FREE WILL AND AUTOMATISM 275 



" It is in virtue of the Will that we are not mere think- 

 ing Automata, mere puppets to be pulled by suggesting- 

 strings capable of being played-upon by every one who 

 shall have made himself master of our springs of action " } 



Since the above-mentioned book was published, I 

 find Locke, Schopenhauer and other writers have enter- 

 tained the same idea. Thus the German philosopher, 

 writing on Reason, says : " It has always been understood 

 to mean the possession of general, abstract non-intuitive 

 ideas, named concepts, which are denoted and fixed by 

 means of words. This faculty alone it is which in reality 

 gives to men their advantage over animals."^ 



As an illustration of what I call " automatic reasoning," 

 I should regard tactfulness. Some people have, as we 

 say, " great tact," in others it is often conspicuous by its 

 absence. The former seem to do or say just the right 

 thing at the right moment ; the latter generally do the 

 wrong one. Why is this? Neither have time deliber- 

 ately to think out the situation, and choose the wisest 

 words or best thing to be said or done on the spur of the 

 moment. The spontaneity of tact is its charm. 



In the one person the mental qualification is present, 

 in the other the brain is lacking something. Such a 

 tactless person is one of whom it is sometimes said that 

 " he has not two ideas in his head," i.e., consecutive ones. 

 He blurts out his first thought. 



In a tactful person, the same thought might arise, but 

 it is instantly and spontaneously checked by a following 

 tactful alternative ; so that the thought may occur to the 

 tactless man afterwards, when he sees the result of his ob- 

 servation, " what a fool I was to say that " ; but he could 

 not help it, for his volition was not equal to the occasion. 



* P. 258. ' The Basis of Morality, p. 71. 



