An Examination of President Edwards' Inquiry into the Freedom of the Will

There is an inconsistency, I am aware, in supposing a choice to be induced by the force of external circumstances, or by the force of motives, whether external or internal; but this inconsistency belongs to the scheme of necessity; and if I have indulged in the supposition for a moment, it was only to meet the necessitarian, and argue with him on his own ground. As I have already said, a will that is determined, instead of determining, is no will at all. And the liberty of the will for which we contend, is implied by the power of the mind to act. It does not depend upon the presence or the absence of any external obstruction. It is no such occasional, or accidental thing; it is an inherent and essential attribute and power of the mind. No power in the universe, but that of creation, can produce it, and no chains on earth can bind it.

The idea of liberty, as contended for by President Edwards, is no other than that entertained by Mr. Locke. Thus, says the latter, “there may be thought, there may be will, there may be volition, where there is no liberty.” In illustration of this position he says, “A man falling into water, (a bridge breaking under him,) has not herein liberty, is not a free-agent. For though he has volition, though he prefers his not falling to falling, yet the forbearance of that motion not being in his power, the stop or cessation of that motion follows not upon his volition; and therefore therein he is not free.”

It is true, he is not therein free, in one of the most common senses of the term; but it is wrong to conclude from hence, that there is in such a case, “no liberty.” For if the volition, of which he is said to be possessed, did not result from the action of any thing, if it was simply an act of the mind, which was not necessarily produced by another act, then he possessed freedom in the philosophical sense of the term. He was free in the act of willing, in the possession of his volition, although the consequence of that volition was cut off and prevented by an over-ruling necessity, which had no conceivable relation to the manner in which he came by his volition. Wherever there is a volition, there is this kind of liberty; for a volition is not, and cannot be, produced by any coercive force.

The foregoing illustration might have been very consistently offered by President Edwards, who considered a volition and a preference of the mind as identically the same; but it comes not with so good a grace from Mr. Locke. He considered an act of the will as different from a preference. According to his doctrine, a man might prefer not to fall, in such a case as that put by himself, and yet not will not to fall. And he illustrates the difference by saying, “a man would prefer flying to walking, yet who can say he ever wills it?” Now, if a man cannot will to fly, it is very difficult to see how he can will not to fall, in case he were dropped from the air.

The illustration of Mr. Locke is fallacious. It does not show, and I humbly conceive it cannot be shown, that there can be a volition anywhere in the universe where there is not freedom. The very idea of a volition, or an act of the mind, necessarily implies that kind of philosophical liberty for which we contend.

The above notion of liberty, which Mr. Locke borrowed from Hobbes, and Edwards from Locke, evidently confounds the motion of the body, (which they frequently call action,) with volition or action of the mind. Thus, no matter how a volition comes to pass, or is caused to exist, if there is nothing to prevent the motion of the body from following its influence, we are said to be perfectly free. This kind of liberty, therefore, refers to the motion of the body, and not to the action of the mind. It has no reference whatever to the question, Is the mind free in the act of willing? This is the question in dispute; and hence, if the necessitarian would say any thing to the purpose, he must show that his scheme is reconcilable with the freedom of the mind in willing. This Edwards has not attempted to do. He has, in fact, as we have seen, only given us the name, while he has taken from us the substance of liberty.

The idea of liberty, for which Edwards contends, may be illustrated by an unobstructed fall of water. Indeed, this is the very thing by which Mr. Hobbes has chosen to illustrate and explain it. “I conceive liberty to be rightly defined in this manner,” says he; “liberty is the absence of all the impediments to action, (motion?) that are not contained in the nature and intrinsical quality of the agent, as for example, the water is said to descend freely, or to have liberty to descend by the channel of the river, because there is no impediment that way, but not across, because the banks are impediments, and though the water cannot ascend, yet men never say it wants the liberty to ascend, but the faculty or power, because the impediment is in the nature of the water, and intrinsical.” Mr. Hobbes encountered no more difficulty in reconciling this notion of liberty with the scheme of fatality for which he contended, than President Edwards found in reconciling it with the same scheme in disguise.

According to the Inquiry, then, we have no other liberty than that which may be ascribed to the winds and the waves of the sea, as they are carried onward in their courses by the power of the Almighty. Edwards looks for liberty, and he finds it, not in the will, but in the motions of the body, which is universally admitted to be passive to the action of the will. He looks for liberty, and he finds it, where, by universal consent, an absolute necessity reigns; thus seeking and finding the living among the dead. It is no wonder, that he could reconcile such a liberty with the scheme of necessity.

Even President Day is not satisfied with this account of liberty. “On the subject of liberty or freedom,” says he, “which occupies a portion of the fifth section of Edwards’ first book, he has been less particular than was to be expected, considering that this is the great object of inquiry in his work.” How could Edwards have been more particular? He has repeatedly and most explicitly informed us, that liberty consists in a power, or opportunity, to do as we choose; without considering how we come by our choice. If we can only do as we choose, though our choice should be produced by the most absolute and irresistible power in the universe, yet are we perfectly free in the highest conceivable sense of the word. “If any imagine they desire, and that they conceive of a higher liberty than this,” says he, “they are deceived, and delude themselves with confused ambiguous words instead of ideas.” President Day complains that all this is not sufficiently particular; but although he may not have been aware of it, I apprehend that he has been dissatisfied with the dreadful particularity and precision with which the doctrine of the Inquiry has been exhibited. It is precisely the doctrine of liberty which has been held by the most absolute and unqualified fatalists the world has ever seen; and it is set forth, too, with a bold precision and clearness, which would have done honour to the stern consistency of Hobbes himself. It is no wonder, that President Day should have felt a desire to see such a doctrine softened down by the author of the Inquiry.

“The professed object of his book,” says President Day, “according to the title-page, is an inquiry concerning the freedom of the will; – not the freedom of external conduct. We naturally look for his meaning of this internal liberty. What he has said, in this section, respecting freedom of the will, has rather the appearance of evading such a definition of it as might be considered his own.” Yes, it is in this section that we naturally look for his idea of the liberty of the will; but we do not find it. We must turn to the title-page, if we wish to see any thing about the liberty of the will. “What he has said, in this section, respecting freedom of the will,” does not, (President Day himself being judge,) relate to the freedom of the will at all; it only relates to the freedom of the body, which has no freedom at all; but which is wholly passive to the action of the will. President Day is not satisfied with all this; and hence, he proceeds to tell us, what Edwards would have said in this section, if he had not thus evaded his own definition of internal liberty. Let us see, then, what he would have said.

From a letter to a minister of the Church of Scotland, President Day finds that in the phrase conducting as a man pleases, the author of the Inquiry means to include the idea of choosing as he pleases. Now, this is all true; and this is the internal liberty, which President Day has extracted from the aforesaid letter. Then, according to Edwards, we have two kinds of liberty: the one is a liberty to move the body as we please, or as we choose; and the other is, to choose as we please, or as we choose. In the vocabulary, and according to the psychology of President Edwards, as we have frequently seen, and as we here see, our pleasing and our choosing are one and the same thing. Hence, to move our bodies according to our pleasure, is to move it according to our choice; and to choose as we please, is to choose as we choose. President Day need not have gone to the letter in question, in order to find this doctrine; for it is repeatedly set forth in the inquiry. President Edwards, as we have seen, frequently contends in the Inquiry, that we always choose as we choose; and as frequently makes his adversaries assert, that we can “choose without choosing;” which is just as absurd, he truly declares, as to say that a body can move while it is in a state of rest.

Now, to place liberty in this “choosing as we choose,” without regard to the cause or origin of our choice, is just about as rational as it would be to place it in the axioms of geometry. Suppose a man is made to choose, by an absolute and uncontrollable power; it is nevertheless true, that he chooses as he does choose. This cannot be otherwise than true; it is a self-evident and necessary truth; for nothing can be different from itself, can be what it is, and yet not what it is, at one and the same time. To speak of a power of choosing as we choose, as Edwards and Day both do, is just about as reasonable as it were to speak of a power to make two and two equal to four. Supposing the Almighty should cause us to choose, it is not in his power to prevent us from choosing as we do choose; for he cannot work contradictions.

Whether President Edwards speaks of our moving as we please, or of our choosing as we please; whether he speaks of an external liberty, or of this internal liberty; he is always careful to remind us, that it has no reference to the question, how we come by our pleasure or choice. In the letter referred to, wherein he admits that a man’s liberty of conducting as he pleases or chooses, includes “a liberty of choosing as he pleases,” he instantly adds, but “without determining how he came by that pleasure.” Yes, no matter how we come by our choice, though it be wrought into us by the most uncontrollable power in the universe, yet are we free in the highest conceivable sense of the word, if we can only “conduct according to our choice.” This, instead of being the greatest liberty, is indeed the greatest mockery, of which it is possible for the imagination of man to conceive. The liberty of fate itself, is, in all respects, to the full as desirable as such a liberty as this. Is it not wonderful, to behold the great and good author of the Inquiry, thus planting himself upon the very ground of atheistical fatalism; and from thence, in sober, serious earnestness, holding out to us, as a great and glorious reality, the mere name and shadow and fiction of liberty? the very phantom which atheists, in mockery and derision, have been pleased to confer upon mankind, as upon poor blind fools, who merely dream of liberty, and fondly dote upon the empty name thereof, whilst they are ignorant of the chains which bind them fast in fate.

SECTION XV.

OF EDWARDS’ IDEA OF VIRTUE

In order to reconcile his scheme of necessity with the existence and reality of virtue, it appears that Edwards has adopted a false notion of virtue. This is the course he has taken, as I have already shown, in regard to the doctrine of liberty or free-agency, in order to reconcile it with necessity; and if I mistake not, it may be shown, that he has been able to reconcile necessity and virtue only by transforming the nature of virtue to make it suit his system.

I do not intend, at present, to enter into a full discussion of the author’s views in relation to the nature of virtue. I shall content myself with a brief consideration of his notion of virtue, as it stands more immediately and directly connected with the subject of the Inquiry.

It is a fundamental principle with him, that “the essence of the virtue and viciousness of dispositions of the heart, and acts of the will, lies not in their cause, but their nature.” In what precise sense the author would have us to understand this proposition, I shall not now stop to inquire. It is sufficient for my present purpose, that he attaches such a sense to it, as to make the idea of virtue it is intended to define, to agree not only with his doctrine of necessity, but also with any other kind of necessity or fatality whatever. For he maintains, that as the essence of virtue does not consist in its cause, but in its nature, so a man by the mere act of creation may, in the proper sense of the word, be endowed with virtuous and holy dispositions. It is true, the man himself has had no share in the production of his dispositions, they are exclusively the work of his Creator; but yet they are virtuous, they are the objects of moral approbation, because the virtuousness of dispositions has nothing at all to do with their cause or origin. It depends wholly on their nature, and having this nature, (as he supposes they may have by creation alone,) he concludes that they are properly and truly virtuous, although the person in whom they exist has in no manner whatever contributed to their production; neither in whole nor in part, neither exclusively nor concurrently with his Maker. Now, it is evident, I think, that if virtue may be made to exist in this way, by a power wholly extraneous to the being in whom it exists, and wholly independent of all his own thoughts and reflections and doings, then it may be easily reconciled with the most absolute scheme of fatality that has ever been advocated. For it may exist without any agency or concurrence or consent on the part of the person in whom it exists; and hence, there would be no difficulty in reconciling it with any scheme of necessity that any fatalist may be pleased to advance.

To show that I have not misrepresented the author, I shall select from many passages of similar import, the following from his work on “Original Sin:” – “Human nature must be created with some dispositions; a disposition to relish some things as good and amiable, and to be averse to other things as odious and disagreeable: otherwise it must be without any such thing as inclination or will, perfectly indifferent, without preference, without choice or aversion towards any thing as agreeable or disagreeable. But if it had any concreated dispositions at all, they must be either right or wrong, either agreeable or disagreeable to the nature of things. If man had at first the highest relish of things excellent and beautiful, a disposition to have the quickest and highest delight in those things which are most worthy of it, then his dispositions were morally right and amiable, and never can be excellent in a higher sense. But if he had a disposition to love most those things that were inferior and less worthy, then his dispositions were vicious. And it is evident there can be no medium between these.”

Now, this principle, that a man may be to praise or to blame, that he may be esteemed virtuous or vicious, on account of what he has wholly and exclusively received from another, appears to me to be utterly irreconcilable with one of the clearest and most unequivocal dictates of reason and conscience.

According to the above passage, there can be no medium between virtuous and vicious dispositions. This sentiment is still more explicitly declared in the following words; “In a moral agent, subject to moral obligations, it is the same thing to be perfectly innocent, as to be perfectly righteous. It must be the same, because there can no more be any medium between sin and righteousness, or between being right and being wrong, in a moral sense, than there can be between being straight and crooked, in a natural sense.” Now, all this is very true, in regard to a moral being who has been called upon to act; for he must either live up to the rule of duty, or he must fall short of it. If he does the former, he becomes righteous in the true and proper sense of the term; and if he does the latter, he loses his original innocence, and becomes a transgressor. But before he has any opportunity of acting, at the instant of his creation, I humbly conceive that no moral agent is either to be praised or blamed for any disposition with which he may have been endowed by his Maker. He is neither virtuous nor vicious, neither righteous nor sinful. This was the condition of Adam, as it very clearly appears to me, at the instant of his creation. He was in a state of perfect innocency; having neither transgressed the law of God, nor attained to true holiness. And if this be the case, then in regard to such a moral agent, before he has an opportunity to act, or to think, or to feel, it is not “the same thing to be perfectly innocent, as to be, perfectly righteous;” nor the same thing to be destitute of true righteousness, as to be sinful.

It strikes my mind with the force of a self-evident truth, that nothing can be our virtue, unless we are in some sense the author of it; and to affirm that a man may be justly praised or blamed, that he may be esteemed virtuous or vicious, on account of what he has wholly and exclusively received from another, appears to me to contradict one of the clearest and most unequivocal dictates of reason, one of the most universal and irreversible laws of human belief.

Though the Almighty endowed Adam with all that is lovely in human nature, the recipient of such noble qualities certainly deserved no credit for them, as he had no agency in their production. All the praise and glory belonged to God. Such dispositions are no doubt the objects of our admiration and love, but they are no more the objects of our moral approbation than is the beauty of a flower. Both are the work of the same creative energy which hath diffused so much of loveliness and beauty over every part of the creation.

Hence, I deny that Adam was “created or brought into existence righteous.” I am willing to admit, that he “was brought into existence capable of acting immediately as a moral agent; and, therefore, he was immediately under a rule of right action. He was obliged as soon as he existed, to act right.” But I deny that until he did begin to act, he could possess the character of true holiness or virtue. That President Edwards thought otherwise, is evident, not only from the passage already quoted, but also from many others, as well as from the fact, that he argues if Adam had not possessed virtuous dispositions before he began to act, – if he had not derived them directly from his Creator, then the existence of virtue would have been impossible.

On this subject, his argument is ingenious and plausible. It is as follows: “It is agreeable to the sense of men, in all nations and ages, not only that the fruit or effect of a good choice is virtuous, but that the good choice itself from whence that effect proceeds, is so; yea, also the antecedent good disposition, temper, or affection of mind, from whence proceeds that good choice, is virtuous. This is the general notion – not that principles derive their goodness from actions, but – that actions derive their goodness from the principles whence they proceed; so that the act of choosing what is good, is no further virtuous, than it proceeds from a good principle, or virtuous disposition of mind. Which supposes that a virtuous disposition of mind, may be before a virtuous act of choice; and that, therefore, it is not necessary there should first be thought, reflection, and choice, before there can be any virtuous disposition. If the choice be first, before the existence of a good disposition of heart, what is the character of that choice? There can, according to our natural notions, be no virtue in a choice which proceeds from no virtuous principle, but from mere self-love, ambition, or some animal appetite: therefore, a virtuous temper of mind may be before a good act of choice, as a tree may be before the fruit, and the fountain before the stream which proceeds from it,” p. 407.

It is true, that actions derive their good or evil quality, as the case may be, from the principles whence they proceed. This accords, as the author truly says, with the universal sentiment of mankind. But this proposition, plain and simple as it appears to be at first sight, may be misunderstood. The term “principle” is ambiguous; and, according to the idea attached to it, the above proposition may be true or false. When it is said, for example, that a vicious or sinful action derives its evil quality from the principle or motive whence it proceeds, I apprehend that no one pretends to fix the brand of condemnation on the implanted principle, or the natural spring of action, from which it is supposed to proceed. To take the very case in question; our first parents, in eating the forbidden fruit, acted partly from a desire of food and partly from a desire of knowledge. Now, this was a sinful action, because forbidden, and consequently, according to the sense of men in all ages and nations, it must have proceeded from a sinful inclination or principle. But yet no one, I presume, will contend that either the desire of food or the desire of knowledge, from which it is supposed to have proceeded, is in itself sinful. They were implanted in our nature by the finger of God, for wise and beneficent purposes; and to assert that they are sinful, is to make God the author of sin. Our first parents were not to blame because they were endowed with these principles. Hence, when it is said, that a sinful action must proceed from a sinful principle, we are not to understand the proposition as meaning that the inherent constitutional principle of action from which it is supposed to proceed is sinful. Our first parents sinned, not in possessing an appetite for food, or a desire for knowledge, but in indulging these contrary to the will of God. It was their intention and design to do that which God had commanded them not to do, and which they knew it was wrong for them to do. It was this intention and design, which was certainly not an implanted principle, or any part of the work of the Creator, which constituted their sin; and it is this intention and design that is pointed at, when it is said, that the principle or motive from which their transgression proceeded, was a sinful principle or motive. And hence, we very clearly perceive, that a sinful action may result from those principles of our constitution, which are in themselves neither virtuous nor vicious, which are wholly destitute of any moral character whatever. So, in like manner, a virtuous action may result from a principle of our nature, implanted in the human breast by the Author of our being, although such principle may not, properly speaking, be called a virtuous principle, or an object of moral approbation.

The fallacy of the author’s argument, I conceive, has arisen from the ambiguity of the term principle. As it is truly said, that a holy action can proceed only from a holy principle or disposition, he concluded, that if man had not been created with a principle of virtue or holiness in his heart, then no such thing as virtue or holiness could ever have found its way into the world. Supposing, all the time, that it is universally considered that a virtuous act could proceed only from an implanted principle of virtue, of which God alone is the author; whereas, in fact, the virtuous principle from which the virtuous act is supposed to derive its character, is not an implanted principle at all, but the design, or intention, or motive with which the act is done; and of which the created agent is himself the author.

There is one thing well worthy of remark in this connexion. President Edwards contends, as we have seen, that Adam must have been created with a principle of virtue, of which his Maker was the sole author, or else the existence of virtue would have been impossible, And yet, he contends that Adam was created perfectly free from sin; – that as he came from the hand of his Maker, he was perfectly pure and holy, without the least stain or blemish of any wrong or vicious principle upon his nature. Is it not wonderful, that it did not occur to so acute a reasoner as the author of the “Inquiry,” that if his own argument was sound, it would, according to his own principle, prove the introduction of sin into the world to be utterly impossible? That he did not see, if it is impossible to account for the existence of holiness, except on the supposition that man was created or brought into the world with a principle of holiness implanted in his heart; so, for the same reason, it is equally impossible to account for the existence of sin, except on the supposition that a sinful principle was implanted in the breast of man by the hand of his Maker?

The above extract, by which Edwards endeavours to prove that Adam could not have performed a virtuous act, unless a virtuous principle had been planted in his nature by the Creator, would be just as correct and conclusive, if we were to read vicious instead of virtuous. By the very same argument, we might prove that he could not have sinned, and so sin would have been impossible, unless God had planted a sinful principle or disposition in his nature.

It is sufficiently evident, that President Edwards’ idea of the essence of virtue, was not altogether correct, and that he was led to adopt it by the necessities of a false system. For if we admit that the essence of virtue or of sin consists in its nature, and not in its cause or origin, it must be conceded, on the other hand, that the nature of those principles, or dispositions, or volitions, or habits, (call them what we may,) which are termed virtuous or vicious, depend in a very important sense upon their cause or origin. It must be conceded, that no disposition or principle whatever which has derived its origin wholly from any cause or power extraneous to the moral agent in which it exists, can be properly denominated virtuous or vicious. It cannot partake of the nature of virtue or of vice, unless it owes its origin to the agent whose virtue or whose vice it is supposed to be. If it proceeds wholly from the “power, influence, or action,” of motives, or from the hand of the Creator, it is not the act of the agent in whom it exists, and consequently he is not accountable for it. Or, in other words, the nature of virtue and vice is such, that they cannot possibly be produced by any “cause, or power, or influence,” which is wholly extraneous to the mind in which they exist. Virtue and vice, in the strict and proper sense of the words, must have the concurrence and consent of the mind in which they exist, or they cannot possibly exist at all. To speak of virtue, – of that which deserves our moral approbation, as being wholly derived from another – as being exclusively the work of God in the soul, is to be guilty of a contradiction, as plain and palpable as the light of heaven. It is to be regretted, it is to be deeply lamented, that Edwards did not try to bring his doctrine of the will into harmony with the common sentiments of mankind with respect to the nature of virtue and free-agency, instead of exerting his matchless powers to make virtue and free-agency agree with his scheme of necessity, by explaining away and transforming their natures. It is to be lamented; because in attempting to uphold and support the distinctive peculiarities of his own system of theology, he has unintentionally struck a deadly blow at the vital and fundamental principles of all religion, both natural and revealed. The infidel and the atheist are much indebted to him for such an exertion of his immortal powers.

SECTION XVI.

OF THE SELF-DETERMINING POWER

The advocates of free-agency have contended that the will is determined by itself, and not by the strongest motive. This is the ground which, so far as I know, has always been taken against the doctrine of necessity; but it may be questioned whether it is tenable, and whether the friends of moral agency might not have made far greater headway against their adversaries if they had not assumed such a position. It appears to be involved in several inevitable contradictions; in the exposure of which the necessitarian has been accustomed to triumph.

The leading argument of Edwards against the self-determining power may be substantially stated in a few words. The will can be the cause of no effect, says he, except by acting, or putting forth a volition to cause it; and hence, if we assert that the will causes its own volitions, we must suppose it causes them by preceding volitions. It can cause a volition only by a prior volition, which, in its turn, can be caused only by another volition prior to it; and so on ad infinitum. Thus, according to Edwards, the self-determining power of the will necessarily runs out into the absurdity of an infinite series of volitions.

If this reasoning is just, the doctrine in question must be abandoned; for no sound doctrine can lead to such a conclusion. But is it just? Does such an absurdity really flow from the self-determining power of the will?

It has been objected to the argument of Edwards, that it is based on a false assumption. The position of Edwards, “that if the will determines itself, it must determine itself by an act of choice,” is, it has been contended, clearly an assumption unsupported, and incapable of being supported. The reason assigned for this objection is, that we do not know how any cause exerts itself in the production of phenomena; and consequently we have no right to assume that the will can cause its volitions only by volitions. In other words, as we do not know how any cause produces its effects, so it is wholly a gratuitous assumption to say, that if the will causes its volitions, it must cause them in this particular manner, that is, by preceding acts of volition.

This objection does not seem to be well taken. When we say, that the will is the cause of any thing, we do not really mean that the will itself is the cause of it; for the will itself does not act: it is not an agent, it is merely the power of an agent. It is that power by which the mind acts. Hence, when the will is said to cause a thing, the language must either have no intelligible meaning, or it must be understood to mean, that the mind causes it by an exercise of its power of willing. But to say that the mind causes a thing by an exercise of its power of willing, is to say that it causes it by an act of the will or a volition; which brings us to the assumption of Edwards. Hence, if the language that “the will causes its own volitions” means any thing, it must mean what Edwards supposes it does. That is, if the will causes its volition, or rather, if the mind in the act of willing causes them, then they must be caused by volitions or acts of the will.

It is said, that “we do not know how any cause acts.” This is very true, when properly understood; but in the true sense of this maxim, Edwards has not undertaken to explain how a cause acts; nor has he made any assumption as to how it acts. The term cause has a variety of meanings; and it is frequently applied with extreme vagueness and want of precision. What is the cause of an effect? – of the motion of the hand, for example? It is the mind, says one; it is the will, says another; it is a volition, replies a third. Now here are three distinct things, – the mind, the will, and the volition; and yet each is said to be the cause of the same identical effect. This diversity of expression may do very well in popular discourse, but it must be laid aside whenever philosophical precision is required.

What is then, really and properly speaking, the cause of the motion in question? It is neither the mind, nor the will; for these might both exist, and yet no such effect result from them. A mind, or a will, that lies still and does not act, is the cause of no effect. If we would speak with philosophical precision, then, we should say that the act of the mind is the cause of the effect in question. The idea of a cause, in the strict and proper sense of the term, is that from which the effect immediately and necessarily flows. Now the motion of the hand is not necessarily connected with the mind itself; for if the mind were to lie still and not act, no such effect would follow. It is with the act of the mind that the effect in question is connected as with its efficient cause. It is the act of the mind which implies the motion of the hand, and that is implied by it; and hence, it is the act of the mind, or the volition, that is properly said to be the cause of such motion. For cause and effect, are said to imply each other.

Now Edwards has not pretended to say how a volition acts upon the external part of our being; if he had done so, he would have been justly obnoxious to the charge of presuming to know how a cause acts, in the proper sense of the word; but he has done no such thing. The connexion between cause and effect, in the proper sense of the terms, he has left enveloped in profound mystery. He has not presumed to say how an act, or cause, properly so called, produces its corresponding effect.

He does not assume to know how a cause acts; but how what is sometimes called a cause really becomes such. The will may be called a cause, if you please; but, in reality, unless it acts, it is the cause of no effect; and even then, properly speaking, the act is the cause. He clearly saw that a will which lies still and does nothing, is the cause of no effect; and hence he stated the simple fact, that it must act in order to become a cause, or, which is the same thing, in order to produce an effect. And is not this perfectly self-evident? We do not know how the will acts, nor how its act produces a change in the external part of our being; but yet do we not certainly know, that a dormant will can do nothing, and that it must act in order to produce an effect. If this be to explain how a cause acts, I humbly conceive that we may do so with perfect propriety.

Indeed, all that is assumed by Edwards, has been conceded to him by most of his adversaries. Thus says Dr. West, as quoted by Edwards the younger, “No being can become a cause, i. e. an efficient, or that which produces an effect, but by first operating, acting, or energizing.” Here we are told, not how a cause acts, but how the mind becomes a cause, or the author of effects. This is all that Edwards takes for granted; and, for aught that I can see, he has done so with perfect propriety.

The same thing is conceded by Dr. Reid. “The change,” says he, “whether it be of thought, of will, or of motion, is the effect. Active power, therefore, is a quality in the cause, which enables it to produce the effect. And the exertion of that active power in producing the effect, is called action, agency, efficiency. In order to the production of any effect, there must be in the cause, not only power, but the exertion of that power.” – Essays on the Active Powers, p. 259. Here it is declared by Dr. Reid, that active power or the will must act, in order to produce an effect, whether the effect be in the mind itself, or out of the mind, whether it be “of thought, of will, or of motion.” This is all that Edwards assumes as the basis of his argument.

But the question is not so much what has been conceded, as what is true. Is it true, then, that if the will causes its own volitions, it can cause them only by preceding volitions? It is, as we have already seen, according to the common acceptation of the terms; for a dormant cause can produce no effect; it must act in order to produce effects. Edwards has truly said, that “if the will be determined, there is a determiner. This must be supposed to be intended even by those that say the will determines itself. If it be so, the will is both determiner and determined; it is a cause that acts and produces effects upon itself, and is the object of its own influence and action.” p. 19. Now, whatever may be the meaning of those who choose to affirm that the will determines itself, admitting that it is both determined and determiner; the conclusion of Edwards seems to be fairly drawn from the language in which their doctrine is expressed. To say the least, he fairly reduces the obvious meaning of their language to the absurdity of an infinite series of volitions.

If the phrase, that the will is determined by itself, has any meaning, it must mean, either that the will is made to act by a preceding act of the will, or that the will simply acts. If the meaning be, that the act or choice of the will is produced by a preceding act of the will, then is the inference of Edwards well drawn, and the self-determining power is involved in the aforesaid ad infinitum absurdity. But if the meaning be, that the will simply acts, why not present the idea in this its true and unambiguous form?

It is evident, that while the will remains inactive, it can produce no effect; it must act, in order to become the author of effects. The effect caused, and the causative act, are clearly distinct; the one produces the other. If the causative act is a volition, then we have an infinite series of volitions. And if it be not a volition, but some other effort of the mind, the same difficulty arises; for if it be necessary to suppose a preceding effort of the mind in order to account for a volition, it will be equally necessary to suppose the existence of another effort to account for that; and so on ad infinitum. And an infinite series of efforts is just as great an absurdity as an infinite series of volitions.

Now let us suppose that, in order to escape these difficulties, an advocate of the self-determining power should deny that there is any causative act of volition; but that volition is itself an act uncaused by any preceding act. According to this view, what does the self-determining power amount to? It amounts to just this, that the will itself acts, – a position which is as freely recognized by Edwards as it could possibly be by the warmest advocate of the self-determining power. If this be all that is meant by self-determination, why not state the simple fact that the will itself acts, in plain English, instead of going about to envelope it in a mist of words? If this be all that is meant, why not state the thing so that it may be acquiesced in by the necessitarian, instead of keeping up such a war of words? Indeed, it appears plain to me, that the assertion that the will is determined by itself, is either false doctrine, or else the language in which it is couched is not a clear and distinct expression of its own meaning. On either supposition, this mode of expression should be abandoned.

I have long been impressed with the conviction, that the self-determining power, as it is generally understood, is full of inconsistencies. While we hold this doctrine, we cannot with a good grace contend that the motive-determining power is involved in the absurdity of an infinite series of causes; for we ourselves are involved in it. Nor can we very well maintain that “a necessary agent is no agent at all;” for the necessitarian will reply, as he always does, that according to our own scheme, our actions are caused; and hence, if it be absurd to speak of a caused action, this is equally true, whether the cause be intrinsic or extrinsic. Moreover, if we should complain that, according to the necessitarian, the phenomena of the will are involved in the “mechanism of cause and effect,” he will be sure to reply, that the same thing is true according to our own scheme, inasmuch as we admit volition to be an effect, and place it under the dominion of an internal cause. These difficulties, as well as some others, have always encumbered the cause of free and accountable agency; just because it has been supposed to consist in the self-determining power of the will. We should, therefore, abandon this doctrine. If Clarke, and Price, and Reid, and West, have not been able to maintain it without running into such inconsistencies, it is high time it should be laid aside forever.

It has always been taken for granted that the will is determined. The use of this word clearly implies that the will is acted upon, either by the will itself, or by something else. It has been conceded, on all sides, that it is determined; and the only controversy has been, as to what is the determiner. It is determined by the strongest motive, says one; it is determined by itself, says another; and upon these two positions the combatants have arranged themselves. But behind all this controversy, there is a question which has not been agitated; and that is, whether the will is determined at all? For my part, I am firmly and fully persuaded that it is not, but that it simply determines. It is the “determiner,” but not the “determined.” It is never the object of its own determination. It acts, but there is no causative act, by which it is made to act. This position, I trust, has been made good in the preceding pages.

If we say that the will is determined by itself, this implies that it is determined in the passive voice, at the same time that it determines in the active voice; whereas, in reality, it is simply active, and not passive to the action of any thing, in its determinations. We should not say, then, that the mind is self-determined, but simply that it is self-active. On this ground we may securely rest in our opposition to the scheme of necessity. It can never be shown that it is involved in the absurdity of an endless series of causes; it will remain for the necessitarian alone to extricate himself from that absurdity. That the mind is self-active, I have already shown, by showing that it is absurd to suppose that an act of the mind is produced by the action of any thing upon it. It is right here, then, upon the self-activity of the human mind, that we take our stand, in order to plant the lever which shall heave the scheme of moral necessity from its foundations. It is right here that we find our stronghold; that we erect the bulwark and the fortifications of man’s free-agency, against which, as against a wall of adamant, all the shafts of the necessitarian will fall blunted to the earth, or else recoil with destructive force upon himself.