It at first grows hazy; at last it becomes indistinguishable.

At first we begin to be uncertain of what we mean by it; at last we find ourselves certain that so far as we trust to reason, we cannot possibly have any meaning at all.

Examined in this way, every act of our lives--all our choices and refusals, seem nothing but the necessary outcome of things that have gone before.

It is true that between some actions the choice hangs at times so evenly, that our _will_ may seem the one thing that at last turns the balance.

But let us analyse the matter a little more carefully, and we shall see that there are a thousand microscopic motives, too small for us to be entirely conscious of, which, according to how they settle on us, will really decide the question.