Kitap 2
22
On this account also in the case of persons who are inspired and utter prophecies, although they perform an act of thought, nevertheless we do not say that saying what they said and doing what they did rested with themselves.
23
Nor yet do we say that what men do because of desire rests with themselves; so that some thoughts and emotions, or the actions that are guided by such thoughts and calculations, do not rest with ourselves, but it is as PhilolausPythagorean philosopher contemporary with Socrates. said—some arguments are too strong for us.
23
Hence if it was necessary to consider the voluntary and involuntary with reference also to acting under compulsion, let this be our decision of the matter (for those who cause most hindrance . . . the voluntary . . .Some words seem to have been lost here (ἀλλά suggests that they contained a negative). as acting under compulsion, but voluntarily).
1
Now that this is concluded, and as the voluntary has been found not to be defined by appetition, nor yet by purposive choice, it therefore remains to define it as that which is in accordance with thought.
2
Now the voluntary seems to be the opposite of the involuntary; and acting with knowledge of either the person acted on or the instrument or the result (for sometimes the agent knows that it is his father but does not intend to kill him but to save him—as the PeliadsThe daughters of Pelias, King of Iolchus, cut him up and boiled him, having been told by Medea (who wanted Jason to leave his throne) that this would restore his youth. did—or knows that what he is offering is a drink but offers it as a love-charm or wine, when really it is hemlock) seems to be the opposite of acting without knowing the person acted on, the instrument and the nature of the act, through ignorance and not by accident. But to act through ignorance of the act, the means and the person acted on is involuntary action.
