Jonathan Edwards Selected Shor (continued)
40. The nature of virtue being a positive thing, can proceed from nothing but God's immediate influence, and must take its rise from creation or infusion by God. For it must be either from that, or from our own choice and production, either at once or gradually, by diligent culture. But it cannot begin or take its rise from the latter, viz. our choice or voluntary diligence. For if there exist nothing at all of the nature of virtue before, it cannot come from cultivation. For by the supposition there is nothing of the nature of virtue to cultivate, it cannot be by repeated and multiplied acts of virtuous choice, till it becomes a habit. For there can be no one virtuous choice unless God immediately gives it. The first virtuous choice, or a disposition to it, must be immediately given, or it must proceed from a preceding choice. If the first virtuous act of will or choice be from a preceding act of will or choice, that preceding act of choice must be a virtuous act of choice, which is contrary to the supposition. For then there would be a preceding act of choice before the first virtuous act of choice. And if it be said the first virtuous act of choice is from a preceding act of will which is not virtuous, this is absurd. For an act of will not virtuous, cannot produce another act of will of a nature entirely above itself, having something positive in it which the cause has nothing of, and more excellent than it is, — any more than motion can produce thought or understanding, or the collision of two bodies can produce thought, or stones and lead can produce a spirit, or nothing can produce something.
41. As to man's inability to convert himself — In them that are totally corrupt there can be no tendency towards their making their hearts better, till they begin to repent they still approve of it, and that tends to maintain their badness and confirm it. But they cannot begin sincerely to repent of the badness of their hearts till their hearts