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But in as much as this has been of such long standing, and has been so generally received, and so much insisted on by Pelagians, Semipelagians, Jesuits, Socinians, Arminians and others, it may deserve a more full consideration. And therefore I shall now proceed to a more particular and thorough inquiry into this notion.

Now, lest some should suppose that I do not understand those that place Liberty in Indifference, or should charge me with misrepresenting their opinion, I would signify, that I am sensible, there are some, who, when they talk of the Liberty of the Will as consisting in Indifference, express themselves as though they would not be understood of the Indifference of the inclination or tendency of the Will, but of, I know not what, Indifference of the soul's power of willing; or that the Will, with respect to its power or ability to choose, is indifferent, can go either way indifferently, either to the right hand or left, either act or forbear to act, one as well as the other. However this seems to be a refining only of some particular writers, and newly invented, and which will by no means consist with the manner of expression used by the defenders of Liberty of Indifference in general. And I wish such refiners would thoroughly consider, whether they distinctly know their own meaning, when they make a distinction between Indifference of the soul as to its power or ability of willing or choosing, and the soul's Indifference as to the preference or choice itself; and whether they do not deceive themselves in imagining that they have any distinct meaning. The Indifference of the soul as to its ability or power to Will, must be the same thing as the Indifference of the state of the power or faculty of the Will, or the indifference of the state which the soul itself, which has that power or faculty, hitherto remains in, as to the exercise of that power, in the choice it shall by and by make.

But not to insist any longer on the abstruseness and inexplicableness of this distinction; let what will be supposed concerning the meaning of those that make use of it, thus much must at least be intended by Arminians when they talk of Indifference as essential to Liberty of Will, if they intend any thing, in any respect to their purpose, viz. That it is such

an Indifference as leaves the Will not determined already ; but free from, and vacant of predetermination, so far, that there may be room for the exercise of the selfdetermining power of the Will; and that the Will's freedom consists in, or depends upon this vacancy and opportunity that is left for the Will itself to be the determiner of the act that is to be the free act.

And here I would observe in the first place, that to make out this scheme of Liberty, the Indifference must be perfect and absolute; there must be a perfect freedom from all antecedent preponderation or inclination. Because if the Will be already inclined, before it exerts its own sovereign power on itself, then its inclination is not wholly owing to itself: If when two opposites are proposed to the soul for its choice, the proposal does not find the soul wholly in a state of Indifference, then it is not found in a state of Liberty for mere selfdetermination.... The least degree of antecedent bias must be inconsistent with their notion of Liberty. For so long as prior inclination possesses the Will, and is not removed, it binds the Will, so that it is utterly impossible that the Will should act otherwise than agreeably to it. Surely the Will cannot act or choose contrary to a remaining prevailing inclination of the Will. To suppose otherwise, would be the same thing as to suppose, that the Will is inclined contrary to its present prevailing inclination, or contrary to what it is inclined to. That which the Will chooses and prefers, that all things considered, it preponderates and inclines to. It is equally impossible for the Will to choose contrary to its own remaining and present preponderating inclination, as it is to prefer contrary to its own present preference, or choose contrary to its own present choice. The Will, therefore, so long as it is under the influence of an old preponderating inclination, is not at Liberty for a new free act, or any act that shall now be an act of selfdetermination. The act which is a selfdetermined free act, must be an act which the Will determines in the possession and use of such a Liberty, as consists in a freedom from every thing, which, if it were there, would make it im

possible that the Will, at that time, should be otherwise than that way to which it tends.

If any one should say, there is no need that the Indifference should be perfect; but although a former inclination and preference still remain, yet, if it be not very strong and violent, possibly the strength of the Will may oppose and overcome it....This is grossly absurd; for the strength of the Will, let it be ever so great, does not enable it to act one way, and not the contrary way, both at the same time. It gives it no such sovereignty and command, as to cause itself to prefer and not to prefer at the same time, or to choose contrary to its own present choice.

Therefore, if there be the least degree of antecedent preponderation of the Will, it must be perfectly abolished, before the Will can be at liberty to determine itself the contrary way. And if the Will determines itself the same way, it is not a free determination, because the Will is not wholly at Liberty in so doing: Its determination is not altogether from itself, but it was partly determined before, in its prior inclination; and all the freedom the Will exercises in the case, is in an increase of inclination, which it gives itself, over and above what it had by the foregoing bias; so much is from itself, and so much is from perfect Indifference. For though the Will had a previous tendency that way, yet as to that additional degree of inclination, it had no tendency. Therefore the previous tendency is of no consideration, with respect to the act wherein the Will is free. So that it comes to the same thing which was said at first, that as to the act of the Will, wherein the Will is free, there must be perfect Indifference, or equilibrium.

To illustrate this; if we should suppose a sovereign, selfmoving power in a natural body, but that the body is in motion already, by an antecedent bias; for instance, gravitation towards the centre of the earth; and has one degree of motion already, by virtue of that previous tendency; but by its selfmoving power it adds one degree more to its motion, and moves so much more swiftly towards the centre of the earth than it would do by its gravity only: It is evident, that all that VOL. V.

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is owing to a selfmoving power in this case, is the additional degree of motion; and that the other degree of motion which it had from gravity, is of no consideration in the case, does not help the effect of the free selfmoving power in the least; the effect is just the same, as if the body had received from itself one degree of motion from a state of perfect rest. So if we should suppose a selfmoving power given to the scale of a balance, which has a weight of one degree beyond the opposite scale; and we ascribe to it an ability to add to itself another degree of force the same way, by its selfmoving pow er; this is just the same thing as to ascribe to it a power to give itself one degree of preponderation from a perfect equili brium; and so much power as the scale has to give itself an overbalance from a perfect equipoise, so much selfmoving selfpreponderating power it has, and no more. So that its free power this way is always to be measured from perfect equilibrium.

I need say no more to prove, that if Indifference be essential to Liberty, it must be perfect Indifference; and that so far as the Will is destitute of this, so far it is destitute of that freedom by which it is its own master, and in a capacity of being its own determiner, without being in the least passive, or subject to the power and sway of something else, in its motions and determinations.

Having observed these things, let us now try whether this notion of the Liberty of Will consisting in indifference and equilibrium, and the Will's selfdetermination in such a state be not absurd and inconsistent.

And here I would lay down this as an axiom of undoubted truth; that every free act is done in a state of freedom, and not after such a state. If an act of the Will be an act wherein the soul is free, it must be exerted in a state of freedom, and in the time of freedom. It will not suffice, that the act immediately follows a state of Liberty; but Liberty must yet continue, and coexist with the act; the soul remaining in possession of Liberty. Because that is the notion of a free act of the soul, even an act wherein the soul uses or exercises Liberty. But if the soul is not, in the very time of the act, in

the possession of Liberty, it cannot at that time be in the use of it.

Now the question is, whether ever the soul of man puts forth an act of Will, while it yet remains in a state of Liberty, in that notion of a state of Liberty, viz. as implying a state of Indifference, or whether the soul ever exerts an act of choice or preference, while at that very time the Will is in a perfect equilibrium, not inclining one way more than another. The very putting of the question is sufficient to shew the absurdity of the affirmative answer; for how ridiculous would it be for any body to insist, that the soul chooses one thing before another, when at the very same instant it is perfectly indifferent with respect to each! This is the same thing as to say, the soul prefers one thing to another, at the very same time that it has no preference. Choice and preference can no more be in a state of Indifference, than motion can be in a state of rest, or than the preponderation of the scale of a balance can be in a state of equilibrium. Motion may be the next moment after rest; but cannot coexist with it, in any, even the least part of it. So choice may be immediately after a state of Indifference, but has no coexistence with it; even the very beginning of it is not in a state of Indifference. And therefore if this be Liberty, no act of the Will, in any degree, is ever performed in a state of Liberty, or in the time of Liberty. Volition and Liberty are so far from agreeing together, and being essential one to another, that they are contrary one to another, and one excludes and destroys the other, as much as motion and rest, light and darkness, or life and death. So that the Will does not so much as begin to act in the time of such Liberty; freedom is perfectly at an end, and has ceased to be, at the first moment of action; and therefore Liberty cannot reach the action, to affect, or qualify it, or give it a denomination, or any part of it, any more than if it had ceased to be twenty years before the action began. The moment that Liberty ceases to be, it ceases to be a qualification of any thing. If light and darkness succeed one another instantaneously, light qualifies nothing after it is gone out, to make any thing lightsome or bright, any more at the first moment of

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