282 RE GENERA TION 



next process. 1 Driesch points out that it is necessary at this stage to 

 make a further assumption, because the cytoplasm must not only be 

 acted upon by the ferment, but it must itself be of such a sort that it 

 responds to the action. This leads to a great complication of the 

 phenomena ; but the assumption does not depart, in the last analysis, 

 from the idea of the cell as a system in a mechanical sense. This 

 assumption of a receiving and an answering station for the stimuli 

 carries with it the further assumption of a many-sided "harmony." 

 Without a harmony at each step in the development there could be 

 no orderly ontogeny. The assumption of this harmony introduces a 

 new element into the series of hypotheses. The appearance of a causal 

 explanation was given in those parts of the argument preceding the 

 introduction of the assumption of a harmony, but with the admission 

 of this new element into the argument, the causal point of view is left. 

 Driesch says in this connection : " If we cannot gain a singleness of 

 view in the way that has been followed, we can reach this in another 

 way. Indeed, the way of doing so has been already implied in that 

 part of the theory dealing with the harmony of the phenomena. The 

 existence of this harmony is inferred, because, in the large majority of 

 "cases, the ontogeny leads to a typical result. Therefore we must 

 assume that the conditions for the end result are given the con- 

 ditions are the harmony itself." Put somewhat less obscurely, if more 

 crudely, we may express Driesch's idea by saying that the harmony 

 that stands for a hen is given in the hen's egg. 



Driesch adds : " Because a typical result always follows, therefore 

 every single step in the ontogeny must be judged, from an analytical 

 standpoint, from the point of view of the result itself. The result is 

 \.\LZ. purpose of the ontogeny. It is as though we visited daily a wharf 

 where a ship is being built, everything appears a chaos of single 

 pieces, and we can only understand what we see when we consider 

 what is to be made. Only from a teleological point of view can we 

 speak of a development, for this term expresses the very existence of 

 an object to be developed. The term is used fraudulently if it is 

 intended to mean that the development is the outcome of 'processes/ 

 using this term in the sense that a mountain or a delta develops from 

 physical processes." " We can only reach a satisfactory view of the 

 phenomena when we introduce the word 'purpose.' This means that 

 we must look upon the ontogeny as a process carried out in its order 

 and quality as though guided by an intelligence. We arrive at this 

 conclusion, because the individual whole is 'given,' as the clearly 

 recognized goal of the entire process of development." 



1 The importance of this conception is, in my opinion, marred by the fiction of the ferment 

 action of the nucleus; but it should not be overlooked that Driesch avowedly called this a 

 pure fiction. 



