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Because all who allow the joys of Heaven
possible, pursue them not.
§38. Were the will determin’d
by the views of good, as it appears
in Contemplation greater or less to the
understanding, which is the
State of all absent good, and that, which in the received
Opinion
the will is supposed to move to, and to be moved by, I do not see
how it
could ever get loose from the infinite eternal Joys of Heaven,
once propos’d and
consider’d as possible. For all absent good, by
which alone barely
propos’d, and coming in view, the
will is thought
to be
determin’d, and so to set us on action, being only possible,
but not infallibly
certain, ’tis unavoidable, that the infinitely
greater possible good should
regularly and constantly determine
the will in all the successive actions it directs;
and then we should
keep constantly and steadily in our course towards Heaven,
without ever standing still, or directing our actions to any other
end: The eternal
condition of a future state infinitely out-weighing
the Expectation of Riches, or
Honour, or any other worldly
pleasure, which we can propose to our selves, though we
should
grant these the more probable to be attain’d: For nothing future
is
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yet in possession, and so the expectation even of these may deceive
us. If it
were so, that the greater good in view determines the
will,
so
great a good once propos’d could not but seize the
will, and
hold
it fast to the pursuit of this infinitely greatest good, without ever
letting
it go again: For the
will having a power over, and directing
the
thoughts, as well as other actions, would, if it were so, hold the
contemplation of the
mind fixed to that good.
But any great uneasiness is never
neglected.
This would be the state of the mind, and regular tendency of
the
will in all its determinations, were it determin’d by that,
which is
consider’d, and in view the greater good; but that it is not so is
visible in Experience. The infinitely greatest confessed good being
often neglected, to
satisfy the successive
uneasiness of our desires
pursuing
trifles. But though the greatest allowed, even everlasting
unspeakable good, which has
sometimes moved, and affected the
mind, does not stedfastly hold the
will, yet we see any very great,
and prevailing
uneasiness, having once laid hold on the
will, lets it not
go; by which we may be convinced, what it is that determines the
will. Thus any vehement pain of the Body; the ungovernable
passion of a Man violently in love; or the impatient desire of
revenge, keeps the
will steady and intent; and the
will thus
deter-
mined never lets the Understanding lay by the object, but all the
thoughts
of the Mind, and powers of the Body are uninterruptedly
employ’d that way, by the
determinations of the
will, influenced by
that topping
uneasiness, as long as it lasts; whereby it seems to me
evident,
that the will, or power of setting us upon one action in
preference to all other, is
determin’d in us, by
uneasiness: and
whether this be not
so, I desire every one to observe in himself.