This is a special edition of Miscellany Mondays, as I’m presenting one of the miscellanies that I got to see in its original notebook while at the Beinecke Library last week. This is a fine example of Edwards’s working out a particular thought, here being how grace works in the life of a believer, especially in times of great distress. The concluding corollary presents a recurring theme in Edwards’s writings, that grace can only be of a supernatural origin, the effects of it being wrought only by the divine Trinity, the Holy Spirit in particular.

818. GRACE, HOW A PRINCIPLE in the HEART.

Rightly to understand the nature of the habit of grace, it must be observed that the Spirit of God in the heart of a saint acts both as a natural vital principle, and also as a voluntary agent manifesting care of that heart that it is in, lest it should be overcome by temptations, and lest it should fall away. The heart sometimes seems to be going on in a way to ruin for some time, and comes just to the edge of it, does but just escape going over the brink once and again; and sometimes seems as if it was gone and would not revive again, but yet the indwelling Spirit takes care of the heart, and wonderfully, and with great care and wisdom, conducts, preserves it, and restores it. The exercises and operations of this Spirit are after the manner of a natural principle in many respects; but yet there is that in it that shows it [to] be something supernatural, not only in such a sense as to be a principle besides all the principles of human nature as such, but also so as to be above all nature, above all laws of any nature, and all natural principles whatsoever. It acts both after the manner of a natural principle or seed, and yet after the manner of a voluntary agent, yea, and a most sovereign agent, and yet of a wise, careful, and faithful agent; and so every way as a divine agent, or as God acting in the soul. That indwelling vital Spirit acts so as to punish miscarriages, and reward diligence, and to answer prayer. The continuance of its actings are in many respects like the continuance of the exercises of a nature; the exercises of that wherein nature consists will be continual because nature can’t be destroyed. But in other respects the continuance of its actings is after such a manner as to show plainly that ’tis owing to a covenant faithfulness. And more especially does the indwelling Spirit appear in its manner of acting as a voluntary agent— more than a natural necessary principle— in times of the greatest exigence, and in it highest acts and fruits, as in those extraordinary exercises of grace that are often given under great trials, terrible persecutions, and the like.

Corol. Hence we may observe that GRACE is a SUPERNATURAL thing in these three respects. (1) ‘Tis from the supernatural and immediate operation of the Spirit. ‘Tis given at first by an efficiency that is not such an efficiency as is confined to the laws of nature, but ’tis immediate and arbitrary. (2) The effect itself is supernatural. The principle and exercises are something diverse in nature and kind from, and above all that belongs to, or proceeds from, human nature as such. See sermons on the parable of the ten virgins. (3) They are supernatural so as not only to be above all the principles and exercises of human nature as such, but so as to be above all nature whatsoever. That is, its exercises are after the manner not of a mere natural [principle], or a principle that in its exercises is subject to laws of nature, but above all stated fixed laws; and so is a divine thing that acts in divine manner, as God himself is a being above all nature, a voluntary, sovereign, arbitrary agent, not subject to laws of nature in his acting, but above all those laws, being the arbitrary author of all those laws.

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miscellany mondays, the miscellanies