 Part 4, Section 2 of the Freedom of the Will by Jonathan Edwards, this LibriVox recording is in the public domain. The falseness and inconsistence of that metaphysical notion of action and agency, which seems to be generally entertained by the defenders of the Armenian doctrine concerning liberty, moral, agency, etc. One thing that is made very much a ground of argument and supposed demonstration by Armenians in defense of the aforementioned principles concerning moral agency, virtue, vice, etc., is their metaphysical notion of agency and action. They say unless the soul has a self-determining power, it has no power of action. If its volitions be not caused by itself but are excited and determined by some extrinsic cause, they cannot be the soul's own acts, and that the soul cannot be acted but must be holy-passed in those effects of which it is the subject necessarily and not from its own free determination. Mr. Chubb lays the foundation of his scheme of liberty and of his arguments to support it very much in this position that man is an agent and capable of action, which doubtless is true, but self-determination belongs to his notion of action and is the very essence of it, whence he infers that it is impossible for a man to act and be acted upon in the same thing at the same time, and that no action can be the effect of the action of another, and he insists that a necessary agent or an agent that is necessarily determined to act is a plain contradiction, but those are a precarious sort of demonstrations which men build on the meaning that they arbitrarily affix to a word, especially when that meaning is abstruse, inconsistent, and entirely diverse from the original sense of the word in common speech, that the meaning of the word action, as Mr. Chubb and many others use it, is utterly unintelligible and inconsistent, is manifest because it belongs to their notion of an action that it is something wherein is no passion or passiveness, that is, according to their sense of passiveness, it is under the power, influence, or action of no cause, and this implies that action has no cause and is no effect, for to be an effect implies passiveness or the being subject to the power and action of its cause, and yet they hold that the mind's action is the effect of its own determination, yea, the mind's free and voluntary determination, which is the same with free choice, so that action is the effect of something preceding, even our preceding active choice, and consequently in this effect the mind is passive, subject to the power and action of the preceding cause, which is the foregoing choice and therefore cannot be active, so that here we have this contradiction that action is always the effect of foregoing choice and therefore cannot be action, because it is passive to the power of that preceding causal choice, and the mind cannot be active and passive in the same thing at the same time, again they say necessity is utterly inconsistent with action and a necessary action is a contradiction, and so their notion of action implies contingence and excludes all necessity, and therefore their notion of action implies that it has no necessary dependence on or connection with anything foregoing, for such a dependence or connection excludes contingence and implies necessity, and yet their notion of action implies necessity and supposes that it is necessary and cannot be contingent, for they suppose that whatever is properly called action must be determined by the will and free choice, and this is as much as to say that it must be necessary being dependent upon and determined by something foregoing, namely a foregoing act of choice. Again it belongs to their notion of action that it is the beginning of motion or of exertion of power, but yet it is implied in their notion of action that it is not the beginning of motion or exertion of power, but is consequent and dependent on a preceding exertion of power, these the power of will and choice, for they say there is no proper action for what is freely chosen or which is the same thing determined by a foregoing act of free choice, but if any of them shall see cause to deny this and say they hold no such thing as that every action is chosen or determined by a foregoing choice, but that the very first exertion of will only undetermined by any preceding act is properly called action, then I say such a man's notion of action implies necessity, for what the mind is the subject of without the determination of its own previous choice it is the subject of necessarily as to any hand that free choice has in the affair, and without any ability the mind has to prevent it by any will or election of its own because by the supposition it precludes all previous acts of the will or choice in the case which might prevent it, so that it is again in this other way implied in their notion of act that it is both necessary and not necessary, again it belongs to their notion of an act that it is no effect of a predetermining bias or preponderation, but springs immediately out of indifference, and this implies that it cannot be from foregoing choice which is foregoing preponderation, if it be not habitual but occasional yet if it causes the act it is truly previous, efficacious, and determining, and yet at the same time it is a central to their notion of the act that it is what the agent is the author freely and voluntarily, and that is by previous choice and design, so that according to their notion of the act considered with regard to its consequences these following things are all essential to it, these that it should be necessary and not necessary, that it should be from a cause and no cause, that it should be the fruit of choice and design, and not the fruit of choice and design, that it should be the beginning of motion or exertion, and yet consequent on previous exertion, that it should be before it is, that it should spring immediately out of indifference and equilibrium, and yet be the effect of preponderation, that it should be self-originated and also have its original from something else, that it is what the mind causes itself of its own will and can produce or prevent according to its choice or pleasure, and yet what the mind has no power to prevent precluding all previous choice in the affair, so that an act according to their metaphysical notion of it is something of which there is no idea, it is nothing but a confusion of the mind, excited by words without any distinct meaning, and is an absolute non-entity, and that into respects. One, there is nothing in the world that ever was is or can be to answer the things which must belong to its description according to what they supposed to be essential to it, and two, there neither is nor ever was nor can be any notion or idea to answer the word as they use and explain it, for if we should suppose any such notion it would many ways destroy itself, but it is impossible any idea or notion should subsist in the mind whose very nature and essence which constitutes it destroys it. If some learned philosopher who had been abroad in giving an account of the curious observations he had made in his travels should say he had been in Terra del Fuego and there had seen an animal which he calls by a certain name that begat and brought forth itself and yet had a sire and dam distinct from itself that it had an appetite and was hungry before it had a being, that his master who led him and governed him at his pleasure was always governed by him and driven by him, where he pleased that when he moved he always took a step before the first step, that he went with his head first and yet always went tail foremost and this though he had neither head nor tail it would be no impudence at all to tell such a traveler the well-earned man that he himself had no idea of such an animal as he gave an account of and never had nor ever would have as the aforementioned notion of action is very inconsistent so it is wholly diverse from the original meaning of the word the more usual signification of it in vulgar speech seems to be some motion or exertion of power that is voluntary or that is the effect of the will and is used in the same sense as doing and most commonly it is used to signify outward actions so thinking is often distinguished from acting and desiring and willing from doing besides this more usual and proper signification of the word action there are other ways in which the word is used that are less proper which yet have place in common speech oftentimes it is used to signify some motion or alteration in inanimate things with relation to some object and effect so the spring of a watch is said to act upon the chain and wheels the sunbeams to act upon plants and trees and the fire to act upon wood sometimes the word is used to signify motions alterations and exertions of power which are seen in corporeal things considered absolutely especially when these motions seem to arise from some internal cause which is hidden so that they have a greater resemblance of those motions of our bodies which are the effects of natural volition or invisible exertions of will so the fermentation of liquor the operations of the lone stone and of electrical bodies are called the action of these things and sometimes the word action is used to signify the exercise of thought or of will and inclination so meditating loving hating inclining disinclining choosing and refusing maybe sometimes called acting though more rarely unless it be by philosophers and metaphysicians than in any of the other senses but the word is never used in vulgar speech for the self-determinate exercise of the will or an exertion of the soul that arises without any necessary connection with anything foregoing if a man does something voluntarily or as the effective is choice then in the most proper sense and as the word is most originally and commonly used he is said to act but whether that choice or volition be self-determined or no whether it be connected with a foregoing habitual bias whether it be the certain effect of the strongest motive or some intrinsic cause never comes into consideration in the meaning of the word and if the word action is arbitrarily used by some men otherwise to suit some scheme of metaphysics or morality no argument can reasonably be founded on such and use of this term to prove anything but their own pleasure for divines and philosophers strenuously to urge such arguments as though they were sufficient to support and demonstrate a whole scheme of moral philosophy and divinity is certainly to erect a mighty edifice on the sand or rather on a shadow and though it may now perhaps through custom have become natural for them to use the word in the sense if that may be called a sense or meaning which is inconsistent with itself yet this does not prove that it is agreeable to the natural notions men have of things or that there can be anything in the creation that should answer such a meaning and though they appeal to experience yet the truth is that men are so far from experiencing any such thing that it is impossible for them to have any conception of it if it should be objected that action and passion are doubtless words of our contrary signification but to suppose that the agent in its action is under the power and influence of something intrinsic is to confound action and passion and make them the same thing I answer that action and passion are doubtless as they are sometimes used words of opposite signification but not as signifying opposite existences but only opposite relations the words cause and effect are terms of opposite signification but nevertheless if I assert that the same thing may at the same time in different respects and relations be both cause and effect this will not prove that I confound the terms the soul may be both active and passive in the same thing in different respects active with relation to one thing and passive with relation to another the word passion when set in opposition to action or rather activeness is merely a relative it signifies no effect or cause nor any proper existence but is the same with passiveness or being passive or being acted upon by something which is a mere relation of a thing to some power or force exerted by some cause producing some effect in it or upon it and action when set properly in opposition to passion or passiveness is no real existence it is not the same with an action but is a mere relation it is the activeness of something on another thing being the opposite relation to the other these a relation of power or force exerted by some cause towards another thing which is the subject of the effect of that power indeed the word action is frequently used to signify something not merely relative but more absolute and a real existence as when we say an action when the word is not used transitively but absolutely for some motion or exercise of body or mind without any relation to any object or effect and as used thus it is not properly the opposite of passion which ordinarily signifies nothing absolute but merely the relation of being acted upon and therefore if the word action be used in the like relative sense then action and passion are only two contrary relations and it is no absurdity to suppose that contrary relations may belong to the same thing at the same time with respect to different things so to suppose that there are acts of the soul by which a man voluntarily moves and acts upon objects and produces effects which yet themselves are effects of something else and we're in the soul itself is the object of something acting upon and influencing that do not at all confound action and passion the words may nevertheless be properly of opposite signification there may be as true and real a difference between acting and being cause to act though we should suppose the soul to be both in the same volition as there is between living and being quickened or made to live it is no more a contradiction to suppose that action may be the effect of some other cause besides the agent or being that acts than to suppose that life may be the effect of some other cause besides the being that lives what has led men into this inconsistent notion of action when applied to volition as though it were essential to this internal action that the agent should be self determined in it and that the will should be the cause of it was probably this that according to the sense of mankind and the common use of language it is so with respect to men's external actions which originally and according to the vulgar use and most proper sense of the word are called actions men and these are self-directed self-determined and their wills are the cause of the motions of their bodies and external things done so that unless men do them voluntarily and of choice and the action be determined by their antecedent volition it is no action or doing of theirs hence some metaphysicians have been led unwarily but exceeding absurdly to suppose the same concerning volition itself that that also must be determined by the will which is to be determined by antecedent volition as the motion of the body is not considering the contradiction it implies but it is very evident that in that metaphysical distinction between action and passion though long since become common and in general vote due care has not been taken to conform language to the nature of things or to any distinct clear ideas as it is in innumerable other philosophical metaphysical terms used in these disputes which has occasioned inexpressible difficulty contention error and confusion and thus probably came to be thought that necessity was inconsistent with action as these terms are applied to volition first these terms action and necessity are changed from their original meaning as signifying external voluntary action and constraint in which meaning they are evidently inconsistent to signify quite other things these volition itself and certainty of existence and when the change of signification is made care is not taken to make proper allowances and abatements for the difference of sense but still the same things are unwarily attributed to action and necessity in the new meaning of the words which plainly belong to them in their first sense and on this ground maxims are established without any real foundation as though they were the most certain truths and the most evident dictates of reason but however strenuously it is maintained that what is necessary cannot be properly called action and that a necessary action is a contradiction yet it is probable there are few Armenian divines who thoroughly tried would stand to these principles they will allow that God is in the highest sense an active being and the highest fountain of life and action and they would not probably deny that what are called God's acts of righteousness holiness and faithfulness are truly and properly God's acts and God is really a holy agent in them and yet I trust they will not deny that God necessarily acts justly and faithfully and that it is impossible for him to act unrighteously and unholy in the part four section two part four section three of the freedom of the will by Jonathan Edwards this LibriVox recording is in the public domain the reasons why some think it contrary to common sense to suppose those things which are necessary to be worthy of either praise or blame it is abundantly affirmed and urged by Armenian writers that it is contrary to common sense and the natural notions and apprehensions of mankind to suppose otherwise than that necessity making no distinction between natural and moral necessity is inconsistent with virtue and vice praise and blame reward and punishment and their arguments from hence have been greatly triumphed in and have been not a little perplexing to many who have been friendly to the truth as clearly revealed in the holy scriptures it has seemed to them indeed difficult to reconcile Calvinistic doctrines with the notions men commonly have of justice and equity the true reasons of it seem to be the following one it is indeed a very plain dictate of common sense that natural necessity is wholly inconsistent with just praise or blame if men do things which in themselves are very good fit to be brought to pass and attended with very happy effects properly against their wills or do them from a necessity that is without their wills or with which their wills have no concern or connection then it is a plain dictate of common sense that such doings are none of their virtue nor have they any moral good in them and that the persons are not worthy to be rewarded or praised or at all esteemed honored or loved on that account and on the other hand that if from like necessity they do those things which in themselves are very unhappy and pernicious and do them because they cannot help it the necessity is such that it is all one whether they will them or no and the reason why they are done is from necessity only and not from their wills it is a very plain dictate of common sense that they are not at all to blame there is no vice fault or moral evil at all in the effect done nor are they who are thus necessitated in any wise worthy to be punished hated or in the least disrespected on that account in like manner if things in themselves good and desirable are absolutely impossible with a natural impossibility the universal reason of mankind teaches that this wholly imperfectly excuses persons and they're not doing them and it is also a plain dictate of common sense that if doing things in themselves good or avoiding things in themselves evil is not absolutely impossible with such a natural impossibility but very difficult with a natural difficulty that is a difficulty prior to and not at all consisting in will and inclination itself and which would remain the same that the inclination be what it will then a person's neglect or omission is excused in some measure though not holy his sin is less aggravated than if the thing to be done were easy and if instead of difficulty and hindrance there be a contrary natural propensity in the state of things to the thing to be done or effect to be brought to pass abstracted from any consideration of the inclination of the heart though the propensity be not so great as to amount to natural necessity yet being some approach to it so that the doing of the good thing be very much from this natural tendency in the state of things and but little from a good inclination then it is a dictate of common sense that there is so much the less virtue in what is done and so it is less praiseworthy and rewardable the reason is easy bees because such a natural propensity or tendency is an approach to natural necessity and the greater the propensity still so much the nearer is the approach to necessity and therefore as natural necessity takes away or shuts out all virtue so this propensity approaches to an abolition of virtue that is it diminishes it and on the other hand natural difficulty in the state of things is an approach to natural impossibility and as the latter when it is complete and absolute holy takes away blame so much difficulty takes away some blame or diminishes blame and makes the thing done to be less worthy of punishment to men in their first use of such phrases as these must cannot cannot help it cannot avoid it necessary unable impossible unavoidable irresistible etc use them to signify a necessity of constraint or restraint a natural necessity or impossibility or some necessity that the will has nothing to do in which may be whether men will or no and which may be supposed to be just the same let men's inclinations and desires be what they will such kind of terms in their original use I suppose among all nations are relative caring in their signification as was before observed a reference or respect to some contrary will desire or endeavor which it is supposed is or it may be in the case all men find and begin to find in early childhood that there are innumerable things that cannot be done which they desire to do and innumerable things which they are a verse to that must be they cannot avoid them they will be whether they choose them or no it is to express this necessity which men so soon and so often find in which so greatly and early affects them in innumerable cases that such terms and phrases are first formed and it is to signify such a necessity that they are first used and that they are most constantly used in the common affairs of life and not to signify any such metaphysical speculative and abstract notion as that connection in the natural course of things which is between the subject and predicative of a proposition and which is the foundation of the certain truth of that proposition to signify which they who employed themselves in philosophical inquiries into the first origin and metaphysical relations and dependencies of things have borrowed these terms for want of others but we grow up from our cradles in the use of terms and phrases entirely different from this and carrying a sense of exceeding diverse from that in which they are commonly used in the controversy between Armenians and Calvinists and it being as was said before a dictate of the universal sense of mankind evident to us as soon as we begin to think that the necessity signified by these terms in the sense in which we first learn them does excuse persons and free them from all fault or blame hence our ideas of excusableness or faultlessness is tied to these terms and phrases by a strong habit which is begun in childhood as soon as we begin to speak and grows up with us and is strengthened by constant use and custom the connection growing stronger and stronger the habitual connection which is in men's minds between blamelessness and those four mentioned terms must cannot enable necessary impossible unavoidable etc becomes very strong because as soon as ever men begin to use reason and speech they have occasion to excuse themselves from the natural necessity signified by these terms in numerous instances I cannot do it I could not help it and all mankind have constant and daily occasion to use such phrases in this sense to excuse themselves and others in almost all the concerns of life with respect to disappointments and things that happen which concern and affect ourselves and others that are hurtful or disagreeable to us or them or things desirable that we or others fail to obtain that are being accustomed to and union of different ideas from early childhood makes the habitual connection exceeding strong as though such connection we're owing to nature is manifest in innumerable instances it is altogether by such an habitual connection of ideas that men judge of the bigness or distance of the objects of sight from their appearance thus it is owing to such a connection early established and growing up with a person that he judges a mountain which he sees at 10 miles distance to be bigger than his nose or further off than the end of it having been used so long to join a considerable distance and magnitude with such an appearance men imagine it is by a dictate of natural sense whereas it would be quite otherwise with one that had his eyes newly opened who had been born blind he would have the same visible appearance but natural sense would dictate no such thing concerning the magnitude or distance of what appeared three when men after they have been so habituated to connect ideas of innocencey or blamelessness with such terms that the union seems to be the effective mere nature come to hear the same terms used and learn to use them in the aforementioned new and metaphysical sense to signify quite another sort of necessity which has no such kind of relation to a contrary supposable will and endeavor the notion of plain and manifest blamelessness by this means is by a strong prejudice insensibly and unwarily transferred to a case to which it by no means belongs the change of the use of the terms to a signification which is very diverse not being taken notice of or averted to and there are several reasons why it is not one the terms as used by philosophers are not very distinct and clear in their meaning few use them in a fixed determinant sense on the contrary their meaning is very vague and confused which commonly happens to the words used to signify things intellectual and moral and to express what Mr. Locke calls mixed modes if men had a clear and distinct understanding of what is intended by these metaphysical terms they would be able more easily to compare them with their original and common sense and so would not be easily led into delusion by words of this sort to the change of the signification of terms is the more insensible because the things signified though indeed very different yet due in some generals agree in necessity that which is vulgarly so-called there is a strong connection between the things said to be necessary and something antecedent to it in the order of nature so there is also a philosophical necessity and though in both kinds of necessity the connection cannot be called by that name with relation to an opposite will or endeavor to which it is superior which is the case in vulgar necessity yet in both the connection is prior to will and endeavor and so in some respects superior in both kinds of necessity there is a foundation for some certainty of the proposition that affirms the event the terms used being the same and the things signified agreeing in these and some other general circumstances and the expressions as used by philosophers being not well-defined and so of obscure and loose signification hence persons are not aware of the great difference the notions of innocence or faultiness which were so strongly associated with them and were strictly united in their minds ever since they can remember remain united with them still as if the union were altogether natural and necessary and they that go about to make a separation seem to them to do great violence even to nature itself for another reason why it appears difficult to reconcile it with reason that men should be blamed for that which is necessary without moral necessity which as was observed before is a species of philosophical necessity is that for want of due consideration men inwardly entertain that apprehension that this necessity may be against men's wills and sincere endeavors they go away with that notion that men may truly will and wish and strive that it may be otherwise but that invincible necessity stands in the way and many think thus concerning themselves some wicked men think they wish that they were good and that they love god and holiness but yet do not find that their wishes produce the effect the reasons why men think thus are as follows when they find what may be called an indirect willingness to have a better will in the manner before observed for it is impossible and a contradiction to suppose the will to be directly and properly against itself and they do not consider that this indirect willingness is entirely a different thing from properly willing what is the duty and virtue required and that there is no virtue in that sort of willingness which they have they do not consider that the volitions which a wicked man may have that he loved god are no acts of the will at all against the moral evil of not loving god but only some disagreeable consequences but the making of the requisite distinction requires more care of reflection and thought than most men are used to and men through a prejudice in their own favor are disposed to think well of their own desires and dispositions and to account them good and virtuous though their respect to virtue be only indirect and remote and it is nothing at all virtuous that truly excites or terminates their inclinations to another thing that insensibly leads and begasmen into a supposition that this moral necessity or impossibility is or maybe against men's wills and true endeavors is the derivation of the terms often used to express it such words for instance as unable unavoidable impossible irresistible which carry a plain reference to a supposable power exerted endeavors used resistance made in opposition to the necessity and the persons that hear them not considering nor suspecting but that they are used in their proper sense that sense being therefore understood there does naturally and as it were necessarily arise in their minds a supposition that it may be so indeed that true desires and endeavors may take place but that invincible necessity stands in the way and renders them vain and to no effect five another thing which makes persons more ready to suppose it to be contrary to reason that men should be exposed to the punishments threatened to sin for doing those things which are morally necessary or not doing those things which are morally impossible is that imagination strengthens the argument and adds greatly to the power and influence of the seeming reasons against it from the greatness of that punishment to allow that they may be justly exposed to a small punishment would not be so difficult whereas if there were any good reason in the case if it were truly a dictative reason that such necessity was inconsistent with faultiness or just punishment the demonstration would be equally certain with respect to a small punishment or any punishment at all as a very great one but it is not equally easy to the imagination they that argue against the justice of damning men for those things that are thus necessary seem to make their argument the stronger by setting forth the greatness of the punishment in strong expressions that a man should be cast into eternal burnings that he should be made to fry and hell through all eternity for those things which he had no power to avoid and was under a fatal unfrustrable invincible necessity of doing etc in the part four section three part four section four of the freedom of the will by jonathan edwards this lieber vox recording is in the public domain it is agreeable to common sense and the natural notions of mankind to suppose moral necessity to be consistent with praise and blame reward and punishment whether the reasons that have been given why it appears difficult to some persons to reconcile with common sense the praising or blaming rewarding or punishing those things which are morally necessary our thought satisfactory or not yet it most evidently appears by the following things that if this matter be rightly understood setting aside all delusion arising from the impropriety and ambiguity of terms this is not at all inconsistent with the natural apprehensions of mankind and that sense of things which is found everywhere in the common people who are furthest from having their thoughts perverted from their natural channel by metaphysical and philosophical subtleties but on the contrary altogether agreeable to and the very voiced and dictated of this natural and vulgar sense one this will appear if we consider what the vulgar notion of blame worthiness is the idea which the common people through all ages and nations have a fault in this I suppose to be plainly this a person being or doing wrong with his own will and pleasure containing these two things one is doing wrong when he does as he pleases to his pleasure being wrong or in other words perhaps more intelligibly expressing their notion a person having his heart wrong and doing wrong from his heart and this is the sum total of the matter the common people do not ascend up in their reflections and abstractions to the metaphysical sources relations and dependencies of things in order to form their notion of faultiness or blame worthiness they do not wait till they have decided by their refinings what first determines the will whether be determined by something extrinsic or intrinsic whether volition determines volition or whether the understanding determines the will whether there be any such thing as metaphysicians mean by contingents if they have any meaning whether there be a sort of a strange unaccountable sovereignty in the will in the exercise of which by its own sovereign acts it brings to pass all its own sovereign acts they do not take any part of their notion of fault or blame from the resolution of any such questions if this were the case there are multitudes yea the far greater part of mankind 999 out of a thousand would live and die without having any such notion as that of fault ever entering into their heads or without so much as once having any conception that anybody was to be either blamed or commended for anything if this were the case it would be a long time before men came to have such notions whereas it is manifest they are in fact some of the first notions that appear in children who discover as soon as they can think or speak or act at all as rational creatures has sense of dessert and certainly informing their notion of it they make no use of metaphysics all the ground they go upon consists in these two things experience and a natural sensation of a certain fitness or agreeableness which there is in uniting such moral evil as is above described these are being or doing wrong with the will and resentment in others and pain inflicted on the person in whom this moral evil is which natural sense is what we call by the name of conscience it is true the common people and children in their notion of any faulty act or deed of any person do suppose that it is the person's own act and deed but this is all that belongs to what they understand by a thing being a person's own deed or action even that it is something done by him of choice that some exercise or motion should begin of itself does not belong to their notion of an action or doing if so we would belong to their notion of it that it is the cause of its own beginning and that is as much as to say that it is before it begins to be nor is there a notion of an action some motion or exercise that begins accidentally without any cause or reason for that is contrary to one of the prime dictates of common sense namely that everything that begins to be has some cause or reason why it is the common people in their notion of a faulty or praiseworthy work done by anyone do suppose that the man does it in the exercise of liberty but then their notion of liberty is only a person having opportunity of doing as he pleases they have no notion of liberty consisting in the will first acting and so causing its own acts determining and so causing its own determinations or choosing and so causing its own choice such a notion of liberty is what none have for those that have darkened their own minds with confused metaphysical speculation and abstruse and ambiguous terms if a man is not restrained from acting as his will determines or constrained to act otherwise then he has liberty according to common notions of liberty without taking into the idea that grand contradiction of all the determinations of a man's free will being the effects of the determinations of his free will nor have men commonly any notion of freedom consisting in indifference for if so then it would be agreeable to their notion that the greater indifference men act with the more freedom they act with whereas the reverse is true he that in acting proceeds with the fullest inclination does what he does with the greatest freedom according to common sense and so far is it from being agreeable to common sense that such liberty as consists in indifference is requisite to praise or blame that on the contrary the dictate of every man's natural sense through the world is that the further he is from being indifferent in his acting good or evil and the more he does either with full and strong inclination the more is he esteemed or abhorred commended or condemned to if it were inconsistent with the common sense of mankind that men should be either blamed or commended in any volitions in case of moral necessity or impossibility then it would surely also be agreeable to the same sense and reason of mankind that the nearer the case approaches to such a moral necessity or impossibility either through a strong antecedent moral propensity on the one hand or a great antecedent opposition and difficulty on the other the nearer does it approach to a person being neither blamable nor commendable so that acts exerted with such preceding propensity would be worthy of proportionably less praise and when omitted the act being attended with such difficulty the omission would be worthy of the less blame it is so as was observed before with natural necessity and impossibility propensity and difficulty as it is a plain dictate of the sense of all mankind that natural necessity and impossibility take away all blame and praise and therefore that the nearer the approach is to these through previous propensity or difficulty so praise and blame are proportionably diminished and if it were as much a dictate of common sense that moral necessity of doing or impossibility of avoiding takes away all praise and blame as that natural necessity or impossibility does then by a perfect parity of reason it would be as much the dictate of common sense that an approach of moral necessity of doing or impossibility of avoiding diminishes praise and blame as that an approach to natural necessity and impossibility does so it is equally the voice of common sense that persons are excusable in part in neglecting things difficult against their wills as that they are excusable wholly in neglecting things impossible against their wills and if it made no difference whether the impossibility were natural and against the will or moral lying in the will with regard to excusableness so neither would it make any difference whether the difficulty or approach to necessity be natural against the will or moral lying in the propensity of the will but it is apparent that the reverse of these things is true if there be an approach to a moral necessity in a man's exertion of good acts of will they being the exercise of a strong propensity to good and a very powerful love to virtue it is so far from being the dictate of common sense that he is less virtuous and the less to be esteemed loved and praised that it is agreeable to the natural notions of all mankind that he is so much the better man worthy of greater respect and higher commendation and the stronger the inclination is and the nearer it approaches to necessity in that respect or to impossibility of neglecting the virtuous actor of doing a vicious one still the more virtuous and worthy of higher commendation and on the other hand if a man exerts evil acts of mine as for instance acts of pride or malice from a rooted and strong habit or principle of haughtiness and maliciousness and a violent propensity of heart to such acts according to the natural sense of men he is so far from being the less hateful and blameable on that account that he is so much the more worthy to be detested and condemned by all that observe him moreover it is manifest that it is no part of the notion which mankind commonly have of a blamable or praiseworthy act of the will that it is an act which is not determined by an antecedent bias or motives but by the sovereign power of the will itself because if so the greater hand such causes had in determining any acts of the will so much the less virtuous or vicious would they be accounted and the less hand the more virtuous or vicious whereas the reverse is true men do not think a good act to be the less praiseworthy for the agent being much determined in it by a good inclination or a good motive but the more and if good inclination or motive has but little influence in determining the agent they do not think his acts so much the more virtuous but the less and so concerning evil acts which are determined by evil motives or inclinations yet if it be supposed that good or evil dispositions are implanted in the hearts of men by nature itself which it is certain is vulgarly supposed in innumerable cases yet it is not commonly supposed that men are worthy of no praise or dispraise for such dispositions although what is natural is undoubtedly necessary nature being prior to all acts of the will whatsoever thus for instance if a man appears to be of a very haughty or malicious disposition and is supposed to be so by his natural temper it is no vulgar notion no dictate of the common sense and that prehension of men that such dispositions are no vices or moral evils or that such persons are not worthy of disesteem or odium and dishonor or that the proud or malicious acts which flow from such natural dispositions are worthy of no resentment yay such vile natural dispositions and the strength of them will commonly be mentioned rather as an aggravation of the wicked acts that come from such a fountain than an extenuation of them it being natural for men to act thus is often observed by men in the height of their indignation they will say it is his very nature he is of a vile natural temper it is as natural for him to act so as it is to breathe he cannot help serving the devil etc but it is not thus with regard to hurtful mischievous things that any are the subjects or occasions of by natural necessity against their inclinations in such a case the necessity by the common voice of mankind will be spoken of as a full excuse thus it is very plain that common sense makes a vast difference between these two kinds of necessity as to the judgment it makes of their influence on the moral quality and dessert of men's actions and these dictates are so natural and necessary that it may be very much doubted whether the armenians themselves have ever got rid of them yay their greatest doctors that have gone furthest in defense of their metaphysical notions of liberty and have brought their arguments to their greatest strength and as they supposed to a demonstration against the consistency of virtue and vice with any necessity it is to be questioned whether there is so much as one of them but that if he suffered very much from the injurious acts of a man under the power of an invincible heartiness and malignancy of temper would not from the fore mention natural sense of mind resented for otherwise than if as great sufferings came upon him from the wind that blows in the fire that burns by natural necessity and otherwise than he would if he suffered as much from the conduct of a man perfectly delirious yet though he first brought his distraction upon him some way by his own fault some seem to disdain the distinction that we make between natural and moral necessity as though it were altogether importment in this controversy that which is necessary say they is necessary it is that which must be and cannot be prevented and that which is impossible is impossible and cannot be done and therefore none can be to blame for not doing it and such comparisons are made use of as the commanding of a man to walk who has lost his legs and condemning him and punishing him for not obeying inviting and calling upon a man who has shut up in a strong prison to come forth etc but in these things our minions are very unreasonable let common sense determine whether there be not a great difference between these two cases the one that of a man who has offended his prince and has cast into prison and after he has lain there a while the king comes to him calls him to come forth and tells him that if he will do so and will fall down before him and humbly beg his pardon he shall be forgiven and set at liberty and also be greatly enriched in advance to honor the prisoner hardly repents of the folly and wickedness of his offense against his prince is thoroughly disposed to base himself and accept of the king's offer but is confined by strong walls with gates of brass and bars of iron the other case is that of a man who is of a very unreasonable spirit of a haughty ungrateful willful disposition and moreover has been brought up in traitorous principles and has his heart possessed with an extreme and in better enmity to his lawful sovereign and for his rebellion is cast into prison and lies long there loaded with heavy chains and in miserable circumstances at length the compassionate prince comes to the prison orders his chains to be knocked off and his prison doors to be set wide open calls to him and tells him if he will come forth to him and fall down before him acknowledge that he has treated him unworthily and ask his forgiveness he shall be forgiven set at liberty and set in a place of great dignity and profit in his court but he is so stout and full of haughty malignity that he cannot be willing to accept the offer his rooted strong pride and malice have perfect power over him and as it were bind him by binding his heart the opposition of his heart has the mastery over him having an influence on his mind far superior to the king's grace and condescension and to all his kind offers and promises now is it agreeable to common sense to assert and stand to it that there is no difference between these two cases as to any worthiness of blame in the prisoners because for suit there is a necessity in both and the required act in each case is impossible it is true a man's evil dispositions may be as strong and immovable as the bars of a castle but who cannot see that when a man in the latter case is said to be unable to obey the command the expression is used improperly and not in the sense it has originally and in common speech and that it may properly be said to be in the rebel's power to come out of prison seeing he can easily do it if he pleases though by reason of his vile temper of heart which is fixed and rooted it is impossible that it should please him upon the whole I presume there is no person of good understanding who impartially considers these things but will allow that it is not evident from the dictates of common sense or natural notions that moral necessity is inconsistent with praise and blame and therefore if the Armenians would prove any such inconsistency it must be by some philosophical and metaphysical arguments and not common sense there is a grand illusion in the pretended demonstration of Armenians from common sense the main strength of all these demonstrations lies in that prejudice that arises through the insensible change of the use and meaning of such terms as liberty able unable necessary impossible unavoidable invincible action etc from their original and vulgar sense to a metaphysical sense entirely diverse and the strong connection of the ideas of blamelessness etc with some of these terms by habit contracted and established while these terms were used in their first meaning this prejudice and delusion is the foundation of all those positions they lay down as maxims but which most of the scriptures they allege in this controversy are interpreted and on which all their pompous demonstrations from scripture and reason depend from this secret delusion and prejudice they have almost all their advantages it is the strength of their bulwarks and the edge of their weapons and this is the main ground of all the right they have to treat their neighbors in so assuming a manner and to insult others perhaps as wise and good as themselves as weak bigots men that dwell in the dark caves of superstition perversely set obstinately shutting their eyes against the noonday light enemies to common sense maintaining the first born of absurdities etc etc but perhaps an impartial consideration of the things which have been observed in the preceding parts of this inquiry may enable the lovers of truth better to judge whose doctrine is indeed absurd abstruse self-contradictory and inconsistent with common sense in many ways repugnant to the universal dictates of the reason of mankind corollary from the things which have been observed it will follow that it is agreeable to common sense to suppose that the glorified saints have not their freedom at all diminished in any respect and that God himself has the highest possible freedom according to the true and proper meaning of the term and that he is in the highest possible respect an agent and active in the exercise of his infinite holiness though he acts therein in the highest degree necessarily and his actions of this kind are in the highest most absolutely perfect manner virtuous and praise worthy and are so for that very reason because they are most perfectly necessary end of part four section four part four section five of the freedom of the will by Jonathan Edwards this lever box recording is in the public domain objections that the scheme of necessity renders all means and endeavors for avoiding sin or obtaining virtue and holiness vain and to no purpose and that it makes men no more than mere machines in affairs of morality and religion answer Armenians say if sin and virtue come to pass by a necessity consisting in a sure connection of causes and effects antecedents and consequence it can never be worthwhile to use any means or endeavors to obtain the one and avoid the other seeing no endeavors can alter the futurity of the event which has become necessary by a connection already established but I desire that this matter may be fully considered and that it may be examined with a thorough strictness whether it will follow that endeavors of means in order to avoid or obtain any future thing must be more in vain on the supposition of such a connection of antecedents and consequence than if the contrary be supposed for endeavors to be in vain is for them not to be successful that is to say for them not eventually to be the means of the thing aimed at which cannot be but in one of these two ways either first that although the means are used yet the event aimed at does not follow or secondly the event does follow it is not because of the means or from any connection or dependence of the event on the means the event would have come to pass as well without the means as with them if either of these two things are the case then the means are not properly successful and are truly in vain the success or non-success of means in order to an effect or their being in vain or not in vain consists in those means being connected or not connected with the effect in such a manner as this these that the effect is with the means and not without them or that the being of the effect is on the one hand connected with means and the want of the effect on the other hand is connected with the want of the means if there be such a connection has this between means and end. The means are not in vain. The more there is of such a connection, the further they are from being in vain. And the less of such a connection, the more they are in vain. Now therefore the question to be answered in order to determine whether it follows from this doctrine of the necessary connection between foregoing things and consequent ones that means used in order to any effect are more in vain than they would be otherwise is whether it follows from it that there is less of the forementioned connection between means and effect. That is whether on the supposition of there being a real and true connection between antecedent things and consequent ones there must be less of a connection between means and effect than on the supposition of there being no fixed connection between antecedent things and consequent ones. And the very stating of this question is sufficient to answer it. It must appear to everyone that will open his eyes that this question cannot be affirmed without the grossest absurdity and inconsistence. Means are foregoing things and effects are following things. And if there were no connection between foregoing things and following ones there could be no connection between means and end. And so all means would be holy vain and fruitless for it is only by virtue of some connection that they become successful. It is some connection observed or revealed or otherwise known between antecedent things and following ones that directs in the choice of means. And if there were no such thing as an established connection there could be no choice as to means. One thing would have no more tendency to and effect than another. There would be no such thing as tendency in the case. All those things which are successful means of other things do therein prove connected antecedents of them. And therefore to assert that a fixed connection between antecedents and consequence makes means vain and useless or stands in the way to hinder the connection between means and end is just so ridiculous as to say that a connection between antecedents and consequence stands in the way to hinder a connection between antecedents and consequence. Nor can any supposed connection of the succession or train of antecedents and consequence from the very beginning of all things, the connection being made already sure and necessary either by established laws of nature or by these together with the decree of sovereign immediate interpositions of divine power on such and such occasions or any other way if any other there be. I say no such necessary connection of a series of antecedents and consequence can in the least tend to hinder but that the means we use may belong to the series. And so maybe some of those antecedents which are connected with the consequence we aim at in the established course of things. Endeavors which we use are things that exist and therefore they belong to the general chain of events all the parts of which chain are supposed to be connected and so endeavors are supposed to be connected with some effects or some consequent things or other and certainly this does not hinder but that the events they are connected with maybe those which we aim at and which we choose because we judge them most likely to have a connection with those events from the established order and course of things which we observe or from something in divine revelation. Let us suppose a real and sure connection between a man having his eyes open in the clear daylight with good organs of sight and seeing so that seeing is connected with his opening his eyes and not seeing with his not opening his eyes and also the light connection between such a man attempting to open his eyes and his actually doing it. The supposed established connection between these antecedents and consequence that the connection be never so sure and necessary certainly does not prove that it is in vain for a man in sub circumstances to attempt to open his eyes in order to seeing is aiming at that event and the use of the means being the effective as well does not break the connection or hinder their success so that the objection we are upon does not lie against the doctrine of the necessity of events by a certainty of connection and consequence on the contrary it is truly forcible against the Armenian doctrine of contingence and self-determination which is inconsistent with such a connection where there be no connection between those events wherein virtue and vice consist than anything antecedent then there is no connection between these events and any means or endeavors used in order to them and if so then those means must be in vain the less there is a connection between foregoing things and following ones so much the less there is between means and endeavors and success and then the same proportion are means and endeavors ineffectual and in vain it will follow from Armenian principles that there is no degree of connection between virtue or vice and any foregoing event or thing or in other words that the determination of the existence of virtue or vice does not in the least depend on the influence of anything that comes to pass and to seededly as its cause means or ground because so far as it is so it is not from self-determination and therefore so far there is nothing of the nature of virtue or vice and so it follows that virtue and vice are not at all in any degree dependent upon or connected with as any foregoing event or existence its cause ground or means and if so then all foregoing means must be totally in vain hence it follows that there cannot in any consistency with the Armenian scheme be any reasonable ground of so much as a conjecture concerning the consequence of any means and endeavors in order to escaping vice or obtaining virtue or any choice or preference of means as having a greater probability of success by some than others either from any natural connection or dependence of the end on the means or through any divine constitution or revealed way of God bestowing or bringing to pass these things in consequence of any means endeavors prayers or deeds conjectures in this matter case depend on a supposition that God himself is the giver or determining cause of the events sought but if they depend on self-determination and God is not the determining or disposing author of them into these things are not of his disposal then no conjecture can be made from any revelation he has given concerning any method of his disposal of them on these principles it will not only follow that men cannot have any reasonable ground of judgment or conjecture that their means and endeavors to obtain virtue or avoid vice will be successful but they may be sure they will not they may be certain that they will be in vain and that if ever the thing which they seek comes to pass it will not be at all owing to the means they use for means and endeavors can have no effect at all in order to obtain the end but in one of these two ways either one through a natural tendency and influence to prepare and dispose the mind more to virtuous acts either by causing the disposition of the heart to be more in favor of such acts or by bringing the mind more into the view of powerful motives and inducements or to by putting persons more in the way of God's bestowment of the benefit but neither of these can be the case not the latter for as has been just now observed it does not consist with the Armenian notion of self-determination which they suppose essential to virtue that God should be the bestower or which is the same thing the determining disposing author of virtue not the former for natural influence and tendency supposed causality connection and necessity of event which are inconsistent with Armenian liberty attendance their means by biasing the heart in favor of virtue or by bringing the will under the influence and power of motives in its determinations are both inconsistent with Armenian liberty of will consisting in indifference and sovereign self-determination as has been largely demonstrated before the more full removal of this prejudice against the doctrine of necessity which has been maintained as though it tended to encourage a total neglect of all endeavors as vain the following things may be considered the question is not whether men may not thus improve this doctrine we know that many true and wholesome doctrines are abused but whether the doctrine gives any justification for such an improvement or whether on the supposition of the truth of the doctrine such a use of it would not be unreasonable if any shall affirm that it would not but that the very nature of the doctrine is such as gives justification for it it must be on this supposition namely that such an invariable necessity of all things already settled must render the interposition of all means endeavors conclusions or actions of ours in order to the obtaining any future and whatsoever perfectly insignificant because they cannot in the least alter or vary the course in series of things in any event or circumstance all being already fixed unalterably by necessity and that therefore it is folly for men to use any means for any end but their wisdom to save themselves the trouble of endeavors and take their ease no person can draw such an inference from this doctrine and come to such a conclusion without contradicting himself and going counter to the very principles he pretends to act upon before he comes to a conclusion and takes a course in order to an end even his ease or saving himself from trouble he seeks something future and uses means in order to a future thing even in his drawing up that conclusion that he will seek nothing and use no means in order to anything in future he seeks his future ease and the benefit and comfort of indolence if prior necessity that determines all things makes vain all actions or conclusions of ours in order to anything future then it makes vain all conclusions and conduct of ours in order to our future ease the measure of our ease with the time manner and every circumstance of it is already fixed by all determining necessity as much as anything else if he says within himself what future happiness or misery i shall have is already in effect determined by the necessary course and connection of things therefore i will save myself the trouble of labor indolence which cannot add to my determined degree of happiness or diminish my misery but will take my ease and will enjoy the comfort of sloth and negligence such a man contradicts himself he says the measure of his future happiness and misery is already fixed and he will not try to diminish the one or add to the other but yet in his very conclusion he contradicts this for he takes up this conclusion to add to his future happiness by the ease and comfort of his negligence and to diminish this future trouble and misery by saving himself the trouble of using means and taking pains therefore persons cannot reasonably make this improvement of the doctrine of necessity that they will go into a voluntary negligence of means for their own happiness for the principles they must go upon in order to this are inconsistent with their making any improvement at all of the doctrine for to make some improvement of it is to be influenced by to come to some voluntary conclusion in regard to their own conduct with some view or aim but this as has been shown is inconsistent with the principles they pretend to act upon in short the principles are such as cannot be acted upon at all or in any respect consistently and therefore in every pretense of acting upon them or making any improvement at all of them there is a self contradiction as to that objection against the doctrine which i have endeavored to prove that it makes men no more than mere machines i would say that notwithstanding this doctrine man is entirely perfectly and unspeakably different from a mere machine in that he has reason and understanding with the faculty of will and so is capable of volition and choice in that his will is guided by the dictates or views of his understanding and in that his external actions and behavior and in many respects also his thoughts and the exercises of his mind are subject to his will so that he has liberty to act according to his choice and do what he pleases and by means of these things is capable of moral habits and moral acts such inclinations and actions as according to the common sense of mankind are worthy of praise esteem love and reward or on the contrary of disesteem detestation indignation and punishment in these things is all the difference from mere machines as to liberty and agency that would be any perfection dignity or privilege in any respect all the difference that can be desired and all that can be conceived of and indeed all that the pretensions of the armenians themselves come to as they are forced often to explain themselves though their explanations overthrow and abolish the things asserted and pretended to be explained for they are forced to explain a self-determining power of will by a power in the soul to determine as it chooses a will which comes to know more than this that a man has a power of choosing and in many instances can do as he chooses which is quite a different thing from that contradiction is having power of choosing his first act of choice in the case or if their scheme make any other difference than this between men and machines it is for the worse it is so far from supposing them to have a dignity and privilege about machines that it makes the manner of their being determined still more unhappy whereas machines are guided by an intelligent cause by the skillful hand of the workman or owner the will of man is left to the guidance of nothing but absolute blind contingents end of part four section five part four section six of the freedom of the will by jonathan edwards this LibriVox recording is in the public domain concerning that objection against the doctrine which has been maintained that it agrees with the historical doctrine of fate and the opinions of mr. Hobbes when Calvinists oppose the Armenian notion of the freedom of will and contingents of elision and insist that there are no acts of the will nor any other events whatsoever for what are attended with some kind of necessity their opposers exclaim against them as agreeing with the ancient Stoics in their doctrine of fate and with mr. Hobbes and his opinion of necessity it would not be worthwhile to take notice of so important an objection had it not been urged by some of the chief Armenian writers there were many important truths maintained by the ancient Greek and Roman philosophers and especially the Stoics that are never the worst for being held by them the stoic philosophers by the general agreement of Christian divines and even Armenian divines were the greatest wisest and most virtuous of all the heathen philosophers and in their doctrine and practice came the nearest to Christianity of any of their sects how frequently are the sayings of these philosophers in many of the writings and sermons even of Armenian divines produced not as arguments for the falseness of the doctrines which they delivered but as a confirmation of some of the greatest truths of the Christian religion relating to the unity and perfections of the godhead of future state the duty and happiness of mankind etc and how the light of nature and reason in the wisest and best of the heathen harmonized with and confirms the gospel of Jesus Christ and it is very remarkable concerning Dr. Whitby that although he alleges the agreement of the Stoics with us wherein he supposes they maintained the light doctrine as an argument against the truth of ours yet this very Dr. Whitby alleges the agreement of the Stoics with the Armenians wherein he supposes they taught the same doctrine with them as an argument for the truth of their doctrine so that when the Stoics agree with them it is a confirmation of their doctrine and a computation of ours as showing that our opinions are contrary to that natural sense and common reason of mankind nevertheless when the Stoics agree with us it argues no such thing in our favor but on the contrary is a great argument against us and shows our doctrine to be heathenish it is observed by some Calvinistic writers that the Armenians symbolize with the Stoics and some of those doctrines wherein they are opposed by the Calvinists particularly in their denying and original innate total corruption and depravity of heart and in what they held of man's ability to make himself truly virtuous and conform to God and in some other doctrines it may be further observed that certainly it is no better objection against our doctrine that it agrees in some respects with the doctrine of the ancient Stoic philosophers than it is against theirs wherein they differ from us that it agrees in some respects with the opinion of the very worst of the heathen philosophers the followers of Epicurus the father of atheism and licentiousness and with the doctrine of the Sadducees and Jesuits I'm not much concerned to know precisely what the ancient Stoic philosophers held concerning fate in order to determine what is true as though it were a sure way to be in the right to take good heed to differ from them it seems that they differed among themselves and probably the doctrine of fate as maintained by most of them was in some respects erroneous for whatever their doctrine was if any of them held such a fate as is repugnant to any liberty consisting in our doing as we please I utterly deny such a fate if they held any such fate as is not consistent with the common and universal notions that mankind have of liberty activity more agency virtue and vice I disclaim any such thing and think I have demonstrated that the scheme I maintain is no such scheme if the Stoics by fate meant anything of such a nature as can be supposed to stand in the way of advantage and benefit of in use of means and endeavors or would make it less worthwhile for men to desire and seek after anything wherein their virtue and happiness consists I hold no doctrine that is clogged with any such inconvenience any more than any other scheme whatsoever and by no means so much as the Armenian scheme of contingents as has been shown if they held any such doctrine of universal fatality as is inconsistent with any kind of liberty that is or can be any perfection dignity privilege or benefit or anything desirable in any respect for any intelligent creature or indeed with any liberty that is possible or conceivable I embrace no such doctrine if they held any such doctrine of fate as is inconsistent with the world being in all things subject to the disposal of an intelligent wise agent that presides not as the soul of the world but as the sovereign lord of the universe governing all things by proper will choice and design in the exercise of the most perfect liberty conceivable without subjection to any constraint or being properly under the power or influence of anything before above or without himself I wholly renounce any such doctrine as to Mr. Hobbes maintaining the same doctrine concerning necessity I confess it happens I never read Mr. Hobbes let his opinion be what it will we need not reject all truth which is demonstrated by clear evidence merely because it was once held by some bad man this great truth that Jesus is the Son of God was not spoiled because it was once and again proclaimed with a loud voice by the devil if truth is so defiled because it is spoken by the mouth or written by the pen of some ill-minded mischievous man that it must never be received we shall never know when we hold any of the most precious and evident truths by a sure tenure and if Mr. Hobbes has made a bad use of this truth that is to be lamented but the truth is not to be thought worthy of rejection on that account it is common for the corrupt hearts of evil men to abuse the best things to vile purposes I might also take notice of its having been observed that the Armenians agree with Mr. Hobbes and many more things than the Calvinists as in what he is said to hold concerning original sin in denying the necessity of supernatural illumination in denying infused grace in denying the doctrine of justification by faith alone and other things. End of part 4 section 6 part 4 section 7 of the freedom of the will by Jonathan Edwards this Lieber-Vox recording is in the public domain concerning the necessity of the divine will some may possibly object against what has been supposed of the absurdity and inconsistence of a self-determining power in the will and the impossibility of its being otherwise than that the will should be determined in every case by some motive and by a motive which as it stands in the view of the understanding is of superior strength to any appearing on the other side that if these things are true it will follow that not only the will of created minds but the will of God himself is necessary in all its determinations concerning which the author of the essay on the freedom of will in God and in the creature pages 85 86 says what strange doctrine is this contrary to all our ideas of the dominion of God does it not destroy the glory of his liberty of choice and take away from the creator and governor and benefactor of the world that most free and sovereign agent all the glory of this sort of freedom does it not seem to make him a kind of mechanical medium of fate and introduce Mr. Hobbes's doctrine of fatality and necessity into all things that God hath to do with does it not seem to represent the blessed God as a being of vast understanding as well as power and efficiency but still to leave him without a will to choose among all the objects within his view in short it seems to make the blessed God a sort of almighty minister of fate under his universal and supreme influence as it was the professed sentiment of some of the ancients that fate was above the gods this is declaiming rather than arguing and an application to men's imaginations and prejudices rather than to mere reason i would now calmly endeavor to consider whether there be any reason in this frightful representation but before i enter upon a particular consideration of the matter i would observe that it is reasonable to suppose it should be much more difficult to express or conceive things according to exact metaphysical truth relating to the nature and manner of the existence of things in the divine understanding and will and the operation of these faculties if i may so call them of the divine mind then in the human mind which is infinitely more within our view more proportionate to the measure of our comprehension and more commensurate to the use and import of human speech language is indeed very deficient in regard of terms to express precise truth concerning our own minds and their faculties and operations words were first formed to express external things and those that are applied to express things internal and spiritual are almost all borrowed and used in a sort of figurative sense once they are most of them attended with a great deal of ambiguity and unfixedness in their signification occasioning innumerable doubts difficulties and confusions in inquiries and controversies about things of this nature but languages much less adapted to express things existing in the mind of the incomprehensible deity precisely as they are we find a great deal of difficulty in conceiving exactly of the nature of our own souls in notwithstanding all the progress which has been made in past ages and the present in this kind of knowledge whereby our metaphysics as it relates to these things is brought to greater perfection than once it was yet here is still work enough left for future inquiries and researches and room for progress still to be made for many ages and generations but we had need to be infinitely able metaphysicians to conceive with clearness according to strict proper and perfect truth concerning the nature of the divine essence and the modes of action and operation in the powers of the divine mind and it may be noted particularly that though we are obliged to conceive of some things in God as consequent and dependent on others and of some things pertaining to the divine nature and will as the foundation of others and so before others in the order of nature as we must conceive of the knowledge and holiness of God as prior in the order of nature to his happiness the perfection of his understanding as the foundation of his wise purposes and decrees the holiness of his nature as the cause and reason of his holy determinations and yet when we speak of cause and effect antecedent and consequent fundamental and dependent determining and determined in the first being who is self-existent independent of perfect and absolute simplicity and immutability and the first cause of all things doubtless there must be less propriety in such representations than when we speak of derived dependent beings who are compounded and liable to perpetual mutation and succession having premised this I proceed to observe concerning the four mentioned authors exclamation about the necessary determination of God's will in all things by what he sees to be fittest and best that all the seeming force of such objections and exclamations must arise from an imagination that there is some sort of privilege or dignity in being without such moral necessity as will make it impossible to do any other than always choose what is wisest and best as though there were some disadvantage meanness and subjection in such a necessity a thing by which the will was confined kept under and held in servitude by something which as it were maintained a strong and invincible power and dominion over it by bonds that held him fast and from which he could by no means deliver himself whereas this must be all mere imagination and delusion it is no disadvantage or dishonor to a being necessarily to act in the most excellent and happy manner from the necessary perfection of his own nature this argues no imperfection inferiority or dependence nor any want of dignity privilege or ascendancy it is not inconsistent with the absolute and most perfect sovereignty of God the sovereignty of God is his ability and authority to do whatever pleases him whereby he death according to his will in the armies of heaven and amongst the inhabitants of the earth and none can stay his hand or say under him what does now the following things belong to the sovereignty of God these one supreme universal and infinite power whereby he is able to do what he pleases without control without any confinement of that power without any subjection in the least measure to any other power and so without any hindrance or restraint that it should be either impossible or at all difficult for him to accomplish his will and without any dependence of his power on any other power from whence it should be derived or of which it should stand in any need so far from this that all other power is derived from him and is absolutely dependent on him to that he has supreme authority absolute and most perfect right to do what he wills without subjection to any superior authority or any derivation of authority from any other or limitation by any distinct independent authority either superior equal or inferior he being the head of all dominion and fountain of all authority and also without restraint by any obligation implying either subjection derivation or dependence or proper limitation three that his will is supreme undefined and independent on anything without himself being in everything determined by his own counsel having no other rule but his own wisdom his will not being subject to or restrained by the will of any other and other wills being perfectly subject to his for that his wisdom which determines his will is supreme perfect undefined self-sufficient and independent so that it may be said as in isaiah 40 14 with whom took he counsel and who instructed him and taught him in the path of judgment and taught him knowledge and showed him the way of understanding there is no other divine sovereignty but this and this is properly absolute sovereignty no other is desirable nor would any other be honorable or happy and indeed there is no other conceivable or possible it is the glory and greatness of the divine sovereign that his will is determined by his own infinite all sufficient wisdom in everything and is in nothing at all directed either by inferior wisdom or by no wisdom whereby it would become senseless arbitrariness determining and acting without reason design or end if god's will is steadily and surely determined in everything by supreme wisdom than it is in everything necessarily determined to that which is most wise and certainly it would be a disadvantage and indignity to be otherwise for if the divine will was not necessarily determined to what in every case is wisest and best it must be subject to some degree of undesigning contingence and so in the same degree liable to evil to suppose the divine will liable to be carried hither and thither at random by the uncertain wind of blind contingence which is guided by no wisdom no motive no intelligent dictate whatsoever if any such thing were possible would certainly argue a great degree of imperfection and meanness infinitely unworthy of the deity it would be a disadvantage for the divine will to be attended with this moral necessity than the more free from it and the more left at random the greater dignity and advantage and consequently to be perfectly free from the direction of understanding and universally and entirely left to senseless unmeaning contingence to act absolutely at random would be the supreme glory it no more argues any dependence of god's will that his supremely wise volition is necessary than it argues a dependence of his being that his existence is necessary if it be something too low for the supreme being to have his will determined by moral necessity so as necessarily in every case to will in the highest degree holily and happily than why is it not also something too low for him to have his existence and the infinite perfection of his nature and his infinite happiness determined by necessity it is no more to god's dishonor to be necessarily wise than to be necessarily holy and if neither of them be to his dishonor then it is not to his dishonor necessarily to act holily and wisely and if it be not dishonorable to be necessarily holy and wise in the highest possible degree no more is it mean and dishonorable necessarily to act holily and wisely in the highest possible degree or which is the same thing to do that in every case which above all other things is wisest and best the reason why it is not dishonorable to be necessarily most holy is because holiness in itself is an excellent and honorable thing for the same reason it is no dishonor to be necessarily most wise and in every case to act most wisely or do the thing which is the wisest of all for wisdom is also in itself excellent and honorable the forementioned author of the essay on the freedom of will etc as has been observed represents that doctrine of the divine will being in everything necessarily determined by superior fitness as making the blessed god a kind of almighty minister a mechanical medium of fate he insists pages 93 94 that this moral necessity and impossibility is in effect the same thing with physical and natural necessity and impossibility and says pages 54 55 the scheme which determines the will always and certainly by the understanding and the understanding by the appearance of things seems to take away the true nature of vice and virtue for the sublimest of virtues and the vilest of vices seem rather to be matters of fate and necessity flowing naturally and necessarily from the existence the circumstances and present situation of persons and things for this existence and situation necessarily makes such an appearance to the mind from this appearance flows unnecessary perception and judgment concerning these things this judgment necessarily determines the will and thus by this chain of necessary causes virtue and vice would lose their nature and become natural ideas and necessary things instead of moral and free actions and yet this same author allows pages 3031 that a perfectly wise being will constantly and certainly choose what is most fit and says pages 102 103 I grant and always have granted that where so ever there is such antecedent superior fitness of things God acts according to it so as never to contradict it and particularly in all his judicial proceedings as a governor and distributor of rewards and punishments yeah he says expressly page 42 that it is not possible for God to act otherwise than according to this fitness and goodness in things so that according to this author putting these several passages of his essay together there is no virtue nor anything of a moral nature in the most sublime and glorious acts and exercises of God's holiness justice and faithfulness and he never does anything which is in itself supremely worthy and above all other things fit and excellent but only as a kind of mechanical medium of fate and in what he does as the judge and moral governor of the world he exercises no moral excellency exercising no freedom in these things because he acts by moral necessity which is in effect the same with physical or natural necessity and therefore he only acts by and have this to call fatality as a being indeed a vast understanding as well as power and efficiency as he said before but without a will to choose being a kind of almighty minister of fate acting under its supreme influence for he allows that in all these things God's will is determined constantly and certainly by a superior fitness and that it is not possible for him to act otherwise and if these things are so what glory or praise belongs to God for doing holily and justly or taking the most fit holy wise and excellent course in any one instance whereas according to the scriptures and also the common sense of mankind it does not in the least derogate from the honor of any being that through the moral perfection of his nature he necessarily acts with supreme wisdom and holiness but on the contrary his praise is the greater herein consists the height of his glory the same author page 56 supposes that herein appears the excellent character of a wise and good man that though he can choose contrary to the fitness of things yet he does not but suffers himself to be directed by fitness and that in this conduct he imitates the blessed God and yet he supposes it contrary wise with the blessed God not that he suffers himself to be directed by fitness when he can choose contrary to the fitness of things but that he cannot choose contrary to the fitness of things as he says page 42 that it is not possible for God to act otherwise than according to this fitness whether is any fitness or goodness in things yay he supposes page 31 that if a man were perfectly wise and good he could not do otherwise than be constantly and certainly determined by the fitness of things one thing more I would observe before I conclude this section and that is that if it derogate nothing from the glory of God to be necessarily determined by superior fitness and some things then neither does it to be thus determined in all things from anything in the nature of such necessity as at all detracting from God's freedom independence absolute supremacy or any dignity or glory of his nature state or manner of acting or as implying any infirmity restraint or subjection and if the thing be such as well consists with God's glory and has nothing tending at all to detract from it then we need not be afraid of ascribing it to God in too many things lest thereby we should detract from God's glory too much end of part four section seven