ABSTRACT
The medieval voluntarist Henry of Ghent recognizes on the one hand that we make choices on the basis of judgements; on the other hand, according to his understanding of the relationship between the will and the intellect, the faculties of rational appetition and cognition respectively, the will moves itself by itself to the act of choosing an object presented to it by the intellect. There is therefore a puzzle in Henry of Ghent’s voluntarism: how is it possible for the will to make a choice on the basis of the judgement of the intellect? This chapter explores two aspects of Henry of Ghent’s voluntarism in an attempt to solve this puzzle. First, it shows that the role of the intellect in choice is not exhausted by its presenting an object to the will; the intellect also influences the manner in which the will elicits its choices. Second, drawing on Henry’s use of a popular image of the will as the king of the kingdom of the soul, it shows that the will cannot simply have appetites; it must also have cognitions.
