It is worse than a waste of time, it is a grievous offence against the cause of truth, to undertake to refute an author without having taken pains to understand exactly what he teaches. In every discussion, the first thing to be settled is the point in dispute; and if this be omitted, the controversy must needs degenerate into a mere idle logomachy. It seldom happens that any thing affords so much satisfaction, or throws so much light on a controversy, as to have the point at issue clearly made

W e have already seen that Edwards must be understood as holding motive to be the cause of volition; but still we cannot make up the issue with him, until we have ascertained in what sense he employs the term cause . It has been contended, by high authority, that he did not regard motive as the efficient, or producing cause of volition, but only as the occasion or condition on which volition is produced. Hence, it becomes necessary to examine this point, and to settle the meaning of the author,

T he great doctrine of the Inquiry seems to go round in a vicious circle, to run into an insignificant truism. This is a grave charge, I am aware, and I have ventured to make it only after the most mature reflection: and the justness of it, may be shown by a variety of considerations. In the first place, when we ask, “what determines the will?” the author replies, “it is the strongest motive;” and yet, according to his definition, the strongest motive is that which determines the will. Thus, say

T he argument of the Inquiry, as I have shown, assumes that a volition is an effect in the proper sense of the word; that it is the correlative of an efficient cause. If it were necessary, this point might be established by a great variety of additional considerations; but, I presume that every candid reader of the Inquiry is fully satisfied in relation to it. If we mean by an effect, every thing that comes to pass, of course a volition is an effect; for no one can deny that it comes to pass. Or

I t has been frequently conceded that a volition is an effect; but to make this concession, without explanation or qualification, is to surrender the whole cause of free agency into the hand of the enemy. For if a volition is an effect, properly speaking, the only question is as to its efficient cause: it is necessarily produced by its cause. To make this matter clear, let us consider what is precisely meant by the term cause when it is thus used? An effect is necessarily connected, not with the

I n a former section, I referred to some of the false assumptions which have been incautiously conceded to the necessitarian, and in which he has laid the foundations of his system; but I have not, as yet, alluded to the argument or deduction in which he is accustomed to triumph. This argument, strange as it may seem, is a deduction, not from any principle or general fact which has been ascertained by observation or experience, but from a self-evident and universal truth. That every effect must

I n the last section I considered the application of the maxim, “that every effect must have a cause,” to the question of necessity. This maxim figures so largely in every scheme of necessity, and it is relied upon with so much confidence, that I shall present some further views respecting its true nature and application. The necessitarian may see the truth of this maxim clearly, but he applies it vaguely. He is always saying, “that if we give up this great principle of common sense, then there

I t is well known that Edwards confounds the sensitive part of our nature with the will, the susceptibility by which the mind feels with the power by which it acts. He expressly declares, that “the affections and the will are not two faculties of the soul;” and it is upon this confusion of things that much of his argument depends for its coherency. But although he thus expressly confounds them; yet he frequently speaks of them, in the course of his argument, as if they were two different faculti

I f , as I have endeavoured to show, the appetites and passions exert no positive influence in the production of volition, if they do not sustain the relation of cause to the acts of the will; then is the doctrine of the liberty of indifference placed in a clear and strong light having admitted that the sensitive part of our nature always tends to produce volition, and in some cases irresistibly produces it, the advocates of free agency have not been able to maintain the doctrine of a perfect li

T here are no two things in nature which are more perfectly distinct than action and passion; the one necessarily excludes the other. Thus, if an effect is produced in any thing, by the action or influence of something else, then is the thing in which the effect is produced wholly passive in regard to it. The effect itself is called passion or passiveness. It is not an act of that in which it is produced; it is an effect resulting wholly from that which produces it. To say that a thing acts then

T he argument from the foreknowledge of God, is one on which the necessitarian relies with great confidence. Nor is this at all surprising; since to so many minds, even among distinguished philosophers, the prescience of Deity and the free-agency of man have appeared to be irreconcilable. Thus, says Mr. Stewart, “I have mentioned the attempt of Clarke and others to show that no valid argument against the scheme of free-will can be deduced from the prescience of God, even supposing that to extend

I n the controversy concerning the will, nothing is of more importance, it will readily be admitted, than to guard against the influence of the ambiguity of words. Yet, it may be shown, that President Edwards has used the principal terms in this controversy in an exceedingly loose and indeterminate manner. This he has done especially in regard to the term necessity . His very definition prepares the way for such an abuse of language. “ Philosophical necessity ,” says he, “is really nothing else

I have already said many things bearing upon the famous distinction between natural and moral necessity; but this distinction is regarded as so important by its advocates, that it deserves a separate notice. This I shall proceed to give it. The distinction in question is treated with no great reverence by the advocates of free-agency. It is denounced by them as a distinction without a difference; and, though this may be true in the main, yet this is not the way to settle any thing. There is, ind

I t was not the design of Edwards, as it is well known, to interfere with the moral agency of man. He honestly believed that the scheme of necessity, as held by himself, was perfectly consistent with the doctrine of liberty; and he retorted upon his adversaries that it was their system, and not his, which struck at the foundation of moral agency and accountability. But however upright may have been his intentions, he has merely left us the name of liberty, while he has in reality denied to us it

I n 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

T he 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 whic

H aving shown, as I trust, that there is no influence whatever operating upon the mind to produce volition, I am now prepared to declare the true idea of a free-agent. A free-agent, then, is one who acts without being caused to act. Here the question arises, Is such a thing possible? Can any being act, without being caused to act? The answer to this question, depends upon the meaning which is attached to the very ambiguous term cause. If it means an efficient cause, or that which produces a thin

W hether our volitions come to pass in the manner we call freely, or are brought to pass by the operation of necessary causes, is a question of fact, which should be referred to the tribunal of consciousness. If we ever hope to settle this question, we must occasionally turn from the arena of dialectics, and unite our efforts in the cultivation of the much-neglected field of observation. We must turn from the dust and smoke of mere logical contention, and consult the living oracle within; we mus