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A Careful and Strict Enquiry Into the Modern Prevailing Notions of That Freedom of Will, Which Is Supposed to Be Essential to Moral Agency
A Careful and Strict Enquiry Into the Modern Prevailing Notions of That Freedom of Will Which Is Supposed to Be Essential to Moral Agency Author:Jonathan Edwards General Books publication date: 2009 Original publication date: 1831 Subjects: Computers / Programming / General Computers / Programming Languages / General Computers / Programming / Software Development Notes: This is a black and white OCR reprint of the original. It has no illustrations and there may be typos or missing text. When yo... more »u buy the General Books edition of this book you get free trial access to Million-Books.com where you can select from more than a million books for free. Excerpt: NOTES. Note A. p. xxii. The devout Edwards. -- The life of Edwards should be perused by every one who reads his " Essay on Freedom of Will." Let it be said, that his style of Christianity might have borne some corrections ; and let it also be admitted, that, in his modesty, and his low estimation of himself, and in his love of retirement, his melancholic temperament had an influence. After every deduction of this sort has been made, it must be granted, that this eminent man, whose intellectual superiority might have enabled him to shine in European colleges of learning, displayed a meek greatness of soul which belongs only to those who derive their principles from the Gospel. How refreshing is the contrast of sentiments which strikes us in turning from the private correspondence of men who thought of nothing beyond their personal fame as philosophers or writers, to the correspondence and diary of a man like Edwards ! In the one case, the single, paramount motive -- literary or philosophic vanity -- lurks in every sentence, unblushingly shews itself on many a page, and when most concealed, is concealed by an affectation as loathsome as the fault it hides. But how much of this deformed self-love could the most diligent detractor cull from the private papers or works of the President of the New Jersey College ? We question if a single sentence which could be fairly construed to betray the vanity or ambition of superior intelligence is any where to be found in them. Edw...« less