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Jonathan Edwards and “The Way of Ideas”

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  10 June 2011

Claude A. Smith
Claude A. Smith
Affiliation:
Cambridge, Mass.
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Extract

That Jonathan Edwards was greatly influenced by the writings of John Locke scarcely needs asserting. Edwards himself regarded his reading of the Essay Concerning Human Understanding as the major intellectual event of his youth. His major writings and private notebooks abound with comments and reflections on matters discussed by Locke. What is fascinating concerning the history of Edwardsean scholarship, however, is that the decisive significance of Locke, for Edwards, has been elucidated only very recently, in the writings of the renowned Puritan scholar, the late Perry Miller.

Type
Research Article
Information
Harvard Theological Review , Volume 59 , Issue 2 , April 1966 , pp. 153 - 173
Copyright
Copyright © President and Fellows of Harvard College 1966

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References

1 Edwards, Jonathan, The Life and Character of The Late Reverend Mr. Jonathan Edwards … (Boston, 1765), 3–4.Google Scholar

2 Cf. especially his Jonathan Edwards (New York, 1949); essays in Errand into the Wilderness (Cambridge, 1956); and “Jonathan Edwards on The Sense of the Heart,” HTR (April, 1948).

3 Perry Miller, Jonathan Edwards, 53–54.

4 For a detailed discussion cf. the writer's A Sense of the Heart, an unpublished doctoral dissertation, Widener Library, Harvard University, 1964.

5 Locke, John, Essay Concerning Human Understanding (Fraser, ed.), Book IV, Ch. 18–19, 415ff.Google Scholar

6 Locke, John, The Reasonableness of Christianity … (Boston, 1811).Google Scholar

7 Locke, , Essay, Book IV, Ch. 19, #4, 431.Google Scholar

8 Edwards, , Miscellaneous Observations … (Edinburgh, 1793), 306–07.Google Scholar

9 Ibid., 312–13.

10 Edwards, “Miscellanies,” #204, Yale Manuscripts, Sterling Memorial Library, New Haven, Conn. The writer wishes to acknowledge his indebtedness to Prof. Thomas Schafer of McCormick Theological Seminary, Chicago, Ill., for making available his transcripts of Edwards' “Miscellanies.”

11 Edwards, “Miscellanies,” #837, Miscellaneous Observations …, 160.

12 Edwards, “Miscellanies,” #986, Harvey G. Townsend, editor, The Philosophy of Jonathan Edwards From His Private Notebooks (Univ. of Oregon, 1955), 212.

13 Edwards, “Miscellanies,” #153, Yale Manuscripts.

14 Dwight, Works of Edwards (New York, 1829), Vol. I, 176. (Hereafter referred to as: Dwight, Life.)

15 Ibid., 188–89.

16 Edwards, “Miscellanies,” # 254, Townsend, 77.

17 Edwards, Miscellaneous Observations. …, 258ff.

18 R. I. Aaron, John Locke (2nd Edition, Oxford, 1955), 96.

19 Dwight, Life, 664.

20 If the writer's attempt to substantiate the claim that Edwards went beyond Locke be accepted, an unanswerable question remains, namely, why Edwards did not see fit to make explicit why and at what point he found Locke's epistemology inadequate, since he was usually very careful to make himself clear on such matters. Possibly, the reason why Edwards is mute on this point is due to the fact that Locke by-passed a thorough consideration of the notion of the mind's active powers. Cf. Fraser, Prolegomena, Essay Concerning Human Understanding, lxxii, and Aaron, John Locke, 307, for a discussion of the reasons why Locke failed to treat of the mind's active powers.

21 Locke, Essay, Book II, Ch. 21, #2, 309–10.

22 Dwight, Life, 668.

23 Ibid., 668.

24 Ibid., 669.

25 Ibid., 669.

26 Ibid., 669.

27 Ibid., 669.

28 The general conclusion of most scholars is that Edwards arrived at his idealism independently from Berkeley. For a discussion of this question cf. H. N. Gardiner, “The Early Idealism of Jonathan Edwards,” Philosophical Review, Vol. IX; J. H. MacCracken, “The Sources of Jonathan Edwards' Idealism,” Philosophical Review, Vol. XI; E. C. Smyth, “Jonathan Edwards' Idealism,” American Journal of Theology, Vol. I.

29 Locke, Essay, Book II, Ch. 9, #1, 183.

30 Dwight, Life, 671.

31 Locke, Essay, Book II, Ch. 21, #31, 332.

32 Dwight, Life, 692.

33 Dwight, Life, 691.

34 Cf. “The Personal Narrative,” Dwight, Life, Chapters V, VI, VIII, X.

35 Hutcheson, An Inquiry into the Original of Our Ideas of Beauty and Virtue in Two Treatises (3rd Edition, London, 1829), 14.

36 Hutcheson, An Essay on the Nature and Conduct of the Passions and Affections (3rd Edition, London, 1842), vii.

37 Cf. especially Aaron, John Locke, Part II, Ch. II, 83ff.

38 Dwight, Life, 696.

39 Dwight, Life, 693.

40 Dwight, Life, 696.

41 Ibid., 696.

42 Dwight, Life, 696.

43 Edwards, Two Dissertations: … (Boston, 1765), 135.

44 Edwards, Two Dissertations, 138.

45 Ibid., 139.

46 Cf. especially A Divine and Supernatural Light, Immediately imparted to the Soul by the Spirit of God … (Boston, 1734), 4ff., and A Treatise Concerning Religious Affections … (Boston, 1746) (Reprint in Yale Edition, New Haven, 1959), 267f