Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 58.djvu/197

Rh they are 'free/ they must not be conditioned by antecedent circumstances of any sort, by the misery of the beggar, by the pity in the heart of the passer-by. They must be causeless, not determined. They must drop from a clear sky out of the void, for just in so far as they can be accounted for they are not 'free.'

Is it then I that am 'free'? Am I the cause of the good or evil deeds which—shall I say?—result from my 'freedom'? I do not cause them, for they are uncaused. And, since they are uncaused, and have no necessary congruity with my character or impulses, what guarantee have I that the course of my life will not exhibit the melancholy spectacle of the reign of mere caprice? For forty years I have lived quietly and in obedience to law. I am regarded as a decent citizen, and one who can be counted upon not to rob his neighbor, or wave the red flag of the anarchist. I have grown gradually to be a character of such and such a kind; I am fairly familiar with my impulses and aspirations; I hope to carry out plans extending over a good many years in the future. Is it this I with whom I have lived in the past, and whom I think I know, that will elect for me whether I shall carry out plans or break them, be consistent or inconsistent, love or hate, be virtuous or betake myself to crime? Alas! I am 'free,' and this I with whom I am familiar cannot condition the future. But I will make the most serious of resolves, bind myself with the holiest of promises! To what end? How can any resolve be a cause of causeless actions, or any promise clip the erratic wing of 'free-will'? In so far as I am 'free' the future is a wall of darkness. One cannot even say with the Moslem: 'What shall be, will be;' for there is no shall about it. It is wholly impossible for me to guess what I will 'freely' do, and it is impossible for me to make any provision against the consequences of 'free' acts of the most deplorable sort. A knowledge of my own character in the past brings with it neither hope nor consolation. My 'freedom' is just as 'free' as that of the man who was hanged last week. It is not conditioned by my character. If he could 'freely' commit murder, so can I. But I never dreamt of killing a man, and would not do it for the world! No; that is true; the I that I know rebels against the thought. Yet to admit that this I can prevent it is to become a determinist. If I am 'free' I cannot seek this city of refuge. Is 'freedom' a thing that can be inherited as a bodily or mental constitution? Can it be repressed by a course of education, or laid in chains by life-long habit? In so far as any action is 'free,' what I have been, what I am, what I have always done or striven to do, what I most earnestly wish or resolve to do at the present moment—these things can have no more to do with its future realization than if they had no existence. If, then, I really am 'free,' I must face the possibility that I may at any moment do anything that any man can 'freely' do. The possibility is a hideous one; and surely even the most