THE ORGANIC AND THE INORGANIC 331 



centuries has left us with a terminology which applies 

 strictly to operations in which only these concepts are 

 involved. But if, as all minute analysis of vital 

 phenomena shows, the search for the antecedents of 

 some energetic, material, extended system of elements 

 in a preceding energetical, material, extended system 

 of elements only leads to confusion and contradictions, 

 then this concept of an agency which is neither energetic, 

 nor material, nor spatial must be formulated. En- 

 telechy, then, is not energy, but rather the arrangement 

 and co-ordination of energetic processes. It is not 

 something that is extended in space, but something 

 which acts into space. It is not material, but it mani- 

 fests itself in material changes. It is a manifoldness, or 

 organisation, but the manifoldness is an intensive one. 

 Compare this definition with the notion of the ether of 

 space now accepted by the mathematical physicists, 

 and it will be seen that our speculations are similar to 

 those of the physicists, and, like them, the test of their 

 reality and usefulness is to be justified pragmatically. 



We may now attempt a formal description of the 

 organism based on the discussions of the previous 

 chapters. 1 



The organism is a typical constellation of physico- 

 chemical parts or elements. 



That is to say, it is an object in nature possessing 

 a definite form, which is the result of the arrangement 

 of its tissues. Each tissue is again an arrangement of 

 cells, and each cell is a complex of chemical substances. 

 The organism therefore resembles, so far as our defini- 

 tion goes, an inorganic crystal. But it is the typical 



1 This description is largely an expansion of Driesch's " Analytical definition 

 of the individual living organism." The readershould note also that it includes 

 the Bergsonian idea of duration, and that of the organism as a typical phase 

 in an evolutionary flux, as parts of the description. 



