N05663:615
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.
The Arguments, to prove that the most High, in some Instances, chooses to do one Thing rather than another, where the Things themselves are perfectly without Difference, are two.
The Arguments, to prove that the most High, in some Instances, chuses to do one Thing rather than another, where the Things themselves are perfectly without Difference, are two.
1. That the various Parts of infinite Time and Space, absolutely considered, are perfectly alike, and don't differ at all one from another: And that therefore, when God determined to create the World in such a Part of infinite Duration and Space, rather than others, he determined and preferred among various Objects, between which there was no Preferableness, and absolutely no Difference.
1. That the various Parts of infinite Time and Space, absolutely considered, are perfectly alike, and don't differ at all one from another: And that therefore, when God determined to create the World in such a Part of infinite Duration and Space, rather than others, he determin'd and prefer'd among various Objects, between which there was no Preferableness, and absolutely no Difference.
Answ. This Objection supposes an infinite Length of Time before the World was created, distinguished by successive Parts, properly and truly so; or a Succession of limited and unmeasurable Periods of Time, following one another, in an infinitely long Series: which must needs be a groundless Imagination. The eternal Duration which was before the World, being only the Eternity of God's Existence; which is nothing ⟨p. 241⟩else but his immediate, perfect and invariable Possession of the whole of his unlimited Life, together and at once; Vitae interminabilis, tota, simul & perfecta Possessio. Which is so generally allowed, that I need not stand to demonstrate it.