There is a conservatism in tyranny which mocks at the lapse of time. Four years have passed since the period to which this history is brought down, and still, as we have already noticed in reference to Rome, no change to alter the general applicability of its details has to be recorded. At the Congress of Paris in 1856, Count Cavour, the representative of Sardinia, nobly raised his voice in behalf of the suffering populations of the Pontifical States. A few months later, the remonstrances of England and France to the king of Naples significantly attested the grievances of his subjects; and the Sicilians, ever ready to construe the formal remonstrances of diplomacy into an earnest of active interference, rushed into a new attempt at insurrection, which has served to aggravate their former wretchedness. Over Lombardy, the dawn seems breaking. The military rule has been laid aside, and from the approaching marriage of the young governor-general, the Archduke Maximilian, with the daughter of King Leopold of Belgium, the Nestor of constitutional sovereigns, many hopes are entertained. The hour truly is come for some relaxation of severity.

But if those hopes are disappointed, if Austria still persists in closing her ears to the voice of reason and humanity, nor imposes on the Italian Courts, where her influence is paramount, a speedy alteration in their policy, the result is thus shadowed forth in the words with which the historian concludes his task.

"Upon populations are mirrored the crimes of their rulers Accustom them to see faith broken, oaths cast to the winds, injustice, and vindictiveness, and the same vices will be reflected back in greater intensity. If, therefore, in a future outbreak, we should have to deplore the triumph of licence rather than of liberty, the blame will rest with those governments which sowed the seeds of this public corruption; and, fostering rancour and division, inevitably obtain that any revolutionary movement must of necessity generate excess-the certain road to despotism.'

ART. II.-Free Agency.

IN all discussions concerning sin and grace, the question concerning the nature and necessary conditions of free agency is of necessity involved. This is one of the points in which theology and psychology come into immediate contact. There is a theory of free agency with which the doctrines of original sin and of efficacious grace are utterly irreconcilable, and there is another

theory with which those doctrines are perfectly consistent. In all ages of the Church, therefore, those who have adopted the former of these theories, reject those doctrines; and, on the other hand, those who are constrained to believe those doctrines, are no less constrained to adopt the other and congenial theory of free agency. Pelagians, Semi-Pelagians, and Remonstrants are not more notoriously at variance with Augustinians, Lutherans, and Calvinists, on the doctrines of sin and grace, than they are on the metaphysical and moral question of human liberty. In every system of theology, therefore, there is a chapter De libero arbitrio. This is a question which every theologian finds in his path, and which he must dispose of; and on the manner in which it is determined depends his theology, and of course his religion, so far as his theology is to him a truth and reality.

It may seem preposterous to attempt, in the compass of a few pages, the discussion of a question on which so many volumes have been written. There is, however, this important difference between all subjects which relate to the soul, or the world within, and those which relate to the external world: with regard to the former, all the materials of knowledge being facts of consciousness, are already in our possession; whereas, in regard to the latter, the facts have first to be collected. In questions, therefore which relate to the mind, a mere statement of the case is often all that is required, and all that can be done. If that statement be correct, the facts of consciousness spontaneously arrange themselves in order around it; if it be incorrect, they obstinately refuse to be thus marshalled. If this be so, why is it that men differ so much about these questions? To this it may be answered, 1. That they do not differ so much as they appear to do. When the mind is left undisturbed, and allowed to act according to its own laws, men, in the great majority of cases, think alike on all the great questions about which philosophers are divided. It is only when they stir up the placid lake, and attempt to sound its depths, to analyse its waters, to determine the laws of its currents, and ascertain its contents, that they see and think so differently. However men may differ in their speculative opinions as to the ultimate nature of matter, thay all practically feel and act in the same way in everything which concerns its application and use. And however they may differ as to the question of liberty or necessity, they agree in regarding themselves and others as responsible agents. 2. On no subject is the ambiguity of language a more serious impediment, in the way of conscious agreement, than in reference to this whole department, and specially in regard to the question of free agency. The same statement often appears true to one mind and false to another, because it is understood differently. This ambiguity arises partly from the inherent im

perfection of human language. Words have, and must have, more than one sense; and although we may define our terms, and state in which of its several senses we use a given word, yet the exigencies of language, or inattention, almost unavoidably lead to its being employed in some other of its legitimate meanings Besides, the states of mind which these terms are employed to designate, are themselves so complex that no words can accurately represent them. We have terms to express the operations of the intellect, others to designate the feelings, and others again for acts of the will; but thousands of our acts include the exercise of the intellect, the sensibility, and the will, and it is absolutely impossible to find words for all these complex and varying states of mind. It is not wonderful, therefore, that men should misunderstand each other, and fail in their most strenuous efforts to express what they mean, so that others shall attach precisely the same sense to the words which they use. 3. There is another reason for the diversity of opinion which has ever prevailed on all subjects connected with free agency. Although the facts which should determine the questions discussed are facts of consciousness common to all men, yet they are so numerous, and of such different kinds, that it is hard to allow each its due place and importance. From habit, or mental training, or from the moral state of mind, some men allow too much weight to one class of these facts, and too little to another. Some are governed by their understanding, others by their moral feelings. In some the moral sensibilities are much more lively and informing than in others. Some adopt certain principles as axioms to which they force all their judgments to conform. It is vain to hope, therefore, that we shall ever find all men of one mind, on even the plainest and most important questions relating to the constitution and laws of their own nature. There is but one sure guide, and but one path to either truth or unity, the Spirit and word of God; and happy are those who submit to be led by that guide, and to walk in that path.

All the different theories of the will may be included under the three classes of Necessity, Contingency, and Certainty.

To the first of these classes belongs: 1. The doctrine of Fatalism, which teaches that all events are determined by a blind necessity. This necessity does not arise from the will of an intelligent Being governing all his creatures, and all their acts according to their nature and for purposes of wisdom and goodness; but from a law of sequence to which God (or rather the gods) as well as men is subject. It precludes the idea of foresight or plan, or of the voluntary selection of an end, and adoption of means for its accomplishment. Things are as they are, and must be as they are, and are to be, without any rational cause. This theory ignores any distinction between physical

laws and free agency. The acts of men and the operations of nature are determined by a necessity of the same kind. Events are like a mighty stream borne onward by a resistless force-a force outside of themselves, which cannot be controlled or modified. All we have to do is to acquiesce in being thus carried on. Whether we acquiesce or not makes no difference. A man falling from a precipice cannot by an act of will counteract the force of gravity; neither can he in any way control or modify the action of fate. His outward circumstances and inward acts are all equally determined by an inexorable law or influence residing out of himself. This at least is one form of fatalism. This view of the doctrine of necessity may rest on the assumption that the universe has the ground of its existence in itself, and is governed in all its operations by fixed laws, which determine the sequence of all events in the mineral, vegetable, and animal kingdom, by a like necessity. Or it may admit that the world owed its existence to an intelligent first cause, but assume that its author never designed to create free agents, but determined to set in operation certain causes which should work out given results. However fatalists may differ as to the cause of the necessity which governs all events, they agree as to its nature. It may arise from the influence of the stars, as the ancient Chaldeans held; or from the operation of second causes; or from the original constitution of things; or from the decree of God. It avowedly precludes all liberty of action, and reduces the acts of men to the same category with those of irrational animals. Properly speaking, however, fatalism refers this necessity to fate—an unintelligent cause.

2. A second form of the doctrine of necessity, is the mechanical theory. This denies that man is the efficient cause of his own acts. It represents him as passive, or as endued with no higher form of activity than spontaneity. It avowedly precludes the idea of responsibility. It assumes that the inward state of man, and consequently his acts, are determined by his outward circumstances. This doctrine as connected with the materialism of Hobbes, Hartley, Priestley, Belsham, and especially as fully developed by the French Encyclopædists, supposes that from the constitution of our nature, some things give us pain, others pleasure, some excite desire and others aversion, and this susceptibility of being acted upon is all the activity which belongs to man, who is as purely a piece of living mechanism as the irrational animals. A certain external object produces a corresponding impression on the nerves, that is transmitted to the brain, and an answering impulse is sent back to the muscles; or the effect is spent on the brain itself in the form of thought or feeling thereby excited or evolved. The general features of this theory are the same as far as its advocates ignore any distinction between physical and moral necessity, and

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reject the doctrine of free agency and responsibility, however much they may differ on other points.

3. A third form of necessity includes all those theories which supersede the efficiency of second causes, by referring all events to the immediate agency of the first cause. This of course is done by Pantheism in all its forms, whether it merely makes God the soul of the world, and refers all the operations of nature and all the actions of men to his immediate agency; or whether it regards the world itself as God; or whether it makes God the only substance of which nature and mind are the phenomena. According to all these views, God is the only agent; all activity is but different modes in which the activity of God manifests itself.

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The theory of occasional causes leads to the same result. cording to this doctrine, all efficiency is in God. Second causes are only the occasions on which that efficiency is exerted. Although this system allows a real existence to matter and mind, and admits that they are endowed with certain qualities and attributes, yet these are nothing more than susceptibilities, or receptivities for the manifestation of the divine efficiency. They furnish the occasions for the exercise of the all-pervading power of God. Matter and mind are alike passive: all the changes in the one, and all the appearance of activity in the other, are due to God's immediate operation.

Under the same head belongs the doctrine that the agency of God in the preservation of the world is a continuous creation. This mode of representation is indeed often adopted as a figure of speech by orthodox theologians; but if taken literally it implies the absolute inefficiency of all second causes. If God creates the outward world at every successive moment, he must be the immediate author of all its changes. There is no connection between what precedes and what follows, between antecedent and consequent, cause and effect, but succession in time; and when applied to the inward world, or the soul, the same consequence of necessity follows. The soul, at any given moment, exists only in a certain state; if in that state it is created, then the creative energy is the immediate cause of all its feelings, cognitions, and acts. The soul is not an agent; it is only something which God creates in a given form. All continuity of being, all identity, all efficiency are lost; and the universe of matter and mind becomes nothing more than the continued pulsation of the life of God.

Nearly allied with the doctrine of a continued creation is the "exercise scheme." According to this theory the soul is a series of exercises created by God. There is no such thing as the soul, no self, but only certain perceptions which succeed each other with amazing rapidity. Hume denies any real cause. All we