N05663:491
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.
Here again it must be remembered, that if determining thus to suspend and consider, be that Act of the Will wherein alone Liberty is exercised, then in this all Virtue and Vice must ⟨p. 187⟩consist; and the Acts that follow this Consideration, and are the Effects of it, being necessary, are no more virtuous or vicious than some good or bad Events which happen when they are fast asleep, and are the Consequences of what they did when they were awake. Therefore I would here observe two Things.
Here again it must be remember'd, that if determining thus to suspend and consider, be that Act of the Will wherein alone Liberty is exercised, then in this all Vertue and Vice must ⟨p. 187⟩consist; and the Acts that follow this Consideration, and are the Effects of it, being necessary, are no more vertuous or vicious than some good or bad Events which happen when they are fast asleep, and are the Consequences of what they did when they were awake. Therefore I would here observe two Things.
1. To suppose that all Virtue and Vice, in every […], consists in determining whether to take Time for Consideration, or not, is not agreeable to common Sense. For according to such a Supposition, the most horrid Crimes, Adultery, Murder, Buggery, Blasphemy, &c. do not at all consist in the horrid Nature of the Things themselves, but only in the Neglect of thorough Consideration before they were perpetrated: which brings their Viciousness to a small Matter, and makes all Crimes equal. If it be said, that Neglect of Considerati••• when such heinous Evils are proposed to Choice, is worse than in other Cases: I answer, this is inconsistent, as it supposes the very Thing to be, which at the same Time is supposed not to be; it supposes all moral Evil, all Viciousness and Heinousness, does not consist merely in the want of Consideration. It supposes some Crimes in themselves, in their own Nature, to be more heinous than others, antecedent to Consideration or Inconsideration, which lays the Person under a previous Obligation to consider in some Cases more than others.