EDWARDS, Georoe, fellow of the Royal and Antiquarian Societies, was born at Stratford, a hamlet belonging to Westham in Essex, on the 3d of April 1693. After having spent some time at school, he was put as apprentice to a tradesman in Fenchurch Street. His master, who was eminent both for his piety and skill in the languages, treated him with very great kindness; but about the middle of his apprenticeship an accident happened which totally put a stop to the hopes of young Edwards advancing himself in the way of trade. Dr Nicoas, a person of eminence[7:8:451] in the physical world, and a relation of his master’s, happened to die. The doctor’s books were removed to an apartment occupied by Edwards, who eagerly employed all his leisure hours, both during the day and great part of the night, in perusing those which treated of natural history, sculpture, painting, astronomy, and antiquities. The reading of these books entirely deprived him of any inclination which he might have formerly had for mercantile business, and he resolved to travel into foreign countries. In 1716 he visited most of the principal towns in Holland, and in about a month returned to England. Two years afterwards he took a voyage to Norway, at the invitation of a gentleman who was disposed to be his friend, and who was nephew to the master of the ship in which he embarked. At this time Charles XII. was besieging Frederickshall, an operation which prevented our young naturalist from making such excursions into the country as he would otherwise have done, for the Swedes were very careful to intercept such strangers as could not give a good account of themselves. But notwithstanding all his precaution he was confined by the Danish guard, who supposed him to be a spy employed by the enemy to procure intelligence of their designs. However, by obtaining testimonials of his innocence, a release was granted. In 1718 he returned to England, and next year he visited Paris by the way of Dieppe. During his stay in France he made two journeys of one hundred miles each, the first to Chalons in Champagne, in May 1720, and the second on foot to Orleans and Blois; but an edict happening at that time to be issued for securing vagrants, in order to transport them to America, as the banks of the Mississippi wanted population, our author narrowly escaped a western voyage. On his arrival in England, Mr Edwards closely pursued his favourite study of natural history, applying himself to drawing and colouring such animals as fell under his notice. In this pursuit he paid a strict attention to natural rather than to picturesque beauty. Birds first engaged his particular attention; and having purchased some of the best pictures of them, he was induced to make a few drawings of his own, which were admired by the curious, who encouraged the young naturalist to proceed, by paying a good price for his early labours. Amongst his first patrons and benefactors may be mentioned Mr James Theobalds of Lambeth, a gentleman zealous for the promotion of science. Being thus unexpectedly encouraged, he increased in skill and assiduity, and, by application to his favourite pursuit, procured a decent subsistence and a large acquaintance. However, he remitted his industry in 1731, when, in company with two of his relations, he made an excursion to Holland and Brabant, where he collected several scarce books and prints, and had an opportunity of examining the original pictures of several great masters at Antwerp, Brussels, Utrecht, and other cities. In December 1733, by the recommendation of Sir Hans Sloane, then president of the College of Physicians, he was chosen librarian to that body, and had apartments assigned him in the college. This office wns peculiarly agreeable to his taste and inclination, as he had the opportunity of a constant recourse to a valuable library filled with scarce and curious books on the subject of natural history, which he so assiduously studied. By degrees he became one of the most eminent ornithologists in this or in any other country. His merit in this respect is too well known to render it necessary to pronounce any eulogium on his performances; but it may be observed, that he never trusted to others what he could perforin himself, and he often found it so difficult to satisfy his own mind, that he frequently made three or four drawings in order to delineate the object in its most lively character, attitude, and representation. In the year 1743, the first volume of the History of Birds was published in quarto. As the number of his subscribers exceeded even his most sanguine expectations, a second volume appeared in 1747. The third volume was published in 1750; and in 1751 appeared the fourth volume. This being the last which he intended to publish at that time, he seems to have considered it as the most perfect of his productions in natural history; and therefore devoutly offered it up to the great God of nature, in humble gratitude for all the good things which he had received from Him in this world. Our author, in 1758, continued his labours under a new title, that of Gleanings of Natural History. A second volume of the Gleanings was published in 1760. The third part, which formed the seventh and last volume of his works, appeared in 1764. Thus our author, after a long series of years, the most studious application, and the most extensive correspondence in every quarter of the world, concluded a work which contains engravings and descriptions of more than six hundred subjects in natural history not before described or delineated. He likewise added a general index in French and English, which was afterwards perfected with the Linnaean names, by Linnaeus himself, who frequently honoured him with his friendship and correspondence. Some time after Mr Edwards bad been appointed librarian to the Royal College of Physicians, he was, on St Andrew’s Day, in the year 1750, presented by the president and council of the Royal Society with the gold medal, the donation of Sir Godfrey Copley, annually given on that day to the author of any new discovery in art or nature, in consideration of his natural history just then completed. A copy of this medal he had afterwards engraved, and placed under the title in the first volume of his history. He was a few years afterwards elected fellow of the Royal Society and of the Society of Antiquaries, London, and also a member of many of the academies of sciences and learning in different parts of Europe. In return for these honorary distinctions from learned bodies, he presented elegantly-coloured copies of all his works to the Royal College of Physicians, the Royal Society, the Society of Antiquaries, and to the British Museum; and also to the Academy of Sciences at Paris, from which he received a very polite and obliging letter of thanks by their then secretary Μ. Defouchy. His collection of drawings, which amounted to upwards of nine hundred, were purchased by the Earl of Bute. They contain a great number of British as well as foreign birds, and other animals hitherto not accurately delineated nr described. After the publication of the last work, having arrived at his seventieth year, he found his sight beginning to fail, and his hand losing its wonted steadiness. He retired front public employment to a little house which he had purchased at Plaistow, previously to which he disposed of all the copies as well as plates of his works. The conversation of a few select friends, and the perusal of a few select books, were the amusement of the evening of his life; and now and then he made an excursion to some of the principal cities in England, particularly to Bristol, Bath, Exeter, and Norwich. Some years before his death, the alarming depredation of a cancer, which baffled all the efforts of medical skill, deprived him of the sight of one of his eyes; and he also suffered much from the stone, to which at different periods of his life he had been subject; but in the severest paroxysms of pain he was scarcely known to utter a single complaint. Having completed his eightieth year, emaciated with age and sickness, he died, deservedly lamented, on the 23d of July 1773.

Edwards, Bryan, the well-known historian of the West Indies, was born at Westbury, in Wiltshire, on the 21st of May 1743. His father had a small paternal estate; [7:8:452] but as this did not exceed L.100 per annum, he found it insufficient for the maintenance of a numerous family, and endeavoured to improve his circumstances by dealing in corn and malt. This hazardous trade proved, as it often does, only a means of more deeply involving his affairs; and he died in 1756, leaving a widow and six children in a very distressed situation. Mrs Edwards, however, had two opulent brothers in the West Indies, the eldest of whom, Zachary Bayly, possessing a princely fortune, and being of a very amiable and generous disposition, undertook the support and education of young Edwards. He had already been placed by his father at the school of Mr Foot, a dissenting clergyman at Bristol, where he had been taught the elementary branches of education; but, for some reason which he never was able to divine, that person was strictly prohibited from initiating him in any branches of classical learning. He gave a species of instruction, however, not usual in schools, and from which his pupil probably derived the greatest benefit. He was accustomed to make the boys write letters, or rather essays, on various subjects, such as the beauty and dignity of truth, the obligations to a religious life, the benefits of good education, and the like, giving them, where it appeared necessary, an outline of the arguments which might be employed on the subject. When the papers were given in, he made such observations as appeared proper, insisting at least that they should be correct in point of grammar and orthography. These exercises gave occasion to display the superior talents of Edwards, whose powers of elegant composition already began to appear. He soon became the favourite of his master, who liberally praised these youthful performances, and often transmitted them for the gratification of his parents. They were entirely satisfied; but when the care of liis education devolved on his uncle, the agent employed by him at Bristol was much surprised to find an entire deficiency in classical knowledge, and, imputing the blame to the master, removed him immediately to a French boarding school in the same city. It is not said that he acquired here any great portion of Greek and Latin, but he became master of the French language, and having access to an extensive circulating library, cultivated a taste for reading which adhered to him throughout the whole of his future life.

In 1759, another uncle, the younger brother of him under whose care he had hitherto been, arrived in England. He, too, was possessed of an ample fortune, became member of parliament, first for Abingdon, and afterwards for his native town, and set up a splendid establishment in London. He appeared quite disposed to befriend young Edwards, and even took the latter to reside with him; but the nephew observes, that, after enumerating his external advantages, he had nothing else to say in favour of his uncle. What the bad qualities were which drew forth so unfavourable a sentence we are not informed; but in a few months they separated, and Edwards went out to his other uncle. In this friend he seems to have found every thing he could desire; the most enlightened mind, the sweetest temper, and the most generous disposition. To this was added a truly paternal regard for himself, which was returned with all the warmth of filial affection. His uncle, finding him possessed of literary talents, but deficient in classical acquirements, engaged a Mr Teale, a clergyman, and formerly master of a free grammar-school, to reside in his house, and give him the instruction of which he stood in need. This choice proved most acceptable to Edwards; he found in Mr Teale a man of extensive information, and one, too, possessing considerable taste in poetry. He viewed him, therefore, as a companion rather than as a teacher; but this relation between the tutor and pupil, however agreeable to both, was not favourable for instilling the dry principles of grammar and prosody. A much larger proportion of their time was spent in tasting the beauties of Dryden and Pope, and in laughing at the comic sallies of Molière. Mr Edwards, upon the whole, acquired, during this period, small Latin and less Greek; but he continued to practise composition, both in prose and verse; and the two companions sent occasional pieces to the colonial newspapers.

The time was now coming when Mr Edwards’ talents were to be exercised in a wider sphere. His uncle dying, bequeathed to him his property; and in 1773 he became heir to the much larger estate of Mr Hume, also of Jamaica. His wealth and talents united, now entitled him to take a lead in the political concerns of the island. In 1784 he published Thoughts on the Proceedings of Government respecting the Trade of the West India Islands with the United States of America. This was followed by a speech delivered at a free conference between the Council and Assembly at Jamaica, held on the 25th of November 1789, on the subject of Mr Wilberforce’s propositions in the House of Commons concerning the slave trade. It was in 1793, however, that he published his great work, on which he had been many years engaged, entitled History, Civil and Commercial of the British Colonies in the West Indies, 2 vols. 4to. He begins the work by giving a view of the original inhabitants of the West Indies, their manners, institutions, and the means by which they have been so entirely exterminated. This was followed by a sketch of the revolutions through which these islands have passed since the first European invasion. He gives next a geographical and statistical description of each particular island. He treats finally, at great length, of the government, the social state, and above all the commerce, of this remarkable region. In the course of the discussion, he enters fully into its relations with the African coast and the negro slave trade. Mr Edwards, as a great and long-resident proprietor, was almost inevitably led to be a supporter of this traffic. He reasons, however, in a liberal and candid manner on the question, and does not even attempt to deny the extent of the evils with which it was accompanied. He only insists that these evils have been overrated; and that Great Britain, by renouncing it whilst it was still prosecuted by the other nations of Europe, would ruin her own colonies, without doing any thing to improve the condition of the Africans. In 1796 he published, in one volume quarto, a History of St Domingo, an island which had excited a deep interest, in consequence of the insurrection of the slaves, and the consequent establishment of an independent negro government. In 1801 a new edition of both these works was published, in three vols. 8vo, under the general title of History of the West Indies. A fifth edition issued from the press in the year 1819. When Park returned from his celebrated journey, Mr Edwards, from his oral information, drew up a report of it. which was submitted to the African Society, and published in their Transactions. Mr Park afterwards incorporated the greater part of this into the general narrative of his Travels, in preparing which he availed himself much of the assistance and suggestions of Mr Edwards. It has beer currently said that this narrative was entirely written by Mr Edwards; but as this assertion has been pointedly contradicted by Park, who has elsewhere shown respectable talents for composition, it can only be understood in the limited sense which has now been stated. It appears, however, that Mr Park was induced, by Mr Edwards’ influence, to give rather a more favourable view of the trade in slaves than reflection afterwards led him to sanction.

Mr Edwards, after his removal to England, took up his residence at Polygon, near Southampton; and in 1796 he [7:8:453]became member of parliament for the borough of Grampound, which he continued to represent till his death, which took place on the 15th of July 1800. He left a short narrative of his life, which was prefixed to the edition of his history published in 1801. (e.) Edwards, Jonathan, a celebrated American metaphysician and divine, was born on the 5th of October 1703, at Windsor, in the province of Connecticut. His family had originally emigrated from England in the reign of Queen Elizabeth. His father, Mr Timothy Edwards, was a clergyman of great piety and respectability, and by his mother he was grandson of Mr Solomon Stoddard, a noted and zealous divine of Northampton. Jonathan was accordingly reared in the bosom of Puritanism, and all his ideas were early imbued with the cast of thought which was native to the stock from which he had sprung. There was something indeed not a little singular in the prevailing character of religion in America in those days. A conversion seems to have been a regular era in a man’s life, which could be fixed down to a date, as much as his coming of age or his being married. A very curious document remains of Jonathan’s conversion, the whole steps and progress of which he has detailed for the behoof of his children; and it is a document which, even amidst all its frequent weakness and extravagance, impresses us with a high sense of the genius and of the worth of this remarkable man. We cannot avoid giving our readers a little insight into it, especially as it contains some passages of deep feeling and sensibility, which form a striking contrast to the controversial hardness of his other writings. It is full of bursts of tenderness; and even whilst the subjects of his earliest meditations were the same dark doctrines, in their most tremendous form, which he afterwards defended so ably by the help of his mature reason, amidst all the gloom which naturally surrounds them, they seem to have left upon his mind no sentiments but those of gentleness and charity. At the same time, this document affords us a distinct proof that such doctrines take their origin, in a great measure, in peculiar circumstances of society, or of the individual mind; and since they were quite as fully impressed upon Edwards before he was capable of any profound reasoning concerning them, as afterwards, the presumption is, that his early prepossessions came strongly in aid of his later conclusions.

It was in the midst of these youthful musings that he acquired a full and firm persuasion of tenets which we will own scarcely seem to us to be either so lovely, or of so good report, as the more natural sentiments of his unconverted state, which he gave up in exchange for them. “I had a variety,” says he “of concerns and exercises about my soul from my childhood; but had two more remarkable seasons of awakening before I met with that change by which I was brought to those new dispositions, and that new sense of things, that I have since had. The first time was when I was a boy, some years before I went to college, at a time of remarkable awakening in my father’s congregation. I was then very much affected for many months, and concerned about the things of religion.” This state of mind, however, appears to have passed off; but, in his last year at college, he was visited by a severe sickness, which made him form many wise and holy resolutions, which he was afterwards for the most part enabled to keep. So far it was well; but now follows the grand proof of his conversion. “From my childhood up,” he says, “my mind had been wont to be full of objections against the doctrine of God’s sovereignty in choosing whom he would to eternal life, and rejecting whom lie pleased, leaving them eternally to perish, and be everlastingly tormented in hell. It used to appear like a horrible doctrine to me. But I remember very well when I seemed to be convinced and fully satisfied as to this sovereignty of God, and his justice in thus eternally disposing of men according to his sovereign pleasure. But I never could give an account how or by what means I was thus convinced, not in the least imagining in the time of it, nor a long time after, that there was any extraordinary influence of God’s Spirit in it, but only that now I saw farther, and my reason apprehended the justice and reasonableness of it. However, my mind rested in it, and it put an end to all those cavils and objections that had till then abode with me all the preceding part of my life. And there has been a wonderful alteration in my mind with respect to God’s sovereignty from that day to this, so that I scarce ever have found so much as the rising of an objection against God’s sovereignty in the most absolute sense, in showing mercy to whom he will show mercy, and hardening and eternally damning whom he will. God’s absolute sovereignty and justice, with respect to salvation and damnation, is what my mind seems to rest assured of as much as of any thing that I see with my eyes.” This doctrine continued throughout Mr Edwards’ life in peculiar favour with him; and he employs the whole resources of his dialectics to support it, with a full conviction that he was thereby glorifying God, and performing an important service to mankind.

In this document of Mr Edwards' early opinions, we have said that, amidst all the horrors of his creed, there are many intimations of the natural fineness and sensibility of his spirit. The following passages are remarkably beautiful, and have about them a tone of pastoral or rather scriptural poetry. “Not long after I first began to experience these things, I gave an account to my father of some things that had passed in my mind. I was pretty much affected by the discourse we had together; and when the discourse was ended, I walked abroad alone in a solitary place in my father’s pasture for contemplation. And as 1 was walking there, and looked up on the sky and clouds, there came into my mind so sweet a sense of the glorious majesty and grace of God that I know not how to express it....God’s excellency, his wisdom, his purity and love, seemed to appear in every thing; in the sun, moon, and stars; in the clouds and blue sky; in the grass, flowers, trees; in the water and all nature, which used greatly to fix my mind. I often used to sit and view the moon for a long time, and so in the day time spent much time in viewing the clouds and sky, to behold the sweet glory of God in these things; in the mean time singing forth with a loud voice my contemplations of the Creator and Redeemer...! used to be a person uncommonly terrified with thunder; and it used to strike me with terror when I saw a thunder-storm rising; but now,on the contrary, it rejoiced me. I felt God at the first appearance of a thunder-storm, and used to take an opportunity at such times to fix myself to view the clouds, and see the lightnings play, and hear the majestic and awful voice of God’s thunder.” These confessions have let us already into the inside of Edwards' mind, and there is no need to return upon them whilst we pursue the account of his studies, life, and writings. There is a poetry and grandeur in some of his passages of this sort which show a moral sublimity of genius in the midst of enthusiastic reveries, often, in inferior minds, more productive of dark and disorderly sentiments than of sound and elevated piety. When he comes, however, to reason on his theological or philosophical tenets, he is no longer either an enthusiast or a poet; for he then proceeds with all the pertinacity and ingenuity of a hard-headed dialectician, determined neither to tolerate nor employ any weapon but stem argument

He went young to Yale College, and as early as his thirteenth year had read Locke On the Human Under- [7:8:454]standing with great delight and profit. He had a great taste for natural philosophy, but the moral and divine sciences were his chief object; and after a long residence at college, during which time he prepared himself assiduously for the ministry, he was in due form licensed to preach. In August 1722 he was invited to preach to the English Presbyterians at New York, where he continued with approbation above eight months; but as this society was too small to maintain a preacher, he returned in the year 1723 to his father’s house at Connecticut, where, for some time, he applied to his studies with much industry and perseverance; and this severe application became habitual to him, although he was of a delicate constitution. In the spring of 1724·, having taken his master’s degree, he was appointed tutor of Yale College, being then in his twenty-first year; an office which, notwithstanding his youth, he filled for two years with great success and reputation. In September 1726 he received an invitation from the people of Northampton in Connecticut, to become assistant to his mother’s father, Mr Stoddard, to whom he was ordained colleague in his twenty-fourth year, and continued as pastor of this congregation till the year 1750. During this time he married, had many children, and wrote several pious and useful treatises, chiefly suggested by the events of the times, such as his Faithful Narrative of the Surprising Work of God, in the Conversion of many Hundred Souls in Northampton (for these, as his biographer^[1. This primitive piece of biography, from which all our quotations are taken, is prefixed to a volume of sermons published after Mr Edwards’ death. Its author is not mentioned. The edition from which we quote is printed at Edinburgh, by Alexander Jardine, IJ9i>. ] tells us, were remarkable times for the out-pouring of God’s Spirit); but particularly a sensible and useful treatise on Religious Affections, in which he endeavoured to restrain the extravagance and fanaticism into which, under these strong impressions, the religion of his flock was but too apt to degenerate. He was a most faithful and conscientious minister, but at last fell under the displeasure of his people, from no other cause except his anxiety for their spiritual interests. They appear, indeed, to have been a very stiff-necked generation, full of absurd whimsical vagaries on the subject of religion, but at the same time evincing little of its spirit in their lives and conversations. They had all a voice in the election and continuance of their clergyman, and they were very ready to seize any opportunity to show their power. Mr Edwards discovered that some licentious books had got among the youth of his congregation, a fact as to which he wished some investigation to take place; and this was the first point upon which his people flew off from him. There arose afterwards another point about the administration of the holy communion. His grandfather Mr Stoddard had, it seems, a notion that the administration of the sacrament was a moment which the Divine Spirit was much disposed to seize for the conversion of sinners; and that, therefore, the most notorious sinners were almost without scruple to be admitted to that holy ordinance, in the hope that this conversion would fall upon them. The result of this precious notion was, that the utmost licentiousness, mingled as it was with wild religious fancies floating in every brain, began to prevail amongst the people. When Mr Edwards, on his grandfather’s death, obtained the entire charge, he endeavoured to make a change in this particular; but the outcry against him “as loud and overbearing. Even his brethren of the clergy tamely gave way to a clamour which they condemned; and this excellent, able, and pious clergyman was thus driven away by the misguided flock, for whom he had laboured assiduously during twenty-four years; and at an advanced period of life, with a wife and a large family, he was thrown upon the world and the care of providence.

His next position was at Stockbridge, in the western part of Massachusetts Bay, where he was put at the head of a mission for converting the Indians. He was not enabled to do much as a missionary; but here he had a great deal of leisure, which he employed in writing his principal works. It was now he completed his chief treatise on the subject of free will; a work concerning the rapid execution of which we have the following information in Sir Henry Moncreiff Wellwood’s able and interesting Life of Dr Erskine. “It was not till the month of July 1752, that he appears to have resumed his studies on the subject of free will; for on the 7th of that month he writes Dr Erskine, that ‘ he hoped soon to be at leisure to resume his design ;’ and gives him another sketch of the plan of his book, in which, though there be nothing new, there is more detail than in that which he had formerly sent him. Whatever opinion,” continues this able writer, “may be held with regard to Mr Edwards’ argument, it must appear astonishing to those who are capable of appreciating the difficulty of his subject, that, in nine months from the date of this letter, on the 14th of April 1753, he could write Dr Erskine, that he had almost finished the first draught of what he originally intended; though he was under the necessity of delaying the publication till he knew the result of proposals which he had circulated for printing his book by subscription. His book was published in 1754, and, though he had made some progress in preparing his materials before he left Northampton, was certainly written, and nearly completed, within the time ascertained by the two letters referred to, and must be admitted to convey a very striking idea, both of his mental resources and of his literary ardour.”

In 1757, on the death of Mr Aaron Burr, Mr Edwards was chosen president of New Jersey College. He had only been here, however, a very short time, when he was carried off on the 22d of March 1758, in the fifty-fifth year of his age, by the small-pox. This disease was at that time raging in the neighbourhood. Mr Edwards, who had never had it, proposed to be inoculated, which his physicians approved of. He had the disease favourably, but a secondary fever set in, and by reason of a number of pustules in his throat, the obstruction became such that he could not swallow the necessary medicines, and the fatal result was what we have stated. The character of Mr Edwards is that of a very primitive, self-mortified, simple, and amiable man, and affords a strong proof of the power of genuine Christian piety upon the heart, in spite of the most gloomy and repulsive tenets. He was solely occupied with his professional duties and his theological studies, insomuch that, as is mentioned with inimitable simplicity by the author of his life, “he was less acquainted with most of his temporal affairs than many of his neighbours, and seldom knew when and by whom his forage for winter was gathered in, or how many milk-kine he had; whence his table was furnished,” or by what means his wants were provided for. Mrs Edwards, however, a most valuable and sensible woman, fully supplied his defects in these particulars. We must quote another passage from this piece of biography, which is equal in simplicity, though by no means in any thing else, to some of the exquisite biographies of Isaac Walton. After being informed that he did not permit dancing, against which [7:8:455]amusement, indeed, he wrote a sermon, we are told that “he allowed not his children to be from home after nine o’clock at night, when they went abroad to see their friends and companions; neither were they allowed to sit up much after that time, in his own house, when any came to make them a visit. If any gentleman desired acquaint-tance with his daughters, after handsomely introducing himself, by properly consulting the parents, he was allowed all proper opportunity for it, and a room and fire, if needed; but must not intrude on the proper hours of rest and sleep, nor the religion and order of the family.”

Mr Edwards comes nearer Bishop Butler as a philosophical divine than any other theologian with whom we are acquainted. His style, like Butler’s, is very much that of a man thinking aloud. In both these authors the train of thinking in their own minds is more clearly exhibited to us than perhaps by any other writer, whilst they show us with great truth and distinctness what their notions are, and how they came by them, with very little concern about the form of expression in which they are brought out. Butler, however, had a larger mind than Edwards, and was by no means so much of a mere dialectician. If, therefore, he be less acute than the American, he is more comprehensive, and gives fairer play to every opposing argument. We do not mean here to enter into any of Edwards’ speculations. Both on the subject of original sin, and on the freedom of the will, he seems to us to unite a great deal too closely the views which originated, as we have seen, in no small degree, amidst his early reveries, with the infallible discoveries of divine revelation. Our notion is, that in all discussions on such subjects which have hitherto appeared, the speculatists have forgotten how little a part either of the history or the nature of man we are in fact acquainted with; and bow ready we ever are, in laying the foundations of our theories, to place a tortoise beneath the elephant. The whole difficulty, for instance, on the freedom of the will, turns upon a puzzle in the idea of cause and effect. Perhaps this idea is far from being precise in our minds (Mr Edwards uses it very loosely in his speculations); yet we do not scruple, in our reasonings upon it, to draw the most positive inferences from the assumptions with which we set out. We suspect, indeed, that the true and accurate notion of causation always involves the idea of volition; and, on that supposition, to ask for the cause of volition itself is absurd. It may be very true that we cannot will to do any thing without previous thought or motive; neither can we think without previous existence. But is our existence the cause of our thinking? Just as much as our thinking is the cause of our willing. We are far, however, from wishing to add our own crude conceptions to those which have been piled up on this subject from the beginning of time to the present hour, without, we believe, doing the slightest service to the cause of moral and religious truth, or accomplishing any thing, in short, beyond affording an exercise for ingenuity, and too often a handle for uncharitable rancour and presumptuous absurdity. Mr Edwards, with all his great powers, has accordingly, we apprehend, done but little good to the world, we mean as a philosopher; for he did much good in his own day, whilst he was living the life of a zealous and faithful Christian minister. But it is “thus we play the fools with the time; and the spirits of the wise sit in the clouds and mock us.” Exalted above all the folly of human wisdom, the spirit of this truly good and pious man is now, it may be, disposed to regard with some such sentiment many of his own most severe and laborious speculations, which were carried on in the serious belief, that if “the knots of Calvinism were trimmed off, or its doctrines, in the whole length and breadth of them, were not rigidly maintained, a man could nowhere set his foot down with consistency and safety, short of Deism, or even Atheism itself, or rather universal Scepticism.”

Edwards’ works consist of several volumes of sermons, printed at various times, and often reprinted in this country as well as in America. Besides these, he wrote, 1. A Treatise concerning Religious Affections, 1746, 8vo; 2. An Account of the Life of the Rererend David Brainerd, 1749, 8vo; 3. An Inquiry into the Qualifications for full Communion in the Visible Church, 1749, intended as a vindication of his principles in the matter which occasioned his dismission from Northampton; 4. A careful and strict Inquiry into the Modern Notion of that Freedom of Will which is supposed to be essential to Moral Agency, 1754; 5. The Great Christian Doctrine of Original Sin defended, containing a Reply to the Olŋections of Dr John Taylor, 1758; 6. A History of Redemption ; 7. Miscellaneous Observations on Important Theological Subjects, London, 1793; 8. Remarks on Important Theological Controversies, ibid. 1796. Some of these were posthumous, as were a few other tracts of less importance written by him. (l. l. l.)