CHAPTER II
this reason it seems to me that if I sin I sin by necessity, and if I do not sin it is by necessity that I do not sin.'
CHAPTER II
And I reply: We should realize that we often say it is necessary for something to occur even though there is nothing compelling it to occur, and that it is necessary for something not to occur even though there is nothing precluding it from occurring. We say, for instance, that it is necessary for God to be immortal and that it is necessary for God not to be unjust. But we do not mean that some power compels Him to be Immortal or prevents Him from being unjust, because no power can prevent Him from being immortal or can com pel Him to be unjust. Similarly, I say it is necessary that you are going to sin or not going to sin by your will alone-in accordance with God's foreknow ledge. But this must not be understood to mean that something prevents your willing the action which is not going to occur or that something compels your willing the action which is going to occur. For God, who foresees what you are willingly going to do, foreknows that your will is not compelled or pre vented by anything else; hence this activity of the will is free. If these things are carefully considered, I think it will be seen that no contradiction prevents us from affirming both the foreknowledge of God and freedom of choice.
Moreover, if one considers the proper meaning of the word 'foreknow,' he will see that when something is said to be foreknown, it is thus declared to be something that actually will occur. For since knowledge can be only of what is the case, one can foreknow only what is going to happen. Therefore, when I say, 'If God foreknows something, it is necessary that it be going to occur,' this is the same as saying, 'If something will occur, then necessarily it will occur.' But this necessity neither compels a thing to be nor prevents it from
being. And so by the very fact that something exists it is said necessarily to exist; and by the very fact that something does not exist it is said neces sarily not to exist. In saying this we do not mean that some necessity is compelling this thing to exist or preventing it from not existing. For when
I say, 'If a thing will be, then necessarily it will be,' this necessity follows, rather than precedes, the presumed existence of the thing. The same thing would be true if I were to declare, 'What will be, necessarily will be.'
For this necessity signifies nothing more than the impossibility that something will both be and not be at the same time.
Likewise, it is true that a thing's existence--past, present, or future-does not occur by necessity, and also that there is the necessity of its having been what it was or its being what it is or its going to be what it will be.
Indeed, for a thing to be past is not the same as for a past thing to be past; nor is it the same thing for something to be present and for a present thing to be present, or for something to be future and for a future thing to be future-just as it is not the same for a thing to be white and for a white thing to be white. A piece of wood, for instance, is not necessarily white at all times, for before it became white it was possible for it not to become white, and after it has become white it is possible for it to become not-white. But a white piece of wood is necessarily white at all times, because neither before it existed nor after it existed as white, is it possible for something white to be not-white at the same time. In the same way, a thing may be existing in the present without necessity, since before it began to exist in the present it was possible for it not to exist and while it exists it is possible for it to cease existing in the present. But it is necessary for a present thing always to exist in the present--because neither before it existed nor after
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