Modern French Philosophy: a Study of the Development Since ComteGunn, John Alexander
Philosophy
Modern French Philosophy: a Study of the Development Since Comte
Gunn, John Alexander
Philosophy, French; Philosophy, Modern
Yet, we have, Renouvier reminds us, no logical proof of the reality of
freedom. We feel ourselves moved, spontaneously and unconstrained. The
future, in so far as it depends upon ourselves, appears not as
prearranged but ambiguous, open.[7] Whether our judgment be true or
false, we in practical life act invariably on the belief in freedom.
That, of course, as Renouvier admits at this stage of his discussion,
does not prove that our belief is not an illusion. It is a feeling,
natural and spontaneous.
[7] Cf., later, Bergson’s remark: “The portals of the future stand
wide open, the future is being made.”
One of the most current forms of the doctrine of freedom has been that
known as the “liberty of indifference.” The upholders of this theory
regard the will as separated from motives and ends. The operation of
the will is regarded by them as indifferent to the claims or influence
of reason or feeling. Will is superadded externally to motives, where
such exist, or may be superimposed on intellectual views even to the
extent of annulling these. Judgment and will are separated in this
view, and the will is a purely arbitrary or indifferent factor. It can
operate without reason against reason. The opponents of freedom find
little difficulty in assailing this view, in which the will appears to
operate like a dice or a roulette game, absolutely at hazard, reducing
man to a non-rational creature. Such a type of will, however, Renouvier
declares to be non-existent, for every man who has full consciousness
of an act of his has at the same time a consciousness of an end or
purpose for this act, and he proposes to realise by this means a good
which he regards as preferable to any other. In so far as he has doubts
of this preference the act and the judgment will be suspended. He must,
however, if he be an intelligent being, pursue what he deems to be his
good—that is to say, what he deems to be good at the time of acting.
Renouvier here agrees with Socrates and Plato in the view that no man
deliberately and knowingly wills what he considers to be evil or to be
bad for him. Virtue involves knowledge, and although there is the
almost proverbial phrase of Ovid and of Paul, about seeing and
approving the better, yet nevertheless doing the worse, it is a general
statement which does not express an antithesis as present to
consciousness at the time of action. The agent may afterwards say
. . . “_Video meliora proboque
deteriora sequor_.”
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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