That we should exert our utmost endeavours to become acquainted with the nature of this influence, which we term the will, is most natural; but hitherto our researches have been wholly unavailing; and it should be recollected that the appearances of life cannot be accounted for by that which is inanimate, nor can the phenomena of intelligence be solved by material analogies. As we are possessed of the implements of motion, it is evident that they were constructed to accomplish their destined purpose; but of the intimate nature of the stimulus which goads them to action, we have no conception: it seems, however, certain that there exists a mutual consent,--a reciprocal subaudition,--a compact, the result of exercise and experience,--between the implements of motion and the will or influence which excites them.
As far as we are able to discover, by the most attentive and deliberate examination of our own minds, we do not appear conscious of any intermediate perception, between the motive and the performance of the action, or the execution of the will. If it were allowable to indulge in analogical reasoning, which usually diverts us from the consideration of the subject, we might endeavour to illustrate this process by the firing of a pistol. When we have taken due aim, we have only to draw the trigger, which produces the explosion: in doing this, however, we perceive the emission of light from the combustion of the powder; but to this there is nothing analogous in the operation of the will:--the dictate of the will, and the motion excited, when watched with the utmost attention, appear instantaneous, and become synchronous by habit. Considering the celerity of our voluntary movements, there appears a good reason why no perceptible intervention should exist, to divert the mind from the immediate performance of the will. The correspondence of the motion to the intimation of the will, is the business of education and the performance of habit.
The exertion of the will on the bodily organs having been generally described, it now remains to demonstrate its influence on the mind; and so far as we are enabled to discover, it appears to be performed by the same process. The direction of the several organs of sense to the examination of objects, is an act of the will, and has been named Attention; which, by some writers, has been deemed a peculiar and constituent faculty of the mind; but in the present view it is considered only as the practical result of the operation of volition on the organs of sense, on memory, and on reflection. The soundest mind (as far as it has been hitherto considered) may be attributed to him who possesses the most enduring control over the organs of sense, in order to examine objects accurately, and thereby to acquire a full and complete perception. That memory is the best, which can voluntarily and immediately produce that which has been committed to its custody; and that reflection is the most perfect, which is exclusively occupied with the subject of consideration. There seems also to be a considerable similarity between the morbid states of the instruments of voluntary motion, and certain affections of the mental powers: thus, paralysis has its counterpart in the defects of recollection, where the utmost endeavour to remember is ineffectually exerted; tremor may be compared with incapability of fixing the attention, and this involuntary state of muscles ordinarily subjected to the will, also finds a parallel, where the mind loses its influence on the train of thought, and becomes subject to spontaneous intrusions; as may be exemplified in reverie, dreaming, and some species of madness.