To be sure, it remains true that man is man, endowed with certain instincts and impulses and gifted with human intelligence. Nor are all men alike in their impulses or in the degree of their intelligence. Within limits the individual may exercise choice, reacting upon and modifying his environment and himself. But a moment's reflection reveals to us that the new departure is but a step taken from a vantage-ground which has not been won by independent effort. The information in the light of which he chooses, the situation in the face of which he acts, the emotional nature which impels him to effort, the habits of thought and action which have become part of his being--these are largely due to the larger whole of which he finds himself a part. He did not build the stage upon which he is to act. His lines have been learned from others. He may recite them imperfectly; he may modify them in this or in that particular. But the drama from which, and from which alone, he gains his significance, is not his own creation. The independence of the individual in the face of his material and social environment makes itself more apparent with the progressive development of man. But man attains his development as a member of society, and in the course of a historical evolution. It was pointed out many centuries ago that a hand cut off from the human body cannot properly be called a hand, for it can perform none of the functions of one. And man, torn from his setting, can no longer be considered man as the proper subject of moral science. It is as a thinking and willing creature in a social setting that man becomes a moral agent. To understand him we must make a study of the individual and of the social will. PART IV THE REALM OF ENDS CHAPTER XI IMPULSE, DESIRE, AND WILL 31. IMPULSE.--Commands and prohibitions address themselves to man as a voluntary agent. But it seems right to treat as willed by man much more than falls under the head of conscious and deliberate volition. We do not hesitate to make him responsible for vastly more; and yet common sense does not, when enlightened, regard men as responsible for what is recognized as falling wholly beyond the direct and indirect control of their wills. Motions due to even the blindest of impulses are not to be confounded with those brought about by external compulsion. They may have the appearance of being vaguely purposive, although we would never attribute purpose to the creature making them. The infant that cries and struggles, when tormented by the intrusive pin, the worm writhing in the beak of a bird,--these act blindly, but it does not appear meaningless to say that they act. The impulse is from within. Some impulses result in actions very nicely adjusted to definite ends. Such are winking, sneezing, swallowing. These reflexes may occur as the mechanical response to a given stimulus. They may occur without our being conscious of them and without our having willed them.