(_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.