In opposition to this, the fatalist maintains that every act of choice follows the strongest desire, so that there is the same _invariable_ antecedence and sequence between the two as there is in material changes between the necessary cause and effect. This being so, the mind has no power to choose any thing but that which excites the strongest desire. Now, this is a question which every person, learned or unlearned, can decide. Have we power to choose any other way than as we do choose? Here it is claimed that every human being _believes_ that we have this power, and proves that he believes it by word and action. And if any person were habitually to talk and act as if he believed children and men had no power to choose right when they choose wrong, he would be regarded as having lost his reason. This, therefore, is placed as one of the principles of common sense, viz., _every rational mind has power to choose either that which excites the strongest desire or that which the intellect decides to be best, even when it does not excite the strongest desire_. _Moral power_ is the power to control rational minds by motives. When no desire for any good and no fear of any evil exists, the mind has no power to choose. Excited desires (or motives) are as indispensable to choice as physical causes are to any change in matter. The stronger the desire for a thing, the _easier_ it is to choose it; and the less desire there is for a given thing, the _harder_ it is to choose it. This measuring of various degrees of power to choose, is a matter of consciousness to every mind, and it is recognized in all languages. And we find that all mankind, of all languages, recognize the fact that men have power to choose what is _best_, even when it conflicts with the strongest desire; so much so, that life itself has been relinquished for the good of others, when there was little or no expectation of a future life, or of any consequent good to self. Moreover, it will be shown in a future chapter that our _highest_ idea of virtue implies a conflict between the strongest desire and the conviction of what is right and best on the whole; so that sometimes men choose what is seen to be wrong and yet excites the strongest desire, and at other times what is right or best, when it does not excite the strongest desire. All self‐control, self‐denial and self‐government involve the idea of a conflict between the decisions of reason and conscience as to what is best and right, and the importunities of the strongest desire for what is not so. Subordinate and General Purposes.