A: That is a reason. You see that you cannot wish without reason. I declare to you that you are free to marry; that is, that you have the power to sign the contract, have your nuptials, and sleep with your wife.
B: How now! I cannot wish without reason? And what will become of that other proverb: Sit pro ratione voluntas; my will is my reason, I wish because I wish?
A: That is absurd, my dear fellow; there would be in you an effect without a cause.
B: What! When I play at odds and evens, I have a reason for choosing evens rather than odds?
A: Yes, undoubtedly.
B: And what is that reason, if you please?
A: The reason is that the idea of even rather than the opposite idea presents itself to your mind. It would be comic that there were cases where you wished because there was a cause of wishing, and that there were cases where you wished without any cause. When you wish to be married, you evidently feel the dominating reason; you do not feel it when you are playing at odds and evens; and yet there certainly must be one.
B: But, I repeat, I am not free then?
A: Your will is not free, but your actions are. You are free to act, when you have the power to act.
B: But all the books I have read on the liberty of indifference....