N05663:551
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.
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, are 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 every where 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 Voice and Dictate of this natural and vulgar Sense.
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, are 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 every where in the common People, who are furthest from having their▪ Thoughts perverted from their natural Channel, by metaphysical and philosophical Subtilties; but on the contrary, altogether agreable to, and the very Voice and Dictate of this natural and vulgar Sense.
I. This will appear if we consider what the vulgar Notion of Blame-worthiness is. The Idea which the common People ⟨p. 213⟩through all Ages and Nations have of Faultiness, I suppose to be plainly this; A Person's being or doing wrong, with his own Will and Pleasure; containing these two Things; 1. His doing wrong, when he does as he pleases. 2. His Pleasure's being wrong. Or in other Words, perhaps more intelligibly expressing their Notion; A Person's having his Heart wrong, and doing wrong from his Heart. And this is the Sum total of the Matter.