But God foreknows the actions of men;
Therefore their actions are certain.

This is now a good argument, because we have got the same in the premises and in the conclusion, namely, the certainty of the actions of men. But when you change the term certain, for the term necessary or unavoidable, you make a false argument of it, because you bring more into the conclusion than you have in the premises. In the premises you have simply the certainty of their actions; but in the conclusion you have more than the certainty, you have the necessity of their actions, and the impossibility that their actions should have been different from what they are: in other words, the premises relate simply to the actions of men as agents; but the conclusion relates to the physical power of the agents, and asserts that they have not power to act differently from what they do.

Let us now apply this distinction between the certainty and the necessity of human actions to some familiar cases, and we shall see that actions may be certain which are not necessary. A man is convicted of a crime. It is therefore certain that he has committed a crimina action. The question, therefore, is not now respecting the certainty of the criminal action, but concerning the necessity of it; and though after the action is performed, it cannot be altered, yet it is certain that before it was performed it might have been prevented. But, says the objector, the criminal action in this

case was foreknown, and therefore it was necessary, and could not possibly have been otherwise. To this it may be replied, that foreknowledge, as well as present knowledge, being dependent on the action, and not the action on the knowledge of it, the action might have been different, that is, a virtuous action might have been performed instead of a criminal one, in which case the criminal action would not have been foreknown, but the virtuous one. And it is abundantly evident that he who performed the criminal action, had, at the time he performed it, all the ability necessary for avoiding it, and for performing a virtuous one in its stead.

And this is the sentiment of all mankind in practice, and therefore it is just; but the contrary would be absurd and dangerous in practice, and therefore must be false. All punishments, human and Divine, proceed on the principle, that he who has done wrong, might have done right. The necessity of wrong actions, is, therefore, universally rejected. Let us suppose a man to be brought before a judge in an action of theft, and to plead in extenuation of guilt, that the theft was foreknown, and therefore could not possibly have been prevented. Would his plea be admitted? But suppose the thief should urge this plea with the judge, and should say, "Your honour foreknew that I should commit this theft; and therefore I could not possibly avoid it." What reply would the judge make? Would he not say, "I

merely foresaw how you, as a free agent, would act; and I saw, at the same time, that you had power to act differently; you cannot, therefore, exculpate yourself on the ground of necessity." Every master, and every parent who has occasion to administer punishment would say the same. And God himself says the same in all the administrations of the penalties of his law. He never admits the plea of necessity arising from foreknowledge, which he no doubt would do if it were true.

If I mistake not, we may conclude, from the foregoing observations, that the only difficulty arising from foreknowledge is in a mistake of our own, in supposing that the actions foreknown are dependent on the knowledge of them for their existence; whereas foreknowledge is as much dependent on the actions foreknown, as present knowledge is. And in all cases the action foreknown, in the order of nature, precedes the knowledge of it; though in relation to God, there may be no difference in time between the action and the knowledge of it. And were we careful to observe that the phrase "foreknowledge," is a phrase "after the manner of men," and conveys an idea of human knowledge which is always imperfect; and that the Divine knowledge is all present knowledge, we should have no more difficulty about the foreknowledge of God, than we have about our present knowledge. And who that should learn at any time the objects, persons, and actions surrounding

him, would suppose from the bare fact of his knowledge of them, that they were dependent on his knowledge for their existence, or that they existed of necessity? Yet the inference of necessity in this case would be just as correct as in the case of foreknowledge. When therefore, the question of necessity arising from foreknowledge comes up, we have only to reflect that present knowledge does not imply such a necessity of the existence of human actions as that they could not have been different from what they are, and that the Divine knowledge is all present knowledge, and the difficulty vanishes at once.

That prince of English poets, the author of Paradise Lost, has some striking thoughts on this subject, which are so just and beautiful that I cannot withhold them from the audience. He represents the Father as speaking to the Son on the apostasy of Adam, thus

"So will fall,

He and his faithless progeny. Whose fault?
Whose but his own? Ingrate! he had of me
All he could have; I made him just and right,
Sufficient to have stood, though free to fall.
Such I created all th' ethereal powers

And spirits, both them who stood and them whe fail'd;

Freely they stood who stood, and fell who fell.

Not free, what proof could they have given sincere Of true allegiance, constant faith or love,

Where only what they needs must do appear'd, Not what they would? what praise could they receive?

What pleasure I from such obedience paid,
When will and reason (reason also is choice)
Useless and vain, of freedom both despoil'd,
Made passive both, had served necessity,
Not me? they therefore as to right belong'd,`
So were created, nor can justly accuse
Their Maker, or their making, or their fate,
As if predestination overruled

Their will, disposed by absolute decree

Or high foreknowledge: they themselves decreed
Their own revolt, not I: if I foreknew,
Foreknowledge had no influence on their fault,
Which had no less proved certain unforeknown."

In my opponent's arguments for necessity, there is a manifest want of method, the same argument recurring repeatedly in different words. His third and fourth arguments may be taken together, and expressed thus :

"From the omnipotence of God we may infer that he would not suffer his creatures to act contrary to his own choice."

Now when we look around us we see much irreligion, much neglect of Christ and the Gospel; we see much obscenity and profaneness; much gross intemperance and fraudulent dealing; much of murder, suicide, and duelling; in a word, much of all kinds of wickedness, and all, according to the argument, the "choice" of God, that is, he preferred that his creatures should be guilty of unnatural, beastly, and diabolical conduct, to their being innocent, pure, and holy. That there is much of this conduct among men is the plain matter of fact, and cannot be denied; and the argument tells us that "God will not suffer his creatures to act con