Clarke, Samuel (1675-1729)

Of the Liberty of Moral Agents [from Sermons]

London

W. Botham

1704-5; 1731

"Most men seem to place it in being allowed to let loose the Reins to all their Appetites and Passions without controul; to be under no restraint either from the Laws of Men, or from the Fear of God."

[...] So, in This particular, Men themselves, even Wise men and Learned, the Rich and the Potent, the cunning and the most sensible in other Affairs, are very frequently imposed upon, (I would say, impose upon themselves,) and love to be deceived, and take pains to abuse their own Understandings; and, while they love Liberty above all things, embrace Slavery in the stead thereof; shutting their Eyes, and calling things by false Names, and stiling Bondage Liberty, and Liberty Bondage. For while All men contend for Liberty, wherein does the greater part of the World imagine true Liberty to consist? Most men seem to place it in being allowed to let loose the Reins to all their Appetites and Passions without controul; to be under no restraint either from the Laws of Men, or from the Fear of God. Princes generally think it to consist in having the Power of tyrannizing over the multitude of their Subjects, and sacrificing the common Rights and Properties of Mankind to their own single and unreasonable Ambition. The common People, are apt to place it in unbounded Licentiousness, and having no superiour but the Humour of the Multitude. The Covetous person would gladly be allowed to increase his Treasure by some shorter steps than those of honest Industry and patient Labour. The Debauchee thinks no Chains more troublesom, than those which would confine his Pleasures from irregularity and excess. And oh! how happy would the revengeful spirit be, might he but have Liberty to satisfy his Malice, without present Shame or future Danger! This, 'tis to be feared, is the Notion too great a part of Mankind have of Liberty. And what a Liberty is This? Is it not like the Liberty a Madman desires, of being permitted to destroy himself? Is it any thing more, than a Liberty to chuse the worst of Slaveries, and to exchange the Government of a most reasonable Master, for that of the worst and cruellest Tyrant? For, what does the Ambitious Prince or the Licentious Multitude; what does the Covetous, and Revengeful, or the Debauched Sinner; but only chuse to be a Servant to Passion, instead of a Follower of Right Reason? What is it that makes a Beast be a Creature of less Liberty than Man, but only that its natural Appetites more necessarily govern all its Actions, and that it is not indued with a Faculty of Reason, whereby to exert itself, and gain a Power or Liberty of over-ruling those Appetites? For if the true Liberty of a Moral Agent does not principally consist in the Power of over-ruling such Appetites; wherein lies the Excellency of humane Nature at all, above the inferiour Creation ? Or what superiority has Man above the Beasts that perish, in any Moral regard; if his greater Knowledge and Understanding serves only to make him feel and be sensible of his Subjection to those lower Appetites, which the other Creatures are naturally subject to, without being sensible or having any uneasy Reflections that they are so? Is not the Difference, in such a Case, This only, that the Man is really the greater Slave, or has the less Liberty of the Two, because He only is by his Reason capable of understanding that he wants it? If a man's Body be under confinement, or he be impotent in his Limbs, he is then deprived of his bodily Liberty: And for the same Reason, if his Mind be blinded by sottish Errors, and his Reason overruled by violent Passions; is not This likewise plainly as great a Slavery and as true a Confinement? For, to whomsoever men yield themselves servants to obey, (as the Apostle excellently expresses it,) are they not his servants to whom they obey, Rom. vi. 16. and of whomsoever a man is overcome, of the same also is he not brought in bondage, 2 Pet. ii. 19?
(pp. 8-11)