THE INDIRECT JUSTIFICATION OF ENTELECHY 243 



oxidation or they may not. The last result of the process 

 of oxidation is the production of carbonic acid, uric acid, 

 urea, and some other compounds, which are poisonous to the 

 organism if care is not taken for their removal. 



As we have said already, oxidation is generally regarded 

 as a source of energy exclusively ; or, better, as a source of 

 so-called free energy, that is, energy that may do work on 

 account of differences of coupled potentials. But this role 

 of oxidation would never explain its absolute necessity. 

 If such a doctrine were the whole truth, the stopping of 

 oxidation would only stop the functioning of the organism ; 

 but the organism is not only damaged, it dies if oxidation 

 is not allowed, and death is well known here not to be due 

 merely to a poisoning by the final products of oxidation 

 such as carbonic acid, for the removing of which the most 

 elaborate arrangements exist in the organism. Therefore 

 there must be yet another part played by oxidation. We 

 should not be wrong, I suppose, to formulate this role in 

 the following way : The organism by its merely synthetic 

 or analytic metabolism seems to produce some substances 

 which are poisonous to it, i.e. which disturb the order of 

 its metabolism in an irreparable manner if they are not 

 converted into an innoxious form : this conversion into an 

 innoxious form is done by oxidation. 1 



For a long time the foundations of organic oxidation 

 were an absolute enigma to biology, and all sorts of theories 

 were invented to solve it. All these theories, as, for 

 instance, the one which utilises the effect of oxygen in its 



1 I advocated this theory as early as 1901, at a time when only Xoll held 

 a similar view with regard to organic oxidation. But at present the theory 

 of the anti-poisonous action of oxidation seems to be gaining ground, the new 

 discoveries of Winterstein being most favourable to it. Comp. vol. i. p. 199. 



