I fully concur with the younger Edwards, that "Clarke, Johnson, Price, and Reid have granted too much;" and while I try to show this, I shall also endeavour to show that President Edwards has assumed too much, not for the good of the cause in which he is engaged, but for the attainment of truth. If his system had not been founded upon certain natural illusions, by which the true secrets of nature are concealed from our view, it could never have been the boast of its admirers, "that a reluctant world has been constrained to bow in homage to its truth." If we would try the strength of this system then, we must bend a searching and scrutinizing eye upon the premises and assumptions upon which it is based; we must put aside every preconceived notion, even the most plausible and commonly received opinions, and lay our minds open to the steady and unbiased contemplation of nature, just as it has been created by the Almighty Architect; we must view the intellectual system of the world, not as it is seen through our hasty and careless conceptions, but as it is revealed to us in the light of consciousness and severe meditation. This will be no light task, I am aware; but whosoever would seek the truth on such a subject, must not expect to find it by light and trifling efforts; he must go after it in all the loving energy of his soul. Let this course be pursued, honestly and perseveringly pursued, and I am persuaded, that a system of truth will be revealed to the mind, to which it will not be constrained to render "a reluctant homage," but which, by harmonizing the deductions of logic with the dictates of nature, will secure to itself the most pleasing and delightful homage of which the human mind is susceptible. Those false conceptions which are common to the human mind, those "idols of the tribe," of which Bacon speaks, have been, as it is well known, the sources of some of the most obstinate errors, both in science and in religion, that have ever infested the world. And it is evident, that while the assumptions from which any system, however false, legitimately results, are conceded, it will stand, like a wall of adamant, against the most powerful artillery of logic. It will remain triumphant in spite of all opposition. It may be contrary to our natural convictions, and consequently liable to our suspicions; but it cannot be refuted by argument. Its advocates may reason correctly, and its adversaries may appeal to opposite truths; but neither can ever arrive at the truth, and the whole truth. This has appeared to me to be the case, with respect to the long controverted question of liberty and necessity.