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tion, there a new relation arises: it is the relation which subsists between an agent and its act. We may trace changes in the external world up to the volitions or acts of mind, and perceive no diversity in the chain of dependencies; but precisely at this point the chain of cause and effect ceases, and agency begins. The surrounding circumstances may be conditions, may be occasional causes, may be predisposing causes, but they are not, and cannot be, producing or efficient causes. Here, then, the iron chain terminates, and freedom commences. In the ambiguity which fails to distinguish between "the relation of cause and effect," and the relation which volition bears to its antecedents, "consists the strength of the necessitarian system." Let this distinction be clearly made and firmly borne in mind, and the great boasted adamantine scheme of necessity will resolve itself into an empty, ineffectual sound.

Hence, if we would place the doctrine of liberty upon solid · grounds, it becomes necessary to modify the categories of M. Cousin. All things, says he, fall under the one or the other of the two following relations: the relation between subject and attribute, or the relation between cause and effect. This last category, we think, should be subdivided, so as to give two relations; one between cause and effect, properly so called, and the other between agent and action. Until this be done, it will be impossible to extricate the phenomena of the will from the mechanism of cause and effect.

We think we might here leave the stupendous sophism of the necessitarian; but as it has exerted so wonderful an influence over the human mind, and obscured, for ages, the glory of the moral government of God, we may well be permitted to pursue it further, and to continue the pursuit so long as a fragment or a shadow of it remains to be demolished.

SECTION IV.

The scheme of necessity is fortified by false conceptions.

One of the notions to which the cause of necessity owes much of its strength, is a false conception of liberty, as consisting in "a power over the determinations of the will." Hence it

is said that this power over the will can do nothing, can cause no determination except by acting to produce it. But accord

ing to this notion of liberty, this causative act cannot be free unless it be also caused by a preceding act; and so on ad infinitum. Such is one of the favourite arguments of the necessitarian. But in truth the freedom of the mind does not consist in its possessing a power over the determinations of its own will, for the true notion of freedom is a negative idea, and consists in the absence of every power over the determinations of the will. The mind is free because it possesses a power of acting, over which there is no controlling power, either within or without itself.

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It must be admitted, it seems to us, that the advocates of free-agency have too often sanctioned this false conception of liberty, and thereby strengthened the cause of their opponents. Cudworth, Clark, Stuart, Coleridge, and Reid, all speak of this supposed power of the mind over the determinations of the will, as that which constitutes its freedom. Thus says Reid, for example: "By the liberty of a moral agent, I understand a power over the determinations of his own will." Now, it is not at all strange that this language should be conceived by necessitarians in such a manner as to involve the doctrine of liberty in the absurd consequence of an infinite series of acts, since it is so understood by some of the most enlightened advocates of free-agency themselves. A power over the determinations of our will," says Sir William Hamilton, “supposes an act of the will that our will should determine so and so; for we can only exert power through a rational determination or volition. This definition of liberty is right. But the question upon question remains, (and this ad infinitum)-have we a power (a will) over such anterior will? and until this question be definitively answered, which it never can, we must be unable to conceive the possibility of the fact of liberty. But, though inconceivable, this fact is not therefore false." True, we are unable to conceive the possibility of the fact of liberty, if this must be conceived as consisting in a power over the determinations of the will; but, in our humble opinion, this definition of liberty is not right. It seems more correct to say, that the freedom of the will consists in the absence of a power over its determinations, than in the presence of such a power.

There is another false conception which has given great apparent force to the cause of necessity. It is supposed that

the states of the will, the volitions, are often necessitated by the necessitated states of the sensibility. In other words, it is supposed that the appetites, passions, and desires, often act upon the will, and produce its volitions. But this seems to be a very great mistake, which has arisen from viewing the subtle operations of the mind through the medium of those mechanical forms of thought that have been derived from the contemplation of the phenomena of the material world. In truth, the feelings do not act at all, and consequently they cannot act upon the will. It is absurd, as Locke and Edwards well say, to ascribe power, which belongs to the agent himself, to the properties of an agent. Hence, it is absurd to suppose that our feelings, appetites, desires, and passions, are endowed with power, and can act. They are not agents-they are merely the properties of an agent. It is the mind itself which acts, and not its passions. These are but passive impressions made upon the sensibility; and hence, "it is to philosophize very crudely concerning mind, and to image everything in a corporeal manner," to conceive that they act upon the will and control its determinations, just as the motions of body are caused and controlled by the action of mind.*

This conception, however, is not peculiar to the necessitarian. It has been most unfortunately sanctioned by the greatest advocates of free-agency. Thus says Dr. Reid, in relation to the appetites and passions: "Such motives are not addressed to the rational powers. Their influence is immediately upon the will." "When a man is acted upon by contrary motives of this kind, he finds it easy to yield to the strongest. They are like two forces pushing him in contrary directions. To yield to the strongest he needs only be passive." If this be so, how can Dr. Reid maintain, as he does, that "the determination was made by the man, and not by the motive?" To this assertion Sir Wiliam Hamilton replies: "But was the man determined by no motive to that determination? Was his specific volition to this or to that without a cause? On the supposition that the sum of the influences (motives, dispositions, tendencies) to volition A is equal to 12, and the sum of counter volition B, equal to 8-can we conceive that the determination of volition A should not be necessary? We can only conceive the voli

See Examination of Edwards on the Will.

tion B to be determined by supposing that the man creates (calls from nonexistence into existence) a certain supplement of influences. But this creation as actual, or in itself, is inconceivable; and even to conceive the possibility of this inconceiv able act, we must suppose some cause by which the man is determined to exert it. We thus in thought, never escape determination and necessity. It will be observed that I do not consider this inability to notion any disproof of the fact of freewill."

It is true, that if we suppose, according to the doctrine of Sir William and Dr. Reid, that two counter influences act upon the will, the one being as 12 and the other as 8, then the first must necessarily prevail. But if this supposition be correct, we are not only unable to conceive the fact of liberty, we are also able to conceive that it cannot be a fact at all. There is a great difference, we have been accustomed to believe, between being unable to conceive how a thing is, and being able to conceive that it cannot be anyhow at all: the first would leave it a mere mystery, the last would show it to be an absurdity. In the one case, the thing would be above reason, and in the other, contrary to reason. Now, to which of these categories does the fact of liberty, as left by Sir William Hamilton, belong? Is it a mystery, or is it an absurdity? Is it an inconceivable fact, or is it a conceived impossibility? It seems to us that it is the latter; and that if we will only take the pains to view the phenomena of mind as they exist in consciousness, and not through the medium of material analogies, we shall be able to untie the knot which Sir William Hamilton has found it necessary to cut.

The doctrine of liberty, if properly viewed, is perfectly conceivable. We can certainly conceive that the omnipotence of God can put forth an act without being impelled thereto by a power back of his own; and to suppose otherwise, is to suppose a power greater than God's, and upon which the exercise of his omnipotence depends. By parity of reason, we should he compelled to suppose another power still back of that, and so on ad infinitum. This is not only absurd, but, as Calvin truly says, it is impious. Here, then, we have upon the throne of the universe a clear and unequivocal instance of a self-active power,--a power whose goings forth are not impelled by any

power without itself. It goes forth, it is true, in the light of the Eternal Reason, and in pursuit of the ends of the Eternal Goodness; but yet in itself it possesses an infinite fulness, being self-sustained, self-active, and wholly independent of all other powers and influences whatsoever.

Now, if such a Being should create at all, it is not difficult to conceive that he would create subordinate agents, bearing his own image in this, namely, the possession of a self-active power. It is not difficult to conceive that he should produce spiritual beings like himself, who can act without being necessitated to act, like the inanimate portions of creation, as well as those of an inferior nature. Nor is it more difficult to conceive that man, in point of fact, possesses such a limited selfactive power, than it is to conceive that God possesses an infinite self-active power. Indeed we must and do conceive this, or else we should have no type or representative in this lower part of the world, by and through which to rise to a contemplation of its universal Lord and Sovereign. We should have a temple without a symbol, and a universe without a God. But God has not thus left himself without witness; for he has raised man above the dust of the earth in this, that he is endowed with a self-active power, from whence, as from an humble platform, he may rise to the sublime contemplation of the Universal Mover of the heavens and the earth. But for this ray of light, shed abroad in our hearts by the creative energy of God, the nature of the divine power itself would be unknown to us, and its eternal, immutable glories shrouded in impenetrable darkness. The idea of an omnipotent power, moving in and of itself in obedience to the dictates of infinite wisdom and goodness, would be forever merged and lost in the dark scheme of an implexed series and concatenation of causes, binding all things fast, God himself not excepted, in the iron bonds of fate.

If liberty be a fact, as Sir William Hamilton contends it is, then no such objections can be urged against it as those in which he supposes it to be involved. We are aware of what may be said in favour of such a mode of viewing subjects of this kind, as well as of the nature of the principles from which it takes its rise. But we cannot consider those principles altogether sound. They appear to be too sceptical, with respect

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