SECTION VIII.

REVIEW OF DR. WHITBY'S DISCOURSE OF THE FREEDOM OF THE WILL OF MAN.

WE next proceed to examine the opinions held on the opposite side of this controversy; and it will be found that there is greater difference in the character of the writers than in the opinions which they hold. Edwards, clear and accurate, like a hardy and skilful veteran, calmly secures his ground wherever he advances: Whitby, not less able, but incorrect and impetuous, forces his way through the thickest of the enemy, but is enveloped in smoke and confusion.Edwards is right, so far as he goes, but his view is partial, and is therefore as dangerous as error, in deriving practical conclusions: Whitby is right in his general principle, but overlooks the exceptions which, in some instances, are more numerous than the effects which follow the general law. The practical conclusion drawn from the doctrine of the one, denies moral obligation, and hence implicitly the truth of all religion the conclusion from that of the

other subverts the peculiar doctrines of Christianity, in which consists all its excellency. Thus the result has been, what has not been unusual among theological controversialists, in their hardy zeal to defend truth, they have cruelly strangled her between them. The correctness of these remarks we shall presently ascertain.

Dr. Whitby, in his Discourse of the Freedom of the Will, attempts to establish his principle of liberty, by general arguments, without entering deeply into the metaphysics of his subject. He derives his evidence from three sources : the testimony of the sacred Scriptures, general reasonings from admitted truths, and the writings of the fathers of the Christian church. It is not the intention to pursue his reasonings through the mass of evidence of this sort which he brings forward, but to take up his principal conclusions, and examine them on the principles of mental philosophy, and ascertain how far they are consistent with the pheno mena of the human mind, which, as the work of God, is not, when candidly interrogated, less correct in the statement of facts than his word.

If the object of this discourse be considered, as it certainly seems intended, to prove the reality of that moral freedom which is peculiar to man, the Doctor has completely succeeded in his design, and has done just what we have attempted to do in the Second Section of the present Es

say. He is chargeable, indeed, with a number of inaccuracies in point of philosophy, as Edwards has shown, and does not always observe the distinction between animal and moral freedom, but occasionally says of the one what can be truly affirmed only of the other; and, hence, while he defines a liberty which is nowhere to be found but in the imagination of the writer, he brings forward a text to prove another, and reasons from it as if it were a third. In no writer do we more sensibly feel the absence of correct definition, and perceive the justness of the sarcastic remark of Luther, respecting writers of this sort. "It is not enough," says he, "to say there is a power, there is a power, (as they are perpetually repeating), there is a power of free will; for what is more easily uttered; nor is this the practice of the most learned and distinguished philosopher of all ages; but, to use the words of a German proverb, let them name the child, let them define what this power is, -its effects, its susceptibilities, it properties.* By the want of correct definition, and by not always attending to the definitions which he has given us, the Doctor has been led into all the

* Non enim satis est dicere, est vis, est vis, est vis, quædam liberi arbitrii; quid enim dicitur facilius? Nec hoc virorum eruditissimorum et sanctissimorum tot saeculis approbatorum. Sed nominandus est infans, ut aiunt Germanico proverbio,-definiendum est quæ sit illa vis, quid faciat, quid patiatur, quid accidat.— De Servo Arbitrio.

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inconsistencies which his work exhibits. mistakes, however, as he has committed, are not peculiar to one side of the question, and might have been expected from an author who, though he clearly saw the consequences of one view of his subject, was unacquainted with the subject itself. Notwithstanding all his inconsistencies, his general reasonings remain unaffected, and are perfectly conclusive in confutation of that necessity, which, as he justly conceived, leads directly to fatalism; and he is well entitled, therefore, to the gratitude of every friend of Christianity, for having so ably and successfully maintained at once the true dignity of a moral being, and the ground of his moral obligation.

The foundation of his arguments, as well as the principal mistake into which he falls, is stated as follows: "Again what makes the will choose, is something approved by the understanding, and consequently appearing to the soul as good; and whatsoever it refuseth is something represented to the understanding, and so appearing to the will, as evil. * * Wherefore, to say that evidence proposed, apprehended, and considered, is not sufficient to make the understanding to approve, or that the greatest good proposed, the greatest evil threatened, when equally believed and reflected on, is not sufficient to engage the will to choose the good and refuse the evil, is in effect to say, that which alone doth move the

will to choose or to refuse is not sufficient to engage it so to do-that which alone is requisite to make one understand and approve is not sufficient to do so, which being contradictory to it, self, must of necessity be false."*

There are in this passage, evidently two distinct questions blended together, on the separation of which the whole question of moral liberty or necessity depends. They are the mode in which the assent or approbation of the understanding is obtained, and that in which the will is determined. With respect to the former, there is no difference of opinion. Evidence considered and apprehended is universally sufficient to make the understanding to approve; and it were a contradiction in terms to affirm, that a man apprehends the evidence of a truth which yet he does not believe to be true.

With respect to the second question, as a general principle, the Doctor is also right. In the present condition of man, it is the general law of mind, that the perception of the greatest good or evil determines the will; and were men perfect beings, it would no doubt be the universal law of their intellectual nature. That it is not so however in point of fact, we trust we made sufficiently evident in the Fourth Section. was there shown in what respect the understand

*Discourse of Sufficient and Effectual Grace, chap. I. § 3.

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