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J. D. EIther I am free to write this discourse for Liberty against Necessity, or I am not free. If I have obteined 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 exa∣mine this discourse of Liberty and Necessi∣ty, which (because I never had uttered my opinion of it) concerned me the less. But seeing it was both your Lordships, and J. D.'s. desire, that I should begin with the latter, I was contented so to do. And here I pre∣sent and submit it to your Lordships judge∣ment.
J. D. THe first day that I did read over T. H. his defence of the necessity of all things, was April 20. 1646. which proceeded not out of any disrespect to him; for if all his discourses had been Geome∣trical demonstrations, able not onely to perswade, but also to compell assent, all had been one to me, first my journey, and afterwards some other trifles (which we call business) having diverted me untill then. And then my occasions permitting me, and an advertisement from a friend awakening me, I set my self 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 practicks familiar∣ly enterferre one with another. The very first words of T. H. his defence trip up the heels of his whole cause; I had ones
resolved; To resolve praesupposeth delibe∣ration, but what deliberation can there be of that which is inevitably determined by causes, without our selves, before we do deliberate? can a condemned man deli∣berate 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, to resolve implies a mans dominion over his own actions, and his actuall determination of himself; but he who holds an absolute necessity of all things, hath quitted this dominion over himself, and (which is worse) hath quit∣ted it to the second extrinsecal causes, in which he makes all his actions to be de∣termined; one may as well call again Ye∣sterday, as resolve, or newly determine that which is determined to his hand al∣ready. I have perused this treatise, weighed T. H. his answers, considered his reasons, and conclude that he hath missed and misled the question, that the answers are evasions, that his Arguments are parolo∣gisms, that the opinion of absolute and universall 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, per∣haps
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 exteri∣our 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 our selves, either in our intellectuals, be∣cause the one sees clearer then the other, or in our affections, which betray our un∣derstandings, and produce an implicite ad∣haerence in the one more than in the other. Howsoever it be, the difference is in our selves. 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 severall and respective de∣liberations and affections, are in part the causes of our contrary resolutions, and do concur with the outward causes, to make up one totall and adaequate cause, to the necessary production of this effect. If it be so, he hath spun a fair thred, to make all this stir for such a necessity as no man ever denied or doubted of; when all the causes have actually determined them∣selves, then the effect is in being; for though there be a priority in nature be∣tween the cause and the effect, yet they are together in time. And the old rule is, whatsoever is, when it is, is necessarily so
as it is. This is no absolute necessity, but onely upon supposition, that a man hath determined his own liberty. When we question whether all occurrences be ne∣cessary, 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 ne∣cessary before they were determined by our selves, by or in the praecedent causes before our selves, or in the exteriour cau∣ses without ourselves. It is not incon∣sistent with true liberty to determine it self, but it is inconsistent with true liber∣ty to be determined by another without it self.
T. H. saith further, that upon your Lordships desire and mine, he was contented to begin with this discourse of liberty and necessity, that is, to change his former re∣solution. If the chain of necessity be no stronger, but that it may be snapped so easily in sunder, if his will was no other∣wise determined from without himself, but onely by the signification of your Lordships desire, and my modest intreaty, then we may safely conclude, that humane affairs are not alwaies governed by ab∣solute necessity, that a man is Lord of his own actions, if not in chief, yet in mean, subordinate to the Lord Paramount of Hea∣ven and Earth, and that all things are
not so absolutely determined in the out∣ward and precedent causes, but that fair intreaties, and morall perswasions may work upon a good nature so far, as to pre∣vent 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 Physicall or naturall 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 conver∣sation with him hath not been frequent, yet I remember well, that when this que∣stion was agitated between us two in your Lordships 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.