THE ORGANISM AS A NATURAL THING 19 



imagined, before it was actually made, with a purpose in con- 

 templation. It is in this way that man makes machines. 



In all artifacts some external agency has been operative. 

 Natural, inanimate things may have structure, but this structure 

 is due to tendencies inherent in the things themselves. The 

 earth, as a planet, has structure in that it consists of a metallic 

 kernel, a basaltic substratum, a lithosphere which is broken up 

 into continents, a watery envelope and an atmosphere. This 

 structure is the consequence of the original state of the earth : 

 when it was detached from the parent sun it was a mass of in- 

 candescent gas that had a motion of rotation. Gravitation, the 

 loss of heat by radiation and the physical and chemical properties 

 of the original earth-materials modified the latter. The structure 

 of the earth is therefore due to intrinsic agencies that operated, 

 of themselves, and which had tendency. The tendency was that 

 which is in the passage of nature and expressed the movement 

 towards ultimate stability. 



In all artifacts we can trace the operation of agencies external 

 to the inanimate things that were utilized, or segregated, or 

 fabricated, and these agencies are the life-impulses of organisms. 



Man tends more and more to form about himself an environ- 

 ment of artifacts. Civilizations, cities, ships, railways, houses, 

 machines, tools, elaborated clothing, cultivated foods, synthetic 

 chemical substances, etc., now form much the more significant 

 parts of his environment. Before man these things did not exist 

 and they are truly parts of nature made, not in the passage of 

 nature, but by man himself. 



