LECTURES AND ESS A YS 



fall ; and if there be absolutely or rela- 

 tively no reason why a man should act, 

 he will not act. It is true that the 

 united voice of this assembly could not 

 persuade me that I have not, at this 

 moment, the power to lift my arm if I 

 wished to do so. Within this range the 

 conscious freedom of my will cannot be 

 questioned. But what about the origin 

 of the " wish " ? Are we, or are we not, 

 complete masters of the circumstances 

 which create our wishes, motives, and 

 tendencies to action ? Adequate reflec- 

 tion will, I think, prove that we are not. 

 What, for example, have I had to do 

 with the generation and development of 

 that which some will consider my total 

 being, and others a most potent factor of 

 my total being the living, speaking 

 organism which now addresses you ? 

 As stated at the beginning of this dis- 

 course, my physical and intellectual 

 textures were woven for me, not by me. 

 Processes in the conduct or regulation 

 of which I had no share have made me 

 what I am. Here, surely, if anywhere, I 

 we are as clay in the hands of the potter, j 

 It is the greatest of delusions to suppose 

 that we come into this world as sheets of 

 white paper, on which the age can write ) 

 anything it likes, making us good or bad, | 

 noble or mean, as the age pleases. The 

 age can stunt, promote, or pervert pre- 

 existent capacities, but it cannot create 

 them. The worthy Robert Owen, who 

 saw in external circumstances the great 

 moulders of human character, was 

 obliged to supplement his doctrine by 

 making the man himself one of the 

 circumstances. It is as fatal as it is 

 cowardly to blink facts because they are 

 not to our taste. How many disorders, 

 ghostly and bodily, are transmitted to us 

 by inheritance ? In our courts of law, 

 whenever it is a question whether a crime 

 has been committed under the influence 

 of insanity, the best guidance the judge 

 and jury can have is derived from the 

 parental antecedents of the accused. If 

 among these insanity be exhibited in any 

 marked degree, the presumption in the 

 prisoner's favour is enormously enhanced, 



because the experience of life has taught 

 both judge and jury that insanity is fre- 

 quently transmitted from parent to child. 



I met, some years ago, in a railway 

 carriage the governor of one of our largest 

 prisons. He was evidently an observant 

 and reflective man, possessed of wide 

 experience gathered in various parts of 

 the world., and a thorough student of the 

 duties of his vocation. He told me that 

 the prisoners in his charge might be 

 divided into three distinct classes. The 

 first class consisted of persons who ought 

 never to have been in prison. External 

 accident, and not internal taint, had 

 brought them within the grasp of the 

 law, and what had happened to them 

 might happen to most of us. They 

 were essentially men of sound moral 

 stamina, though wearing the prison garb. 

 Then came the largest class, formed of 

 individuals possessing no strong bias, 

 moral or immoral, plastic to the touch of 

 circumstances, which could mould them 

 into either good or evil members of 

 society. Thirdly came a class happily 

 not a large one whom no kindness 

 could conciliate and no discipline tame. 

 They were sent into this world labelled 

 "incorrigible,"wickedness being stamped, 

 as it were, upon their organisations. It 

 was an unpleasant truth, but, as a truth, 

 it ought to be faced. For such criminals 

 the prison over which he ruled was 

 certainly not the proper place. If con- 

 fined at all, their prison should be on a 

 desert island, where the deadly contagium 

 of their example could not taint the 

 moral air. But the sea itself he was 

 disposed to regard as a cheap and appro- 

 priate substitute for the island. It 

 seemed to him evident that the State 

 would benefit if prisoners of the first 

 class were liberated ; prisoners of the 

 second class educated ; and prisoners of 

 the third class put compendiously under 

 water. 



It is not, however, from the observa- 

 tion of individuals that the argument 

 against " free-will," as commonly under- 

 stood, derives its principal force. It is, as 

 already hinted, indefinitely strengthened 



