equally, the King of Bohemia hath a casting voice. That the prescience of God supposeth no necessity of the future existence of the things foreknown, because God is not eternal but eternity, and eternity is a standing now, without succession of time; and therefore God foresees all things intuitively by the presentiality they have in nunc stans, which comprehendeth in it all time past, present, and to come, not formally, but eminently and virtually. That the will is free even then when it acteth, but that is in a compounded, not in a divided sense. That to be made, and to be eternal, do consist together, because God’s decrees are made, and are nevertheless eternal. That the order, beauty, and perfection of the world doth require that in the universe there should be agents of all sorts, some necessary, some free, some contingent. That though it be true, that to-morrow it shall rain or not rain, yet neither of them is true determinate. That the doctrine of necessity is a blasphemous, desperate, and destructive doctrine. That it were better to be an Atheist, than to hold it; and he that maintaineth it, is fitter to be refuted with rods than with arguments. And now whether this his doctrine or mine be the more intelligible, more rational, or more conformable to God’s word, I leave it to the judgment of the reader.

But whatsoever be the truth of the disputed question, the reader may peradventure think I have not used the Bishop with that respect I ought, or without disadvantage of my cause I might have done; for which I am to make a short apology. A little before the last parliament of the late king, when every man spake freely against the then present government, I thought it worth my study to consider the grounds and consequences of such behaviour, and whether it were conformable or contrary to reason and to the Word of God. And after some time I did put in order and publish my thoughts thereof, first in Latin, and then again the same in English; where I endeavoured to prove both by reason and Scripture, that they who have once submitted themselves to any sovereign governor, either by express acknowledgment of his power, or by receiving protection from his laws, are obliged to be true and faithful to him, and to acknowledge no other supreme power but him in any matter or question whatsoever, either civil or ecclesiastical. In which books of mine, I pursued my subject without taking notice of any particular man that held any opinion contrary to that which I then wrote; only in general I maintained that the office of the clergy, in respect of the supreme civil power, was not magisterial, but ministerial; and that their teaching of the people was founded upon no other authority than that of the civil sovereign; and all this without any word tending to the disgrace either of episcopacy or of presbytery. Nevertheless I find since, that divers of them, whereof thethe Bishop of Derry is one, have taken offence especially at two things; one, that I make the supremacy in matters of religion to reside in the civil sovereign; the other, that being no clergyman, I deliver doctrines, and ground them upon words of the Scripture, which doctrines they, being by profession divines, have never taught. And in this their displeasure, divers of them in their books and sermons, without answering any of my arguments, have not only exclaimed against my doctrine, but reviled me, and endeavoured to make me hateful for those things, for which (if they knew their own and the public good) they ought to have given me thanks. There is also one of them, that taking offence at me for blaming in part the discipline instituted heretofore, and regulated by the authority of the Pope, in the universities, not only ranks me amongst those men that would have the revenue of the universities diminished, and says plainly I have no religion, but also thinks me so simple and ignorant of the world as to believe that our universities maintain Popery. And this is the author of the book called Vindiciæ Academiarum. If either of the universities had thought itself injured, I believe it could have authorised or appointed some member of theirs, whereof there be many abler men than he, to have made their vindication. But this Vindex, (as little dogs to please their masters use to bark, in token of their sedulity, indifferently at strangers, till they be rated off), unprovoked by me hath fallen upon me without bidding. I have been publicly injured by many of whom I took no notice, supposing that that humour would spend itself; but seeing it last, and grow higher in this writing I now answer, I thought it necessary at last to make of some of them, and first of this Bishop, an example.

END OF VOL. V.

Transcriber’s Note

There were two kinds of sidenote in this volumn. At the top of each page, the section number, along with either “Animadversions upon the Bishop’s reply” or “The Bishop’s Reply”, is repeated. The former have been removed as they are redundant with the section title. The “Bishop’s Reply” notes are positioned before each paragraph beginning “J. D” to mark where the “Bishop’s” voice resumes.

Internal references to specific articles in this text are linked for ease of navigation.

There was no Table of Contents, but each section may be addressed using the Roman numeral in the its title.

The sidenote on p. 81 mistakenly referred to “Animadversions...” rather than the expected “The Bishop’s reply.”

Other errors deemed most likely to be the printer’s have been corrected, and are noted here. The references are to the page and line in the original.

5.11 | to do what he will,[”] | Added.
10.13 | O Israel, thy de[s]truction | Restored.
25.8 | So God bless us.[”] | Added.
33.8 | of the second causes.[”] | Added.
38.17 | [t]hat one may take away an ell | Restored.
62.25 | between [l/d]uade distinctions cloven feet. | Restored (probable).
85.26 | [“/‘]that wise men may do | Replaced.
85.27 | actions,[”/’] | Replaced.
85.33 | [“/‘]that fools, children, | Replaced.
85.34 | and elect,[”/’] | Replaced.
126.34 | but his own justice better[.] | Restored.
137.3 | would have him to will.[’] | Added.
142.1 | [“]Wherefore T. H. is mightily mistaken | Added.
145.1 | Another is Genesis xix. 22[)]: | Removed.
151.14 | that all consult[a]tions are vain. | Restored.
155.33 | for the public good[,/.] | Replaced.
185.7 | when it is necess[s]ary | Removed.
229.23 | Quid hoc?[”] | Added.
310.17 | choose a good one.[”] | Added.
316.30 | and so the[ the] action be become | Removed.
324.11 | and if he[ ]means so | Inserted.
336.5 | [“]But because his eyesight was weak | Added.
405.28 | was I to grow old!’[”] | Added.
425.6 | forbear to act[”/’]; | Replaced.
434.15 | not too much possessed with prejudice.[”] | Added.
437.24 | such poor things as eyes, ears, brains[’] | Added.
439.33 | the religion of every Ch[r]istian country | Inserted.
447.30 | per[s]used T. H.’s answers | Removed.
454.9 | whereof the[ the Bishop of Derry is one | Removed.

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Table of Contents

- THE ENGLISH WORKS OF THOMAS HOBBES.

- THE QUESTIONS CONCERNING LIBERTY, NECESSITY, AND CHANCE,

- TO THE READER.

- THE QUESTIONS CONCERNING LIBERTY, NECESSITY, AND CHANCE.

- THE STATE OF THE QUESTION.

- THE FOUNTAINS OF ARGUMENT IN THIS QUESTION.

- A VINDICATION OF TRUE LIBERTY FROM ANTECEDENT AND EXTRINSICAL NECESSITY.

- ANIMADVERSIONS UPON THE BISHOP’S REPLY NO. I.

- NO. II.

- NO. III.

- NO. IV.

- NO. V.

- PROOFS OF LIBERTY OUT OF SCRIPTURE.--NO. VI.

- NO. VII.

- NO. VIII.

- NO. IX.

- NO. X.

- NO. XI.

- NO. XII.

- PROOFS OF LIBERTY DRAWN FROM REASON. NO. XIII.

- NO. XIV.

- NO. XV.

- NO. XVI.

- NO. XVII.

- NO. XVIII.

- NO. XIX.

- NO. XX.

- NO. XXI.

- NO. XXII.

- NO. XXIII.

- NO. XXIV.

- MY OPINION ABOUT LIBERTY AND NECESSITY NO. XXV.

- NO. XXVI.

- NO. XXVII.

- NO. XXVIII.

- NO. XXIX.

- NO. XXX.

- NO. XXXI.

- NO. XXXII.

- NO. XXXIII.

- NO. XXXIV.

- NO. XXXV.

- NO. XXXVI.

- NO. XXXVII.

- NO. XXXVIII.

- THE FULL PROJECT GUTENBERG™ LICENSE