In the course of the discussion to which attention is called, our author has contributed an idea worthy of all acceptation and is valuable for the reason that it goes outside the beaten paths followed in the free will controversy: "When most people talk of believing in moral freedom, they mean by freedom a power which exhausts itself in acts of choice between a series of alternative courses; but, important though such choice, as a function of freedom is, the root idea of freedom lies deeper still. It consists in the idea, not that a man is, as a personality, the first and the sole cause of his choice between alternative courses, but that he is, in a true, even if in a qualified sense, the first cause of what he does, or feels, or is, whether this involves an act of choice, or consists of an unimpeded impulse. Freedom of choice between alternatives is the consequence of this primary faculty. It is the form in which the faculty is most noticeably manifested; but it is not the primary faculty of personal freedom itself." I believe this fact in relation to man's freedom; that it is a quality capable of manifesting itself in other modes than choice between alternatives; that it may project an unimpeded line of conduct, and yet in this world its chief manifestations are in a choice between things opposite and we shall see later, according to the Book of Mormon, that conditions in this world are so ordained in the existence of opposites--antinomies--that man may exercise this quality of freedom in the choice of alternatives. IX. _The Atonement._ After giving an account of the fall of man, substantially as found in Genesis, the Nephite prophet Alma, is represented in the Book of Mormon as teaching his son Corianton the doctrine of the atonement, as follows: ###_Alma's Doctrine of Atonement_. And now we see by this, that our first parents were cut off, both temporally and spiritually, from the presence of the Lord; and thus we see they became subjects to follow after their own will. Now, behold, it was not expedient that man should be reclaimed from this temporal death, for that would destroy the great plan of happiness; Therefore, as the soul could never die, and the fall had brought upon all mankind a spiritual death as well as a temporal; that is, they were cut off from the presence of the Lord, it was expedient that mankind should be reclaimed from this spiritual death; Therefore, as they had become carnal, sensual, and devilish, by nature, this probationary state became a state for them [in which] to prepare; it became a preparatory state. And now remember, my son, if it were not for the plan of redemption (laying it aside), as soon as they were dead, their souls were miserable, being cut off from the presence of the Lord. And now there was no means to reclaim men from this fallen state which man had brought upon himself, because of his own disobedience;