And now let us retire within our own consciousness, and see if this fundamental axiom of rational integration--Will as the principle of all Reality, Efficiency, and Perfection--is not reflected in our reason, and evolved in our inner experience. Do we not find that the central point of our consciousness--that which makes each man what he is in contradistinction from every other man--that which expresses the _real essence of the soul_ apart from its formal processes and regulative laws--is the WILL? Without Will man would fall back from the elevation which he now assumes to the level of impersonal nature: in a word, he would be a _thing_, and not a _power_. Power, spontaneity, causality, will--these, or similar forms, express, as nearly as can be, the essential nature or principle of the human soul.[21] Furthermore, it is obvious that mere Power or Energy does not suffice for the notion of Will--there must also be Reason and Affection.[22] Indeed, "Will is contemplated universally as the inseparable union and perpetual differentiation of Intelligence and originative Power, and as such the sole ground of the intelligibility of all causation."[23] A volitional act, a moral and responsible act, must be one which is performed under the influence of motives, and for which, when called to account, we can assign valid reasons. All true volition supposes a purpose or end to be realized, an inward appetency or motive which makes the end desirable, and the selection and adaptation of means to accomplish that end. Power divorced from reason is simply _blind force_, and can not be dignified with the name of Will. The mind of man is sometimes in a predominant state of _knowing_, sometimes in a predominant state of _feeling_, and sometimes in a predominant state of _determination_. To call these separate faculties, however, is altogether beside the mark. No act of intelligence can be performed without some determination of the Ego, no act of determination without some cognition, and no act of the one or the other without some amount of feeling being mingled in the process. Thus, while each mental state may have its distinctive characteristics, there is unity at the root--_the identical Ego, spirit_, WILL.[24] Sensibility is the condition, Reason is the light, Will is the centre of human consciousness. Consciousness is a threefold phenomenon in which feeling, knowing, and self-determination are reciprocal elements, and in their connection and simultaneousness, and at the same time their differentiation, they compose the entire intellectual life.[25] The finite spirit or will unfolds itself, first, subjectively, in the spontaneous affirmation of self-being or self-potency (IPSËITY); secondly, objectively, in the exertion of power to produce motion, change, phenomena (EFFICIENCY); thirdly, synthetically, in the unity of motive and intention, purpose and act, means and end (PERSONALITY).