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LOGIC OF THE MORAL SCIENCES* 



our characters, and that our charac- 

 ters follow from our organisation, our 

 education, and our circumstances, is 

 apt to be, with more or less of con- 

 sciousness on his part, a Fatalist as to 

 his own actions, and to believe that 

 his nature is such, or that his edu- 

 cation and circumstances have so 

 moulded his character, that nothing 

 can now prevent him from feeling 

 and acting in a particular way, or at 

 least that no effort of his own can 

 hinder it. In the words of the sect 

 which in our own day has most per- 

 severingly inculcated and most per- 

 versely misunderstood this great doc- 

 trine, his character is formed for him, 

 and not hy him; therefore his wishing 

 that it had been formed differently is 

 of no use ; he has no power to alter 

 it. But this is a grand error. He 

 has, to a certain extent, a power to 

 alter his character. Its being, in the 

 ultimate resort, formed for him, is 

 not inconsistent with its being, in 

 part, formed hy him as one of the 

 intermediate agents. His character 

 is formed by his circumstances, (in- 

 cluding among these his particular 

 organisation,) but his own desire to 

 mould it in a particular way is one 

 of those circumstances, and by no 

 means one of the least influential. 

 We cannot, indeed, directly will to 

 be different from what we are ; but 

 neither did those who are supposed 

 to have formed our characters directly 

 will that we should be what we are. 

 Their will had no direct power except 

 over their own actions. They made 

 us what they did make us by willing, 

 not the end, but the requisite means ; 

 and we, when our habits are not too 

 inveterate, can, by similarly willing 

 the requisite means, make ourselves 

 different. If they could place us 

 under the influence of certain cir- 

 cumstances, we in like manner can 

 place ourselves under the influence of 

 other circumstances. We are exactly 

 as capable of making our own char- 

 acter, if ive wiU, as others are of 

 making it for us. 



Yes, (answers the Owenite,) but 



these words, "if we will,'* surrender 

 the whole point, since the will to 

 alter our own character is given us, 

 not by any efforts of ours, but by cir- 

 cumstances which we cannot help ; 

 it comes to us either from external 

 causes or not at all. Most true : if 

 the Owenite stops here, he is in a 

 position from which nothing can ex- 

 pel him. Our character is formed by 

 us as well as for us ; but the wish 

 which induces us to attempt to form 

 it is formed for us ; and how ? Not, 

 in general, by our organisation, nor 

 wholly by our education, but by our 

 experience — experience of the painful 

 consequences of the character we pre- 

 viously had, or by some strong feeling 

 of admiration or aspiration accident- 

 ally aroused. But to think that we 

 have no power of altering our char- 

 acter, and to think that we shall not 

 use our power unless we desire to use 

 it, are very different things, and have 

 a very different effect on the mind. 

 A person who does not wish to alter 

 his character cannot b© the person 

 who is supposed to feel discouraged 

 or paralysed by thinking himself un- 

 able to do it. The depressing effect 

 of the Fatalist doctrine can only be 

 felt where there is a wish to do what 

 that doctrine represents as impossible. 

 It is of no consequence what we think 

 forms our character, when we have 

 no desire of our own about forming 

 it, but it is of great consequence that 

 we should not be prevented from 

 forming such a desire by thinking 

 the attainment impracticable, and 

 that if we have the desire we should 

 know that the work is not so irre- 

 vocably done as to be incapable of 

 being altered. 



And, indeed, if we examine closely, 

 we shall find that this feeling, of our 

 being able to modify our own char- 

 acter if we wish, is itself the feeling 

 of moral freedom which we are con- 

 scious of. A person feels morally 

 free who feels that his habits or his 

 temptations are not his masters, but 

 he theirs : who even in yielding to 

 them knows that he could resist ; that 



