Williston Walker

“ Virtue consists in preference for the good of the whole to any private advantage; hence the really virtuous man must willingly accept any disposition of himself that God may deem wise—a doctrine often called “willingness to be damned.” All have natural power to choose the right, and are therefore responsible for their acts ”

“ His distinctive theological tenets are to be found in his important work, A System of Doctrines Contained in Divine Revelation, Explained and Defended (1793) , which has had an influence hardly inferior to that exercised by the writings of Edwards himself. They may be summed up as follows: God so rules the universe as to produce its highest happiness, considered as a whole. Since God’s sovereignty is absolute, sin must be, by divine permission, a means by which this happiness of the whole is secured, though that this is its consequence, renders it no less heinous in the sinner. ”

“ In vigour of intellect and in strength and purity of moral tone he was hardly inferior to Edwards himself. Though he was originally a slave-holder, to him belongs the honour of having been the first among the Congregational ministers of New England to denounce slavery both by voice and pen; and to his persistent though bitterly opposed efforts are probably chiefly to be attributed the law of 1774, which forbade the importation of negro slaves into Rhode Island, as also that of 1784, which declared that all children of slaves born in Rhode Island after the following March should be free. ”