MENTAL PHYSIOLOGY. 707 



Is it, as some think, the mere resultant of the general (spontaneous or automatic) 

 activity of the mind, and dependent like it upon physical antecedents ? Or, is 

 it a power which, being completely independent of these conditions, is capable 

 of acting against the preponderance of motives ? — as if, when one scale of a beam 

 is declining downward, a hand placed upon the beam from which the other scale 

 is suspended were to cause that lighter scale to go down. Now, that the will is 

 something essentially different from the general resultant of the automatic activi- 

 ty of the mind, appears to the writer to be proved, not merely by the evidence 

 of our own consciousness of the possession of a self-determining power^ but by 

 observation of the striking contrasts which are continually presented in abnormal 

 states of the mind between the automatic activity and the power of volitional 

 control (i. e,, in toxic delirium), while the weakening of that power, usually 

 in concurrence with an exaltation of some emotional tendency, is the special 

 characteristic of insanity." 



Dr. Carpenter proceeds to show how the will can override reason 

 and judgment, in questions either of intellectual or moral truth, by 

 keeping some considerations out of view and by fixing the attention 

 upon others ; so that in this manner the will determines the balance 

 of evidence which commands belief, as it does the balance of evidence 

 which determines conduct. It is, perhaps, superfluous to observe that 

 this self-determining power which rules the senses, guides the opin- 

 ions, directs the judgment, and controls the conduct of men, which is 

 something essentially different from the general activities of the mind, 

 and is completely independent of physical antecedents, cannot be a 

 physiological, and therefore must be a spiritual power. And this no- 

 tion agrees with what we have read in other places than Dr. Carpen- 

 ter's book on Mental Physiology, and where it has caused us less sur- 

 prise. Granted — we have seen it stated — that perception, memory, 

 emotion, judgment, and all other activities which you more or less 

 successfully demonstrate to be functions of the brain are so in fact, 

 still there is the will. In what ganglion or convolution will you 

 locate that ? What influence has the chemistry of the little cells 

 upon that prime motive power ? What can change of structure effect 

 there ? 



It is autocratic, self-dependent, and, excepting in itself and by 

 itself, unchangeable. It is at least a spiritual force with which body 

 has naught to do. It is the heavenly part of man. It is the soul. 



The theological bearings of the question will be somewhat out of 

 place in these pages, but it is worth while to remark that the absolute 

 freedom of the will does not fit in with some systems of theology which 

 are tenaciously held by large numbers of Christians. 



Let those who think that there can be no morality and no religion, 

 no foundation for human responsibility, and no basis for a moral code, 

 without freedom of the will, read the great work of that grand old 

 Puritan divine, Jonathan Edwards, entitled "A Careful and Strict 

 Enquiry into the Modern Prevailing Notions of that Freedom of the 

 Will which is supposed to be essential to Moral Agency, Virtue and 



