Critique of the freedom of choice.
We must however beware of enunciating this relation in a false form, as happens with the theory called freedom of choice, where the will is conceived as the faculty that chooses one volition from among others and makes it its own. The will does not choose a volition (save metaphorically), but so to speak chooses the choice itself, or makes itself will among the desires which are not will. Nor should the possible actions that are excluded be looked upon as constituting a graduation in respect to the spirit, which should will a and not b, c, d, e, and so on, attributing to them, nevertheless, different values, which can be symbolized by the declining series of numbers, passing downward from the will which is 10, to 9, 8, 7, 6, and so on. In reality, the volitions that are excluded (b, c, d, e) have no actual value, for the very reason that they are excluded. They may acquire it in other situations different from the one analyzed, but it is not possible to present the various situations together in one, and far less to determine them quantitatively and numerically, otherwise than in a symbolical manner. The propositions that present the will sometimes as the strongest volition in respect to the passions or desires, and sometimes as the weakest in respect to the passions, which seem to be the strongest, that is, according as we consider the active or the passive moment of the will, its victory or defeat, are also metaphorical and symbolical.
Significance of the so-called precedence of feeling over the volitional act.
The relation established receives further light from the generally admitted theory of the necessary precedence of the feelings as condition for the volitional act. The volitional act is preceded by a jostling multiplicity of volitions, by a swarm of passions and desires, which it dominates; and therefore it may seem that it follows, not the volition, but something different from the volition, to be called feeling. It is certainly different, but only because it is the plural of that singular. The nature of the passions and desires in respect to the volitional act has not been clearly elucidated, and this is another of the reasons that have caused the customary category of "feeling" to appear and to be retained.
Polipathicism and apathicism.
Finally and always through the established relation, the two opposed theories concerning the passions are excluded: that which makes the efficacious explanation of practical life to consist in giving free course to the passions, holding them all to be sacred as such: this theory could be called polipathicism; the other, which makes it consist of the eradication and destruction of all the passions, in order to give place to the exclusive domination of reason, of rational will, or of the will that really is will, and could therefore be called apathicism.
Polipathicism has the defect of not taking account among the passions of that which is passion par excellence, and which alone becomes actual, driving away the others: the will. Apathicism naturally possesses the opposite defect and takes account only of the will, and therefore not of that either, for the will becomes impotent when alone, just as in the other case it becomes a chaotic jumble of all the passions.
Erroneousness of both opposed theses.
Such views as these are so openly unsustainable that they hardly appear at all in their strictness and purity, in the course of the history of philosophy, and then fugitively. But it is desirable to be attentive not to identify the theoretic formulæ given above with the programmes of certain groups, sects, associations, or individuals who have verbally proclaimed polipathicism and apathicism, whereas they have implied something very different, and could not have done otherwise. Complete polipathicism and complete apathicism could only be attained by the individual at the cost of disaggregation and annihilation. At the most, sects, groups, societies, and individuals have been able to conform to those formulæ as the simple expression of tendencies; or those formulæ are applicable to them by hyperbole, in the condemnation that it has been held desirable to inflict upon certain unhealthy tendencies. Certainly there are individuals whose passions are in such slight control as to suggest the absence of will; they run after every one of their desires, or leave their soul open to the onset of the passions that devastate it as the wind and the hail do the fields. Lorenzo the Magnificent (symbolizing with his wonted finesse a profoundly philosophical conflict) said to his son Piero, who was addicted to every pleasure and caprice: "And I never have any wish but you realize it for yourself."[1] The young rake whose adventures were sung by De Musset may afford an example of the same disaggregation, composed of the most violent kind of passions:
Ce n'était pas Rolla qui gouvernait sa vie:
C'étaient ses passions; il les laissait aller,
Comme un pâtre assoupi regarde l'eau couler....