2. By the very fact of _moral law_ or _duty_; I _ought_, therefore I _can_. No one is held to do the impossible. If, then, there is in me a law that commands me to do good and avoid evil, it is because I can do either as I wish. 3. By the _moral satisfaction_ which accompanies a good action; by the remorse or repentance which follows a bad one. One does not rejoice over a thing done against his will, and no one reproaches himself for an act committed under compulsion. The first word of all those reproached for a bad action is, that it was not done _on purpose, intentionally_. They acknowledge thereby that we can only be reproached for an action done wilfully; namely, freely. 4. By the rewards and punishments, and in general by the _moral responsibility_ which is attached to all our actions when they have been committed knowingly. We do not punish actions which are the result of constraint or ignorance. 5. By the _exhortations_ or counsels we give to others. We do not exhort a man to be warm or cold, not to suffer hunger or thirst, because it is well known that this is not a thing dependent on his will. But we exhort him to be honest, because we believe that he can be so if he wishes. 6. By _promises_: no one promises not to die, not to be sick, etc., but one promises to be present at a certain meeting, to pay a certain sum of money, on such a day, to such a man, because one feels he can do so unless circumstances over which he has no control prevent. _Prejudices against Liberty._--Although men, as we have seen, may have the sense of liberty very strong, and may show it by their acts, by their approbation or blame, etc., yet, on the other hand, they often yield to the force of certain prejudices which seem to contradict the universal belief we have just spoken of. 1. _Character._--The principal one of these prejudices is the often expressed opinion that every man is impelled by his own _character_ to perform the actions which accord with this character, and that there is no help against this irresistible necessity of nature; this is often expressed by the common axiom: "One cannot make himself over again." The same has also been expressed by the poet Destouches in that celebrated line: Chassez le naturel, il revient au galop.[4] Nothing is less exact as a fact and more dangerous as a principle, than this pretended immutability of human character, which, if true, would render evil irremediable and incorrigible. Experience teaches the contrary. No man is wholly deprived of good and bad inclinations; he may develop the one or the other, as he chooses between them.