The English works of Thomas Hobbes of Malmesbury, Volume 05 (of 11) — Thomas Hobbes — John Shaqi
The English works of Thomas Hobbes of Malmesbury, Volume 05 (of 11)
Thomas Hobbes · en
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.
[Sidenote: 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.