51 
object to in many of bis positions, it is satisfactory here to be 
able heartily to concur with him. The truth is, however much 
we may bewilder our minds by obscure speculations, we cannot 
help believing in the idea of causation as distinct from a mere 
succession of antecedents and consequents. The mistake has 
originated in representing our idea of causation as a self- 
evident truth, which it is not. It is an intuition of our con- 
sciousness. 
10. I feel that I am a cause. I am conscious that action origi- 
nates in myself ; nor does my inability to express this belief 
in the terms of a strict definition enable me to get rid of this 
perception. I am conscious of myself as the cause of my own 
actions, in a very different sense from my being a mere 
antecedent, and the actions the consequent. The conception 
includes the consciousness of volition. Dr. Newman errs in 
referring the idea of causation only to experience. “The 
notion of causation,” says he, “is one of the first lessons 
which a child learns from experience, that experience limiting 
the conception to agents possessing intelligence and will. 
It is the notion of power combined with a purpose and an 
end. Physical phenomena as such are without sense, and 
experience teaches us nothing about physical phenomena as 
causes.” 
1 1 . When we speak of causes in the material world, we transfer 
an idea of causation derived from consciousness to the phenomena 
of succession and law. I am ready to admit that this has been 
attended with very serious errors. Still, however, I cannot 
think that the modern theory of antecedents and conse- 
quents has unravelled the entire mystery, even in matters 
of material causation. We have definite meanings when we 
say that want of food is the cause of hunger, or the explosion 
in the gun is the cause of the impulse of the ball. In such 
things the mind instinctively recognises something more than 
a bare succession of antecedents and consequents : it yields 
assent to the truth that all action must be ultimately referred 
to the impulse of will. 
12.. Dr. Newman has some very valuable remarks on the 
doctrine, that the order of nature cannot be otherwise than 
it is, and in that sense is necessary, and that this necessity 
is proved by experience. On the contrary, if proved at all, 
it is not proved by experience, but by reasoning, and by a 
reasoning which corrects the inaccuracies of our experience. 
As he remarks, “few concrete facts precisely repeat them- 
selves.” We can only infer their invariableness except on 
the principle of the existence of an unchanging will. 
13. In considering Dr. Newman's position, we must carefully 
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