Bonaventure: necessity of compulsion destroys freedom, necessity of immutability does not
Bonaventure plainly held this view. On the second book of the Sentences, distinction 7, question 2, he writes: 'To the claim that willing freely and willing necessarily are opposed, the answer is that necessity is of two kinds. One comes from an outside cause, such as the necessity of compulsion, and this is opposed to willing freely. The other comes from an inner disposition, and this is not opposed to it but stands together with freedom. Such is the necessity in the free choice of the demons, who bind evil to themselves so tightly that they would by no means be parted from it.'
In distinction 25, question 2, he says: 'Free choice may be considered in two ways, as free or as deliberating. Taken as free, I grant that it can concern not only what is contingent but also what is necessary, as is evident in God, in Christ, in the angels, and in the blessed.
'There are two necessities, of compulsion and of immutability. The first conflicts with freedom of choice, the second does not. For choice is called free not because, in willing this, it can will the opposite, but because whatever it wills it seeks under its own command. It wills a thing in such a way that it wills itself to will it, and so in the very act of willing it moves itself and rules itself. For that reason it is called free, even though it is unchangeably directed to its object.'
A little later he adds: 'The act of free choice, taken as free, can not only concern what is necessary but can itself be necessary.'
Latin
XV. Ita procul omni dubio censuit Bonaventura, cujus haec verba sunt in secundum sententiarum distinct. 7. quaest. 2. Ad illud quod dicitur quod libere velle, & necessario opponuntur, dicendum quod duplex est necessitas, quaedam a causa extrinseca, utpote necessitas coactionis: & haec opponitur ei quod est libere velle. Quaedam vero est a dispositione intrinseca, & haec huic non opponitur: imo stat simul cum libertate. Talis est in libero arbitrio daemonum, qui ita conglutinant sibi malum, ut nullo modo velint ab eo separari. Et distinctione vigesima quinta quaest. 2. Liberum arbitrium, inquit, dupliciter potest considerari: aut secundum quod liberum est, aut secundum quod deliberans. Si loquamur de ipso secundum quod liberum, sic concedo quod potest esse non solum respectu contingentis, sed etiam necessarii, sicut patet in Deo, & in Christo, & in Angelis, & in hominibus beatis. Cum enim duplex sit necessitas, videlicet, coactionis & immutabilitatis, necessitas coactionis repugnat libertati arbitrii, non autem necessitas immutabilitatis: eo quod arbitrium dicitur liberum, non quia sic velit hoc ut possit velle ejus oppositum, sed quia omne quod vult appetit ad sui ipsius imperium, quia sic vult aliquid, ut velit se velle illud, & ideo in actu volendi seipsum movet, & sibi dominatur, & pro tanto dicitur liberum, quamvis immutabiliter ordinetur ad illud. Et paulo inferius, Actus liberi arbitrii, ut liberum est, non solum potest esse circa necessarium, sed etiam necessarius in se.