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But I had no choice in my beginning, nor in my construction, 
nor in my birth, nor in my endowments. All were without 
even my concurrence. I did not make or place the object which 
first evoked my consciousness, nor am I the author of those 
objects which by continual operation increase my knowledge 
and augment my power. 
For my bemg I am immediately indebted to my parents, but 
not to their direct and immediate volition. For, when we com- 
pare human and brute procreation, we find a lack of uniformity 
in the former, which shows that a superior authority to our 
immediate parentage must be the source of life. All others 
have come into being in the same manner as ourselves; hence 
our relations to others and theirs to us are independent of our 
own will, we have all been without the possibility of choice, 
and, therefore, are plainly under the direction and at the 
disposal of some super-human authority, possessed of power 
to fulfil his own purposes. 
Here is achain of accountability. First, to the author of our 
nature and the giver of our life. When a man constructs a 
machine, he has a right to its use and to dispose of it as he 
pleases. Healso is presumed to have had some definite purpose 
in its construction, and the right, therefore, to employ it for this 
purpose, and to forbid its use in any way which will spoil or 
deteriorate it. And this right is considered sacred and inde- 
feasible, in proportion to the excellence and value of the instru- 
ment constructed. How, then, can bounds be set to the right 
of the Author of a nature like ours, with all its wealth of intellect, 
emotion, and will, which He has placed in conditions calculated 
to call forth every power to its full strength, to use, or to require 
its use, according to His own purpose ? 
But here we see the special distinction of humanity. We 
have a body, a wonderful and exquisite machine,—by which we 
receive instruction and various other benefits from the material 
universe, and by which we can act upon it, for good or evil,— 
but we ourselves are more than, and different from, a machine, 
however perfect. We are not instruments, as our body is, but 
agents. ‘That is, we can see the nature of any and every act, 
the consequences which follow from it to ourselves and others, 
and the reasons why we should do it orleave itundone. And 
we are further able to determine, of and from ourselves, whether 
we will act in harmony with our nature and relations or not. 
Weare, therefore, as much bound to answer to our great Author 
for the proper use of the personal and relative endowments 
committed to our trust as the driver of a locomotive is for the 
use of the engine put into his hands. 
But our responsibility to the Author of our nature is not 
