676 PSYCHOLOGY. 



those presented by tlie impulsions of an explosive, will 

 Really both effort and resistance are ours, and the identifi- 

 cation of our -se?/" with one of these factors is an illusion 

 and a trick of speech. I do not see how anyone can fail 

 (especially when the mythologic dynamism of sej)arate 

 ' ideas,' which Professor Lipps cleaves to, is translated into 

 that of brain-processes) to recognize the fascinating sim- 

 plicity of some such view as his. Nor do I see why 

 for scientijic purposes one need give it up even if indeter- 

 minate amounts of effort really do occur. Before their inde- 

 terminism, science simply stops. She can abstract from it 

 altogether, then ; for in the impulses and inhibitions wath 

 which the effort has to coj)e there is already a larger field 

 of uniformity than she can ever practically cultivate. Her 

 prevision will never foretell, even if the effort be completely 

 predestinate, the actual way in which each individual emer- 

 gency is resolved. Psychology will be Psychology,* and 

 Science Science, as much as ever (as much and no more) 

 in this world, whether free-will be true in it or not. Science, 

 however, must be constantly reminded that her purposes 

 are not the only purposes, and that the order of uniform 

 causation which she has use for, and is therefore right in 

 postulating, may be enveloped in a wider order, on which 

 she has no claims at all. 



We can therefore leave the free-wdll question altogether 

 out of our account. As we said in Chapter VI (p. 453)^ 

 the operation of free effort, if it existed, could only be to 

 hold some one ideal object, or part of an object, a little 

 longer or a little more intensely before the mind. Amongst 

 the alternatives which present themselves as genuine possi- 



* Such ejaculations as Mr. Spencer's : " Psychical changes either 

 conform to law or they do not. If they do not, this work, in common with 

 all works on the subject, is sheer nonsense: no science of Psychology is 

 possible " (Principles of Psychology, i. 503),— are beneath criticism. Mr. 

 Spencer's work, like all the other ' works on the subject,' treats of those 

 general conditions oi possible conduct within which aii our real decisions 

 must fall no matter whether their effort be small or great. However 

 closely psychical changes may conform to law, it is safe to say that indi- 

 vidual histories and biographies will never be written in advance no matter 

 how ' evolved ' psychology may become. 



