Page:Carroll - Sylvie and Bruno.djvu/418

390 "Thank God!" Arthur said to himself, but in so low a whisper that only I heard it. "You grant then that I can, by an act of free choice, move this cup," suiting the action to the word, "this way or that way?"

"Yes, I grant it."

"Well, let us see how far the result is produced by fixed laws. The cup moves because certain mechanical forces are impressed on it by my hand. My hand moves because certain forces——electric, magnetic, or whatever 'nerve-force' may prove to be——are impressed on it by my brain. This nerve-force, stored in the brain, would probably be traceable, if Science were complete, to chemical forces supplied to the brain by the blood, and ultimately derived from the food I eat and the air I breathe."

"But would not that be Fatalism? Where would Free-Will come in?"

"In choice of nerves," replied Arthur. "The nerve-force in the brain may flow just as naturally down one nerve as down another. We need something more than a fixed Law of Nature to settle which nerve shall carry it. That 'something' is Free-Will."