if liberty be taken away the nature and formall reason of sin is taken away I answer by denying the consequence The nature of sin consiâ—â—eth in this that the action done proceed from ouâ— will and be against the Law A Judge in judging whether it be sin or not which is done against the Law lâ—oks at no higher cause oâ— the action then the will of the doer Now when I say the action was necessary I do not say it was done against the will oâ— the doer but with his will and so necessarily because mans will that is every act of the will and purpose of man had a sufficient and therefore a necessary cause and consequently every voluntary action was necessitated An action therefore may be voluntary and a sin and nevertheless be necessary And because God may afflict by right derived from his â—mnipâ—tency though sin were not And the example of punishment on voluntary sinners is the cause that produceth Justice and maketh sin less frequent for God to punish such sinners as I have shewed before is no injustice And thus you have my answer to his objections both out of Scripture and Reason J. D. SCis tu simulare â—upressum quid hoc It was shrewd counsâ—il which Alcibiades gave to Themistocles when he was busy about his accounts to the State that he should rather study how to make no accounts So it seems T. H. thinks it a more compendious way to baulk an argument then to satisfie it And if he can produce a Rowland against an Olâ—ver if he can urge a reason against a reason he thinks he hath quitted himself fairely But it will not serve his turn And that he may not complain of misunderstanding it as those who have a politick deafness to hear nothing but what liketh them I will first reduce mine argument into form and then weigh what he saith in answer or rather in opposition to it a That opinion which takes away the formall reason of sin and by consequence sin it self is not to be approoved this is cleer because both Reason and Religion Nature and Scripture do proove and the whole world confesseth that there is sin But this opinion of the necessity of all things by reason of a conflux of second causes ordered and determined by the first cause doth take away the very formal reason of sin This is prooved thus That which makes sin it self to be good and just and lawfull takes away the formall cause and destroyes the essence of sin for if sin be good and just and lawfull it is no more evill it is no sin no anomy But this opinion of the necessity of all things makes sin to be very good and just and lawful for nothing can flow essentially by way of Physicall determination from the first cause which is the Law and Rule of Goodness and Justice but that which is good and just and lawfull but this opinion makes sin to proceed essentially by way of Physicall determination from the first cause as appears in T. H. his whole discourse Neither is it material at all whether it proceed immediatly from the fist cause or mediately so as it be by a necessary flux of second and determinate causes which produce it inevitably To these proofs hee answers nothing but onely by denying the first consequence as he calls it and then sings over his old song That the nature of sin consisteth in this that the action proceede from our will and be against the Law which in our sense is most true if he understand a just Law and a free rationall will b But supposing as he doth that the Law injoins things impossible in themselves to be done then it is an unjust and Tyrahnical Law and the transgression of it is no sin not to do that which never was in our power to do And supposing likewise as he doth that the will is inevitably determined by special influence from the first cause then it is not mans will but Gods Will and flows essentially from the Law of Goodness c That which he addes of a Judge is altogether impertinent as to his defence Neither is a Civil Judge the proper Judge noâ— the Law of the Land the proper Rule of Sin But it makes strongly against him for the Judge goes upon a good ground and even this which he confesseth that the Judge looks at no higâ—er cause then the will of the doer prooves that the will of the doer did determine it self freely and that the malefactor had liberty to have kept the Law if he would Certainly a Judge ought to look at all material circumstances and much more at all essential causes Whether every sufficient cause be a necessary cause will come to be examined more properly Numb 31. For the present it shall suffice to say that liberty flows from the sufficiency and contingency from the debility of the cause d Nature Never intends the generation of a monster If all the causes concur sufficiently a a perfect creature is produced but by reason of the insufficiency or debility or contingent aberration of some of the causes sometimes a Monster is produced Yet the causes of a Monster were sufficient for the production of that which was produced that is a Monster otherwise a Monster had not been produced What is it then A Monster is not produced by vertue of that order which is set in Nature but by the contingent aberration of some of the natural causes in their concurrence The order set in Nature is that every like should beget its like But supposing the concurrence of the causes to be such as it is in the generation of a Monster the generation of a Monster is necessary as all the events in the world are when they are that is by an hypothetical necessity e Then he betakes himself to his old help that God may punish by right of omnipotence though there were no sin The question is not now what God may do but what God will do according to that Covenant which he hath made with man Fac hoc vives Do this and thou shalt live Neither doth God punish any man contrary to this Covenant Hosea 13. 9. O Israel thy destruction is from thy self but in me is thy help He that wills not the death of a Sinner doth much less will the death of an innocent Creature By death or destruction in this discourse the onely separation of Soul and Body is not intended which is a debt of nature and which God as Lord of Life and Death may justly do and make it not a punishment but a blessing to the party but we understand the subjecting of the Creature to eternal torments Lastly he tells of that benefit which redounds to others from Exemplary Justice which is most true but not according to his own grounds for neither is it Justice to punish a man for doing that which it was impossible always for him not to do Neither is it lawfull to punish an
opinion of T. H almost as there are words Here we learn that God is rich in goodness and will not punish his creatures for that which is his own act Secondly that he suffers and forbeares sinners long and doth not snatch them away by sudden death as they deserve Thirdly that the reason of Gods forbearance is to bring men to repentance Fourthly that hardness of heart and impenitency is not causally from God but from our selves Fiftly that it is not the insufficient proposal of the means of their conversion on Gods ' part which is the cause of mens perdition but their own contempt and despising of these means Sixtly that punishment is not an act of absolute dominion but an act of righteous judgement whereby God renders to every man according to his own deeds wrath to them and only to them who treasure up wrath unto themselves eternal life to those who continue patiently in well-doing If they deserve such punishment who only neglect the goodness and long suffering of God what do they who utterly deny it and make Gods doing and his suffering to be all one I do beseech T. H. to consider what a degree of wilfulness it is out of one obscure text wholly misunderstood to contradict the clear current of the whole Scripture Of the same mind with St. Paul was St. Peter 1 Pet. 3. 22. The long suffering of God waited once in the daies of Noah And 2 Pet. 3. 15. Account that the long suffering of the Lord is salvation This is the name God gives himself Exod. 34. 6. The Lord the Lord God mercyful and gracious long suffering c. b Yet I do acknowledge that which T. H. saith to be commonly true That he who doth permit any thing to be done which it is in his power to hinder knowing that if he do not hinder it it will be done doth in some sort will it I say in some sort that is either by an antecedent will or by a consequent will either by an operative will or by a permissive will or he is willing to let it be done but not willing to do it Sometimes an antecedent engagement doth cause a man to suffer that to be done which otherwise he would not suffer So Darius suffered Daniel to be cast into the Lions den to make good his rash decree So Herod suffered John Baptist to be beheaded to make good his rash oath How much more may the immutable rule of justice in God and his fidelity in keeping his word draw from him the punishment of obstinate sinners though antecedently he willeth their conversion He loveth all his creatures well but his own Justice better Again sometimes a man suffereth that to be done which he doth not will directly in it self but indirectly for some other end or for the producing of some greater good As a man willeth that a putrid member be cut off from his body to save the life of the whole Or as a Judge being desirous to save a malefactors life and having power to reprieve him doth yet condemn him for example sake that by the death of one he may save the lives of many Marvel not then if God suffer some creatures to take such courses as tend to their own ruine so long as their sufferings do make for the greater manifestation of his glory and for the greater benefit of his faithful servants This is a most certain truth that God would not suffer evil to be in the world unless he knew how to draw good out of evil Yet this ought not to be understood as if we made any priority or posteriority of time in the acts of God but onely of Nature Nor do we make the antecedent and consequent will to be contrary one to another because the one respects man pure and uncorrupted the other respects him as he is lapsed The objects are the same but considered after a diverse manner Nor yet do we make these wills to be distinct in God for they are the same with the divine essence which is one But the distinction is in order to the objects or things willed Nor lastly do we make this permission to be a naked or a meer permission God causeth all good pemitteth all evil disposeth all things both good and evill c T. H. demands how God should be the cause of the action and yet not be the cause of the irregularity of the action I answer because he concurres to the doing of evill by a general but not by a speciall influence As the Earth gives nourishment to all kinds of plants as well to Hemlock as to Wheat but the reason why the one yeilds food to our sustenance the other poison to our destruction is not from the general nourishment of the Earth but from the special quality of the root Even so the general power to act is from God In him we live and move and have our being This is good But the specification and determination of this general power to the doing of any evill is from our selves and proceeds from the free will of man This is bad And to speak properly the free will of man is not the efficient cause of sin as the root of the Hemlock is of poison sin having no true entity or being in it as poison hath But rather the deficient cause Now no defect can flow from him who is the highest perfection d Wherefore T. H. is mightily mistaken to make the particular and determinate act of killing Uriah to be from God The general power to act is from God but the specification of this general and good power to murther or to any particular evil is not from God but from the free will of man So T. H. may see clearly if he will how one may be the cause of the Law and likewise of the action in some sort that is by general influence and yet another cause concurring by special influence and determining this general and good power may make it self the true cause of the anomy or the irregularity And therefore he may keep his longer and shorter garments for some other occasion Certainly they will not fit this subject unless he could make general and special influence to be all one But T. H. presseth yet further that the case is the same and the objection used by the Jews ver 19. Why doth he yet find fault who hath resisted his will is the very same with my argument And St. Pauls answer ver 20. O man who art thou that repliest against God shall the thing formed say to him that formed it why hast thou made me thus Hath not the Potter power over his Clay c is the very same with his answer in this place drawn from the irresistible power and absolute dominion of God which justifieth all his actions And that the Apostle in his answer doth not deny that it was Gods will nor that Gods decree was before Esaus sin To which I reply First that the case is
not at all the same but quite different as may appear by these particulars first those words before they had done either good or evill are not cannot be refered to those other words Esau have I hated Secondly If they could yet it is less than nothing because before Esau had actually sinned his future sins were known to God Thirdly by the Potters clay here is not to be understood the pure mass but the corrupted mass of mankind Fourthly the hating here mentioned is only a comparative hatred that is a less degree of love Fiftly the hardening which St. Paul speaks of is not a positive but a negative obduration or a not imparting of grace Sixtly St. Paul speaketh not of any positive reprobation to eternal punishment much less doth he speak of the actual inflicting of punishment without sin which is the Question between us and wherein T. H. differs from all that I remember to have read who do all acknowledge that punishment is never actually inflicted but for sin If the Question be put why God doth good to one more than to another or why God imparteth more grace to one than to another as it is there the answer is just and fit because it is his pleasure and it is sawciness in a creature in this case to reply May not God do what he will with his own Matth. 20. 15. No man doubteth but God imparteth grace beyond mans desert c But if the case be put why God doth punish one more than another or why he throws one into hell fire and not another which is the present case agitated between us To say with T. H. that it is because God is Omnipotent or because his power is irresistible or meerly because it is his pleasure is not only not warranted but is plainly condemned by St. Paul in this place So many differences there are between those two cases It is not therefore against God that I reply but against T. H. I do not call my Creator to the Bar but my fellow creature I ask no account of Gods counsails but of mans presumptions It is the mode of these times to father their own fancies upon God and when they cannot justifie them by reason to plead his Omnipotence or to cry O altitudo that the wayes of God are unsearchable If they may justifie their drowsie dreams because Gods power and dominion is absolute much more may we reject such phantastical devises which are inconsistent with the â—ruth and goodness and justice of God and make him to be a Tyrant who is the Father of Mercies and the God af all consolation The unsearchableness of Gods wayes should be a bridle to restrain presumption and not a sanctuary for spirits of error Secondly this objection conteined ver 19. to which the Apostle answers ver 20. is not made in the person of Esau or Pharaoh as T. H. supposeth but of the unbelieving Jews who thought much at that grace and favour which God was pleased to vouchsafe unto the Gentiles to acknowledge them for his people which honour they would have appropriated to the posterity of Abraham And the Apostles answer is not onely drawn from the Soveraign Dominion of God to impart his grace to whom he pleaseth as hath been shewed already but also from the obstinacy and proper fault of the Jews as appeareth ver 22. What if God willing that is by a consequent will to shew his wrath and to make his power known endureth with much long suffering the vessels of wrath fitted to destruction They acted God endured They were toltrated by God but fitted to destruction by themselves for their much wrong doing here is Gods much long suffering And more plainly ver 31. Israel hath not atteined to the Law of righteousness wherefore because they sought it not by faith but as it were by the works of the Law This reason is set down yet more emphaâ—ically in the next Chapter ver 3. They that is the Israelites being ignorant of Gods righteousness that is by faith in Christ and going about to establish their own righteousness that is by the works of the Law have not submitted themselves to the righteousness of God And yet most expresly Chap. 11. ver 20. Because of undelief they were broken off but thou standest by faith Neither was there any precedent binding decree of God to necessitate them to unbelief and consequently to punishment It was in their own power by their concurrence with Gods grace to prevent these judgements and to recover their former estate ver 23. If they that is the unbelidving Jews abide not still in unbelief they shall be grafted in The Crown and the Sword are immovable to use St. Anselmes comparison but it is we that move change places Sometimes the Jews were under the Crown and the Gentiles under the Sword sometimes the Jews under the Sword and â—he Gentiles under the Crown Thirdly though I confess that human pacts are not the measure of Gods Justice but his justice is his own immutable will whereby he is ready to give every man that which is his own as rewards to the good punishments to the bad so nevertheless God may oblige himself freely to his creature He made the Covenant of works with mankind in Adam and therefore he punisheth not man contrary to his own Covenant but for the transgression of his duty And Divine justice is not measured by Omnipotence or by irresistible power but by Gods will God can do many things according to his absolute power which he doth not He could raise up children to Abraham of stones but he never did so It is a rule in Theology that God cannot do any thing which argues any wickedness or imperfection as God cannot deny himself 2 Tim 2. 13. He cannot lie Tit. 1. 2. These and the like are fruits of impotence not of power So God cannot destroy the righteous with the wicked Gen. 18. 25. He could not destroy Shdome whil'st Lot was in it Gen. 19 22. not for want of dominion or power but because it was not agreeable to his Justice nor to that Law which himself had constituted The Apostle saith Heb. 6. 10. God is not unrighteous to forget your work As it is a good consequence to say this is from God therefore it is righteous so is this also This thing is unrighteous therefore it cannot proceed from God We see how all creatures by instinct of nature do love their young as the Hen her Chickens how they will expose themselves to death for them And yet all these are but shadowes of that love which is in God towards his Creatures How impious is it then to conceive that God did create so many millions of souls to be tormented eternally in hell without any fault of theirs except such as he himself did necessitate them unto meerly to shew his dominion and because his power is irresistible The same priviledge which T. H. appropriates here to power absolutely irresistible a friend
Lieutenant of God from whom he derives his power of life and death T. H. hath one plea more As a drowning man catcheth at every Buâ—rush so he layes hold on every pretence to save a desperate cause But first it is worth our observation to see how oft he changeth shapes in this one particular â— First he told us that it was the irresistible power of God that justifies all his actions though he command one thing openly and plot another thing secretly though he be the cause not onely of the action but also of the irregularity though he both give man power to act and determine this power to evil as well as good though he punish the Creatures for doing that which he himself did necessitate them to do But being pressed with reason that this is tyrannical first to necessitate a man to do his will and then to punish him for doing of it he leaves this pretence in the plain field and flies to a second That therefore a man is justly punished for that which he was necessitated to do because the act was voluntary on his part This hath more shew of reason than the former if he did make the will of man to be in his own disposition but maintaining that the will is irresistibly determined to will whatsoever it doth will the injustice and absurdity is the same First to necessitate a man to will and then to punish him for willing The Dog onely bites the stone which is thrown at him with a strange haud but they make the first cause to punish the instrument for that which is his own proper act Wherefore not being satisfied with this he casts it off and flies to his third shift Men are not punished saith he â—…fore because their theft proceeded from election that is because it was willingly done for to Elect and Will saith he are both one Is not this to blow hot and cold with the same breath but because it was noxious and contrary to mens preservation Thus far he saith true that every creature by the instinct of nature seeks to preserve it self cast water into a dusty place and it contracts it self into little globes that is to preserve it self And those who are noxious the eye of the Law are justly punished by them to whom the execution of the Law is committed but the Law accounts no persons noxious but those who are noxious by their own fault It punisheth not a thorn for pricking because it is the nature of the thorn and it can do no otherwise nor a child before it have the use of reason If one should take mine hand perforce and give another a box on the ear with it my hand is noxious but the Law punisheth the other who is faulty And therefore he hath reason to propose the question how it is just to kill on man to amend another if he who killed did nothing but what he was necessitated to do He might as well demand how it is lawful to murther a company of innocent Infants to make a bath of their lukewarm blood for curing the Leprosie It had been a more rational way first to have demonstrated that it is so and then to have questioned why it is so His assertion it self is but a dream and the reason which he gives of it why it is so is a dream of a dream The sum of it is this That where there is no Law there no killing or any thing else can be unjust that before the constitution of Commonwealths every man had power to kill another if he conceived him to be hurtfull to him that at the constitution of Commonwealhts particular men lay down this right in part and in part reserve it to themselves as in case of theft or murther That the right which the Commonwealth hath to put a malefactor to death is not created by the Law but remaineth from the first right of Nature which every man hath to preserve himself that the killing of men in this case is as the killing of beasts in order to our own preservation This may well be called stringing of Paradoxes But first h there never was any such time when Mankind was without Governors and Lawes and Societies Paternal Government was in the world from the beginning and the Law of Nature There might be sometimes a root of such Barbatous Theevish Brigants in some rocks or desarts or odd corners of the World but it was an abuse and a degeneration from the nature of man who is a political creature This savage opinion reflects too much upon the honour of mankind Secondly there never was a time when it was lawfull ordinarily for private men to kill one another for their own preservation If God would have had men live like wild beasts as Lions Bears or Tygers he would have armed them with hornes or tusks or talons or pricks but of all creatures man is born most naked without any weapon to defend himself because God had provided a better means of security for him that is the Magistrate Thirdly that right which private men have to preserve themselves though it be with the killing of another when they are set upon to be murthered or robbed is not a remainder or a reserve of some greater power which they have resigned but a priviledge which God hath given them in case of extream danger and invincible necessity that when they cannot possibly have recourse to the ordinary remedy that is the Magistrate every man becomes a Magistrate to himself Fourthly nothing can give that which it never had The people whilest they were a dispersed rable which in some odd cases might happen to be never had justly the power of life and death and therefore they could not give it by their election All that they do is to prepare the matter but it is God Almighty that infuseth the soul of power Fiftly and lastly I am sorry to hear a man of reason and parts to compare the murthering of men with the slaughtering of brute beasts The elements are for the Plants the Plants for the brute Beasts the brute Beasts for Man When God enlarged his former grant to man and gave him liberty to eat the flesh of his creatures for his sustenance Gen. 9. 3. Yet man is expresly excepted ver â— Who so sheddeth mans blood by man shall his blood be shed And the reason is assigned for in the image of God made he man Before sin entred into the World or before any creatures were hurtful or noxious to man he had â—â—minion over them as their Lord and Master And though the possession of this soveraignty be lost in part for the sin of man which made not onely the creatures to rebel but also the inferiour 〈…〉 to rebel against the superiour from whence it comes that one man is hurtful to another yet the dominion still remains wherein we may observe how sweetly the providence of God doth temper this cross that though the strongest creatures
is in our own power True saith he but then the contrary habit doth necessitate the onâ— way as well as the former habit did the other way By which very consideration it appears that that which he calls a necessity is no more but a Proclivity If it were a true necessity it could not be avoided nor altered by our endeavours Again he mistakes for I said that Prayer Fasting c. when they alter our habits do necessarily cause the contrary habits which is not to say that the habit necessitates but is necessitated But this is Common with him to make me say that which out of readinâ— nâ—t out of Meditation he useth to say hiâ—â—â—â— Bâ—t how doth it apâ—â—ar that Prayer and Fasting c. make but a Proclivity in men to do what they do for if it â—ere but a Proclivity then what they do they do not Therefore they either necessitate the Will or the Will followeth nâ—t I contend for the truth of this onely that when the Wâ—ll followeth them they necessitate the will and when a â—râ—climity followeth they necessitate the proclimity But the Bishop thinâ—s I maintain that that also is produced necessiarily which is not produced at aâ— d He adds that we are not moved to Prayer or any other Action but by outward objects as pioâ—s company and Godly Preachers or something equivalent Wherein are two other mistakeâ— first to make Godly Preachers and pious company to be outward objects which are outward Agents Secondly to affirm that the Will is not moved but by outward objects The Wâ—l is moved by it self c. The first mistake he urgeth that I call Preachers and company objects Is not the Preacher to the hearer the object of his hearing No perhaps he will say it is the voyce which is the object and that we hear not the Preacher but his voyce as before he said the object of sight was not the cause of sight I must therefore once more make him smile with a great Paradox which is this that in all thâ— senses he Object is the Agent And that it is when we hear a Preacher the Preacher that we hear and that his voyce is the same thing with the hearing and a fancy in the hearer though the motion oâ— the Lips and other organs of speâ—ch be his that speaketh But of this I have written more largely in a moâ—e proper place My second mistake in affirming that the Will is not moved but by outward objects is a mistake of his own For I said not the Will is not moved but we ate not moved for I alwayes avoid attributing motion to any thing but Body The Will is produced generated formed and created in suâ—h â—ort as accidents are effected in a corpâ—real subject but moved it cannot be because it goeth not â—rom place to place And whereas hâ— saith the Will is moved by it self if he had spoken properly as he ought to do and said the Will is made or created by it self he would presently have acknowledged that it was impossible So that it is not without cause men use improper Language when they mean to keep their errours from being detected And because nothing can move that is not it self moved it is untruly said that either the Will or any thing else is moved by it self by the understanding by the sensitive passions or by Acts or habits or that Acts or habits are infused by God for infusion is motion and nothing is moved but bodys e He answers that I prove Ulysses was not necessitated to weep nor the Philosopher to strik but I do not prove that they were not necessitated to forbear He saith true I am not now proving but answering By his favour though he be answering now he was proving then And what he answers now maketh nothing more toward a proof then was before For these words the rational Wil hath Power to sleight the most appetible objects and to controle the most unruly passions are no more being reduced into proper terms then this the appetite hath power to be without appetite towards most appetible objects and to Will contrary to the most unruly Will which is Jargon f He objects that Liberty is in no danger but to be lost but I say it cannot be lost therefore he inferrs that it is in no danger at all I answer First that Liberty is in more danger to be abused then lost c. Secondly Liberty is in danger likewise to be weakened by vicâ—ous habits Thirdly it may be totally lost It is true that a man hath more liberty one time then another and in one place then another which is a difference of liberty 〈◊〉 to the Body But as to the liberty of doing what we will in those things we are able to do it cannot be greater one time then another Consequently outward objects can 〈◊〉 wayes endanger liberty further then it destroyeth it And his answer that liberty is in more danger to be abused then lost is not to the question but a meer shift to be thought not silenced And whereas he says liberty is diminished by vitious habits it cannot be understood otherwise then that vicious habits make a man the lesse free to do vicious actions which I believe is not his meaning And lastly whereas he says that Liberty is lost when reason is lost and that they who by expresse of Study or by continuall gurmandising or by extravagant passion c. do become sots have consequently lost their liberty it requireth proof for for any thing that I can observe mad men and fools have the same liberty that other men have in those things that are in their power to do J. D. FOurthly the natural Philosopher doth teach that the will Num. 23. doth necessarily follow the last dictate of the understanding It is true indeed the will should follow the direction of the understanding but I am not satisfied that it doth evermore follow it Sometimes this saying hath place Video mâ—liora proboque Deteriora sequor As that great Roman said of two Sailers that the one produced the better reasons but the other must have the office So reason often lies dejected at the feet of affection Things neerer to the senses moove more powerfully Do what a man can he shall sorrow more for the death of his child than for the sin of his soul Yet appreciatively in the estimation of judgment he accounts the offence of God a greater evill than any temporal loss Next I do not believe that a man is bound to weigh the expedience or inexpedience of every ordinary trivial action to the least grain in the ballance of his understanding or to run up into his Watch-Tower with his perspective to take notice of every Jack-daw that flies by for fear of some hidden danger This seems to me to be a prostitution of reason to petit observations as concerning every rag that a man wears each drop of drink each morsel of bread that he eates
each pace that he walks Thus many steps must he go not one more nor one less under pain of mortal sin What is this but a Rack and a Gibbet to the Conscience But God leaves many things indifferent though man be so curious he will not A good Architect will be sure to provide sufficient materials for his building but what particular number of stones or trees he troubles not his head And suppose he should weigh each action thus yet he doth not so still there is liberty Thirdly I conceive it is possible in this mist and weakness of human apprehension for two actions to be so equally circumstantiated that no discernable difference can appear between them upon discussion Aâ— suppose a Chirurgion should give two plaisters to his Patient and â—id him apply either oâ— them to his wound what can induce his reason more to the one than to the other but that he may refer it to chance whether he will use But leaving these probable speculations which I submit â—o better judgments I answer the Philosopher briefly thus Admitting that the will did necessarily follow the last dictare of the understanding as certainly in many things it doth Yet First this is no extrinsâ—â—al determination from without and a mans own resolution is not destructive to his own liberty but depends upon it So the person is still free Secondly this determination is not antecedent but joyned with the Action The understanding and the will are not different Agents but distinct faculties of the same soul. Here is an infallibility or an hypothetical necessity as we say Quicquid est quando est necessâ— est esse A necessity of consequence but not a necessity of consequent Though an Agent have certainly determined and so the Action be become infallible yet if the Agent did determine freely the Action likewise is free T. H. THE fourth opinion which he râ—jecteth is of them that make the will necessarily to follow the last dictate of the understanding but it seems he understands that Tenet in another sense than I do For he speaketh as if they that held it did suppose men must dispute the sequel of every astion they do great and small to the least grain which it a thing that he thinks with reason to be untrue But I understand it to signifie that thâ— will followes the last opinion or judgment immediatly proceding thâ— action concerning whether it be good to do it or not whether he hath weighed it long before or not at all And that I take to be the meaning of them that hold it As for example when a man strikes his will to strike followes necessarily that thought he had of the sequel of his stroke immediately before the liftinâ— of his hand Nâ—w iâ— it be understood in that sense the last dictate of the understanding does â—ertainly necessitate the action though not as the whole cause yet as the last cause as the last feather necessitates the breaking of an horses back when there are so many laid on before as there needeth but the addition oâ— that one to make the weight sufficient That which he alledgeth against this is first out of a Poet who in the person of Medea sayes Video Meliora proboque Deteriora sequorâ— But the saying as prâ—try as it is 〈◊〉 not true for though Medea saw many reasons to forbear killing her Children yet the last dictate of her judgment was that the present revenge on her husband outweighed them all and thereupon the wicked action followed necessarily Then the story of the Roman that of two competitors said one had the better reasons but the oâ— her must have the office This also maketh against him for the last dictate of his judgment that had the bestowing of the office was this that it was better to take a great bribe than reward a great merit Thirdly he objects that things neerer the senses moove more powerfully than reason What followeth thence but this That the sense of the present good is commonly more immediate to the Action than the foresight of the evill consequents to come Fourthly whereas he sayes that do what a man can he shall sorrow more for the death of his son than for the sin of his soul it makes nothing to the last dictate of the understanding but it argues plainly that sorrow for sin is not voluntary And by consequence repentance proceedeth from causes J. D. THE fourth pretense alledged against Liberty was that the will doth necessarily follow the last dictate of the understanding This objection is largely answered before in several places of this Reply and particularly Numb 7. In my former discourse I gave two answers to it The one certain and undoubted That a supposing the last dictate of the understanding did alwayes determine the will yet this determination being not antecedent in time nor proceeding from extrinsecal causes but from the proper resolution of the Agent who had now freely determined himself it makes no absolute necessity but onely hypothetical upon supposion that the Agent hath determined his own will after this or that manner Which being the main answer T. H. is so far from taking it away that he takes no notice of it The other part of mine answer was probable That it is not alwayes certain that the will doth alwayes actually follow the last dictate of the understanding though it alwayes ought to follow it b Of which I gave then three reasons one was that actions may be so equally circumstantiated or the case so intricate that reason cannot give a positive sentence but leaves the election to liberty or chance To this he answers not a word Another of my reasons was because reason doth not weigh nor is bound to weigh the convenience or inconvenience of every individual action to the uttermost grain in the balance of true judgement The truth of this reason is confessed by T. H. though he might have had more abetters in this than in the most part of his discourse that nothing is indifferent that a man cannot stroak his beard on one side but it was either necessary to do it or sinful to omit it from which confession of his it follows that in all those actions wherein reason doth not define what is most convenient there the will is free from the determination of the understanding and by consequence the last feather is wanting to break the horses back A third reason was because passions and affections sometimes prevail against judgment as I prooved by the example of Medea and Caesar by the neerness of the objects to the senses and by the estimation of a temporal loss more than sin Against this reason his whole answer is addressed And first c he explaineth the sense of the assertion by the comparison of the last feather wherewith he seems to be delighted seeing he useth it now the second time But let him like it as he will it is improper for three reasons First the determination of the