 This understanding of conscience as an inner court is well illustrated by the story of Huckleberry Finn in Mark Twain’s famous novel (Twain 1884; Bennett 1974). In a well-known episode of the novel, Huck feels guilty and blameworthy for having helped his slave friend Jim to escape from his owner Miss Watson. Blame does not come from some external moral authority, but it is a verdict issued by conscience according to its moral laws. The bites of conscience in Huck’s case were caused by a tension between his feelings supporting what he did and the principles he had inherited from his social environment. At the time when the novel is set, slave-owning was considered a natural type of possession and helping slaves run away meant depriving someone of her private property. This was the “law” (metaphorically speaking) against which Huck’s conscience assessed his behavior.