the expression "free to choose and to act," is not definite. No one has ever denied, that man is free to choose and to act according to the dictates of his will, which will is determined by circumstances under the control of Providence. The question is, whether man is free to act and to chuse, independently of Providence and external circumstances,-especially the latter. This, however, it is presumed, Dr Coplestone meant to express in his axiom. If he did not, the axiom is admitted by Necessitarians, and is strictly in unison with the Necessitarian theory. The assertion, that "God deals with man, as if future events were contingent," shall be considered by and by. In his third Discourse, the reverend inquirer transfers his reasoning to the Calvinistic doctrine of predestination. The fourth also inquires, whether, according to the Calvinists, "there be few that be saved;" and whether "each man's destiny is to be regarded as settled from all eternity;" this, including some very proper observations on the use of words, is, I believe, the substance of Dr Coplestone's Preface.

It remains to proceed with my intention of offering some cursory remarks, in reply to the points brought forward in his Discourses. There is one distinction, however, insisted upon by the reverend author, from which I must express my dissent. It is the following objection to the use of the word "true," as applied to the future. "If it (truth) be found to mean what all accurate writers define it to be, the agreement of a representation with the thing represented, there must be some thing previously existing before the idea of truth can be entertained at all. Propositio vera quod res est dicit.' The original may be antecedent to the representation. An assertion, there fore, respecting the future, may be probable or improbable, ** it may have any relation we please to the mind of the person who makes it, or of him who hears it; but it can have no relation at all to a thing which is not." Now, this distinction appears to me completely "to turn upon the equivocation of a word." An assertion of the certainty of future events, is only an assertion of the present exist

ence of grounds for knowing that a certain chain of causes and effects must take place. That which has ceased to be," is not" as much as that which has not begun to be; yet Dr Coplestone would hardly object to an assertion of the present existence of grounds, for knowing that some past event certainly has been why should he then to an assertion that some future event shall be? In fact, the knowledge of the past and of the future are precisely of the same sort; distant views of causes and effects, not at present in action, but which have either ceased to act, or not begun to act. To a perfect intelligence, it is admitted, that the past and the future must be alike, as it must perceive the chain of causes, equally clearly and fully, on each side. Nay, with the human mind, this is the case, as far as human infirmity will permit. In cases where we have the means of a very full knowledge of cause and effect, this is evident; as, for instance, a clockmaker is as certain, barring some very distant chances, that his clock will strike the next hour as that it struck the last.

Dr Coplestone takes for his first text, Acts, xv. 18. "Known unto God are all his works, from the beginning to the end." The Discourse sets out with explaining the nature of the Divine prescience, by comparing it to that imperfect foreknowledge of events, at which the human mind is sometimes enabled to arrive. "As man is a being of a certain composition, having such and such faculties, inclinations, affections, desires, and appetites, it is very possible for those who study his nature attentively, especially for those who have practical experience of any individual, or of any community of men, to foretel how they will be affected, and how they will act under any supposed circumstances. The same power, in an unlimited degree, it is natural and reasonable to ascribe to that Being who excels the wisest of us, infinitely more than the wisest of us excels his fellowcreatures. It never enters the mind of a person, who reflects in this way, that his anticipation of another's conduct lays any restraint upon that conduct when he comes to act. The anticipation, indeed, is relative to him

self. ** **** No man supposes the certainty of the event, (to use a common, but, as I conceive, improper phrase,) to correspond at all with the certainty of him who foretels or expects it. In fact, every day's experience shews that men are deceived in the event, even when they regard themselves as most certain. ***** How is it then? God can never be deceived; his knowledge, therefore, is always accompanied or followed by the event; and yet, if we get an idea of what his knowledge is by our own, why should we regard it as dragging the event along with it, when, in our own case, we acknowledge the two things have no connection?" This first point of Dr Coplestone's discourse is by no means new-scarcely any, indeed, of the objections to the doctrine of philosophical necessity are so-and as it is not new, so it has been more than once answered in some shape or other. The reverend metaphysician himself has, indeed, supplied an apparent solution, probably for the sake of afterwards overturning it, but this solution Necessitarians will not adopt. It is not the true answer to say, "that though your knowledge does not affect the event, yet God, who is all-powerful, who made all things as they are, and who knows all that will come to pass, must be regarded as rendering that necessary which he foreknows, just even as you may be considered accessary to the event, which you anticipate, exactly in proportion to the share you have had in preparing the instruments, or forming the minds of those who are to bring it about." It is equally useless, consequently, to rejoin with the reverend gentleman,

that the connection between the knowledge and the event, is not at all proved by this argument;" or, that "it is not because I knew what would follow, but because I contributed towards it that it is influenced by me." Nor will it serve any purpose of argument to assert," that God's foreknowledge ought not to interfere without belief in the contingency of events, and the freedom of human actions."

The plain reply is this:-Necessitarians do not hold that the Divine foreknowledge renders events necessary, but that it proves them to be necessary. Human foreknowledge also is a proof, as far as it goes, of the necessity of that which is foreknown.

The difference between the human mind feeling certain of a future event, and the Divine mind feeling certain of a future event, is nearly this-that human judgment, instead of being perfect, is built upon deductions drawn from observation and experience, which, though often right, are fallible in their nature, and consequently sometimes false, even when resting upon the best apparent grounds. When, however, a man feels certain of a future event, and his certainty is founded, as it often is, upon real and good foundations of observation and experience, it is, in fact, a complete proof of the necessary occurrence of that future event, though not acknowledged to be such, because it is impossible to be sure beforehand, whether the grounds of certainty be absolutely good and secure. The dif ference between the validity of proof drawn from human certainty, and that of proof drawn from the Divine certainty, is the difference between the fallibility of human foresight and the infallibility of Divine foresight. The infallible foresight of the Deity is a perfect proof of the future necessary occurrence of an event, of which the fallible foresight of the human mind is an imperfect proof, but a legitimate one, as far as it goes. In a note appended to his first discourse, Dr Coplestone, in reply to Edwards, who has strongly enforced this argument, says, fallible foreknowledge, while it remains foreknowledge, proves nothing. When the being who possesses this declares that a thing will come to pass, that declaration indeed proves, or is a certain ground of assurance to us, that it will come to pass. Even then it does not prove the event to be neces sary."

"In

Here are some distinctions which may include a little difficulty. The difficulty, however, arises from any thing but the truth of the distinctions. If infallible foreknowledge, when declared, proves that an event will come to pass-that foreknowledge, when undeclared, must be an existing proof, though an undeclared proof, of the future occurrence of the given event; it must be an existing proof, because it is known or has declared itself to him who possesses it, although he has not made it known or declared it to others. The declaration or non-declaration of any thing cannot alter the nature or affect the existence of that

thing. If infallible foreknowledge of an event be a proof of its future occurrence, then, as soon as any one shall possess that foreknowledge, the proof must exist in full force, whether known to one or to many. But even if declared, says Dr Coplestone, it does not prove the event to be necessary. "This (he goes on to observe) is an example of the same error which pervades the stoical argument mentioned in the treatise De Fato,' i. e. confounding words with things. One proposition may be a necessary consequence of another proposition; but the thing denoted by it is not therefore necessary." If it be here meant that the truth of the second proposition is not necessary, this is an assertion at which logicians will a little startle. That the truth of a proposition flowing from a true premiss should not be necessary, is something new in logic. This paradox, however, is not needed to overturn the stoical sophism quoted in the treatise "De Fato."* The argument of the Stoics, which puzzled the disciples of Epicurus, was an affirmation "of the certainty of either the affirmative or the negative of every proposition that could be uttered concerning what was to pass hereafter." The sophism lies in this, that in the first assumption the question in dispute is begged. One of these two propositions that, on a given day, it will rain, or will not rain, is now certainly true, says the fatalist; and this the epicurean did not, it seems, take upon him to deny. He might have done so, however, according to his own principles. If it be argued that there are such things as contingent events, the definition of such events must be, that they are future events, possible in themselves, but on the occurrence or non-occurrence of which, there is no ground in nature for deciding beforehand. The chances for

their future occurrence or non-occurrence must be exactly equal, and there must be absolutely no ground for expecting or predicting one alternative in preference to the other. This, it is presumed, is the definition of what is meant by absolute contingency, as applied to a future event. If this be so, all propositions as to such events, whether affirmative or negative, must be equally uncertain. Supposing, then, that it is affirmed of an absolutely contingent event, (as it is asserted to be,) for instance, of a person's laughing on a given day," one of the two is certain, he will laugh, or he will not laugh;" then this must be denied. For what is the meaning of the assertion? not that one of the two propositions will ultimately become certain, but that one of them is, at the present time, certain; which is only an assertion opposed to the assertion of contingency. The definition of a contingent event is, an event in its own nature absolutely uncertain, and as to the occurrence or non-occurrence of which, all propositions must consequently be uncertain. He, therefore, who undertakes to prove the negative of the assertion which says that both propositions, the affirming or denying the occurrence of a future event, are equally uncertain together with the event, and who begins with laying down as one of his premises, that one of the two is now certain, is guilty of a petitio principii. The only difficulty lies in distinguishing the falsehood of the position" because one of the two will, ultimately, become absolutely certain ;" therefore one of the two must now, at this moment, be absolutely certain-which does not follow. With respect to the possibility of such things as contingent events, the existence of which is, after all, a mere assumption, more hereafter.

Dr Coplestone's distinction between

VOL. X.

2 B

absolute certainty and necessity is not new. It is formally laid down, I believe, in Kirwan's Metaphysical Essays, and probably occurs, more or less directly, elsewhere. It seems to be this-that though it may be known that a future event certainly shall be, yet it does not follow that such future event necessarily must be. It is an endeavour to shew that the terms, "certainly shall be," and "necessarily must be," are not identical, or do not include each other. Let us see how this can consist. If it be generally and merely known to be not true that a future event necessarily must be, there is an equal chance for the converse of the proposition being true, viz. that it necessarily must not be; and if there is an equal chance that the proposition "it necessarily must not be" shall be true, then of course an assertion," that the event may not happen," is as likely as "that it may happen." Now, if it be true of this same event, that it certainly shall be this would exclude the truth of the negative, that it certainly shall not be, and also of the contingent, that it certainly may not be. If, then, the Supreme Being know of a future supposed event, that it is not necessary, he as certainly knows that it may not be; and, of course, if he knows also that its non-occurrence is not necessary, then he has a complete knowledge of its contingency; he knows that neither the assertion "it may be," nor the assertion" it may not be," is necessarily untrue. If, in addition to this, he know that the event certainly shall be, then he knows that a present de

claration to that effect must be absolutely true; and that truth must be as necessary as any thing which now exists is necessary. It follows, then, that he may declare of the event, "that it certainly shall be,” and also "that it has an equal chance not to be;" and that both these declarations are necessary, absolute, and existing truths.

The doctrine of contingency must not, however, be assumed, as it has generally been, without examination. Öf the existence of such things as absolutely contingent events, there has never been the shadow of a proof.t Absolute contingency is a mere "Ens Rationis," (a phrase sufficiently cloudy;) nay, it is hardly even that. What definition of contingency has ever been offered, from which any distinct ideas can be drawn? What is to become of the reasonings founded upon cause and effect, if events may take place without causes, or causes may be followed by no effects, or by contrary effects? Dr Coplestone, very properly no doubt, submits, (p. 40,) that" if we mean by the word contingent, that which cannot be known beforehand; we only say that what cannot be known beforehand, cannot be known beforehandwhich is saying nothing; therefore nothing is denied of the Deity." Granted: but what better meaning can the advocates of free-will put upon it? In fact, they are driven to assume, either this sort of absolute contingence, which, as they allow, excludes the divine foreknowledge; or else another sort, the definition of which includes a contradiction; that is to say, they de