On Free Choice of the Will Quotes

“So the will's desire for death is not a desire for nonexistence, but a desire for peace. When someone wrongly believes that he will not exist, he desires by nature to be at peace; that is, he desire to exist in a higher degree.”
― Augustine of Hippo, On Free Choice of the Will

“Every soul must pay back what it owes, either by using well what it received, or by losing what it was unwilling to use well.”
― Augustine of Hippo, On Free Choice of the Will

“the soul is not moved to abandon higher things and love inferior things unless it wills to do so.”
― Augustine of Hippo, On Free Choice of the Will

“For there is no single cause of evil; rather, everyone who does evil is the cause of his own evildoing. If you doubt this, recall what I said earlier: Evil deeds are punished by the justice of God. They would not be punished justly if they had not been performed voluntarily.”
― Augustine of Hippo, On Free Choice of the Will

“Reason judges in one way, custom in another. Reason judges by the light of truth, so that by right judgment it subjects lesser things to greater. Custom is often swayed by agreeable habits, so that it esteems as greater what truth reveals as lower.”
― Augustine of Hippo, On Free Choice of the Will

“Augustine, however, would point out that if you are your own boss, you are ipso facto your own slave. And it is not right to be ruled by what is equal to oneself. One should be ruled only by what is in every respect superior to oneself, and that is Truth, which Augustine identifies with God.”
― Augustine of Hippo, On Free Choice of the Will

“Without metaphysical freedom, the universe is just a divine puppet show. If there is to be any real creaturely goodness, any new and creative act of love, rather than the merely mechanical uncoiling of a wind-up universe, if there are to be any real decisions other than those made in the divine will, then there must be metaphysical freedom, and such freedom brings with it the possibility of evil as well as the promise of goodness.”
― Augustine of Hippo, On Free Choice of the Will

“Only one possibility remains: the movement by which the will turns from enjoying the Creator to enjoying his creatures belongs to the will itself.”
― Augustine of Hippo, On Free Choice of the Will

“For the will cannot be forced into such iniquity by anything superior or equal to it, since that would be unjust; or by anything inferior to it, since that is impossible.”
― Augustine of Hippo, On Free Choice of the Will