50 
C. L, Herrick 
expression of the universal in terms of the individual. In like 
manner the soul is a spontaneity in so far as not trammeled by its 
setting. As the entelechy of the body, the soul is at once its 
form, its principle of motion, and its end. 
In later times Thomas Aquinas is the first to reiterate the posi- 
tion of Aristotle, but with reserve by reason of the influence of 
the church, to whose authority he bowed in matters of apparent 
discrepancy. God exists as pure immaterial form, as pure actu- 
ality, wholly free from potentiality. It is plain that the phrase 
^^free from potentiality’’ means that the inherent energy is 
pure spontaneity and non-conditioned, for it is added that he 
is ^Ahe efficient and final cause of the world.” 
^^Ea res libera dicitur, quae ex sola suae naturae existit et a se 
sola ad agendum determinatur. ” — Spinoza. The true idea of 
freedom of the will lies in the absence of or inability of external 
coercion to prevent the expression of the nature of the free subject. 
Spinoza is evidently greatly indebted to Aristotle. Yet he loses 
much of the cogency of the older writer by failing to make the 
dynamic element explicit, and by a spurious mathematical form. 
He says, however, ^^God acts only according to the laws of his 
nature, constrained by no one, and hence with absolute freedom, 
and he is the only free cause.” As a cause God is immanent. 
In Leibnitz the dynamic element is fully recognized. Active 
force is the essence of substance. The doctrine of monads adds 
obscurity rather than intelligibility to a grand concept. The 
energy which is the essence of monads is intelligent and where 
the force is equilibrated or reflected upon self the subject becomes 
conscious. The principle of continuity necessary to any system 
of nature is derived from the concept of motion; but in reality 
it is not motion but energy which constitutes essence and it is this 
alone which remains constant. Extension is not predicated of the 
monad and position is only used in an illustrative way. Activity 
and limitation are the elementary conditions of individual being. 
Lessing elaborates these ideas and says that thinking, willing 
and creating are identical in God. 
In Herbart the dynamic element is most clearly developed and 
it is to this fact that Herbart’s utility in pedagogy is chiefly to 
be ascribed. Herbart says that the soul is a simple, spaceless 
essence, of simple quality. The intellectual and in fact all 
psychical phenomena are reactions in opposition to disturbances. 
