But such an "alternative" power, the necessitarian affirms, is incomprehensible and inexplicable. To which we need only reply in the language of Hamilton, "The scheme of freedom is not more incomprehensible than the scheme of necessity."[535] "_Omnia exeunt in mysterium_"--there is nothing the absolute ground of which is not a mystery. In saying so much, however, we by no means grant the affirmation of Hamilton that "we are unable to conceive an absolute commencement [of being or motion]; we can not therefore conceive a free volition."[536] This is not admitted by Mansel, the disciple and annotator of Hamilton, as flowing even from his mental "law of the conditioned." "It may be true, as a fact, that no material atom has been added to the world since the first creation; but the assertion, however true, is certainly not _necessary_. The Power which created once must be conceived as able to create again, whether that ability is actually exercised or not. The same conclusion is still more evident when we proceed from the consideration of matter to that of mind. Of matter we maintain that the creation of new portions is perfectly conceivable as a result, if not as a process. Every man who comes into the world comes into it as a distinct individual, having a personality and consciousness of his own; and that personality is a distinct accession to the number of persons previously existing.... I believe that every new person that comes into the world is, as a person, a new existence."[537] So a volition is a _new_ existence, an absolute origination, "a beginning of motion" which has its source in the primordial power of the human spirit as spirit. The _fact_ is undeniable, the _mode_ is inexplicable. But the inconceivability of the mode in which the will creates a volition no more renders the fact doubtful than the impossibility of conceiving how a new and distinct self-conscious personality comes into existence invalidates the fact that "I exist, and know myself as a distinctly existing being." 2. _The Psychological Argument._--This may be briefly stated in the following terms: It is a fact of observation and experience that _motives_ do stand to the will in the relation of _causes_ which necessitate volition. They have an exact mathematical commensurability, and their prevalence is in the precise ratio of their antecedent intrinsic _strength_. If motives are wanting, there can be no choice; but when the same motives are presented to the same mind, it obeys them with such remarkable _uniformity_ that human actions may be reduced to statistical tables as reliable and as accurate as tables of mortality.