Nature of True Virtue (1765)

INTRODUCTION

The dissertation Nature of True Virtue has become widely discussed for its ethical implications, and deservedly so. For Edwards, there are different levels of virtue, as the title, with its distinction of “true virtue,” implies. There is common morality and true virtue, or saving virtue, with the former being a secondary or inferior type of virtue. True virtue must be based on a benevolence or love to “Being, simply considered,” which is God. By extension, too, true virtue consists in a “union of heart” to “Being in general.” In other words, other beings with true virtue, or love to God, will inspire in us a love for them. This, Edwards states, is the “consent of beings to Being.”