It is plain that for his purpose this is the only course possible. If the will be really free, there can be no question of finding a mechanical explanation of it. There is therefore no alternative but to cut the Gordian knot, and to declare that the liberty which the vast majority of men believe themselves to exercise every instant, is proved by Science to be no better than a pure dogma, that is to say, a mere figment.
When we seek for his indication of the line of argument whereby this position is made good, the information supplied is less full than might be desired. He begins[122] with a rather lengthy sketch of the history of controversy in this regard,—which contains the remarkable statement that "Some of the first teachers of the Christian Churches—such as St. Augustine and Calvin—rejected the freedom of the will as decidedly as the famous leaders of pure Materialism, Holbach in the eighteenth, and Büchner in the nineteenth century." Then he proceeds:
The great struggle between the determinist and the indeterminist, between the opponent and the sustainer of the freedom of the will, has ended to-day after more than 2,000 years, completely in favour of the determinist. The human will has no more freedom than that of the higher animals, from which it differs only in degree, not in kind. In the last [i.e. the eighteenth][{83}] century the doctrine of liberty was fought with general philosophic and cosmological arguments. The nineteenth century has given us very different weapons for its definitive destruction—the powerful weapons which we find in the arsenal of comparative physiology and evolution. We now know that each act of the will is as fatally determined by the organization of the individual, and as dependent on the momentary condition of his environment, as every other psychic activity. The character of the inclination was determined long ago by heredity from parents and ancestors; the determination to each particular act is an instance of adaptation to the circumstances of the moment wherein the strongest motive prevails, according to the laws which govern the statics of emotion. Ontogeny teaches us to understand the evolution of the will in the individual child. Phylogeny reveals to us the historical development of the will within the ranks of our vertebrate ancestors.[123]
That is all. It is needless to observe that jargon like this proves nothing. Of anything approaching to evidence there is here, manifestly, no vestige, and there is consequently nothing which can avail to win our assent as rational men.
It is likewise obvious that we have here a question[{84}] as to which every human being has the means of judging equally with the most eminent man of Science, and modern improvement of the methods and instruments of research leaves us just where we always were. The final evidence on the subject every man has within himself, in the most vital facts of his own experience. Into the philosophy of the matter it is neither necessary nor advisable at present to go. In dealing with profound yet elementary questions, regarding which our means of knowledge are thus simple and direct, men are apt to bewilder themselves when they begin to philosophize, and to persuade themselves that they cannot be sure precisely of those things that are most certain. George Borrow is by no means the only one who has tormented himself with doubts as to his own existence.[124] A still larger number have professed to believe themselves mere machines compelled to go like clocks, and to do only what has been predetermined for them. But such beliefs are for the lecture-room or the study only, and in practical life every one behaves as if both he himself and others—especially others—were responsible for their conduct. So common-sense teaches, than which we shall not find a safer guide. "Sir," said the eminently common-sense Dr. Johnson, "we know our will is free; and there's an end on't. All theory is against the freedom of the will; all experience for it.... But, Sir, as to the doctrine of necessity, no[{85}] man believes it. If a man should give me arguments that I cannot answer to prove that I cannot see; because I cannot answer his arguments, do I believe that I have no eyes?"
Thus we find once again that the doctrines which some would force upon us in the name of Science, on whatever they are founded, have no basis of fact, and cannot therefore rightly call themselves scientific.[{86}]
XI
THE ORDER OF NATURE
THAT the world which we inhabit is a Cosmos, ruled by law and order, no one has ever attempted to deny. Only because laws are everywhere found awaiting discovery, is natural science a possibility. What such laws really are, we have already considered. They are, as Mr. Lewes puts it, the paths along which the forces of nature travel to their results; and it is only because these forces keep invariably each to its proper path, that we are able to follow them with our minds, either to learn anything concerning them, or to turn our knowledge to practical account. In something of the same manner, it is because we are assured that our railway trains will run on their appointed lines, that we can learn from Bradshaw how to get to Exeter or to Edinburgh;—but the forces of Nature are never derailed. It is, in fact, as we have heard, the first principle of Science, that "the reign of law is universal, the principle of continuity ubiquitous,"—and upon this the validity of all her methods and conclusions wholly depends. It is taken for granted, with absolute confidence, that what is once found to happen[{87}] will be exactly repeated in like circumstances,—that the laws experimentally observed, regarding motion, heat, light, sound, chemical combination, electricity, magnetism, and the rest, will be faithfully obeyed, in every minutest particular, as certainly as suns will rise and set, or moons wax and wane. Were it not so, were the forces of Nature to act spasmodically and at random, and did not their common action so result as to establish or subserve other laws of bewildering complexity,—as in molecular dynamics, the mechanism of the heavens, and the processes of organic life,—we could learn no more from the study of nature than from a page of type which had been set up by an idiot, or an anthropoid ape.
Here is another factor in our problem, and one which has from the first attracted the attention of thinking men. No feature of nature impressed them more than this same reign of law and order, apparent everywhere; and on this account they called the world Cosmos, instead of Chaos. And, since it is self-evident that everything must have a reason for its being, that whatever is not self-existent must have a cause other than itself, they felt compelled to enquire what manner of cause would account for law and order. The like enquiry we have still to pursue, and by methods radically the same as ever; for amid all her discoveries Science has found nothing which does anything whatever to furnish an answer. All that has been done is enormously to multiply the aspects under which the problem presents itself.[{88}]