Free Will

Jonathan Edwards’ Psychological, Ethical, and Theological Philosophy in his Freedom of the Will

Peter B. Jung

• Publisher: Resource Publications
• Year: 2019
• Print ISBN:
  9781532661402
  9781532661419
• eBook ISBN:
  9781532661426
• Topic: Theology & Religion
• Subtopic: Christian Theology

Free Will, also known as Freedom of the Will, is appraised as the one of the greatest works ever produced in America. The mid-eighteenth-century New England philosophical theologian Jonathan Edwards (1703-58) defines the will by importing terms from John Locke. Edwards states the Arminian nature of free will, suspects the need for such free will, and finally defends Calvinist free will and objects to the Arminian one. In his argument, he chooses three British antagonists: Daniel Whitby, Thomas Chubb, and Isaac Watts. These antagonists insist that the self-determining will is necessary for us to be morally accountable. Edwards disputes their objections that God's determination is contradictory to the liberty of the human will. He then goes to argue what kind of freedom of the will is necessary for the former and latter to be compatible. Edwards's psychological, moral, and theological philosophy is displayed. In addition, readers can learn how our will chooses something pleasant by following the dictate of understanding, while the author demonstrates the natures of New England Arminianism and Calvinism.

Part I

Wherein are Explained Various Terms and Things Belonging to the Subject of the Ensuing Discourse

Section 1

Concerning the Nature of the Will

It may possibly be thought, that there is no great need of going about to define or describe the “will”; this word being generally as well understood as any other words we can use to explain it: and so perhaps it would be, had not philosophers, metaphysicians and polemic divines brought the matter into obscurity by the things they have said of it. But since it is so, I think it may be of some use, and will tend to the greater clearness in the following discourse, to say a few things concerning it.

JE defines the will as “that by which the mind chooses anything.”

And therefore I observe, that the will (without any metaphysical refining) is plainly, that by which the mind chooses anything. The faculty of the will196 is that faculty or power or principle of mind by which it is capable of choosing: an act of the will is the same as an act of choosing or choice.

JE defines the will as “that by which the soul chooses.”

If any think it is a more perfect definition of the will, to say, that it is that by which the soul either chooses or refuses; I am content with it: though I think that it is enough to say, it’s that by which the soul chooses: for in every act of will whatsoever, the mind chooses one thing rather than another; it chooses something rather than the contrary, or rather than the want or nonexistence of that thing. So in every act of refusal, the mind chooses the absence of the thing refused; the positive and the negative are set before the mind for its choice, and it chooses the negative;197 and the mind’s making its choice in that case is properly the act of the will: the will’s determining between the two is a voluntary determining; but that is the same thing as making a choice. So that whatever names we call the act of the will by—choosing, refusing, approving, disapproving, liking, disliking, embracing, rejecting, determining, directing, commanding, forbidding, inclining or being averse, a being pleased or displeased with—all may be reduced to this of choosing. For the soul to act voluntarily, is evermore to act electively.

Locke defines the will as “a power or ability to prefer or choose.”

Mr. Locke198 says, “The will signifies nothing but a power or ability to prefer or choose.” And in the foregoing page says, “The word ‘preferring’ seems best to express the act of volition”; but adds, that “it does it not precisely; for” (says he) “though a man would prefer flying to walking, yet who can say he ever wills it?”199

JE argues that Locke’s definition of the will is erroneous and points that ongoing preferring brings out successive acts of the will.

But the instance he mentions doesn’t prove that there is anything else in “willing” but merely “preferring”: for it should be considered what is the next and immediate object of the will, with respect to a man’s walking, or any other external action; which is not his being removed from one place to another; on the earth, or through the air; these are remoter objects of preference; but such or such an immediate exertion of himself. The thing nextly chosen or preferred when a man wills to walk, is not his being removed to such a place where he would be, but such an exertion and motion of his legs and feet, etc., in order to it. And his willing such an alteration in his body in the present moment, is nothing else but his choosing or preferring such an alteration in his body at such a moment, or his liking it better than the forbearance of it.

JE continues that, in the will, there should be such alterations of preferring or choosing or desiring or pleasing or liking, through successive moments.

And God has so made and established the human nature, the soul being united to a body in proper state, that the soul preferring or choosing such an immediate exertion or alteration of the body, such an alteration instantaneously follows. There is nothing else in the actings of my mind, that I am conscious of while I walk, but only my preferring or choosing, through successive moments, that there should be such alterations of my external sensations and motions; together with a concurring habitual expectation that it will be so; having ever found by experience, that on such an immediate preference, such sensations and motions do actually instantaneously, and constantly arise. But it is not so in the case of flying: though a man may be said remotely to choose or prefer flying; yet he doesn’t choose or prefer, incline to or desire, under circumstances in view, any immediate exertion of the members of his body in order to do it; because he has no expectation that he should obtain the desired end by any such exertion; and he doesn’t prefer or incline to any bodily exertion or effort under this apprehended circumstance, of its being wholly in vain.

So that if we carefully distinguish the proper objects of the several acts of the will, it will not appear by this, and suchlike instances, that there is any difference between “volition” and “preference”; or that a man’s choosing, liking best, or being best pleased with a thing, are not the same with his willing that thing; as they seem to be according to those general and more natural notions of men, according to which language is formed. Thus an act of the will is commonly expressed by its pleasing a man to do thus or thus; and a man’s doing as he wills, and doing as he pleases, are the same thing in common speech.

JL observes that the will and desire conflict with each other: e.g., a man under coercion to persuade another.

Mr. Locke says, “The will is perfectly distinguished from desire; which in the very same action may have a quite contrary tendency from that which our wills set us upon. A man” (says he) “whom I cannot deny, may oblige me to use persuasions to another, which, at the same time I am speaking, I may wish may not prevail on him. In this case it is plain the will and desire run counter.”

JE insists that a man never, at any instance, wills anything contrary to his desires, or desires anything contrary to his will.

I don’t suppose, that “will” and “desire” are words of precisely the same signification: “will” seems to be a word of a more general signification, extending to things present and absent. “Desire” respects something absent. I may prefer my present situation and posture, suppose sitting still, or having my eyes open, and so may will it. But yet I can’t think they are so entirely distinct, that they can ever be properly said to run counter. A man never, in any instance, wills anything contrary to his desires, or desires anything contrary to his will.

The aforementioned instance, which Mr. Locke produces, doesn’t prove that he ever does. He may, on some consideration or other, will to utter speeches which have a tendency to persuade another, and still may desire that they may not persuade him: but yet his will and desire don’t run counter at all: the thing which he wills, the very same he desires; and he doesn’t will a thing, and desire the contrary in any particular. In this instance, it is not carefully observed, what is the thing willed, and what is the thing desired: if it were, it would be found that will and desire don’t clash in the least. The thing willed on some consideration, is to utter such words; and certainly, the same consideration so influences him, that he doesn’t desire the contrary; all things considered, he chooses to utter such words, and doesn’t desire not to utter them. And so as to the thing which Mr. Locke speaks of as desired, viz. that the words, though they tend to persuade, should not be effectual to that end, his will is not contrary to this; he doesn’t will that they should be effectual, but rather wills that they should not, as he desires....

Table of contents

• Title Page
• Editor’s Introduction
• Author’s Preface
• Part I: Wherein are Explained Various Terms and Things Belonging to the Subject of the Ensuing Discourse
• Part II: Where It Is Considered, whether There Is, or Can Be Any Such Sort of Freedom of Will, as That wherein Arminians Place the Essence of the Liberty of All Moral Agents; and Whether Any Such Thing Ever Was, or Can Be Conceived of
• Part III: Wherein Is Inquired, Whether Any Such Liberty of Will as Arminians Hold, Be Necessary to Moral Agency, Virtue and Vice, Praise, and Dispraise, Etc.
• Part IV: Wherein the Chief Grounds of the Reasonings of Arminians, in Support and defense of Their Notions of Liberty, Moral Agency, etc. and against the Opposite Doctrine, Are Considered
• The Conclusion
• Appendix 1: (Edwards’s) Remarks on the “Essays on the Principles of Morality and Natural Religion (by Henry Home, Lord Kames, 1751),” in a Letter to a Minister of the Church of Scotland 1
• Appendix 2: (Edwards’s) Letter to John Erskine, August 3, 1757, “To Mr. Erskine”
• Appendix 3: The Last Letter from John Erskine to Jonathan Edwards, January 24, 1758.
• Appendix 4: Thomas Reid’s Reading Notes on Edwards’s Freedom of the Will
• Appendix 5: Proposals for printing Freedom of the Will