N05663:241
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.
I. He is abundant in asserting, that the Will, in all it's Acts, is influenced by Motive and Excitement; and that this is the previous Ground and Reason of all it's Acts, and that it is never otherwise in any Instance. He says, (P. 262.) No Action can take Place without some Motive to excite it. And in P. 203. Volition cannot take Place without some PREVIOUS Reason or Motive to induce it. And in P. 310. Action would not take Place without s•me Reason or Motive to induce it; it being absurd to suppose, that the active Faculty would be exerted without some PREVIOUS Reason to dispose the Mind to Action. So also P. 257. And he speaks of th•se Things as what we may be absolutely certain of, and which are the Foundation, the only Foundation we have of a Certainty of the moral Perfections of God. P. 252, 253, 254, 255, 261, 262, 263, 264.
I. He is abundant in asserting, that the Will, in all it's Acts, is influenced by Motive and Excitement; and that this is the previous Ground and Reason of all it's Acts, and that it is never otherwise in any Instance. He says, (P. 262.) No Action can take Place without some Motive to excite it. And in P. 203. Volition cannot take Place without some PREVIOUS Reason or M•tive to induce it. And in P. 310. Action would not take Place without s•me Reason or Motive to induce it; it being absurd to suppose, that the active Faculty would be exerted without some PREVIOUS Reason to dispose the Mind to Action. So also P. 257. And he speaks of th•se Things as what we may be absolutely certain of, and which are the Foundation, the only Foundation we have of a Certainty of the moral Perfections of God. P. 252, 253, 254, 255, 261, 262, 263, 264.
And yet at the same Time, by his Scheme, the Influence of Motives upon us to excite to Action, and to be actually a Ground of Volition, is consequent on the Volition or Choice of the Mind. For he very greatly insists upon it, that in all free Actions, before the Mind is the Subject of those Volitions which Motives excite, it chooses to be so. It chooses whether it will comply with the Motive, which presents it self in View, or not; and when various Motives are presented, it chooses which it will yield to, and which it will reject. So P. 256. Every Man has Power to act, or to refrain from acting agreeably with, or contrary to, any Motive that presents. P. 257. Every Man is at Liberty to act, or refrain from acting agreeably with, or contrary to, what each of these Motives, considered singly, would excite him to.—Man has Power, and is as much at Liberty to reject the Motive that does prevail, as he has Power, and is at Liberty to reject those Motives