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and statistics combined. So far as the metaphysical portion of the question 
is concerned, he argues that like causes will always produce like effects, and 
that one man, under a similar condition of circumstances with another, will 
invariably do exactly similar things, — ergo , there can be no freedom of the 
will. Circumstances rule us, and we are bound to pursue a particular course 
of action, whether we will it or not, according to the state of the antecedent 
circumstances. But I utterly deny the abstract and moral possibility of 
there ever being any state of circumstances between any two men identically 
alike. Take even the case of two men of the same age and surrounded by 
corresponding external circumstances. Just as in the case of a chessboard, 
with its sixty-four squares, you have a wonderful number of combinations 
in playing the game, and the combinations would be marvellously increased 
if you had 664 squares instead of 64 ; so you have your combinations in- 
conceivably multiplied ad infinitum between the two men in the grand 
game of life, and there never can be any state of circumstances which can 
perfectly assimilate them. Only look at men’s faces. There are three 
millions in London, and yet no. two of them are alike. I put the freedom of 
the will in this way : I take the measure of the variation which exists in 
reference to these faces to be a measure of the free will which each of 
those men holds and exercises for himself. With regard to statistics, Mr. 
Buckle brings forward a number of statements with reference to murders, 
suicides, miscarried letters, and so on, and he argues that because there are 
general uniform averages among them, there can be no freedom of the will. 
Mr. Buckle is called a deep thinker, and in many respects he is ; but no man 
can be a really profound thinker who generalizes hastily, and I certainly 
hesitate to call Buckle the profound thinker that some people dub him. So 
far as his statistics are concerned, I have no doubt we could carry them out, 
not merely usque ad nauseam , but usque ad absurdum . — I utterly deny that 
marriages, for instance, are mere results of the price of corn and the 
amount of wages paid in the country ; and that the will of the individual has 
nothing to do with it. That is a complete non sequitur. When I married, 
I am sure it was not because the country was more prosperous : it was because 
I became the incumbent of a church, and was able to marry. (Laughter .) But 
Mr. Row has scarcely done Buckle justice in one passage. He quotes from 
Buckle : — “ These assumptions are : that there is an independent faculty 
called consciousness, and that the dictates of that faculty are infallible ; ” 
and Mr. Row observes, “ I find a difficulty in conceiving how a man of 
Mr. Buckle’s reasoning powers could have written this passage. I apprehend 
that in any strict meaning of language it is incorrect to designate conscious- 
ness a faculty.” But that is the very thing that Buckle himself says. He 
says, “ It is by no means certain that consciousness is a faculty and 
further, that “ some of the ablest thinkers have been of opinion that it is a 
natural state or condition of the mind.” Mr. Row goes on to say : — 
“ It involves an unspeakable confusion of thought to speak of all con- 
sciousness as infallibly true. If such an assumption has been made, I agree 
with Mr. Buckle that it is utterly contradicted by facts. But to say that 
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