this
question, and I have merely made the above quotations for the purpose of
showing that Sir W. Hamilton appears to identify the _theory_ of Free-will
with the _fact_ that we possess a moral sense. He argues throughout as
though the theory he advocates were the only one that can explain a given
"fact of real actuality." But no one with whom we have to deal questions
the fact of our having a moral sense; and to identify this "deliverance of
consciousness" with belief in the theory that volitions are uncaused, is,
or would now be, merely to abandon the only questions in dispute.

It is very instructive, from this point of view, to observe the dilemma
into which Hamilton found himself driven by this identification of genuine
fact with spurious theory. He believed that the fact of man possessing an
ethical faculty could only be explained by the theory that man's will was
not determined by motives; for otherwise man could not be the author of his
own actions. But when he considered the matter in its other aspect, he
found that his theory of Free-will was as little compatible with moral
responsibility as was the opposing theory of "Bond-will;" for not only did
he candidly confess that he could not conceive of will as acting without
motives, but he further allowed the unquestionable truth "that, though
inconceivable, a motiveless volition would, if conceived, be conceived as
morally worthless."[13] I say this is very instructive, because it shows
that in Hamilton's view each theory was alike irreconcilable with "the
deliverance of consciousness," and that he only chose the one in preference
to the other, because, although not any more conceivable a solution, it
seemed to him a more possible one.[14]

Sec. 21. Such, then, is the speculative basis on which, according to Sir W.
Hamilton, our belief in a Deity can alone be grounded.

Those who at the present day are still confused enough in their notions
regarding the Free-will question to suppose that any further rational
question remains, may here be left to ruminate over this _bolus_, and to
draw from it such nourishment as they can in support of their belief in a
God; but to those who can see as plainly as daylight that the doctrine of
Determinism not only harmonises with all the facts of observation, but
alone affords a possible condition for, and a satisfactory explanation of,
the existence of our ethical faculty,--to such persons the question will
naturally arise:--"Alth