A Careful and Strict Enquiry into the Modern Prevailing Notions of that Freedom of Will, which is Supposed to be Essential to Moral Agency, Vertue and Vice, Reward and Punishment, Praise and Blame.
Boston: S. Kneeland, 1754.
A Careful and Strict Enquiry into the Modern Prevailing Notions of that Freedom of Will, which is Supposed to be Essential to Moral Agency, Vertue and Vice, Reward and Punishment, Praise and Blame.
Boston: S. Kneeland, 1754. First edition. Rebound to style in full sheep, blind rules, raised bands and a red morocco spine label. Octavo (pages 195 x 114 m), collating: [ii], vi, [iv], 294, [xiv]; complete with the Table of Contents in the front, and the Index and List of Subscribers, in the back. Index with errata slip pasted in. Pages browned, minor soiling and a few early and late leaves dampstained. Overall a Very Good copy of a scarce and important work.
The Cambridge History of American Literature devotes a whole chapter to Jonathan Edwards, pointing out that he remains one of the giants of the intellect and one of the enduring masters of religious emotion. It was of this book that Dr. Johnson said "[a]ll theory is against the freedom of the will, all experience for it." Boswell's typical remark was "[t]he only relief I had was to forget it." A very important early American philosophical work.
"The most recent generation of scholars has put Edwards back into deeper historical context: as a pastor exemplifying changes in the role of the minister within a socioeconomically evolving community; as a preacher developing the homiletic arts to fit the needs of his audience; and as a thinker engaging with the best European ideas, innovatively synthesizing rationalism and piety in order to transmit the best of the Puritan vision of man's frailty and God's glory into a modern age that found it convenient to ignore both." (ANB).
Grolier One hundred influential American books printed before 1900 (Item #1843)
