a very insignificant consideration, and the benefit to be produced^ suppose to a world, is inestimable. Yet he falsely and unjustly prefers th6 first, and views the latter as trivial; nay, separately taken, as not entitled to the smallest regard. If the dictates of impartial justice be taken into the account, then^ according to the system of self-love, the best action that ever was performed, may, for any thing we know, have been the action, in the whole world, of the most exquisite and deliberate injustice. Nay> it could not have been otherwise, since it produced the greatest good, and therefore was the indivi* dual instance, in which the greatest good was most directly postponed to personal gratifi cation K Such is the spirit of the doctrine I undertake to refute.
But man is not in truth so poor and pusillani- mous a creature as this system would represent.
It is time however to proceed to the real merits of the quesjtion, to examine what in fact is the mo- tive which induces a good man to elect a generous mode of proceeding.
Locke is the philosopher, who, in writing on Human Understanding, has specially delivered the doctrine, that uneasiness is the cause which deter* mines the will, and urges us to act. He says% "The motive we have for continuing in the same state, is only the present satisfaction we feel in it; the mo* *> Polilical Justice, Book IV, Chap. X. « Book II, Chap. XXI, Sect. 29.
XI.] OF SELF-LOVE AND BENEVOLENCE. 211 tive to change is always some uneasiness: nothing setting us upon the change of state^ or upon any new action, but some uneasiness. This is the great motive that works on the mind."
It is not my concern to enquire, whether Locke by this statement meant to assert that self-love is the only principle of human action. It has at any rate been taken to express the doctrine which I here propose to refute* And, in the first place, I say, that, if our business is to discover the consideration entertained by the mind which induces us to act, this tells us nothing. It is like the case of the Indian philosopher <', who, being asked what it was that kept the earth in its place, answered, that it was supported by an ele* phant, and that elephant again rested on a tortoise. He must, be endowed with a slender portion of curiosity, who, being told that uneasiness is that which spurs on the mind to act, shall rest satisfied with this explanation, and does not proceed to en- quire, what makes us uneasy?
An explanation like this is no more instructive, than it would be, if, when we saw a man walking, or grasping a sword or a bludgeon, and we enquired into the cause of this phenomenon, any one should inform us that he walks, because he has feet, and he grasps, because he has hands.
I could not commodiously give to my thoughts their present form, unless I had been previously * Locke on Understanding, Book II> Chap. XIII, Sect. 19.
p2 212 OF SELF-LOVE AND BENEVOLENCE. [esSAY furnished with pens and paper. But it would be absurd to say^ that my being furnished with pens and paper^ is the cause of my writing this Essay on Self-love and Benevolence.
The advocates of self-love have, very inartificially and unjustly, substituted the abstract definition of a voluntary agent, and made that stand for the motive by which he is prompted to act. It is true, that we cannot act without the impulse of desire or uneasU . ness; but we do not think of that desire and un- easiness; and it is the thing upon which the mind is fixed that constitutes our motive. In the bound- less variety of the acts, passions and pursuits of human beings, it is absurd on the face of it to say that we are all governed by one motive, and that, however dissimilar are the ends we pursue, all this dissimilarity is the fruit of a single cause. I One man chooses travelling, another ambition, a A third study, a fourth voluptuousness and a mistress. Y^- Why do these men take so diflFerent courses?
/ Because one is partial to new scenes, new build- \ mgs, new manners, and the study of character. Be- cause a second is attracted by the contemplation of wealth and power. Because a third feels a decided ', preference for the works of Homer, or Shakespear, or Bacon, or Euclid. Because a fourth finds no- thing calculated to stir his mind in comparison with female beauty, female allurements, or expensive living.
Each of these finds the qualities he likes, intrin- > XI.] OF SELF-LOVE AND BENEVOLENCE. 213 sically in the thing he chooses. One man feels \ himself strongly moved, and raised to extacy, by! the beauties of nature, or the magnificence of archi- tecture. Another is ravished with the divine excel* lencies of Homer, or of some other of the heroes of literature. A third finds nothing delights him so much as the happiness of others, the beholding that happiness increased, and seeing pain and oppression and sorrow put to flight. The cause of these dif- ferences is, that each man has an individual internal structure, directing his partialities, one man to onq^ thing, and another to another.
Few things can exceed the characters of human beings in variety. There must be something abs- tractedly in the nature of mind, which renders it accessible to these varieties, for the present we will call it taste. One man feels his spirits regaled with the sight of those things which constitute wealth, another in meditating the triumphs of Alex- ander or Caesar, and a third in viewing the galleries \ of the Louvre. Not one of these thinks in the out- \ set of appropriating these objects to himself; not / one of them begins with aspiring to be the pos- \ sessor of vast opulence, or emulating the triumphs \ of Caesar, or obtaining in property the pictures and i statues the sight of which affords him so exquisite delight. Even the admirer of female beauty, does not at first think of converting this attractive object into a mistress, but on the contrary desires, like Pygmalion, that the figure he beholds might become ^ 214 OF 8ELF-LOVE AND BENEVOLENCE4 [essAY bis solace and companion, because he had previously admired it for itself.
Just so the benevolent man is an individual who finds a pecidiar delight in contemplating the con* tentment, the peace and heart's ease of other men, and sympathises in no ordinary degree with their sufferings. He rejoices in the existence and diffu- sion of human happiness, though he should not have had the smallest share in giving birth to the thing he loves. It is because such are his tastes, and what above all things he prefers, that he after-^ wards becomes distinguished by the benevolence of his conduct.
The reflex act of the mind, which these new phi- losophers put forward as the solution of all human pursuits, rarely presents itself but to the speculative enquirer in his closet. The savage never dreams of it. The active man, engaged in the busy scenes of life, thinks little, and on rare occasions of himself, but much, and in a manner for ever, of the objects of his pursuit.
Some men are uniform in their character, and from the cradle to the grave prefer the same objects that first awakened their partialities. Other men are inconsistent and given to change, are " every thing by starts^ and nothing long." Still it is pro- bable that, in most cases, he who performs an act of benevolence, feels for the time that he has a pe- culiar delight in contemplating the good of his fel- low-man.
XI.] OF SELF-X.OVE AND BENEVOLENCE. 315 The doctrine of the modern philosophers on this pointy is in many ways imbecil and unsound. It is inauspicious to their creed, that the reflex act of the mind is purely the affair, of Experience. Why did the liberal-minded man perform his first act of benevolence? The answer of these persons ought to be, because the recollection of a generous deed ja a source of the truest delight. But there id an/ absurdity on the face of this solution., We do not experimentally know the delight which attends the recollection of a generous deed, till a generous deed lias been performed by us. We do not learn these things from books. And least of all is this solution to the pui-pose, when the business is to find a solu- ilion that suits the human mind universally, the un- learned as well as the learned, the savage as well as the sage. And surely it is inconsistent with all sound reasoning, to represent that as the sole spring of our benevoleint actions, which by the very terms will not fit the first benevolent act in which ^ny man engaged.
The advocates of the doctrine of " self-love the i9iOurce of all our actions,'* are still more puzzled, ,when the case set before them is that of the man, who flies, at an instant's warning, to save the life of the child who has fallen into the river, or the unfortunate whom he beholds in the upper story of a house in flames. This man, as might be illus- trated in a thousand instances, treats his own ex- istence as unworthy of notice, and exposes it to .1 216 OF SELF-LOVE AND BENEVOLENCE. [ESSAY multiplied risks to effect the object to which he devotes himself.
They are obliged to say^ that this man anticipates the joy he will feel in the recollection of a noble act^ and the cutting and intolerable pain he will experience in the consciousness that a human be- ing has perished, whom it was in his power to save. It is in vain that we tell them that, without a mo- ment's consideration, he tore oflF his clothes, or plunged into the stream with his clothes on, or rushed up a flaming stair-case. Still they tell us, that he recollected what compunctious visitings would be his lot if he remained supine — ^he felt the sharpest uneasiness at sight of the accident before him, and it was to get rid of that uneasiness, and not for the smallest regard to the unhappy being he has been the means to save, that he entered on the hazardous undertaking.
Uneasiness, the knowledge of what inwardly passes in the mind, is a thing not in the slightest degree adverted to but in an interval of leisure. No; the man here spoken of thinks of nothing but the object immediately before his eyes; he adverts not at all to himself; he acts only with an undeveloped, confused and hurried consciousness that he may be of some use, and may avert the instantly impending calamity. He has scarcely even so much reflection as amounts to this.
The history of man, whether national or indivi- dual, and consequently the acts of human creatures XI.] OF SELF-LOVE AND BENEVOLENCE. 217 which it describes, are cast in another mould than that which the philosophy of self-love sets before «s. A topic that from the earliest accounts perpe- tually presents itself in the records of mankind, is «elf-sacrifice, parents sacrificing themselves for their children^ and children for their parents. Cimon, the Athenian, yet in the flower of his youth, voluntarily became the inmate of a prison, that the body of his father might receive the honours of sepulture. Va- rious and unquestionable are the examples of per* sons who have exposed themselves to destruction, and even petitioned to die, that so they might save the lives of those, whose lives they held dearer than their own. Life is indeed a thing, that is notoriously set at nothing by generous souls, who have fervently devoted themselves to an overwhelming purpose. There have been instances of persons, exposed to all the horrors of famine, where one has determined to perish by that slowest and most humiliating of all the modes of animal destruction, that another, dearer to him than life itself, might, if possible, be preserved.
What is the true explanation of these determina- tions of the human will? Is it, that the person, thus consigning himself to death, loved nothing but him- self, regarded only the pleasure he might reap, or the uneasiness he was eager to avoid? Or, is it, that he had arrived at the exalted point of self-ob- livion, and that his whole soul was penetrated and 218 OF J5£LF-LOV£ AND B£N£VOL£NC£. [essAY ingrossed with the love of those for whom he con- ceived so exalted a partiality? ^ This sentiment so truly forms a part of our na- ture,:that a multitude of absmrd practices, and a / multitude of heart-rending fables, have been found- ed upon the consciousness of man in different ages and nations, that these modes of thinking form a constituent part of our common existence*. In India there was found a woman, whose love to the deceased partner of her soul was so overwhelming, that she resolved voluntarily to perinh on his funeral pile. And this example became so fascinating and admirable, that, by insensible degrees, it grew into ^ national custom with the Hindoos, that, by a sort of voluntary constraint, the widows of all men of a certain caste, should consign themselves to the flames witli the dead bodies of their husbands* The story of Zopyrus cutting off his nose and ears, and \ of Curtius leaping into the gulph, may be fictitious: I but it was the consciousness of those by whom these i narratives were written that they drew their mate* I rials from the mighty store-house of the heart of ^ man, that prompted them to record them. The institutions of clientship and clans, so extensively diffused in different ages of the world, rests upon this characteristic of our nature, that multitudes of men may be trained and educated so, as to hold their existence at no price, when the life of the in- dividual they were taught unlimitedly to reverence XI.] OF S£l.F-LaV£ AND B£N£yOL£»9C£. 319 might be preserved, or might be defended at the risk of their destruction. » •; « ' The princips(l drcumstance tibat dividies our feel- ings for others from our feelings for ourselvesy and that givesy to satirical observ^sy*. and sup^ficial thinkers, an air of exclusive selfishness' to the hu- man mind, lies in this, that we can ily from others, but cannot fly from ourselves. While I am sitting by the bed-side of the sufferer, while I am listening to the tale of his woes, there is^ comparatively but a slight line of demarcation, whether they are bis sorrows or my own., My sympathy is vehemently excited towards him, and I feel his twinges and an- guish in a most painful degree. But I can quit his apartment and the house in which he dwells, can go out in the fields, and feel the fresh air of heaven fanning: my hair, and playing upon my cheeks. This is at first but a very imperfect relief; His image follows me; I cannot forget what I have heard and seen; I even reproach myself for the mitigation I involuntarily experience. But man is the creature of his senses. I am every moment further removed, both in time and place, from. the object that distressed me. There he still lies upon the bed of agony: but the sound 6f his complaint, and the sight of all that expresses his suffering, are no longer before me. A short experience of human life convinces us that we have this remedy always at hand [" I am unhappy, only while I please"*^]; and ' Douglas.
220 OF S£LF-LOV£ AND BENEVOLEMCB. [ESSAY we soon come therefore to anticipate the cure, and so, even while we are in the presence of the sufferer, to feel that he and ourselves are not perfectly one.
But with our own distempers and adversities it is altogether different. It is this that barbs the arrow* We may change the place of our local existence; but we cannot go away from ourselves. With cha- riots, and embarking ourselves on board of ships, we may seek to escape from the enemy. But grief and apprehension enter the vessel along with us; and, when we mount on horseback, the discontent that specially annoyed us, gets up behind, and clings to our sides with a hold never to be loosened ^ Is it then indeed a proof of selfishness^ that we are in a greater or less degree relieved from the an- guish we endured for our friend, when other objects occupy us, and we are no longer the witnesses of his sufferings? If this were true, the same argu- ment would irresistibly prove, that we are the most generous of imaginable beings, the most disregard- * ful of whatever relates to ourselves. Is it not the first ejaculation of the miserable, ** Oh, that I could fly from myself? Oh, for a thick, substantial sleep!" What the desperate man hates is his own identity. But he knows that, if for a few moments he loses himself in forgetfulness, he will presently awake to all that distracted him. He knows that he must act his part to the end, and drink the bitter cup to the dregs. He can do none of these things by proxy.
' Horace.
XI.] OF SELF-LOVE AND BENEVOLENCE, 221 It is the consciousness of the indubitable future, from which we can never be divorced, that gives to our present calamity its most fearful empire. Were it not for this great line of distinction, there are many that would feel not less for their friend than for themselves. But they are aware, that his ruin will not make them beggars, his mortal disease will not bring them to the tomb, and that, when he is dead, they may yet be reserved for many years of health, of consciousness and vigour.
The language of the hypothesis of self-love was well adapted to the courtiers of the reign of Louis the Fourteenth. The language of disinterestedness was adapted to the ancient republicans in the purest times of Sparta and Rome.
But these ancients were not always disinterested; and the modems are not always narrow, self-centred and cold. The ancients paid, though with compa- rative infrequency, the tax imposed upon mortals, • and thought of their own gratification and ease; and the moderns are not utterly disqualified for acts of heroic affection.
It is of great consequence that men should come to think correctly on this subject. The most snail- blooded man that exists, is not so selfish as he pre- tends to be. In spite of all the indifference he pro- fesses towards the good of others, he will sometimes be detected in a very heretical state of sensibility towards his wife, his child or his friend; he will shed tears at a tale of distress, and make consider- 222 OF SELF-LOVE AND BENEVOLENCE. [ESSAY able sacrifices of his own gratification for the relief of others.
But his creed is a pernicious one. He who for ever thinks, that his " charity must begin at home/' is in great danger of becoming an indifferent citizen, and of withering those feelings of philan^ thropy, which in all soimd estimation constitute the crowning glory of man. He will perhaps have a reasonable afiection towards what he calls his own flesh and bloody and may assist even a stranger in a case of urgent distress. — But it is dangerous to trifle^ with the first principles and sentiments of morality. And this man will scarcely in any case have his mind prepared to hail the first dawnings of human improvement, and to regard all that be* longs to the welfare of his kind as parcel of his own particular estate.
The creed of self-love will always have a tendency to make us Frenchmen in the frivolous part of that character, and Dutchmen in the plodding and shop^ keeping spirit of barter and sale. There is no need that we should beat down the impulse of heroism in the human character, and be upon our guard against the effervescences and excess of a generous sentiment. One of the instnictors of my youth was accustomed to say to his pupils, "Do not be afraid to commit your thoughts to paper in all the fervour and glow of your first conception: when you come to look at them the next day, you will find this gone off to a surprising degree." As this XI.] OF SELF-LOVE AND BENEVOLENCE. 223 was no ill precept for literary composition^ even so in our actions and moral conduct we shall be in small danger of being too warm-hearted and too generous. r^ Modern improvements in education are earnest 1 in recommending to us the study of facts, and that / we should not waste the time of young persona • upon the flights of imagination. But it is to imar! gination that we are indebted for our highest enjoy- \ ments; it tames the ruggedness of uncivilised:na- ture, and is the never-failing associate! of all tJKi considerable advances of social tnan^ whethi^r in throwing down the strong fences of intellectual slavery, or in giving firmness and duration to tl^ / edifice of political freedom. « [^ And who does not feel that every thing depends upon the creed we embrace,. and the discipline we exercise over our own souls? . The disciple of the theory of self-love, if of a liberal disposition, will perpetually whip himself forward " with loose reins,'* upon a spiritless Pega- sus, and say, "I will do generous things; I will not bring into contempt the master I serve — ^though I am conscious all the while that this is but a delu* sion, and that, however I brag of generosity, I do not set a step forward, but singly for my own ends, and my own gratification.'' Meanwhile, this is all a forced condition of. thought; and the man who cherishes it, will be perpetually falling back into the cold, heartless convictions he inwardly retains.
224 OF SELF-LOVE AND BENEVOLENCE. [essAY Self-love is the unwholesome, infectious atmosphere in which he dwells; and, however he may seek to rise, the wings of his soul will eternally be drawn downwards, and he cannot be pervaded, as he might have been, with the free spirit of genuine philan- thropy. To be consistent, he ought continually to grow colder and colder; and the romance, which fired his youth, and made him forget the venomous potion he had swallowed, will fade away in age, rendering him careless of all but himself, and indif- ferent to the adversity and suflferings of all of whom he hears, and all with whom he is connected.
On the other hand, the man who has embraced the creed of disinterested benevolence, will know that it is not his fitting element, to " live for him- self, or to die for himself." Whether he is under the dominion of family-affection, friendship, pa- triotism, or a zeal for his brethren of mankind, he will feel that he is at home. The generous man therefore looks forward to the time when the chil- ling and wretched philosophy of the reign of Louis the Fourteenth shall be forgotten, and a fervent desire for the happiness and improvement of the human species shall reign in all hearts.
I am not especially desirous of sheltering my opinions under the authority of great names: but, in a question of such vital importance to the true welfare of men in society, no fair advantage should be neglected. The author of the system of " self- love the source of all our actions" was La Roche- XI.] OF SELF-LOVE AND BENEVOLENCE. 225 foucault; and the whole herd of the French phi- losophers have not been ashamed to follow in the train of their vaunted master. I am grieved to say, that, as I think, the majority of my refining and subtilising countrymen of the present day have en- listed under his banner. But the more noble and ^nerous view of the subject has been powerfully isupported by Shaftesbury, Butler, Hutcheson and Hume. On the last of these I particularly pique . myself; inasmuch as, though he became naturalised as a Frenchman in a vast variety of topics, the greatness of his intellectual powers exempted him from degradation in this. ^- That however which I would chiefly urge in the way of authority, is the thing mentioned in the be- ginning of this Essay, I mean, the sentiments that have animated the authors of religion, that charac- terise the best ages of Greece and Rome, and that in all cases display themselves when the loftiest and most generous sentiments of the heart are called into action. The opposite creed could only have been engendered in the dregs of a corrupt and emas- culated court; and human nature will never shew itself what it is capable of being, till the last re- mains of a doctrine, invented in the latter part of the seventeenth century, shall have been consigned to the execration they deserve.
226 OF THE LIBERTY OF HUMAN ACTIONS. [ESSAY ESSAY XII.
OF THE LIBERTY OF HUMAN ACTIONS.
The question, which has been attended with so long and obstinate debates, concerning the meta- physical doctrines of liberty and necessity, and the freedom of human actions, is not even yet finally and satisfactorily settled.
The negative is made out by an argument which seems to amount to demonstration, that every event requires a cause, a cause why it is as it is and not otherwise, that the human will is guided by motives, and is consequently always ruled by the strongest motive, and that we can never choose any thing, either without a motive of preference, or in the way of following the weaker, and deserting the stronger v^lnotive^ C Why is it then that disbelief or doubt should still subsist in a question so fully decided?
For the same reason that compels us to reject many other demonstrations. The human mind is so constituted as to oblige us, if not theoretically, at least practically, to reject demonstration, and adhere to our senses.
^- The case is thus in the great question of the non- iexistence of an external world, or of matter. How- * PoliticalJustice, Book IV, Chap. VH.
XII.] OP THE LIBERTY OF HUMAN ACTIONS, 227 ever much the understanding may be satisfied of the truth of the proposition by the arguments of Berke- ley and others, we no sooner go out into actual life, than we become convinced, in spite of our pre- vious scepticism or unbelief, of the real existence of the table, the chair, and the objects around us, \ and of the permanence and reality of the persons, n both body and mind, with whom we have inter- ' course. If we were not, we should soon become. ^ indifferent to their pleasure and pain, and in no long time reason ourselves into the opinion that the one was not more desirable than the other, and conduct ourselves accordingly.
But there is a great difference between the ques- tion of a material world, and the question of liberty and necessity. The most strenuous Berkleian can never say, that there is any contradiction or impos- sibility in the existence of matter. All that he can consistently and soberly maintain is, that, if the ma- terial world exists, we can never perceive it, and that our sensations, and trains of impressions and think'- ing go on wholly independent of that existence.
But the question of the freedom of human actions \ is totally of another class. To say that in our [ \ choice we reject the stronger motive, and that we choose a thing merely because we choose it, is sheer nonsense and absurdity; and whoever with a sound understanding will fix his mind upon the state of the question will perceive its impossibility.
In the mean time it is not less true, that every a2 wn 228 QF THE LIBERTY OF HUMAN ACTIONS. [ESSAY \ man, the necessarian as well as his opponent, acts on the assumption of human liberty, and can never for a moment, when he enters into the scenes of \ real life, divest himself of this persuasion.
' r Let us take separately into our consideration the laws of matter and of mind. We acknowledge gey nerally in both an established order of antecedents ^ and consequents, or of causes and effects. This is ' the sole foundation of human prudence and of all . morality. It is because we foresee that certain ef- \ fects will follow from a certain mode of conduct, H — /that we act in one way rather than another. It is I Wbecause we foresee that, if the soil is prepared in a certain way, and if seed is properly scattered and covered up in the soil thus prepared, a crop will follow, that we engage in the labours of agricul- ture. In the same manner, it is because we fore- see that, if lessons are properly given, and a young person has them clearly explained to him, certain benefits will result, and because we are apprised of the operation of persuasion, admonition, remon- strance, menace, punishment and reward, that we engage in the labours of education. All the stu- dies of the natural philosopher and the chemist, all our journeys by land and our voyages by sea, and all the systems and science of government, are built upon this principle, that from a certain me- thod of proceeding, regulated by the precepts of wisdom and experience, certain effects may be ex- pected to follow.
XII.] OF THE LIBERTY OF HUMAN ACTIONS. 229 Yet, at the same time that we admit of a regular series of cause and eflfect in the operations both of matter and mind, we never fail, in our reflections upon each, to ascribe to them an essential diflFerence. In the laws by which a falling body descends to the earth, and by which the planets are retained in their orbits, in a word, in all that relates to inanimate nature, we readily assent to the existence of abso- lute laws, so that, when we have once ascertained the fundamental principles of astronomy and phy- sics, we rely with perfect assurance upon the inva- riable operation of these laws, yesterday, to-day, and for ever. As long as the system of things, of which we are spectators, and in which we act our several parts, shall remain, so long have the general phenomena of nature gone on unchanged for more years of past ages than we can define, and will in all probability continue to operate for as many ages to come. We admit of no variation, but firmly be- lieve that, if we were perfectly acquainted with all the causes, we could, without danger of error, pre- dict all the effects. We are satisfied that, since first the machine of the universe was set going, everything in inanimate nature has taken place in a regular course, and nothing has happened and can happen, otherwise than as it actually has been and will be.
But we believe, or, more accurately speaking, we feel, that it is otherwise in the universe of mind. Whoever attentively observes the phenomena of 230 OF THE LIBERTY OF HUMAN ACTIONS. [essAY thinking and sentient beings, will be convinced, that men and animals are under the influence of motives^ that we are subject to the predominance of the passions, of love and hatred, of desire and aver- sion^ of sorrow and joy, and that the elections we make ate regulated by impressions supplied to us by these passions. But we are fully penetrated with the notion, that mind is an arbiter, that it sits on its throne, and decides, as an absolute prince^ this way or that; in short, that, while inanimate nature proceeds passively in an eternal chain of cause and effect, mind is endowed with an initiating power, and forms its determinations by an inhe- rent and indefeasible prerogative.
Henc*e arises the idea of contingency relative to the acts of living and sentient beings, and the opi- nion tliat, while, in the universe of matter, every thing proceeds in regular course, and nothing has happened or can happen, otherwise than as it actu- ally has been or will be, in the determinations and acts of living beings each occurrence may be or not be, and waits the mastery of mind to decide whe- ther the event shall be one way or the other, both issues being equally possible till that decision has been made.
Thus, as was said in the beginning, we have de- monstration, all the powers of our reasoning fa- culty, on one side, and the feeling of our minds, an inward persuasion of which with all our efforts we can never divest ourselves, on the other. This XI 1.] OF THE LIBERTY OF HUMAN ACTIONS. 231 phenomenon in the history of every human creature, had aptly enough been denominated, the ^^ delusive sense of liberty^.'* ^^ And, though the philosopher in his closet will ^ for the most part fully assent to the doctrine of the necessity of human actions, yet this indestructible, feeling of liberty, which accompanies us from the / cradle to the grave, is entitled to our serious atten- tion^ and has never obtained that consideration from the speculative part of mankind, which must by no f means be withheld, if we would properly enter into i the mysteries of our nature. The necessarian has paid a very imperfect attention to the impulses which form the character of man, if he omits this chapter in the history of mind, while on the other hand the advocate of free will, if he would follow up his doctrine rigorously into all its consequences, would render all speculations on human character and conduct superfluous, put an end to the system of persuasion, admonition, remonstrance, menace, punishment and reward, annihilate the very essence of civil government, and bring to a close all dis- tinction between the sane person and the maniac.