Summary: | "Any substantial contribution to the most difficult of all psychological and moral problems, the reconciliation of the sense of Responsibility with our intellectual conclusions regarding the nature of Choice, must be a service to a true psychology, a consistent theology, and a rational piety. It can hardly be expected that any single mind will at the present time so solve this problem, even with all the aids his predecessors in the discussion afford, as to leave nothing to his successors to elucidate. Yet the present writer would not offer this treatise to the public did he not believe that even to so ancient a debate he had furnished some new thoughts, and brought the difficulty nearer to a solution. If there is a class of thinkers who are perfectly satisfied with the Edwardean method of reconciliation, or who see not the discord to be reconciled, or who find a moral advantage in holding both sides of the contradiction, this work can scarcely be considered as written for them. It is rather dedicated to the acceptance of those who feel the discord, and seek a more satisfactory harmony; of those who recognize the discord as absolute, and reject the doctrine of responsibility; but especially of those who, called to the sacred office of explaining and impressing the law of accountability upon the conscience, appreciate the necessity of making it acceptable to the reason"--Preface. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved). "Past First, states the nature of the freedom of the Will as opposed to Volitional Necessity, and as required, in our estimation, by the doctrine of Responsibility. The form of the Argument upon this Issue is this. Through our Part Second, assuming the reality of this Freedom, we show that it is not invalidated by the Necessitarian Argument; and in our Part Third that it is established by its own Affirmative Argument"--Book. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved).
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