Theological Theses · §1760 · Louis Le Blanc de Beaulieu

Wendelin and Ursinus make every voluntary act free, so that God is freely good because not by compulsion

He and those who agree with him admit a difference among the will's acts: the will is fixed on some of them, while toward others it stays by nature able to go either way. Still they hold that the will should be called free with respect to both kinds, and that both kinds come freely from the will.

So they do distinguish between what is simply voluntary and what comes from choice, but they draw no line between the voluntary and the free. They want the two to cover the same ground, so that whatever is voluntary is free for that very reason. They do not think any necessity destroys the nature of freedom unless it also destroys the nature of the voluntary.

They therefore teach that God, though good by nature, is freely good, because his goodness is not forced but willed. Ursinus says this in the passage cited above: "What is free is called hekousion, that is, spontaneous. It is the opposite of akousion, the involuntary and forced, but not of anankaion, the necessary.

"Hekousion can go with anankaion, but not with akousion. God and the holy angels are good anankaios, that is, necessarily, yet not akousios, that is, under force; they are good most freely, because the source of their goodness is in themselves, a free will."

Latin

VIII. Quamvis igitur ille, & qui cum eo sentiunt, agnoscant discrimen esse inter actus voluntatis, nempe ad quosdam voluntatem determinatam esse, aliorum vero respectu natura sua manere idoneam ad opposita; censent tamen voluntatem, tam horum quam illorum respectu, liberam dici debere, & tam hos quam illos libere a voluntate prodire & elici. Ac proinde distinguunt quidem inter voluntarium simpliciter, & illud quod fit ex electione: sed inter voluntarium & liberum non distinguunt. Nam utrumque volunt aeque late patere, & quicquid voluntarium est, hoc ipso esse liberum. Nec ullam necessitatem quae voluntarii naturam non evertat, libertatis naturam evertere existimant. Adeoque quamvis Deus per naturam bonus sit, docent tamen illum esse libere bonum, quoniam non coacte, sed voluntarie bonus est. Sicuti videre est apud Zachariam Ursinum loco jam allegato. Liberum, inquit, vocatur ἑκούσιον, hoc est, spontaneum: quod opponitur ἀκουσίῳ, hoc est, involuntario, & coacto: non autem ἀναγκαίῳ, seu necessario. Potest enim ἑκούσιον consistere cum ἀναγκαίῳ, sed non cum ἀκουσίῳ, ut Deus & sancti Angeli ἀναγκαίως, hoc est, necessario sunt boni: non tamen ἀκουσίως, hoc est, coacte, sed liberrime: quia principium suae bonitatis habent in seipsis, liberam voluntatem.

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