  We can begin to get at the difficulty in Clarke's view of divine freedom by considering God's perfections and their implications for whether he can freely choose to do evil. Clarke readily sees that were a perfectly good, omniscient being to freely choose to do some evil deed, it would thereby cease to be perfectly good. And it would cease to be perfectly good even if, as could not happen in God's case, it were prevented from carrying out the evil deed it chose to do. For the free choice to do evil is itself inconsistent with continuing to be a perfectly good, omniscient being. A being who freely chooses to do what it knows to be an evil deed thereby ceases to be a perfectly good being. So, if God were to freely choose to do an evil deed, he would cease to be perfectly good. In short, it is not logically possible for God both to freely choose to do evil and to continue to be perfectly good. Now, since Clarke holds with Leibniz that God necessarily exists and necessarily is omnipotent, omniscient, and perfectly good, we can advance to the simpler conclusion that it is not logically possible for God to freely chose to do evil. It is not logically possible because it is inconsistent with what is logically necessary: the existence of a being (God) who is necessarily omnipotent, omniscient, and perfectly good.