Now let us endeavour to escape from this accusation. For this purpose, let us assume the directly opposite position: let us deny that our volitions are produced by preceding acts of choice—and what then? Are we out of danger? Far from it. We are still convicted of the dreaded doctrine of necessity. On the very supposition we have made, diametrically opposite as it is to the former, we are still convicted of the same doctrine of necessity. We cannot escape from it. It pursues us, like a ghost, through the dark and ill-defined shadows of an ambiguous phraseology, and lays its cold hand upon us. Turn wheresoever we may, it is sure to meet us in some shape or other.
This is not all. We are also convicted of a contradiction in terms. It is shown, that we hold an act to be “both necessary and not necessary.” This may appear to be an exceedingly grave charge; and yet I think we may venture to put in the plea of “guilty.” We do hold an act to be necessary, as to the strongest motive, as well as to any preceding act of choice, by which we contend it is not produced, and by which it cannot be prevented. We likewise most freely admit, that many volitions are necessary in other senses of the word, as explained by President Edwards. We cannot deny this, so long as we retain our senses; for “a thing is said to be necessary,” according to him, “when it has already come to pass, and so made sure of its existence; and it is likewise said to be necessary, when its present existence, is certainly and infallibly known, as well as when its future existence is certainly and infallibly foreknown. But yet we deny, that an act of volition is necessary, in the sense that it is produced by the operation of the strongest motive, as it is called. That is to say, we admit an act of choice to be necessary, in some senses of the word; and, in another sense of it, we deny it to be necessary.” Is there any thing very contradictory in all this? Any thing to shock the common sense and reason of mankind?
It may be said, that Edwards does not always endeavour to establish the doctrine of moral necessity; that he frequently aims merely to show, that our actions are “not without all necessity.” This is unquestionably true. He frequently arrives at this conclusion; and he seems to think that he has done something, whenever he has shown our actions to be necessary in any sense of the word as defined by himself. But it is difficult to conceive with whom he could have had any controversy. For certainly no one in his right mind, could pretend to deny that human actions are necessary in any sense, as the word is explained and used in the Inquiry. When it is said, for example, that the truth of the proposition which affirms the future existence of an event, is necessarily connected with the idea that that event is certainly and infallibly foreknown; no one, in his right mind, can deny the position. Such a denial, as Edwards says, involves a contradiction in terms. Hence, this notion of necessity only requires to be stated and understood, in order to rivet irresistible conviction on the mind of every rational being. No light has been thrown upon it, by the pages which President Edwards has devoted to the subject; nor could a thousand volumes render it one whit clearer than it is in itself. Hence, the author of the Inquiry should have seen, that if there was any controversy with him on this point, it was not because there was any diversity of opinion; but because there was a misconception of his proposition. And no doubt he would have seen this, if the meaning of his own language had been clearly defined in his own mind: if he had marked out and circumscribed, as with a sunbeam, the precise limitation within which his own propositions are true, and beyond which they are false.
If he had done this, he would have seen that there was, and that there could have been, but one real point of difference between himself and his adversaries. He would have seen, that, aside from the ambiguities of language, there was but one real point in dispute. He would have seen, that it was affirmed, on the one side, that the strongest motive operates to produce a choice; and that this was denied on the other. And hence, he would have put forth his whole strength to establish this single point, to fortify this single doctrine of moral necessity. He would not have crowded so many different ideas into the definition of the term necessity; and then imagined that he was overwhelming and confounding his adversaries, when he was only showing that human “actions are not without all necessity.” And when they said, that “a necessary action is a contradiction,” he would have seen how they used the term necessary; and he would not have concluded, as he has done, that this “notion of action implies contingence, and excludes all necessity,” p. 199. He would have seen, that the idea of an action, in our view, is inconsistent with necessity, in one sense of the word; and yet not inconsistent with every thing that has been called necessity.
In the definition of President Edwards, there is an inherent and radical defect, which I have not as yet noticed; and which is, indeed, the source of all his vacillating on this subject. It proceeds from a very common error, which has been well explained and illustrated by Mr. Stewart in his Essay on the Beautiful.
The various theories, which ingenious men have framed in relation to the beautiful, says Mr. Stewart, “have originated in a prejudice, which has descended to modern times from the scholastic ages; that when a word admits of a variety of significations, these different significations must all be species of the same genus; and must consequently include some essential idea common to every individual to which the generic term can be applied.”
The question of Aristippas, “how can beauty differ from beauty,” says Mr. Stewart, “plainly proceeded on a total misconception of the nature of the circumstances; which, in the history of language, attach different meanings to the same word; and which by slow and insensible gradations, remove them to such a distance from their primitive or radical sense, that no ingenuity can trace the successive steps of their progress. The variety of these circumstances is, in fact, so great, that it is impossible to attempt a complete enumeration of them; and I shall, therefore, select a few of the cases, in which the principle now in question appears most obviously and indisputably to fail.”
“I shall begin with supposing, that the letters A, B, C, D, E, denote a series of objects; that A possesses some quality in common with B; B a quality in common with C; C a quality in common with D; D a quality in common with E;—while at the same time, no quality can be found which belongs in common to any three objects in the series. Is it not conceivable, that the affinity between A and B may produce a transference of the name of the first to the second; and that, in consequence of the other affinities which connect the remaining objects together, the same name may pass in succession from B to C; from C to D; and from D to E?”
This idea, and the reasoning which Mr. Stewart has founded upon it, are at once obvious, original and profound. It shows that the most gifted philosophers, have not been able to frame a satisfactory theory of the beautiful, because they have proceeded on the false supposition, that all those objects which are called beautiful have some common property, merely because they have a common appellation, by which they are distinguished from other objects; and that in endeavouring to point out and define this common property, they have engaged in an impracticable attempt; and hence they have succeeded to their own satisfaction, only by doing violence to the nature of things.
This is a fruitful idea. It admits of many illustrations. I shall select only a few. Philosophers and jurists have frequently attempted to define executive power; but they have proceeded on the supposition, that all those powers called executive, have a common and distinguishing property, because they have a common name. Hence, they have necessarily failed; because the supposition on which they have proceeded is false. Executive power, properly so called, is that which sees to the execution of the laws; and other powers are called executive, not because they partake of the nature of such powers, but simply because they have been conferred upon the chief executive magistrate.