I have dwelt the longer on this subject, because I am weary, and I believe we all are, of hearing the oft-repeated complaint, “You misrepresent us!” “You mistake our doctrine!”
In the next No., by the leave of Providence, the nature of human agency, and the ground of human responsibility, will be examined.
[ NUMBER VIII. ]
MORAL AGENCY AND ACCOUNTABILITY.
By what has been said on the theory of Calvinistic predestination, it will be seen, I think, that this system involves such necessity of moral action as is incompatible with free agency. It is possible, I grant, to give to the terms will, liberty, free agency, such a definition as will make these terms, thus defined, compatible with the other peculiarities of the Calvinistic system.—Both parties agree that man is a free moral agent; both maintain that he is responsible; but we maintain that what the Calvinists call free moral agency, is not such in fact as is commonly understood by the term, nor such as is requisite to make man accountable. Here, therefore, we are again thrown back upon our definitions, as the starting point of argument. What is that power, or property, or faculty of the mind, which constitutes man a free moral agent? It is the power of choice, connected with liberty to choose either good or evil. Both the power and liberty to choose either good or evil are requisite to constitute the free agency of a probationer. It has been contended that choice, though from the condition of the moral agent it must of necessity be exclusively on one side, is nevertheless free; since it implies a voluntary preference of the mind. Hence it is contended that the fallen and the holy angels, glorified and lost human spirits, though some of these are confined in an impeccable state, and the others have a perpetual and invincible enmity to good, are nevertheless free agents. With respect to the free agency of these beings, a question might be started, whether it is such as renders them responsible for their present acts, the decision of which might have some bearing on the subject under investigation; but not such bearing as would make it important to discuss it here. If they are responsible for their present acts, it must be on account of a former probation, which by sin they have judicially forfeited. Or if any one thinks otherwise, and is disposed to maintain that a being who is not, and never was so circumstanced as to render the choice of good possible to him, is nevertheless a free moral agent, in any such sense as renders him accountable, with such a sentiment at present I have no controversy. Indeed such an opinion is so violent an outrage upon all the acknowledged principles of justice, that to controvert it would be a work of little profit.
It is certain that the moral standing of those angels and men whose states are now unalterably fixed, differs materially from their probationary state; and this difference renders their moral agency unsuited to illustrate the agency of beings who are on probation. Man, in this life, is in a state of trial; good and evil are presented before him as objects of choice; and upon this choice are suspended eternal consequences of happiness or misery. Of a being thus circumstanced, it is not enough to say he is free to choose as he does, unless you can say, also, he is equally free to make an opposite choice.—Hence, in defining the free agency of man, as a probationer, we say, as above, that it implies a power of choice, with full liberty to choose either good or evil.
The foregoing definition, at first view, seems sufficient for all practical purposes, and so indeed it would have been, if a speculative philosophy had not thrown it into the alembic of metaphysics for decomposition and analysis. It is doubtful whether this process has subserved the cause of truth; nay, it is certain, I think, that it has produced many perplexing refinements and speculations that have greatly aided the cause of error. Into these abstrusities, therefore, it seems necessary to follow this question, to try, if possible, to draw out and combine the elements of truth.
Having defined free agency to mean the power of choice, &c, it is asked again, What is this power of choice? It is probable that the different answers given to this question constitute the fundamental differences between Calvinists and Arminians. To the above question some, like the reply of the Jews to Christ, have said, “We cannot tell.” And they give this evasive reply perhaps for a reason similar to that which influenced the Jews; they fear that a definite answer will involve themselves or their theory in difficulty. This is a very convenient way to avoid responsibility, but not indicative of much fairness, or confidence in their cause. When men have involved their system in apparent contradictions, it will hardly satisfy the candid inquirer after truth to see them start aside from the very point that is to give character to their whole system. We are told by men who reason upon foreknowledge, &c, that “God hath decreed whatsoever comes to pass;” and then we are told that all men are free, and they enter into a great deal of metaphysical speculation about foreknowledge, the nature of voluntary action, &c, to prove these positions; but when they are pressed upon this point, “How can you reconcile with free agency that kind of Divine efficiency necessary to secure the execution of the decrees, and that kind of dependency of moral agents which this efficiency implies?” the reply is, “We cannot tell—the how in the case we cannot explain.” This evasion might be allowable, perhaps, in either of the two following cases: 1. If the apparent discrepancy of the two positions grew out of what is mysterious, and not of what is palpably contradictory; or, 2. If both propositions were so clearly proved, that it would do greater violence to our reasons, and be a greater outrage upon all acknowledged principles of belief, to disbelieve either of them, than it would to believe them with all their apparent contradictions. With respect to the first alternative, it appears to me, and doubtless it would so appear to all whose prejudices did not mislead the mind, that the want of apparent agreement between the two is not for lack of light in the case, but from the natural incongruity of the things compared. When you say, “God executes his decrees by efficiently controlling the will of man,” and say also, “The mind of man is free,” both these propositions are clear; there is nothing mysterious about them. But you say, perhaps, “The mystery is in the want of light to see the agreement of the two; we cannot see their agreement, but we should not therefore infer that they do not agree.” I answer, What is light, in this case, but a clear conception of the propositions? This we have, and we see that they are, in their nature, incompatible; and the more light you can pour upon this subject, the more clearly must this incompatibility appear. If you say that “perhaps neither you nor I fully understand the meaning of these propositions;” then I reply, We have no business to use them. “Who is this that darkens counsel by words without knowledge?” And this is what I have already complained of; men will reason themselves into propositions which they call doctrinal facts, but which seem to the eye of common sense to have all the characteristics of contradictions, and when we urge these contradictions in objection, the objection is not allowed to have any weight, because we do not fully understand the propositions. So then the propositions must be received, though we do not understand them! and though, as far as we do understand them, they are obviously incompatible!! Is this the way to gain knowledge, and to make truth triumphant? How much more consistent to say, Since it is evident the mind is free, and since the doctrine of predestination is apparently incompatible with that freedom, therefore this doctrine should be exploded!
Or will this second alternative be resorted to? Will it be said that both of these propositions are so clearly proved, that to deny them would do greater violence to our reasons, and the principles of belief, than to acknowledge them, notwithstanding their apparent incongruity? Let us examine them. Of one of them we cannot doubt, unless we doubt all primary truths, viz. That the human mind is free. It is presumed, if the question come to this, that they must either give up human liberty or the dogma of predestination, candid Calvinists themselves would not hesitate; they would say, the former must stand, whatever becomes of the latter. If I am correct here, it follows that, predestinarians themselves being judges, the doctrine of predestination is not so clear as some other moral truths. But is there any thing clearer than that man ought not to be held accountable for what is unavoidable? that he ought not to be held to answer for volitions that are efficiently controlled by a superior? To me this is as clear as consciousness itself can make it, and I think it must be to mankind in general. If I am correct, then we come to the conclusion at once, that to believe in the compatibility of predestination with human liberty and accountability does more violence to the laws of belief than it would to discard predestination. Whatever, therefore, may seem to be favourable to this doctrine, should be sacrificed to a stronger claim upon our belief in another direction. But, that the argument may be set in as strong light as possible, let the evidence of predestination be adduced. What is it? It is not consciousness certainly; and it is almost as clear that it is not moral demonstration by a course of reasoning. The most I believe that has ever been said, in the way of moral demonstration, has been in an argument founded on foreknowledge, which argument, it is supposed by the author, is fairly disposed of in the sermon on predestination, by reasoning which has not, to his knowledge, ever been refuted. A refutation has been attempted, I grant, by some of the reviewers of the sermon, but the only apparent success that attended those attempts was, as we have already seen, in consequence of their taking the very ground of the sermon, and building the decrees of God upon a prior view and knowledge of all possible contingencies. If consciousness and reasoning are taken away from this doctrine, it has nothing left to stand upon but testimony. And no testimony but Divine will here be of any authority; and does revelation prove this doctrine? In the sermon on predestination it was stated that “there was not a single passage in the Bible which teaches directly that God hath foreordained whatsoever comes to pass;” and it is not known to the writer, that among the different reviews of the sermon it has even been attempted to show that the statement was incorrect. But if a solitary passage could have been adduced, should we not have heard of it? The evidence from Scripture then, if there is any, is indirect, and merely by inference. And even this indirect testimony is far from being the best of its kind; so, at least, a great portion of believers in revelation think.