Chapter VI

CONNECTION OF THE DOCTRINE OF LIBERTY WITH THE DIVINE PRESCIENCE.

The argument on which Necessitarians chiefly rely, against the doctrine of Liberty, and in support of that of Necessity, is based upon the Divine prescience of human conduct. The argument runs thus: all acts of the Will, however remote in the distant future, are foreknown to God. This fact necessitates the conclusion, that such acts are in themselves certain, and, consequently, not free, but necessary. Either God cannot foreknow acts of Will, or they are necessary. The reply to this argument has already been anticipated in the Introduction. The Divine prescience is not the truth to which the appeal should be made, to determine the philosophy of the Will pre-supposed in the Bible. This I argue, for the obvious reason, that of the mode, nature, and degree, of the Divine prescience of human conduct we are profoundly ignorant. These we must know with perfect clearness, before we can affirm, with any certainty, whether this prescience is or is not consistent with the doctrine of Liberty. The Divine prescience is a truth of inspiration, and therefore a fact. The doctrine of Liberty is, as we have seen, a truth of inspiration, and therefore a fact. It is also a fact, as affirmed by the universal consciousness of man. How do we know that these two facts are not perfectly consistent with each other? How do we know but that, if we understood the mode, to say nothing of the nature and degree of the Divine prescience, we should not perceive with the utmost clearness, that this truth consists as perfectly with the doctrine of Liberty, as with that of Necessity.

If God foresees events, he foreknows them as they are, and not as they are not. If they are free and not necessary, as free and not necessary he foresees them. Having ascertained by consciousness that the acts of the Will are free, and having, from reason and revelation, determined, that God foreknows such acts, the great truth stands revealed to our mind, that God does and can foreknow human conduct, and yet man in such conduct be free; and that the mode, nature, and degree, of the former are such as most perfectly to consist with the latter.

I know with perfect distinctness, that I am now putting forth certain acts of Will. With equal distinctness I know, that such acts are not necessary, but free. My present knowledge is perfectly consistent with present freedom. How do I know but that God’s foreknowledge of future acts is equally consistent with the most perfect freedom of such acts.

Perhaps a better presentation of this whole subject cannot be found than in the following extract from Jouffroy’s “Introduction to Ethics.” The extract, though somewhat lengthy, will well repay a most attentive perusal.