ABSTRACT
In the first edition of the Essay Concerning Human Understanding, John Locke claims that human beings have freedom of action – that is, that some of their actions are free – but that they do not have freedom of will – that is, that none of their volitions are free. Volitions themselves are actions for Locke; they are operations of the will and hence acts of willing. And volitions give rise to other actions: an action that follows and is caused by a volition is thereby a voluntary action. Since judgments are products of our faculty of understanding, Locke sometimes says that the will is determined by ‘dictates of the understanding’. The doctrine of suspension maintains that, at least in most cases, such volitions are avoidable. Locke then is speaking carelessly when he says that the power of suspension is the source of all liberty and that free will consists therein.
