Excerpt from A Careful and Strict Enquiry Into the Modern Prevailing Notions of That Freedom of Will, Which Is Supposed to Be Essential to Moral Agency, Virtue and Vice, Reward and Punishment, Praise and Blame I have nothing further to fay by way of preface, but only to befpeak the Reader's candor, and calm attention to what Ihave written. The fubjee't is of fuch importance, as to demand attention, and the molt thorough confideration. Of all kinds of knowledge that we can ever obtain, the knowledge of God, and the knowledge of ourfelves, are the melt important As religion is the great bufinefs, for which we are created, and on which our happinefs depends; and as reli gion conflfts in an intercourfe between our felvesiand our Maker; and {0 has its foun dation in God's nature and ours, and in the relation that God and we {land in to each other; therefore a true knowledge of both mull: be needful, in order to true religion. But the knowledge ofourfelves confifls chiefly in right apprehenfions concerning tbofe two chief faculties of our nature, the underflanding and will. Both are very important yet the fcience of the latter mull be confefled to be of greatefl moment inafmuch as all virtue and religion have their feat more immediately in the will, confifiing more efpecially in right ae'ts and habits of this faculty. And the grand guefiion about the Freedom of the Will, is the main point that belongs to the fcience of the Will. Therefore, I fay, the importance. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.