In a transition period he stood in a curious way between the new and the old. He clung fast to the old Puritan ideas of original sin, of predestinaA Treatise on the Religious Affections.
An Inquiry into the Freedom of the Will.tion and the terrors of punishment at the hands of an angry God. His awful idea of God can be shown in a brief quotation.
"The God that holds you over the pit of hell, much as one holds a spider or some loathsome insect over the fire, abhors you and is dreadfully provoked....If you cry to God to pity you, he will be so far from pitying you in your doleful case that he will only tread you under foot. He will crush out your blood and make it fly, and it shall be sprinkled on all his garments so as to stain all his raiment." — Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God.
And yet, Edwards was exceedingly sensitive and susceptible to new ideas. In an unscientific age he was an eager student of the laws of nature. He sought earnestly for the light wherever it might lead him. In his metaphysical work so far was he ahead of his age that his writings are regarded as authorities in modern times. His searching mind and catholic soul were ever ready to recognize truth, no matter what havoc it might play with preconceived notions.
Life (by Samuel Hopkins; by Sereno Edwards Dwight; by A. V. G. Allen). Edwards was born at East Winsor, Connecticut, in 1703. While a mere youth, he delighted in philosophy, writing, at the age of thirteen, profound letters concerning the nature of the soul, and the exposition of the theology of Calvin.
While a sophomore at Yale College, he chanced upon a copy of Locke's Essay on the Human Understanding.
