Libertatem arbitrii remanere post peccatum.

Free Choice Wounded, Not Destroyed

Augustine answers the objection that freedom of choice has perished because humanity cannot avoid sin, arguing that free choice remains whole though its former freedoms are lost.

What then? Free choice has perished, since it can't help but sin? Not at all. But it has lost the freedom of counsel, through which it once had the ability not to sin — just as, now, it certainly lacks the strength not to be troubled. And so it happens to the wretched person that he has also lost the freedom of delight, through which he once had the ability not to be troubled.¹ So free choice remains even after sin — wretched, yes, but still whole. And that a person, by himself, isn't enough to shake off sin or misery doesn't mean free choice has been destroyed. But the loss of the two remaining freedoms. What belongs to free choice, insofar as it is in itself — or at any time has belonged to it — is not the power to be able or to be wise, but only to will. Nor does it make the creature powerful or wise, but only willing. So free choice isn't thought to have been lost if the creature has ceased to be powerful or wise, but only if it has ceased to be willing.

Where There Is a Will, There Is Freedom

Augustine argues that free choice follows the will so closely that it endures in both good and evil, in misery as in blessing, and cannot be diminished by any adversity.

Where there's no will, there's no freedom either. I'm not saying that if a creature stops willing the good altogether, but if it stops willing entirely — it has to be admitted, without any contradiction, that where goodness no longer comes from the will but the will itself has perished completely, free choice has perished too.² But if someone is simply unable to will the good, that's a sign that what's missing isn't free choice but freedom of counsel.³ But if the problem isn't an unwillingness as such, but that the ability to achieve the good a person already wants is lacking — then they should know that what they've lost is the freedom of delight, not that free choice has perished.⁴ So if free choice everywhere follows the will in such a way that it doesn't fail the will unless the will itself entirely ceases to exist — and the will, whether in good or in evil, endures equally — then free choice equally perseveres, whole and sound, in evil as much as in good.⁵ And just as the will, even when placed in misery, doesn't stop being a will — it's called, and is, a miserable will, just as it can be a blessed will — so no adversity or necessity can destroy free choice or, as far as free choice itself is concerned, diminish it in any way at all.⁶

The Fallen Cannot Raise Themselves

Though free choice persists without loss, it cannot by itself recover the good, just as a fallen person cannot get up on their own or advance while standing.

But although free will persists everywhere equally without any loss of itself, it cannot however recover by itself from evil to good, just as it was able by itself to fall from good into evil. And what's so surprising if a person lying fallen can't get up by themselves, since even while standing they couldn't advance toward anything better by any effort of their own? In short, while free will still possessed two other freedoms in some measure, it still could not ascend from the lower degrees of those freedoms to the higher: that is, from being able not to sin and being able not to be disturbed, to not being able to sin and not being able to be disturbed. Because if, even when helped by those freedoms in whatever way, free will still could not bring itself to stretch from good toward something better, how much less will it be able, entirely abandoned by those same freedoms, to rise by itself from evil back to what was once good?

Christ Restores What Sin Destroyed

Augustine teaches that only through Christ's wisdom and power can freedom be fully restored, while in this life believers exercise real but partial freedom against sin and adversity.

Therefore man needs God's power and God's wisdom — Christ — who, insofar as he is wisdom, may pour back into him the true power of knowing, for the restoration of freedom of counsel; and insofar as he is power, may restore the full ability, for the repair of freedom of delight: so that on the one hand, being perfectly good, he may now be ignorant of sin; and on the other, being fully blessed, he may feel nothing adverse.⁷⁸ But let that perfection be looked for in the life to come, when both freedoms now lost will be fully restored to free choice — not as it is given to any just person in this age, however perfect; nor as it was given even to the first human beings to possess in paradise; but as the angels already possess it in heaven.⁹¹⁰ Meanwhile, let it be enough in this body of death and in this wicked age not to obey sin in concupiscence, by the freedom of counsel; and not to fear adversity for the sake of justice, by the freedom of delight.^✦¹¹¹² There is, however, in this flesh of sin and in this day of wickedness, no small power of knowing how not to consent to sin — even if we cannot be entirely free of it; and there is no small ability to despise adversity manfully for the sake of truth — even if we do not yet happily feel nothing adverse at all.¹³¹⁴

Restoring God's Image Through Grace

Augustine concludes by urging believers to use their restored freedom rightly so as to recover God's image, ending with a blessing over the one who does good by grace.

So our task here and now, for the time we have, is this: not to abuse our freedom of choice out of the freedom of counsel — so that one day we may fully enjoy the freedom of true satisfaction. In this way, truly, we restore God's image within us; in this way we press toward that ancient honor which we lost through sin, and through grace are being prepared to recover. And blessed is the one who will deserve to hear about himself: 'Who is this? And we will praise him!' For he has done wonders in his life: he could have transgressed and did not; he could have done evil and did not. (Sirach 31:9, 10).

Read the original Latin

Quid ergo? Periit liberum arbitrium, quoniam non potest non peccare? Nequaquam: sed liberum perdidit consilium, per quod prius habuit posse non peccare: quomodo et quod jam non valet utique non turbari, inde misero accidit, quod complaciti 613 quoque libertatem amiserit, per quam et ante habuit posse non turbari. Manet ergo, etiam post peccatum, liberum arbitrium; etsi miserum, tamen integrum. Et quod se per se homo non sufficit excutere a peccato sive miseria, non liberi arbitrii signat destructionem. sed duarum reliquarum libertatum privationem. Neque enim ad liberum arbitrium, quantum in se est, pertinet, aut aliquando pertinuit posse, vel sapere, sed tantum velle: nec potentem facit creaturam, nec sapientem, sed tantum volentem. Non ergo si potens, aut sapiens, sed tantum si volens esse desierit, liberum arbitrium amisisse putanda erit.

Ubi enim non est voluntas, nec libertas. Non dico si velle bonum, sed si velle omnino creatura desierit; fatendum sine contradictione, ubi non jam ex voluntate bonitas, sed ipsa ex toto voluntas periit, etiam liberum deperire arbitrium. Quod si velle bonum tantum non poterit , signum est quod ei desit liberum, non arbitrium, sed consilium. Si autem non quidem velle, sed ad id quod jam vult bonum, ei posse defuerit; noverit sibi deesse liberum complacitum, non liberum periisse arbitrium. Si ergo liberum arbitrium ita ubique sequitur voluntatem, ut nisi illa penitus esse desinat, isto non careat: voluntas vero sicut in bono, ita etiam in malo aeque perdurat: aeque profecto et liberum arbitrium tam in malo, quam in bono integrum perseverat. Et quomodo voluntas etiam posita in miseria non desinit esse voluntas, sed dicitur, et est misera voluntas, sicut et beata voluntas: ita nec liberum arbitrium destruere, sive, quantum in se est, aliquatenus imminuere poterit quaecunque adversitas vel necessitas.

Sed licet ubique pariter sine sui diminutione perduret; non tamen pariter sicut de bono potuit per se in malum corruere, ita quoque per se de malo in bonum poterit respirare. Et quid mirum si jacens non valet per se resurgere, quod stans in aliquod melius nullo suo conatu valebat proficere? Denique, dum adhuc duas alias libertates ex aliqua parte secum haberet, non potuit de inferioribus illarum gradibus ad superiora ascendere, hoc est de posse non peccare, et de posse non turbari, ad non posse peccare, et non posse turbari. Quod si libertatibus illis etiam utcunque adjutum, non praevaluit tamen de bono in melius se extendere: quanto minus eisdem prorsus destitutum, de malo in id quod fuit bonum, poterit per se ipsum emergere?

Habet igitur homo necessarium Dei virtutem, et Dei sapientiam Christum, qui ex eo quod sapientia est, verum ei Sapere reinfundat, in restaurationem liberi consilii; et ex eo quod virtus est, plenum Posse restituat, in reparationem liberi complaciti: quatenus ex altero perfecte bonus, peccatum jam nesciat; ex altero plene beatus, nil adversum sentiat. Sed sane ista perfectio in futura vita exspectetur, quando utraque nunc amissa libertas, libero arbitrio plene restaurabitur; non quomodo justo cuivis in hoc saeculo, quantumcunque perfecto; non quomodo vel ipsis primis hominibus datum fuit eas habere in paradiso: sed sicut jam nunc angeli possident in coelo. Interim vero sufficiat in hoc corpore mortis atque in hoc saeculo nequam, ex libertate quidem consilii peccato non obedire in concupiscentia: ex libertate autem complaciti adversa non formidare pro justitia. Est autem in hac carne peccati et in hac diei malitia non mediocre Sapere, peccato, etsi non ex toto carere, certe non consentire: et est Posse non parvum, adversa, etsi necdum feliciter omnino non sentire, viriliter tamen pro veritate contemnere.

Discendum sane hic interim nobis est ex libertate consilii jam libertate arbitrii non abuti, ut plene 614 quandoque frui possimus libertate complaciti. Sic profecto Dei in nobis reparamus imaginem: sic antiquo honori illi capessendo, quem per peccatum amisimus, per gratiam praeparamur. Et beatus qui de se audire merebitur: Quis est hic, et laudabimus eum? Fecit enim mirabilia in vita sua: qui potuit transgredi, et non est transgressus; facere malum, et non fecit (Eccli. XXXI, 9, 10) .

Scripture echoes

↩Rom.7.24 — Wretched man that I am! Who will rescue me from this body of death?

Notes

1 ↩complaciti is morphologically uncertain (possibly genitive plural of complacitus or a noun); rendered as referring to those who were pleasing to God, but the sense is debated.
2 ↩The syntax of the Latin is compressed: 'non jam ex voluntate bonitas, sed ipsa ex toto voluntas periit' can be read as 'goodness no longer proceeds from the will, but the will itself has perished entirely.' The distinction is between a will that fails to produce good and a will that has ceased to exist as will.
3 ↩The distinction between liberum arbitrium (free choice) and consilium (counsel) is theologically loaded: Kempis argues that the will's orientation toward good depends on wise counsel, and its absence signals a failure of counsel, not the destruction of free choice itself.
4 ↩liberum complacitum is a striking phrase: 'the freedom of being pleased' or 'freedom's pleasure,' i.e., the ease and satisfaction that come from a will aligned with good. Kempis distinguishes between the bare faculty of willing and the delight that accompanies willing what is good.
5 ↩The argument hinges on the claim that the will persists as will regardless of its moral quality (good or evil), and since free choice is tied to the will's existence rather than its moral direction, it too persists in both states.
6 ↩The analogy between voluntas misera and voluntas beata is central: the will's identity as will is not altered by its moral or experiential state. The same holds for free choice — external pressure (adversitas, necessitas) may burden it but cannot destroy or diminish it from within.
7 ↩Liberum consilii and liberum complaciti are technical distinctions: the freedom to choose wisely and the freedom to delight fully in the good. Rendered here as 'freedom of counsel' and 'freedom of delight' to preserve the paired theological sense.
8 ↩Sapere and Posse are capitalized substantives in the source, functioning almost as abstract nouns ('the power of knowing,' 'the ability'). The translation preserves their weight without personifying them.
9 ↩Utraque nunc amissa libertas refers to the two freedoms (liberum consilii and liberum complaciti) lost through sin. The contrast is between the partial restoration possible now and the full restoration awaiting the blessed in heaven.
10 ↩The comparison with the angels in heaven (sicut jam nunc angeli possident in coelo) draws on the traditional theological understanding that the blessed share in the angelic state of confirmed grace.
11 ↩In hoc corpore mortis echoes Romans 7:24 (corpus mortis huius), though the allusion is not a direct quotation. The phrase frames the present life as one of struggle.
12 ↩Libertas consilii and libertas complaciti are rendered consistently with sentence 1 as 'freedom of counsel' and 'freedom of delight' to maintain the technical pairing.
13 ↩Sapere peccato non consentire and adversa contemnere pro veritate express the two practical freedoms available even in the fallen state: the ability not to consent to sin and the courage to face hardship for truth.
14 ↩Sapere and Posse are again capitalized substantives. Rendered here as 'power of knowing' and 'ability' to convey their abstract, quasi-technical force.

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