9 
DETERMINISM AND FREE-WILL. 301 
In fact, in every department of life we assume without 
argument that men’s actions are determined by their character. 
The man who is good at knowing character is a perfect prophet 
in predicting action. The wise and shrewd man gets help or 
money or sympathy with his aims, largely by playing on the 
strings of human character, which he is clever enough to 
understand. 
If I am not wearying you, I will add one more argument for 
determinism from the law pervading history. Every historian 
traces law in the development of nations; so manifest, that 
from the history of one nation you can predict that of another, 
¢g., the Romans rose to greatness when surrounded by diffi- 
culties; but when they attained luxury and power they began 
to lose their energy, and to sink down to the position of a 
decadent race. The reason is obvious: poverty and difficulty 
are a stimulus to energy. When attainment comes, the 
stimulus disappears. This law is universal, and from it we 
can predict the fate of existing nations. But the law shows 
that nations, like men, are determined in their actions by the 
conditions amid which they are placed. And the historian 
writes on this assumption. 
Having endeavoured to show that men act on the assump- 
tion that the will is determined, I will now try to grapple with 
the question as to what the verdict of our intellect is when we 
come to examine into our own nature. We may, I think, 
divide all our actions into two divisions—first, unconscious 
actions, secondly, conscious. But the conscious consist of two 
kinds, impulsive and deliberate. As regards unconscious 
actions, they seem to take place without any movement of the 
will. One does not resolve to breathe or to blink with one’s 
eyelids. But there are conscious acts which constantly pass 
into the region of the unconscious. When a child begins to 
play the piano, it consciously places each finger on a certain 
note; but later on the action becomes instinctive; that is 
unconscious. So that we may class both these kinds of action 
as determined. 
With regard to impulsive actions, these seem directly caused 
by passion or feeling. The man who commits murder under 
strong excitement which clouds his judgment and moral sense 
is not usually considered so responsible as the one who plans 
beforehand to commit the crime. There are instances of 
temptation which seems too strong to resist. I have known 
a prisoner say that if a certain temptation were before him, 
and the gallows staring him in the face, he would be compelled 
