3. _The sense of responsibility presupposes the freedom of the will._ This sense of responsibility is native to the human mind. Every man feels himself to be accountable for his own conduct, not only at the bar of his own conscience, but before the moral judgment-seat of his fellow-men. Every where he recognizes the right of his fellow-men to inquire into his character, to sit in judgment upon his conduct, and to esteem and treat him accordingly. We necessarily impute blame when an unjust action is performed by another; we feel conscious of guilt and unworthiness when a wrong is done by ourselves. These are facts of universal consciousness. But these sentiments are irrational and absurd if man is a mere machine impelled by natural causes, and has no self-determining power.[529] Whatever disasters may overtake us in the course of nature, however we may suffer by the wild tornado or the blighting mildew, how much soever of our property may be swallowed up by the ocean tempest or the devouring flame, we impute no blame; and we experience here emotions essentially different from those which we experience when a wrong is intentionally inflicted upon us by our fellow-men. "Suppose yourself to have been the victim of some act of injustice and villainy by which you were reduced to penury, and your family to want and indigence. By what philosophy can you eradicate the sense of wrong or cease to impute blame to the man whose perfidy has despoiled your life? You may forgive him, and follow him with your prayers to the last hour of your life, but you will still pray for him as a guilty man whose crime has been the burden of your life." Now what is this radical and fundamental difference between the events of the material universe and the actions of men? and what is the rational basis for the different feelings we experience and the diverse judgments we pass in regard to them? There is only one answer to this question. The ultimate ground-difference is found in the fact that one class of events is _necessary_--there is no adequate power in the thing to be or do otherwise; the other class of actions is _free_--they need not have been performed, the actor had full power for a contrary choice. In the world of nature _force_ reigns; in the world of moral life _liberty_ prevails. The fundamental principle of difference is the _freedom of the will_. This second condition of moral government--namely, the possession of _free alternative power_ on the part of the subject to comply, or refuse to comply, with the requirements of moral law--is thus established, first, by the direct testimony of consciousness, from which there can be no appeal, and, secondly, by necessary inference from collateral facts of consciousness, which can not be invalidated by counter-proofs.