88 HOLISM AND EVOLUTION chap. 



at the various onward stages of its progress. And if there is 

 this more fundamental principle, can it be formulated into 

 a definite concept, and will it account for the specific concrete 

 character of our universe? That is our problem, in the 

 consideration of which a commencement will be made in this 

 chapter. 



Throughout the history of human thought there have been 

 two ultimate points of departure in the explanation of the 

 universe, two contrasted fundamental mental attitudes or 

 view-points from which the universe has been envisaged 

 and accounted for. According to the one view everything 

 is, in one way or another, given at the beginning; according 

 to the other a minimum is assumed at the beginning, and 

 the universe is a progressive creation or evolution from this 

 minimum starting-point. On the first view it makes no 

 difference whether the original creation was complete in all 

 details or whether merely its logical or metaphysical scheme 

 was complete, while the contents were only implicitly 

 given. In either case there can be nothing new in the 

 course of the subsequent history of the world. If the 

 original creation was complete and final, all subsequent 

 events and changes can only be rearrangements, reshufflings 

 of the original groupings: both the material elements and 

 their principles or forms of arrangement are there as original 

 data, and determine all subsequent events and arrangements. 

 If, again, the metaphysical scheme or structure of the 

 universe must be taken as given, the evolution of the universe 

 is merely a logical development in compliance with this 

 scheme; or in other words, the logical development of the 

 scheme will give us the material universe as a result. The 

 ' development of Hegel's Idea is just such an attempt at a 

 logical unfolding of the universe. In both cases the explana- 

 tion of the universe is in the past, at the beginning: that 

 beginning rules all and predetermines all. The past is the 

 efficient cause of the future, and no new creation, nothing 

 essentially new, can arise in the future. The full volume of 

 reality was there at the beginning and continues to roll on, 

 changing its forms and appearances by the way, but making 



