 Compatibilism’s place in contemporary philosophy has developed in at least three stages. The first stage involves the classical form of compatibilism, which was developed in the modern era by the empiricists Hobbes and Hume, and reinvigorated in the early part of the twentieth century. The second stage involves three distinct contributions in the 1960s, contributions that challenged many of the dialectical presuppositions driving classical compatibilism. The third stage involves various contemporary forms of compatibilism, forms that diverge from the classical variety and that emerged out of, or resonate with, at least one of the three contributions found in the second transitional stage. This section is devoted to the first stage, that of classical compatibilism.