453 
be said that desire had anything to do either with the making 
or the execution of the law under which he suffers ; for, although 
laws are made for the benefit of the community, and therefore 
come under the category which we are considering (of beneficial 
actions), yet legislators are not usually supposed to make them 
out of fright, which is an instinct, but out of a rational con- 
sideration for the public welfare. Now if we are to place all 
human actions in the same automatic or necessary category on 
the ground of their common tendency to the advantage of the 
agent, we must expect the perception of his greatest advantage 
to awaken the strongest desire. But we really find, on the 
contrary, that the strongest desires are generally those which 
are awakened without any knowledge in the agent of the benefit 
accruing from their fulfilment ; whereas a clear perception of 
his own advantage produces in the agent a weaker inclination, 
and frequently no desire at all ; in fact it often happens that a 
man will voluntarily call in the assistance of an animal desire 
to enable him to effect a purpose which his reason has shown 
to be beneficial. 
18. From these considerations it is apparent that even if we 
allow a common (selfish) tendency in all the actions of man 
and brute, yet that actions are produced by two essentially 
different principles, which stand out in clear contrast with each 
other — the automatic principle operating independently of 
knowledge (in the agent), and the rational principle, producing 
actions from the knowledge of the agent by means of the 
rational will. 
19. The rational principle is commonly considered to be a dis- 
tinctive feature of the human psychology; and the variety of 
opinion which exists on this subject seems to have resulted from 
the selection of a particular phase as typical of the general 
principle. One writer considers the distinction to consist in 
a rational will, another in the intellectual faculties, another in 
the moral sense, another in self-consciousness, &c. &c. This 
variety of opinion amongst those who nevertheless maintain 
in common the distinctive existence of a rational principle, 
does not prove in any way the weakness of their general view, 
but rather that the attention of each writer has been too much 
taken up by a particular mode. If we place the distinction in 
the will alone, we do not escape the sophistry of the Fatalist; 
for he will argue, as we have just seen, that the will is always 
determined by motives, and that all motives are motives of self- 
interest or self-gratification. The moral sense he will regard 
as an instinct, peculiar possibly to man, and varying consider- 
ably in different individuals and races, but still an instinct. 
