_Sempre con ordin certo il nuovo nasce;_
_Ne tracciando i primi semi, fanno_
_Di moto un tal principio, il qual poi rompa_
_I decreti del fato, accio non segua_
_L'una causa dell' altra in infinito;_
_Onde han questa, dich' io_, del fato sciolta
Libera volunta, _per cui ciascuno_
_Va dove piu l'agrada? I moti ancora_
_Si declinan sovente, e non in tempo_
_Certo, ne certa region, ma solo_
_Quando e dove commanda il nostro arbitrio;_
_Poiche senz' alcun dubbio a queste cose_
_Da sol principio il voler proprio, e quindi_
_Van poi scorrendo per le membra i moti._

It is comical that a man like Epicurus, after having discarded the gods and
all incorporeal substances, could have supposed that the will, which he
himself takes as composed of atoms, could have had control over the atoms,
and diverted them from their path, without its being possible for one to
say how.

322. Carneades, not going so far back as to the atoms, claimed to find at
once in the soul of man the reason for the so-called vague indifference,
assuming as reason for the thing just that for which Epicurus sought a
reason. Carneades gained nothing thereby, except that he more easily
deceived careless people, in transferring the absurdity from one subject,
where it is somewhat too evident, to another subject where it is easier to
confuse matters, that is to say, from the body to the soul. For most
philosophers had not very distinct notions of the nature of the soul. [321]
Epicurus, who composed it of atoms, was at least right in seeking the
origin of its determination in that which he believed to be the origin of
the soul itself. That is why Cicero and M. Bayle were wrong to find so much
fault with him, and to be indulgent towards, and even praise, Carneades,
who is no less irrational. I do not understand how M. Bayle, who was so
clear-sighted, was thus satisfied by a disguised absurdity, even to the
extent of calling it the greatest effort the human mind can make on this
matter. It is as if the soul, which is the seat of reason, were more
capable than the body of acting without being determined by some reason or
cause, internal or external; or as if the great principle which states that
nothing comes to pass without cause only related to the body.

323. It is true that the Form or the Soul has this advantage over matter,
that it is the source of action, having within itself the principle of
motion or of change, in a word, [Greek: