A Review of Edwards's "Inquiry into the Freedom of the Will"

by Henry Philip Tappan

X. The sense of guilt and shame and the fear of retribution cannot, according to this system, have a real and necessary connexion with any volitions, but must be regarded as prejudices or errors of education, from which philosophy will serve to relieve us.

Edwards labours to prove, (part iv. sec. 1,) that virtue and vice lie essentially in the volitions themselves, and that of course the consciousness of evil volitions is the consciousness of guilt. I will, or put forth volitions. The volitions are mine, and therefore I am guilty. This reasoning is plausible, but not consequential; for, according to this system, I put forth volitions in entire passivity: the volitions appear necessarily and by Antecedent motives in my consciousness, and really are mine only because they are produced in me. Connected with this may be the perception that those volitions are wrong; but if there is likewise the conviction that they are necessary, and that to suppose them different from what they are, is to suppose what could not possibly have been,—since a series of sequents and antecedents connect these volitions which now appear, by absolutely necessary relations, with a first and necessary cause,—then the sense of guilt and shame, and the judgement I ought to be punished, can have no place in the human mind. It is of no avail to tell me that I will, and, according to the common judgement of mankind, I must be guilty when I will wrong,—if, at the same time, philosophy teaches me that I will under the necessary and inevitable governance of an antecedent motive. The common judgement of mankind is an error, and philosophy must soon dissipate the sense of guilt and shame, and of moral desert, which have hitherto annoyed me and made me fearful: and much more must such a result ensue, when I take into consideration, likewise, that the necessity which determines me, is a necessity which takes its rise in infinite and necessary wisdom.

What is true of guilt and retribution is true also of well-doing and reward. If I do well, the volitions being determined by an antecedent necessity, I could not possibly have done otherwise. It does not answer the conditions of the case at all, to say I might have done otherwise, if I had willed to do otherwise; because the will to do as I actually am doing, is a will that could not have been otherwise. Give me, then, in any action called good, great, noble, glorious, &c. the conviction that the choice of this action was a necessary choice, predetermined in a long and unbroken chain of necessary antecedents, and the sense of praiseworthiness, and the judgement I ought to be rewarded, remain no longer.

Merit and demerit are connected in our minds with our volitions, under the impression that the good we perform, we perform in opposition to temptation, and with the power and possibility of doing evil; and that the evil we perform, we perform in opposition to motives of good, and with the power and possibility of doing good. But when we are informed that all the power and possibility of a conduct opposite to our actual conduct is this,—that if we had put forth opposite volitions, there would have been opposite external acts, but that nevertheless the volitions themselves were necessary, and could not have been otherwise,—we cannot but experience a revulsion of mind. We perhaps are first led to doubt the philosophy,—or if, by acute reasonings, or by the authority of great names, we are influenced to yield an implicit belief,—the sense of merit and demerit must either die away, or be maintained by a hasty retreat from the regions of speculation to those of common sense.

XI. It follows from this system, also, that nature and spirit, as causes or agents, cannot be distinguished in their operations.

There are three classes of natural causes or agents generally acknowledged 1. Inanimate,—as water, wind, steam, magnetism, &c.; 2. Animate, but insensible,—as the life and affinities of plants; 3. Animate and sensitive, or brute animal power.

These all properly come under the denomination of natural, because they are alike necessitated. “Whatever is comprised in the chain and mechanism of cause and effect, of course necessitated, and having its necessity in some other thing antecedent or concurrent,—this is said to be natural; and the aggregate and system of all such things is nature.” Now spirit, as a cause or agent, by this system, comes under the same definition: in all its acts it is necessitated. It is in will particularly that man is taken as a cause or agent, because it is by will that he directly produces phenomena or effects; and by this system it is not possible to distinguish, so far as necessary connexion is considered, a chain of antecedents and sequents made up of motives, volitions, and the consequents of volitions, from a chain of sequents and antecedents into which the three first mentioned classes of natural agents enter. All the several classes have peculiar and distinguishing characteristics; but in the relation of antecedence and sequence,—their relation as causes or agents producing effects,—no distinction can be perceived. Wind, water, &c. form one kind of cause; organic life forms another; brute organization and sensitivity another; intelligent volition another: but they are all necessary, absolutely necessary; and therefore they are the co-ordinate parts of the one system of nature. The difference which exists between them is a difference of terms merely. There is no difference in the nature of the relation between the terms. The nature of the relation between the water-wheel and the water,—of the relation between the organic life of plants and their developement,—of the relation between passion and volition in brutes,—of the relation between their efforts and material effects,—and the nature of the relation between motive and volition,—are one: it is the relation of cause and effect considered as stated antecedent and sequent, and no more and no less necessary in one subject than in another.

XII. It follows, again, that sensations produced by external objects, and all emotions following perception, and all the acts of the intelligence, whether in intuitive knowledge or in ratiocination, are as really our acts, and acts for which we are as really responsible, if responsibility be granted to exist, as acts of volition. Sensations, emotions, perceptions, reasonings, are all within us; they all lie in our consciousness; they are not created by our volitions, like the motions of the hands and feet; they take place by their own causes, just as volitions take place by their causes. The relation of the man to all is precisely the same. He is in no sense the cause of any of these affections of his being; he is simply the subject: the subject of sensation, of perception, of emotion, of reasoning, and of volition; and he is the subject of all by the same necessity.

XIII. The system of punishment is only a system accommodated to the opinions of society.

There is nothing evil in itself, according to this system of necessity, as we have already shown. Every thing which takes place is, in its time, place, and relations generally, the necessary result of necessary and infinite wisdom. But still it is a fact that society are desirous of preventing certain acts,—such as stealing, adultery, murder, &c.; and they are necessarily so desirous. Now the system of punishment is a mere collection of motives in relation to the sense of pain and the emotion of fear, which prevent the commission of these acts. Where these acts do take place, it is best they should take place; but where they are prevented by the fear of punishment, it is best they should be prevented. Where the criminal suffers, he has no right to complain, because it is best that he should suffer; and yet, if he does complain, it is best that he should complain. The system of punishment is good, as every thing else is good. The system of divine punishments must be considered in the same light. Indeed, what are human punishments, when properly considered, but divine punishments? They are comprehended in the pre-ordained and necessary chain of being and events.