X. Philosophy of Freedom and Monism

Naive as well as metaphysical realism, in order to be consistent, must deny freedom for one and the same reason, since they regard man as being simply the agent or executor of principles which are forced upon him by necessity. Naive realism kills freedom through subjection to the authority either of a perceptible being or of an entity thought of as similar to a perceptible being, or else through submission to the authority of the abstract inner voice which is interpreted as “conscience;” the metaphysical realist, who merely infers something extra-human, cannot acknowledge freedom because he lets man be determined, mechanically or morally, by a “Being-in-itself.”