GUIDE TO THE PHILOSOPHY 1938 - 1947.pdf - Rare Books at ...

108 ETHICS AND POLITICS: THE GREEKS
Since the notion of ought is essential to morality, the
so that
conception of free will is also essential to morality,
if a man is not responsible for his actions, he cannot be
considered a moral agent. If, therefore, Aristotle's ordinary
man is not to be regarded merely as a well-trained auto-
maton performing, as an ant performs, those actions which
are necessary to the well-being of the community to which
he belongs, if he is to be regarded as a moral agent able
freely to choose what is right and to act in accordance
with his choice, it is essential that he should be credited
with free will. Now to establish the existence of free will
is an exceedingly difficult undertaking, for once you begin
to think about free will, you are apt to find, as I shall
try later to show, 1 that all the arguments that occur to
you on the subject are arguments against it. Freedom may
be a fact and we may be convinced that it is a fact, but,
if so, it is a fact which must be approached only with
the greatest circumspection; that is why arguments
between determinists and upholders of freedom almost
invariably end in favour of the former. How various and
how formidable are the arguments which may be brought
against the conception of freedom I shall hope to show in
Chapter VII. For the present, we are concerned only
with Aristotle's treatment of the subject.
What Constitutes an Action ? Aristotle propounds a
doctrine which purports to claim freedom for the human
will, and which he officially regards as establishing the
claim. Aristotle, in fact, shares the plain man's conviction
of freedom, but it may be doubted whether he has been
any more successful in substantiating it than other philosophers
who have attempted the task. Aristotle begins by
pointing out that, when we judge men from the moral
point of view, assigning to them moral praise or blame, it
is not so much about their actions that we are judging
as about the will, or intention, from which their actions
spring. An action is, after all, only the displacement of
1 See Chapter VII, pp. 228-245.