Quid liberum arbitrium, seu in quo consistat libertas.
A Higher View of the Soul's Powers
The author steps back to define the natural faculties of living beings—life, sensation, appetite, and consent—showing how the will alone is the seat of freedom.
But so that what's said may become clearer, and so that we may arrive more competently at the point we're aiming for, I think it's worth going back over things from a slightly higher vantage point. In natural things, life is not the same as sensation; sensation is not the same as appetite; nor is appetite the same as consent. This will shine out more clearly from the definitions of each one. For in any living body there is life — an internal and natural motion, active only within. Sensation, by contrast, is a vital motion in the body, active also outwardly.1 Appetite, on the other hand, is a natural power in a living being, assigned to move the senses eagerly toward their objects.2 But consent is the spontaneous nod of the will — or, as I recall saying above, it is a state of mind that is free in itself.3 Furthermore, the will is a rational motion, presiding over both sensation and appetite.
Reason Serves, Not Destroys, the Will
Reason accompanies the will as its servant and judge, never imposing necessity; the will's freedom is what makes a person capable of misery or blessedness.
Wherever it turns, the will truly has reason as its companion and, in a way, its attendant — not because it always acts from reason, but because it is never moved without reason, such that it often does many things through reason against reason, that is, as if by reason's own service, against its counsel or judgment. Whence that saying: The sons of this age are wiser than the sons of light in their own generation.✦ And again: The wise are wise to do evil.✦ IV, 22) . For neither prudence nor wisdom can exist in a creature, or in evil, except certainly through reason. Reason is indeed given to the will so that it may instruct it, not destroy it. It would destroy the will, however, if it imposed any necessity on it, so that the will could no longer freely turn itself one way or the other by its own choice — whether toward evil, consenting to desire or to a worthless spirit, so as to be unspiritual, not perceiving the things that are of the Spirit of God, or at any rate pursuing them; or toward good, following grace, and becoming spiritual. The will judges all these things itself, and by its own nature is judged by no one.✦4 If, I say, reason prevented any of these movements so that the will could not will, then it would no longer be a will.5 Where there is necessity, there is no longer will. Because if just or unjust acts could come about from necessity and without the consent of the will itself, then a rational creature surely ought not to be considered wretched on any account, nor could it ever be fully blessed — since in either case it would lack the one thing by which alone it is capable of misery or blessedness, that is, the will. The other faculties mentioned above — life, sense, or desire — do not by themselves make a person wretched or blessed. Otherwise, trees too could be subject to misery by virtue of life alone, and cattle by virtue of the other two faculties — or suited for blessedness — which is altogether impossible. We share life with trees, and sense and desire — along with life — with animals; but the faculty called the will is what sets us apart from both.
Free Choice Defined
Voluntary consent of the will, grounded in unlosable freedom and the judgment of reason, is fittingly called free choice.
When the will's consent is freely given, not forced — since it either approves the just or condemns the unjust — it rightly makes them blessed or wretched, depending on the case. So such consent, grounded in the will's unlosable freedom and in the steady judgment that reason always and everywhere carries with it, may fittingly be called, as I see it, free choice — free in itself by reason of the will, judge of itself by reason of reason.6 And rightly does judgment accompany freedom, since what is free in itself assuredly judges itself wherever it sins. For there is judgment because, surely and justly, the person who sins suffers what they do not wish, and the person who does not sin does so only because they wish to.
What Is Not Free Is Not Judged
Necessity excuses from judgment; whatever lacks voluntary consent—including all faculties other than the will—is without merit or guilt.
Now the fact that the will is not known to be free in itself is recognized by the very way either good or evil is imputed to it. Necessity, of course, excuses both. Furthermore, where necessity is, freedom is not; where freedom is not, there is no merit either, and therefore no judgment. Of course, all this is with the exception of original sin, which is established to have a different character. Beyond this, whatever does not have the freedom of voluntary consent is without both merit and judgment, beyond any doubt. Therefore everything that belongs to a person apart from the will alone is free from both, because it is not free in itself. Life, sense, appetite, memory, intellect, and whatever powers like these there are, are subject to necessity by that very fact, in that they are not fully subjected to the will. But that the will itself should fail to obey itself is impossible — for no one either does not will what he wills, or wills what he does not will — and so it is equally impossible for it to be stripped of its own freedom.
The Will Cannot Lose Its Freedom
The will can change but never cease to be a will; therefore it can never be stripped of its own freedom, and only its own movement renders a person guilty or innocent.
The will can indeed be changed, but only into another will, so that it never loses its freedom. Therefore, it cannot be deprived of that [freedom] to such a degree that it is not even free from itself.7 If at some point a person could either will nothing at all, or will something without willing it, then the will could also be without freedom.8 This is why nothing that the insane, infants, or those who are asleep do — whether good or evil — is credited to them: because, clearly, just as they are not in possession of their own reason, so neither do they exercise their own will, and therefore they have no judgment of freedom. Since, therefore, the will has nothing free except itself, it is rightly not judged except on its own account. Since a slow mind, a slippery memory, a restless appetite, a dull sense, or a languid life do not by themselves make a person guilty — just as their opposites do not make one innocent — and this for no other reason than that these things are shown to occur necessarily and apart from the will.
Read the original Latin
Sed ut manifestius fiat quod dicitur, et competentius ad id quod volumus veniamus, paulo altius aestimo repetendum. In rebus naturalibus non est id vita, quod sensus; non sensus, quod appetitus; nec ille, quod consensus. Quod ex singulorum definitionibus clarius elucebit. Est enim in quolibet corpore vita, internus ac naturalis motus, vigens tantum intrinsecus. Sensus vero, vitalis in corpore motus, vigens et extrinsecus. Appetitus autem naturalis, vis in animante, movendis avide sensibus attributa. Verum consensus, nutus est voluntatis spontaneus, vel certe (quod superius dixisse me memini) habitus animi, liber sui. Porro voluntas est motus rationalis, et sensui praesidens, et appetitui.
Habet sane, quocunque se volverit, semper rationem comitem, et quodammodo pedissequam: non quod semper ex ratione, sed quod nunquam absque ratione moveatur, ita ut multa faciat per ipsam contra ipsam, hoc est quasi per ejus ministerium, contra ejus consilium sive judicium. Unde est illud: Prudentiores sunt filii hujus saeculi filiis lucis in generatione sua (Luc. XVI, 8) ; et rursum: Sapientes sunt ut faciant mala (Jerem. IV, 22) . Neque enim prudentia seu sapientia inesse creaturae potest, vel in malo, nisi utique per rationem.
Est vero ratio data voluntati ut instruat illam, non destruat. Destrueret autem, si necessitatem ei ullam imponeret, quominus libere pro arbitrio sese volveret, sive in malum consentiens appetitui, aut nequam spiritui; ut sit animalis, non percipiens, vel certe et persequens ea quae sunt spiritus Dei: sive ad bonum gratiam sequens, et fiat spiritualis; quae omnia dijudicans, ipsa a nemine judicetur. Si, inquam, horum quodlibet prohibente ratione voluntas non posset, 605 voluntas jam non esset. Ubi quippe necessitas, jam non voluntas. Quod si ex necessitate, et absque consensu propriae voluntatis, justa, injustave fieri possent; rationalis creatura, aut misera profecto esse nulla ratione deberet; aut beata penitus non posset, cui nimirum in utravis parte id deesset, quod solum in ea miseriae, sive beatitudinis capax est, id est voluntas. Caetera siquidem, quae supra memorata sunt, vita, sensus, vel appetitus, nec miserum per se faciunt, nec beatum. Alioquin et arbores ex vita, et pecudes etiam ex reliquis duobus, vel miseriae possent esse obnoxiae, vel idoneae beatitudini: quod omnino impossibile est. Communem itaque habentes, vitam quidem cum arboribus, sensum vero et appetitum, et aeque vitam cum pecoribus; id quod dicitur voluntas, nos ab utrisque discernit.
Cujus voluntatis consensus, utique voluntarius, non necessarius, dum aut justos probat, aut injustos, etiam merito beatos facit vel miseros. Is ergo talis consensus ob voluntatis inamissibilem libertatem, et rationis quod secum semper et ubique portat, indeclinabile judicium, non incongrue dicetur, ut arbitror, liberum arbitrium, ipse liber sui propter voluntatem, ipse judex sui propter rationem. Et merito libertatem comitatur judicium: quoniam quidem quod liberum sui est, profecto ubi peccat, ibi se judicat. Est autem judicium, quia juste profecto, si peccat, patitur quod nolit, qui non peccat nisi velit.
Caeterum quod sui liberum non esse cognoscitur, quo pacto vel bonum ei, vel malum imputatur? Excusat nempe utrumque necessitas. Porro ubi necessitas est, libertas non est: ubi libertas non est, nec meritum, ac per hoc nec judicium. Excepto sane per omnia originali peccato, quod aliam constat habere rationem. De caetero quidquid hanc non habet voluntarii consensus libertatem, procul dubio et merito caret, et judicio. Proinde universa quae sunt hominis, praeter solam voluntatem, ab utroque libera sunt, quia sui libera non sunt. Vita, sensus, appetitus, memoria, ingenium, et si qua talia sunt, eo ipso subjacent necessitati, quo non plene subdita sunt voluntati. Ipsam vero quia impossibile est de se ipsa sibi non obedire (nemo quippe aut non vult quod vult, aut vult quod non vult), etiam impossibile est sua privari libertate.
Potest quidem mutari voluntas, sed nonnisi in aliam voluntatem, ut nunquam amittat libertatem. Tam ergo non potest privari illa, quam nec se ipsa. Si poterit homo aliquando, aut nihil omnino velle, aut velle aliquid, et non voluntate; poterit et carere libertate voluntas. Hinc est quod insanis, infantibus, itemque dormientibus, nihil quod faciant, vel bonum, vel malum, imputatur: quia nimirum sicut suae non sunt compotes rationis, sic nec usum retinent propriae voluntatis, ac per hoc nec judicium libertatis. Cum igitur voluntas nil liberum habeat nisi se, merito non judicatur nisi ex se. Siquidem nec tardum ingenium, nec labilis memoria, nec inquietus appetitus, nec sensus obtusus, nec vita languens, reum per se statuunt hominem, sicut nec contraria innocentem; et hoc non ob aliud, nisi quia haec necessarie, ac praeter voluntatem posse provenire probantur.
Scripture echoes
- ↩Luke.16.8 — And the master commended the dishonest manager because he had acted shrewdly; for the people of this age are more shrewd in dealing with their own generation than the people of light.
- ↩Jer.4.22 — For my people are foolish; they have not known me. They are senseless children, and they are not discerning. They are wise to do evil, but to do good they have no knowledge.
- ↩1Cor.2.14 — But the natural person does not accept the things of the Spirit of God, for they are foolishness to him, and he is not able to understand them, because they are spiritually discerned.
Notes
- 1 ↩vero rendered as 'by contrast' to capture the adversative force distinguishing sensation from the purely internal motion of life.
- 2 ↩autem rendered as 'on the other hand' to mark the stepwise distinction from sensation to appetite.
- 3 ↩Verum at sentence start rendered adversatively as 'But' to mark the shift to the highest faculty, consent.
- 4 ↩animalis rendered 'unspiritual' (i.e., merely natural, not spiritual) to capture the contrast with spiritualis; percipiens rendered 'perceiving' in the sense of spiritual discernment.
- 5 ↩The numeral '605' in the raw text is a page/line marker from the critical edition and has been omitted in translation.
- 6 ↩The phrase 'liberum arbitrium' is rendered 'free choice' to preserve the technical sense of liberum arbitrium as the faculty of free decision, distinct from libertas (freedom/liberty). The doubling 'ipse liber sui... ipse judex sui' is compressed for readability while preserving the two grounds (will and reason).
- 7 ↩The Latin 'quam nec se ipsa' is compressed: the will cannot be stripped of its freedom to the point that it is not free even from itself. The sense is that the will's self-dispossession is the limit of its capacity to be deprived.
- 8 ↩The phrase 'velle aliquid, et non voluntate' is compressed: to will something and yet not by will — i.e., to will without the act of willing. The sentence is a counterfactual exploring what would follow if the will could be bypassed.
De gratia et libero arbitrio (On Grace and Free Choice) companion
Grace works through practice — so practice
Bernard's conclusion frees you to show up daily without anxiety. Chosen Portion makes showing up simple and free.
Bernard's teaching that grace and human consent cooperate is enacted every time a reader freely opens their daily portion in Chosen Portion.
- One 10-minute devotional portion every day, no guesswork
- Read Bernard and other classics in modern English, portion by portion
- A consistent daily rhythm that treats effort as cooperation, not earning