of the oaitli wlio did not sin. When we look on a new-born Infant we know tluit whatever may be uncertain in its future, it is abso- hitely, inevitably certain that, should it live, it will sin. In every aspect, therefore, in which we can contemplate free agency, wliether in Gotl, in the human nature of Christ, in the redeemed in heaven, or in man here on earth, we find that it is compatible with absolute
certainty.
Arguments from Scripture.
A second argument on this subject is derived from those doctrines of Scripture which necessarily suppose that free acts may be certain as to their occurrence.
1. The first and most obvious of these doctrines is the fore- knowledge of God. Whatever metaphysical explanation may be given of this divine attribute ; however we may ignore the distinction between knowledge and foreknowledge, or however we may contend that because God inhabits eternity, and is in no wise subject to the limitations of time, and that to Him nothing is successive, still the fact remains that we exist in time, and that to us there is a future as well as a present. It remains, there- fore, a fact that human acts are known before they occur in time, and consequently are foreknown. But if foreknown as future, they must be certain ; not because foreknowledge renders their occurrence certain, but because it supposes it to be so. It is a contradiction in terms to say that an uncertain event can be fore- known as certain. To deny foreknowledge to God, to say that free acts, because necessarily uncertain as to their occurrence, are not the objects of foreknowledge any more than sounds are the objects of sight, or mathematical truths of the affections, is to destroy the very idea of God. The future must be as dark to Him as to us ; and He must every moment be receiving vast accessions of knowledge. He cannot be an eternal being, pervading all dura- tion with a simultaneous existence, much less an omniscient Being, to whom there is nothing new. It is impossible, therefore, to believe in God as He is revealed in the Bible, unless we believe that all things are known unto Him from the beginning. But if all things are known, all things, whether fortuitous or free, are certain ; con- S'.M|uently certainty must be consistent with freedom. We are not more assured of our existence than we are of our free agency. To say that this is a delusion is to deny the veracity of consciousness, which of necessity not only involves a denial of the veracity of God, but also subverts the foundation of all knowledge, and plunges us into absolute scepticism. We may just as well say that our ex-
300 PART II. Ch. IX.— free agency.
istence is a delusion as that any other fact of consciousness is delu- sive. We have no more and no higher evidence for one such fact than for another. Men may speculate as thej please, they must believe and act according to the laws impressed on our nature hv our Creator. We must believe, therefore, in our existence and in our free agency; and as by a necessity scarcely less imperative we must believe that all things are known to God from eternity, and that if foreknown their occurrence is certain, we cannot deny that certainty is consistent with free agency without involving ourselves in palpable contradictions. This argument is so conclusive that most theistical advocates of the doctrine of contingency, when they come to deal with it, give the matter up, and acknowledge that an act may be certain as to its occurrence and yet free. They content themselves for the time being with denying that it is necessary, although it may be certain. But they forget that by " moral necessity" nothing more than certainty is intended, and that certainty is precisely the thing which, on other occasions, they affirm to be contrary to liberty. If from all eternity it is fixed how every man will act ; if the same consequences follow invariably from the same antecedents ; if the acts of men are inevitable, this is declared to be fatalism. If, however, it be indeed true that the advocates of indifference, self-determining power of the will, power of contrary choice, or by whatever other name the theory of con- tingency may be called, really do not intend to oppose the doctrine of certainty, but are simply combating fatalism or physical necessity, then the controversy is ended. What more could Leibnitz or Edwards ask than Reid concedes "in the following passage : " It must be granted, that, as whatever was, certainly was, and what- ever is, certainly is, so whatever shall be, certainly shall be. These are identical propositions, and cannot be doubted by those who con- ceive them distinctly. But I know no rule of reasoning by which it can be inferred that because an event certainly shall he, therefore its production Tnust he necessary. The manner of its production, whether free or necessary, cannot be concluded from the time of its production, whether it be past, present, or future. That it shall be, no more implies that it shall be necessarily than that it shall be freely produced ; for neither present, past, nor future, have any more connection with necessity than they have with freedom. I grant, therefore, that from events being foreseen, it may be justly concluded, that, they are certainly future ; but from their being certainly future it does not follow that they are necessary." ^ As
1 Active Powers^ Essay iv. ch. 10; Works, edit. Edinburgh, 1849, p 629.