Note 208 — Chapter IV · THE PROBLEM OF MORAL FREEDOM

Then, are “animals” free? I see no reason to deny that, since their life, in as its degree, must have teleological continuity to be a life at all, they too must possess a rudimentary degree of freedom, though a degree not sufficient to fit them for a place as ἴσοι καὶ ὄμοιοι in human society, and therefore, for the special purposes of human ethical systems, negligible. Similarly, a human imbecile may possess a degree of freedom which is important for the educator who is interested in the “care of the feeble minded,” and yet may rightly be treated for the different purposes of a penal code as simply unfree.