Mozley: A Treatise on the Augustinian Doctrine of

CHAP. viii. of Freewill. 203
otherwise than as it did? This is the doctrine
happened
of necessity. Suppose two men under exactly the same
circumstances as regards a particular temptation to which
they are subjected- the same even to the minutest parti
culars. Let the circumstances which are thus identical be
not external only, but internal ones. Let them have the
same amount of inward bias or inclination, and let this
inclination be acted upon from without by a whole, com
plex, manifold and intricate machinery of invitations and
allurements, precisely the same in both cases. Lei- every
thing, in short, which is properly circumstantial i.e. is
not the very act of the will itself be by supposition the
same in both cases. Now, the doctrine of freewill is, that
these two agents may, under this entire and absolute iden
tity of circumstances, act differently ; the doctrine of neces
sity is that they must act the same. According to the
doctrine of freewill there is an ultimate power of choice in
the human will, which, however strongly it may be drawn,
or tempted, or attracted to decide one way or another by
external appeals or motives, is not ruled and decided by
such motives, but by the will itself
only. This is the selfdetermining
power of the will, the assertion of which is the
characteristic of that doctrine. Under this identity of cir
cumstances, an original act or motion of the will is said to
take place, which may be different in the two persons, and
be the one single difference in the whole of the two cases.
On the other hand, the necessitarian maintains that where
the circumstances, external and internal, are really and
completely alike, there is not room for this further differ
ence ; but that the issue will be the same in both cases,
and both will act alike. Archbishop Whately s position,
that supposing all the circumstances connected with it to
remain the same, it is absurd to say anything could have
happened otherwise than as it did, is identical with this
necessitarian one. He adds, that this assertion that the
event must always be the same under the same circum
stances, is little more than an expansion of the position
that it is impossible for the same thing to be and not to
be. Of course, supposing it true that the whole of the