Neither external nor internal causes determine the will. — If a lump of matter changes its state, if from a solid, it becomes a liquid, or assumes a new color or a new shape, we look for the cause of this change to something existing out of the substance itself, and operating upon it from without. We do so, from our intuitive perception of the fact, that it is incapable of acting on itself, or, in other words, of changing itself. But if incapable of acting on itself, how can we suppose that it is capable of acting on something else? If it cannot change itself but through the intervention of a foreign cause, how can it change the state of another substance? We deny, then, that one physical event depends on another of a similar character; and Fichte's long chain of causes, from the displacement of a grain of sand up to the creation of a world, drops asunder at every link. In the world of consciousness, moreover, since there is often no external event to which a particular change or determination of the will can be attributed, the necessarian, in seeking for a cause of the phenomenon, is obliged to look to an antecedent state of the man himself, that is, to a motive, a preëxistent or concomitant longing or desire. He thinks to make out his theory, then, by saying, that the strongest motive causes the change, or, in other words, determines the will. But as the mind or person is absolutely single, and only exhibits itself under different phases, or as variously employed, the motive means nothing but the man himself wishing for some object; and the determination of the will means nothing but the same person acting. The assertion, that the motive determines the will, therefore, is only an abstract statement of the fact, that the man wishing determines the man acting, or that the will determines itself, which is precisely the theory of the advocate for human freedom. The necessarian theory is absurd, for it assigns an abstraction as the cause of a reality. - CHAPTER VI. THE ARGUMENT FOR FREE AGENCY CONTINUED: REASONING FROM EFFECT TO CAUSE. Summary of the last chapter. The two theories of causation, which I have endeavored to develop, terminate respectively in the system of Spinoza, which is atheistic fatalism, and in that of freewill, which ascribes all action to mind or person, and therefore attributes all changes that take place in the universe, except those which are caused by man, to the immediate agency of the Deity. These two theories are the only ones with which we need concern ourselves, for they alone are logical, consistent, and complete. No compromise is possible between them. Take the doctrine of necessity in its mildest and most liberal form, as expounded by those who shrank from the awful consequences that Spinoza deduced from it, and it will not be difficult to show that it is partial and inconsequent; the premises on which it rests, as we might expect from the demonstrative character of the reasoning employed, leading either to universal conclusions, or to no conclusions at all. Spinozism in itself is utterly incredible and absurd, no sane man ever having actually believed it, or entertained it in any way, except as a mere exercise of the intellect, — the fanciful scheme of a hypothetical universe, in which abstractions are taken for realities and assumptions for facts. I endeavored to show further, that the argument in support of this monstrous system, being a mathematical one, needs to be complete and certain in all its parts, so that if a breach be anywhere made in it, the whole fabric must fall. To prove the falsity of any one doctrine, that is really involved in it, is to disprove the whole system. Observe, then, at how many points it is refuted by the principles which we have already established by independent evidence. First, it begins with the assumption, that every physical event is caused, or necessitated, by the antecedent physical event; while it is now admitted on all hands, that we never have discovered, and never can discover, between two physical events any necessary union whatever. Secondly, the system requires us to believe, that there is no distinction between mind and matter, but that thought and extension are attributes of the same substance; while it has been proved that personality is essentially distinct from materiality, and that the acts of the will do not belong to the same class with changes in matter, so that reasoning from the latter to the former is wholly fallacious; they have not even any qualities in common. Thirdly, Spinoza denies that there is any such thing as active power, and teaches that every event is necessarily produced by the inherent passivity, so to speak, of all objects, there being nowhere an agent, a mover, or a primal source of power; while it has been shown, that in the phenomena of will, there is a consciousness of effort or exertion, which is a direct perception of original, and not of merely transmitted, power. Fourthly, a cardinal point in the system is a denial of the freedom of the will, and the consequent doing away with all sense of moral obligation, all consciousness of merit or remorse for crime; while the voice of conscience imperatively declares, what we can no more disbelieve than we can distrust the multiplication-table or the axioms of the geometer, that man is accountable for his actions, and incurs merit or blame for deeds which he was free to commit. Argument for the freedom of the will continued. — In regard to the freedom of the will, I argued further, what all experience teaches, that, of two successive states of the same substance, the former is not the cause of the latter, but only its antecedent. Daylight is not the cause of darkness; a headache does not produce the freedom from pain which follows it. The consid eration of motives and the subsequent volition are two successive states of the same person; if there were a causal or necessary union between them, the latter would immediately succeed the former; for when the cause is present, the effect cannot be delayed. But we often and involuntarily pause and dwell upon various motives, holding them up in various lights, and balaneing them against each other, the will remaining quiescent during this process, the understanding and reason alone being active. Now, if the strongest motive is necessarily followed by the volition, why is it not immediately so followed, the motives being certainly before the mind? If you assert, that there is an immediate determination of the will in such a case, namely, a determination to remain quiet, or to postpone the particular action in view till the motives have been fully weighed, I deny the fact. The will certainly may remain dormant for a time, without a particular volition to that end. Take the case of a man absorbed in some operation of pure intellect, considering, for instance, the various steps of a mathematical problem; there is no action of the will here, not even a volition to suspend volition. But the balancing of motives is as much an intellectual operation as mathematical research; why, then, I repeat, if motives necessarily act on the will, do they not determine it immediately? I see not how it is possible for the necessarian to answer this question in conformity with his theory. The will is a source of power, and is not an effect. But it is argued against the doctrine of the freedom of the will, that it requires us to believe in an uncaused event, and thus denies the universal application of the law of causality. How can a volition, it is asked, take place without a cause, if it be true that every change, every thing which begins to exist, must have a cause? I reply, that the law of causation is founded on the acknowledged inertness of matter; because matter cannot act on itself, we say that every change in matter must have a cause; but it does not follow that this cause is also in its turn an effect, and must have been caused by some antecedent event, and that again by another cause, and so on to infinity. This notion of a chain, or infinite series, of causes has already been refuted, because it really banishes all idea of efficient agency from the universe; we chase the phantom of a cause along the line for ever, without the possibility of overtaking it. The true maxim is, that every physical event, every material phenomenon, must have a cause, because it cannot act of itself; but it does not fol low that this cause must also have a cause, for it is itself a source of power; it is mind, or person, which, unlike matter, can act of itself, and therefore does not need a cause. It is an unauthorized extension of the law of causality, to say that every action of a conscious agent must have a cause, just as much as a material phenomenon. This would be begging the question in the present case, and it is refuted by the direct evidence of consciousness, which teaches us that the will is a true source of power in itself. We must get rid of this notion of transmitted power, or a chain of causes and effects, which is a mere fiction, founded on the interminable succession of material phenomena; this succession, as we have shown again and again, is not causation, but mere sequence in time. Each event in that succession must have a cause; but this cause is not found, and never can be found, in the antecedent physical event, but only in some power, or being, acting out of the line; and to ask for the cause of this being, that is, for the cause of this power, or cause of a cause, is absurd. Reid's statement of the doctrine of causation. -Thus, the doctrine of the freedom of the will brings us back again to the grand dogma of the immediate agency of the Deity throughout creation, that is, to the omnipresence and omnipotence of God. In some recently published letters, from the private correspondence of Dr. Reid, I find a part of this theory of causation so clearly stated and illustrated, that a few passages from them may well be cited here. "In the strict and proper sense," says this philosopher, "I take an efficient cause to be a being who had power to produce the effect, and exerted that power for that purpose. Power to produce an effect supposes power not to produce it; otherwise it is not power, but necessity, which is incompatible with power taken in a strict sense. I am not able to form a conception how power, in the strict sense, can be exerted without will; nor can there be will without some degree of understanding. Therefore, nothing can be an efficient cause, in the proper sense, but an intelligent being. I believe we get the first conception of power, in the proper sense, from the consciousness of our own exertions; and as all our power is exerted |