50 LORD GRIMTHORPE 
COMMUNICATIONS. 
The following communications have been received in regard to 
the foregoing paper :— 
The Rev. R. Cotttys, M.A., writes— 
“T have read the proof of Lord Grimthorpe’s paper with some interest. 
No doubt a man’s conviction of his responsibility to God depends upon his 
apprehension of God ; and the responsibility remains so long as there is 
the opportunity of that apprehension. Lord Grimthorpe’s contention is 
sound, that a conviction of the truths of Revelation must come before a 
conviction of future responsibility. 
“ But perhaps in many minds there is a question that is needed to be 
met, as tothe causes that lead up to our actions: are any of them the 
result of causes over which we have no real control ? If it beso, there can 
scarcely be responsibility. Many questions are involved here. Responsi- 
bility means that a man must be able to know his actions as his own, the 
result of his own will ; he must also be in possession of a knowledge and 
sound judgment, as to whether the actions are right or wrong. And even 
when there is not sound knowledge there may be responsibility in not 
taking advantage of opportunities of obtaining knowledge. Now the 
general sanity of mankind should be enough, perhaps, to prove their 
responsibility. But the difficulty will be in a certain class of minds in 
regard to the actual nature of the will ; with those, for instance, who regard 
will as a mere ‘conflict between two sets of ideal motor changes which 
generally tend to become real, and one of which eventually does become 
real’; in other words, as something quite different from a voluntary and 
original determination of a being who is an originating free agent. The 
real nature of the recipient of a revelation from God, as well as the fact of 
the revelation itself, seems to me to be a necessary part of the ground- 
work of a discussion on this subject, if the object be to meet the actual 
difficulties that exist in some minds as to the nature of human 
responsibility. 
