CHAPTER III.

FATALISM.

§ 229. THIS topic, in its general bearings, is a natural sequence of that just considered, as well as of those to be presently noticed. If we are controlled by a system of positive law, general as well as specific, such as holds the follower of Comte; if we are but constituent members in one great aggregate total of cosmical life, without the capacity of motion except in obedience to the common impulse, as holds the pantheist; if we are the mere evolutions or scintillations of an organic growth, as hold the advocates of physiological development, then we are the subjects of an arbitrary code, natural or supernatural, which excludes the agency of either special providence or individual will. It is proposed, however, in the present chapter, to consider fatalism as a distinct scheme of unbelief, separate from the several theories in which it is involved. In this view, let us notice,

a. THE a priori PROBABILITY THAT THE SYSTEM WHICH

AN ALL-WISE AND ALL-POWERFUL GOVERNOR WOULD ADOPT FOR THE MORAL EDUCATION OF CREATURES UNDER PROBATION WOULD BE A MIXED ONE OF GENERAL LAWS AND OF SPECIAL

ADAPTATIONS.

§ 230. Let us take in view the given factors of a wise

and Divine Ruler on the one hand, and of man, in his present state, as a subject of probation, on the other. Let us imagine ourselves about to lay down a system of government for a colony of creatures, constructed like ourselves, on some distant planet. We see on the one hand, that it is important to cultivate in them habits of fixed industry, of patience, of energy, of social and domestic affection, of individual integrity. We see on the other hand, that it is equally important to generate in them submission under unexpected casualties,-hopefulness which a foreknowledge on their part of disappointments to come would destroy,close dependence on and affection for the government that provides for them, so that the graces of humanity and of faith, might grow. How would we provide for this? The answer is, by a system of general laws; e.g. those of the seasons, which wheel round in their unvarying cycles, broken by special adaptations, such as those which particular rains, freshets, and tides, bring to bear on the husbandman's art.

Suppose that we had a system of general laws only, and those foreannounced. Not only the seasons, let us suppose, move on in their recognized order, but every rain by which a crop is to be washed away, every freshet by which a village is to be inundated, every season of peculiar benignity and fruitfulness, every blight which would render labor useless, is known beforehand. Where would we find that hardy industry which, in providing against the contingencies of disaster, and facing its reality, does so much to the development of the courage, the endurance, the self-reliance, the energy of our race? In those climates where we find the uniformity of the seasons most marked, either by a cold and

rigid torpor, or by a regular and prodigal fructification, we shall observe the greatest lethargy and the most entire subordination of the spiritual and intellectual to the animal. But if in addition to this, misfortunes should move toward us equally heralded in advance, would not the paralysis be almost complete? Greatly indeed would present happiness be abridged, and present energy cramped, and present sorrow intensified, if the future were known. Who, in looking back at any of the great calamities which have struck him,— let him take the sharpest and most stunning shock of his life, but will say, "had I known this, I never would have prepared that home; I never would have opened its door; I never would have entered at all on that train of business; I never could have enjoyed, even for a moment, sweet intercourse with that friend, had I seen the hearse that stood outside." Yet it is to this discipline that the heart owes its best training for immortality. If then, we are, even with our limited capacity, planning a training school for moral agents, conditioned as ourselves, would we rest the government of that school on a system of arbitrary, universal, all-penetrating, all-directing laws, and those laws to be preannounced?

§ 231. On the other hand, let us suppose that a government should be established in which no general laws are laid down, but in which each case is determined as it arises. Take, for instance, the unexpectedness of the action of such government, resulting in the inability of the subject to understand what measures to take to provide against the future. As an illustration of this, notice the condition of Rome

under Tiberius, one scene in which is thus sketched by De Quincey :

"At midnight an elderly gentleman suddenly sends round a message to a select party of noblemen, rouses them out of bed, and summons them instantly to his palace. Trembling for their lives from the suddenness of the summons, and from the unseasonable hour, and scarcely doubting that by some anonymous delator they have been implicated as parties to a conspiracy, they hurry to the palace-are received in portentous silence by the ushers and pages in attendance. —are conducted to a saloon, where (as in everywhere else) the silence of night prevails, united with the silence of fear and whispering expectation. All are seated, all look at each other in ominous anxiety. Which is accuser? Which the accused? On whom shall their suspicion settle,-on whom their pity? All are silent-almost speechless-and even the current of their thoughts is frost-bound by fear. Suddenly the sound of a fiddle or a viol is caught from a distance-it swells upon the ear-the steps approach-and in another moment in rushes the elderly gentleman, grave and gloomy as his audience, but capering about in a frenzy of excitement. For half an hour he continues to perform all possible evolutions of caprioles, pirouettes, and other extravagant feats of activity, accompanying himself on the fiddle; and, at length, not having once looked at his guests, the elderly gentleman whirls out of the room in the same transport of emotion with which he entered it; the panicstruck visitors are requested by a slave to consider themselves as dismissed: they retire; resume their couches :—the nocturnal pageant has 'dislimned' and vanished; and on

the following morning, were it not for their concurring testimonies, all would be disposed to take this interruption of their sleep for one of its most fantastic dreams. The elderly gentleman who figured in this delirious pas seul—who was he? He was Tiberius Cæsar, king of kings, and lord of the terraqueous globe."*

§ 232. Now what we would call for, a priori, to meet both these difficulties, is a government with laws enough in it to invoke energy and foresight, and with enough special direction in it to produce watchfulness and a sense of dependence on its Divine Head. †

Let us see, then, how far we find this system of government-this combination of general laws with special providences-carried out in the moral discipline of man. As to this point, there is, I apprehend, no difficulty. Upon the distant and general horizon the machinery of general laws moves like clock-work; e.g. the movements of the stars, the waxing and waning of the moon, with its consequent influence on the tides, the aggregate of rain falling in each year. But as we approach man, we become conscious of an atmosphere through which general laws cannot penetrate. It would seem as if moral agency was thus coated with an armor which defies the action of that inexorable code by which all the physical universe is enthralled. The nearer these general laws approach man, the more are they re

* De Quincey's Cæsars, p. 129.

† See this question ably discussed in Bishop Potter's Sermon on the Immutability of Natural Laws; Phil. Lectures on Evidences, p. 127.