often intend nothing beforehand, and suddenly, being tempted, we find that we are in the fault before we know what we are doing. And here volition does not take place. Do you say, “But it was possible”? What do you mean? Are you not deluding yourself with phrases? We say, of course it was possible; of course all might have been otherwise, if it had not been what it was. But then it was so, and not otherwise. What you say about possibility here might be said everywhere else and about everything else.’
We must explain. We admit that in a given case it may fairly be said to be psychically impossible that a man, being tempted, should exercise volition one way or the other. But we add that he need not, therefore, be any the less accountable.
The point is this. The impossibility being admitted, why is it there? From what comes it? Is it because solicitation to bad is so strong, or because desire of good is so weak? And if it be answered, ‘That makes no difference, for it all is relative’; we say that, in this sense, it is not ‘all relative’ at all. The question is, can the man say, ‘It is not my doing that my will for good is not stronger. It is not my doing that solicitation to bad is not weaker’? Can he say, ‘What energy was in me has, so far as my power went, been made one with good and withdrawn from bad. My standing will, for which volition was not possible, was in this respect not of my own making’? If a man can truly say this, then he may also say, ‘I did not have a volition because I could not; and therefore I am not responsible for the act, because not responsible for the will’?
No man can be tempted except by his own will; and the point is, Is it his fault that his will is not otherwise? If that is not his fault, then we admit that he was overborne—that volition was really impossible; and we think that to him, as a moral agent, the deed is not imputable.
But now in our turn we ask, How many bad acts will this account of the matter excuse? Not many, we think.
To repeat, wherever a man can truly say, ‘It was not that through my act or neglect my will is generally weak, nor that what will I have is too little made one with the good and turned away from the bad, but my finite strength was overborne;’ there we say there is no moral imputation, because it did not lie with the man’s will, nor was it in his power, that volition should have taken place.
But where we collect ourselves and volition does take place, I think we must say that, given knowledge, there is always imputation. The degree of guilt is of course another matter, which we do not enter on.
