LIBERTY,or freedom,signifieth properly the absence of opposition (by opposition,I mean external impediments of motion);and may be applied no less to irrational and inanimate creatures than to rational.For whatsoever is so tied,or environed,as it cannot move but within a certain space,which space is determined by the opposition of some external body,we say it hath not liberty to go further.And so of all living creatures,whilst they are imprisoned,or restrained with walls or chains;and of the water whilst it is kept in by banks or vessels that otherwise would spread itself into a larger space;we use to say they are not at liberty to move in such manner as without those external impediments they would.But when the impediment of motion is in the constitution of the thing itself,we use not to say it wants the liberty,but the power,to move;as when a stone lieth still,or a man is fastened to his bed by sickness.
And according to this proper and generally received meaning of the word,a freeman is he that,in those things which by his strength and wit he is able to do,is not hindered to do what he has a will to.
But when the words free and liberty are applied to anything but bodies,they are abused;for that which is not subject to motion is not to subject to impediment:and therefore,when it is said,for example,the way is free,no liberty of the way is signified,but of those that walk in it without stop.And when we say a gift is free,there is not meant any liberty of the gift,but of the giver,that was not bound by any law or covenant to give it.So when we speak freely,it is not the liberty of voice,or pronunciation,but of the man,whom no law hath obliged to speak otherwise than he did.
Lastly,from the use of the words free will,no liberty can be inferred of the will,desire,or inclination,but the liberty of the man;which consisteth in this,that he finds no stop in doing what he has the will,desire,or inclination to do.
Fear and liberty are consistent:as when a man throweth his goods into the sea for fear the ship should sink,he doth it nevertheless very willingly,and may refuse to do it if he will;it is therefore the action of one that was free:so a man sometimes pays his debt,only for fear of imprisonment,which,because no body hindered him from detaining,was the action of a man at liberty.And generally all actions which men do in Commonwealths,for fear of the law,are actions which the doers had liberty to omit.
Liberty and necessity are consistent:as in the water that hath not only liberty,but a necessity of descending by the channel;so,likewise in the actions which men voluntarily do,which,because they proceed their will,proceed from liberty,and yet because every act of man's will and every desire and inclination proceedeth from some cause,and that from another cause,in a continual chain (whose first link is in the hand of God,the first of all causes),proceed from necessity.So that to him that could see the connexion of those causes,the necessity of all men's voluntary actions would appear manifest.And therefore God,that seeth and disposeth all things,seeth also that the liberty of man in doing what he will is accompanied with the necessity of doing that which God will and no more,nor less.For though men may do many things which God does not command,nor is therefore author of them;yet they can have no passion,nor appetite to anything,of which appetite God's will is not the cause.And did not His will assure the necessity of man's will,and consequently of all that on man's will dependeth,the liberty of men would be a contradiction and impediment to the omnipotence and liberty of God.And this shall suffice,as to the matter in hand,of that natural liberty,which only is properly called liberty.
But as men,for the attaining of peace and conservation of themselves thereby,have made an artificial man,which we call a Commonwealth;so also have they made artificial chains,called civil laws,which they themselves,by mutual covenants,have fastened at one end to the lips of that man,or assembly,to whom they have given the sovereign power,and at the other to their own ears.These bonds,in their own nature but weak,may nevertheless be made to hold,by the danger,though not by the difficulty of breaking them.
In relation to these bonds only it is that I am to speak now of the liberty of subjects.For seeing there is no Commonwealth in the world wherein there be rules enough set down for the regulating of all the actions and words of men (as being a thing impossible):it followeth necessarily that in all kinds of actions,by the laws pretermitted,men have the liberty of doing what their own reasons shall suggest for the most profitable to themselves.For if we take liberty in the proper sense,for corporal liberty;that is to say,freedom from chains and prison,it were very absurd for men to clamour as they do for the liberty they so manifestly enjoy.Again,if we take liberty for an exemption from laws,it is no less absurd for men to demand as they do that liberty by which all other men may be masters of their lives.And yet as absurd as it is,this is it they demand,not knowing that the laws are of no power to protect them without a sword in the hands of a man,or men,to cause those laws to be put in execution.The liberty of a subject lieth therefore only in those things which,in regulating their actions,the sovereign hath pretermitted:such as is the liberty to buy,and sell,and otherwise contract with one another;to choose their own abode,their own diet,their own trade of life,and institute their children as they themselves think fit;and the like.
Nevertheless we are not to understand that by such liberty the sovereign power of life and death is either abolished or limited.