All things that fall out in the natural and moral world are alike necessary. P. 174, This inclination and choice is unavoidable, caused or occasioned by the prevailing motive. In this lies the necessity of our actions, that in such circumstances it was impossible we could act otherwise. He often expresses himself in like manner elsewhere, speaking in strong terms of men's actions as unavoidable, what they cannot forbear, having no power over their own actions, the order of them being unalterably fixed and inseparably linked together, &c.*

On the contrary, I have largely declared, that the connection between antecedent things and consequent ones which takes place with regard to the acts of men's wills, which is called moral necessity, is called by the name of Necessity improperly; and that all such terms as must, cannot, impossible, unable, irresistible, unavoidable, invincible, &c when applied here, are not applied in their proper signification, and are either used nonsensically and with perfect insignificance, or in a sense quite diverse from their original and proper meaning and their use in common speech and that such a necessity as attends the acts of men's will is more properly called certainty than necessity; it being no other than the certain connection between the subject and predicate of the proposition which affirms their existence.

Agreeably to what is observed in my Inquiry, I think it is evidently owing to a strong prejudice, arising from an insensible habitual perversion and misapplication of such like terms as necessary, impossible, unable, unavoidable, invincible, &c. that they are ready to think, that to suppose a certain connection of men's volitions without any foregoing motives or inclinations, or any preceding moral influence whatsoever, is truly and properly to suppose a strong irrefragable chain of causes and effects, as stands in the way of, and makes utterly vain, opposite desires and endeavours, like immovable and impenetrable mountains of brass; and impedes our liberty like walls of adamant, gates of brass, and bars of iron: whereas, all such representations suggest ideas as far from the truth as the east is from the west. Nothing that I maintain, supposes that men are at all hindered by any fatal necessity, from doing, and even willing and choosing as they please, with full freedom; yea, with the highest degree of liberty that ever was thought of, or that ever could possibly enter into the heart of any man to conceive. I know it is in vain to endeavour to make some persons believe this, or at least fully and steadily to believe it: for if it be demonstrated to them, still the old prejudice remains, which has been long fixed by the use of the terms necessary, must, cannot, impossible, &c. the association with these terms of

*P. 180, 188, 193, 194, 195, 197, 198, 199, 205, 206.

certain ideas inconsistent with liberty, is not broken; and the judgment is powerfully warped by it; as a thing that has been long bent and grown stiff, if it be straitened, will return to its former curvity again and again.

The author of the Essays most manifestly supposes, that if men had the truth concerning the real necessity of all their actions clearly in view, they would not appear to themselves or one another, as at all praiseworthy or culpable, or under any moral obligation, or accountable for their actions:* which supposes, that men are not to be blamed or praised for any of their actions, and are not under any obligations nor are truly accountable for any thing they do, by reason of this necessity; which is very contrary to what I have endeavoured to prove throughout the third part of my Inquiry. I humbly conceive it is there shown, that this is so far from the truth, that the moral necessity of men's actions which truly take place is requisite to the being of virtue and vice, or any thing praiseworthy or culpable: that the liberty of indifference and contingence, which is advanced in opposition to that necessity, is inconsistent with the being of these; as it would suppose that men are not determined in what they do by any virtuous or vicious principles, nor act from any motives, intentions or aims whatsoever; or have any end, either good or bad, in acting.— And is it not remarkable that this author should suppose, that in order to men's actions truly having any desert, they must be performed without any view, purpose, design, or desire or any principle of action, or any thing agreeable to a rational nature? As it will appear that he does, if we compare p. 206, 207, with p. 175.

The author of the Essays supposes, that God has deeply implanted in man's nature a strong and invincible apprehension, or feeling, as he calls it, of a liberty and contingence of his own actions, opposite to that necessity which truly attends them; and which in truth does not agree with real fact, is not agreeable to strict philosophic truth, is contradictory to the truth of things,§ and which truth contradicts||, not tallying with the real plan:T and that therefore such feelings are deceitful,** and are in reality of the delusive kind.tt He speaks of them as a wise delusion,‡‡ as nice artificial feelings, merely that conscience may have a commanding power:§§ meaning plainly, that these feelings are a cunning artifice of the author of Nature, to make men believe they are free when they are not. He supposes that by these feelings the moral world has a disguised appearance,¶¶ &c. He supposes that all selfapprobation, and all remorse of conscience, all commenda

* P. 207, 209, and other places. P. 200. P. 152. § P. 183. P. 186. T P 205. ‡‡ P. 209. §§ P. 211. P. 153.

†† P. 183.

**P. 203, 204, 211. ¶¶ P. 214.

tion or condemnation of ourselves or others, all sense of desert, and all that is connected with this way of thinking, all the ideas which at present are suggested by the words ought, should, arise from this delusion, and would entirely vanish without it*.

All which is very contrary to what I have abundantly insisted on and endeavoured to demonstrate in my Inquiry; where I have largely shewn that it is agreeable to the natural sense of mankind, that the moral necessity or certainty that attends men's actions, is consistent with praise and blame, reward and punishment:† and that it is agreeable to our natural notions that moral evil, with its desert of dislike and abhorrence, and all its other ill deservings, consists in a certain deformity in the nature of the dispositions and acts of the heart, and not in the evil of something else, diverse from these supposed to be their cause or occasion.‡

I might well ask here, whether any one is to be found in the world of mankind, who is conscious to a sense or feeling naturally and deeply rooted in his mind, that in order to a man's performing any action that is praiseworthy or blameworthy, he must exercise a liberty that implies and signifies a power of acting without any motive, view, design, desire, or principle of action? For such a liberty, this author supposes, that must be which is opposed to moral necessity, as I have already observed. Supposing a man should actually do good, independent of desire, aim, inducement, principle or end, is it a dictate of invincible natural sense, that his act is more meri. torious or praiseworthy, than if he had performed it for some good end, and had been governed in it by good principles and motives? and so I might ask, on the contrary, with respect to evil actions.§

The author of the Essays supposes that the liberty without necessity of which we have a natural feeling, implies contingence: and, speaking of this contingence, he sometimes calls it by the name of chance. And it is evident, that his notion of it, or rather what he says about it, implies things happening loosely, fortuitously, by accident, and without a cause.|| Now I conceive the slightest reflection may be sufficient to satisfy any one, that such a contingence of men's actions, according to our natural sense, is so far from being essential to the morality or merit of those actions, that it would destroy it; and that on the contrary, the dependence of our actions on such causes, as inward inclinations, incitements and ends, is essential to the being of it. Natural sense teaches men, when

* P. 160, 194, 199, 205, 206, 207, 209 Inquiry Part IV. Sect. 4.throughout. Idem, Part IV. Sect. 1. throughout.

§ See this matter illustrated in my Inquiry, Part IV. Sect. 4. P. 156-159 177, 178, 181, 183-185.

they see any thing done by others of a good or evil tendency, to inquire what their intention was; what principles and views they were moved by, in order to judge how far they are to be justified or condemned: and not to determine, that, in order to their being approved or blamed at all, the action must be performed altogether fortuitously, proceeding from nothing, arising from no cause. Concerning this matter, I have fully expressed my mind in the Inquiry.

If the liberty of which we have a natural sense as necessary to desert, consists in the mind's self-determination, without being determined by previous inclination or motive, then indifference is essential to it, yea absolute indifference; as is observed in my Inquiry. But men naturally have no notion of any such liberty as this, as essential to the morality or demerit of their actions; but, on the contrary, such a liberty, if it were possible, would be inconsistent with our natural notions of desert, as is largely shown in the Inquiry.* If it be agreeable to natural sense that men must be indifferent in determining their own actions; then, according to the same, the more they are determined by inclination, either good or bad, the less they have of desert: the more good actions are performed from good disposition, the less praiseworthy; and the more evil deeds are from evil dispositions, the less culpable; and, in general the more men's actions are from their hearts, the less they are to be commended or condemned which all must know is very contrary to natural

sense.

Moral necessity is owing to the power and government of the inclination of the heart, either habitual or occasional, excited by motive: but according to natural and common sense, the more a man does anything with full inclination of heart, the more is to be charged to his account for his condemnation if it be an ill action, and the more to be ascribed to him for his praise if it be good.

If the mind were determined to evil actions by contingence, from a state of indifference, then either there would be no fault in them, or else the fault would be in being so perfectly indifferent, that the mind was equally liable to be a bad or good determination. And if this indifference be liberty, then the very essence of the blame or fault would lie in the liberty itself, or the wickedness would, primarily and summarily, lie in being a free agent. If there were no fault in being indifferent, then there could be no fault in the determination being agreeable to such a state of indifference: that is, there could be no fault found, that opposite determinations actually happen to take place indifferently, sometimes good and sometimes bad, as contingence governs and decides. And if

Especially in Part III. Sect. 6 and 7.

it be a fault to be indifferent to good and evil, then such indifference is no indifference to good and evil, but is a determination to evil, or to a fault; and such an indifferent disposition would be an evil disposition, tendency, or determination of mind. So inconsistent are these notions of liberty, as essential to praise or blame.

The author of the Essays supposes men's natural delusive sense of a liberty of contingence to be, in truth, the foundation of all the labour, care and industry of mankind ;* and that if men's "practical ideas had been formed on the plan of universal necessity, the ignava ratio, the inactive doctrine of the Stoics, would have followed, and that there would have been no Room for forethought about futurity, or any sort of industry and care:t" plainly implying, that in this case, men would see and know that all their industry and care signified nothing, was in vain, and to no purpose, or of no benefit; events being fixed in an irrefragable chain, and not at all DEPENDING on their care and endeavour; as he explains himself particularly, in the instance of men's use of means to prolong life: not only very contrary to what I largely maintain in my Enquiry, but also very inconsistently with his own scheme, in what he supposes of the ends for which God has so deeply implanted this deceitful feeling in man's nature; in which he manifestly supposes men's care and industry not to be in vain and of no benefit, but of great use, yea of absolute necessity, in order to their obtaining the most important ends and necessary purposes of human life, and to fulfil the ends of action to the BEST ADVANTAGE; as he largely declares. Now, how shall these things be reconciled? That if men had a clear view of real truth, they would see that there was no ROOM for their care and industry, because they would see it to be in vain and of no benefit; and yet that God, by having a clear view of real truth, sees their being excited to care and industry will be of excellent use to mankind and greatly for the benefit of the world, yea absolutely necessary in order to it: and that therefore the great wisdom and goodness of God to men appears, in artfully contriving to put them on care and industry for their good, which good could not be obtained without them; and yet both these things are maintained at once, and in the same sentences and words by this author. The very reason he gives, why God has put this deceitful feeling into men, contradicts and destroys itself; that God in his great goodness to men gave them such a deceitful feeling, because it was very useful and necessary for them, and greatly for their benefit, or excites them to care and

* P. 184. †P. 189. P. 184, 185. § Especially Part IV. Sect. 5. P. 188 ---192. and in many other places,

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