food, and clinging to other beings, is not to be
confounded with a pure material sequence, as the fall of rain, or the
explosion of gunpowder. The phenomena, in both kinds, are phenomena of
sequence, and of _regular_ or _uniform_ sequence; but the things that
make up the sequence are widely different: in the one, a feeling of the
mind, or a concurrence of feelings, is followed by a conscious muscular
exertion; in the other, both steps are made up of purely material
circumstances. It is the difference between a mental or psychological,
and a material or physical sequence--in short, the difference between
mind and matter; the greatest contrast within the whole compass of
nature, within the universe of being. Now language must be found to give
ample explicitness to this diametrical antithesis; still, I am satisfied
that rarely in the usages of human speech has a more unfortunate choice
been made than to employ, in the present instance, the antithetic
couple--Freedom and Necessity. It misses the real point, and introduces
meanings alien to the case. It converts the glory of the human character
into a reproach (although its leading motive throughout has been to pay
us a compliment). The _constancy_ of man's emotional nature (but for
which our life would be a chaos, an impossibility) has to be explained
away, for no other reason than that, at one time, a blundering epithet
was applied to designate the mental sequences. Great is the difference
between Mind and Matter; but the terms Freedom and Necessity represent
the point of agreement as the point of difference; and this being made
familiar, through iteration, as the mode of expressing the contrast, the
rectification is supposed to unsettle everything, and to obliterate the
wide distinction of the two natures.

* * * * *

[SEIZING A QUESTION BY THE WRONG END.]

V. What is called Moral Ability and Inability is another artificial
perplexity in regard to the will, and might also be the text for a
sermon on prevailing errors. More especially, it exemplifies what may be
termed _seizing a question by the wrong end_.

The votary, we shall say, of alcoholic liquor is found fault with, and
makes the excuse, he cannot help it--he cannot resist the temptation. So
far, the language may pass. But what shall we say to the not uncommon
reply,--You could help it if you would. Surely there is some
mystification here; it is not one of those plain statements t