If he had done this, he would have seen that there was, and that there could have been, but one real point of difference between himself and his adversaries. He would have seen, that, aside from the ambiguities of language, there was but one real point in dispute. He would have seen, that it was affirmed, on the one side, that the strongest motive operates to produce a choice; and that this was denied on the other. And hence, he would have put forth his whole strength to establish this single point, to fortify this single doctrine of moral necessity. He would not have crowded so many different ideas into the definition of the term _necessity_; and then imagined that he was overwhelming and confounding his adversaries, when he was only showing that human "actions are not without all necessity." And when they said, that "a necessary action is a contradiction," he would have seen how they used the term necessary; and he would not have concluded, as he has done, that this "notion of action implies contingence, _and excludes all necessity_," p. 199. He would have seen, that the idea of an action, in our view, is inconsistent with necessity, in one sense of the word; and yet not inconsistent with every thing that has been called necessity. In the definition of President Edwards, there is an inherent and radical defect, which I have not as yet noticed; and which is, indeed, the source of all his vacillating on this subject. It proceeds from a very common error, which has been well explained and illustrated by Mr. Stewart in his Essay on the Beautiful. The various theories, which ingenious men have framed in relation to the beautiful, says Mr. Stewart, "have originated in a prejudice, which has descended to modern times from the scholastic ages; that when a word admits of a variety of significations, these different significations must all be _species_ of the same _genus_; and must consequently include some essential idea common to every individual to which the generic term can be applied." The question of Aristippas, "how can beauty differ from beauty," says Mr. Stewart, "plainly proceeded on a total misconception of the nature of the circumstances; which, in the history of language, attach different meanings to the same word; and which by slow and insensible gradations, remove them to such a distance from their primitive or radical sense, that no ingenuity can trace the successive steps of their progress. The variety of these circumstances is, in fact, so great, that it is impossible to attempt a complete enumeration of them; and I shall, therefore, select a few of the cases, in which the principle now in question appears most obviously and indisputably to fail."