A careful and strict enquiry into the modern prevailing notions of that freedom of…

The Word Good, in this Sense, includes in its Signification, the Removal or Avoiding of Evil, or of that which is disagreeable & uneasy. 'Tis agreeable and pleasing, to avoid what is disagreeable and displeasing, and to have Uneasiness removed. So that here is included what Mr. Locke supposes determines the Will. For when he speaks of Uneasiness as determining the Will, he must be understood as supposing that the End or Aim which governs in the Volition or Act of Preference, is the Avoiding or Removal of that Uneasiness; and that is the same Thing as choosing and seeking what is more easy and agreeable.

The Word Good, in this Sense, includes in its Signification, the Removal or Avoiding of Evil, or of that which is disagreable & uneasy. 'Tis agreable and pleasing, to avoid what is disagreable and displeasing, and to have Uneasiness removed. So that here is included what Mr. Locke supposes determines the Will. For when he speaks of Uneasiness as determining the Will, he must be understood as supposing that the End or Aim which governs in the Volition or Act of Preference, is the Avoiding or Removal of that Uneasiness; and that is the same Thing as chusing and seeking what is more easy and agreable.

2. When I say, the Will is as the greatest apparent Good is, or (as I have explained it) that Volition has always for its Object the Thing which appears most agreeable; it must be carefully observed, to avoid Confusion and needless Objection, that I speak of the direct and immediate Object of the Act of Volition; and not some Object that the Act of Will has not an immediate, but only an indirect and remote Respect to. Many Acts of Volition have some remote Relation to an Object, that is different from the Thing most immediately willed and chosen. Thus, when a Drunkard has his Liquor before him, & he has to choose whether to drink it, or no; the proper and immediate Objects, about which his present Volition is conversant, and between which his Choice now decides, are his own Acts, in drinking the Liquor, or letting it alone; and this will certainly be done according to what, in the present View of his Mind, taken in the whole of it, is most agreeable to him. If he chooses or wills to drink it, and not to let it alone; then this Action, as it stands in the View of his Mind, with all that belongs to its Appearance there, is more agreeable and pleasing than letting it alone.