A careful and strict enquiry into the modern prevailing notions of that freedom of…

It may be of some Use in these Controversies, further to observe concerning metaphysical Necessity, that (agreeable to the Distinction before observed of Necessity, as vulgarly understood) Things that exist may be said to be necessary, either with a general or particular Necessity. The Existence of a Thing may be said to be necessary with a general Necessity, when all Things whatsoever being considered, there is a Foundation for Certainty of their Existence; or when in the most general and universal View of Things, the Subject and Predicate of the Proposition, which affirms its Existence, would appear with an infallible Connection.

It may be of some Use in these Controversies, further to observe concerning metaphysical Necessity, that (agreable to the Distinction before observed of Necessity, as vulgarly understood) Things that exist may be said to be necessary, either with a general or particular Necessity. The Existence of a Thing may be said to be necessary with a gen•ral Necessity, when all Things whatsoever being considered, there is a Foundation for Certainty of their Existence; or when in the most general and universal View of Things, the Subject and Predicate of the Proposition, which affirms its Existence, would appear with an infallible Connection.

An Event, or the Existence of a Thing, may be said to be necessary with a particular Necessity, or with Regard to a particular Person, Thing or Time, when Nothing that can be taken into Consideration, in or about that Person, Thing or Time, alters the Case at all, as to the Certainty of that Event, or the Existence of that Thing; or can be of any ⟨p. 19⟩Account at all, in determining the Infallibility of the Connection of the Subject and Predicate in the Proposition which affirms the Existence of the Thing; so that it is all one, as to that Person, or Thing, at least, at that Time, as if the Existence were necessary with a Necessity that is most universal and absolute. Thus there are many Things that happen to particular Persons, which they have no Hand in, and in the Existence of which no Will of theirs has any Concern, at least, at that Time; which, whether they are necessary or not, with Regard to Things in general, yet are necessary to them, and with Regard to any Volition of theirs at that Time; as they prevent all Acts of the Will about the Affair. — I shall have Occasion to apply this Observation to particular Instances in the following Discourse.—Whether the same Things that are necessary with a particular Necessity, be not also necessary with a general Necessity, may be a Matter of future Consideration. Let that be as it will, it alters not the Case, as to the Use of this Distinction of the Kinds of Necessity.