passage 322 of 360 · book with much acrimony. But the accused won his case in a Synod. > V.D.H.) attacking the power of the Governor of Holland, which was at that time considered a danger to the Republic; for the memory of Prince William the Second's attempt upon the city of Amsterdam was still quite fresh.[351] (33/71)
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This kind of necessity is happy and desirable, when one is prompted by good reasons to act as one does; but necessity blind and absolute would subvert piety and morality.
- There is more reason in Mr. Hobbes's discourse when he admits that [396]
our actions are in our power, so that we do that which we will when we have the power to do it, and when there is no hindrance. He asserts notwithstanding that our volitions themselves are not so within our power that we can give ourselves, without difficulty and according to our good pleasure, inclinations and wills which we might desire. The bishop does not appear to have taken notice of this reflexion, which Mr. Hobbes also does not develop enough. The truth is that we have some power also over our volitions, but obliquely, and not absolutely and indifferently. This has been explained in some passages of this work. Finally Mr. Hobbes shows, like others before him, that the certainty of events, and necessity itself, if there were any in the way our actions depend upon causes, would not prevent us from employing deliberations, exhortations, blame and praise, punishments and rewards: for these are of service and prompt men to produce actions or to refrain from them. Thus, if human actions were necessary, they would be so through these means. But the truth is, that since these actions are not necessary absolutely whatever one may do, these means contribute only to render the actions determinate and certain, as they are indeed; for their nature shows that they are not subject to an absolute necessity. He gives also a good enough notion of freedom, in so far as it is taken in a general sense, common to intelligent and non-intelligent substances: he states that a thing is deemed free when the power which it has is not impeded by an external thing. Thus the water that is dammed by a dyke has the power to spread, but not the freedom. On the other hand, it has not the power to rise above the dyke, although nothing would prevent it then from spreading, and although nothing from outside prevents it from rising so high. To that end it would be necessary that the water itself should come from a higher point or that the water-level should be raised by an increased flow. Thus a prisoner lacks the freedom, while a sick man lacks the power, to go his way.
HKB