“If in animated beings we have the solitary instance of an efficient cause acting among the forces of nature and possessing the power of initiation, this efficient cause produces no disturbance of physical law. Its existence is as much a recognised part of the infinite variety of form within the order of nature, as the existence of a crystal or a plant; and although the character of the force exercised by it may not be clearly understood, its effects are regulated by the same laws as govern all the other forces of nature. If the laws of matter are suspended by the laws of life, each time an animated being moves any part of its body, one physical law is suspended in precisely the same manner and to an equivalent degree, each time another physical law is called into action. The law of gravitation, for instance, is suspended by the law of magnetism each time a magnet suspends a weight in the air. In each case a law is successfully resisted precisely to the extent of the force employed.... No exercise of will can overcome the law of gravitation or any other law to a greater extent than the actual force exerted, any more than a magnetic current can do so beyond the action of the battery. Will has no power against exhaustion. Even Moses in the sublimest moments of faith could not hold up his arms to heaven after his physical force was consumed.” P. 44, vol. i. First: it is alleged “that an efficient cause” (man for example) “acting among the forces of nature, and possessing the power of initiation, produces no disturbance of physical law.” What is here meant by disturbance of physical law? It is plain that physical forces would work out a wholly different result apart from the action of man upon them. Though he suspends no physical force, the action of man has produced an order of events in nature different from that which would have taken place without it, but by balancing one against the other he modifies their action. What is more, he possesses a power of self‐determination. Other forces are unintelligent. Man is an intelligent force capable of introducing an order of nature quite different from that which the material forces of nature would have produced without his intervention.