No man becomes this or
that by wishing to be it, however earnestly. His acts proceed from his
innate and unalterable character, and they are more immediately and
particularly determined by motives. A man's conduct, therefore, is the
necessary product of both character and motive. It may be illustrated
by the course of a planet, which is the result of the combined effect
of the tangential energy with which it is endowed, and the centripetal
energy which operates from the sun. In this simile the former energy
represents character, and the latter the influence of motive. It is
almost more than a mere simile. The tangential energy which properly
speaking is the source of the planet's motion, whilst on the
other hand the motion is kept in check by gravitation, is, from a
metaphysical point of view, the will manifesting itself in that body.
To grasp this fact is to see that we really never form anything more
than a conjecture of what we shall do under circumstances which are
still to happen; although we often take our conjecture for a resolve.
When, for instance, in pursuance of a proposal, a man with the
greatest sincerity, and even eagerness, accepts an engagement to do
this or that on the occurrence of a certain future event, it is by
no means certain that he will fulfil the engagement; unless he is so
constituted that the promise which he gives, in itself and as such, is
always and everywhere a motive sufficient for him, by acting upon him,
through considerations of honour, like some external compulsion.
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