708 THE LESSON OF THE LIFE OF HUXLEY. 



cosmic process is the expression is predestined or spontaneous? Proc- 

 esses, evolutionary or otherwise, are matters of fact. There is nothing 

 of power or agency included in the notion of a process. 



''The tenacity- of the wonderful fallacy that the laws of nature are 

 agents, instead of being, as they really are, a mere record of experi- 

 ence, upon which we base our interpretation of that which does 

 happen and our anticipation of what we expect to happen, is a 

 remarkable psychological fact," says Huxley. ''If it should be worth 

 anyl)ody's while to hunt for examples of such misuse of language on 

 ray own i)art,'" says he, "I am not at all sure he might not succeed. If 

 1 am guilty I do ptMiance beforehand, and I only hope I may deter 

 others from connnitting the like fault." 



Huxley believes that proof that our conduct, or anything else, is 

 part and parcel of the cosmic process, and neither more nor less than 

 one might lia\e expected if he had known all about pi'imitive nebulosity, 

 would show that our volition is only "so called," and that it is the empty 

 and meaningless acconii)animent of our bodily activity. 



If it is misuse of language which leads him to this conclusion — if it 

 does not follow fioni the i)remises— it is surely worth while to point 

 this out. not in anv spirit of criticism, but solely that others may be 

 deteri'ed from connnitting the like fault. 



"The necessity of any action, eithei- of matter or of mind," sa3^s 

 Hume, "is not, properly speaking, a (|uality of the agent, hut in any 

 thinking and intelligent being who may consider the action." Hume 

 regards this obvious truth as evidence that our feeling of freedom in 

 willing and doing is nothing more than a singular effect of custom; but 

 may it not rather be the notion of necessity which is a singular effect 

 of custom ( If necessity is not a quality of the agent, but of the spec- 

 tator, may it not be that the quality of freedom in willing and doing — 

 if there be such freedom — is not, properly speaking, in any spectator 

 who may consider the action, but in the free and intelligent agent? 



"I take it for demonstrable," says Huxley, "that it is utterly impos- 

 sible to prove that anything whatever may not be the effect of a material 

 and necessary cause, and that human logic is equall}^ incompetent to 

 pro\'e that any act is really spontaneous." But we must not forget that 

 he is sorry for logic if there is any antagonism between this opinion 

 and belief in our ability "to influence and modify the cosmic process." 

 If the opinion is well warranted, as it seems to me to be, ma}^ it not be 

 valid onl}' because logic never does tell us any matter of fact? May it 

 not be because it is utterh^ impossible to prove by logic that anything 

 whatever is the effect of a necessary cause, that it is also impossible 

 thus to prove that an}' event is not the effect of that sort of cause ? If 

 human logic is utterh^ incompetent to prove that all acts, or any acts, 

 are or are not really spontaneous, may it not be that some acts are 



