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This assumption comes with a peculiarly ill grace from the necessitarian. He should be the last man to contend, that God cannot foresee future events unless they are involved in known producing causes; just as all that we know of the future is ascertained by reasoning from known causes to effects. For he contends that with God, “there is no time”; but that to His view all things are seen as if they were present. His knowledge is without succession, and there is no before nor after with him; all things are intimately present to his mind from all eternity. Such is the doctrine of both the Edwardses; and Dr. Dick believes, that “God sees all things at a glance.”

Now, present things are not known to exist, because they are implied by known causes, but because they are present and seen. And hence, if God sees all things as present, there is not the shadow of a foundation whereon to rest the proof of “moral necessity” from his foreknowledge. It is all taken away by their own doctrine, and their argument is left without the least support from it.

Indeed, there is no need of lugging the foreknowledge of God into the present controversy, except it be to deceive the mind. For all future events will certainly and infallibly come to pass, whether they are foreknown or not; and foreknowledge cannot make the matter any more certain than it is without it. We may say that God foreknows all things, and we may mix this up with all possible propositions; but this will never help the conclusion, that “all future things will certainly and infallibly come to pass.” If God should cease to foreknow all future volitions, or if he had never foreknown them, they would, nevertheless, just as certainly and infallibly come to pass, as if he had foreknown them from all eternity. The bare naked fact, that they are future infers all that is implied in God’s foreknowledge of them; and it is just as much a contradiction in terms, to say that what is future will not come to pass, as it is to say, that what God foreknows will never take place. Hence, by bringing in the prescience of Deity, we do not really strengthen or add to the conclusion in favour of necessity. It only furnishes a very convenient and plausible method of begging the question, or of seeming to prove something by hiding our sophisms in the blaze of the divine attributes. It only serves as a veil, behind which is concealed those sophistical tricks, by which both the performer and the spectator are deceived. This whole argument from the foreknowledge of God, is, indeed, a grand specimen of undesigned metaphysical jugglery, by which the mind is called off in one direction, whilst it is deceived, perplexed, and confounded, by not seeing what takes place in another.

It appears from these things, that those persons who have endeavoured to clear up this matter, by supposing that some things are not foreknown to God; have only got rid of one of the divine attributes, and not of their difficulty. It appears also, that Edwards might have made his argument far more simple and direct, by leaving out the long section in which he proves that God really foreknows all future things; and confining himself to the simple proposition, “that all future events will certainly and infallibly come to pass;” that “it is a contradiction in terms to say that a thing is future and yet that it will not come to pass”; or, in other words, “if a thing is future, it is impossible it should be otherwise than true,” that it will come to pass. And how unreasonable are those, who have imagined that we are free-agents, because God has chosen not to foresee our free actions; as if the supposition that he might have foreseen them, does not infer necessity just as much as the fact that he does foresee them. Indeed, these reasoners seem to have expected to see one truth, by shutting their eyes upon another!

Mr. Hobbes has an argument to prove necessity, precisely like that of Edwards, except that its nakedness is not covered up with the foreknowledge of God. “Let the case be put,” says he, “of the weather: ‘tis necessary that to-morrow it shall rain or not rain. If, therefore, it be not necessary that it shall rain, it is necessary it shall not rain; otherwise there is no necessity that the proposition, it shall rain or not rain, should be true.” This sophism confounds the axiomatical necessity referred to in the premise, that it must rain or not rain, with the causal necessity intended to be deduced from it in the conclusion. This poor sophism has been adopted by Mr. Locke, and seriously employed to prove that human volitions “cannot be free.” Thus, says he, “It is unavoidably necessary to prefer the doing or forbearance of an action in a man’s power, which is once proposed to a man’s thoughts. The act of volition or preferring one of the two, being that, which he cannot avoid, a man in respect of that act of willing is under necessity.” Here we have precisely the same confusion of an axiomatical with a causal necessity, that occurs in the argument of Mr. Hobbes. And yet, the younger Edwards has deemed this argument of Mr. Locke as worthy of his special notice and commendation; and President Day falls in with the same idea, alleging that “we will because we cannot avoid willing,” because we must either choose or refuse. Is it not wonderful, that these philosophers should have imagined, that they had any controversy with any one, in contending so manfully that the mind, under certain circumstances, must either choose or refuse? or that they could infer any thing from this, in favour of a causal necessity – the only question in dispute? With what clearness! with what force! would President Edwards have dashed this poor flimsy sophism into a thousand atoms, if he had come across it in the atheism of Hobbes! But, unfortunately, he came across it in a different direction; and hence, he has rescued it from the loathsome dunghill of atheistical trash, invested it with dignity, seeming to clothe it in the solemn sanction of religion, by covering it up in the ample folds of the divine Omniscience.

This, then, is the conclusion of the whole matter. The prescience of God does not make our volitions necessary; it only proves them to be certain. This is conceded by Edwards. It proves them to be certain, just as present knowledge proves them to be certain. This also is admitted by Edwards. But present knowledge proves an act of the mind to be certain, because it is infallibly connected with that knowledge, and not because it is necessitated by the influence of a cause. It proves it to be certain, because it is impossible for a volition, or any thing else, not to exist at the time of its existence, and not because it is impossible for it to come to pass without being necessitated. In short, it proves an axiomatical and a logical necessity, but not a causal necessity; that is to say, it proves nothing to the point in dispute.

The necessitarian can connect his conclusion with the thing he has undertaken to prove, in only one of two ways: he may say, that if an event is certain, it cannot come into existence without a producing cause; or he may allege, that God cannot foresee them, unless he is determined to bring them to pass. If he takes the former position, he really discards the argument from foreknowledge, and returns for support to the old argument, that every effect must have a cause. And if he assumes the latter, maintaining that God cannot foreknow future events unless he reasons from producing causes to effects, he builds his argument, not upon foreknowledge alone, but upon this in connection with a most unwarrantable flight of presumption, without which the argument from prescience is good for nothing.

And besides, the bringing in of the divine prescience, only serves to blind, and not to illuminate. For God foreknows only what is future; and all future things will come to pass just as infallibly, without being foreknown, as they will with it. If we assume them to be future, it is just as much a contradiction to deny that they will come to pass; as it is to assume that they are foreknown and yet deny it. Nothing can be proved in this way, except what is assumed or taken for granted; and the foreknowledge of God is only a plausible way of begging the question, or concealing a sophism.

In conclusion, the necessitarian takes the wrong course in his inquiries, and lays his premises in the dark. To illustrate this point: – I know that I act; and hence, I conclude that God foreknew that I would act. And again, I know that my act is not necessitated, that it does necessarily proceed from the action, or influence of causes; and hence, I conclude that God foreknew that I would thus act freely, in precisely this manner, and not otherwise. Thus, I reason from what I know to what I do not know, from my knowledge of the actual world as it is, up to God’s foreknowledge respecting it.

The necessitarian pursues the opposite course. He reasons from what he does not know, that is, from the particulars of the divine foreknowledge, about which he absolutely knows nothing a priori, down to the facts of the actual world. Thus, quitting the light which shines so brightly within us and around us, he seeks for light in the midst of impenetrable darkness. He endeavours to determine the phenomena of the world, not by looking at them and seeing what they are; but by deducing conclusions from God’s infinite foreknowledge respecting them!

In doing this, a grand illusion is practised, by his merely supposing that the volitions themselves are foreknown, without taking into the supposition the whole of the case, and recollecting that God not only foresees all our actions, but also all about them. For if this were done, if it were remembered that He not only foresees that our volitions will come to pass, but also how they will come to pass; the necessitarian would see, that nothing could be proved in this way except what is first tacitly assumed. The grand illusion would vanish, and it would be clearly seen, that if the argument from foreknowledge proves any thing, it just as well proves the necessity of freedom as any thing else.

Indeed, it does seem to me, that it is one of the most wonderful phenomena in the history of the human mind, that, in reasoning about facts in relation to which the most direct and palpable sources of evidence are open before us, so many of its brightest ornaments should so long have endeavoured to draw conclusions from “the dark unknown” of God’s foreknowledge; without perceiving that this is to reject the true method, to invert the true order of inquiry, and to involve the inquirer in all the darkness and confusion inseparable therefrom: without perceiving that no powers, however great, that no genius, however exalted, can possibly extort from such a method any thing but the dark, and confused, and perplexing exhibitions of an ingenious logomachy.

SECTION XII.
OF EDWARDS’ USE OF THE TERM NECESSITY

In 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 than the full and fixed connexion between the things signified by the subject and predicate of a proposition, which affirms something to be true. When there is such a connexion, then the thing affirmed in the proposition is necessary, in a philosophical sense, whether any opposition or contrary effort be supposed or no. When the subject and predicate of the proposition, which affirms the existence of any thing, either substance, quality, act, or circumstance, have a full and certain connexion, then the existence or being of that thing is said to be necessary in a metaphysical sense. And in this sense I use the word Necessity, in the following discourse, when I endeavour to prove that Necessity is not inconsistent with Liberty.”

“The subject and predicate of a proposition, which affirms existence of something, may have a full, fixed, and certain connexion several ways.”

“1. They may have a full and perfect connexion in and of themselves; because it may imply a contradiction, or gross absurdity, to suppose them not connected. Thus many things are necessary in their own nature. So the eternal existence of being, generally considered, is necessary in itself; because it would be in itself the greatest absurdity, to deny the existence of being in general, or to say there was absolute and universal nothing; and as it were the sum of all contradictions; as might be shown, if this were the proper place for it. So God’s infinity, and other attributes are necessary. So it is necessary in its own nature, that two and two should be four; and it is necessary, that all right lines drawn from the centre to the circumference should be equal. It is necessary, fit, and suitable, that men should do to others, as they would that they should do to them. So innumerable metaphysical and mathematical truths are necessary in themselves; the subject and predicate of the proposition which affirms them, are perfectly connected of themselves.”

“2. The connexion of the subject and predicate of a proposition, which affirms the existence of something, may be fixed and made certain, because the existence of that thing is already come to pass; and either now is, or has been; and so has, as it were, made sure of existence. And therefore, the proposition which affirms present or past existence of it, may by this means, be made certain, and necessarily and unalterably true; the past event has fixed and decided the matter, as to its existence; and has made it impossible but that existence should be truly predicated of it. Thus the existence of whatever is already come to pass, is now become necessary; it is become impossible it should be otherwise than true, that such a thing has been.”

“3. The subject and predicate of a proposition which affirms something to be, may have a real and certain connexion consequentially; and so the existence of the thing may be consequentially necessary, as it may be surely and firmly connected with something else, that is necessary in one of the former respects. As it is either fully and thoroughly connected with that which is absolutely necessary in its own nature; or with something which has already made sure of its existence. This necessity lies in, and may be explained by, the connexion between two or more propositions, one with another. Things which are perfectly connected with other things that are necessary, are necessary themselves, by a necessity of consequence.”

After having defined what he means by philosophical or metaphysical necessity, he tells us, that this is the sense in which he uses the word, when he endeavours to show that necessity is not inconsistent with liberty. And yet under “this sense,” how many totally distinct ideas are embraced! The eternal existence of being in general; the attributes of God; the proposition that two and two are four; the equality of the radii of a circle; the moral duty that we should do as we would be done by; the existence of a thing which has already come to pass; the existence of things, that are connected with that which is absolutely necessary in itself, or with something that has already made sure of its existence; the connexion of two or more propositions with each other – all these things are included in his definition of philosophical necessity! And yet he tells us, that he uses the term in this sense (in what sense?) when he undertakes to reconcile liberty with necessity! When he says, that he employs the word in this sense, one would suppose that, as a great metaphysician, he referred to some one of its precise and definite significations; but no such thing. He merely refers to its philosophical sense, which, according to his own explanation, embraces a multitude of different ideas. Hence, although he may keep close to this philosophical sense of the word, “in the ensuing discourse;” yet he may, before the discourse is concluded, shift his position a thousand times from one of these ideas to another. And he may always seem, to superficial observers, to speak of the same thing; because although the things spoken of are really different, they are all drawn together under one definition, and called by one name. He not only may have done this; he actually has done it. And if he had formed the express design to envelope the whole subject in a cloud of sophistry, he could not have taken a better course to accomplish his object.

It was the design of the Inquiry to establish the doctrine of moral necessity; and hence it was incumbent on President Edwards to reconcile this kind of necessity, and not philosophical necessity, with the free-agency of man. He contends that there is a necessary connexion between the influence of motives and volitions. This he calls moral necessity. It differs from natural necessity, says he, it differs from the necessary connexion between cause and effect; but yet, he expressly tells us, that this difference “does not lie so much in the nature of the connexion, as in the terms connected.” In both cases, he maintains, the connexion is necessary and absolute. The two terms connected are different; but the kind and nature of the connexion is the same. This is the kind of necessity for which he pleads; and we can never be satisfied with his scheme, until the term shall be used in this precise and definite sense, and the doctrine it expresses shall be shown to be consistent with the true idea and feeling of liberty in the human breast. It will not, it cannot satisfy the mind, that any other kind of necessity is reconcilable with liberty; while it remains to be shown that moral necessity, as it is defined and explained in the Inquiry, is consistent with the free-agency of man.

There is one sense of the term in question, says he, “which especially belongs to the controversy about acts of the will,” p. 30. It is what he calls “a necessity of consequence.” This would be very true, if he merely meant by a necessity of consequence, to refer to the necessary connexion between cause and effect. But this is not his meaning; for he expressly says, that “a necessity of consequence” “lies in, and may be explained by, the connexion of two or more propositions one with another.” Now what has the connexion between any two or all the propositions in the universe, to do with the controversy about acts of the will? Is it not evident, that it is the connexion which subsists between effects and their producing causes, and which is supposed to subsist between motives and actions, that has to do with the controversy in question; and that the connexion which subsists between two or more propositions is entirely foreign to the subject?

It may be said, that by “a necessity of consequence,” Edwards referred not only to the connexion between two or more propositions, but also to the connexion between cause and effect. This is undoubtedly true; for he speaks of effects as coming to pass by this kind of necessity. But then it is to be lamented that two ideas, which are so perfectly distinct, should have been couched under the same mode of expression, and treated as if they were identically the same. Such a confounding of different ideas, has led to no little confusion and error in the reasoning of President Edwards.

The subject of the last section furnishes a striking illustration of the justness of this remark. From the proposition that a volition is certainly and infallibly foreknown, it follows, by a necessity of consequence, that it will come to pass. This is an instance of the necessary connexion between two ideas or propositions; between the idea or proposition, that a certain volition is foreknown, and the idea that it will come to pass; between the proposition which affirms that, it is foreknown, and the idea that it will come to pass in other words, the proposition which affirms that it is foreknown, necessarily assumes that it will come to pass; and to deny this assumption, at the same time that we make it, is surely to be guilty of a contradiction in terms. To suppose that a volition will not come to pass, is inconsistent with the proposition that it is certainly and infallibly foreknown. Edwards himself has frequently declared that this is the kind of necessity which is inferred from foreknowledge.

In truth, the necessary connexion which exists between the idea that a thing is foreknown, and the truth of the proposition which predicates future existence of it, is perfectly distinct from the necessary connexion between cause and effect. They are as widely different, as the connexion between any two propositions in Euclid is from the connexion between the motion of a ball and the force by which it is put in motion. Hence, the kind of necessity which is involved in the idea of foreknowledge, has nothing to do with the controversy about acts of the will.

There is, in like manner, a necessary connexion between the idea that a volition is now certainly and infallibly known to exist, and the truth of the proposition which affirms present existence of it; and hence, its present existence is necessary, by “a necessity of consequence,” according to the definition of President Edwards. But all this has no relevancy to the question, as to how that volition came to pass. Its present existence is necessarily connected with the idea that it is certainly known to exist; but this is “a necessity of consequence” which “lies in, and may be explained by, the connexion between two or more propositions.” It is not “a necessity of consequence” that lies in, or can be explained by, the connexion between cause and effect. The two things are entirely different, and it is strange, that they should always have been confounded by President Edwards. I do most certainly and infallibly know, for example, that I am now willing to write; and from this knowledge, it necessarily follows, that I am now willing to write. But if any one should infer from hence, that I am necessitated to write, by the operation of some cause, we should certainly think his inference very badly drawn. Yet this is precisely the way in which the necessitarian proceeds, when he infers the necessity of human actions from the foreknowledge of God. He confounds the necessary connexion between two propositions, with the necessary connexion between cause and effect. This single ambiguity has been a mighty instrument in the building up of that portentous scheme of necessity, which has seemed to overshadow the glory and beauty of man’s nature as a free and accountable being.

This is not the only ambiguity of the term in question which has been turned to account by the necessitarian. In opposition to the scheme of moral necessity, or the necessary connexion between volitions and the influence of motives, it has been said, that volitions are produced neither by motives, nor by preceding acts of choice. This is a direct denial of the doctrine of moral necessity, of the only thing which we are at all concerned to deny. We may thus attempt to escape from the thing, but the name still pursues us.

For, to this view of the subject, President Edwards replies as follows: “If any shall see cause to deny this, and say they hold no such thing as that every action is chosen or determined by a foregoing choice; but that the very first exertion of will only, undetermined by any preceding act, is properly called action; then I say, such a man’s notion of action implies necessity; for what the mind is the subject of, without the determination of its own previous choice, it is the subject of necessarily, as to any hand that free choice has in the affair; and without any ability the mind has to prevent it, by any will or election of its own; because by the supposition it precludes all previous acts of the will or choice in the case, which might prevent it. So that it is again, in this other way, implied in the notion of an act, that, it is both necessary and not necessary,” p. 199. It is in this manner, that President Edwards disposes of this important view of the subject of free-agency. Let us examine his logic.

In the first place, the argument is not sound. It proceeds on the supposition, that unless a volition is produced, it cannot be prevented, by a preceding act of volition. This is a false supposition. I choose, for example, to go out at one of the doors of my room. This choice is not produced by any preceding act of choice. And yet I can certainly prevent it, by choosing to go out at the other door of the room, or by choosing to sit still. Thus one act of choice may, from the very nature of things, necessarily exclude or prevent another act of choice; although it could not possibly have produced that other act of choice.

But suppose the argument to be sound, what does it prove? It proves our actions to be necessary; but in what sense? Does it show them to be subject to that moral necessity, for which Edwards contends, and against which we protest? This is the question, let me repeat, which we have undertaken to discuss; and if we would not wander in an eternal maze of words, we must keep to it; it is the talisman which is to conduct us out of all our difficulties and perplexities. It is the first point, and the second point, and the third point in logic, to keep to the issue, steadily, constantly, and without the least shadow of turning. Otherwise we shall lose ourselves in a labyrinth of words, in darkness and confusion interminable.

In what sense, then, does the above argument, supposing it to be sound, prove our actions to be necessary? Does it prove them to be necessary with a moral necessity? It does not. According to the argument in question, volitions are necessary, “as to any hand free choice has in the affair; because by the supposition it precludes all previous acts of the will or choice in the case, which might prevent them.” That is to say, volitions are necessary as to previous acts of choice; because by the supposition previous acts of choice do not produce them, and consequently cannot prevent them. This is the argument.

Now, it is very true, that this is not an unheard of use of the term in question. We say a thing is necessary, when it is dependent upon no cause for its existence. Thus the existence of the Supreme Being is said to be necessary, because he is the uncaused Cause of all things. As he owes his existence to nothing, so there is nothing capable of destroying it. He is independent of all causes; and hence, his existence is said to be necessary.

In like manner, a thing may be said to be necessary as to any other particular thing, upon which it does not depend for its existence. As the Supreme Being is said to be necessary as to all things, because his existence depends upon nothing; so any created object may be said to be necessary, as to the influence of any other object, to which it does not owe its existence, and upon which its existence does not depend. It is in this sense that our volitions are shown to be necessary by the above argument of President Edwards. A volition “is necessary as to any hand free choice has in the affair; because by the supposition it preclude all previous acts of the will or choice in the case, which might prevent it.” That is to say, it is necessary as to preceding acts of choice; because, by the supposition, it is wholly independent of preceding acts of choice for its existence.

Now, in so far as the doctrine of moral necessity is concerned, this argument amounts to just exactly nothing. For although a volition may be necessary as to one particular cause, in consequence of its being wholly independent of that cause; it does not follow that it is necessarily produced by another cause. Because it does not result from any preceding act of volition, and consequently is necessary as to any hand that preceding act of volition had in the affair, it does not follow, that the “strongest motive” produces it. Supposing a volition to be independent of all causes, as well as of preceding acts of choice; and then it would be necessary, in the same sense, as to all causes, as well as to preceding acts of choice. But how infinitely absurd would it be to conclude, that because a volition is independent of the influence of all causes, it is therefore necessarily connected with the influence of a particular cause!

We only deny that volitions are necessarily connected with the “power,” or “influence,” or “action,” of motives or moral causes. This is the only kind of necessity against which, as the advocates of free-agency, we are at all concerned to contend. And it is worse than idle for the necessitarian to endeavour to establish any other kind of necessity beside this. Let him come directly to the point, and keep to it, if he would hope to accomplish any thing. This shifting backwards and forwards from one meaning of an ambiguous term to another; this showing a volition to be necessary in one sense, and then tacitly assuming it to be necessary in another sense; is not the way to silence and refute the adversaries of the doctrine of moral necessity. It may show, (supposing the argument to be sound,) that a volition is necessary as to a particular cause, on the supposition that it is not produced by that cause; and in the same manner, it might be shown, that a volition is necessary as to all causes, on the supposition that it is produced by no cause. But the necessity which results from such a supposition, would be directly arrayed against the necessity for which President Edwards contends. In the same sense, volitions “are necessary as to any hand motives have in the affair,” on the supposition that they do not result from the influence of motives; but instead of building on this kind of necessity, one would have supposed that President Edwards was somewhat concerned in its destruction.