free in
accordance with Hobbes' definition of freedom. Suppose, for example,
that on seeing a bone I think of Professor Flower, then remember that a
long time ago I lent his book on Osteology to a friend, and forthwith
resolve to ask my friend what has become of it; here my ultimate
volition would be unfree if it were the effect of physical processes
going on in my brain. But the volition might be free if each of these
mental processes were the result of the preceding one, seeing that there
may then have been 'an absence of all impediments' to the occurrence of
these processes.

Of course it will be objected--as I have myself urged in the preceding
chapter--that causal action of any kind is incompatible with freedom of
volition--that if there be any such causal action, even though it be
wholly restricted within the sphere of mind, the Will is really
compelled to will as it does will, is determined to determine as it does
determine, and hence that its apparent freedom is illusory. Hobbes'
definition, it may be urged, when applied to the case of the Will, is
equivocal. No doubt a man is free as to his _action_, if there be an
'absence of all impediments' to his action--or, in other words, if he is
able to act as he wills to act. But it does not follow that he is free
as to his _will_, even though there be an absence of all impediments to
his willing as he wills to will. For here the very question is as to
whether there are any impediments to his willing otherwise than he does
will. The fact that he wills to will as he does will proves that there
are no impediments to his willing in that direction; but is there a
similar absence of impediments to his willing to will in any other
direction? If so, we are still within the lines of determinism. Thus
Hobbes' definition of freedom really applies only to freedom of bodily
action; not to freedom of volition, seeing that if my will is caused I
could not have willed to will otherwise than I did will. Now, the answer
which Monism supplies to this objection is that the will itself is here
the ultimate agent, and _therefore an agent which must be identified
with the principle of causality_. In other words, the very reason why we
feel that Hobbes' definition of liberty, while perfectly valid as
regards bodily action, seems to lack something when applied to volition,
is because volition belongs to the sphere of mind--belongs, therefore,
to that sphere which the theory of Monism regards