4. Finally, the Intelligence may not only make positive affirmations in the presence of qualities perceived, but it may affirm _hypothetically_, that is, when a given proposition is _assumed_ as true, the Intelligence may and will present the logical _antecedents_ and _consequents_ of that assumption. If the assumption is false, such will be the character of the antecedents and consequents following from it. An individual, in tracing out these antecedents and consequents, however, may mistake the hypothetical, for the real, affirmations of the Intelligence. One wrong assumption in theology or philosophy, for example, may give an entire system, all of the leading principles of which are likewise false. In tracing out, and perfecting that system, how natural the assumption, that one is following the _real_, and not the _hypothetical_, affirmations of the Intelligence! From this one source an infinity of error exists among men. In an enlarged Treatise on mental science, the subject of the present chapter should receive a much more extensive elucidation than could be given to it in this connection. Few subjects would throw more clear light over the domains of truth and error than this, if fully and distinctly elucidated. In conclusion, I would simply remark, that one of the highest attainments in virtue which we can conceive an intelligent being to make, consists in a continued and vigorous employment of the Intelligence in search of the right, the just, the true, and the good, in all departments of human investigation; and in a rigid discipline of the Will, to receive and treat, as true and sacred, whatever the Intelligence may present, as possessed of such characteristics, to the full subjection of all impulses in the direction of unauthorized assumptions. CHAPTER XIV. LIBERTY AND SERVITUDE. LIBERTY OF WILL AS OPPOSED TO MORAL SERVITUDE. THERE are, among others, two senses of the term Liberty, which ought to be carefully distinguished from each other. In the first sense, it stands opposed to Necessity; in the second, to what is called Moral Servitude. It is in the last sense that I propose to consider the subject in the present Chapter. What, then, is Liberty as opposed to Moral Servitude? _It is that state in which the action of Will is in harmony with the Moral Law, with the idea of the right, the just, the true, and the good, while all the propensities are held in perfect subordination--a state in which the mind may purpose obedience to the law of right with the rational hope of carrying that determination into accomplishment_. This state all mankind agree in calling a state of moral freedom. The individual who has attained to it, is not in servitude to any propensity whatever. He "rules his own spirit." He is the master of himself. He purposes the good, and performs it. He resolves against the evil, and avoids it. "Greater," says the maxim of ancient wisdom, "is such a man than he that taketh a city."