N05663:166
A careful and strict enquiry into the modern prevailing notions of that freedom of…
A careful and strict enquiry into the modern prevailing notions of that freedom of will, which is supposed to be essential to moral agency, virtue and vice, reward and punishment, praise and blame. By Jonathan Edwards, A.M. Pastor of the church in Stockbridge. ; [One line from Romans]A careful and strict enquiry into the modern prevailing notions of that freedom of will, which is supposed to be essential to moral agency, vertue and vice, reward and punishment, praise and blame. By Jonathan Edwards, A.M. Pastor of the church in Stockbridge. ; [One line from Romans]
printed by S. Kneeland, 1754
Modern spelling is a reading aid: the words are the author’s, only the spelling is modernized. Original shows the page as printed, with the transcription marks.
SECTION VI. Concerning the Will's determining in Things which are perfectly indifferent, in the View of the Mind.
A Great Argument for Self-determining Power, is the supposed Experience we universally have of an Ability to determine our Wills, in Cases wherein no prevailing Motive is presented: The Will (as is supposed) has it's Choice to make between two or more Things, that are perfectly equal in the View of the Mind; and the Will is apparently altogether indifferent; and yet we find no Difficulty in coming to a Choice; the Will can instantly determine it self to one, by a sovereign Power which it has over it self, without being moved by any preponderating Inducement.
A Great Argument for Self-determining Power, is the supposed Experience we universally have of an Ability to determine our Wills, in Cases wherein no prevailing Motive is presented: The Will (as is supposed) has it's Choice to make between two or more Things, that are perfectly equal in the View of the Mind; and the Will is apparently altogether indifferent; and yet we find no Di••iculty in coming to a Choice; the Will can instantly determine it self to one, by a sovereign Power which it has over it self, without being moved by any preponderating Inducement.
Thus the forementioned Author of an Essay on the Freedom of the Will &c. P. 25, 26, 27, supposes, That there are many Instances, wherein the Will is determined neither by present Uneasiness, nor by the greatest apparent Good, nor by the last Dictate of the Understanding, nor by any Thing else, but merely by it self, as a Sovereign Self-determining Power of the Soul; and that the Soul does not will this or that Action, in some Cases, by any other Influence, but because it will. Thus (says he) I can turn my Face to the South, or the North; I can point with my Fing upward, or downward.— And thus, in some Cases, the Will determines it self in a very sovereign Manner, because it will, without a Reason borrowed from the Understanding: and hereby it discovers it's own perfect Power of Choice, rising from within it self, and free from all Influence or Restraint of any Kind. And in Pages 66, 70, & 73, 74. This Author very expressly supposes the Will in many Cases to be determined by no Motive at all, and acts altogether without Motive, or Ground of Preference. — Here I would observe,