THE LOGIC OF HISTORY 305 



principle of phylogeny in the organism itself, and to which 

 therefore even organic forms would be not accidental but 

 essential, might be forced to regard the descent of organisms 

 as a true evolution. The singularities in phylogenetic 

 history would thus become links in one whole : history proper 

 would become more than history. But I only say that 

 phylogeny might be evolution, and in fact I cannot admit 

 more than this a priori, even on the basis of an internal 

 transformistic principle, as has been assumed. Such a 

 principle also might lead always from one typical state of 

 organisation to the next : but ad inftnitum. 1 Then 

 phylogeny, though containing what might in some sense 

 be called " progress," would not be " evolution " ; it might 

 even be called cumulation in such a case, in spite of the 

 internal transforming principle, though, of course, cumula- 

 tion from within would always mean something very 

 different from cumulation from without. 2 



But we must leave this problem an open question, as 

 long as our actual knowledge about transformism remains 

 as poor as it is. We need only add, for the sake of logical 

 interest, that phylogeny, as a true evolution, would neces- 

 sarily be characterised by the possibility of being repeated. 



1 An immanent vitalistic phylogeny without a pre-established end has 

 recently been advocated by H. Bergsoii (L 'evolution creatrice, Paris, 1907). 



: In this connection the problem may be raised, whether there can be such 

 a thing as unchangeable " species " in spite of the mutability of the 

 individuals. Compare page 251, note 1. 



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