214 SCIENCE AND PHILOSOPHY OF THE ORGANISM 



of applying nothing but geometry. Psychologically we 

 here find ourselves face to face with the simple fact that 

 " pushing and pulling," i.e. mechanical causality in the crudest 

 form, is the only kind of causality we are able to perform 

 ourselves. In this sense alone do we "understand" mechanical 

 causality. 



I have said more about the philosophy of mechanics than 

 might seem to be required in a biological discussion, because 

 at the present time mechanical physics has been discredited 

 in the utmost degree. It was necessary to rehabilitate it to 

 a certain extent, in order that it might not be regarded as 

 altogether valueless to analyse the relation in which auto- 

 nomous biology stands to the mechanical type of inorganic 

 science. 



ft. THE DIFFERENT FORMS OF UNIVERSAL MECHANICS 



We now return to our biological problem. What about 

 entelechy and inorganic nature as a system of uniform 

 elements in motion, now that we understand the relation of 

 entelechy to the inorganic universe as a system of qualitative 

 energies or even qualitative energetical elemental centres ? 



It is important to notice at the very beginning of our 

 study of the role of entelechy in a world that is considered 

 mechanically, that it matters little how the mechanical view 

 of nature is conceived in detail. Whether the dualism of 

 ether and mass, or in other terms, of primary and secondary 

 matter, be solved or unsolved, whether the ultimate elements 

 of mass be regarded as particles or as dynamical points, or, 

 in the kinetic fashion, as specified permanent states in a 

 continuum all these questions, though of the greatest im- 



