N05663:619
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.
2. The second Argument, to prove that the most High wills one Thing rather than another, without any superior Fitness or Preferableness in the Thing preferred, is God's actually placing in different Parts of the World, Particles or Atoms of Matter that are perfectly equal and alike. The forementioned Author says, P. 78, &c. If one would descend to the minute specific Particles, of which different Bodies are composed, we should see abundant Reason to believe that there are Thousands of such little Particles or Atoms of Matter, which are perfectly equal and alike, and could give no distinct Determination to the Will of God, where to place them. He there instances in Particles of Water, of which there are such immense Numbers, which compose the Rivers and Oceans of this World; and the infinite Myriads of the luminous and fiery Particles, which compose the Body of the Sun; so many, that it would be very unreasonable to suppose no two of them should be exactly equal and alike.
2. The second Argument, to prove that the most High wills one Thing rather than another, without any superior Fitness or Preferableness in the Thing prefer'd, is God's actually placing in different Parts of the World, Particles or Atoms of Matter that are perfectly equal and alike. The forementioned Author says, P. 78, &c. If one would descend to the minute specific Particles, of which different Bodies are composed, we should see abundant Reason to believe that there are Thousands of such little Particles or Atoms of Matter, which are perfectly equal and alike, and could give no distinct Determination to the Will of God, where to place them. He there instances in Particles of Water, of which there are such immense Numbers, which compose the Rivers and Oceans of this World; and the infinite Myriads of the luminous and fiery Particles, which compose the Body of the Sun; so many, that it would be very unreasonable to suppose no two of them should be exactly equal and alike.
Answ. (1.) To this I answer: That as we must suppose Matter to be infinitely divisible, 'tis very unlikely that any two of all these Particles are exactly equal and alike; so unlikely, that it is a Thousand to one, yea, an infinite Number to one, but it is otherwise: And that altho' we should allow a great