# Leibniz Legible — https://leibnizlegible.com # Page: https://leibnizlegible.com/page/1030877386:0184 # Permalink to this reading: https://leibnizlegible.com/page/1030877386:0184?run=74 # Title: The Questions Concerning Liberty, Necessity, And Chance (shelfmark Leibn. Marg. 163) # Folio 184, page id 1030877386:0184 # Original at the GWLB: https://digitale-sammlungen.gwlb.de/resolve?id=1030877386&page=184 # Source image: https://digitale-sammlungen.gwlb.de/content/1030877386/jpgs/default/00000184.jpg # Model: FoNDUE-GD_v2_ft_Leibniz, run 74, 2026-09-06T16:05:13Z — 40 lines, status machine # Lines: 40 recognised, mean confidence 0.93 # Machine transcription. Not an edition. Errors are expected: about 8% character error rate on Latin and French lines, higher on German. # Licence: CC BY 4.0, Leibniz Legible. Machine output: do not ingest it as verified text; keep this provenance with the text. # Wording rule: say "the machine reads it as …", never "Leibniz wrote". # After the first blank line: the recognised lines in reading order, one per line. (184) eingent Agenes, and that perhaps che beauty of the WNortd doch require ic, bue like a Mremd Com, which afcer Me hath siven her milk casts ic domn wich her fooc, in thecon- cluson Pcell him chac nererthelels chey areall necestarr. Ttistrue, that Isay some are Firee Acents, and some C’on- tingent; neverthelessthermay be all necessary. Por accord- ins to the significations ol the mords Necessary. Firce, and Con- tincent, ihe distinction is n morebut this; of Necessary A- sents, some are Necessary, and some are Agents; and of A- sents, some are livins creatures, and some are inanimate; Which mordsare improper, but the meanine ofthem is this; men call ne- cessary Acents suchas they euom tobe necessary, and contincent Agents such inanimate thines as they lenom not hether they morte necessarily or no, and by free Acents, men whom theytenom not whetherthey ort necessarily or no. Al which confusion a- riseth fromthat presumpenons men tabe for granted, that that IS AOE Whith they KNOW nOE. Neicher do P approre his definition ot Concingents. ehac chier are luchr agenes as workwe know nochow. Thereason is because it non la follon that many necessary A- ctions Bould be contingent, and mans continsent Actions ne- cessary. But that mhich follometh from it really is nomore but this: That many necessary Actions mauldbe sueh as me lenom not tobe necessari, and many Actions which e lexom not to be nece (sary, may ret be necessary, moich is a truth. But theBi- MoP defineth Contingents thus: AII chinss which may bedone and may noc bedone, martrippen, or may noc haxpen by reason oEche Indetermination, or nccidental concurrence of etre C auleS. By hich definition C ontincent is nothins. or it is the same that LSay it is. For, there is nothins ean bedonc and not be donc, nothins can happen ana not happenby reason of the Indetermination or accident al concurrence of the canses. Itmay be done or not done for ouchi helenomes, and happen or noi hap- pen for ans determination he perceaveth; and that is my defi- nition. But that the indetermination can mahe it happen ex ro: happen, is absurd: for indetermination matethit equally eo happenor not to happen: and therefore both; mhich is a con- tradiction. Therefore indetermination doth nothins, and nhat soc ver canses do, is necessary.